STILL Not Dead (Terrors & Tactics Updade)

We’re doing okay. My mom is making some travel plans for the spring to go on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land with her sister (who lost her husband about three months before Dad passed), so she’s starting to live her life again which is good.

As for me, I’m feeling better than I have in a while… bad dietary habits developed over the years I was assisting with overnight dialysis (having to wake up at 3am three nights a week) and then the hospital/therapy facilities had given me a rather chronic case of anemia.

Short version, tea (and coffee to a lesser extent) has a chemical in it that interferes with the uptake of iron if you have it within an hour of eating. One cup of tea can keep up to 30% of the iron in foods from being absorbed. I was having upwards of 4-5 cups worth at every meal (there’s a ceiling on how much it can bond with, but basically I was getting about 10% of the iron I thought I was and about half of what I needed).

But some iron supplements and avoiding tea at mealtimes has rebounded that and I have so much more energy… my body adapted to basically getting half the oxygen it should normally be getting (sorta like living at high altitudes) and now that’s it’s getting what it should it’s like I’m supercharged by comparison.

* * * *

And yes, the race stuff was part of it, but there’s a lot more with classes/talents and even to vehicles and some spillover into rebuilding the PC-Light rules (the NPC-only classes primarily, but some tweaks for creating weak-tier PC-Light builds makes me think I’ve been overcomplicating the weak tier of opponents entirely).

I have just few more things to button up and it’ll be along with a big explanatory post.

I'm glad you're feeling better. I think part of it also is that you're getting a solid night's rest every night again. It's one thing if you always get up at that time, but it's a whole different ball game if your schedule fluctuates like that.

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I'll be praying for your mother and aunt - God willing, their pilgrimage will be a safe one. Though it is good that she's getting out of the house and living. All too often, when one spouse passes away, the other is quick to follow.

Well, my mom’s mom lived another decade after her dad had passed (into her mid-90’s) so hopefully I won’t be dealing with another death in the family for a while.

Now, on to the update;

So the new version is up. Due to some changes made that spilled over to GM’s Guide elements, I’m temporarily including those rules elements in the PDF after the back cover. The GM’s Guide is going to need an extensive cleanup due to the cascade of Player’s Guide changes and sci-fantasy shifts), but I wanted some eyeballs on the bits that were changed.

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So I have finished the race revisions; Dwarves are now a subset of humans (their culture was virtually identical anyway), Fetches are now a type of Eldritch (and the Fetch nature of wandering clan caravans was extended to all the more humanoid Eldritch) and Elves and Gnomes are now grouped as Avatars along with Archons, Banshees, Barghest (Wild Hunt Hounds), Changelings, Dreamcasters, Furies, Redcaps, Sphynx, and Wisps.

One of the things I decided on to keep the Avatars from being too “on the nose” was to include a number of types who weren’t in the games they were translated from as corporeal forms; Changelings are an edge case of this as their shapeshifting derives from having previously been the AI that handled customizable companion NPCs, but better examples are Dreamcasters who were the random dungeon generation programs (thus spawning illusory environments and monsters), Furies were the anti-cheating programs (oathbreakers have violated the terms of service agreement), Sphynx were data-encryption security systems (protecting valuable knowledge from misuse), Wisps are the manifestation of the in-game HUD and delight in leading people to various places (i.e. they were the icons over the heads of quest givers and mission objectives).

That should be less meta in the sense of a game within a game element if it had only been onscreen NPCs that were translated over.

It also established certain relationships as well; for example the archons functioned as mini-bosses in the sim and those spawned in various dungeons, so archons tended to first spawn alongside a Dreamcaster (who generated the dungeon and its generic spawns).

Another important aspect is what I’m calling “awakening”; the point when the fleshy brain the AI got translated into realizes it’s not in the simulation anymore and can be more than it was. It comes more easily to some than others and the more incongruous the real world is from their simulated reality.

The awakened state is the default state for PCs since this often involves a rejection of the status quo (as many avatars are, by default, opponents to the players who interacted with their simuluations).

A few avatars at the top will instead embrace their roles (ex. The elven “gods”) and even take steps to maintain their positions. In the case of El-Phara this involves the leaders (the “gods” and most archons and dreamcasters) regularly purging their subjects (i.e. killing them so respawn back to their starting state rather than let them experience enough to awaken). The Inquisitors are awakened elves who hunt those who run in exchange for not being reset.

So, yeah, El-Phara is now definitively a realm of evil (the former archon loyalist example PC got rewritten into one who realized the injustice being perpetrated and now seeks to awaken as many elves as possible to free them… making him be regarded as especially traitorous because he had everything to gain by working with the system and chose to rebel anyway… he’s now someone I’d gladly play instead of a kinda jerkass type who is nevertheless heroic in his opposition to greater threats).

Anyway, I’ll let you take a look and see what you think.

*****

On to the next bit. I had mentioned previously that I something rather extensive in the works and it’s finally ready so is included here.

It sprung from some observations looking at the sorts of characters being built and some player feedback about options.

The first observation came as I was looking at a number of PC sheets and noticed a distinct lack of Stance talents among the fighting classes. In fact, when I actually laid them out on a spreadsheet it was something like 90% never bothered with Stance talents, and none had more than one Stance talent.

I asked those I had available about it, but it was mostly vague and mainly seemed to come down to Stances not feeling particularly worthwhile compared to the general martial talents.

So, in light of that I actually took a deeper look at the stances. In pretty short order I concluded that about 80% were “on hit impose a condition, spend focus for extra conditions.”

And then I started looking more closely at the places where I didn’t allow stances to be used.

And so I ended up combining those 80% of stances into a single “impairing strike” talent with a trigger of “when you deal damage with a main action weapon attack that doesn’t have an infliction added to it” (which covers all the places where stances couldn’t be used) and which may be selected multiple times to gain additional conditions to choose from when used or focus is added). Then I converted the 20% of stances that didn’t match the norm into martial talents (though two; disarm and trip became general actions; and two others were resolved by a slight tweak to the wording of “mobile harrier”) and then merged all of them into the martial talents (and renamed them to Fighting Talents to go with Fighting classes and paths).

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The second part of the changes derived from a combo of my trying to think of ways to make the Ironclad and Skirmisher feel more distinct and a comment from two testers that all my spellcasting classes felt largely alike.

Long story short; while I haven’t found a good solution for the ironclad and skirmisher, I was able to look at the spellcasting classes and find means of making them more distinct from each other.

