Post/Author/DateTime	Post
mkill 12-25-06, 11:18 PM	In this thread I'd like to collect small houserules, minor tweaks and simple rules judgements that you use in your games to gloss over inconsistencies, speed up the game and increase the fun. 1. Ranger animal companion The ranger’s effective druid level is his ranger level -3. Normal: The ranger’s effective druid level is one-half his ranger level. Reason: Make sure the critter still survives higher level play. 2. Divine Grace (Paladin) and Dark Blessing (Blackguard) don't stack. Normal: Both are unnamed abilities, so one might argue they do stack. Reason: With the UA Paladin variants it is possible for an evil Paladin to take Blackguard levels without losing his abilities. This creates an unintendet rules loophole. 3. Fighter Gain Spot and Listen as class skills. Starting from 11th level, fighters gain a bonus feat every level. Reason: Silence the whining about the fighter. 4. Dodge feat If your base attack bonus is +4 or higher, you no longer need to pick a target for this feat. You gain a flat +1 dodge bonus to AC. For the effects of feats and abilities based on dodge, such as Elusive Target, you still need to pick a target. If your base attack bonus is +12 or higher, the dodge bonus is increased to +2. Reason: Speeds up game play because there is one less feat to worry about every round. 5. Weapon Focus The attack bonus from weapon focus is increased by +1 for every 8 points of base attack bonus you have. You may use this feat (and every other feat in the WF chain) with an additional weapon if you train with that weapon for 1 hour a day. Reason: Makes this feat still somewhat worth it at higher levels, makes Greater Weapon Focus superfluous (take a useful feat instead) 6. Weapon Specialization (rewrite) Prerequisite: Weapon Focus with weapon Benefit: The damage you deal with your chosen weapon is increased by +1, +1 for every 4 points of base attack bonus you have. Reason: Makes this feat still somewhat worth it at higher levels, makes Greater Weapon Specialization superfluous (take a useful feat instead) 7. Knights Gain Diplomacy as a class skill Reason: Why that one was left out is a mystery to me. 8. Clerics Gain Sense Motive as a class skill Reason: Clerics should be able to pinpoint liars and sinners. 9. Familiars The familiar's hit point total is either their own or half their master's hp. Reason: It makes Improved Familiars die less often. 10. Weapon Proficiency (feat rewrite) Prerequisite: none Benefit: You gain proficiency with one weapon of choice for each point of base attack bonus that you have, at least one. Reason: Make sure the feat is more useful compared to other feats, so it's not just taken by spiked chain trippers. Merge 3 feats into one (simple, martial, exotic) 11. Divine Metamagic (rewrite) Prerequisite: Turn or Rebuke Undead Benefit: By spending some of your daily Turn/Rebuke Undead attempts as a swift action, you can spontaneously apply a metamagic feat that you possess to a spell you cast. You need to spend a number of attempts equal to the spell level increase. You may not boost spells higher than the maximum spell level you are able to cast. Reason: While this reduces the Quicken and Persistant cheese to low-level spells, the added flexibility makes this still a worthwile feat.
Fargren 12-25-06, 11:31 PM	9. Familiars The familiar's hit point total is either their own or half their master's. Reason: Reduce fatality of Improved Familiars. I don't undestand.
mkill 12-25-06, 11:36 PM	(9. Improved Familiar) Some of the battle-worthy Improved Familiars in CW have decent hit point totals, such as the Winter Wolf (51 hp). By standard rules, all familiars have hit points equal to half their master's. While that gives some bonus hp to all those toads and ravens, this actually reduces the hp of Winter Wolves and similar, as most wizards would have less than 102 hp. This little house rule makes sure that the Winter Wolf does not become frail and weak just because somebody bonded him as a familiar.
Fargren 12-25-06, 11:39 PM	Ah, thanks. Nice house rule.
strife_001 12-26-06, 12:15 AM	8. Clerics Gain Sense Motive as a class skill Reason: Clerics should be able to pinpoint liars and sinners. They can, but they have to use spells.
mkill 12-26-06, 03:27 AM	They can, but they have to use spells. True, but they should be able to do that without magic. For example, Druids get both the Handle Animal skill and a bunch of spells with the same effect, such as Charm Animal. Beguilers have both Enchantment spells and social skills, too, and so on. Anyway, this thread was supposed to be a community effort, so who submits houserule #12?
Ghenesh 12-26-06, 06:53 PM	mkill, your scaling feat fixes are overpowered, maybe you haven't tested in game yet or seen all the options, at least check out how to make work Elusive Target (CW) with your Dodge. 12.- At first level all characters have 2 feats (instead of 1) and 2 extra skill points, they can spend this skill points on Craft, Perform, Profession or Knowledge (any). To add some background mechanics. 13.- The feat Skill Focus make the chosen skill a class skill for all the levels the character gains. 14.- The spell Keen Edge and the Weapon Enhancement Keen Edge now increase the threat range of the weapon by 1 and stacks with the feat Improved Critical. 15.- The Sorcerer gain a bonus Metamagic or Heritage Feat at levels 11, 15 and 19. At 20th level a Sorcerer can replace any known spell for another arcane spell read in a magic scroll or a wizard's spellbook by succeeding a Spellcraft check (DC 20 + spell level), doing so takes an hour. To help Sorcerers stand a chance against PrCs.
mkill 12-28-06, 11:56 AM	mkill, your scaling feat fixes are overpowered, maybe you haven't tested in game yet or seen all the options It's not overpowered by design because any NPC enemy and any monster (many monsters do have the dodge feat, and it's quite easy to slap on WF with their natural Weapons) will gain the bonus too. It also does not favor any class because it is really no problem to fit Weapon Focus in somewhere. All it does is... It powers Weapon Focus up against other feat choices. But that was the reason for that houserule in the first place! Ok, it does have a second effect, it saves fighters with the feat from wasting a second slot on the improved version. Again, this is intended. So please don't claim it is overpowered until you have tested it in game. at least check out how to make work Elusive Target (CW) with your Dodge. Simple, you don't pick an enemy to dodge for the dodge feat, but you do still pick one enemy for the effect of the Elusive target feat if you have it. I've already put that in there. It still speeds up the game, because many PCs will choose a basic feat like dodge, but Elusive target is something for special builds. 12.- At first level all characters have 2 feats (instead of 1) and 2 extra skill points, they can spend this skill points on Craft, Perform, Profession or Knowledge (any). To add some background mechanics. I do like the idea of background bonus skill points very much. But handing out a free feat does power up the game a few percent, as certain optimized builds suddenly become possible. I guess it scales out because every PCs gets it, but this is not a minor rule you can add without rebalancing elsewhere (upping the CRs of encounters a fraction). 13.- The feat Skill Focus make the chosen skill a class skill for all the levels the character gains. Yes. Very good. 14.- The spell Keen Edge and the Weapon Enhancement Keen Edge now increase the threat range of the weapon by 1 and stacks with the feat Improved Critical. I have my doubts about that one. First of all, many players don't realize how little they get from improved criticals, compared to just increasing their attack bonus and damage. This alone makes the Improved Critical feat not worth it. So, what you do is nerf a somewhat useful, if sub-par weapon enhancement and a passable spell to force PCs to take a very sub-par feat. I disagree there, just leave the bad feat as bait for those who can't do the math. Or make it the other way around, rewrite the feat that it increases the threat range of the weapon by 2, and stacks. 15.- The Sorcerer gain a bonus Metamagic or Heritage Feat at levels 11, 15 and 19. At 20th level a Sorcerer can replace any known spell for another arcane spell read in a magic scroll or a wizard's spellbook by succeeding a Spellcraft check (DC 20 + spell level), doing so takes an hour. To help Sorcerers stand a chance against PrCs. Agreed, and I'd also add Eschew Materials, Versatile Spellcaster, Spell Penetration, Spell Focus, and a bunch of other feats to the bonus choice list.
