Hey guys, has there been any concerted attempt to make a high fantasy hack for 2d20? Currently aiming to make one myself, lifepath, races, and magic included but would appreciate some inspiration!
I havenāt tried it myself, but really any system could be plopped down into any setting, at least as far as Iām concerned.
You could easily use Conan, change the setting (or not), dtop the oenalties for sorcery, add more spells and weaker magic items that occur more commonly and viola, you have a 2d20 high fantasy game.
3 Likes
I appreciate that sentiment, but the magic in Conan is absolutely not the kind of stuff youād find in a high fantasy setting. Iāll probably reflavor the abilities from Mutant Chroniclesā art powers instead, Conan was what I was planning to use as the framework. Itās just integrating races in a meaningful way in char gen thatās proving to be a road bump so far, to get the D&D feel I was thinking talent trees for each of the classes
[T]he magic in Conan is absolutely not the kind of stuff youād find in a high fantasy setting.
Not in a bog-standard D&D setting, I agree, although if you want to recreate D&Dā¦ it seems sensible to play D&D.
A lot of it would very much fit in as āarts of the enemyā in Middle Earth or many other notionally high fantasy settings. (I actually disagree that Middle Earth really is āhigh fantasyā.) I bet that Conan could be adapted to run something like First Age or Second Age Middle Earth nicely.
Just focusing on Middle Earth in the First and Second Ages, magic is around, but itās not really at all like D&D magic, or even the Vancian magic D&Dās spell system is modeled on. Itās much more subtle overall, for one (although Gandalf does a lot of blasting off-camera), is clearly quite tiring for its casters, and, generally speaking, slow. I think it would do Eternal Champion very well, too, certainly much better than any other game system Iāve ever seen that attempted to handle the way magic works in Moorcockās multiverse.
For all its flaws and inability to model genre, D&D magic has one really big virtueāit allows sorcery on the battlefield in a way that most fictional versions do not. Looking at an old favorite duology that is worth digging out, Brian Daleyās Coramonde novels feature magic, which sometimes breaches to the battlefield, but in general battle magic is difficult and chancy. Two of the three casters in the stories that appear in a substantial way carry weapons and the supporting character casters often have a bevy of soldiers around them.
So it depends a lot on what you intend the role of magic to be and, of course if you add things to the game, for instance some kind of ālight magicā option, with ādark magicā that involves sacrifice and pacts with eldritch entities always being a constant temptation.
1 Like
I did add something like Momentum and Threat to replace Inspiration, which I think is just grafted onto 5E with very little thought on the part of the designers.
Good and Ill Fortune
The party starts each session with three Good Fortune dice, which can be used by a PC to alter any ability, attack, or saving throw made for that PC by adding +D6 to the roll after seeing the result of the D20 but before the result is adjudicated.
You can spend one Good Fortune die in this way. However, you can choose to āPress Your Luckā and add a second die to the roll after seeing the result of the first roll, or if the Good Fortune pool is empty to roll as if it was Good Fortune. However, by doing so, you build up the Ill Fortune pool. These dice are spent by the GM to reduce a PCās roll or counteract a Good Fortune die some time later.
Ill Fortune decreases by one at the end of the session but Good Fortune resets to three at the next session (donāt hoard them).
I award Good Fortune for cool RP or a heroic action of some sort, or having a good idea that advances the plotāthis lets me signal to keep going in that direction. It would make sense to also allow a roll of a natural 20 to, instead of scoring a critical hit, to build Good Fortune and, similarly, a natural 1 to build Ill Fortune. I havenāt done this, but it is a pretty logical extension. If I were to play with this more, I could easily see adding feats that make this better.
I worked out a trial Momentum hack for DnD 5e, but have yet to try it with players. My group didnāt want to play 5e, and so we danced around the system, playing other things, before settling on Conan - which weāre loving.
Anyway, I wrote this draft last year - feel free to use it or comment on it.
1 Like
Any bets there will end up being a Skyrim 2D20 system in 2021- 2022?
