# data[].attributes.body
August 30th, 2022

A few days ago I was struggling on an answer to a problem I was having. I wanted many powerful spellcasters to be able to cast incredibly strong magic, and I wanted to simultaneously allow a party of adventurers specifically the players to be able to cast higher slots than on their own. In order to solve this, I figured out how much 'mana' casters of certain strength would have, and made it so 2 casters of equal level could cast one level higher, 10 casters two levels, and 30 casters three levels higher. In this manner, a party could potentially cast high magic. At the same time, a large group could cast a powerful spell to say resurrect someone, or create a floating city.

# data[].attributes.body
August 31st, 2022

Horizontal scaling is gaining more versatility and options, vertical scaling is gaining bigger numbers at its core. I am struggling to find a good solution to encourage horizontal scaling rather than pure vertical scaling, without forcing it, as I'd like the system to have highly customizable players, this is the same reason I do not have classes in my system. Instead, I represent character progression through 'maneuvers' and 'spelltwists.' These can be learning using xp, or experience which is rewarded to players on occasion. These act as modifiers on standard attacks and spells that you cast, often being advantageous in certain situations but disadvantageous in others. This is tied to the system for raising your stats, which grant vertical scaling. I made a maneuver significantly cheaper than raising your stats, but I am not sure if this will work the way I intended. To figure this out I am going to form a group of playtesters and see how they spend their 'xp'

# data[].attributes.body
September 2nd, 2022

I have been guiding some people through character creation, and have created a 'quick build' system. I am going to make example substat distributions for various types of characters. This would help new players make characters, as a new system can always be overwhelming.

# data[].attributes.body
To enhance character customization, I have added 'boons.' You may spend XP (experience) points to gain a boon instead of raising your attributes, substats, or skills. A difficulty with this system is balancing the XP cost of the boons so they are worth an equal amount to simply 'raising your numbers' so to speak. Not too much to make them always worth the price, but not too little they are worthless.

# data[].attributes.body
In terms of character building, this weekend I overhauled the system by making it so you start with low stats and no skills, and you use the XP system to purchase your stats. I have implemented a system where at certain levels of a stat it gets more expensive to raise (costs x below 5, costs y below 10, etc.) In this way it encourages not raising simply one stat, and diversifying your character's abilities.

# data[].attributes.body
September 12th, 2022
Last Friday I did a playtest of the system with two people, during the playtest I discovered what I thought to be an issue. The 'issue' was that combat was bland, but this was because my players did not learn any combat maneuvers. I thought about this for a while, an made the realization that this allows for a new player who isn't familiar with the system to not get maneuvers so that they do not need to worry about another level of depth to the system, and only need to focus on moving and attacking, a system which is very similar to other tabletops.

# data[].attributes.body
For simplicities sake, I have prepared several standard arrays and sets of starting equipment to take to make character creation as optionally simple as possible, as such what used to be an endeavor that took hours of time now only is as long as you wish it to be.

# data[].attributes.body
I did a dungeon playtest with two people, and learned a few things. Namely, summoning is too powerful, and secondly, combat rounds take too long when playing summoners. Luckily, these two issues can be solved by just reducing how powerful summoners are. I am going to simply reduce the number of control points a summoner has, and make it so you must spend resources to control your summons.

# data[].attributes.body
Something I have realized is in order to make a good baseline, I need more spells. In the system, there are ten levels of spells, and in order to have a system I can publish, I need at least a few spells of each level. Notably, there are very few spells of levels 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, and 10th level. This is because in the system it is very difficult to access these, but I still should have enough that a power level for each slot is well established.

# data[].attributes.body
here is a link to the rules so far:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1hSRp44rnAAtscWfJLYZZxuOV2_yhmj9Yk_jXXyw-NUQ/edit?usp=sharing

# data[].attributes.body
I designed a character sheet, learning from my mistakes I went for a more spread out and legible design opposed to hyper-compressed information

# data[].attributes.body
A personal deadline I had was to create a baseline for the rules and have enough content that a balance is established. I have succeeded with flying colors, as I have completed this before my break in early October. I am now focusing on balancing the system, and making it feel fair and balanced, as opposed to a chaotic cesspit it could become should I neglect to do this. One such balance change was changing the cost to replenish a spell slot, to make 1st level spells more valuable. This in turn is reducing the main weakness of a caster being that they require a long time to recover their magic. I have shifted this weakness to time, and as such I am going to make casting go very late in initiative, which in turn means that a spellcaster will need to stay back to cast crazier spells, as a fighter could very well approach and slice at them, interrupting their cast spell.

# data[].attributes.body
Monsters are an essential bit of content for all ttrpg's. Over the past few weeks while I have not added many more monsters, I have learned a lot about balance. I am a lazy person, so I prefer to get things right the first go around. As such I am rebalancing as I figure out what numbers best represent a monsters abilities.

# data[].attributes.body
In order to make magic items in my system more distinct, and to encourage player creativity I am going to implement a system that allows players to use magic items in different ways, for example, using an amulet that heals you passively to heal another instead. If you succeed in the roll, then this is a new feature of the item that only you can use. You can teach it to others if you wish, but they too must roll the check.

# data[].attributes.body
I have begun to lose interest in the project, and I do not know if I will carry this on to official publishing. My motivation has not yet run dry, so I believe a change of pace is needed. I am going to work on worldbuilding and the lore of the universe as opposed to the rules for a week or two.