[Introduction] About 13th Age

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General Information about 13th Age

• Overview
• Icons
• Character Mechanics
  • One Unique Thing
  • Icon Relationships
  • Backgrounds
  • Races
  • Classes
  • Feats
• Combat Mechanics
  • Escalation Die
  • Simplified Monsters/NPCs
  • Abstract Positioning
  • Simplified Mechanics
• Story Mechanics
  • Icon Relationship Rolls
  • Montage
  • Magic Items
• External Resources

Currently brought to you by hippo, Tilal, hvg3akaek, Aethera, and Ghostwriter.

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Overview of 13th Age

About 13th Age 13th Age is a recent d20 fantasy roleplaying game from Jonathan Tweet and Rob Heinsoo, the lead developers of D&D 3e and 4e respectively. Called their “love letter to D&D”, 13th Age provides a familiar D&D experience enhanced with story-telling hooks that put players at the heart of building a campaign. I believe its combination of innovative story mechanics and streamlined combat makes 13th Age a great option for a play-by-post site like RPG Crossing.

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About Icons

Icons Most d20 games have powerful NPCs who shape the world behind the scenes. 13th Age brings them forward, making these thirteen powerful NPCs into icons the PCs will aid or oppose over the course of each campaign.

For individual Icons, consult the appropriate setting information thread listed here or in your game forum:

• The Dragon Empire

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One Unique Thing

Make Your Character Interesting Every character in 13th Age has something special about them in a narrative sense. These "One Unique Things" (or Uniques as they'll henceforth be known) is not just a personal element, as ideally it will shape the world and the campaign in a way you would never expect. It sends a message to the GM that you'd like them to highlight something in the setting, some element you create that plants a seed for the GM to cultivate. It is very important to stress that a Unique is entirely flavorful, and does not have any mechanical benefit to it at all. You want your fighter to shoot lasers out of his eyes? Well, that is certainly unique, but if you plan on using those lasers in combat you'll need to look Perhaps reskinning the Dragonspawn's Breath Weapon, for instanceelsewhere. The intent is to give the GM something fun to work with, to weave into the storyline to focus on your character in unexpected ways. Your laser eyes might be entirely uncontrollable, and used when the GM feels it will enrich the story with Like accidentally setting the Emperor's wig on firedramatic tension. They could be a sign of the coming apocalypse, or mark an affinity with an ancient entity of light that could very well be a significant campaign villain. Leaving a Unique open-ended is the best way to go, because it lets all sorts of great stories come out. Playing for discoveries versus playing to reach an end you already know... which sounds more fun? Uniques can be very powerful outside of combat. The dwarf that can paint the future could be given all sorts of delicious information for the party, and the elf who has apples growing out their hair could keep a party alive in the wasteland. But don't be afraid of picking something that appears to have no story benefit at all, so long as you feel it is flavorful and interesting. Talk with your GM if you have something that might seem less then spectacular or that you don't see adding much to the campaign. Most will be able to come up with something fun, if you work with them, if you're attached to a particular idea. While it's harder to put the spotlight on a character that has seven toes on each foot over the one who can summon songbirds by whistling, it might just delight the GM because now they get to come up with a reason for it to be a powerful story element. Your seven toed character might just find a cult that worships him, or find mysterious giant seven toed footprint that leads to all sorts of trouble. Lastly, Uniques can be a good way to tie your character to an Icon of the world in a dramatic way. Using the default Dragon Empire setting, you could be the Archmage's first successful stained glass golem, or the Three's first fusion of red, blue, and black dragon souls within a single dragonspawn. You could be one of several bearers of the Lich King's segmented phylactery, or the archer who put out one of the Orc Lord's eyes. That's a surefire way to play up the importance of an Icon in a campaign! Here are links to character threads here at RPGX if you'd like to see what we've come up with for our Uniques: Crown of the Lich King Voyages of the Lost Star Here are some external lists of Uniques: Vault of the 13th Age 13th Age's Google+ Community