DreadArchon 12-28-06, 09:01 PM	I really like the idea of adding skill points that can only be used on background stuff. I'm surprised I didn't think of it. (My solution was to give all classes +2 skill points per level and just attempt, as a DM, to cause problems for those with no backstory-type skills)
Anodai 12-28-06, 09:54 PM	15: you cant take 20 on search, listen, or spot, etc if you have no way of knowing whether you failed or something is really there. doesnt make life easier but makes a helluva lotta sence.
stargate525 12-29-06, 02:43 PM	12.- At first level all characters have 2 feats (instead of 1) and 2 extra skill points, they can spend this skill points on Craft, Perform, Profession or Knowledge (any). To add some background mechanics. I've got a variation of this; that all characters get the human skill package (4 at first and one thereafter) to be used on craft, knowledge, perform, or profession. Other skills subject to DM approval. This makes it so that they can continue to develop their background interests beyond first level.
ESP 12-29-06, 11:54 PM	16. Weapon Finesse applies to all light weapons. Seems silly to me to make people take this feat for every light weapon individualy.
unundindur 12-30-06, 02:53 PM	16. Weapon Finesse applies to all light weapons. Seems silly to me to make people take this feat for every light weapon individualy. In 3.5 weapon finess do work for all light weapons :)
unundindur 12-30-06, 03:09 PM	Some more tweaks that I prefer: Scimitar = light weapon Max hp at all levels for PCs and Villains, average for critters Two weapon fighting feat includes effect of improved and greater two weapon fighting All skills as class skills Weapon finesse for free at level 1. Shortsword, longsword and dagger dealing slashing OR piercing damage.
nonsi 12-30-06, 06:39 PM	1. To gain an AoO against anyone who merely moves in your threatened area, you must ready an action. This goes for every individual in the game world. 2. Combat Reflex is canceled. Everyone gets 1 AoO... + 1 / #Atk when readying an action instead of attacking.
ESP 12-30-06, 11:26 PM	In 3.5 weapon finess do work for all light weapons :) :embarrass :doh: Well I'm glad Wizards agrees with me.:D
Sphyre 12-31-06, 12:49 AM	4. Dodge feat If your base attack bonus is +4 or higher, you no longer need to pick a target for this feat. You gain a flat +1 dodge bonus to AC. For the effects of feats and abilities based on dodge, such as Elusive Target, you still need to pick a target. If your base attack bonus is +12 or higher, the dodge bonus is increased to +2. Reason: Speeds up game play because there is one less feat to worry about every round. I houseruled Dodge differently. To remove the whole "pick a target" thing, if you choose not to apply your dodge bonus to a target, it is automatically assigned to the first thing attacking you for that round. This way you never have to assign the stupid bonus, but you always get the effect. All you have to do is remember you have the feat. But forgetting you have it is like forgetting to power attack, you should know what feats you have.
mkill 01-01-07, 08:44 AM	(Ok, let's get the counter back in shape / some of the following were posted by unundindur above) Weapons 18. Scimitar and Longsword are finessable weapons Reason: Help the elven sword dancer / swashbuckler / pirate archetype 19. Shortsword and longsword deal slashing and piercing damage (note: dagger already does) Reason: While a longsword is usually used for slashing and a shortsword for piercing, it's at least possible to use the weapon the other way. Also, you could bash with the hilt for 1d4 bludgeoning damage (I'm not so much for his other suggestions as they clearly give PCs a general boost and don't qualify as "minor tweaks") 20. Half-Orcs Half-Orcs receive an extra feat at first level and a +2 racial bonus on Survival checks. They inherit some of the talent of their human ancenstry, and as they are often outcasts in both societies they have learn to rely on their own wits. Reason: There seems to be a consensus that half-orcs are the weakest race in the PHB (in spite of their +2 Str). The bonus feat actually makes them a good choice for many classes, on par with the human (who still has a better attribute average and bonus skill points). 21. Half-Elves Half-Elves receive +4 extra skill points at first level and +1 extra skill points at each level after that. This reflects their inherited talent from the human side. Reason: Half-Elves need a little bump if the XP-penalty for multiclassing is gone (see #22 and #24). Multiclassing 22. No XP-penalty There are no XP penalties for multiclassing. The whole chapter on page 60 of the PHB is ignored. Reason: The XP penalties were introduced way back in the first playtesting, to keep the spirit of AD&D multiclassing: Either advance in a single class or keep up two classes evenly. Now, in 2007, nobody really cares about AD&D multiclassing anymore. What's worse, Prestige classes changed the whole system, and now the multiclassing penalty is more or less a "No-Prestige-class-penalty". It is clunky and useless. 23. Monks and Paladins Monks and Paladins can reenter their class freely after multiclassing. The respective passages are ignored. Reason: Sean Reynolds has been preaching this since 3.0 edition (homepage (http://www.seankreynolds.com/rpgfiles/opinions/PH_opinions_classes.html)), and I fully agree: The monk multiclassing restriction should go away. It was only put in to mollify PH playtesters who felt that "leaving the path of the monk" should be restricted. It's a flavor thing, not a game balance thing. FR and Eberron have already dented this rule anyway, it's time to finally trash it. 24. Favored Class Without the XP penalty, the favored class of the individual races is reduced to a flavor thing, without any rules effect. This is a good thing. Some of the many reasons are: * no more stereotyping * no more elf = ranger or elf = wizard discussion, as well as gnome = illusionist vs. gnome = bard * classes introduced in splatbooks are not disadvantaged
mkill 01-01-07, 08:58 AM	1. To gain an AoO against anyone who merely moves in your threatened area, you must ready an action. This rule is unnecessary. You can already declare "I ready an action to attack any enemy that moves within my threatened area". See SRD - Ready (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/specialInitiativeActions.htm#ready). The only difference is that you can only ready one attack. Unless you are surrounded by enemies, this does not make a difference. And the whole idea of an AoO is that you don't have to ready an action. Don't confuse the two. Normal AoOs for attacks against moving through a threatened square should still apply right? This goes for every individual in the game world. Well, rules should never need such a clarification. If it's a game rule, of course it applies to everyone. There are no exceptions for "fighters named Bob". 2. Combat Reflex is canceled. Everyone gets 1 AoO... + 1 / #Atk when readying an action instead of attacking. I strongly disagree. First of all, you can get AoO from more sources than just enemies moving. Second, the whole idea of AoOs is that you don't have to ready. Third, the feat is useful and should stay.
nonsi 01-01-07, 02:57 PM	And the whole idea of an AoO is that you don't have to ready an action. Don't confuse the two. Normal AoOs for attacks against moving through a threatened square should still apply right? 1. And the whole idea is that if you can do it, so can others do it to you. 2. If you're engaged in something and divide your attention to atack someone that you can reach, and that someone isn't doing something that lowers his defenses (like reaching into his backpack to grab a potion), no reason why you should get a free opportunity to slip in a blow while he can't retaliate. 3. In real life, if someone is moving and you're standing still, on the average he has the upper hand. 4. Turn back and have a peek at the title ("increase the fun of the game"). I strongly disagree. First of all, you can get AoO from more sources than just enemies moving. Second, the whole idea of AoOs is that you don't have to ready. Third, the feat is useful and should stay. 1. Combat Reflex offers an awkward mechanics. it offers absofragnlutely nothing to someone with DEX 13 or less and is absofragnlutely broken for someone with DET 18 or more. It's pretty much like any other arbitrary feat you'd take and decide it evolves. What, no insight to someone who's a bit slower ?! 2. As I said - if you can do it, so can they. 3. removing this feat offers some simplification to the game flow.
