Thinking about Anima?

[Arcanaman 0]

Recently I have become disenchanted with a roleplaying game I have been playing for several years (cough cough dnd 4E) me and my players  are

looking for something  else now  and I would like  to know the differences between Anima  and  dnd anything  you can give me would be much obliged I

have also made a similar query about warhammer  on enworld 

Thank you in advanced

[Exarkfr 129]

Anima is not as much combat oriented. Many skills are there that are not combat related

The classes give you the cost for improving each ability, but you are free to spend your points as you see fit. It's not as rigid as DnD

The game is less loot-driven. It's skill that matters

You don't have to spend hours reading the rules to figure out how a kobold "shifty" ability works when you move, charge, teleport, shift close to him

Magic and Psychic abilities share mechanics with combat, but have their own flavours

 

(I have a little dislike with DnD 4; I feel like all they did with this game is turn DnD Miniatures into a RPG, but forgot to add RP back into it)

 

[Arcanaman 0]

Could you give me an example

[Arcanaman 0]

Could you give me an example

[Exarkfr 129]

examples :

- Being a wizard or a mentalist is not a matter of class, but an Advantage bought at creation (or discovered latter if the GM wishes). Every class can invest points into the magic or psychic skills, but it will cost more for some to achieve the same results.

Your class can be seen as the training your are undergoing. Wizards devote more time to magic, so they pay less to improve their magic skills, and more to improve their martial skills.  Fighters pay less for their martial skills, but more for their magical skills.

- Items of good quality (+5) can be made by skilled craftsmen, but it will take them some time (such items are expensive, and can't be found everywhere).
Items of great quality (+10) are the kind of items ordered by a lord for a worthy servant. They demand such skill and time to create that they are made by renowned craftsmen only.
Items of exceptional quality (+15) are chef d'oeuvre. It takes more than a master to make them, and access to very rare materials.
Better quality (+20/+25) fall into artefacts.

Magic items, well, they "don't exist". It would require a very very powerful wizard to permanently put a low-level enchant on an item. You won't find them in shops (not even potions and scrolls, forget about them)

- What can you do to replace loot, then ? If you are a wizard, you have spells. If you are a mentalist, you have your psychic powers. If you are a summoner, you can call upon powerful beings.
And you have Ki. Every one has access to Ki (some classes are better at it than others). And Ki can do a lot to replicate what magic items do in other games.
If you learn to channel your inner energy into your weapon, you can strengthen it and hurt creatures immune to regular weapons. You can increase the damage you deal. You can inflict elemental damage with it.
You can use Ki to protect yourself from damage.
You can walk on water, levitate, heal wounds, ignore pain....

[Dragan2 0]

Anima uses d100 for resolving skill checks but I don't think you will find hard to transit from one system to other- basically, you have skill bonus, you roll d100 and add nubers together. Check the table how successful you are and voila!  There are several other roll types but this one is most common.

Character creation process can be a bit longish at start due to sheere nuber of options and calculations you have to make but after 3rd or 4th created character you will be able to shorten that proces to few minutes.

Lastly, take note that Anima is story driven rpg and that you should not base it on combat since the combat can get quite deadly at some times. It is also good if you are one of descriptive types GM/player since it adds to the coolness factor of game session.

Regards,

[Arcanaman 0]

Cool thats exactly what I am looking for

[Arcanaman 0]

Does Anima have alignments?

[Ysalaine 0]

NO. There's no strict RP obligations for the character from class or something else, interpretation is totally free. In my opinion, a general inclination of the setting is to be "grey" instead of "black or white". There are not so much real vilains, and even heroes can be not so good. Anima is not a manichean game.

There are Light/Darkness and Creation/Destruction magic paths, they are opposed, but none is "good" or "bad" : they are just different parts of the Magic.

[Arcanaman 0]

I have read in many threads that character creation is a long process how much longer is then a normal 3.5 dnd character sheet ?

[Exarkfr 129]

Learning (or teaching someone) how to make a character is "long" (can't give you a time, though)

But once you know how it works, it goes quite fast. What might take time is optimization, making up your mind on what will be your character's main role, building up a good party synergy, and all the things that slow down character creation in any RPG
(I can't have A and B right now, what should I take first ; will I mainly go sword&board or two-handed ; shall I invest more into offensive or healing spells ; I want something later, is there any prerequisite I should try and meet right now ; ....)