Authors:Tilal

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Icon Relationships

Who You Know Matters Your characters are not the most powerful figures in the world, although they might someday become so. But for now, while it seems you are playing second fiddle to great living legends, that's not really the case. The choices you make matter, and for every heroic act or nefarious deed someone is watching, and reacting. Whether you serve as part of an Icon's forces, directly oppose the operations of another, or simply are trying to live your life free of their influences — there will be an impact. You can think of these figures as countries during war time, where being fully neutral isn't really an option. Each campaign can have a different set of Icons, and it's important before starting a 13th Age game to get familiar with them. To keep things simple, we'll refer to the Dragon Empire Icons in this article. Note that when you build your Icon relationships, you aren't just deciding who is your friend and who is your foe... you are shaping the Icons, and their influence on the world. At its core, 13th Age is about telling stories together, and not just listening to the GM wax poetic about a world where all of the realities are known or planned out. The Icons are left deliberately vague in most cases, so that you and the GM together can fill in the blanks for your campaign. When you decide that your character served the Archmage as a secret agent saboteur against the rising power of the High Druid, you just made that a reality of the setting as well as choosing a positive and negative relationship. You might decide that the Prince of Shadows is actually a woman, or the Three have been trying to destroy the Archmage for a crime committed long ago. Somethings may have to be tweaked to fit if the other players and GM have different ideas for an Icon, but having players make bold decisions about the world is part of what makes the system so powerful. The mechanics of it are simple. You will roll three dice when the GM asks for them, usually at the beginning of a new thread in a game. Each die will correspond with an Icon, and mark either a positive, conflicted, or negative relationship. You could have three positive dice with the Emperor which denotes an extremely strong sort of patriotism, or a negative die for the Lich King, the Orc Lord, and the Diabolist that shows you aren't dedicated to crushing only one of the great forces of evil. You could have two conflicted dice with the Prince of Shadows, and one positive with the Crusader that might mean you serve the agent of the dark gods, but the Prince has some strong hold on you he will certainly seek to use. You are hoping to roll high on those dice, and for every 5 or 6 you gain some sort of benefit you can call up in the chapter. For every 5 rolled, you get a benefit that comes with a price. You may be given a magic item by your Icon, but you might now become the target of thieves seeking it. For every 6 you roll, you get a benefit without a cost. Free passage on a ship for your party, with no strings attached. Each GM may have a different set of things you can do with the successes, and may even attach mechanical benefits, but the most important part is tying each die success to the narrative and making it count. Ideally, when building the relationships you are building some solid, dramatic ties. While you could say that your positive die with the Archmage was because you were the star pupil of his academy, you could make a bolder statement in saying that the Icon's familiar would sneak out to help you study. As a vengeful elf whose village was slain by orcs, you might just use that as your negative die with the Orc Lord. But you could spice it up by also explaining how you killed the Orc Lord's favorite skald as part of a botched assassination attempt. They need not be highly involved relationships, but try to bring out something that not only makes you feel connected to the Icon, but that also makes things extremely personal. It doesn't have to be as heavy handed as the above examples, but strong bonds can create more powerful stories. Some GMs will limit you in a way so as to build the campaign they are envisioning. For instance, if they are looking for a truly heroic campaign, they might limit the number of dice you can have positively with villains and negatively with heroes as the core rules suggest. Others will not care about such things, and trust in the players to make everything work. Both methods have good sides and bad sides, it depends entirely on the group you have and how well they can work together. Not all players deal well with party conflicts, so having a paladin that has three positive dice with the Great Gold Wyrm and the rogue assassin that has three positive dice with the Lich King on the same team can be rough. This isn't a new issue with 13th Age, as every RPG system that can have paladins and rogues together deals with it to a certain extent. Certainly something to keep in mind when building a group, and it may be a good idea to discussing potential issues right off the bat so everyone has a good time.

