Mike Mearls Games
patreon
Odyssey Rulebook Draft
🕑 Added 2025-02-04 15:01:37 +0000 UTCHey everyone! Today I've uploaded the working draft of Odyssey. It has mostly complete rules for characters.
To make a character:
Determine abilities
Pick a race
Pick a background
Pick a class
And done!
If you want to do a live playtest before I share the monsters, you can use D&D creatures. Assume that an Odyssey character is half their level in D&D, rounded down, +1 to account for the apprentice levels.
A few notes:
Subclass: This document includes the first subclass, a very simple and streamlined fighter called the brute. It's made for your friend who just wants to swing a giant axe.
Talents: Talents are design as a way to customize your character. Every character gets them at 2nd, 4th, 6th, and 9th level. They have prerequisites based on level, race, abilities, and other factors. This area is the most underdeveloped in the document, and I need to design a few to fill things out.
Comments: I am behind on comments on the last few posts, mainly because my day job and my teaching position have been eating into my time. I'll catch up on stuff this week. You might see some changes that haven't been updated in response to comments on posts.
Options: These rules are a starting point. A few specific things that I'm planning to add:
Other spell systems, including point and slot-based options
Other ways to get starting equipment, such as giving characters a budget they can spend on gear
More classes! I shared the monk earlier this year, and I'd like to add more classes in the near term.
Road Map: Here is what I am going to work on next:
Talents: We need more to fill out the options
Monsters: We really need these so you have stuff to fight
Treasure: Magic items, treasure guidelines, and stuff you can do with coins
Comments
Yurisei
But how many D&D characters are going to be thinking about their political views, especially through the lens of modern factions? You're a scrubby little gremlin trying to make ends meet by stealing ancient junk from bone wizards. You probably don't even know you have a king, let alone know the words "autonomous collective". Your engagement with right and wrong is going to come down to whether you have a set of principles you try to follow or whether you tend to do what feels like the right thing to do in the moment.
Rodger Gamblin
Hey! I'm brand new and I think this is super cool! Your interview on Questing Beast got me interested in your system and I'm looking forward to learning more about it! That having been said, I have a nitpick. Sylvan Ape starts with "You are an intelligent, talking ape." That made me laugh and say "tell me something I don't know." Funny, but that's the nitpick. Since humans are already intelligent(ish), talking apes, maybe you could change it to "You are an intelligent, talking gorilla" or "You are an intelligent, talking, non-human ape" Just a thought!
Scott Douglass
I've never liked 3 or 9 alignment systems. Lawful vs chaotic sounds like something someone that supports hierarchical power structures would use to describe the world, and not the way that the majority of people opposing them would describe themselves. Anarchists are not necessarily against organization and community and are not necessarily individualist. At the same time, they specifically oppose hierarchical power structures, which is what first comes to mind when reading the description for lawful. I think it would be more useful to describe people's alignment in terms of an ideology and/or what they support, stand for, and oppose. Are they a monarchist? A liberal? A statist communist? A social anarchist? A nationalist? Do they support feudal hierarchy? Do they stand for freedom? What is their conception of freedom? A liberal's conception of freedom is very different from an anarchist's conception of freedom. I understand that this adds a level of complexity that typical alignment systems avoid, but it feels a lot more immersive, and ties into creating meaningful conflict and alliances better.