A big part of this has come from the realization that I’m kinda okay with not being entirely generic. That my setting actually IS a big draw to people and so I should lean into that more.

So in revising the Mage, Mechanist* and Mystic, I decided to start with fluff and see if I couldn’t then apply those to mechanics. What I ended up deciding was that Mechanists focus on devices, Mages on spells, and Mages are given their powers for a purpose.

Mechanically this became Mechanists getting abilities and exclusive talents related to implements (devices), mages getting abilities and exclusive talents related to using inflictions (spells), and for mystics to gain options related to improving their role-related actions (i.e. their purpose).

Basically, I currated the spellcasting talents a bit creating a shorter list available to all casters, and then created exclusive talent lists for each spellcasting class.

Inflictions became a separate aspect with each class getting a talent to allow them to take inflictions in slightly different ways. Mechanists, for example, get two inflictions and can either spend an hour fiddling or a reserve point to “modify” their implement to use the other infliction.

Similarly, get a bonus for assigning their class-related actions to specific implements (or can use them as is by assigning them to some small worn item).

Mystics, by contrast, can only select an infliction once per tier and the infliction has to match a threat type they can already deal (their now exclusive access to the -mancy talents and role-boosting talents should completely make up for that.

I also went in and rebuilt the diabolist and necromancer along the same lines… actually taking a cue from the fighting classes to divide them into thralls (abyssal objects), vessels (possessed) and witches (pact) for diabolists (now abyssal classes) and hollowed (undead) and necromancer (still living casters) for the shadow classes.

This allowed me to create some more distinctive elements for the different types… ex. thralls being a bit similar to Mechanists in that all the power is bound into an object… but more extreme as a mechanist can build replacements while a Thrall is just out of luck. Witches and Necromancers are basically the abyssal and shadow equivalents of the mystic.

They also get their own custom talents (and boons as usual).

Essentially, now each type of caster should feel more distinct from each other… not overwhelmingly so, but enough to add a bit more of a setting specific feel which I think will actually make it more interesting than the more generic versions.

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More a housekeeping note than a change, underperformance by the Medic companion led to a slight tweaking of it and a rename to Sergeant (fitting since only the military background can select it and because medicine alone was too hard to expand without breaking something, it got some minor leadery/mastermindy things it can do to fulfill a “mini-enabler” role in the same way bodyguard and enforcer do (with warriors using their area denial and flanking potential to be minor controllers collectively).

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This has been one of the larger reworks at least in terms of number of pages affected. The side document where I worked on the changes before merging was at 80 pages by the time I’d finished (this included pages where only one thing on the pages was changed though so it’s not quite as crazy as it sounds).

One result of all the changes above though, mostly in the race consolidations (10 became 7) is that I now have up to 16 extra pages for additional material if I need them (dropped from 364 to 348 pages). While I don’t have to fill all of those, they are available.

Right now, my plan is to put more information into the Old Praetoria gazetteer in the back. I found a bunch of my old notes on places like Stonepoint Monastery, Riverhold, Ironhold, the smaller towns in the Free Cities, etc.

However, short of going insane with the details, that’s probably not going to fill more five extra pages (and the gazetteer isn’t intended to be more than an overview since the GM’s Guide has all the material for building your own realm (and why overload on material that might never get directly used).

I’ve also been persuaded by some others that, as much as they are rules players would interact with if used, that the optional rules probably should be kept in the GM’s Guide (along with the Abyssal and Shadow classes) because it’s the GM’s decision as to which of those rules to use and if it’s in the Player’s Guide, even if listed as “GM permission required”, a large number of players will presume them by default (they cited that in 3e, even with prestige classes and the leadership feat in the DMG because they too were intended to be optional, most players still consider them as default options).

I’m not locked into that decision, but it seems a reasonable position and it’s not like the GM’s Guide is hurting for space (I already had room for a bunch of additional opponents and Astral Servitors aren’t in the book anymore (having become Avatars) so that’s another four pages freed up.

So far I think the best suggestion is to add more example hirelings (maybe a couple of standard tier ‘veteran’ mercs), vehicles**, structures, traps and hazards. That’s maybe six pages unless I go insane with examples.

That said, I’m not sure more examples are particularly needed, at least not in the player’s guide. If anything I’d lean to cutting back the traps to things readily useable by PCs on an adventure and move the rest to the DMG (adding some more elaborate ones there since the GM will be using them most) and it should really be up to the GM if any sort of veteran mercs are even available for hire.

Or maybe 350 pages (I definitely have enough minor details about the Free Cities and Toria Tribes… i.e. the heroic realms of the default setting… to add two more pages while leaving the further away places at just a line or two) is enough (it’d be about 175 pages if laid out in traditional RPG formats).

While I’m almost certainly NOT going to do it, I may as well throw out my most nutty idea for what to do with the pages… reorganize the whole project. Cut the Old Praetoria gazetteer, cosmos, religions, etc. from the first book and replace it with all the rules from the GM’s Guide (i.e. improvising, adventure creation, terrain, afflictions, rewards, monster building) into a GM section. Then take all the gazetteer and world information (and expand on it a bit more), meld that to all of the example opponents, and add a few example adventures to it and make that “World Book One: Old Praetoria.”

… OR… (literally had a brainstorm as I was typing that) far less crazy; are you familiar with the old Basic D&D Red Box? It opened with two short solo adventures to introduce you to the game’s mechanics.

I could do the same for the start of the Player’s Guide. I could take the extra pages and create a mini-solo adventure (which is even easier than D&D since players roll everything by default) to teach players about checks and actions and resources.

Probably an ironclad captain (I can make the first combat be with an opponent that does less threat than the captain could regain with their minor action inspiration so they have all the time needed to learn even if their dice rolls suck).

Introduce attributes, skills and make a couple of checks (an untrained attribute check and a skill check) to find/reach the ruin. Introduce attack checks and the action economy in a simple encounter. Discuss Edge and Focus (basic use to increase check results) and then afterwards spending a Reserve to Rally.

Then maybe an encounter with conditions and recovery checks, finding an ally and working with them to overcome a greater threat. Don’t end with the downer of the hot cleric dying to a single magic missile though.

Yeah, okay forget I even thought about rearranging the books that much… short solo-adventure tutorial (and a bit more in the Gazetteer… more details on the smaller settlements of the Free Cities, Stonepoint Monastery and the Toria Tribe trading settlement) is where I’m going to spend those pages.

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*I kept catching myself calling it the mechanist even after having it changed to inventor and realized that I never did that with gadgeteer despite it being the name for far longer… so clearly it was more evocative and so its back.