Icon Relationships (13th Age SRD)

Authors: Tilal

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Backgrounds

Non-Weapon Proficiencies Have Come A Long Way Backgrounds describe the present and past of the player characters. They replace the standard skill systems of traditional d20 games with rich and evocative descriptions. They allow any character from any class to potentially be proficient with any skillset. You want a lock picking paladin? No problem. A rogue trained as a priest? Easily done. Each background, rather than a individual skills, are a collection of affinities that might be natural talents or the rewards of dedication and training. Mechanically, you have 8 points to spend over two or three backgrounds in any combination, with a maximum of 5 points per background. You could have two at 4 points each, or one at 5 and one at 3, one at 4 and two at 2, etc. Each background requries a descriptive name, no more than a short phrase. However, when you create a background, you aren't just picking a profession or a chapter in your character's history. You are adding to the setting, giving the GM something they can use to make the world come alive. For instance, if you're building a rogue and want to be a spy, you wouldn't just fill out "Spy, 5 points" on your character sheet. Instead, you should feel free to make up an entire organization by simply writing down, "Whispermaster of the Scarlet Eclipse, 5 points." That doesn't require you to write a three page essay on the command structure, history, and composition of the Scarlet Eclipse. You might just have an idea, or thought the name was cool, and together with the GM and perhaps even the other players the organization could come alive. It often helps to have some sort of rough mental sketch of what your creation brings to the world. Perhaps you've decided that the Scarlet Eclipse follow a warrior code of a civilization wiped out in a previous age, and that their demise had something to do with the Three. You may have a symbol in mind for them, and say that their mark is the image of the moon blotting out the sun, made in blood. That's enough to go by, and the rest can come out in play. But by adding a couple extra words in there, you didn't just give yourself a sneaky skillset to use, you created something that adds content to the game for months and years to come. Skill checks work nearly identically to other d20 systems, where a skill bonus gets added to an attribute bonus. The main difference here is that you also add your level, the background bonus replaces a skill bonus, and the attribute bonus varies based on the situation. Your background, "Griffon Tamer for the Diabolist's Circus, 2 points" might be used with Dexterity to duck underneath a saw-blade trap. In a completely different scenario, it might also be used with Intelligence to help identify some exotic monster. What's important is when you write out the description of your skill check in a post, you call upon the character's past and bring something interesting out for others to read. For the first example, it could be a quick reference to recollections of dodging a hungry griffon's claws during feeding time. The second example could be remembering your frequent chats with other trainers within the circus menagerie, and the crazy monster stories you'd hear. If you love to write, you could even flush out a memory that the current situation calls out, or you could make a reference to it in passing. The important part is to have fun by inventing ways in which your background might apply in a given situation. Your "Line Cook for the Imperial Army, 4 points" background might seem extremely limited to culinary situations, which in a dungeon setting you might not encounter much. But with a bit of creativity, you can tell the story of knife throwing contests you'd have with the other cooks, and how it helps you throw your axe to send the rope bridge into the water before the hobgoblins could cross over. Or how you would often make fun of people's accents in the kitchen, and how that aids your ability to pull off a hastily put together disguise to avoid capture. The 13th Age designers seem perfectly content with people coming up with outlandish ways in which your dominant background could help in a situation that normally would make little sense. You don't need to have absurd backgrounds of course, so if you are the type to want to have something straight forward like "Survivor of the Red Wastes, 5 points" versus being "Horizon's Most Desired Carpenter, 3 points." The outlandish ones might make people chuckle, but the important part is to not feel trapped into having 'useless' backgrounds if the absurd is not your style.

Backgrounds (13th Age SRD)

Authors: hippo, Tilal

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Races

• Humans
• Dwarves
• Half-Orcs
• Elves
  • High Elves
  • Wood Elves
  • Dark Elves
• Gnomes
• Half-Elves
• Halflings
• Optional Races
  • Dragonic/Dragonspawn
  • Holy One/Aasimar
  • Forgeborn/Dwarf-forged
  • Tiefling/Demon-touched

Races (13th Age SRD)

Authors: Aethera

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Classes
For more detail, check out the classes thread, or click any of the class names below.

