Beacon d20 Resources

I decided that I would take what I have on my resources page and just copy/paste it here. I'm not sure that it is necessary for there to be a page for Beacon Resources when I could just have it be a blog post. I'm not even certain that anyone plays Beacon d20, anyway. The blogger that created it has stopped posting to their blog and I don't really hear or see people talking about playing the game. If you think that it'd make resources for the game easier to find or some other reason, post a comment and I'll consider putting the page back up.

Multi-classing in Beacon

While I've been converting NPCs to Beacon from AD&D, I've noticed the discrepancy between systems -- other versions of D&D use multi-classing. This won't be as difficult to handle in B/X and Original D&D modules, but the issue comes up with AD&D and, notably, D&D 3.x/Pathfinder. Beacon doesn't allow multi-classing, yet many modules have NPCs and adversaries who are multi-classed. I have had to grapple with how to handle something like this in converting the first module I converted to Beacon -- Grakhirt's Lair. In this post I'm going to discuss how I have approached it.

To begin with, I wouldn't allow players to multi-class in Beacon. It's technically possible. However, it's an easy way to inflate various skills and intrude on another PC's niche. Certainly, there could be a few fighters and those fighters might be spectacularly distinct from each other. I would nonetheless restrict multi-classing to avert skill inflation. I'm sure that there are a few ways that a group could handle it: The skill bonus in multi-classing is the only skill improvement you receive (i.e. they couldn't also receive a +1 to any skill of their choice when they choose to take a level in another class); Restrict multi-classing to only one other class; perhaps bar Savant as a class that can only be begun with (so as to limit the skill inflation). Indeed, multi-classing in this way might open up a way for the Paladin to exist (Fighter-Cleric). Those limitations might keep the game in balance, but there's another reason for the restriction: Beacon has much OSR flavoring. To be sure, there's multi-classing in AD&D, but the version of D&D that Beacon seems to strive to emulate (know that I don't have Todd Mitchell's word to back me up here) is Original or B/X D&D. In those versions of D&D there is no multi-classing. 

So to sum up, even though, provided the limitations above, multi-classing is possible, it may be worthwhile to restrict it for niche-protection, skill inflation, and the flavor of Old-School Basic D&D.

To the point of my post -- how I deal with multi-classing in modules I'm converting when I don't necessarily allow my players to pursue it -- I have usually dealt with them as monsters with special abilities. Many NPCs in Beacon are handled as monsters. An easy reference is the Human Commoner: HD 1d8 (5-8) AC 10 Dagger or sling (frankly, I'd revise that to club or sling). As the case-study for today's post I'll use the NPC I had described above -- Grakhirt.

Grakhirt, in AD&D1e terms, was a level 2 Assassin and a level 4 Illusionist. In Beacon, this would be Rogue and Enchanter. In the module, he was supposed to cast invisibility and then attempt an AD&D Assassination on one of the PCs (whichever one had been slaying the most near-goblins). I, consequently, gave Grakhirt Subterfuge and Knowledge as his highest skills. I gave Grakhirt the ability to cast spells as a fourth level Enchanter and the ability to sneak attack as a Beacon rogue. To represent the deadliness of AD&D assassination, I gave Grakhirt a rather high Subterfuge.
That's pretty much it. Basically, as most NPCs, treat the originally multi-classed adversary as a monster with special powers from a number of different sources. I imagine that this might be a no-brainer for most Beacon GMs, but I hope that the accompanying house rules on Multi-Classing in Beacon will also be helpful.

Grakhirt's Lair (AD&D1e to Beacon Conversion)

Today I bring you a Beacon d20 conversion of an Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 1st Edition module from Dungeon Magazine. The next module I will convert to Beacon will be an AD&D2e module, also from Dungeon Magazine. I have been converting modules to Beacon from AD&D to see how effective and versatile it is. Also, there is some good stuff in the old modules. I will also be converting these same modules to ACKS to see how well that system can handle material from AD&D (it'll probably be easier than converting to Beacon). The conversion is available in this blog post, on this Google Doc (if I change anything, the changes will be there first), this bookmarked PDF, and this ODT.

Converted from AD&D 1e to Beacon v6: “Grakhirt’s Lair” by John Nephew Dungeon Magazine no 1 pp. 28-37.

