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| Considering a third of this image is "blue haired anime guy with sword", it might not be the most appropriate to the topic but oh well. -Fire Emblem Heroes Official Art |
Not So Recently, I read SandroAD's blogpost, "Hirelings as Specialists." It's less of a gameable system, and more of a proof of concept for turning existing fantasy game skill sets into hireable NPCs, and thus allowing Players to access those abilities without needing to be of that class themselves. Slightly More Recently, I went down a bit of a Rabbit hole, beginning with Joshy Mcroo's blogpost, "A Campaign Where There Is One Of Anything." As the title suggests, it posits a fantasy world in which concepts, classes, monsters and the like are singular and rare. It's part of a longer discussion among multiple blogs, some helpfully listed at the end of Mcroo's post, about the nature of Monsters, the banality of 'generic' fantasy concepts, and ways to mitigate those issues. With both of these blogposts rattling about in the empty space where my brain should be, they were bound to eventually collide, which is where I find myself today.
In a game where There Is One of Anything, especially if Player Options are also uniquely limited, there comes a question of how literal that One is. Having The Bard doesn't mean there are no other sassily homoerotic lute players roaming the lands and getting gigs at taverns. Having The Witch doesn't mean the concept of a full Coven is an alien one. The impetus on creating a world Where There Is One of Anything is a matter of focus. Yes, there are "Paladins", knights that swear oaths to a higher power and follow a code of conduct. But for the purposes of your adventure? Your characters? Your party? There is only one that truly matters. Only one whose purpose and goals are truly divine in nature, and who's decisions will alter the path of history (or at least, do so where your players can see them).
Expanding on SandroAD's concept of placing class features into a hireable npc to feature multiple classes is fairly simple. The Specialist Point system they posit would need tweaking and balancing, but the base concept is sound. Each Hireling has a set of abilities with a point cost, which the players can trigger once a Dungeon Turn by paying it. There are a handful of passive abilities that make just having the Hireling come along a good choice, even if you never use their Point abilities in that specific dungeon. I could open any edition of DnD, blur my eyes, and come up with a bunch of these in one go.
For a DM who runs multiple campaigns, especially those with overlapping players, this system might already sound like an utter wash. Do you just make 12 NPCs, one for each core class, and reuse those over and over? Isn't that??? Boring? And to that I say no, not really. For starters, while Sandro details a specific Thief in his blogpost, none of the mechanical abilities are tied to that character's species, personality, or toolkit. I think this should be left alone on purpose. By keeping the mechanics the same (i.e. all thieves across games have the same abilities), but changing the context in which those abilities came to be, you create a familiarity with the Rules and their use, while creating a new social challenge for your players to overcome in order to attain them. Rannie the Human Thief may actively want to work for the Party in one game, while Yoseph, the Dwarf Thief might actively dislike a member of the party in another game. If the players already know what they will gain by convincing Yoseph to put aside their differences, they may choose to invest more time in that character in the hopes they can add his abilities to their toolkit.
Example: The Alchemist
(1) Acid Splash - The Alchemist can set a trap using their questionable ingredients to damage foes or infrastructure. (1d4)
(1) Identify Poison - The Alchemist can test a substance for negative effects, declaring the properties and means to nullify them
(1) Chug Jug - Regardless of turn order, if The Alchemist can physically reach a PC, they can use a Potion from either's inventory on the PC.
(3) Quick Brew - In a pinch, The Alchemist can just throw something together, they can create a slapdash Potion of 1d6 efficiency. - Roll d6, on a 1 they only manage a 1d2 Potion
Passives:
- For every day spent alone during Downtime, The Alchemist has a 1 in 6 chance of brewing a Potion of 1d6 efficiency. The potion has a random effect and must be accounted for in a PC's inventory or sold at the end of the Downtime action
- The Alchemist has textbook knowledge of medicinal plants and minerals used in potion making, and can ascertain the location of most ingredients, should they be needed.
Additional Thoughts:
- Starting from the 12 core dnd 5e classes would be a good start, but what of subclasses? If you have a "Ranger" NPC, would you want to treat "Beastmaster" as a separate entity, or randomly choose WHICH Ranger is in this specific game? With a handful of triggerable abilities and some passives, this makes homebrewing additional content in fairly simple, but where do you draw the line?
- Perhaps adding in a Gacha system of sorts, with basic Classes being more common to find, and the wilder concepts being rarer? Or throwing caution to the wind and letting the Power Ranger and Super Saiyan NPCs show up when the dice or story say they do.
- Like stated in Mcroo's post; these NPCs can just exist in the world as well. Use them as Masters to train with to learn one of their abilities as a PC, have them be shopkeeps with their abilities for sale, make them quest-givers or leaders of their own factions. The players should be aware of when they meet The One Class of the campaign, but they don't all Need to be Hireable.