Our system is big, our system is complex, our system has large power gaps between classes and between starting and ending characters. 2 years ago there was a motion to decapitate the system, but with no details and I supported the idea.

Problems without solutions is just whine, and it is unfair to suggest something that would be a large piece of work for someone else. So below is a template for system decapitation, taken from my original wiki page and updated to account for last years changes and that I have mellowed and gone up to level 6.

Overall Changes

I have mellowed slightly and decided that decapitating at level 5 makes things too short.

Decapitate system at level 6. Remove any level 7 / 8 skill, or any skill with a level 7 / 8 pre-requisiste unless specifically noted.

Because of shortened system all starting characters are 90XP, irrelvant of character nubmer / length of play.

Max XP set at 360.

Reduce retire after 1 years worth of interactives level to 270XP. (mid level 5)

All characters may restat. Any over 270XP may choose to downstat to 270XP to avoid triggering the retirement counter, or to 360XP/their original total (whichever is lower) and immediately trigger the retirement counter. If they were already on retirement count this does not reset it.

I would actually find this made the system much less fun for me to play. I have also not found the powergap to be that much in non warrior builds, in warrior build, yes the power gap feels massive, but even then starting as a pure warrior I didn't feel *too* much behind - Porange

Concur with porange, this makes me sad. --Locksmith

I am surprised that warrior is the one where people feel there is a power gap. I feel not very much more capable as a 260 XP warrior than I did on 150. Slightly more hits, better blind fighting, higher damage grade- all of which palls compared to how much advantage I felt I got from 'having a shield'. -TimB

I would be generally against decapitating the system, possibly because I'm neither a seasoned player, nor a ref. Personally, I would find it quite tricky to build characters. Any character would only be halfway level 2 if they are mono-classed, and possibly not even level two if they are multi-classed (for example that would be the case with Robin). Also, the Wessex arms would be full of characters who don't deal a lot of damage and would have a hard time defending themselves. And thinking of a backstory would also be tricky - if you say your character was a merc, or an ex-soldier, then why can you only do singles by one weapon and have puny armour? -RainbowKitten

General

Warrior

Beserker & Extra Rage

Remove

Melee

Swap melee 5 and 6:

• Melee 5: Further training with melee weapons, granting the ability to add one degree of unnatural damage to the character's first weapon blow in an encounter. This refreshes as DAC does.
• Melee 6: Advanced experience in melee skills, giving the ability to do +1 natural degree of damage when striking with any melee weapon. This does not override Melee 5, thus the first first weapon blow has a 1 degree unnatural increase.

Wilderness

Camouflage

1. You can hide yourself within a terrain feature given suitable camouflage. You must go to the edge of the terrain feature, assume 'hidden' position and spend 60 seconds 'hiding yourself'; you are then hidden within the terrain feature and are invisible as per invisibility rules. Being watched while concealing yourself is not enough to prevent you hiding; any call other than Nothing will interrupt you, as per casting. A terrain feature is defined as an inanimate object or plant large enough to physically hide you.
2. You may move slowly (i.e. not running) around the edge of (and through) this terrain feature up to the limits of physrepping. If you move more than a metre from the terrain feature this breaks invisibility. Two terrain features are considered separate features (and thus moving between them requires you making yourself visible while you hide yourself in the new one) if they are physically separated by more than a metre.
3. It now only takes you 30 seconds to hide in a terrain feature.
4. It now only takes you 10 seconds to hide in a terrain feature.
5. You may break camouflage instantly by making a melee attack.
6. It now only takes you 3 seconds to hide in a terrain feature.

Agility

Change to 1pt DAC per 3 Levels. Same restrictions on armour as before.

Subterfuge

Streetfighter

Compress.

1. Single by dagger sized weapon in either hand
2. Single by short melee weapon in either hand
3. Single by long melee weapon in main hand only
4. Single through by sharp dagger sized melee weapon
5. Single through by sharp short melee weapon.

Agility

Change to 1pt DAC per 3 Levels. Same restrictions on armour as before.

Magic

Skills

Create Mana Store

Reduce pre-req to lvl 6

Spells

Grey

Compatible with the “rewrite grey antimagic” motion.

Spirit

Miracles

Talk to Deity goes away.

So does $UNIQUEPERSONALMIRACLE. --MorkaisChosen

I personally think this is a shame, as it's quite a nice thing for a priest to be able to do- otherwise there is no customization available to miracles at all, which is IMO less good. -- Salavant

Whereas mages can go for $INTERESTINGRESEARCHSPELL. --MC

Exactly. --Salavant

Healing

Replace Preservation (6) with Regeneration (7).

Alchemy

Discuss

My own personal preference is to decapitate at level 5, because most of the classes in the game get an awesome at level 5. Level 6 stuff seems to contain luxuries and broken things, but hey. --ahdok

Things I have thought about

Health / Combat awareness progression. Warriors get a bit stuffed : fitness/fort 6, combat awareness 5 and 6 are a bit useless. Woe is them they only get 1 pt of DAC and + 4 rounds of hits, they will just have to cry into their 24 points of armour and natural double.

Similarly non warrior/wildernessers only get health so only get one round of hits, this is diliberate.

MorkaisChosen, he reckon: While it makes sense to be starting on less XP, 90 does mean there are a lot of things that don't really work as starting characters- clanky types are gonna have to be non-clanky on a couple of locations, paladins are going to have trouble clanking at all. Not sure this is a soluble problem, however.

Spells / Miracles

Does the level 6 suck for a top end? If so suggest a better one.

Purity suffers here- hooray, our top level miracle is PURGE 6. Suggest a smaller version of the current level 7; SILENCE 150 or 180 or whatever people decide is balanced. --MorkaisChosen

Oh dear god no. Just no. By all means cap the top end of the system, but starting PCs on 90XP is an appallingly bad idea. New PCs already have the handicap of not knowing or being trusted by anyone; adding in not having any skills anyone wants to take advantage of for even longer would make it even harder for new PCs who want to PvE? to be more than spectators than it already is. 150 is quite low enough, thank you very much. Besides, the only significant gain from capping the top end would be to reduce the power differential, and reducing the bottom removes that merit. If you want more low-XP PCs, reduce the rate of XP gain - or, better yet, increase the rate at which rate of XP gain decreases as you go up XP, so that it's easy to reach e.g. 240, but then very slow to reach 360. --Jacob

As long as the old 10xp per interactive when under 150 came back then it's less than 6 weeks of play (depending on linear monstering) to hit 150 so in timescale it's not long, although the 90 to 150 power difference is fairly huge. (Stated with no intent to argue one side or the other) --Malselene

150xp is a massive amount of XP. Most characters I play never progress beyond this, and there's a huge wealth of options and skills available to them. 90xp is still pretty decent if your focus is on doing a particular thing well, and if you place the emphasis of your skill buys on that, you can compete on that front. I admit you can't be an all-round good-at-everything character with only 90xp though.--ahdok

The significant gain from decapitating the system isn't just reduction of power differential, it's also the removal of most of the more ridiculous skills, the unbalanced skills, the one shot PVP skills and so on. --ahdok