Beginner's Essentials

Creating game materials? Monsters, spells, classes, adventures? This is the place!
Sir Bedivere
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Re: Beginner's Essentials

Post by Sir Bedivere »

chiisu81 wrote:I was gonna suggest building off of the current BFRPG standard sheet, since alot of the others are PDF only, but it's a spreadsheet file. Should we just make a new sheet just for the BE within LibreWriter?
Possibly so. If anyone wants to give it a whirl, feel free. EDIT: Actually, before we jump into anything, let me look over BE and the record sheets we have. I'll look over all this over the weekend. I don't want anyone to do a lot of work on this until I have a good idea of what I want to do with BE.
Last edited by Sir Bedivere on Sat Apr 20, 2013 8:27 am, edited 1 time in total.
Sir Bedivere
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Re: Beginner's Essentials

Post by Sir Bedivere »

chiisu81 wrote:
Sir Bedivere wrote:Will there be enough of a change to keep two versions around?
I think we should have a separate file/download for a BE for 3rd edition, and we can polish up the one for 2nd while 3rd is being developed.
Question: If the changes really are minor, do we need two versions of BE? What reason would there be?

Also, 3E mostly fixes 2E bugs and things like that, so won't pretty much everyone shift to 3E?
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SmootRK
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Re: Beginner's Essentials

Post by SmootRK »

Sir Bedivere wrote:
chiisu81 wrote:
Sir Bedivere wrote:Will there be enough of a change to keep two versions around?
I think we should have a separate file/download for a BE for 3rd edition, and we can polish up the one for 2nd while 3rd is being developed.
Question: If the changes really are minor, do we need two versions of BE? What reason would there be?

Also, 3E mostly fixes 2E bugs and things like that, so won't pretty much everyone shift to 3E?
I would stick to a 3e document.... diferences between 2e and 3e lie mostly in page numbers (because of adding some entries (monsters), expanding a few rule texts (to clarify), and otherwise just fixing a few things. I think it would be sort of backwards thinking to try to have a 2e document.... as any new people (once the new edition is ready) will likely download the latest edition (not the older one); the 2e document people will be an ever-diminishing group.
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Hywaywolf
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Re: Beginner's Essentials

Post by Hywaywolf »

Chris is maintaining a 1e presence on the download page even after uploading 2e to not inconvinience anyone who stuck with 1e rather than buy/download new books. I imagine he will do the same thing with 2e once he uploads 3e. Maintaining a 2e BE just remains consistent with that idea. Its not like all the other supplements that build on the core rules and thus really won't be affected by the change in editions. BE is actually a restating of the core rules in a brief format. So if Chris sees a need to keep 2e on the download page, and since we already have a 2e BE, I see a need for keeping 2e BE as well. Its not like its more work, it just staying consistent with current policy on new editions.
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Solomoriah
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Re: Beginner's Essentials

Post by Solomoriah »

Actually, I dropped 1E from the Downloads page a month or two back, because there was really no longer a reason to have it there.

BFRPG is the same game, regardless of whether it is 1E or 2E or 3E. This is a firm design goal, and one that I believe I followed quite well from 1E to 2E. I don't expect 3E to be any different.

Given that, I'd like to see Beginner's Essentials aligned with 3E, after 3E is final. For the moment, I'd prefer no one mess with edition changes to the document. When 3E goes to print, the 2E core will be dropped from the Downloads page, and there will be no point in maintaining a 2E Beginner's Essentials.
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Hywaywolf
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Re: Beginner's Essentials

Post by Hywaywolf »

awesome. If no 2e then no 2e BE. I never liked the idea of keeping 1e up after publishing 2e (or even calling it 2e) so I am glad to see that 2e will be moved once 3e is up.
Sir Bedivere
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Re: Beginner's Essentials

Post by Sir Bedivere »

That answers the question quite handily. Thanks!
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chiisu81
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Re: Beginner's Essentials

Post by chiisu81 »

I've started work on several sheets (LibreOffice Draw, Paint.net and by hand) but I'm not anticipating any would be good enough to include in this document.

Personally my favorite sheet is Steve Zeiser's. The standard sheet has always bugged me: the line weights are all different, savings throws at the bottom, etc. The equipment section is way too large, and instead of notes there needs to be a spells/abilities section. I have the same criticism for Steve's sheet.

Again just my opinion, and so far I've never found a sheet for any rulseset that I've been complete happy with, so I guess that's why I'm trying it out myself. ;)
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Hywaywolf
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Re: Beginner's Essentials

Post by Hywaywolf »

My opinion is that the equipment section just needs to be large enough to show your weapons and armor. You have the whole backside of the sheet to make a long list of your gear.
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chiisu81
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Re: Beginner's Essentials

Post by chiisu81 »

Very true, and a sheet esp. for a beginner/first level isn't likely to have too much on-hand anyways. I've always preferred a generic spell/abilities section, as I'm not personally big on class-specific sheets (ie having to have 2+ different variations to keep track of and/or print out).
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