# D&D 5E - 13th Age Variant Rules ## Using this Homebrew This homebrew set is intended to replace several portions of the standard 5E rules with rules pulled from the [13th Age SRD](ttps://www.13thagesrd.com/). These rules were selected to solve specific issues within my long-running campaign *The Chequered Field*, a faction-oriented game of politics, war, and powers beyond mortal comprehension. <br><br> The specific rules I'm incorporating from 13th Age are: * **Icons:** The plot of *The Chequered Field* revolves around a number of powerful individuals and entities, all working at cross purposes with one another. The Icon system provides more formalized rules around how the party interacts with the powers that be. * **Backgrounds:** In *The Chequered Field*, most actions fall into a small number of skill rolls, often social skill rolls. Replacing 5e skills with the *13th Age* Background method makes skill roles more varied, dynamic, and personal to the character. * **Combat Positioning:** I want combat in *The Chequered Field* to have a more narrative flow than grid-based combat, but have struggled to make a pure Theater-of-the-Mind approach work. The Engagement rules in the *13th Age* provide a welcome middle ground between the two * **Resting:** Fights (as well as other contests of will) don't happen on a regular schedule. Conflict may happen on a timescale of minutes, hours, weeks or even months. As much as it pains me to admit it, the only real way to address this is by disassociating the mechanic of resting from time and instead coupling it to number of encounters. * **Magical Rites:** *The Chequered Field* is a relatively high-magic setting, but because combat happens less frequently than other types of encounters, spells often go un-used. By giving players the chance to use their spells for non-RAW yet thematically-related effects, it raises the importance and prominence of magic in play. This isn't meant to be a "fix" for either of these rulesets, nor is it meant to be a more 'roleplay-heavy' version of 5E. I can't really recommend other players use these rules in their game unless they want a campaign like mine: one where there aren't any good guys and very few bad guys; one where the players can go weeks or months without killing anything; one where diplomacy abounds, but so does violence, intrigue, danger and magic. Please note that this document is not meant to be a complete replacement for the *13th Age* source book. I do hope that I have provided enough information to make each of these rules playable without owning it, but I'll admit that much of the power of these rules come in the authors' notes and flavor text, which provide excellent examples on how to use squirmy rules like the Icon relationships or rituals. ## Icons The political landscape of the continent is dominated by 12 powerful individuals and entities known as Icons. Each Icon has incredible power and vast resources as their disposal, and each have their own agendas that they are pursuing in the region. ### Player Relationships with Icons At 1st level, each character gets 3 relationship points. These numbers can be used to purchase up to 3 ranks of positive, conflicted, or negative relationships with one or more icons. These points do not necessarily dictate how intimate you are with a specific Icon--they simply reflect how entangled you are in their affairs, and how likely you are to benefit or suffer from that relationship. * A **positive** relationship means that you have the respect or love of the Icon. They and their agents are more likely to help you, but their enemies will oppose you, and you may find yourself bound by the obligations they place upon you. * A **conflicted** relationship means your relationship with the Icon is complex or fraught. You may be an ally of circumstance that they distrust, or an opponent that they have an uneasy truce with. It could be that some of their agents embrace you while others despise you. You can still count on being able to capitalize on those connections, but you should always expect that connection to have a catch. * A **negative** relationship is one where you and the Icon are open enemies or rival. They and their agents will actively attempt to thwart you, but all their enemies will be willing to aid you, even if they would otherwise be opponents themselves \pagebreak <div class='classTable wide'> ### Icons of Colra | Icon Name | Icon Description | |:---:|:---:|:---| | **The Ivory Queen** | The astoundingly powerful mage-queen of Ivar; she pursues power greater than Godhood| | **The Queen Consort** | The Ivory Queen's sister and her main rival; ruler of the fractious nation of Umbra | | **The Fist of the South** | An oligarch of Selenia whose ruthless cunning protects the nation from collapse | | **The Father of Gods** | One of the Paradoxes; driven from this realm, yet his influence remains and runs deep| | **The Mother of Power** | One of the Paradoxes; a shadowy being of the depths; revered by sea-going cultists | | **The Sister of Life** | One of the Paradoxes; a silver dragon who rules over a tribe of elder dragonborn | | **The Thaumaturge** | The most powerful wizard to have ever lived; the only person to truly know the Paradoxes | | **The Sword of Varrat** | A tangled network of anarchists, driven by a mechanism even they don't understand | | **The Scorpion Council** | The leaders of the Venom, an international crime ring of particular cruelty | | **The Blackbirds** | Angels cast from the upper planes for the sin of greed; merchant lords of Ravenspire | | **The Faerie Courts** | The fickle lords and ladies of the Feywild; they are involved in Colra, but their agenda is mysterious | | **The Dark Powers** | Rulers of the Shadowfell; their interests intersect with the Faerie Courts but are otherwise unknown | </div> ### Changing Relationships Whenever you gain a level, you may (if you so choose) move one relationship point to a relationship with another Icon, or move all your relationship points to a different type of relationship with the same icon (e.g. from positive to conflicted) to reflect the