D&D Conversion Notes

These notes document conversions used when adapting D&D material into Ninefold. They are adaptation guidance, not active play rules.

Item Import

The D&D source cache contains 450 D&D 2024 SRD 5.2.1 records for editorial normalization into the shared Item Compendium:

The non-playable source cache is dnd_item_import.json. Canonical Items may merge rank-only variants, use general names, and retain links to the corresponding D&D Free Rules only in provenance. Six headings about sentient-item rules were excluded because they are rules text rather than items.

Standard D&D weapons establish the first-stage Ninefold damage baseline. Cyberpunk weapons then select the nearest D&D weapon and inherit that converted baseline; Cyberpunk DPS does not replace it.

Item Effect Extraction

Item mechanics are decomposed into the shared Effect Mechanics Compendium and linked directly from their host Items. There is no separate effect-application compendium. A source item with only descriptive text, such as ordinary travel clothing, needs no mechanical link.

The reusable item mechanisms include damage, recovery, conditions, defenses, mobility, critical changes, action changes, transformation, creation or summoning, effect invocation, storage capacity, task enablement, and fixed-attribute replacement. D&D saves, AC, ability scores, advantage, timing, charges, and durations remain import evidence until converted into Ninefold contested rolls, percentages, ticks, and resources.

Spell-Derived Candidate Cost

A D&D source action is normalized to a 2-tick Ninefold candidate action. A D&D source reaction is normalized to a 1-tick candidate reaction. A Bonus Action becomes a 1-tick combo addition. These are conversion assumptions for imported D&D material, not shared player-system timing rules. An explicit converted effect may define another duration.

A spell-derived effect candidate pays 1 Stamina for every occupied action tick, plus Stamina equal to the source spell level. This follows the ordinary action-resource rule and adds spell complexity as a separate cost.

Stamina cost = occupied ticks + source spell level

An ordinary action occupies 2 ticks, so a level 3 effect costs 5 Stamina. A level 3 reaction occupies 1 tick and costs 4 Stamina. A cantrip is level 0 and therefore pays only its occupied-tick cost. Explicit timing overrides the default action or reaction duration.

Core-System Differences

• D&D ability scores and ability modifiers are not retained. Ninefold stats are recorded directly as signed percentage-point bonuses.
• D&D saving throws become contested Ninefold defense rolls using the applicable stats, proficiency, and typed resistance.
• D&D's shared Proficiency Bonus is not imported. Every Ninefold skill has its own percentage-point proficiency rating.
• D&D level prerequisites, rest limits, class scaling, and action terminology remain source context until explicitly adapted into a Ninefold rule.

Movement

D&D movement is listed as feet per six-second round. Convert it to Ninefold feet per second with:

Ninefold movement in ft/s = D&D movement in ft/round ÷ 6 seconds

For example:

30 ft/round ÷ 6 seconds = 5 ft/s

Keep a useful decimal when the result is not whole. For example, 40 ft/round becomes approximately 6.7 ft/s.

Back to the System Reference

Skill-Tree Imports

Every imported Mind-side candidate is assigned to a named conversion branch. Playable trained skills sit beneath five named root families. Arcane owns magical training, spells, spell repertoires, metamagic, magical spatial manipulation, magical telepathy, supernatural auras, and other explicitly magical effects. These entries must not be placed under general Virtual Manipulation merely because a particular campaign presents magic through a virtual world.

Root Skill Families

These five families are independent root nodes containing actual separately trained skills, not D&D clauses that grant generic proficiency or Expertise.

Arcana belongs to the dedicated Arcane group. Generic “gain proficiency,” Expertise, Reliable Talent, saving-throw training, and similar source features are not skills. They must become a specific skill purchase, an action enhancement, or a quarantined conversion record.

The named Mind branches organize general conversion work. Physical embodiment upgrades are Items purchased with Embodiment Points, never Skills purchased with Skill Points. Quarantined source clauses are not playable. Arcane source powers become virtual or real-world Items; only mental training used to control those Items belongs in the Skill tree. The D&D Skill Import Catalogue is a source-review ledger rather than a public compendium.

