Has anyone put the SRD on a Wiki?

[Funksaw]

I'm sure everyone wants a crack at improving D&D.  I'm just wondering - has anyone put the 3.5 SRD on a Wiki and just letting people go wild on it?

[sayter]

Yes, I am sure it has been done. But, "improving" D&D is a relative term based on what you want to get out of the game.

I dont mind it in a few ways. But I have a strong dislike for level based systems, and an equal distaste for strict classes. I dont see any reason why a mage cant be as good with a sword as a warrior. Gandalf did it, and countless other heroes in fantasy settings have. I feel that limiting a player like this is compressing the possibility of the game. That, and wizards in D&D have an absolutely horrific system.

Whoever thought of their magick system should be kicked in the sack. Its just THAT bad. Forgetting spells immediately after casting them? Having to rememorize them EVERY DAY? ugh. Turns me off of spellcasters altogether.
Yes yes..."play a sorceror"....still sucks.

If I want to cast 100 fireballs in a day, why cant I? granted that I have the "mana" to do so, nothing should be able to stop me from doing so.

those are my main gripes with 3 and 3.5e d&d.

[Funksaw]

Right, and I think D&D's system is a little wonky too.

But there are a number of strengths that I think are too easily overlooked in criticism of the system.

1) D&D has a simple core mechanic.  

Yes, a d20 die is wonky - it's linear and very arbitrary.  But that doesn't stop games like Unisystem from using a similar die and not feeling "arbitrary" despite the fact that a d20 is merely one degree away from a d10.  I think that d20's "arbitraryness" has much to do with it's high failure rate - which might be built into the system, or may be just because "you've always needed to roll 15 or more to succeed in D&D so that's what we made it."  

A single d20 resolving problems is s simple, singlular solution.  

2) D&D's classes do fit archetypes of the fantasy genre and help new players figure out the role the character is supposed to play in the intra-group dynamic.  

A fighter fights, a wizard weilds magic.  While they may not be able to grasp all the complexity, anyone can grasp that simple concept.  

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Now, with that said, there are systems that have both of those features, and do it better.  For linear mechanic, I mentioned Unisystem, for Class-archetypes, I'm looking at Feng Shui.  

And of course, Castles and Crusades is an improvement in many ways that makes the system much more simplified (although I think you lose quite a bit of what little flexibility you already had with the system.)

With the Wiki idea, people would be able to cut, copy, and clone the SRD to work on additional projects.  It wouldn't be one guide but dozens - one section could work on simplifying the system (the idea that spawned this) another one could work on expanding the system, yet another one could work on creating alternative magic systems (like a mana pool, or perhaps grouping all the "attack someone" spells together as one spell that varies with level.)

In short, I think it's worth an experiment, no?

[John Kim]

With the Wiki idea, people would be able to cut, copy, and clone the SRD to work on additional projects.  It wouldn't be one guide but dozens - one section could work on simplifying the system (the idea that spawned this) another one could work on expanding the system, yet another one could work on creating alternative magic systems (like a mana pool, or perhaps grouping all the "attack someone" spells together as one spell that varies with level.)

In short, I think it's worth an experiment, no?

Well, the SRD is perfectly editable in its raw form, and there are many translations of it to other editable forms (notably HTML).  Really, I don't think that a wiki is a good approach to game design.  I think it might be a good place to put minor variants of the standard SRD that an individual could pick-and-choose from, but if you really want to design a variant game, then it should be by a finite team of people, not "design-by-committee" where the committee is the whole world.  

Still, after a brief browse, I see two attempts at SRD wikis:

http://critical-miss.net/games/Call_to_Arms/wiki/index.php/System_Reference_Document
This is a campaign-specific wiki which has a fair bit of data, but the host isn't necessarily open to other people editing.  

http://www.dndresources.com/index.php?module=xwikka&page=D20+Encyclopedia
This is a less-complete wiki which the host has put out specifically for opening up.

[Larry L.]

Hi Funksaw. (I assume that's not your given name, yes?) Welcome to the Forge.

I actually had some brief motivation after D&D 3.5 was released to create a couple variant SRDs. I wasn't a big fan of the changes in 3.5, so I was going to make an SRD of the 3.5 that I would have liked. The other was going to be a more faithful "port" of 1st edition to D20, for a true retro feel.

Then I realized it was a lot easier to just stop playing D&D and play games where playing was more important than accumulating pretty sourcebooks.

So I don't actually agree that "everyone wants a crack at improving D&D." Seems like a waste of time when you could just write your own RPG instead. Much more interesting than helping Wizards shill rulebooks would be to start with a game under a Creative Commons License.

But, um, for sake of discussion, let's assume I'm unimaginative. What sort of fruit can you see modification of the D20 SRD bearing?

[Funksaw]

Hi Funksaw. (I assume that's not your given name, yes?) Welcome to the Forge.