** I almost forgot that with the shift to a more overt science fantasy that I reworked vehicular arcane lift to have different altitude ceilings (1, 10, 100 and 1000 paces) so that things like hover bikes and cars could also be built. Also added were jump jets and sensors. Between the jump jets, sensors, plus arcane lift arms, anti-structure devices and revised field weapons, I also added a large “mech” (along with a hoverbike and renaming the flying carpet to “hover platform”) to the vehicle examples.

Man, you weren't kidding when you said it was extensive!

Revising most of the stances into a single "impairing strike" and turning the rest into regular Fighting talents is a perfect example. I like how you did Accurate Offense and Aggressive Style, using Action Focus to implement their focus effects.

If you're looking to differentiate the Ironclad and Skirmisher further, you could look at the Potent and Swift Mystics and how they got extra talents - the Skirmisher could do well with getting Mobile Harrier for free like the Swift Mystic did, but I'm not sure what to do with the Ironclad. Giving them Armor Efficiency was the first thing to some to mind, but I'm not sure if that's a good idea from a defense balance standpoint.

You'll also want to define Bull Rush, since the Ironclad and Improvisation Expert both mention it, but it's not defined anywhere (unless it's supposed to be Shove).

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The casters got huge changes as well. Altering how they do spell attacks is going to go a long way towards differentiating them - a Mechanist can't even use spell attacks without a magical device, while a mage is limited to nonlethal psychic attacks without an implement.

And tying their inflictions to different mechanics (devices/implements in the case of the Mechanist and elements in the case of the Mystic) does a lot to make them more mechanically interesting. The Mechanist's adaptable gear and various device-based talents go a long way towards selling those devices as being more than the implement clones they used to be.

As to the mystic, the new path-based talents are definitely interesting. And while I'm going to mourn the loss of the -mancy talents for non-mystics, I understand why you're doing it, and not just from a mechanical perspective. Being mystics that work with primal spirits to get things done, they're going to have a deeper ability to work those elements, while the mage and mechanist are restricted to Energy Adaptation and Energy Resistance.

Having the mage focus more on psychic assaults when it's not using spell admixture and energy adaptation/resistance gives it an identity of its own, even if certain players (like me) will probably focus more on spell admixture (which if I recall correctly is the only way to deal more than one threat type at a time, even if the amount of threat remains the same as the original infliction).

I'm gonna miss the war wizard with pyromancy that I've had in my head, but it's for the best.

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The avatar looks good from a mechanical perspective, and separating the changeling and archon out from the elf allows all three to maintain their own identity.

Now, about El-Phara. You've managed to turn that place, which was already bad enough as a theocratic, caste-driven dictatorship, into a full-on psychological horror show. How many elves have secretly awakened, but have to hide it from everyone around them for fear of the Inquisition? How many of them feel alone in a sea of literal NPCs, never knowing if anyone around them has awakened? Not even elves loyal to the status quo are safe - if the Inquisition learns of their existence, the only think keeping the loyal awakened elf from being murdered to put him back in his place is whether the Inquisition has bigger fish to fry.

Seriously, fuck El-Phara. Fuck El-Phara and every tyrannical archon and cowardly hypocrite in the Inquisition. They're the worst civilization in the setting right now - they make the Bloodspear Empire and Riverhold look good.

On a lighter note, I love what you did with Danai Kar-Taxsu, the archon sample character. You turned him from a jerkish embodiment of El-Phara's bullshit - a lawful jerkass take on paladins - into an avenging angel on a crusade to free his brethren from the chains of a cabal of false gods and megalomaniacal tyrants. Basically what a paladin is supposed to be. He's gone from my least favorite sample character to my absolute favorite, beating out Aranine the adorable golem girl and Blackfeather the vengeful murder crow.

Yeah, Bull Rush is an artifact. The action got renamed to Shove when I added Disarm and Trip as basic maneuvers and realized that with the way movement works, I didn’t need a separate Shove and Bull Rush because you can move before and after actions.

So, I need to do a quick search and replace and that will fix that.

* * * *

Yeah, I debated about the -mancy talents being non-universal, but in terms of establishing distinct feels it was necessary. Each of the spellcasting classes now has a particular focus; mechanists on their tools, mages on their inflictions and mystics on their roles and closer ties to the elements themselves.

One thing I’m sure you noticed is that each spellcasting class accesses Inflictions differently now; and mystics actually have the most restricted access; once per tier (so three total) and it has to match a threat type the mystic can already deal.

The idea is that mystics don’t control the gifts they get; so most of their talents are related to learning to use what you do have in more flexible ways. If a mage or mechanist wants to do more with fire they just pick an infliction. The mystic has to upgrade their control of fire through the -mancy talents.

I’m sorry about the less of the pyromancy war-wizard… however, worth noting is that “wizard” is now just a title in the setting… there’s nothing to say a swift or potent mystic couldn’t be a war-wizard (indeed, signature character Kalla’s whole schtick is passing herself off as one of Blackspire’s war mages).

* * * *

As for El-Phara; great settings are often defined by the nature of their opposition and part of being superversive is to paint in bold colors.

El-Phara IS the worst and overcoming it when those sitting at the top just respawn (and though unawakened are going to do most of the same things they’d otherwise do) if you take them out conventionally makes overcoming them an epic (in the literary sense) quest that will require great heroes to overcome and a plan for what the new society will need to look like in order to not fall back into the hellscape.

I’m glad you like Danai. He’s probably my favorite change to come out of this… if you’re going to give example PC heroes, then paint them bold too. Jerkass made sense when I was trying to be more just a D&D clone, but I have finally embraced that this is my own thing.

It may share roots with D&D (and still embraces its black sheep of the D&D family 4E DNA), but I don’t want R&R to be a bland copy of generally more popular system anymore. It’s about being a hero and not being afraid to take on challenges that seem impossible. That’s Danai 2.0 in a nutshell.

I also just have to laugh at “murder crow” in a “I see what you did there” way.

* * * *

And in God reminding me to not be too proud just yet. Another tester dropped a comment on my that was 100% true and which I had completely overlooked, again because I’m too familiar with things as they were.

The comment amounted to “why do you have sustain hit and recovery checks as separate things when players roll for both of them?”

BAM! Right between the eyes. It made absolute perfect sense when the GM was rolling in the same way players were; the party vested in maintaining an effect rolled to keep it going, a party vested in stopping it rolled to end it.

But now all the checks are done by the PCs (barring important NPCs or optional rules) and it really is a needless complexity to keep them seperate.