mkill 01-02-07, 01:02 AM	Wait a second, you confuse me. So you want to scrap all attacks of opportunity for movement. Defenders have to ready an action to attack moving opponents. Do I get that right? Ok. So while this variant is clearly possible, it changes the value of many abilities. Combat Reflexes is superfluous, right. But it also devalues the Tumble skill, the Mobility feat, reach weapons, and anything that gives reach, such as the Enlarge spell. It also puts heavy armored tanks at a disadvantage, because it is so much easier to avoid them. They never get a full attack, as they always have to run up to the enemy and attack, or ready an attack to hit them when they run away. You completely change game tactics. 2. If you're engaged in something and divide your attention to atack someone that you can reach, and that someone isn't doing something that lowers his defenses (like reaching into his backpack to grab a potion), no reason why you should get a free opportunity to slip in a blow while he can't retaliate. 3. In real life, if someone is moving and you're standing still, on the average he has the upper hand. I'm a little reluctant to discuss whether any game rule is "realistic", as D&D combat clearly is not meant to be realistic. It's a rather abstract game, where some realistic things are impossible (cut of the sword arm) and other unrealistic things are quite normal (fireball). In D&D, you can move a little in 6 seconds of the fight (5 feet) without letting your guard down or losing time for attacks. Any more movement costs you. I judge this as somewhat realistic, but I've never been involved in a sword fight. 4. Turn back and have a peek at the title ("increase the fun of the game"). But it also says "minor tweaks", stuff that does not change the way the game works in a major way. Your suggestion changes a lot. 1. Combat Reflex offers an awkward mechanics. it offers absofragnlutely nothing to someone with DEX 13 or less and is absofragnlutely broken for someone with DET 18 or more. It's pretty much like any other arbitrary feat you'd take and decide it evolves. What, no insight to someone who's a bit slower ?! Well, duh, Power Attack is pretty useless with a Strength of 8 and very powerful with a Str of 18+. Many of the divine feats are useless if you don't have a high Charisma. There are many feats like that. It's not "awkward", it's the way the game works. So yes, no insight if you are too slow.
ESP 01-02-07, 11:33 AM	25. Replace the Half-Elf +2 to Gather Info/ Diplomacy with a bonus feat chosen from any of the +2/+2 skill enhancing feats. This better reflects the versatility of the human side. (Note: This was borrowed from someone on the races board. My apologies but I don't remember whom.) 26. All classes get +2 skill points per level. Two skill points plus int sucks no matter what class so to be fair I bumped them all up.
mkill 01-02-07, 01:51 PM	27. Toughness The toughness feat grants one bonus hit point per class level / HD, with a minimum of three. (This rolls Toughness and Improved Toughness into one feat, to make it useful at both low and high levels.)
Sphyre 01-02-07, 03:03 PM	27. Toughness The toughness feat grants one bonus hit point per class level / HD, with a minimum of three. (This rolls Toughness and Improved Toughness into one feat, to make it useful at both low and high levels.) I do that too :)
mkill 01-02-07, 03:31 PM	I do that too :) Well, we do collect the obvious stuff here :cool:
mkill 01-04-07, 10:24 AM	28. If you have selected a feat and later gain that feat as a class feature, you may retrain the original feat without XP cost. Think about a character with the Combat Finesse feat who wants to multiclass into Swashbuckler... If you employ this as a general rule it removes some headache about planning ahead, like discovering some great PrC for an existing character but it gives stuff you already have.
unundindur 01-04-07, 10:28 AM	28. If you have selected a feat and later gain that feat as a class feature, you may retrain the original feat without XP cost. Think about a character with the Combat Finesse feat who wants to multiclass into Swashbuckler... If you employ this as a general rule it removes some headache about planning ahead, like discovering some great PrC for an existing character but it gives stuff you already have. Ah! This reminds me of another house rule we play with: "Whenever you gain a level you can chose which of you classes shall count as your first-level class." In tune with what you said it removes the problem with planning. If you wnat to play a fighter/rogue you are no longer penalized for chosing one before the other.
Dochenor 01-05-07, 01:49 AM	29. get rid of Martial Weapon Proficiency. If you can swing a longspear or quarterstaff use can use a polearm. same goes for mace and warhammer. Long bows and shortbows are a lot simpler than crossbows. 30. Add new Skill Knowledge: Monster. adventures travel, fight monsters and spend time in inns and taverns listening to older adventures talk. they know about classic common monsters. 31. All classes get Listen, Spot and Knowledge: Monster as class skills. (unless they are blind or deaf or something?) 32. Clerics get access to 3 Doamins while Rangers, Paladins and Druids get acess to 1 Domain
mkill 01-05-07, 04:14 AM	29. get rid of Martial Weapon Proficiency. If you can swing a longspear or quarterstaff use can use a polearm. same goes for mace and warhammer. Long bows and shortbows are a lot simpler than crossbows. 30. Add new Skill Knowledge: Monster. adventures travel, fight monsters and spend time in inns and taverns listening to older adventures talk. they know about classic common monsters. 31. All classes get Listen, Spot and Knowledge: Monster as class skills. (unless they are blind or deaf or something?) 32. Clerics get access to 3 Doamins while Rangers, Paladins and Druids get acess to 1 Domain Let's see... I agree that Paladins should get to select a domain, preferably at 4th level, when they get spellcasting. I like the idea of "champion of a cause". Rangers... their spellcasting has more of a druid flavor, and they don't get a domain. If you want to boost the Ranger, maybe give them another combat style feat at 16th and 20th level. 3 domains for Clerics... while I love to play Clerics, they don't need that. They are already in the top-tier of classes. Giving them another domain for free is just too much. Listen and Spot for everybody? Maybe not wizards, but fighters and some other classes could really use these. Knowledge (monster): This is already handled by Knowledge (local), (nature), (arcane), (religion) and (dungeoneering). Not necessary. Also, it's hard to define what a "classic common monster" is. Which monster in the MM isn't? All martial weapons as simple weapons... The current system is somewhat weird, I agree. When they wrote 3.0 edition they put all bludgeoning weapons into the simple category and gave the cleric proficiency with all simple weapons, because in AD&D clerics were restricted to bludgeoning weapons. It didn't really make sense then and it still does not make much sense, especially with deities that have longswords as favored weapons. The weapon category system is better, but it's a lot of effort to implement it with not much benefit.
