How to Combine Pathfinder 2e and BRP?

[Pao]

Any tip on how to convert PF2e into BRP?

Edited August 16, 2023 by Pao

[smiorgan]

What do you want to convert, exactly? The adventures/ setting or classes, spells, monsters?

 

[Raleel]

Classic fantasy (now in Mythras) is a good start. That’s d&d but close. 
 

the work I’ve done on it, largely in Mythras but clearly portable, has revolved around making a cult (essentially a set of powers) for each ancestry, class, archetype, and for many of the feats. I restricted it to 5 levels, but that covered all of level 1-20. I avoided +5% bonuses as a personal preference. I eyeballed pathfinder levels as combat/casting skill at 50% and add 5% per level for comparison. 
 

it’s not a small tasks. 

[jackleg2010]

I've seen this type of topic on other forums. Mythras Classic Fantasy is a good place to start. But you can rarely convert. What you have to do adapt it to BRP. Sometimes you have to eyeball to it. Tweek it here and there. I've tried to convert, and it never works 💯 percent of the time. But if you adapt, it's less headaches. Imho 

Edited August 11, 2023 by jackleg2010
spelling

[Raleel]

Yea, I agree. Straight conversion is a little tough. It also loses strengths from the other system. Adapting to the structures present in the target system is normally better. 
 

here’s an example - https://2e.aonprd.com/Heritages.aspx?ID=20 adds 4 additional hit points at the start. How does that convert to BRP? I’d probably do 1 hp per location. The falling should be fine. 

the follow on https://2e.aonprd.com/Feats.aspx?ID=999 gives trained proficiency in acrobatics. I suppose that means you have it as a skill, but it’s not going to be anywhere near as good as the PF2e version. Do you add a bonus? What about the second part? What does tumbling through a foes space mean in BRP?

so… it’s an effort. A large one. 

[Pao]

Thank you, I just having a hard time converting thing like Feat and class Feature.

[Mugen]

On surface, it may seem obvious. 4 abilities are an exact match to BRP characteristics and are on a similar 3d6-ish range, and converting d20 bonuses to d100 chances of success is simple.

But the use of levels in PF2 makes the game very different from BRP.

First, the meaning of Hit Points is very different in both games. In BRP, they're basically "meat points" : losing them means you received a wound. In PF2 and D&D, they're a mix of meat points, will to fight, parry, and ability to "roll with the punches".

PF2 also let all your chances of success automatically grow with level, while in BRP skills you don't use or train will remain the same as they were at character creation.

You basically can't have a magic lab rat in PF. An experienced wizard will also be better at melee than a level 1 fighter.

In short, the best way to convert PF2 to BRP is to rebuild everything using approximatively similar concepts.

Edited August 11, 2023 by Mugen

[smiorgan]

1 hour ago, Pao said:

Thank you, I just having a hard time converting thing like Feat and class Feature.

Assuming that your question is about BRP UG (and not Mythras), I'd use super-powers, which are very flexible and can model a lot of things. 

You might also want to get Magic World and Advanced Sorcery, which are compatible with BRP and introduce more sorcery spells and new subsystems, including Areté - skill based special effects that can be used to model some feats. 

Just out of curiosity, why did you decide to convert to BRP? I mean it's a lot of work, especially if it's a precise conversion, and Pathfinder 2 seems to be good at doing its thing...

 

 

[Ravenheart87]

Feats are a mixed bag, many of them are just situational modifiers or expand what you can do. If you can find something similar in BRP by all means convert it, but if you don't, just let it go. The two systems are fundamentally different. Sometimes it's even easier to just grap the core idea of something, then work it out from scratch.

[Pao]

2 hours ago, smiorgan said:

Assuming that your question is about BRP UG (and not Mythras), I'd use super-powers, which are very flexible and can model a lot of things. 

You might also want to get Magic World and Advanced Sorcery, which are compatible with BRP and introduce more sorcery spells and new subsystems, including Areté - skill based special effects that can be used to model some feats. 

Just out of curiosity, why did you decide to convert to BRP? I mean it's a lot of work, especially if it's a precise conversion, and Pathfinder 2 seems to be good at doing its thing...

 

 

Thank you, Yes I want to convert PF2e to BRP UG, and I have both of those Book but I heard the Pirate Book have some sort of Power for Martial character?

The reason I want to convert PF2e to BRP is because PF2e is a good Gamey ttrpg but I want more Simulation style of game but I still want to retain all of the mechanic of PF2e in BRP or atleast the basic essence of it.

[Pao]

35 minutes ago, Ravenheart87 said:

Feats are a mixed bag, many of them are just situational modifiers or expand what you can do. If you can find something similar in BRP by all means convert it, but if you don't, just let it go. The two systems are fundamentally different. Sometimes it's even easier to just grap the core idea of something, then work it out from scratch.

Thank you for the advice, but I already work on converting the rule and mechanic of PF2e to BRP as faithfully as possible for the last 2 week, I really love the rule I just wish the game world to feel more real, and BRP allow me to do that, I like a more specialist type of character and I want the interaction with the world to be more deep, PF2e does a great job with giving me a lot of option but it restrict me to those option, that the reason I want to convert PF2e to BRP because I want the player to interact with the world more deeply and meaningfully.

[Ravenheart87]

I see. Anyway, if you have any exact ability you are having problems with, do tell us about it, and I'm sure the folks around here will help with it

[smiorgan]

13 minutes ago, Pao said:

Thank you, Yes I want to convert PF2e to BRP UG, and I have both of those Book but I heard the Pirate Book have some sort of Power for Martial character?