 

Things that could slow the creation :
 - martial artists who want to create their own techniques
 - summoners who want to write up their summons

Those should be left to players who already know the mechanics and can come to the table with things already prepared

[Ysalaine 0]

Arcanaman said:

I have read in many threads that character creation is a long process how much longer is then a normal 3.5 dnd character sheet ?

A "normal" creation doesn't really exist, you know... It depends a lot of the person and of your experience with the game, as Exarkfr said. Some friends and I can create a DD3.5 level 15 warrior in only 5 minutes without any book, knowing the tables and most of the feats by heart. Some other people can barely create the same lv15 warrior in a full afternoon, because they're not familiar with the game and/or want to make it very well.

Create your first character alone, with your book, just to try it. When you'll get the logic of it, you can make your players create their own character.

My first Anima chargen were quite long, but know, it's easy and fast (about 30 min - 1h), except if I want to create a character who uses some powers I never used before (a magic path, etc.).

[Arcanaman 0]

I was thinking about doing once I get the book(don't know where to look )  So are there only two races and a buch of subraces or I am kinda confused with that

[Exarkfr 129]

Officially, there is only 1 race : Humans  (the Inquisition will hunt and burn anything else )

But you can also find Nephilims (Humans with souls from another race) and other races (Jayan, D'Abjayni, Sylvain, Daimah, Ebudan, Duk'Zarist).

You can even use the tools at the end of the book to create playable creatures

[Arcanaman 0]

How many main classes are there liked compared with dnd

[Ysalaine 0]

20 classes. But classes aren't like in DD at all. There are almost only patterns of costs for different habilities. Character are created by spending points in these habilities, cheaper or more expensive depending of the class. Some classes also give bonuses/level to some habilities, and all of them give bonuses/level in Health Points (but you can increase HP with points), Turn, and a few other things about supernatural powers.

When you choose a class, you only choose a development pattern. There are no RP obligations as in DD. Someone from the "Paladin" class is only a good warrior who is good in social skills (Command, etc.), there are not Sacred warriors with codes of conducts. Your RP character concept, behaviour, social position, job are only up to you, not decided by your class.

Some class samples : Warrior, Acrobatic warrior, Paladin and Dark Paladin (bad names, just two different versions of the same thing, not "a good" and "a bad" one), Shadow (furtive warrior), Explorer (not sure about the english name), Wizard, Warlock (fighter wizard), Tao (martial arts mainly), Technician (specialist about Ki), Mentalist, Warrior Mentalist, Summoner, Warrior summoner, Wizard mentalist, Rogue, Illusionist (bad name again, just a furtive wizard, not linked to illusions), Novel (no specialisation) etc.

Anima is a very different game than DD, you'll see... Don't have if you had a lot of other experiences in RPG, but you'll need to change a lot of points of view ^^

For example, there are no Priest class, and the game don't need any. If you want to play a priest, you can choose every class depending of your character concept : a little village priest ? Explorer, Novel. A big town bishop ? Novel, Paladin. A pious knight ? Paladin, warrior, Weapon Master. A Saint (someone with supernatural powers recognized by the Church as Divine Gift) ? Wizard, Mentalist, Wizard mentalist, Warlock, etc.

[Exarkfr 129]

I forgot about this.... there is a link in Ysalaine's signature that contains some fan-made documents (mostly French, but some are in English)

One of the documents is the English translation of the Character Generation summary (of course, it won't contain much more than the steps you have to follow, but it could give you some informations)

[Arcanaman 0]

Ok finally got that downloaded yeah me ! ummm....  what is the difference between mentalist powers and wizards? and are the ki powers similar those a monk in dnd has?

[Exarkfr 129]

When using a power, Mentalists must make a roll on that power's table to see how much effect they get (the higher the roll, the greater the effect).

Wizard, have more control on their spells' power, but they must first accumulate enough mana (Zeon) to cast a spell (think Dragon Ball, when they concentrate before blasting every thing)

Ki Abilities might look more like Jedi's skills. Ki technique can replicate many anime style moves (swords shooting energy beams, fighter striking an incredible amount of times, clones...)