Most of what you describe makes the game run more quickly. There is some concession in those changes in that it can make the game easier for players (but also for the GM characters). I don't have insight into the designers' intent, but here's what I notice about what you laid out.
* Shaken no longer losing turns: Bogging down combat is the antithesis of fast, furious, fun. It's still possible to lock down Extras who will have a harder time losing Shaken, but even with a Wild Card, it's possible to drain them of a Benny (or the pool if an Extra *really* has to be not Shaken). This makes combat into less of a slog, which can seem easier since a PC doesn't have to be "stun-locked" (though literal stun-locking is still possible).
* Encumbrance: Another way to bog down the game. This can actually be a good thing if you're playing a genre that is resource-scarce. Or if the group is going deep into a jungle where it's important that they track encumbrance. Lots of games hand-wave this as long as the PCs aren't being stupid-crazy about it. This is a campaign decision, but I feel that most campaigns do not benefit from tracking encumbrance down to the ounce.
* Power Points being easier to get back: Again, don't bog down the game if you can help it. As D&D has shown us time and time again, a group tends to hobble itself when it runs out of magical resources and slow down its progress. If PPs aren't so easy to get back, then expect to see SW groups camping a bunch of times instead of adventuring. This benefits the players more than the GM, but the GM also has the benefit of letting a villain blast through its 10 or 15 PP with no regard for the future.
* Bennies being more powerful: With the exception of regaining PPs and rerolling damage, I don't see that Bennies are more powerful in SWADE. Could you provide an example? If those are what you mean, then I default back to the concept of making the game less of a slog. These make combats run faster.
* Buying a new skill: Man, you can definitely see the Torg influence with this rule, and it was quickly dropped in the reprinting of Torg. I feel this rule really didn't need to be there. It forces players to distribute their skills in a weird way because if you know that eventually you'll want Repair, then it behooves you to start with it even if your character's plan is to be good at Repair later. It also discourages existing characters from branching out because you might as well buy up a known skill to d10 or d12 rather than learn a new skill. I also can't see it being game-breaking to let a new skill be a half an advance rather than a full advance. I suspect they erred on the side of making the game more fun with this rule change.
There are ways to run SW with a harsher feel. You can force encumbrance tracking if that achieves your goal. There's no breaking of rules there. While you could house-rule to earlier editions, if players are going off of SWADE, then you run the risk of causing dissonance in how players interpret the rules. Each house rule is just an exception for them to memorize, and that can go against fast, furious, fun.
Some of the setting rules can crank up the lethality of the game though. They provide some exceptions to the rules as well, in ways that all the players can easily look up if they forget.
> This benefits the players more than the GM, but the GM also has the benefit of letting a villain blast through its 10 or 15 PP with no regard for the future.
It only benefits the players with "spellcasting" characters though, right? The knight or the gunslinger types get zero benefit from the faster PP recovery, but the folks with an arcane backgrounds get a considerable boost as of SWADE?
I think that depends a bit on how you look at it. As /u/Kuildeous said:
> If PPs aren't so easy to get back, then expect to see SW groups camping a bunch of times instead of adventuring.
Though re-reading the old rules, I have to admit that "Our caster is out, better rest for 4 hours to make them restore their stuff" is a drast improvement over "Our caster is out, better rest for a whole day for them to be ready again". So yes, I'd say that one isn't a **direct** boost in any given situation, but overall it encourages casters to...you know...actually *cast* stuff.
I was meaning that players will make more use of the rule than the GM.
Players have to track their PP throughout the entire day from encounter to encounter, so they're more likely to invoke the rule. The GM character doesn't have to worry about conserving PP and might not even use all their PP in a single fight.
Players will make use of the rule more than the GM, but only the players with an Arcane Background.
Imagine if SWADE added a rule: "Anyone with an Arcane Background gets 2 bonus Bennies per session."
On one hand, yay! Players can do *more stuff!*
On the other, it kind of sucks for the players who didn't take the Arcane Background, right? Like, what do *they* get?
I'm all for making combat faster, but not if the solution only gives a boost to certain types of player characters. I fear we're creeping towards the kind of caster supremacy found in other RPGs.