The reason I want to convert PF2e to BRP is because PF2e is a good Gamey ttrpg but I want more Simulation style of game but I still want to retain all of the mechanic of PF2e in BRP or atleast the basic essence of it.

Yes the pirate book (Blood Tide) has a sort of feat system. It's out of print and the pdf is not available anymore. However you can probably find print copies on sale online.

The pulp supplement Astounding Adventures also has powers. You can buy the pdf from Chaosium. 

[NickMiddleton]

As regards Feats and the Arete system from Advanced Sorcery - this might ALSO be of interest: 

 

[g33k]

You really do want to take a look at "Classic Fantasy," either (or both) the partial one for BRP, and/or the completed one (for Mythras).

 

[Mugen]

[b]Mongoose[/b]'s first edition of RuneQuest also had "Heroic Abilities" that were basically feats. But there were very few of them.

Land of Ninja (for RQ3) had Ki powers, which could work to give non-magical prowess to characters, but you should lower the prerequisites to make them equivalent to feats, as you needed a skill of 90+ to learn them, and they started with a very low skill value.

[Ian Absentia]

4 hours ago, smiorgan said:

Yes the pirate book (Blood Tide) has a sort of feat system. It's out of print and the pdf is not available anymore. However you can probably find print copies on sale online.

I express hatred for no Chaosium title other than Blood Tide.  Do not encourage its exchange by paying money for it.  It's stunt rules were workable, though.

I endorse the recommendations for Classic Fantasy, though.

!i!

[smiorgan]

2 hours ago, Ian Absentia said:

I express hatred for no Chaosium title other than Blood Tide.  Do not encourage its exchange by paying money for it.  It's stunt rules were workable, though.

I endorse the recommendations for Classic Fantasy, though.

!i!

What's particularly wrong about Blood Tide? It's fairly badly edited as other products of those years -  it was the "dark ages" just before the Stafford-Petersen restoration, but why the special hate?

[smiorgan]

4 hours ago, g33k said:

You really do want to take a look at "Classic Fantasy," either (or both) the partial one for BRP, and/or the completed one (for Mythras).

 

@Pao If you are working with BRP UGE, as you say, you might try to track the old Classic Fantasy monograph on Ebay, which is 100% compatible. Classic Fantasy for Mythras is much more complete, but it's...well... for Mythras - which is a relatively different branch of the big BRP d100 family (Mythras is an excellent game, anyway). 

[Ian Absentia]

1 hour ago, smiorgan said:

...but why the special hate?

It was especially bad, even for the Dark Ages.  I've described my ire here before.

I'm almost sure that I've been much harsher elsewhere.  They took money for that thing.

But back to the topic at hand...

!i!

[Pao]

How would I simulate the mechanic of DC? Like how can I convert DC 25 to BRP?

[Mugen]

1 hour ago, Pao said:

How would I simulate the mechanic of DC? Like how can I convert DC 25 to BRP?

Basically, each point on a d20 equals +/-5% on a d100.

Just multiply by 5 the difference between the DC and the "average" DC (I think it's 15) and add it or substract it from the skill.

For instance, DC 25 is equivalent to a -50% malus (difference between 15 and 25 is 10, x5 = 50).

But, again, skills in Pathfinder grow faster than in BRP, and "level appropriate" DCs are going to be quickly very difficult gor BRP characters.

Edited August 12, 2023 by Mugen

[Mugen]

In order to give some comparison points, a character with a bonus of 0 has 30% chance of success versus a DC 25 15.

BRP characters tend to have lower chances in skills where they have no experience at all.

But the difference between 2 freshly created BRP characters is also very likely to be bigger than with 2 PF level 1s.

Edited August 13, 2023 by Mugen

[Raleel]

5 hours ago, Pao said:

How would I simulate the mechanic of DC? Like how can I convert DC 25 to BRP?

Start at dc 10. Unmodified that’s a 50% chance of success. DC5 is a 75% of success. DC20 is 5% unmodified. 
 

use those as your skill baseline. 
 

DC 25 requires them to have some way to get them over the hump. I normally do it by having them subtract their skill over 100 from the opposition 

[smiorgan]

2 hours ago, Mugen said:

In order to give some comparison points, a character with a bonus of 0 has 30% chance of success versus a DC 25.

BRP characters tend to have lower chances in skills where they have no experience at all.

But the difference between 2 freshly created BRP characters is also very likely to be bigger than with 2 PF level 1s.

I think that here there's no precise conversion. BRP's philosophy about difficulty levels is just different. It's much less granular and less tightly balanced than Pathfinder. When I run BRP-based games, 90% of the times I call for raw, unmodified, skill rolls. Then you have easy actions at skill x2 and difficult actions at 1/2 skill, which I use very sparingly. Then you have the situational modifiers on page 114, which also are meant to be used sparingly. But, really, the assumption that every action is against a certain DC is very un-BRP.

Also, as you have noticed, the idea of an untrained skill is very different. Level 1 untrained PF characters still have a fair chance against low DCs, while BRP characters can really suck at skills they don't have. So, what's the solution? A few ideas:

 - Don't call for a roll if failure is problematic/ uninteresting.

- Fail forward. Have the characters roll and fail pushing the story forward. If they succeed against the odds, it's a big success and they probably can increase their skill.

- Have the players choose wisely survival-critical skills when they allocate skill points

- If you want to call a roll where everyone has a fair chance use characterstic x5 rolls instead.

- Especially in important / dramatic/ tense situations have them use the augment optional rule coming up with plausible secondary skills to roll to augment the mandated roll see the optional rules on page 38. Have them roleplay and provide a rationale for that. 

   

 

 

   

Edited August 12, 2023 by smiorgan