Converting AD&D Treasure to Beacon d20 (Illuminating Fantasy Roleplay)

I've been converting AD&D modules to Beacon as sort of a test for how Beacon would handle material from beyond the d20 system. I have two different modules that I am working with. Both are from Dungeon Magazine since that material is available on Archive.org so I assume that whoever could have owned the material has given it up. Each of the modules use both editions of AD&D.

So, to begin with I looked at the currency chains of AD&D1e and AD&D2e (as well, of course, of Beacon). It's interesting to see that AD&D1e attempted to have a strange fluctuation in the value of gold, which was desperately annoying. I found this very useful D&D wiki with both of the currency chains available. So here they are:

AD&D1e

1 gp = 20 sp = 200 cp = 2 ep = 1/5 pp

AD&D2e

1 gp = 10 sp = 100 cp = 2 ep = 1/5 pp

Beacon

1 gp = 10 sp = 100 cp = 1/10 pp

After glancing through the catalog of weapons from AD&D2e, only able to wonder what the equipment prices might be for AD&D1e, comparing prices between gear from AD&D to Beacon, coming up with an average in deviation, I've decided to abandon this and make an arbitrary system. This arbitrary system for AD&D1e will be: all gold is converted to silver, halve silver is converted to copper, halve copper, 2 ep convert to 5 sp, and convert platinum to gold.
For AD&D2e, I might leave everything the same but the original silver and copper amounts will be two-thirds of what they were instead of half.

Beacon Weapon Damage

If you haven't heard of Beacon, well, I suppose that's not too surprising (the rulebook for free). It's based off of the Microlite 20 (M20) explosion from when the d20 system was exploding. The way it outshines the other M20 systems is that Beacon is simply better than them. It's combat system is cleaner. The magic system isn't Vancian, so it's infinitely better. The classes offer a more feasible progression that doesn't really create a skill bloat as other M20 systems did. The races, while only offering the tip on balancing new races that boils down to "don't let the new races be unbalanced," offer a much more nuanced and interesting race option than other M20 systems, and give the fantastic approach that the types of hit dice are based on what race the character is. A frail elf or a little halfling, realistically, should be weaker than humans, dwarves, or orcs.

Of the M20 systems, Beacon is the superior. Like all M20 systems, though, Beacon has its flaws. The largest, in my opinion (besides having AC), is its weapon damage tables. There are two types of weapons, light and heavy. Heavy weapons have a further subtlety added to them -- whether or not they're two-handed. As written the damage system works like this: All light weapons deal 1d6 damage and heavy weapons deal 1d8; one-handed melee weapons add half of a character's Strength modifier (rounded down) while two-handed weapons add the full value. When I read that, I scrunched my eyes in surprise and disbelief. The prices of weapons varies quite a bit (from nothing to 50 silver) to the point that, considering the way that damage works, I could just disregard the prices and tell my players to acquire whatever weapons they feel like having, since it's flavor and doesn't really matter anyway.

I decided that it might be better to not waive the prices of weapons and add a little more complexity to the system, by providing simple damage modifiers to all of the weapons based on their price. That might strike someone as strange, but this isn't GURPS and seemed to solve the issue I had. I figured the average of each of the tables and modified the damage by price grades.

For the Light Weapons, the average was close enough to 8. I decided that the price grades would be 3 below 8 and 7 above 8. So weapons costing 5 sp or less had a -1 to damage, 2 sp or less -2, and the club, which costs nothing, has -3 (I'd assume that minimum damage is still implemented). Likewise, weapons that cost 15 sp have +1 to damage, 22 sp +2, 29 +3, 36 +4, 43 +5, and 50 sp (the rapier) +6.

For the Heavy Weapons, the average is close enough to 26. I decided that I would follow the lead of what I'd done above and reduce the weapon damage to half of the die type -- the decreasing price grade is 6. So weapons that cost 20 sp or less are -1 to damage, 14 sp -2, 8 sp -3, and 2 sp -4. I decided that I would again follow what I had done with light weapons and set the increasing price grade to 9. So weapons that cost 35 sp or more are +1 to damage, 44 sp +2, 53 sp +3, 62 sp +4, 71 sp +5, and 80 sp +6.

So there is my solution to adding some more complexity and nuance to weapon damage in Beacon which will allow players who want to buy a falchion or a bastard sword or a great sword get something for their silver, and no munchkin rogue will just grab a club and think themselves in the clear. Share a comment and let me know if this patch is worthwhile or not.
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