Official Classes (Core Rulebook)

• Barbarian
• Bard
• Cleric
• Fighter
• Paladin
• Ranger
• Rogue
• Sorcerer
• Wizard

Official Classes (13 True Ways)

• Chaos Mage
• Commander
• Druid
• Monk
• Necromancer
• Occultist

Ease of Play From the simplest character class to the most complex, the classes go like so: The barbarian is designed for the player who wants to roll dice and slay without worrying too much about the rules. Like the barbarian, the ranger relies on base attacks augmented by class talents instead of a power list. The paladin also relies on a short list of class talents instead of powers. Like the ranger, it can be slightly more complex if you choose its more involved talents. The fighter is simple to play but asks you to make interesting choices between flexible attacks before and during combat. The cleric is probably the easiest of the spellcasters. It requires a touch of patience. The sorcerer is probably more complex than the cleric because of variant spells and the option to cast spells for double the effect in two rounds. Not a decision that new players may feel comfortable with. The rogue can be more complex than other classes because you are tracking whether or not you have momentum, constantly disengaging, and trying to use your Sneak Attack damage effectively. The bard has a variety of options that include battle cries, spells, and songs. Figuring out how to use these options in combat and during roleplaying is probably best for a confident player. The wizard is the most complex class if you choose all the options that allow improvisation and ad-libbing; without those free-form talents, it’s no more difficult than the sorcerer. Excerpt from Core Rulebook, page 75.

Classes (13th Age SRD)

Authors: hippo, Aethera

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Feats
Feats in 13th Age don't come in the complex trees familiar to players of D&D 3/3.5e, Pathfinder or even D&D 4e. Feats are more closely tied to class talents or various powers. Feats enhance things that a character can already do, rather than open up new avenues for the characters. Because the feats are so closely tied to powers in the game, as characters can swap out those powers or spells they can also swap out feats associated with those powers and replace them. This is especially powerful for spellcasters, who can usually change their spells every full heal-up. So a wizard who assigned an Adventurer level feat to a spell could choose to not memorize that spell on a given day and have a feat to be applied to another spell.

Feats (13th Age SRD)

Authors: hippo

[hippo]

The escalation die is an innovative piece of RPG technology which both speeds along combat and makes characters feel heroic. Starting on the second round of combat the escalation die comes into play with a value of 1. The PCs add the escalation die to their attack roles. Each round the characters fully engage in the combat the escalation die increases on the subsequent round, to a maximum value of 6.

Mechanically the escalation die has a number of benefits:

• Players have an incentive to save their daily and per battle attacks beyond the first round, when they will have better chance of success. This helps ensure that combats do not end with the boss dying in the first round.
• Characters feel more powerful as the combat goes on, helping to enhance their heroic stature in the game.
• Character powers can play with the escalation die - increasing it or allowing the bonus to be used for in-combat skill rolls.
• Monsters also get powers that can mess with the escalation die - preventing it from advancing or rolling it backwards. This can make them quite dangerous and can throw the players off balance.
• Monsters like dragons which can also use the escalation die are especially threatening.

Authors: hippo

[hippo]

Simplified Monsters/NPCs

Authors:

[hippo]

Abstract Positioning
The combat system cares about movement and position, but only in simple/approximate terms. It emphasizes where people are and who's fighting whom.

Whereabouts
Each creature has a general, relative position on the battlefield. Combat is dynamic and fluid, so miniatures can't really represent where a character 'really is.'

• Nearby: Generally, all the heroes and their enemies in a battle are nearby. That means they can reach each other with a single move action.
  
  
• Far Away: Generally, you can use a single move action to reach any of the heroes and their enemies (provided no enemy intercepts you). If you want to be far away, two moves away from the enemies, make that clear to the GM and make sure there's room for that maneuver. Wizards and other casters sometimes like to be far away. (This goes for enemy casters, too.)
  
  
• Intercepting: You intercept a creature when you move to stop an enemy attempting to rush past you to attack someone else. You must be near the enemy and the person that enemy is trying to reach.