Dochenor 01-05-07, 09:58 AM	i don't believe that clerics are too powerful. it all depends on how a race/class gets played. besides if i was a deity, i would want my followers to survive. giving rangers more fighting stuff doesn't help. they are still watered down fighters. give them more spells and divine stuff. same goes for druids. i didn't know that wizards in your world all had bad eyes and ears. seriously, wizards should be just as alert as any other class. the have to harness great mystical energies. if they don't pay attention, things could go horribly wrong. the DC for a Knowledge monster check is the monster's CR +5 for basic stuff (name, HD, orginzation, highest stat) CR+10 gives more information (special attacks, special defenses, immunities) that kind of thing
mkill 01-06-07, 09:55 AM	i don't believe that clerics are too powerful. it all depends on how a race/class gets played. besides if i was a deity, i would want my followers to survive. Well, I think clerics are okay, too. Just that lots of people in the forum here rate them as the second powerful class after the druid. Well, if it works for your group no problem there. i didn't know that wizards in your world all had bad eyes and ears. seriously, wizards should be just as alert as any other class. the have to harness great mystical energies. if they don't pay attention, things could go horribly wrong. That's what they have Knowledge (arcana) and Spellcraft for. the DC for a Knowledge monster check is the monster's CR +5 for basic stuff (name, HD, orginzation, highest stat) CR+10 gives more information (special attacks, special defenses, immunities) You can already do that with the knowledge skills I mentioned.
Sang-Drax 01-06-07, 12:42 PM	You guys have quite a few good ideas. From my part, I can't understand why there are no feats that allow longsword to be finesseable. I've heard there's a DMag with such a feat, though. As for the dodge suggestion, I've tried using something of the sort in a campaign I've run. It didn't work too well, as it proved itself to be overpowered. I have no additions to this thread ATM.
guessmyname 01-07-07, 04:27 AM	Several of the rules I've tested, many of which I've dropped due to unnecessary complexity: 33. I also got rid of multiclassing penalties, so to keep the flavor of Favored Classes I ruled that the first time a character takes a level in his favored class he gets a bonus feat, which should related to that class. Humans & Half-Elves get a bonus feat the first time they take a level in a second base class. 34. Cross-class skills do not cost double points. Since the max ranks in a skill get set once it's a class skill for any class, getting the full value out of your skill points is just a matter of careful planning and Retraining. Single-class characters are still limited by max ranks so it's not terribly abusive. This does make the Human Paragon's Adaptive Learning ability obsolete, but the fact that they can choose their own Class Skills more than makes up for it. 35. Weapon Finesse: change prerequisite to 'Base Attack Bonus +1 or Sneak Attack 1d6'. It's always bothered me that Rogues can't take this at first level. 36. Use Reflex Save for Initiative checks; applying Improved Initiative normally. This got dropped rather quickly, since there's so many ways to increase Reflex Saves that shouldn't affect initiative (Cloak of Resistance, anyone?); I do like the idea that a 12th-level fighter should go faster than a 1st-level one, but in practice it added too much complexity, because I had to classify each Reflex bonus as 'Initiative Applicable' or not. 37. Characters do not have 'negative HP', instead, damage after a character is reduce to 0 HP is applied to Con. I like the idea of this because it clarifies that 'Dead = 0 Con', not 'Dead = 0 Con OR -10 HP', and also because it solves the problem of people taking mortal wounds (-9 HP), getting hit with a Cure Serious, and popping back up. I ran a game with a Drow Cleric with Leadership, who just stood behind her minions whipping out CLWs as appropriate. It was like whack-a-mole. Still, this is a lot of bookkeeping, and it really hurts the PCs a lot more than the NPCs. 38. Apply extra skills from Int bonuses retroactively. If you're making a character above first level, I don't like having to go through all his levels to hit the end product. Granted, this only applies to Wizards most of the time, but it bothers me. Since this means re-adjusting sample characters from books on the fly, I'm considering replacing this with: 39. Wizards get 4+Int skills per level; Sorcerers have d6 for HP. Even with Int being their high stat, I don't feel that Wizards have enough skill points to go around. Max ranks in Concentration, Spellcraft, Knowledge: Arcana, and Craft Alchemy; you barely have points for Kn: Planes and Religion, let alone the interesting stuff. And I thought the justification for the d4 was that wizards don't do calisthenics, which is fine; but Sorcerers aren't cooped up in towers so why should they suffer? 40. In addition to +1 to a single attribute every 4 levels, characters can +1 to ALL attributes every 5 levels. I ripped this off (from Conan) and I'm not ashamed to admit it. I think that a 20th level fighter should be SOMEWHAT more Charismatic than when he started; you could argue that's what Belts of Magnificence are for, but I think <b>that</b> particular item has started enough fights for now, don't you? In the end this was too much complexity, as it meant re-adjusting every single monster on the fly; a simple idea in practice (for every 10 HD, get +1 to all attacks, damages, saves, AC, and increase HP by the HD) but that's more work than you'd think, and that's without taking multiple natural weapons into account. Yechhh.
ShinoAburame 01-08-07, 05:50 PM	I like alot of these, here's some of my tweak rules I want to apply to a game. (If I ever get around to making one) 41: Revamped Damage Threshold: Whenever you are dealt damage equal to or more then your constitution score, you must make a fortitude save equal to the damage dealt. Failure results in immideate death. Old version: You had to make a fortitude save of 15 whenever you were dealt 50 or more damage. Reason: To bring higher level characters back to mortal level, to make combat more gritty, and to make players realize being a brute doesn't solve everything. 42: Paladin Fix: Paladins have the following redone; Smite now can be used with ranged attacks. Smite damage is not restricted by alingment. Paladin's hit die is increased to d12. Reason: Paladin's suck, and this helps them atleast be useful. 43: Magic Resistance: All characters gain damage reduction towards magic based attacks equal to thier wisdom modifier. (For example, the cleric with an 18 wisdom reduces all magic damage done to him by -4.) Reason: To bring magic down a notch. 44: Gold restribution: Characters have a starting gold amount equal to thier charisma stat x10. For example, Timmy The Sorcerer has a cha of 18, so his gold amount is 180. Old: Characters had starting gold dependant on thier class-type and had to roll dice x10. Reason: That way charisma isn't nesscarely a dump stat. 45: Gear Tear: Weapons, armor, all equipment when used has to make a d100 check equal to or less then thier hardness score. Failure results in the item breaking. When using a weapon roll the d100, when being attacked roll a d100 for any armor or shields you might be using. Old: Hardness was an abstract concept that depended on sunder attacks to destroy. Reason: Eggs and grits man. Besides, this now encourages an actual hardness score, and for sunderers to become more widely accepted. Destroying equipment might become a better stradegy then simply trying to destroy the person themself. Also some weapons are just more expensive then others with no logical reason. If a quarterstaff and club are both free, why choose a club? Now it makes sense. Greater hardness. 46: Unarmed Damage Decrease: Unarmed attacks now deal damage equal to strength modifier. Old: Unarmed attacks would deal damage based on size, (small=1d4, medium=1d6, large=1d8, etc.) plus strength modifier as with all melee weapons. Reason: Weapons cost money, therefore should logicaly be better then your fists. Why would someone use a weapon when thier fists could do just as good? At the mere cost of a feat damage becomes lethal. Also this makes the monk a more reasonable class. 47: Monk Weapons: Several weapons are now classified under thier own feat, monk weapons. Such weapons inlcude shuriken, sai, quarterstaff, etc. Reason: It's a differant flavor, therefore they should have thier own weapon category. Bonus rule: Sai's now posess the added bonus of increasing your AC by +1 for every sai you wield on hand. The reasoningis simple, sai were designed to be defensive weapons. That's why they're shaped the way they are to block blades and things. For a measly 1d3 damage, you better believe it's going to do something awesome like increase your AC.