I’m pretty sure this means “sustain hit” is going to become “recovery” (as a shorthand for ‘until recovery’) with automatic checks at the end of a character/creature’s turn, but my durations have been a bit of a mess since I opted to drop cyclic initiative for round by round checks (which has been well received overall, as tight as all the math is, the potential to be able to act twice in a row or have to suffer two attacks before you can react makes things feel more fluid and chaotic like a fight for your life should. Also enjoyed is that players grouped before or after the monsters don’t have to go in a particular order which encourages them to devise plans that leverage cooperation).

So I’m thinking this might call for a broader look at duration, both in terms of sustains, but also the 1turn/1round split (previously known as “start of next turn” and “end of next turn” respectively).

The concept in cyclical orders is whether or not you get to benefit from the action on your next turn or not, but that gets complex when the initiative order gets shuffled every round.

In other words, this isn’t an overnight fix… more of a long weekend fix.

* * * *

Another element on the table is, at the request of a playertester GM, is some assistance in trying to convert the Zeitgeist 4E setting and modules to Ruins & Realms. This led to dusting off and updating some of my old conversion documents (the monster one needed some love and is still only “good enough”), but the main thing they requested was a way to handle some of the unique themes the writers of the adventure path had devised for the setting (a celebrity, a doomsday prophet, gunsmith, martial scientist, skyseer, spirit talker, technologist, etc.).

So I’m seeing how much effort is needed to find matching boons/talents and how creating a custom list impacts character creation.

It’s kind of a fun sidequest in terms of seeing how far the mechanics can be pushed for an alternate setting.

Okay, a bit of a false alarm on Sustain vs. Recovery.

All that was really needed was a bit of cleanup on the Sustain Hit and Sustain Miss. Specifically combining them into a unified "Sustained" duration.

Sustained: The effect is treated as having a duration of 1 round, but just before it ends, the check that inflicted the effect is repeated as a free action, renewing or ending the sustained effect as if it were a success or failure on the original check.

You may use the action that inflicts an effect with a duration of Sustained again on the same target, but any conditions from it do not stack.

Recovery checks just needed a little clarification as special actions that can end anything with a duration early.

And with a bit of thought the 1 round duration was cleaned up to be...

One Round (1 round): The effect lasts until you or the target ends their next turn, whichever is longer.

Which because opponents use a static initiative score means even if you go before it in the turn, it won't end when the target takes it turn, it ends when your next turn ends (which might be before or after the creature's next turn, but is easier to track than "end of next round").

By contrast, 1 turn is unchanged, ending with the target's next turn or the end of your current turn if the effect targets yourself... by default making it slightly shorter than the one round effect.

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Now onto those aforementioned Zeitgeist themes/paragon paths... some of which I might do some renaming of and porting into fitting categories if they're interesting or distinct enough (some are just slight variations of existing R&R traits, just put on a list where someone with the Theme can grab them regardless of background or class... others just don't quite fit the themes of R&R proper [i.e. the necromancy themed ones], but a few might be interesting enough to toss in).

Yeah, I'm proud of "murder crow" too.

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Or the mystic could have an arcanist background and use arcane magic for utility stuff while using the Source's gifts in combat. A potent or swift mystic might not even need Wits if he sticks with weapon attacks. It wouldn't be optimal, but it could work.

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Bold colors and contrasts are much better than the muddled grays that modern storytellers are so fond of.

Speaking of El-Phara, the horror I described each El-Pharan subject going through is basically a literalization of what your random person endures under any dictatorship.

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I'm glad the Sustain Hit/Recovery/Sustained duration thing wasn't as big a deal as it could have been.

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Regarding the extra space in the player's guide and the idea of a tutorial solo adventure, do it. It will put all of the various mechanics into context, just like it did with the original Red Box (I only have a vague familiarity with it, and the only reason I even know the aforementioned beautiful cleric's name is because of an online search after you mentioned her.)

Well, I caught a few more glitches (ex. Implement Master mentioned mystic’s unarmed implement attacks) and got the gazetteer section done (the rest of the Free Cities’ settlements, Flotsam, overviews of Ironhold, Riverhold, Northern Steppes, Endless Archipelago, Blood Wastes and Sun Empire/Star Kingdoms… basically the west, north, south, and east of Old Praetoria… which bumped the pages up to exactly 360, leaving me 5 for my intro solo adventure; which since I’m not doing a “you failed your save so the cleric dies” option should barely fit… if I have to cut a bit I’d probably just cut some detail from the neighboring regions), so I’ll probably drop an updated version in a day or two.

And I may as well go into my revision for weak creatures while I’m at it (it’s already there in the GM section). The big realization was that I was trying to keep weak opponents confined to the first tier (level 0-5) because I was viewing them as akin to my old “negative levels for starting PCs” that could eventually grow to become level 0s and so forth.

But that’s not necessarily true. PCs are something special. Even a level 0 has more Edge, has Focus and Reserves than the most skilled ordinary person… even a high level ordinary person (and worth noting is that Action Focus can give a level 1 PC’s check the same odds as a level 6 for that one check.

So, to make a long story short, I’ve opted to instead redefine what levels mean to weak creatures in relation to the “mere mortals” scale of 4+level Edge… because, not coincidentally, 4+15th level = 19 or one point shy of a stanolevel 0’s 20 Edge.

So the new weak levels are the same 0-15 of the other creatures, but with 0-5 as non-combatants, 6-10 as trained combatants (typical guards and such), and level 11-15 as seasoned (but not quite veteran) combatants (knights who’ve trained most of their lives for war, soldiers who’ve been through some real fights).

In terms of design this means you don’t need separate tables, you just divide Edge, threat, CP and treasure by 5 (and give them fewer attribute points and special abilities) for a weak creature (round up however, they’re not really a threat except in very large numbers or supporting stronger ones, but there’s no sense rubbing salt in a wound).

This also allowed it to carry over to the PC-Light building options for GMs who want very well rounded creatures (or to make a particular PC a heroic representation of a baseline type of soldier or spellcaster).

All which adds with certain other changes actually has the GM’s Guide down to 335 pages presently… so roughly 30 pages of new opponents to match the Players Guide (right now I’m leading to a much broader selection of golems, plus now that Redcaps have been defined as Avatars they’ll need some examples (actually now that Avatars have fully replaced Astral Servitors I can think of a number of additions there.

I guess what I’m saying is I should be able to fill those 30 pages easily enough.