I actually had some brief motivation after D&D 3.5 was released to create a couple variant SRDs. I wasn't a big fan of the changes in 3.5, so I was going to make an SRD of the 3.5 that I would have liked. The other was going to be a more faithful "port" of 1st edition to D20, for a true retro feel.

Then I realized it was a lot easier to just stop playing D&D and play games where playing was more important than accumulating pretty sourcebooks.

So I don't actually agree that "everyone wants a crack at improving D&D." Seems like a waste of time when you could just write your own RPG instead. Much more interesting than helping Wizards shill rulebooks would be to start with a game under a Creative Commons License.

But, um, for sake of discussion, let's assume I'm unimaginative. What sort of fruit can you see modification of the D20 SRD bearing?

Well, let's face it, the d20 system is familiar to many, many people.  I could see the following projects:


1) A simplified but still robust ruleset designed to play fantasy archetypes, sacrificing no flexibility in character creation (and indeed improving it) while providing archetypal roles for new players.  

2) A version of the ruleset which could be scaled to various play-styles; a dark, gritty fantasy version, an over-the-top fantastic version, and a pulp-cinematic action version of the game, simply by changing a few rules.

3) A hyper-detailed, crunch-heavy version of the rules, with tons of monsters, loot, and the like.

4) Simplified subsystems for mix-and-match play (Mana-pool based, decription-based, etc.)

5) A complete Variant PHB in 32 pages or less.

The end goal would be for some enterprising gent to take the material on the wiki and produce a PDF variant handbook or series of variant handbooks.  

Keep in mind, I realise this is like saying: "Hey, let's improve Windows." on a Linux board.

But D&D, because of it's familiarity and archetype-based classes, (and the fact that it's become a bit cliche) is *perfect* for beer and pretzel roleplaying.  Unfortunately, the system isn't.

[Vaxalon]

I dont see any reason why a mage cant be as good with a sword as a warrior. Gandalf did it, and countless other heroes in fantasy settings have.

I'm going to split this off into another thread.

[John Kim]

So I don't actually agree that "everyone wants a crack at improving D&D." Seems like a waste of time when you could just write your own RPG instead. Much more interesting than helping Wizards shill rulebooks would be to start with a game under a Creative Commons License.

But, um, for sake of discussion, let's assume I'm unimaginative. What sort of fruit can you see modification of the D20 SRD bearing?

The end goal would be for some enterprising gent to take the material on the wiki and produce a PDF variant handbook or series of variant handbooks.

Well, bear in mind that there already are a number of these.  The most obvious examples would be Monte Cook's Arcana Unearthed, or Mike Mearls' Iron Heroes.  There's also Silver Age Sentinels D20, BESM D20, and the Anime D20 SRD.  There are also plenty of other OGL games now, like Mutants and Masterminds, Blue Rose (and True20), Traveller20, EverQuest, World of Warcraft -- or on the more indie side, things like Deeds Not Words. 

So what are you looking for that isn't already there?  A wiki seems like a terrible place to actually go for a game design in practice, because you don't want the rules text changing on you from one session to the next.  I've seen a couple design-by-committee approaches -- such as DragonNet which was attempted on rec.games.design.  My impressions in general have not been good.  If you just want options for D&D, then there is already such a huge array of choices it seems hard to make a dent in it. 

[Funksaw]

I suppose the big problem is that while I know that there are some greatly designed games out there, the more obscure the game, the less likely you are to be able to convince people who aren't into RPGing at all into RPGing. 

And the more complex the game, the less likely you are to convince people who try RPGing for the first time to get into RPGing. 

So it would help a bunch if the game most people were familiar with was also very simple. I'm trying to convince my new roommates that RP on Thursday might not be a bad idea.  One of them has roleplayed before but not since the mid 90s and was a fan of d6 Star Wars.  The others haven't.  And while I'd like to start them off with something simple and easy to learn, I don't think they'd bite if I told them about super-obscure PDF game.

Which is a shame, because they'd ROCK at Octane. 

[Larry L.]

I suppose the big problem is that while I know that there are some greatly designed games out there, the more obscure the game, the less likely you are to be able to convince people who aren't into RPGing at all into RPGing.

This is a very curious statement. Have you had experiences that would support this assertion?


I think John Kim's right on the money regarding the wiki. Without some sort of editorial process, I suspect the result would be very uninspiring. If someone decides to add 38 new core classes he's converted from Final Fantasy, or his new uber-kill-everything 1st level spells, or a 500-page essay on ferrets, how do you tell him, "Everyone's contribution is valued on this wiki... except yours. I'm totally deleting that garbage."?

What is the advantage to publishing an SRD variant on a wiki, as opposed to just posting it on a static web site?

However, I do seem to recall that Paranoia XP employed a wiki during its development. I don't know too much about this, though.

By the way, just run Octane. You'll be glad you did.

[Vaxalon]

It seems to me that putting a basically-finished document like the SRD on a wiki is counterproductive.

Wikis are for evolving, growing documents.