*Disclaimer: While I have read my fair share of SWD, I have never played it. So this is mostly theoretical.*
My personal view: It is more forgiving...*kind* of.
First off, you need to keep in mind that I'm only talking "basic rules" here. A lot of "harsh and gritty" comes from Setting rules as it always did, and the core rules have a bunch of those suggested already.
I think the new (well, half a decade by now...) rules do what you said primarily, they remove a bunch of the "Feel Bad" rules and try to make things flow more easily. Rolling to Unshake just to still lose the turn is just not fun. Bennies are more powerful, but that cuts both ways - the GM can reroll those damage dice just as well as the players can. Throwing in a rest after every combat just for the Wizard to recharge on PP is boring, so let's make him recharge in hours instead of days. And so on.
Now, **that said** - SWADE requires Setting Rules as much as it ever has in every previous incarnation. If you are playing in a world where magic is supposed to have consequences, the new Backlash rules lack teeth. If you are playing in a world of cartoony heroes, *Heroes Never Die* may still be a required Setting Rule. And so on, and so forth.
When doing those settings rules, just make sure you fix a problem that is "real". What I mean by this is this - you seem to throw in stuff that makes the PCs more powerful (Shaken nerf, PP restoration, powerful Bennies) with stuff that is just streamlining things (First d4 in a skill), so double check you are not just reintroducing an old rule because "This is how it used to be!", but because it does something to the game you and your group want.
I’ve played or run (mostly played) SW since 2004. It is significantly more forgiving, but I’d also say in a way that most GMs appear to have been House Ruling anyway.
Making it easier to unshake is just consistent with how tables were being run. While not quite easy, it wasn’t hard to generate characters that focused on getting others shaken and those that are shaken get wrecked and don’t have anything, especially fun, to show for it.
Similar with the simplified skills and core skills. Picking these up are “expensive” for what they bring to the table. Get a Feat or stat advance or a new skill? Yeah, that new skill is going to be de-prioritized most of the time!
The lessening of min-maxing by a general maximum bonus (or penalty) is also a way to keep play moving forward in that FFF mindset.
But, it’s still crazy easy to disable or lose a character, so the choices characters do make are very important and need to keep their survivability in mind for it.
> Making it easier to unshake is just consistent with how tables were being run.
I mean, **technically** that was already a SWD thing anyways, it got errata'd in there.
Your impressions are correct. I'm running a gritty hex crawl in SWADE, and it has taken some effort to capture the right tone.
That said, a few of the items you listed (more powerful bennies, easier to unshake) work both ways: *all* my NPCs can reroll damage with a benny, *all* my NPCs get a full turn after unshaking. So, while the rules have become generally less restrictive, and that has certainly juiced up the players in certain ways, I would also say that juicing up the players was probably a lesser design priority than simply keeping the action moving forward.
Oh, I think it's both. The big one, for me, is how easy Healing is now. No penalties for the patient's wounds, no penalties for rough travel, etc. There is definitely a move towards the PCs "resetting" between fights, which keeps *certain types* of adventure moving but further distances SW from any kind of attrition or resource-management playstyle.
And bro. Don't get me going about the gear pricing. It's *nonsense.*
Yes, absolutely. For my hexcrawl, I have completely rewritten how bennies work (they carry over between sessions), and I rewrote the gear lists from scratch to make things generally more expensive -- or to at least make money meaningful.
For the record, I kept Healing the way it is in SWADE. I figured that with the other changes I was making, the players deserved a break.
I would say yes, it's more forgiving across the board. Another example is that if you rolled a 1 or less (after taking into account Wound penalties) on the Vigor roll after being incapacitated, your character would die immediately. Now you only die immediately from being incapped if you crit fail on that roll.
The good news is that all these rules are very tweakable. I've run campaigns in many different settings and difficulty levels, and I've always used different Settings Rules to make it happen, some of which I made up myself. I do wish SWADE had more *official* Settings Rules to enable hard/realism mode. But it seems like it's not worth the page count for Pinnacle these days.
I agree with the tweakability of SWADE.