Engagement
In a battle, each combatant is either engaged (locked in combat with one or more enemies) or unengaged (free). When two allies are engaged with the same enemy, they are considered next to each other.

• Free: By default, characters in a battle are free. They can move freely, use ranged attacks, engage in battle, etc. If they try to move past a free enemy, however, that foe usually has the option to intercept them.
  
  
• Engaged: Characters are engaged when they are in melee with foes. Engaged creatures can use melee attacks and close-quarter spells against the creatures they engage. They can use ranged attacks but doing so draws opportunity attacks from the enemies that are engaging them that they don't attack, as does moving away from the enemies they're engaged with. Unengaged creatures have no particular limits on how they move. They can't use melee attacks until engaged.
  
  

  When you are engaged:	When you are unengaged:
  You draw opportunity attacks if you move	You move freely
  You can make melee attacks against enemies engaged with you	You can't make melee attacks
  Your ranged attacks draw opportunity attacks from enemies engaged with you that you don't target	You make ranged attacks normally
  Your spells draw opportunity attacks (except close-quarters spells)	You can cast spells freely
  You can disengage safely as a move action by making a normal save (11+)	You can engage enemies by moving into melee with them
  You can't intercept enemies	You can engage an enemy moving past you
  You're considered nearby other combatants by default	You're considered nearby other combatants by default, but you can usually move far away if you want

  
  
• Disengaging: If you don't want to risk an opportunity attack, you can use your move action to attempt to disengage (a disengage check). If you choose to disengage, roll a normal save (11+). You can disengage from more than one foe with a single successful check, but your roll takes a –1 penalty for each foe beyond the first that you are disengaging from. If you succeed, you can move without drawing opportunity attacks from the foes you were engaged with. Use your move normally. If you fail the disengage check, you don't move, lose your move action for that turn, and remain engaged. You don't take any opportunity attacks.

Position and Engagement (13th Age SRD)

Authors: Aethera

[hippo]

Simplified Mechanics

- fewer conditions
- far fewer bonuses
- no flanking

Authors:

[hippo]

Rolling Icon Relationship Dice
To check your icon relationship (your relationship with a particular icon), roll a d6 for each point you have in the relationship. This means that you will usually roll 1, 2, or 3 dice. (At epic level, it may be 4.)

If any die is a 6, you get some meaningful advantage from the relationship without having complications. If two or three dice come up 6, that's even better.

If any die is a 5, your connection to the icon is going to work out as well as a 6 would, but with some unexpected complication. If it's a good icon you might be drawn into some obligation. If it's a villainous icon, you might attract unwanted attention.

Rolling 5s when you also rolled 6s should make life both interesting and advantageous!

Getting Help from Icon Relationships
The most straightforward way to use your relationship points is on positive or conflicted connections that generally provide you with outright assistance and useful information.

Negative relationships usually provide inside knowledge, special skills, opportunistic allies, and possibly some sort of supernatural advantage against a villain. Often you might find that enemies of your rival see you as an opportunity to strike against that mutual enemy. You might get help, wealth and resources, and even magic items from quite unexpected sources, some of which may not be entirely to your liking. A negative relationship with a thoroughly villainous icon is more in keeping with the heroic lifestyle, but you should expect that the assistance you get from a negative relationship may end up being more directly confrontational than more conventional conflicted and positive relationships.

In addition to aid from others, icon relationships provide characters with special knowledge.

Using Icon Relationship Results
See: examples from Tilal's Voyages from the Lost Star.

Icon Relationships (13th Age SRD)

Authors: Aethera

[hippo]

The montage is a piece of storytelling technology from the Tales of the 13th Age Organized Play Adventures. It serves as a way for the characters to advance their story and be awesome. Usually the montage section is a transition between planned parts of an adventure and represent travel or some easily overcome obstacles. The players in turn come up with "challenges" for the group to face, and a different player creatively describes how the characters defeat the challenge. There is no skill roll - the characters will succeed. But it gives the players a chance to explore sides of their characters and relationships that may not come up during the course of normal play.

Authors: hippo