Fantasy Craft
Fans of OGL 3.5 and Dungeons & Dragons 3.5 have another reason to rejoice: Fantasy Craft from Crafty Games. A massive book totaling 400 pages, Fantasy Craft does to OGL 3.5 what SpyCraft 2.0 did to D20 Modern: revamped it, added to it, and almost made it a new game. Fantasy Craft contains twelve playable races, some from the common fantasy standbys like elf, dwarf, and human. However, there are several new races like the Unborn, Rootwalker, Drake, and Pech. After race is chosen, Fantasy Craft offers twelve character classes and six additional Expert classes, giving players a wide variety of options. In addition, the mechanics outside of character generation, including everything from magic to combat to role-playing, have been redesigned, rewritten, or just plain expanded.
Not to dwell on the point, but when I first opened SpyCraft 2.0 and read through it, I was duly impressed. I felt like SpyCraft 2.0 was what the D20 Modern SRD could become in the hands of a master. I got the same feeling as I read through Fantasy Craft. It was like the D20 Fantasy SRD only bigger, badder, and more of it. To be perfectly fair, neither SpyCraft 2.0 nor Fantasy Craft is fully compliant with the OGL rules, but their rules are close enough to OGL that Fantasy Craft feels very familiar, while also feeling improved.
Of all the areas that Crafty Games changed or differed from the OGL rules, there are three that stand out as being the most interesting. The first is class selection. As noted above, there are twelve classes you can begin the game playing, and an additional six you can take levels in once you meet the requirements. (For veteran OGL players, Expert classes are the same as prestige classes.) However, the nice thing about Fantasy Craft is that Crafty Games decided to do away with the traditional Fighter, Barbarian, Rogue, Wizard, etc. classes and replace them with some less common options.
Players can choose from Assassin, Burglar, Captain, Courtier, Explorer, Keeper, Lancer, Mage, Priest, Sage, Scout, and Solider as level 1. Some of those classes would appear to be the same as classes in Dungeons & Dragons with a different name, but that is not the case. A Priest is a far better fighter than a Cleric ever was (strangely enough), able to take more damage, and is far more able to perform faith-based miracles. Still, there are some similarities. Priests can cast spells, use holy symbols which double as weapons, and have their actions dictated by their alignment. Also, instead of “Fighter”, players can choose from several different styles of martial experts: Captains, Scouts, Lancers, or Soldiers. Each has their own strengths and weaknesses in fighting styles.
The magic system has also been completely revamped from OGL spellcasting. In Fantasy Craft, spells are a skill based. What this means is that once a character is able to cast spells, they get to learn a certain number of spells based on their Wisdom and skill at casting. However, the number of spells a character can cast at a time varies between arcane and divine spellcasters.
Whenever an arcane spellcaster wants to cast a spell, the caster must have the required amount of Spell Points to power it. If so, the arcane magic-user may attempt to cast the spell as normal. If not, the caster cannot summon the concentration, arcane connection, or energy to actually complete the spell. The good news is that Spell Points recharge at the beginning of each Scene, which can mean that they will recharge far more often than a mage recovers his spells in OGL games.
Divine spellcasters’ magic works more like Encounter powers in Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition. Divine spellcasters have one or more paths set by their alignment which define both how they act and the powers that are available to them. Some of these powers include various spell-like abilities, which are usually available to the caster once per Scene.
The characters, with their magic and new class choices, still need a world in which to adventure. Fortunately, Fantasy Craft offers ways to help define the world and the setting. In fact, there is a section in the book entitled “The World” which is a “mere” 80 pages dedicated to helping Gamemasters (GMs) flesh out the setting for their campaign.
This chapter covers everything from genre (sword and sorcery, non-magical fantasy, etc.) to basic questions such as “Does magic work?” or “Can Priests perform miracles?” to trade to politics. The World also contains all of the alignment Paths open to religious and devout individuals, which include the standard Paths one might expect (Good, Evil, Order, Chaos) as well as “Path of the Traveler”, “Path of Beauty”, and “Path of Metal.” Followers of these paths travel, socialize, and craft better than those who do not.
If the game suffers from a flaw, it’s that in some cases, bigger is not always better. Characters in Fantasy Craft start out with more Feats and skills than an equivalent OGL character, which means that their power level (though balanced in the game) may feel off kilter for those familiar with other versions of the game.
Also, some rules feel excessive. For instance, there is a rule for allowing a character to live after they should have died, which is fine, but it takes about a page to explain. It involves the player coming up with an excuse for the character living, the players voting on the excuse, the GM rolling on a mishap table, and so on. Obviously such rules are optional, but at the same time, their presence suggests a crunchy, rules-lawyer-based style of play that doesn’t always produce the most fun.
Still, in most cases, “bigger, badder, more of it” is a good thing. It’s obvious that Crafty Games put a lot of work into producing Fantasy Craft and putting out a product they would want to play. With its new classes, totally revamped magic system, and the World creation rules, Fantasy Craft is something other gamers will want to play as well.
Full disclosure: Chris Perrin is currently an officer in a company that has been approved to release a Fantasy Craft product. He is not currently working on that game.
Want to learn more about Fantasy Craft? Read on…
- Atomic Array: Fantasy Craft (Atomic Array 032)
- Game Cryer: Review by Chris Perrin
- Questing GM: Questing with Fantasy Craft
- allgeektout: What Fantasy Craft Has to Offer
- Campaign Mastery: Mine Fiction for Campaign Qualities
- Emerson’s Bookshelf: Fantasy Just Got Crafty
- Critical Hits: Critical Review
- Fear the Boot: Fear the Review
- Gnome Stew: What Fantasy Craft Brings to the Table
- Uncle Bear: Fantasy Craft Chargen
- Flames Rising: Dark FantasyCraft Review
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January 29th, 2010 at 06:49
Nice web site man, picked up a couple nuggets here…just can’t wait for Cataclysm, I saw a rumor that it’s being released November 2010, however with Blizz you never know :/