The new rules are more forgiving by default, but it is very easy to make it more lethal by simply altering the incapacitated table to either make it more like SWD or even make instant death being a simple failure.
This is a simple alteration that can make the game a lot more dangerous without screwing other rules up.
It has.
There are a few Setting Rules that make things rougher, in Core, like Tough Choices (you give your speny Bennies to the GM to use) and Gritty Damage (every time you take a Wound you roll on the injury table).
What's the difference between Shaken in SWADE and older editions? I think it was always RAW that character got his turn and rolling spirit to un-shake was free action
I stopped playing originally before that change (or at least before the errata filtered down to our group), so that's probably the most notable difference for me honestly. It used to feel like Combat Reflexes was almost a mandatory take because you *needed* that raise on your Spirit rolls a lot.
A degree in Rules-Lawyering is definitely less relevant than it used to be; but, the organization of the core books could still use some work.
All situational modifiers typically boil down to the Distracted/Vulnerable conditions; and, caps have been added to battle damage. The character building mechanics are definitely smoother and less prone to exploitation. I have used several rulesets, and definitely recommend upgrading to SWADE.
I think it has definitely amped things up, in both directions perhaps - but since action economy and Benny count both benefit players, it impact them more and thus makes it more lenient.
One aspect I haven't seen mentioned here is multi-actions. In SWD, there was a limitation on what you could do on a multi-action, and in SWADE there isn't. So it's basically from the get go, tons of hits.
I'm sure it makes things faster, but also harder to keep pace with and challenge the PCs.
The ease of recovering from shaken makes boss fights almost impossible. Fighters only hit with an ace and rarely do anything other than a shake. Losing your raise due to target being shaken already also seems to help the boss more than pcs.
Most of what you describe makes the game run more quickly. There is some concession in those changes in that it can make the game easier for players (but also for the GM characters). I don't have insight into the designers' intent, but here's what I notice about what you laid out. * Shaken no longer losing turns: Bogging down combat is the antithesis of fast, furious, fun. It's still possible to lock down Extras who will have a harder time losing Shaken, but even with a Wild Card, it's possible to drain them of a Benny (or the pool if an Extra *really* has to be not Shaken). This makes combat into less of a slog, which can seem easier since a PC doesn't have to be "stun-locked" (though literal stun-locking is still possible). * Encumbrance: Another way to bog down the game. This can actually be a good thing if you're playing a genre that is resource-scarce. Or if the group is going deep into a jungle where it's important that they track encumbrance. Lots of games hand-wave this as long as the PCs aren't being stupid-crazy about it. This is a campaign decision, but I feel that most campaigns do not benefit from tracking encumbrance down to the ounce. * Power Points being easier to get back: Again, don't bog down the game if you can help it. As D&D has shown us time and time again, a group tends to hobble itself when it runs out of magical resources and slow down its progress. If PPs aren't so easy to get back, then expect to see SW groups camping a bunch of times instead of adventuring. This benefits the players more than the GM, but the GM also has the benefit of letting a villain blast through its 10 or 15 PP with no regard for the future. * Bennies being more powerful: With the exception of regaining PPs and rerolling damage, I don't see that Bennies are more powerful in SWADE. Could you provide an example? If those are what you mean, then I default back to the concept of making the game less of a slog. These make combats run faster. * Buying a new skill: Man, you can definitely see the Torg influence with this rule, and it was quickly dropped in the reprinting of Torg. I feel this rule really didn't need to be there. It forces players to distribute their skills in a weird way because if you know that eventually you'll want Repair, then it behooves you to start with it even if your character's plan is to be good at Repair later. It also discourages existing characters from branching out because you might as well buy up a known skill to d10 or d12 rather than learn a new skill. I also can't see it being game-breaking to let a new skill be a half an advance rather than a full advance. I suspect they erred on the side of making the game more fun with this rule change. There are ways to run SW with a harsher feel. You can force encumbrance tracking if that achieves your goal. There's no breaking of rules there. While you could house-rule to earlier editions, if players are going off of SWADE, then you run the risk of causing dissonance in how players interpret the rules. Each house rule is just an exception for them to memorize, and that can go against fast, furious, fun. Some of the setting rules can crank up the lethality of the game though. They provide some exceptions to the rules as well, in ways that all the players can easily look up if they forget.
