Pillars of Eternity Tabletop RPG coming from Obsidian Entertainment

Not all crowdfunding is done on Kickstarter and computer game company Obsidian Entertainment (Baldur’s Gate, Icewind Dale, Fallout, Planescape: Torment, etc) have been using fig.co to raise money for Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire. Very successfully too as they are approaching $2.5 million with over two weeks left to go! Of interest to us is that their $2.4 million stretch goal unlocked a pen and paper RPG of Pillars of Eternity.

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First and foremost, we are excited to announce that everyone who has backed us at the Premium Digital tier and above will be getting a boost! Today, we’re officially announcing the Pillars of Eterniy pen-and-paper RPG experience! This new journey to the world of Eora begins with a 30-page Starter Guide, featuring a rules set developed from the ground up by Josh Sawyer and the Pillars of Eternity design team. Now, you can have your own adventures with your friends, in the comfort of your favorite tabletop setting. Best of all, if you’ve backed the campaign at Premium Digital or above you literally don’t have to do anything to get this. Pillars of Eternity RPG is our own take on how to play a pen and paper game; it will not be using the Pillars of Eternity computer game system or that of any other RPG – it’s going to use our own ruleset made specifically for the Pillars of Eternity world. Of course, if you haven’t backed us at premium Digital or above, we won’t shut you out! You can get the pen-and-paper Starter’s Guide for just $7 as an add-on, as well.

No further information is available at present but we’ll be keeping an eye on the campaign updates to see if more information about the tabletop RPG is released, including further books.

The Pillars of Eternity II: Deafire campaign page can be found here.

 

[unknowable]

Interested but cautious. I like the world, I like the game. But the mechanics don't really feel solid enough for a pnp game in my opinion.
So even if they try to adapt it rather than work from the ground up I am not really sure how I will feel about it as a whole.

Ultimately it is going to be very dungeons and dragons inspired if the game is anything to go by. 3.5 with 4e design inspirations :S.

 

[CapnZapp]

But the mechanics don't really feel solid enough for a pnp game in my opinion.

Interesting. How can that be?

(Quickly checked the wiki. They seem to have attributes and skills and races and classes and magic and something feat something also-feat... I don't immediately see how this can be viewed as not solid enough?)

 

[Njall]

The mechanics are, IMHO, really solid when it comes to combat, but the game isn't easily translated to PnP, since there's lots of moving parts and fiddly bits; for example, there aren't "rounds" proper in PoE: after an attack, you trigger a "recovery time", which is mainly dependent on armor worn and dexterity.
When recovery ends, you start attacking, and, as soon as the attack lands, after another delay called "attack time", which depends on attack speed and, again, dexterity, the game resolves the attack. Also, attacks in PoE can either deal full damage, half damage, no damage or 150% damage depending on your attack roll vs. the defense rating of your opponent.

The game also features armor as damage reduction and DR varies by damage type, so, for example, a suit of plate armor offers better protection against slashing damage, but is weak against crushing and lightning damage, IIRC.
Also, there's a bunch of status effects which affect both "secondary" stats such as defenses and attributes, with cascading effects that a computer handles easily, but that'd be a pain in the ass to resolve in a tabletop game.

There's also an interrupt mechanic that would prove really helpful in further slowing combat resolution down to a crawl.

I generally prefer crunchy games, and really liked the CRPG, but I wouldn't touch a direct port of PoE's combat to a TTRPG with the proverbial 10 ft pole.


Conversely, the game is pretty light in the skills department, as it only features 5 skills ( athletics, stealth, survival, lore and mechanics ); there's plenty for the CRPG, but I'm not sure they're enough to cover most situations in a tabletop campaign.

The game would have to be overhauled and rebalanced so much that you'd be better off redesigning it from scratch rather than adapting it, IMHO.

 

[unnatural 20]

It looks like they are not using the same system at all. Rather, designing one of their own.

 

[ppaladin123]

The system is changing for PoE2 anyway...introducing multiclassing and subclasses at the very least. Could be interesting.

 

[Scrivener of Doom]

Josh Sawyer is a good name to have attached. He did some great work on the BG series and also started a fantastic thread over at RPG.net after the 3E FRCS came out which was page after page of adventure and campaign hooks.

 

[Lidgar]

I wouldn't mind if they just did a 5e "translation" of the game, kind of like the latest Middle Earth port. As Njall mentioned, there are way too many fiddly bits in PoE to port as is.

They could get enough of the PoE flavor with the races, classes, spells, skills, backgrounds/setting and subsystem for dealing with souls (reading them, harvest/transplant, etc.).

 

[thefrickinpope]

Hopefully they have good firearms rules, too many RPGs just sort of gloss over them, and they were fairly prevalent in PoE itself.