I sometimes make a rod for my own back; some may even say it is of Deadly Casting. At present I am running three different D20 Fantasy games: True20, D&D 4e and Pathfinder 2e. Each of these games are terrific and deliver a different experience at the table. True20 particularly stands out as different, just as it did back in 2006, delivering a high fantasy experience with an ever present sense of vulnerability, having discarded the Hit Point bloat trope of classic D20 games. I am mindful of the similar style and feel of 4e and PF2e. They are both super-heroic player character high fantasy games with a super tanker load of options and widgets built around fairly sleek tactical play. I love them all.
At the same time I am really enjoying playing out D&D 5e adventures in gloomdark Barovia. Dom is running an excellent game in a well developed setting. Our group approach is fairly gung-ho and out to resolve the place by toppling the evil vampiric count in the centre of it all. I think this game has pushed my capacity to juggle multiple iterations of D20 beyond my limit. D&D Beyond, if you like. Concurrently I am juggling variations in sub-systems such as Initiative, Criticals, Saving Throws, Action Economies, Attacks of Opportunity, Spell Management, Healing, Aiding Another, and the list goes on. They are all close, designed variations of similar themes, but they are all different, and I do sometimes get muddled. My groups are all fantastic gamers and make everything fun and rewarding. They also carry some of the game rule load, so that I can manage the games I run, or manage my player character in the case of the Barovian Strahd.
Of the games I am playing, I have to admit that 4e may well be my favourite. I’d like to go deeper with it, and the campaign that we have commenced could have long term legs, affording an opportunity to delve into the Points of Light back catalogue whilst pushing the game rules to see where it takes us. Both Pathfinder 2e and True 20 games have something about them too, with Pathfinder being 27 sessions in, I can tell you that it delivers a sustainable and fun rules chassis for heroic fantasy long term play. It’s tremendous. True 20 has given me a D20 edgier expression that I have been adapting for the long term as my Truer20!
This is almost all good, but there are casualties. The most recent one seems to be my capacity to play my 5e character effectively. I think I may be letting the group down a bit by my sub-optimal rules play. I can turn on some elvish charm when the moment requires and I have a sense of my position in the group team and role interplay, but I think the weight of all my other gaming has pushed me into only a light understanding of the character’s sorcerer abilities, which at critical times have undermined group success. I could fumble excuses about Roll20 sheet design, folding away powers that I missed, but there is no excuse. I should know what my character can do and push these to the limit, not least because the setting is bleak and unforgiving. A heavy and challenging real life work load probably compounds my congested cognitive faculties.
In our 5e game, I sense that most of the opposition we face are considerably more powerful than us and I have felt for some time that we are always a session or two away from a TPK. Our last session was very close to, and perhaps should have been a TPK. Mid-way through, myself and another player simply accepted the inevitability of it and decided to go down fighting. It was a calm moment in a difficult session. However, we would be more effective if we harmonised our abilities as a team to get at the opposition, as is essential with all these D20 team games. I will have to step up a little bit more to play my part in that. It’s not a ‘rock up and just enjoy the play’ kind of game. It has setting depth and just enough rule depth for me to have to get my overstuffed brain around it.
At North Star I plan to run a session of Traveller, which will take me right of the D20 mold and will be a nice refreshing change.
Enjoying the gaming so very much, but I think I have reached my processing limits. It may be time to dial back on one of the games to let me be more excellent at the others?