Shaftiel 01-08-07, 08:12 PM	48: Full Plate Improved Full plate grants DR 2/- and light fortification. This only applies to armor that actually counts as heavy armor - mithril full plate, for example, doesn't grant this bonus. Reason: Flavor, increase the use of heavy armor at high levels, make people in full plate actually somewhat scary. 49: Siangham removed from game I have yet to meet anyone who knows why this extremely exotic and minimally effective "weapon" was included in the game in the first place. The two-handed hooking shield is more effective... 50: Anything can be enchanted Want a +2 flaming rusty old pitchfork? Go for it; it's your XP! 51: Two-Weapon Defense AC bonuses doubled Two-Weapon Defense stinks, exp. compared to Improved Buckler Defense (or whatever that feat is called: they're all in CW). I doubled the bonuses for all the feats in the TWD tree. This makes them - at least sometimes - useful feats. -Shaftiel
mkill 01-09-07, 01:23 AM	41: Revamped Damage Threshold: Whenever you are dealt damage equal to or more then your constitution score, you must make a fortitude save equal to the damage dealt. Failure results in immideate death. Reason: To bring higher level characters back to mortal level, to make combat more gritty, and to make players realize being a brute doesn't solve everything. With this rule, combat will be "I win initiative, I win" from around level 4 or so. Don't expect any of your NPCs to last long. Good bye reoccuring villain. The average party will consist of 5 barbarians with Improved Initiative, all named Bob IV (after Bob I - III were dismembered by unlucky kobold criticals). Actually, with this rule "being a brute" is even more effective, be because it makes the one thing even more powerful that you were already good at: Doing heavy damage with one hit. 42: Paladin Fix: Paladins have the following redone; Smite now can be used with ranged attacks. Smite damage is not restricted by alingment. Paladin's hit die is increased to d12. Reason: Paladin's suck, and this helps them atleast be useful. First of all, Paladins don't suck. Second, if you want to give them a power-up, do so without destroying their flavor. Why should a paladin be good at thwacking good people? Did he run out of evil to fight? Why give him something that violates his code if he uses it? What's the point? Smite on ranged attacks... The usual paladin had to dump Dex to 12 or less, so he won't be effective with a ranged weapon anyway. And his job is not to stay behind and shoot arrows, he belongs in the front line. The bow is a backup weapon at best. d12 hd: This is better than the others, but it is very generic. Any class could be improved by giving a better hit die. I'd like to see something that makes the paladin even better against undead and evil outsiders. For example, an aura that suppresses supernatural abilities of evil outsiders. 43: Magic Resistance: All characters gain damage reduction towards magic based attacks equal to thier wisdom modifier. (For example, the cleric with an 18 wisdom reduces all magic damage done to him by -4.) Reason: To bring magic down a notch. At low levels, this makes any damage-dealing spell useless. Burning Hands etc. already deal almost no damage. Your example 1st-level cleric is near-immune to pretty much every damage spell a first-level wizard could throw at him. On the other hand, at mid-to-high levels this has no effect but extra book-keeping. Most spells will be save-or-die anyway, and the damage dealt will be much higher than any wisdom bonus. Also, this boost two classes first and foremost: Clerics and Druids, widely believed to be the two most powerful classes around. 44: Gold restribution: Characters have a starting gold amount equal to thier charisma stat x10. For example, Timmy The Sorcerer has a cha of 18, so his gold amount is 180. Old: Characters had starting gold dependant on thier class-type and had to roll dice x10. Reason: That way charisma isn't nesscarely a dump stat. This has no effect after the first adventure. If you want to make Cha more important, give either one NPC contact per Cha bonus, or a bonus action point. 45: Gear Tear: Weapons, armor, all equipment when used has to make a d100 check equal to or less then thier hardness score. Failure results in the item breaking. When using a weapon roll the d100, when being attacked roll a d100 for any armor or shields you might be using. Expect your players to hate you for this. Expect them to do silly things to avoid this. Expect them to start endless discussions. Expect combats slowed down to boredom. This rule is the exact opposite of "increase the fun". 46: Unarmed Damage Decrease: Unarmed attacks now deal damage equal to strength modifier. I've never heard of any non-monk character saying "I don't need a weapon! My fists deal 1d3 damage and that's enough". Unnecessary. 47: Monk Weapons: Several weapons are now classified under thier own feat, monk weapons. Such weapons inlcude shuriken, sai, quarterstaff, etc. And the game effect of this, except for reshuffling the weapons table? Bonus rule: Sai's now posess the added bonus of increasing your AC by +1 for every sai you wield on hand. The reasoningis simple, sai were designed to be defensive weapons. That's why they're shaped the way they are to block blades and things. For a measly 1d3 damage, you better believe it's going to do something awesome like increase your AC. This one is actually nice. Btw, the bonus should be a shield bonus.
mkill 01-09-07, 01:31 AM	40. In addition to +1 to a single attribute every 4 levels, characters can +1 to ALL attributes every 5 levels. I ripped this off (from Conan) and I'm not ashamed to admit it. I think that a 20th level fighter should be SOMEWHAT more Charismatic than when he started; you could argue that's what Belts of Magnificence are for, but I think <b>that</b> particular item has started enough fights for now, don't you? In the end this was too much complexity, as it meant re-adjusting every single monster on the fly; a simple idea in practice (for every 10 HD, get +1 to all attacks, damages, saves, AC, and increase HP by the HD) but that's more work than you'd think, and that's without taking multiple natural weapons into account. Yechhh. Ugh. The game already scales like crazy, you can pretty much walk over anything that has 10 levels or CR less than yourself without noticing it's there. With additional stat bonuses, this becomes even more crazy. The only way to balance this would be drastically reducing wealth levels. If the effect should just be "give high-level characters the aura of something special" even if they never increased their charisma, there are other ways to do this. A simple level check against DC 10 to impress commoners comes to my mind.