1 Like
Iāve considered this and MC3e definetly has the better magic system for Dnd than conan
It also covers a lot of spells
Strangely it looks really easy to port the gensys magic rules into 2d20. They also have a max difficulty of 5 so it lines up quite well. Damage is also similar. Its just the rolls that are different.
and you can swap momentum/successes for advantages. Not really for Dnd - but works for other fantasy games
2 Likes
Two thing I donāt love about D and D that I think a āHigh Fantasyā 2d20 should AVOID are ādisposableā magic that is too available and healing āon tapā. They are the main reasons I play Conan instead of D and D. They reduce jeopardy and therefore tension (and therfore āfunā).
The need for Patrons in BRILLIANT and Iād want to keep it. The best fantasy keeps magic limited for a reason - it steals the show, mainly from the player, and short cuts all the problem-solving that could happen. Healing is even worse. So many stories can revolve around saving a wounded comrade/civilian/stranger. But not in D and D!
A good 2d20 High Fantasy should focus on races, maybe make magic a tiny bit more accessible and a really original, intriguing setting. Thatās what Iām hoping to Homebrew anyway.
2 Likes
Iāve been thinking about how to handle magic under 2d20 outside of what has been put forth in Conan, something to give it a slightly different flavor - less grim, dark, and borderline insane to pursue. I kind of like the idea of setting up spells similar to Star Wars saga force powers but maintain the Resolve cost to cost the spells. Spells would be set up to be cast as in an order of magnitude format from 1 to 5, with higher the magnitude the greater the complexity to cast, spell effect, and resolve to cast.
I could see using something like Stress as a way to limit magic casting, especially more limited short-term casting. Itās dangerous in the context of a particular encounter but recovers fairly quickly after the encounter ends. Bigger or longer term effects can cost more consequential personal resources. This can really work nicely with multiple Stress tracks, with different spells drawing on different Stress tracks.
2 Likes
Iām using the Art from Mutant Chronicles 3e as my baseline for building magic powers now! So talent trees with different schools of magic and then each talent provides access to a couple of spells or allows you to manipulate spells you have in more interesting ways 
I just started looking into Mutant Chronicles. Thatās the sort of set-up I was looking at having for spells.
1 Like
You might also be interested in having a look at my homebrew rules for races and sorcery that are a little more D&D than the original Conan:
Spells
Races
While I like the setup from Mutant Chronicles, it doesnāt have a real feeeling of fantasy in my mind. And I also like the flexibility the Sorcery in Conan gives you - less spells, more effects and more imagination from the player required.
Iām working on more āMeta-Magicā talents at the moemnt, that lets you combine Spell effects etc.
Funny; Iām in the process of doing the opposite. I couldnāt find a local Conan game or convince my regular players to shift to it, so Iām converting Conan to Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea. Iām taking a fair degree of the magic out of the latter, but Iāve devised some pretty creative ways (I think) to keep a lot of the Conan flavor and even some mechanics, like Doom & Momentum. If I could ever join a group running 2d20 Conan Iād do it, but this will work for now. I like these books and this setting too much to not play it in some fashion.
The spells you present, while nicely done, stick pretty close to Conan feel. What appeals to me about the Mutant Chronicles format is that learning spells are directly linked to talents on the various trees, in many ways keeping casters very focused on a particular sphere of magic.
As for races, the STA format hits the target for me there. That said, I like the talent set-up for the different subraces you have for your Dwarf and Elf.
1 Like
The spells you present, while nicely done, stick pretty close to Conan feel. What appeals to me about the Mutant Chronicles format is that learning spells are directly linked to talents on the various trees, in many ways keeping casters very focused on a particular sphere of magic.
As for races, the STA format hits the target for me there. That said, I like the talent set-up for the different subraces you have for your Dwarf and Elf.
Thatās the appeal for me too! Also, as a spell slot system is a rather tricky thing to implment in 2d20 (Read: Impossible unless they add in a class system) the more modular magic of Mutant Chronicles is preferable to me, and also adds a degree of risk to casting spells, similar to Shadowrun. Iāve actually knocked out a conversion of the Warhammer Fantasy Winds of Magic to 2d20 over this weekend! Iām happy to share it, Iāve yet to actually delve into talent trees for each of the winds
Color me interested in taking a look!
Have you got discord or something? I canāt seem to find a PM feature on these forums