On a less mechanical side; if you want a rare modern example of Superversive, go check out the live action One Piece. I haven’t been inspired by modern media in quite a few years but that one nailed a lot of notes right on. Monkey D. Luffy might be an avatar of the superversive (though all of the crew are in their own ways).

I'm looking forward to the new monster entries (and the gazetteer, of course). Your take on redcaps sound like old-school goblins as vicious monsters, standing in contrast to your much more sympathetic bioformed bat-like goblins.

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I was looking over your optional abyssal and shadow classes (good job on separating them out - they really are darker echoes of the mystic and mechanist; and Hollowed is a really evocative name for your undead class), and I realized that "any non-mystic class" includes the necromancer, thrall, and witch, potentially even a vessel if you go with the "malfean as their own patron" route.

That's fascinating, because that's how people in the Middle Ages thought that you could became a vampire. Witches - anyone who trafficked in unholy powers - were thought to potentially rise from the grave and feast on the living. Bram Stoker's Dracula may be a more modern reinvention of the concept, but it still has ties to black magic via the Scholomance, where Dracula learned many of his weirder abilities like weather control and shapeshifting - I don't recall which of his abilities were vampiric in origin and which were learned at the Scholomance.

*Side note: werewolves in the Middle Ages, especially in Central and Eastern Europe were also witches, in this case with the ability to shift into wolf forms (via animal skins in some cases) and commit gruesome acts. Ironically, this means that the original werewolf lore better resembles the skinwalkers of the American Southwest more than modern Hollywood "cursed to transform at the full moon" werewolves, especially with regard to the horrific acts that skinwalkers commit to gain their power (which I can't help but notice resembles the part in the witch's fluff entry about the demonic patron requiring the witch to perform horrible acts to maintain their power (though skinwalkers gained their power by committing native taboos such as kinslaying, incest, and cannibalism, sacrificing their loved ones for power)). And this meant that a witch who was also a werewolf could rise from the dead as a vampire.

Working as intended for an undead shapeshifting witch. The Shadow isn’t picky who it uses so long as they harbor hatred for Creation in their hearts.

* * * *

The one with the fixes and extended lore in appendix one is up. Other than likely typos still to be caught and the tutorial adventure (and the art… I need to get back to the art soon here) I think the Player’s Guide is in a good place.

So now my focus shifts to the GM’s Guide, where one of the first things I’ve noted is that my “answering the mysteries” part of setting up a campaign advice now needs a complete rewrite (or just cutting it) as between changes to magic and races (no more theurges or astral servitors) a lot of the “nature of the gods” questions are moot in terms of setting impact. Even if the gods of the Via Praetorum were real they clearly exert no direct power over the world and The Source’s gifts, while real, could be attributed to mutation or forgotten Eldritch ancestors by unbelievers (there is no quantity of proof for a miracle that an unbeliever can’t ignore).

Sidebar: in explaining how a Mystic could be beaten if they have the power of God and work God’s miracles, I finally found the right shorthand I think… “Mystics don’t work miracles. The miracle from God is that they were given powers with which to help others.”

Anyway that leaves the Bloodspear, who actually created the Arcane Web and what caused the Cataclysm… and I suppose “Is The Source God?” and I guess with the broader shift in direction I’m not so sure I need to even ask those questions anymore for GMs to come up with their own answers.

Maybe I just weave the few remaining questions into other places… like the question about the cause of the Cataclysm into the Events section as more of a sidebar when discussing the Cataclysm’s setting role of being an easy “nothing before this line matters terribly much” event. I’m thinking that might be a better option.

And then there’s my big question (so big I don’t even ask it in this paragraph). Previously I had squeezed the default setting lore into the Region Building guidelines as an example, but now that it’s in the Player’s Guide appendix it feels very redundant to repeat it in the GM’s Guide.

So, do I use a brand new region as the example -or- do I skip the example since Old Praetoria is still in the Player’s Guide and it’s not all that unclear and more just a thought focusing exercise for inexperienced GMs?

I’m not sure.

As thin as the GM section is getting compared to the monster manual part, I do almost wonder if my random, almost joking thought of pulling the really critical GM rules (how to make rulings, environment, rewards, making npcs, custom monsters and adventures) into the Player’s Guide and moving all the setting material appendixes over to the pre-genned monsters and make that the Setting Book.

Ultimately I think that’s silly since so many people will only buy a core book and without the opponent pregens you’ve just dropped a lot of work building a setting and opponents onto the GM. The current split gets players thinking about a setting and the GM all the pregens he’d need right next to the tools to make more.

But I still wonder sometimes.

Anyway, that’s where my thoughts are right now… untangling the mess the Player’s Guide has made of the GM’s Guide.

I'd definitely keep the GM's rules in separate from the Player's Guide, simply for the reason that you listed: if the setting and pre-gen monsters are in a separate book that the GM doesn't buy for whatever reason, then the GM has to do a ton of work to build their own monsters, without any monsters to use as examples to go off of. The goal of this system for GMs is to make it easier to GM, like in 4e, not make it more of a pain than other D&D editions.

And as to the "use Old Praetoria" vs "use a new region" for the Realm Creation rules, I'd go with Old Praetoria, so that GMs can see both the rules in action and what the end result might look like.

***

I'm liking the Old Praetoria primer. A lot of it is old information for me, but it's still evocative. I do like the extra information on the Free Cities themselves - Southfort is definitely my favorite, but that's because of its proximity to the Stormhold Necropolis and all the creepy stuff that entails.

I do have a couple of questions regarding a few settlements on the map: Bridgefort, Northpass, Riverrun, and Duskhaven. They're clearly not El-Pharan settlements (though I wouldn't be shocked if Bridgefort and Riverrun were El-Pharan buffer states, given their proximity to Min-Kha and Min-Sung, respectively), and they're too far away from the main cluster of the Free Cities. I figure that Northpass is a connection to Riverhold, and I'm especially curious about Duskhaven and Hilltop.

Just wanted to check in and see how you were doing. I hope you and your family had a lovely Thanksgiving.

We did have a wonderful Thanksgiving. My Christmas rush has started early as well.

There’s some developments on the R&R front as well, but they’re not quite ready for prime time so it will be a few days yet before I’m fully ready to discuss them.

The short version though is that

A) the latest round of testing definitely revealed a few issues in the resources that need to be addressed. While it works fine for most, I have a small contingent who believes they have “solved” the combat system such that any level of threat isn’t actually more dangerous just more tedious/long to resolve and I do see their point (I think some of their analysis is flawed; based on the whole group being especially optimized and the ones who haven’t “solved” it focusing enough on party damage mitigation to make their overwhelming offense via burning of reserves even possible).