Kinghappo 01-09-07, 10:55 AM	Shino's idea for the sai i completely agree with but i would also add that you can enchant them with any of the defencive melee enchantments as well since they count as defencive items (i.e. fortification, basic defencive bonus, axeblock) 52. Return haste it's old glory to provide extra standard action- haste was horribly raped when they made it a melee focused spell.... why would a wizard use this on himself? i hope not to run into the thick of battle with his +2 to stomp some arse. 53. Revamped crafting so that if you have a workshop and all the goodies, you can automaticly craft 2000g worth of stuff during 8 hours of work, if your in the field and have the basic of tools, (i.e. traveling alchemist kit, you can craft up to 500g for standard tools and 800g for masterwork stuff. the support liking people perfer to make their own stuff so they can give it their own flair but what adventure party wishes to stay in a town in the middle of a fast paced campaign while he crafts. now of course those who are crafting stuff in the field do tend to make a lot of noise and attract a lot of unwanted attention so thats the sacrifice fr it. 54. rangers who have a +6 or higher in their favored enemy should be able to crit the creature type even if they are not normaly able to be crited, these guys spend their entire lives chaseing these creatures, they should know a faster and more effective way of getting them where it hurts. 55. assassin's can be good, but only in the most holistic of the thoughts, they should consider themselves more favored by god than even palidins.(had players who actualy wanted to do this with a group and i allowed it under these rules and it ended up being a great campaign) 56. for human's i swapped them for their abilities, at first level they have a +2 and a -2 to assign to their stats (and they could also put them in the same stat to cancle themselves out) and every 4 levels they get an additional feat instead of an increase to their stats. This way they get smarter but not stronger (i leave that to the classes they choose) ::Turns around and waits for the verbal raping of his ideas like everyone else recieved::
mkill 01-09-07, 11:54 AM	::Turns around and waits for the verbal raping of his ideas like everyone else recieved:: I'm sorry and I apologize if I was offensive in any post. Thanks to everybody who contributes here. I just thought that it might be nice not just to list the stuff but to exchange a few opinions. 52. Return haste it's old glory to provide extra standard action- haste was horribly raped when they made it a melee focused spell.... why would a wizard use this on himself? i hope not to run into the thick of battle with his +2 to stomp some arse. <nitpick>It was a partial action, not a standard action, but that one was removed in 3.5</nitpick> In 3.5, spellcasters have a bunch of other options to cast more than one spell per round, with swift action spells and reduced cost quicken spell (by different means). And there are new tricks like double wand wielder. And then there is the Warlock, who could cast two invocations per round without being limited by burnt spell slots... 53. Revamped crafting ... Good idea, the DM should consider something like that if his campaign doesn't allow for much downtime. 54. rangers who have a +6 or higher in their favored enemy should be able to crit the creature type even if they are not normaly able to be crited... Make it a feat! 55. assassin's can be good, but only in the most holistic of the thoughts, they should consider themselves more favored by god than even palidins. You could make that even more general: 57. Unusual alignment The DM should allow a player to build characters with nonstandard alignments for their class if he can come up with a sound, playable and interesting concept. For example, I could see a wonderful concept for a noble tribal protector, who takes his strength through the spiritual guidance of his ancestors. Perfect for a lawful good barbarian. (Why should rage always involve screaming madly and whacking aimlessly?) 56. for human's i swapped them for their abilities, at first level they have a +2 and a -2 to assign to their stats (and they could also put them in the same stat to cancle themselves out) and every 4 levels they get an additional feat instead of an increase to their stats. This way they get smarter but not stronger (i leave that to the classes they choose) In theory, +1 to an ability score is more powerful than a feat. Or, +1 to an ability = epic feat. So, if this is optional, it might be great. If you always have to take a feat instead of an ability boost, humans are pretty screwed, at least for full casters.
Redja_the_Foolish 01-09-07, 12:09 PM	Add two to three knowledge skills and two to three regular skills as class skills appropriate to the players background and back story. A level one fighter who is a noble could for example pick knowledge history and knowledge nobility and royalty as well as diplomacy and sense motive as added class skills. A fighter who is a siege expert would be able to choose knowledge architecture and engineering and knowledge geography coupled with spot and disable device which would represent his training in destroying siege engines. A fighter who was originally a watchman would choose knowledge local and spot and listen. A paladin whose order seeks out evil in the wilderness would choose knowledge nature and knowledge geography with survival and search as class skills. A paladin who is trained to seek out evil mages and magical construcs and beasts could have knowledge arcana and spellcraft. A wizard who had training as a merchant and who dealt in valuable items would have appraise and forgery as class skills. A more outdoorsy wizard whose magical training included medicine and wilderness knowledge would be able to choose heal and survival as class skills. A druid practicing the camouflage and stealthy aspects of nature would for example be able to choose move silently and hide as class skills. An illusionist could choose sleight of hand for stage magic and bluff so that he can convince people that his illusions are real. These are just examples of choices, the DM would of course have to permit it as appropriate to the players background and story. This optional rule would still be balanced since classes like fighters and paladins and clerics would still have a low amount of skillpoints available though it would make them a bit more powerful regarding skills without having to give them more skillpoints or go to such extremes as making every skill available to all classes.
DreadArchon 01-09-07, 07:21 PM	::Turns around and waits for the verbal raping of his ideas like everyone else recieved:: Relax, ShinoAburame made you look good. :nonono:
Kinghappo 01-10-07, 03:50 AM	I'm sorry and I apologize if I was offensive in any post. Thanks to everybody who contributes here. I just thought that it might be nice not just to list the stuff but to exchange a few opinions. Heh we wouldn't all be DM's if we didn't otherwise lol <nitpick>It was a partial action, not a standard action, but that one was removed in 3.5</nitpick> In 3.5, spellcasters have a bunch of other options to cast more than one spell per round, with swift action spells and reduced cost quicken spell (by different means). And there are new tricks like double wand wielder. And then there is the Warlock, who could cast two invocations per round without being limited by burnt spell slots... It still just seems that the spell should be a bit more versitile to all the classes that do other things than attack. it was origionaly a utility spell and should always be that way lol, and not to open a new can of worms i think two speed weapons should stack.... if a character is willing to shell out that much for some speed weapons then he deserves the extra swing, it's the dm's job to teach characters who want to tip the boat not to always show all their cards all the time. (dm's and rust monsters, and sundering black guard's ect lol) Originally Posted by Kinghappo 54. rangers who have a +6 or higher in their favored enemy should be able to crit the creature type even if they are not normaly able to be crited... Make it a feat! hmm good point what do you think balanceing prereq's would be? (+6 bonus on favored enemy, favored enemy that cannot normaly be critted) though i dare think that it could even be pushed to call it... Criticaly Favored? lol 57. Unusual alignment The DM should allow a player to build characters with nonstandard alignments for their class if he can come up with a sound, playable and interesting concept. For example, I could see a wonderful concept for a noble tribal protector, who takes his strength through the spiritual guidance of his ancestors. Perfect for a lawful good barbarian. (Why should rage always involve screaming madly and whacking aimlessly?) I like this, i think i will use it in my next campaign In theory, +1 to an ability score is more powerful than a feat. Or, +1 to an ability = epic feat. So, if this is optional, it might be great. If you always have to take a feat instead of an ability boost, humans are pretty screwed, at least for full casters. As with human's today thats why we are an accessory dependent race, we are the tool masters and this is how we are represented, aren't strong enough now? no problem, take a crafting feat and build yourself a belt of strength, not fast enough, a pair of boots of haste or springing and leaping can fix that. another point is the epic argument between monk and ninja, monks kick arse on their own with their hands and feet but ninja's tend to be smaller and weaker yet with their use of poisions, knowledge and accessories, become just as formitable. and they have <cough>katanas<cough>
