When I did my recent post about converting games to d100 format, I had some real difficulty with 13th Age.
The question I kept asking myself was why?
Every other system could be and in some cases should be conerted for the reasons ststed (consistency, familiarity, simplicity, more fun), but converting 13A seemed like a retrograde move,like sewing legs back onto summer cut-offs for winter
The fact is 13th Age exists in my collection of systems as the ultimate “anti d100” game, the release valve or mindset change. 13A is d20 on steroids, a paragon of abstractness, even in comarison with other d20 games, so if the intent is to convert it back to a more “realistic” d100 base system, then its existence in my collection has to be questioned.
If anything, it plays dual roles, reminding me why I like d100 games and provides a real play style switch. Savage Worlds was meant to be that game, but failed to excite. 13A on the otherhand did it with bells on.
This was highlighted by two things.
The first is how pointless d100-ing 13A would be. Nothing fits in that dynamic. Plenty of games are like that, SW included, but with 13A, even the more rigid dynamics of 5e are stream-lined. The whole point of 13A is to translate years of d20 house rules into something usable by others. It is even a d20 alternative and exemplar in many ways of alternate play styles.
I know that the point of my conversion article was more about re-purposing a systems adventures etc, but even that seems to be at odds with the mindset I adopt when playing 13A.
The reality is any games, d100 or not, can liberally borrow concepts from 13A, but shoe-horning d100 mechanics into 13A does little but break it at it’s core.
The second point was highlighted by a 13A supplement, 13th Age Glorantha and the irony is not lost on me. I have never been overly interested in Glorantha as a d100 setting, which is heresy I guess as Rune Quest, the original Glorantha setting core game is the d100 elder, the progenitor of the whole family, but a version of the game I have never been interested in. Call of Cthulhu was my and many others first d100 contact and will always have a place. RQ was more of a DnD 1e competitor, which I did not play anyway, so it slipped past me. I have adopted Glorantha-free versions of the same evolved system (Legend, Mythras, RQ6 Essential), but never paid into the full thing.
In 13A I like it and feel it really fits like a glove. Again heresy I suppose, but with fresh eyes, the system fits the feel, screw the history. I bought 13AG simply to get more 13A, but fell into the world on offered seemlessly. Plenty of Glorantha fans, with deep roots in RQ can find 13AG interesting, maybe even flattering, but coming from the opposite perspective, I find it the only tolerable form of Glorantha for me.
This is heroic high fantasy, which I feel is much better served by this form of over the top d20 handling. Happy if you don’t, but for me Glorantha with 13A is fine, without it is just another form of d100 fantasy and I have tons I prefer.
Mouse Guard, AIME/TOR, Monsters and Other Childish Things, Traveller etc are all in the d100 parameters for easy conversion. 13A should not be.