B) in an effort to make the classes feel more distinct, I’ve done some mild nerfing of the paths (for most it was taking the “pick two from long list” and making it “pick one”) and then adding an extra path feature that is exclusive to each class (ex. a berserker captain adds the buff keyword to his rage so he can fire up allies, a berserker defender deals extra free strike damage while under rage, an ironclad disabler gets extra defenses against targets he’s hit with disabling strikes, a mastermind striker can grant a minor action when they hit with their minor action attack, etc.).

The idea is that you should have more of a reason to pick one class over another.

In each case I’m trying to stick to a theme… the Berserker’s is Rage, Ironclad’s is Resolve, Mastermind’s is Tactics, Skirmisher’s is Finesse. Mage is Inflictions/channeling, Mechanist is Devices/charge-ups, Mystic is Path/Spirit.

C) not acting on yet, but had a couple of comments that the system would run a bit better if both damage and healing were scaled back by as much as half (basically 5-6 hits to drop a PC instead of 3-ish… similar for monsters as most PCs can leverage flat-footed, and minor action damage to land at least 5-6 hits in a five round combat.

The main reason Rally is set to half (beyond just 4E’s main leader healing adding up to about that between the surge and bonus healing) is because an at-level hit does about 40% of your full health. If a normal hit was 20% then regaining 25% from a rally would be sufficient.

* * * *

Right now my focus is B, but I’m thinking about the others as well.

Good to hear! Our Thanksgiving was nice and quiet - a good day to rest up after the increased business that grocery retail does this time of year. The Christmas rush hasn't kicked in yet for my place of employment, but I'm expecting it very soon.

***

Reducing the "pick two from a long list" part to one will also make things simpler for newbie players who are starting at level one. Instead of having to juggle two minor spells/clever tricks/etc, it gives them a chance to play with just the one at first. That and it gives players an incentive to think about which clever trick/minor spell/etc they're going to use as their main one. Besides, a lot of starting player concepts really only need one clever trick/minor spell/aspect/dweomer to come online.

It'll be interesting to see how each class combines with each path with your new mechanics. You definitely made the right call to stick to certain themes, as well as nail those themes down.

As far as C) goes, it's worth a shot to test it, but you might run into the problem that early 4e did with sumo-padded monster HP.

Good to hear from you, man.

Okay, so the Fighting class options are done...

Berserker’s Path: Choose one of the following options, gain the path’s traits and the following traits. You do not get this trait if you gain the path through the Second Path talent;
● Brigand: Flanker deals 1 extra threat per ally while Berserker’s Rage is active.
● Captain: Berserker’s Rage gains the ‘buff’ keyword.
● Defender: Free Strikes deal Focus extra threat while Berserker’s Rage is active.
● Disabler: Disabling Strikes affects an extra target while Berserker’s Rage is active.
● Ravager: While Berserker’s Rage is active Focused Ravage deals Focus threat to an enemy within 1 pace of the target and Sweeping Ravage’s Wall is increased by 1.
● Sentinel: Free Strikes deal Focus extra threat while Berserker’s Rage is active.
● Striker: Increase your Action Focus bonus by 1 while Berserker’s Rage is active.

Note: The Ravager's Single-target and AoE minor action got combined into a single action with a clarifier that you can't apply both to the same attack. While not a problem in isolation, a Mastermind using Create Minor Opening to grant the Ravager an extra minor action to stack both was allowing it to use AoE's with Slayer-tier damage every turn... that is a LOT of extra damage.

Ironclad’s Path: Choose one of the following options, gain the path’s traits and the following traits. You do not get this trait if you gain the path through the Second Path talent;
● Brigand: You gain +1 to defenses per ally adjacent to a creature attacking you.
● Captain: Team Player can target two allies adjacent to you as of one of its targets.
● Defender: Enemies affected by Lockdown take a -2 to attack checks with actions that don’t include you as a target.
● Disabler: Gain +2 to defenses against targets of your Disabling Strikes (1 turn).
● Ravager: Gain +2 to defenses against targets of Ravage (1 turn).
● Sentinel: Enemies affected by Cover Fire take a -2 to attack checks with actions that don’t include you as a target.
● Striker: Increase your Action Focus bonus by 1 per focus spent when making a defense check.

Mastermind’s Path: Choose one of the following options, gain the path’s traits and the following traits. You do not get this trait if you gain the path through the Second Path talent;
● Captain: When you use Inspire Team, you can use Create Minor Opening in place of a Clever Trick.
● Disabler: When you use Disabling Strikes and Create Opening during the same turn, you can also use Create Minor Opening as a free action.
● Striker: You can use Action Focus to improve the check of an ally within 10 paces of you.

Skirmisher’s Path: Choose one of the following options, gain the path’s traits and the following traits. You do not get this trait if you gain the path through the Second Path talent;
● Brigand: You can shift 1 pace before or after an attack made with Sneak Attack.
● Captain: Targets of your Inspiring Words can also shift 1 pace as a free action.
● Defender: You can shift 1 pace after each Free Strike you make.
● Disabler: If you have the Close Combat trait you gain a Shift speed of 1 pace, at level 5 this improves to 4 paces, and at level 9 it equals your best speed. If you have the Sharpshooter trait, you are not flat-footed while prone and can stand from prone as a 1 pace action with no check needed.
● Ravager: Gain an extra Basic or Fighting talent.
● Sentinel: When using Halting Shot you can choose to knock a target you hit prone instead of halting them. If you do, they cannot attempt to stand during their turn.
● Striker: Gain an extra Basic or Fighting talent.

Next, on to the Spellcasters, who already have some differences now thanks to the change-up of Talents into separate pools. In terms of existing mechanics and working with it, Mage features should be focusing on using Inflictions, Mechanist ones on making their Devices work better, and Mystics will be more about path actions (my default thought is to give them essentially +1 option from all the things I just took an option from, but I'll see if inspiration strikes for something more interesting after I work on the Mage and Mechanist and get a feel for what they're getting instead).

You definitely did a good job keying the path-related fighting class features to each class's theme, really emphasizing their core concepts (speed for the skirmisher, toughness for the Ironclad, and damage/rage for the berserker). The Ironclad might seem the most basic, but it's going to be a freaking tank, even beyond what its armor grants it. I'd definitely playtest it some more just to make sure that it doesn't cause problems, especially the Defender/Sentinel features (which are basically 4e-style marks, which you'd ditched a while back because it made the defender/sentinel too tempting a target).