events in the campaign so far. Once you reach 7th level and again when you reach 14th level, you gain +1 relationship point. You do not need to allocate the point immediately, but can instead wait for an appropriate event that wouild trigger a new relationship, or the deepening of an existing relationship. After level 14, you can put up to 4 relationship points into a relationship with a single icon; you may only have one relationship with 4 points. ### Using Relationships Relationships are used in two contexts; they are used by the DM to drive the Icon's agendas in relation to the players, and they are used by the players to represent their interaction with specific factions. In both cases, the players roll one or more "Icon Checks". When making an Icon Check for a specific Icon, the player rolls a number of d6s equal to the number of points they've put into that relationship and notes the number of 1's and 6's they rolled. \columnbreak #### Icon Agendas To set the Icon Agendas, all the players make an Icon Check for every Icon they have a relationship with. For any checks that resulted in at least one 5 or 6, the DM records both the Icon and the type of relationship that player had with the Icon. This then represents an action that the Icon will take to help or hinder the party in the near future, or even an action that the party takes that helps or hinders an Icon. The results of the roll are determined by the type of relationship, and are public to the whole group. * **Positive:** A 6 means that the Icon is able to offer assistance, resources, or support to the player, no strings attached. A 5 means that that Icon is able to help, but at a cost. Maybe they suffer a setback in giving the players aid, or maybe the need a favor from the party in exchange for their boon. * **Conflicted:** A 6 means merely that the player somehow benefits from their relationship with the Icon. If they are not in a position to receive assistance from the Icon, perhaps they learn something that they can use as leverage over them in the future. A 5 means that the situation is complicated. Maybe the Icon offers grudging assistance, but at a high price. Maybe the player takes a resource they shouldn't have, and angers the Icon. * **Negative:** A 6 means that the player is able to get some sort of advantage over the Icon, such as a secret they would prefer hidden, or a new ally in their fight against the Icon. A 5 means that the Icon is able to make life difficult for the party--though of course, even a straight-up ambush should further the story by giving the party another lead to follow. \pagebreak > ##### Icon Rolls - Assessing Success > When rolling an Icon check, both 5s and 6s should advance the players goals, but if they roll a 5, that advancement may come at a cost. Maybe the players are able to uncover a secret that aids them in their quest, but now an Icon knows they know the secret and sends a squad of goons to ensure their silence. Multiple 6s and 5s in a single check increase the degree of success and complication, respectively. It is up the DM to improvise ways in which these rolls can be tied into the action at the table, though the players should also feel free to try to incorporate the Icon Agenda into the story. As each agenda item comes into play, the DM should cross it off the agenda. Once all the items have been crossed off the agenda, the players make a new agenda by once again making an Icon Check for each of their relationships, at which point the process begins anew. It's possible for agenda items to happen 'off-screen', but even in that case, the players should be made aware of what actually happened--whether it's through a missive or an overheard rumor--before they generate a new Icon Agenda. For a more in-depth discussion of ways in which the relationship rolls can be used to aid in improvisational story-telling, see page 181 of the *13th Age* source book. #### Icon Interactions When player characters interact with an Icon, their agents, their allies, or their enemies, they can use an Icon Check to influence that interaction. This is resolved similar to a skill, where the player states what it is they're trying to accomplish, and then rolls a number of d6s equal to their relationship score with the Icon to determine success. A 6 represents an unqualified success, a 5 represents a qualified success. As with any other Icon Check, the result is heavily dependent on the type of relationship--A success on a positive relationship is likely to result in enthusiastic assistance. A success on a negative relationship might mean uncovering a weakness, or winning support from an unexpected ally. ## Backgrounds **These rules replace Skills in 5E.** Rather than restricting players to only receiving their proficiency bonus on specific skills defined within the rules, the Background system instead allows players to define aspects of their character's background that describe what their training and experience entails, and then use that to determine if the character is proficient in a given task. \columnbreak ### Selecting Backgrounds In addition to the other characteristics provided by your character's background, you must choose 3 *aspects* of their background which describe in detail what their experiences and training within that background entail. These aspects should be more detailed and granular than their background, but should still be broad enough to cover a variety of skills. Bard, Rangers and Rogues may select an additional aspect for a total of 4. For example, Finnan is an Acolyte, but he has a varied and colored past. For aspects he chooses *halfling homesteader, rural minister,* and *reluctant thieves guild member*. ### Using Backgrounds to Roll Skill Checks When a character needs to take an action where success is not guaranteed, the DM will ask them to make a check against one of their attributes. The player than chooses an aspect of their background that they think is applicable to the task they're trying to complete. If the DM approves the choice, the player gets to add their proficiency bonus to the roll as though they were