DreadArchon 01-10-07, 04:30 PM	My house rules at this point: Bell Curve Rolling Players may choose to roll 2d10 in situations normally calling for a d20. Monsters usually do so. Critical hits occur at the usual numbers; critical miss occurs on two 1's if d10's are used. Aiding Another in Combat The Aid Another action may be done with ranged weapons. It works like a standard ranged shot--penalties if firing into cover, penalties if firing into melee, attacks of opportunity against the shooter, etc, including that a round of ammunition is used for each attempt (or one round per attack that the "another" would get an AC bonus against). Further, the benefits from aiding another in combat may be applied to any ally within line of sight, not just one in melee, and the AC bonus holds against a number of attacks equal to the number of attacks that the aiding character could make during a full attack with a single weapon (though it still expires as normal and is lost early if the aiding character loses the ability to provide consistent aid). Examples of new uses: 1) cover fire for an ally (ranged aid another that grants AC from an enemy archer), 2) distracting fire into melee by the party skillhorse, 3) a melee character distracting attention from a mage who is too good a target (or from the party sniper), 4) volley fire by archers (one guy fires and three assist him--lowbie NPC's will be doing this one to you if you anger large groups of them). Ability Scores Starting characters allot their stats so as to have a total of +9 bonuses (i.e. a total of 78 if all ability scores are added together, 18 points worth of abilities above the tenth point), with a maximum of +4 (18 points) in any stat and a minimum of -1 (8 points) in any stat. Only one stat may be +4 (18 points). This applies before racial modifiers. Skill Points All classes gain +2 skill points per level (times four at first level as normal). These skill points may only be spent on Craft, Knowledge, Perform, Profession, Speak Language, or Use Rope skills. Knowledge Skills Knowledge skill checks may be made untrained, though characters doing so may not succeed against a DC higher than 15 (if not a bard) or 25 (if the character has at least four bard levels for Bardic Knowledge checks) as they would not have understood such information even had they heard it. Deities The gods are very active in this setting. All characters must worship a deity (within one step of alignment as normal) and follow any special considerations of that deity's religion. Half-Orcs Half-Orcs are replaced by "Demilizards," which are functionally the same except that they count as lizardfolk rather than orcs and speak Draconic with Orc as a bonus language (as opposed to Orc with Draconic as a bonus). They also resemble lizardfolk to the extent that a half-orc would be expected to resemble an orc. This is basically just a flavor change, accounting for the presence of a strong lizardlike deity and the relative weakness of orcs in this campaign setting. Hit Dice Per Level When rolling hit dice, a character may re-roll until getting at least half of the maximum hit points for that level (2 for a sorceror, 3 for a rogue, etc.). This applies before bonuses (such as Constitution score). Leadership (feat) All player characters have this feat. They need not select it. Cleric Domains and Spontaneous Casting As each domain has only one deity (and as a cleric must be devoted to a particular deity), the cleric gets a relevant cleric domain from his deity as normal. This is considered the cleric's "primary domain," and domain spells from this domain may be spontaneously cast as a cleric would normally cast cure (or inflict) spells. A cleric may not, however, cast cure or inflict spells spontaneously (unless they are in his primary domain, of course). A cleric may select any other domain for his second domain, as long as it does not oppose his primary domain (opposed domain list: law/chaos, good/evil, earth/air, fire/water), though it should be noted that alignment restrictions may still apply to certain spells, as usual (a Good domain cleric could take the Darkness domain as his secondary, but he still couldn't prepare Nightmare). The restriction on alignment domains still applies. This "secondary domain" represents an area of study rather than a divine blessing, and may still be used if the cleric loses the ability to cast spells from his deity (though, in that case, the cleric may only use his domain spell slot of each level). Sneak Attacks, Skirmish Attacks A character making a sneak or skirmish attack may use his damage bonus (+Xd6) on his attack roll rather than his damage roll. The character is considered to be striking at weak points in defenses rather than anatomy. This applies on an individual strike basis, so a rogue with three sneak attacks in a round may choose which have a bonus to attack and which have a bonus to damage. It is declared for each strike prior to rolling to hit for that strike. This may not be used with Power Attack, and the character may not split the dice (to get a bonus to both attack and damage).
IronMouse 01-11-07, 07:43 AM	First of all, Paladins don't suck. Not at first, but after level 7-8 or so, there are almost no reasons to stay in the class. I don't know of a quick-fix, but there are some very good variants floating around in the classes board. :) 70. (or?) Repair magic items With a +10 to the DC of the repair (Craft) check, you can restore the magic properties of a broken item. Totally destroyed (disintegrated, molten down, burned to ash, rustmonstered,...) items still can't be repaired, though. Makes sundering less scary and Craft more useful. 71. Variant for stat rolling 4d6, drop lowest, as normal. Before assigning your stats, check them: 1. If you have no score above 13 and/or the total of your modifiers are +0 or below, you can roll again (as usual). If you want to keep them for some reason, look 2.. 2. If the total of the modifiers is +4 or lower, get a bonus feat at level 1. 3. If the total of modifiers is +5 to +9, nothing changes. 4. If the total of modifiers is +10 or more, you are "highly giftet". You may keep the stats, but you don't get the feat you normally receive at level 1 (your stats rock, shut up). For those who don't like point buy but want a little more balance for extreme rolls.
Boraxe 01-11-07, 01:24 PM	72. 0 level spells can be spontaneously cast. No memorization or preparation required. 73. Unless you are really broke or buying in large quantity don't waste time tracking cp and sp. You have enough to cover it. 74. Character Creation: Roll 4d6 (drop lowest) seven times. Use the top six results, arranged as desired.
Kedami 01-11-07, 03:53 PM	Don't really know what number we're at, but I let my PCs change their single lowest ability to an 18 if they don't already have one. It just lets them have a really good score and my friend's campaign starts next week and he's using that rule too.
ShinoAburame 01-11-07, 04:18 PM	Here's a decent tweak I'm sure everyone will enjoy: Cure Minor Wounds: Normal: Cures 1hp. New version: Cures 1d4hp. Auto profficientcies: Gnomes gain profficietcy with gnome hook hammers. (Instead of it being a martial weapon for them) Dwarves gain profficientcy with dwarven waraxe. (Again, instead of a martial weapon) Half-Orcs gains profficientcy with orc double-axe. (Though I personaly can't stand halfbreeds) Reason: What's the point of curing 1hp someone mind telling me? Even if only a cantrip, a 0 level spell should actually do something worth doing.
Boraxe 01-11-07, 05:13 PM	What's the point of curing 1hp someone mind telling me? Even if only a cantrip, a 0 level spell should actually do something worth doing. It stops you from dying if below 0hp. That seems pretty worth doing to me.
ShinoAburame 01-11-07, 06:14 PM	Well that explains why I found it useless. As I've always used this rule: 0HP=you're dead. There is no "disabled" blahblahblah, you're simply either alive and kicking, or dead. Once you reach 0hp, you be dead. Cleric spell restriction: The cleric's spell-list is limited to what he can cast based on weather he turns or rebukes undead, for practical purposes, we refer to these spells as [good] and [evil]. There are a few, but very few spells that are [neutral]. A neutral cleric is bound to either good or evil spells based on wether he turns or rebukes undead.
Reversefigure4 01-11-07, 07:30 PM	44: Gold restribution: Characters have a starting gold amount equal to thier charisma stat x10. For example, Timmy The Sorcerer has a cha of 18, so his gold amount is 180. Old: Characters had starting gold dependant on thier class-type and had to roll dice x10. Reason: That way charisma isn't nesscarely a dump stat. I like the thinking here. Not sure it really works - sorc, the most charismatic class, has one of the least uses for money at 1st level (no armor, pricey weapons of note, etc), but I like the idea behind it. It's a minor inconvenience that'll cease to matter after first level, but it does add incentive to have a decent CHA. This, on the other hand... 46: Unarmed Damage Decrease: Unarmed attacks now deal damage equal to strength modifier. Old: Unarmed attacks would deal damage based on size, (small=1d4, medium=1d6, large=1d8, etc.) plus strength modifier as with all melee weapons. Reason: Weapons cost money, therefore should logicaly be better then your fists. Why would someone use a weapon when thier fists could do just as good? At the mere cost of a feat damage becomes lethal. Also this makes the monk a more reasonable class. For one thing, weapons don't have to cost money. A club is free, and at 1d6 much better than a normal 1d3 damage from fists, and as good as a 1st level monk's trained fists! Something like a 50gp Greatsword - hardly bankbreaking - absolutely mauls it. At the mere cost of a feat damage becomes lethal... unlike weapons, who's damage is already lethal without needing the feat! And does this just last forever for Monks? At 20th level, the poor Monk is still doing a base damage of 0+Str with his fists?