You make a good point on the marks, and I'd already run those tests once (I'd just forgotten).

So let's instead try flipping it to make it even more of a Catch-22 for the target. Enemies affected by Lockdown or Cover Fire instead take the -2 if they target you. So hit the now even harder to hit guy or risk the Free Strike by going after a squishier target.

I'm also through the Mage and its mechanical theme to distinguish it from other casters is Inflictions (vs. Mechanist's Device/Implement focus and Mystic's Path feature focus).

Mage’s Path: Choose one of the following options, gain the path’s traits and the following traits. This does not apply to a Second Path if you take one.
● Abjurer: If you have Challenging Ward, targets you hit with an Infliction are warded (1 round). If you have Protective Ward, one ally adjacent to a target hit by an Infliction is warded (1 round).
● Benedictor: When you hit with an Infliction, you can apply a Dweomer to an ally adjacent to the target.
● Empowered: Attack Potency increases the die type of spell attacks using Inflictions by an extra step (two steps total).
● Interdictor: When you use Enlarge Spell with an Infliction, you can include or exclude ½ Focus squares adjacent to or within the area from its effects.
● Maledictor: Spell Potency increases the die type when using an Infliction by an extra step (two steps total).
● Manifester: When you use an Infliction with a spell attack, you can center one of your Aspect Auras on the target as a free action. This aura lasts 1 round.
● Summoner: You can apply the hit effects of an Infliction to your Summoned Ally’s hits with its Attack.

ETA: And here is how the Mechanist is looking;

Mechanist’s Path: Choose one of the following options, gain the path’s traits and the following traits. This does not apply to a Second Path if you take one;
● Abjurer: You gain a Shield Drone that grants a +2 shield bonus to all defenses and requires no hands to wield. As a free action on your turn you can shift it to protect an adjacent ally or return to yourself (1 minute or until used again).
● Benedictor: You can make the duration of one of your non-instant Dweomers sustain free on one of its targets (1 min. or until you use it on another target).
● Empowered: Improve the numeric effects of your Dweomers by 1 if you select the held option for them under the Device Use trait.
● Interdictor: Increase the range of Minor Interdiction by Focus paces if you use a Minor Spell with the held option under the Device Use trait.
● Maledictor: Increase the range of Energy Missile and Minor Malediction by Focus paces if you use a Minor Spell with the held option under the Device Use trait.
● Manifester: You can assign an Aspect Aura and Effect to the same held device. When you do, increase the range to Melee 3 (5 at level 5 and 10 at level 9).
● Summoner: In place of the benefits of Summon Ally, you gain a Loyal Beast companion with a starting INT of 0 (may be improved with attribute points), may select any two skills and gains the Construct and Fine Manipulation traits for free. All effects that apply to a Summoned Ally instead apply to the Loyal Beast.

RE:Ironclad Defender/Sentinel: Not only that, it fits in better with the Brigand, Disabler, Ravager, and Striker in increasing the Ironclad's durability. But I'd thought that was the point of the defenders having higher defenses to begin with. It's an interesting idea, but it's worth testing out to make sure that nothing breaks.

***
The Mechanist's path benefits look interesting, especially the summoner one. My first thought on that one was to make it voluntary so that mechanist summoners could still summon their ally, but making them use physical mechanical allies for it sells the flavor very well. Look at the Steel Defender that certain 5e artificers have. Tying the Empowered, Interdictor, Maledictor, and Manifester's path traits to the held option is another carrot to encourage people to take the risk of using the held option, when more conservative players might prefer to stick with the worn option.

The mage's path traits are more basic, but the summoner and abjurer have the most interesting ones: the summoner's trait sounds familiar, like it used to be a feature, though looking at the summoner, the difference appears to be that with the mage summoner, the summoned entity uses its attack stats as opposed to the summoner's stats (not that there's much difference).
The abjurer one is interesting because it lets mage abjurers apply wards without having to burn minor actions if they hit - this encourages the mage abjurer to attack first to see if they hit, and if they do, apply the ward for free, then use the minor action to use a minor spell for even more control, is ward of vigor, or use energy missile (which might not match a slayer's damage, but it's still extra damage for a non-slayer class). This would mean that for a mage abjurer, applying the wards with their minor action is either a situation borne of having to multitask between different threats, or it's a worst-case scenario contingency, an "I whiffed and now I need to do something to salvage something from my turn" situation.

Couple of editing questions:
1) I noticed that the maledictor has a trait called spell potency, and there's a talent called spell potency. I'd recommend changing one of their names, to avoid confusion.

2) I noticed that a while back you'd changed the trigger for challenging ward to "deal threat against targets that don't include you" instead of when the target makes an attack that doesn't include you. At first, I thought it was because the Abjurer has much more flexible range in terms of response than the defender and sentinel, but it just occurred to me that it probably coincided with the change from "attacker rolls" to "players roll for attack and defense," but I'd like to hear your reasoning behind it.

3) Another question that I've been curious about: for the defender, why did you fold armored panoply and harrier's agility into the master defender boons? Abjurer's training still grants the caster classes extra armor without the trap option of a player picking two non-armor-related traits. Yeah, common sense would dictate to grab an armor option, but common sense ain't common, especially for players who are just getting into the RPG hobby as a whole.

1) All corrections welcome. In a similar vein I’ve decided I need to rename the points part of Focus to avoid confusion. Right now I’m going with “power” but am open to suggestions. That should make it easier to parse whether I am referring to Focus (the modifier) or power (the points to fuel effects).

2) the change to “deal threat” from “attack” started with the realization that something like a Maledictor could blast away with their autohit energy missiles and never trigger the wards. Defenders needed it less because, being adjacent, ranged actions would also trigger them, but I think it might be a good idea to extend the “deal threat” language to all the Guardians.

3) the main reason for moving those options into the options was that not every player really needs them.

For example, Ironclad with the STR/REF build could have REF 4 + 2 medium armor + 2 shield = 8. Same as a STR 4-1 + 3 heavy armor + 2 shield = 8.

Sure, adding the harrier option would improve their other defenses by a point, but it’s not strictly needed and the option to take a different Master Defender option would almost certainly be a better pick.

A related element to this came out with a Bodyguard recently where it just really lacked the tools to even be a backup tank. A couple extra points of defenses just aren’t enough mitigate the hits they can take in even a single round. By far the most effective tool of the actual defender (and the berserker who stayed adjacent to a manifester with shielding aura for cover to mitigate their flat-footed) was resistance.