A source feat, class feature, item, or other package is a compound grant, not a node in this tree. Import it by splitting its text into reusable benefits:

1. Reuse an existing benefit node when its effect is the same.
2. Create separate nodes for independent choices, resources, recovery rules, triggers, and effects.
3. Link dependent benefits with prerequisites. For example, a resource-spending effect depends on the resource node that it spends.
4. Record source scaling and restrictions as source context until they have Ninefold Wheel equivalents.
5. Keep acquisition rules on the source mapping. A direct source grant can provide a benefit without following the ordinary purchase path to that benefit.

Prerequisites describe what must already be learned, not merely which source package grants a benefit. Every non-root skill therefore links to at least one enabling skill. Equipment techniques require the relevant equipment training, resource spenders require their resource, state benefits require the state, and upgrades require the feature they improve. The branch foundation skills are the only nodes allowed to have no prerequisite.

This makes one source feature a small tree of benefits and allows the same benefit to be granted by several unrelated sources without duplicating its rule.

First breakdown: Slasher

The D&D Slasher feat is broken into separate candidate nodes rather than treated as one packaged skill:

Melee Weapons
└── Slashing Weapons
    ├── Hamstring Strike
    └── Crippling Critical

Physical Attribute Development
└── Strength or Dexterity Increase

• Melee Weapons — general skill.
• Slashing Weapons — specialization.
• Hamstring Strike — on a slashing hit, reduce a target's speed.
• Crippling Critical — a slashing critical hit impairs the target's attacks.
• Strength or Dexterity Increase — stat improvement clause, tracked separately from the weapon branch.

These are candidate nodes derived from the source. Their skill-point costs, advancement thresholds, and final game effects remain to be designed.

Source

The D&D 2024 feat index is a reference catalogue. The Slasher feat provides this first example: it increases Strength or Dexterity, allows a slashing hit to reduce a target's speed, and makes a target hit by a slashing critical less effective at attacking.

D&D source feats decomposed

Each feat's clauses are being split into independent candidate effect skills. A source feat may therefore point to leaves in several branches. D&D rest limits, Proficiency Bonus scaling, and spell rules are source details to review during adaptation, not assumed Ninefold Wheel rules.

Origin feats — common

Arcane and spell effects

Crafting

Companion, aid, fortune, and mobility

Learning, performance, and focus

Unarmed combat

Combat awareness and durability

All 22 common Origin feats listed by the source have now been reviewed.

Origin feats — Faerûn

Origin feats — Exotic

All 35 Origin feats on the source index have now been reviewed and decomposed into candidate effect leaves.

Fighting Style feats

All 13 Fighting Style feats have been reviewed and their individual combat effects mapped as candidate nodes.

Epic Boon feats — Common

All 15 Common Epic Boon feats have now been reviewed and decomposed into candidate effect leaves.

Epic Boon feats — Eberron

Epic Boon feats — Exotic

Epic Boon feats — Faerûn

All 32 Epic Boon feats on the source index have now been reviewed and decomposed into candidate effect leaves.

Dragonmark feats — standard marks

Standard Dragonmarks separate trained checks, direct mark abilities, granted spell access, and the Mark spell list into distinct candidate nodes.

All 13 standard Dragonmark feats have now been decomposed into candidate effect leaves.

Greater Dragonmark feats

All 14 Greater and Potent Dragonmark feats have now been reviewed and decomposed into candidate effect leaves.

Planar Pact feats — base pacts

Planar Pact feats — greater pacts

All 9 Planar Pact feats have been decomposed. D&D level gates are retained only as source context and do not create level prerequisites in this tree.

Dark Gift feats

All 9 Dark Gift feats have been decomposed. Beneficial and adverse clauses remain separate candidate effects for system design.

General feats — Common

All 60 Common General feats have been reviewed.

General feats — Faerûn

All 13 Faerûn General feats on the source index have now been reviewed.

General feats — Exotic

All 83 General feats on the source index have now been reviewed and decomposed into candidate effect leaves. All feat families in the source catalog have now been reviewed and decomposed into candidate effect leaves.

D&D 2024 base-class packages

Class packages follow the same compound-grant model as feats: each textual bonus points to a reusable benefit node, while source levels and scaling stay as adaptation context. Wrapper grants such as subclass selection, Ability Score Improvement, and Epic Boon select separate packages and do not duplicate their benefits here.

• Artificer
• Barbarian
• Bard
• Cleric
• Druid
• Fighter
• Monk
• Paladin
• Ranger
• Rogue
• Sorcerer
• Warlock
• Wizard