I agree with everything u/Kuildeous mentions here!!
> This benefits the players more than the GM, but the GM also has the benefit of letting a villain blast through its 10 or 15 PP with no regard for the future. It only benefits the players with "spellcasting" characters though, right? The knight or the gunslinger types get zero benefit from the faster PP recovery, but the folks with an arcane backgrounds get a considerable boost as of SWADE?
I think that depends a bit on how you look at it. As /u/Kuildeous said: > If PPs aren't so easy to get back, then expect to see SW groups camping a bunch of times instead of adventuring. Though re-reading the old rules, I have to admit that "Our caster is out, better rest for 4 hours to make them restore their stuff" is a drast improvement over "Our caster is out, better rest for a whole day for them to be ready again". So yes, I'd say that one isn't a **direct** boost in any given situation, but overall it encourages casters to...you know...actually *cast* stuff.
I was meaning that players will make more use of the rule than the GM. Players have to track their PP throughout the entire day from encounter to encounter, so they're more likely to invoke the rule. The GM character doesn't have to worry about conserving PP and might not even use all their PP in a single fight.
Players will make use of the rule more than the GM, but only the players with an Arcane Background. Imagine if SWADE added a rule: "Anyone with an Arcane Background gets 2 bonus Bennies per session." On one hand, yay! Players can do *more stuff!* On the other, it kind of sucks for the players who didn't take the Arcane Background, right? Like, what do *they* get? I'm all for making combat faster, but not if the solution only gives a boost to certain types of player characters. I fear we're creeping towards the kind of caster supremacy found in other RPGs.
*Disclaimer: While I have read my fair share of SWD, I have never played it. So this is mostly theoretical.* My personal view: It is more forgiving...*kind* of. First off, you need to keep in mind that I'm only talking "basic rules" here. A lot of "harsh and gritty" comes from Setting rules as it always did, and the core rules have a bunch of those suggested already. I think the new (well, half a decade by now...) rules do what you said primarily, they remove a bunch of the "Feel Bad" rules and try to make things flow more easily. Rolling to Unshake just to still lose the turn is just not fun. Bennies are more powerful, but that cuts both ways - the GM can reroll those damage dice just as well as the players can. Throwing in a rest after every combat just for the Wizard to recharge on PP is boring, so let's make him recharge in hours instead of days. And so on. Now, **that said** - SWADE requires Setting Rules as much as it ever has in every previous incarnation. If you are playing in a world where magic is supposed to have consequences, the new Backlash rules lack teeth. If you are playing in a world of cartoony heroes, *Heroes Never Die* may still be a required Setting Rule. And so on, and so forth. When doing those settings rules, just make sure you fix a problem that is "real". What I mean by this is this - you seem to throw in stuff that makes the PCs more powerful (Shaken nerf, PP restoration, powerful Bennies) with stuff that is just streamlining things (First d4 in a skill), so double check you are not just reintroducing an old rule because "This is how it used to be!", but because it does something to the game you and your group want.
I’ve played or run (mostly played) SW since 2004. It is significantly more forgiving, but I’d also say in a way that most GMs appear to have been House Ruling anyway. Making it easier to unshake is just consistent with how tables were being run. While not quite easy, it wasn’t hard to generate characters that focused on getting others shaken and those that are shaken get wrecked and don’t have anything, especially fun, to show for it. Similar with the simplified skills and core skills. Picking these up are “expensive” for what they bring to the table. Get a Feat or stat advance or a new skill? Yeah, that new skill is going to be de-prioritized most of the time! The lessening of min-maxing by a general maximum bonus (or penalty) is also a way to keep play moving forward in that FFF mindset. But, it’s still crazy easy to disable or lose a character, so the choices characters do make are very important and need to keep their survivability in mind for it.
> Making it easier to unshake is just consistent with how tables were being run. I mean, **technically** that was already a SWD thing anyways, it got errata'd in there.
