Class Rebuild Idea - Less To Keep Track Of

[bkdubs123]

I've always been a fan of making things easier to remember and track, both for the players and for the DM. It's annoying for me to build high level characters because of the sheer volume of feats and class features they have, not to mention skill ranks, or spells/maneuvers (if ya' got 'em). It's annoying to DM for players that continuously rack up a hundred bonuses at a time, because then nobody has an easy time keeping track of things.

So in the interest of simplifying things, making them easier to keep track of, I'm considering restructuring some things so that players of 20th level characters have the same amount of options as those of 1st level characters - just that the options of 20th level characters are much more powerful. Also, I'd probably increase the 1st level options some.

Basically, characters would switch out lower level stuff for higher level stuff when they get it. No, this isn't realistic, I understand that, not the point. As a variant you could obviously just keep the lower level stuff, but then you get back to having just as much stuff to keep track of as normal.

I'd also be very tempted to make changes to bonuses and penalties, applying a rule that they never, ever stack. I'd do away with bonus types and say something to the equivalent of "the highest bonus and penalty applies at all times." So, if a character normally had a +2 bonus to melee attack rolls, but a teammate's spell provided a +4 bonus, while an enemy effect imposed a -1 penalty, he'd have a +3 bonus to attacks. This would also probably warrant a large restructuring of things.

What do people think? Obviously some of you have never had a problem keeping track of all of your abilities and spells. If so, there's no need to post anything like, "Why would you change anything? There's no problem."

[MasterVega]

Careful about taking away options. Take away too many and you drastically limit the party's ability to respond to a threat. You might also force everyone to play one-trick ponies if you're not careful.

Just my two cents.

[bhu]

We'd have to give PC's lots of options at 1st level if we do this method.  Also that raises the question fo front loading classes.  Sure I dont get the advanced abilities, but Ive got options out the yang by taking 3 or 4 different classes.

[veekie]

Hmm, instinctively, I dislike this approach of condensing options. I would very much prefer the reverse, having your new options expand upon older ones, new augmentations,  alternative ways to make use of simple abilities. Much better for consistency that way.

[Runestar]

I am thinking that perhaps spellcasters should have an option to consolidate lower lv slots into higher lv ones (something like the ur-priest, but with fewer/no limits). This should give the player fewer spells to manage, but more spells to play around with (I am betting that very few of your lower lv spells get used anyways).

[bkdubs123]

@Master Vega: Remember, that I included in the post that it would require some restructuring, so what applies to the PCs would apply to the NPCs and Monsters as well.

@Bhu: This post has nothing to do with TC/RPG. The front loading issue is something I'll have to think about as I work with this idea though, so good point.

@Veekie: Again, this idea has nothing to do with realism or consistency. As far as new options building on old ones - that's not a bad idea either, but it worries me that at 20th level a PC might have 4 or 5 "base options" with 50 expanded options. Which is back to the same problem (if you consider it a problem as I do).

@Runestar: That's heading in the direction I'd like to eventually take, but I'd like to make it work across the board for all classes, and all aspects of character generation.