Kobold Press, which collaborated with Wizards of the Coast on some early 5th Edition books and has also produced the massive Tome of Beasts and Creature Codex (and Tome of Beasts 2) books, along with many others, was one of the 3rd party companies that announced their intention to build their own RPG system in the wake of the OGL fiasco. While I haven't written One D&D off, I'm also eager to see the RPG world diversify, and I've been curious to see what these other companies have cooking.
Project Black Flag is the codename for Kobold Press' new RPG system, and there's a free PDF of its initial playtest packet out via this link. I recommend taking a look.
My impressions are fairly positive if a little surprised to see how similar it is to the existing 5th Edition system, but I wanted to point out some of the differences that I think are really notable:
First, you can generate ability scores basically the same way, and then you can add a +2 to any score that's 16 or lower and a +1 to any score that's 17 or lower, which means no one starts with a 20 in their main stat. Point buy and the standard array no longer allow for the +2/+1 bonuses, but those are incorporated into them. The Standard Array is now 16, 15, 13, 12, 10, and 8 - which is a little more rigid, given that currently, you can put you +1 bonus to whatever stat you give the 15 and your +2 to whatever you give the 14 so that you get two +3 modifiers at level 1.
Point buy now has a maximum score to take of 18, and still uses a table where higher scores are harder to come by. So, for example, if I were playing a Rogue and really only wanted to max out my Dex and maybe get some decent Con, I could get Dex to 18, Con to 14, and then put 10s in Int, Wis, and Str, and have an 11 to Cha. If I wanted a broader spread for a Paladin, I could take 16 in Str, 14s in Con and Cha, maybe a 12 in Dex and then, say, a 9 in Int and a 10 in Wis.
The next change I think is actually really cool is the division between Lineage and Heritage. Lineage is the new name or race, and specifically refers to your inherited physical traits - things like a Dwarf's resistance to poison or an Elf's Trance ability. Heritage, then, is the culture you grew up in, and kind of takes the place of "sub-race."
However, because your Heritage is purely cultural, you don't actually have to be a member of that Lineage to pick it. While Elves in this have the Cloud and Grove Heritages (more or less High Elves versus Wood Elves,) if you were a Human raised by Wood Elves, you could take the Human Lineage traits and the Grove Heritage traits. This is also suggested as a way to represent mixed ancestry - if you're a half-elf/half-dwarf, you might physically represent your elfishness in your Lineage while your have all the training and culture of your Fireforge Dwarf heritage.
Backgrounds are fairly similar, and come with a "Talent," which is the equivalent of a Feat. Talents come in different categories - Magic, Martial, and Technical. Like in 5E, you can choose them instead of an ability score improvement at certain levels (we don't have the classes yet, so I don't know if the frequency is different here).
The talents are a little more streamlined - Armor Training, for example, basically works as Lightly Armored, Moderately Armored, and Heavily Armored and you can take it multiple times if you really want your Wizard to wear plate. My general sense is that these talents are a little stronger - for example, the equivalent of Tough not only gives you the +2 bonus to HP for each level but also increases your hit die by one step (for example, giving your Fighter a d12 hit die) though my little quibble here is that it doesn't seem to be retroactive, meaning that you need to take this early if you want to benefit fully.
It's interesting, and closer to 5E than I expected it to be. I'll be curious going forward to see how this develops.
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