rolling a skill they were proficient in. For example, Finnan might use the *halfling homesteader* aspect to apply his proficiency bonus to a check to see the quality of his cooking. He may use the *rural minister* aspect to convince someone to confide a secret in him. And when he's in the city, he may surprise everyone by using *reluctant thieves guild member* to make contact with the local crime ring. Sometimes the connection between an aspect and the task a character is trying to complete may not be immediately obvious, but the player is free to try to convince the DM that they deserve their proficiency bonus by telling a story about how they did something similar in the background. For example, Finnan may make the argument that he can use *rural minister* to scramble across a steep roof by saying that he frequently had to climb up to the roof of the old country church to replace the shingles. The DM is still able to veto the proficiency bonus for any reason (up to and including, "that definitely isn't a thing you did") but in general players should be rewarded for added color to their character's background. Note that aspects are not connected to a specific attribute. *Rural minster* may use charisma when you're comforting a grieving widow, but could also use intelligence if you're attempting to track down an elusive piece of theology, or even dexterity in the case of attempting to scramble across a steep roof, as described . \pagebreak > ##### Example Background Aspects > There are an infinite number of possible aspects, but examples include: *Apprentice Assassin, amateur alchemist, animal trainer, architect, expert in etiquette, circus acrobat, cathedral servitor, trained chef, conwoman, goblin exterminator, hunted outlaw, knight errant, professor of the arcane arts, refugee of war, reluctant conscript, international spy, church accountant, cat burglar, torturer, transformed animal, traveling martial arts pupil, tribal healer, tunnel scout, wandering minstrel, warrior poet* ## Combat Positioning **These rules do not replace any of the rules on movement speed or combat, only those rules directly related to grid-based combat** This method of managing combat can use a map, but it focuses more on relative position and creating a flow to combat, rather than taking a "tabletop strategy" approach to combat. Most of this text is pulled pulled directly from 162-164 of the *13th Age* source book, with only minor tweaks to fit 5E rules. ### Position There are a few ways players can define their location in combat. Below are a few things they should keep in mind during combat. * **What are my whereabouts?** Each creature has a general position on the battlefield. Mostly you want to track relative position, such as who's in the front rank or which side an ambush is coming from. You can define your character’s geographical location in any natural way, such as “standing behind the paladin” or “slinking along the wall while the rest of the party waits around the corner.” * **Who is Nearby?** Generally, all the heroes and their enemies in a battle are considered to be "nearby". That means they can reach each other with a single move action and can easily be within range of any ranged weapon. Sometimes, as an exception, heroes or enemies can be far away (see below). If a creature has a reach greater than 5 feet, its assumed they can strike someone with a lesser reach without engaging with them. * **Am I behind an ally?** Generally, if you’re behind an unengaged ally, and an enemy moves past that ally to get to you, your ally has the option to move and intercept. * **Can I Intercept?** 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. * **Who is Far Away?** Generally, the heroes and their enemies are nearby each other and you can use a single move action to reach any of them (provided no enemy intercepts you), but in rare cases a character may be far away. Characters who are far away can only use actions with a range of greater than 30 feet. If you want to be far away, two moves away from the enemies, make that clear to the DM and make sure there’s room for that maneuver. Wizards and other casters sometimes like to be far away. * **Which characters are engaged?** In a battle, each combatant is either engaged (locked in combat with one or more enemies) or unengaged (free). ### Movement & Melee The combat system cares about movement and position, but only in simple/approximate terms. It emphasizes where people are and who’s fighting whom, but it doesn’t count squares. Miniatures are useful for keeping track of who’s where and doing what, even if you’re just using bottle caps. #### 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. When a creature is free, they: * Can move freely * Can't make melee attacks, unless they have a reach greater than 5 feet. * Can make ranged attacks normally * Can cast spells freely * Can engage enemies by moving into melee with them * Can engage an enemy moving past them * Are generally considered to be nearby other combatants by default, but can move far away if they want. #### Engaged Characters are engaged when they are in melee with foes. If you are using miniatures, you can push the miniatures together to represents who’s engaged with whom. Characters who are engaged in battle have a hard time moving around without drawing opportunity attacks. Engaged creatures are considered to be within 5 feet of each other. If a creature has a reach greater than 5 feet, its assumed they can strike someone with a lesser reach without engaging with them. When a creature is engaged, they: * draw attacks of opportunity if they move without using the disengage action. * can make melee attacks against enemies engaged with them. * roll at disadvantage when making ranged attacks * can't intercept enemies * are always considered to be nearby other combatants by default. \pagebreak ### Intercepting Generally, if you move past someone who is not already engaged, they have the option to engage you and make you stop where they are. The GM rules on what counts as moving “past” a defending character or enemy. In general, the more