It’s actually caused me to reconsider Guardian mechanics overall; ex. maybe they don’t need extra Edge and defenses so much as something that can soak an extra hit or two or during combat (which mechanically would actually be about the same).

Because a related thing I noticed is that the party Defender almost never uses their focus points for anything but soaking hits (and uses the talent to let her build soak points when she hits).

The final note on the Defender as observed is that unlike the orher paths, it really doesn’t turn off when you use a different path’s minor action. An Interdictor not using minor spells or enlarging an attack isn’t going to feel at all like a controller, a striker not using its minor action to make another weapon attack won’t be putting out slayer numbers. But a defender only has to spend a minor action if it needs to rally and so can basically use a second path action almost without restrictions.

I guess this question has got me thinking a bit more about some other Defender datapoints overall.

1) Any time. On the topic of Focus, I never had confusion between Focus (the modifier) and Focus points. Where did other players see potential for confusion?

2) I'd figured that it was related to monster design, but interaction with Maledictor-style mechanics would make sense.

3) For a minute, I was confused, because I remembered the armor bonuses being 2/3/4 for light/medium/heavy armor, but that changed with the most recent revision. That and when I looked closer at the Armored Panoply trait, I noticed that you'd moved the heavy shield training talent over into the core Defender mechanics, leaving just the armor upgrade trait. And running through the math confirms that every abjurer/defender variant ends up with 8 armor after everything is said and done.

WRT the Guardians, my first thought was giving them Resistance to all threat and conditions like the Berserker, only without being flat-footed, but that would have conflicted with the Berserker's Rage trait. It merits further thought.

As to the Defender's Lockdown, I remember an iteration that required a minor action to maintain each turn, so that looks like an easy solution.

1) it was mostly the other way around. I’ve had several instances over the years and one recently that reminded me of the issue where they thought their Focus modifer went down when they spent their focus points and so didn’t want to spend them. If you read the rules fully that’s not something you’d really get confused, but enough people only skim that a little extra clarity can’t hurt.

I’m not sure I like the term “power” to replace it, but given how broadly it applies it needs to be fairly generic.

3) Amusingly on Resistance for Guardians, I recently got some feedback from a GM who hadn’t realized the Defender’s ability to get Resistance to an attack was an optional trait as he was uncertain how the Defender was supposed to take all the hits they did without it.

So while making the Lockdown aura a minor action is definitely a first step, I’m thinking Guardians as a whole need a more extensive overhaul.

4) speaking of overhauls, I recently had to help a player fix their summoner and, frankly, even I was having a hard time parsing all the elements of it. If the creator is getting confused; it’s time for a revamp. I’ve got thoughts but I want to put them to paper first.

1) I get what you're saying now; they do need to be renamed, since it runs afoul of your rule of "one term for one concept." And I do agree that the Focus modifier needs to stay Focus, since it not only determines the number of points you have to focus your efforts, it determines which attribute you focus on. That being said, "Power" feels too generic. Maybe use the full term "power points" the way other systems do would preserve the distinction between the points and all the other uses of the term "power"

3) So Resistance might be the way to go for Guardians, at least the Defender and possibly the Abjurer. I'm not sure how the Sentinel fares in this regard, since it stays at range compared to the other two. And if this is actually the way to go, then the Berserker's Rage trait is going to need a revamp alongside the Summoner that you're talking about.

What you could do WRT the guardians is tie the Resistance to the minor action feature: "each time you use this trait, you gain Resistance (1 round)." This way, a guardian player has to actively be operating as a guardian to keep that resistance, instead of keeping the resistance while filling another path's role.

I had a similar thought about linking a guardian’s resistance to their role minor action, but a related thought that keeps the berserker from being completely obviated would be that the resistance only applies to targets you’ve threatened (so anyone adjacent for the defender, the targets of cover fire, etc.), but I’ll have to see as I go if that’s viable.

Alternately, broad resistance for the guardians and soak points for the berserker (remove the flat-footed; that was only a reasonable trade when linked to resistance to all conditions)… hmmm, maybe…

Berserker- soak points and resistance to all conditions but flat-footed.
Guardian- resistance to threat and dazed (since keeping your free strikes is critical to the guardian role)
Berserker Guardian - resistance to everything + soak points, but flat-footed.

Related thought from the Summoner revamp that’s leaked into the Guardian is that I’ve codified two more conditions for ease of use;
- Retreat: a push where the target determines direction. This has the fear keyword.
- Threatened: adds the defender triggers to what causes you to trigger a free strike.

They’re rather fringe case for PCs, but as I get into monster revamps I think they’ll be useful.

Completely unrelated to the above, some recent sessions have got me rethinking my rest structure. The short version is I’m starting to understand the merits of the limited long rests that give back everything over my 1 hour partial recovery rests so I’m adding this to my murder board (technically sheets of paper I scribble related notes onto; one for class stuff, one on resources, one on monster issues; but calling it a murder board is more fun).

One minor aspect of my looking at resources is that their number has kinda grown on my from my tight Edge/Focus/Reserves… Fatigue being one of the more obvious, but the focus limit on Rallying is another, and while soak points have always been there they start to feel excessive when the list now looks like Edge/Soak/Focus/Rallies/Reserves/Fatigue.

So one of the goals is looking to collapse those a bit… ex. being able to collapse Fatigue back into Reserves again would be a good thing. The main reason they split out was it was too easy to basically do unlimited rituals (spend a reserve, rest an hour after and it’s like you never spent the reserve… plus NPCs didn’t generally have reserves so couldn’t use rituals without a special trait).

But before that I need to do the Guardian stuff and figure out if the Loyal Beast bit is still going to be viable for the Mechanist Summoner. I need to not get ahead of myself.

And scratch the term Threatened... because its too close to Threat.

It figures that I'd get reminded that I actually have a term rule, then forget I have the term rule in the same post.

ETA: after some thesaurus-digging I thing "Pressured" will work for this condition.

The resistance/soak point dynamic you've proposed for the berserker and the guardian could work rather well. I'm curious to see how it fares in testing, especially without the guardians having increased defenses/reserves/edge.

Funny thing regarding berserkers and soak points, the battlerager fighter in 4e revolved around temporary hit points and would have made a fine defender-oriented barbarian if 4e hadn't introduced the primal barbarian.

***

I just realized why the loyal beast version of the mechanist summoner might not work: if the beast is destroyed, then the whole class stops working and you're just an interdictor minus minor spells, like if a regular summoner couldn't summon anything.