If you're willing to elaborate
@clearstream I'm interested to hear how 5E E6 played, whether you continued increasing the challenges for the static level PCs, and whether the capped advancement--or lateral advancement if the game goes into domain play or acquisition of magic items--feels fun and natural. Does E6 deliver on it's no superheroes and no wuxia intent when applied to 5e?
Yes, it does. Characters become strong, but they are never super-heroic. Bearing in mind that it takes a lot of sessions to see a decent slice of the 12 possible classes + dozens of sub-classes, we need more play still to understand how fun and natural it will feel. So I will report back in a few more sessions.
Allowing epic boons could prove to stray off-piste, because some of them do feel super-heroic. It's easy to find yourself making something expensive that, really, you'd rather not see in play at all! The cost reflects your aversion to it and maybe it's better to cut it. OTOH some epic boons look like they'd add interest....
Relatedly, I am noticing that feats and epic boons are uneven. Something we're doing that I might not have mentioned is
Relaxed prerequisites
Ignore ability score and species feat pre-requisites
Broadened benefits
When a feat increases an ability score by 1, you can increase any ability score... not just those listed
Together, these make a much wider range of feats interesting to each character. If I remember to, when I report back I will document what we're doing more completely!
Also, why did you move away from the rules articulated in the OP? Just wanted to try something different, or did you find them lacking in some way?
I might still revert to the OP! The give and take as I see it includes
OP-version: class features tie better to class thematics than collections of feats and epic boons
Cap-at-6th: it's interesting to customize characters with feats and epic boons
OP-version: class features are unequal*
Cap-at-6th: feats and epic boons are a finite list that's unequal in focus and value
OP-version: there's some interesting play around magic (dispels and counterspells)
Cap-at-6th: it's simpler and thus likely more accessible (although trap-feats might undo that)
*Evaluating classes in ASIs under the OP-version up to 12th: Brb 32, Brd 34, Clr 34, Drd 33, Ftr 25, Mnk 28, Pal 31, Rgr 31, Rog 28, Src 29, War 32, Wiz 27. It's an imperfect analysis, but the gap could be as much as 9 ASIs. As a side note, for anyone who wants to better balance casters against martials, capping spell level at 3rd goes a
long way toward that.