tactical the battle, the easier it is to intercept someone, and the GM should usually rule in favor of interception. When someone intercepts you, you usually do not have the option of continuing your move and accepting an opportunity attack. The standard consequence of being intercepted is that you use your attack against the creature that intercepted you. On your next turn, if you’re willing to provoke an opportunity attack, you can move to where you were headed in the first place. The ability to intercept onrushing enemies isn’t a license to take other actions when enemies are moving. > ##### Using Miniatures > Miniatures and markers help the DM and players agree on where everyone is. You should use them more as reminders of what you imagine in your head rather than as game pieces. If you happen to be using pretty maps with grids or hexes lined up on them, you’ll probably want to avoid looking too closely at the markings on the map—you should generally fudge movement whenever possible—don’t spend time being precise. ### Areas of Effect You should generally assume that when using an action that has an area of effect, you can include any number of characters who are nearby. You may choose who is included in the spell, except that if you include someone who is engaged with another character, anyone they are engaged with is also considered to be within the area of effect. Characters may target any number of people are far away with any spell with a range of 60 feet or greater, but if they do so they may not target anyone nearby. Spells with an area of effect of any shape greater than 30 feet may include targets that are both nearby and far away. For example, Madason and Judith are in a fight with 5 skeletons. Two skeletons are engaged with Judith, two are nearby but not engaged, and one is far away. If Madason casts fireball, he can target: * The two skeletons that are nearby but not engaged. * The two skeletons engaged with Judith AND Judith * All four nearby skeletons AND Judith * The single far away skeleton If Madason were to use Cone of Cold instead, he could target the two unengaged skeleton and the far away skeleton, but if he wanted to include all of five, he would also have to include Judith as well. \columnbreak ## Resting Resting in *The Chequered Field* is decoupled from time, and is instead based on the number of battles the party has fought. Often, this may match a narrative beat; the characters take their long-rest by resting or by celebrating back in town. Sometimes, however, the long rest occurs in the middle of an adventure rather than at the end. In that case, the assumption is that the party are able to find some kind of exceptional place or situation that provides respite (a gorgeous meadow, a secret room, a magic fountain, etc). ### Roughly Four Battles By default, the party should be assumed to be able to take a long rest every four battles. At the DM's discretion, the party may be able to rest after three battles, or may need put off the long rest until after 5 battles. This rule helps the party manage its resources, because it gives them an idea of what opposition they will face before they can get a rest. It also pushes them to stretch themselves. ### Fleeing, Resting and Campaign Losses These rules aren't meant to completely remove player control over when they rest, nor does it mean they should throw themselves suicidally into every fight presented. Instead, these rules represent that saving the world and winning the day requires a certain momentum; the party cannot rest too often or they may put their ultimate goals in jeopardy. To represent this, if the party opts to take a long rest before the DM has awarded them one, then they must accept a *Campaign Loss*. At the GM’s discretion, something that the party was trying to do fails spectacularly. Someone they were trying to rescue is executed; a hostile faction takes over a nearby town; someone beats them to the treasure they were seeking. If the party gets into a fight that they aren't able to win, they have the option of fleeing. At any point, on any PC’s turn, any player can propose fleeing the field. If all of the other players agree, the party immediately succeeds in retreating, including rescuing any unconscious or incapacitated party members. This also causes a *Campaign Loss*, similar to the consequence of resting early. ### Resting Times Short rests still only take a single hour, but a full rest represents three days of rest, during which the party cannot travel. If they are attacked within this period, it doesn't interrupt their rest. During this time, they can continue to take actions like investigating leads, meeting with NPCs, and crafting. \pagebreak ## Magical Rites **Magical Rites do not replace the ritual rules, even though they are called rituals in 13th age.** Magic abounds in the Salastan Sphere, and it's used for many more purposes than any list of spells can completely describe. To represent that diversity of magical expression, players can use magical rites to adapt a spell from their regular spell list to come up with a unique effect. For example, you may cast *gust of wind* as a magical rite to put wind in a ships sails. It's not a strict use of the spell because it involves a sustained wind instead of a strong gust, but it fits the spirit of the spell and expands the ways in which spellcasters can interact with the world. ### Casting a Magical Rite * Choose the spell that will be used and expended by the rite. * Tell the DM what you are trying to accomplish. This may require some negotiation and brainstorming between you and the DM. The DM may necessitate the use of special reagents or stipulate other requirements for the ritual to be successful. * Spend 10 minutes preparing and casting the ritual. If the spell involves an ongoing effect it may require concentration, though it's possible for ongoing effects to be permanent if the effect is much weaker than the level it's cast at ### Rites and Rituals If a spell already has the ritual tag, you can cast it as a Rite without expending a spell slot. Doing so takes a total of 20 minutes.