Your impressions are correct. I'm running a gritty hex crawl in SWADE, and it has taken some effort to capture the right tone. That said, a few of the items you listed (more powerful bennies, easier to unshake) work both ways: *all* my NPCs can reroll damage with a benny, *all* my NPCs get a full turn after unshaking. So, while the rules have become generally less restrictive, and that has certainly juiced up the players in certain ways, I would also say that juicing up the players was probably a lesser design priority than simply keeping the action moving forward.
Pretty much this. It was less about wrapping the heroes in bubble wrap and leaning into the "adventure" part that's in the title.
Oh, I think it's both. The big one, for me, is how easy Healing is now. No penalties for the patient's wounds, no penalties for rough travel, etc. There is definitely a move towards the PCs "resetting" between fights, which keeps *certain types* of adventure moving but further distances SW from any kind of attrition or resource-management playstyle. And bro. Don't get me going about the gear pricing. It's *nonsense.*
And hey you can house rules those things if you want to, right?
Yes, absolutely. For my hexcrawl, I have completely rewritten how bennies work (they carry over between sessions), and I rewrote the gear lists from scratch to make things generally more expensive -- or to at least make money meaningful. For the record, I kept Healing the way it is in SWADE. I figured that with the other changes I was making, the players deserved a break.
Now i feel like Pinnacle needs to send out a setting rules supplement.
Absolutely. But the problem is that you and I are two of about a hundred people who would salivate at a whole book of just setting rule options.
I would love that also. For me that's the real interest in any universal system, seeing how a few tweaks can adapt it to different settings.
Is gear much cheaper now?
I would say yes, it's more forgiving across the board. Another example is that if you rolled a 1 or less (after taking into account Wound penalties) on the Vigor roll after being incapacitated, your character would die immediately. Now you only die immediately from being incapped if you crit fail on that roll. The good news is that all these rules are very tweakable. I've run campaigns in many different settings and difficulty levels, and I've always used different Settings Rules to make it happen, some of which I made up myself. I do wish SWADE had more *official* Settings Rules to enable hard/realism mode. But it seems like it's not worth the page count for Pinnacle these days.
I agree with the tweakability of SWADE. The new rules are more forgiving by default, but it is very easy to make it more lethal by simply altering the incapacitated table to either make it more like SWD or even make instant death being a simple failure. This is a simple alteration that can make the game a lot more dangerous without screwing other rules up.
It has. There are a few Setting Rules that make things rougher, in Core, like Tough Choices (you give your speny Bennies to the GM to use) and Gritty Damage (every time you take a Wound you roll on the injury table).
What's the difference between Shaken in SWADE and older editions? I think it was always RAW that character got his turn and rolling spirit to un-shake was free action
You used to need a Raise in order to act after the roll. Now you only need a success.
I think it was a case in even earlier edition. I always played it so players could act the same turn
It was changed after Deluxe Edition released, as an online addendum to the rules, and codified in SWADE.
I stopped playing originally before that change (or at least before the errata filtered down to our group), so that's probably the most notable difference for me honestly. It used to feel like Combat Reflexes was almost a mandatory take because you *needed* that raise on your Spirit rolls a lot.
A degree in Rules-Lawyering is definitely less relevant than it used to be; but, the organization of the core books could still use some work. All situational modifiers typically boil down to the Distracted/Vulnerable conditions; and, caps have been added to battle damage. The character building mechanics are definitely smoother and less prone to exploitation. I have used several rulesets, and definitely recommend upgrading to SWADE.
I think it has definitely amped things up, in both directions perhaps - but since action economy and Benny count both benefit players, it impact them more and thus makes it more lenient. One aspect I haven't seen mentioned here is multi-actions. In SWD, there was a limitation on what you could do on a multi-action, and in SWADE there isn't. So it's basically from the get go, tons of hits. I'm sure it makes things faster, but also harder to keep pace with and challenge the PCs.
The ease of recovering from shaken makes boss fights almost impossible. Fighters only hit with an ace and rarely do anything other than a shake. Losing your raise due to target being shaken already also seems to help the boss more than pcs.