Starting gear question

#1

In page 25 it says that characters begin with 1 starter loot and 3 common loot. One of my players picked a guardian with the suggested loot and was very powerful throughout the sessio n. Now I realize that Guardians begin with 3 loot items from that list. Other classes priests and shadows begin with 2 items from that list. Are these archetypes OP by design?

Starter Loot Philosophy
#2

The first rule of OP club is there is no OP club. But seriously, what specifically seemed overpowered to you? What loot or bonus caused the issue?

#3

Hm, that looks like it’s wrong. I see the Guardian has recommended Loot with 3 Starters. That’s not correct.
The rules state that you take 1 Starter Loot, not 2.

#4

Characters generally don’t start with all of the items listed under recommended gear. So, a starting character wouldn’t have a beserk ring, a ring of might, AND a weapons kit. He or she would just have one of those, as it says on page 25, choose one. The list of recommedations under each class is just recommendations of potential items to choose from. From there, take three items on p.26, and three weapons on p. 28. And of course, the character gets their starter reward — in the case of the guardian, the shield gloves, and that’s it for basic character creation.

Now, you could run a game where players get to choose multiple pieces of starting loot, but you’d need to make sure that all of the players start off on the same footing and that you are challenging them appropriately as a DM. But I have yet to see any starting characters using the rules above that are OP.

Again, to recap, the basics are:

6 point build
Add any racial bonuses
1 piece of starter loot (p.25)
1 starter reward (unique for each class)
3 starting equipment (p.26)
3 weapons (p.27, or 28 if you’re playing Warp Shell).

Character Building - Classes - Recommended Gear
#5

Oh YEAH! :smile: It’s Recommended as in what would suit it best in the long run. Now the coin fell down the slot machine!

#6

OP really doesn’t exist. There are several avenues you can use to make things more of an even playing field. Room Target is the easiest fix. Then Timers work well. Also, go for the checks that the player doesn’t have a bonus on. In the end, these are stories about extraordinary people doing extraordinary things. Let them be epic. Then destroy their loot.

#7

He was the only tank in the party so it was fortunate that he had all those bonuses but I feel the other players were a little overshadowed. I was just copying the chatacter sheets into a bigger sheet and noticed that (as I had read it) he had 3 starter loot instead of 1. I need to go back to the book to see if i misread or misunderstood some small print. I assumed these were like ready to play templates.

#8

Nooooow I get it. Thanks for clarifying. I thought these were “ready to play” templates for each class and I had little time for chatacter creation and said “pick a class and get the recommended loot”. Don’t know if @Runehammer will be making a 3rd edition but maybe an “or” between the starter items could clarify that. Many thanks. Thoroughly loving the game and the community.

#9

It was not OP per se but the character was way more powerful than the other players.

#10

There will probably be a third edition at some point, but it will be a while. Second Edition needs to soak for a bit, so these things can bubble up to the surface. Thanks for bringing this one to light.

#11

Okay cool, thanks.

If other people are thinking like I was, the confusion comes from where these things were placed in the book. Like if picking a class was before page 25, then I would have got it. It’s like they tell someone to pick equipment, then they go and pick their class and realize they didn’t pick any of the recommended items, so they say oops and go back to page 25 to look at the recommended stuff.

Well thanks for the explanation!