Ghenesh 01-13-07, 12:41 PM	I already posted some of my house rule tweaks, but i'm gonna post some more related with the ones i already wrote. The objective of this house rules is that characters at first level are playable and there's not much diference between the following levels. 80.- All characters (PCs, Monsters and NPCs) start the game with 2 feats instead of 1. Already play tested and not game breaking at all. 81.- All characters start with 4 skill points that must be spent in Craft(any), Knowledge(any), Perform(any), Profession(any), any skill in wich those points are spent becomes a class skill for the character. You can spend 2 of this skill points to learn a new language. Great idea to add background mechanics, not every player use it but there are those who enjoy the extra fluff. 82.- All medium size characters (PCs, Monsters and NPCs) have 10 Base Hit Points (at level 1), for each size over medium the character has 2 more hit points (12 HP for Large, 14 HP for Huge, and so on), for each size below medium the character has 2 less hit points (8 HP for Small, 6 hp for Tiny, and so on). First Hit Die is not maximized, must be rolled. If the character changes his size be any means this hit points changes as well. Characters start out with more HP at low levels, but they don't die in one critical hit... already play tested, not game breaking. About 6th level the extra HP is barely noticed... around 12th level it's insignificant. 83.- Characters can pick the average result (rounded up) in any Hit Die roll, and a nat 1 in a Hit Die roll can be re-rolled. There's always a guy with no luck rolling HP. 84.- Good Saves start at +1 at first class level and improves by 1 every odd class level (+10 at 20th level). Great Fortitude, Lightning Reflexes and Iron Will grant a +3 bonus to each respective Save. Makes save rolls more exciting (and balanced), specially at higher levels when the save bonuses are insane, and helps to balance heavily multiclassed characters with straight characters, this is being playtested in a high level campaign but not a single issue against it has arised.
Schemerrat 01-13-07, 08:03 PM	kill the alignment system -I hate it, and D&D doens't use it correctly imo. kill alignment restrictions on all core classes and most prestige classes. A player can choose a class for certain abilities, doesn't need to play the stereotype. The alignment restrictions are for flavor, players can do that themselves, otherwise I can help them with it. Most prestige classes will be bound to some organization, a test is more appropriate, if the test involves committing an "evil" act, the character has to decide whether or not he's willing to do so. my DM experience is only with people I know, if they can give me good arguments for a choice, then it's ok. It's their game, if they want to be a monk because it's the only class that can actually fight like in the movies, then let them be a CE monk.
MindLich 01-13-07, 09:45 PM	29. get rid of Martial Weapon Proficiency. If you can swing a longspear or quarterstaff use can use a polearm. same goes for mace and warhammer. Long bows and shortbows are a lot simpler than crossbows. Actually, you have to have specific training to be proficient and do a good job with a weapon, you might use similar weapons but in no way a glaive is similar tu a longspear or quarterstaff. If you want something like that read the UA section on weapon category proficiencies, I think thats it. And you're wrong on Longbows and Crossbows, Crossbows were adopted in Europe because, even if their range and power wasn't equal to the Longbow, it was very easy to train troops on how to use them. Meanwhile, the English trained their troops on how to use a Longbow since they were kids so they would have the proper experience and training.
Endarire 01-13-07, 11:08 PM	Improved Critical: The weapon threat range doubles OR the multiplier increases by 1. Additionally, criticals are automatically confirmed. School Focus: You get +1 DC of your chosen school per 5 caster levels to a minimum of one. For the purpose of this bonus, temporary enhancements to caster level, such as an orange ioun stone, don't count. School Focus, Greater: This functions as School Focus but you instead get +1 DC per 2 caster levels. Weapon Focus: You gain +1 accuracy with your chosen weapon per 4 points of base attack bonus to a minimum of one. Weapon Focus, Greater: This functions as Weapon Focus but you instead get +1 accuracy per 2 points of BAB. Weapon Specialization: You gain +1 damage and an additional +1 damage per 3 fighter levels. Weapon Specialization, Greater: This functions as Weapon Specialization, but instead grants +4 damage and an additional +1 damage per fighter level. ---- Recharging items: You may recharge an item with a total number of charges, such as a staff, so long as it has at least 1 charge remaining and you have the appropriate item creation feat. The cost per charge is half the cost to create the item. You may not, however, recharge something that has a certain number of daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly uses. For example, a wand of cure light wounds with 1 charge remaining could be recharged for 3.75 gold 0.15 EX per charge and fully recharging the wand would cost 183.75G & 7.35EX. (Keep a total of fractional EX for this purpose.) ---- The cap for all skills is 3+HD. Cross-class skills simply cost 1 point per half rank. ---- Death from massive damage doesn't exist except for plot purposes. -EE
Candide 01-14-07, 12:36 AM	7. Knights Gain Diplomacy as a class skill Reason: Why that one was left out is a mystery to me. Because its not a knight's job to be a diplomat and talk people OUT of fighting. Why would they give him abilities called "Knight's Challenge"?(or whatever its called) He finds honor through combat, and proving one's mettle against another foe. He got intimidate for that reason I think, instead of diplomacy.
mkill 01-14-07, 01:40 AM	Because its not a knight's job to be a diplomat and talk people OUT of fighting. Why would they give him abilities called "Knight's Challenge"?(or whatever its called) He finds honor through combat, and proving one's mettle against another foe. He got intimidate for that reason I think, instead of diplomacy. A knight is a noble. Nobles are always surrounded by intrigues and politics. A knight fights not for the fun of it, but for a higher political goal. And he is supposed to be a leader. How can you lead troops to battle without knowing how to convince people to fight for your side? If you think that Diplomacy is to prevent battles, your dead wrong. Diplomacy exists to make sure you win the war after you won the battle.
Roflwolf 01-14-07, 02:03 AM	At the mere cost of a feat damage becomes lethal... unlike weapons, who's damage is already lethal without needing the feat! And does this just last forever for Monks? At 20th level, the poor Monk is still doing a base damage of 0+Str with his fists? A Monk's fists are considered weapons, not unarmed attack anyways. (Come on people, keep with the numbers :( ) 93. You're alignment is based on the ideals of your god of choice. Since deities do exist, you naturally pick a god based close to your own alignment. Should you refuse to worship a god, then I shall have you choice a god close to your ideals of which to follow. Should you further refuse, rather opting to believe in no god, then you will be considered ignorant and I will chose a god or two that will watch over you. How you'd decide what a god believes in would be something we'd discuss or just obvious (Pelor's probably for killing those evil demons terrorizing the capital...). Not really sure how I'd actually implement that, since I can't force someone one on something like this. However the reason why is because I believe having a guideline to follow for your alignment is handy and makes deities feel more loved.
Boraxe 01-15-07, 01:53 PM	Almost the polar opposite of #93… 94. Save for clerics, your alignment does not need to be the same or similar to that of your god. What the god represents is the prime reason for worship, not similarities of behaviour or ethics. For example, sailors revere the god of the sea and warriors revere the god of battle irrespective of the gods' or the worshippers' alignments.
jagggar 01-15-07, 03:24 PM	Well, I guess I'll toss this one in as long as we're on the subject of deitys and alignment: 95. Everyone, including clerics and other divine casters, may be of any alignment, reguardless of the alignment of the god they worship. That's more or less Eberron's rule. It makes it harder to just say, "Well that cleric is obviuosly corrupt. He can't cast spells." or to use the holy symbol as an excuse for slaughter, "Of course he's evil, he worships [evil god]!"
CaptainPicard 01-15-07, 07:11 PM	Weapon Finesse now has no prerequisites. I think someone already said this, but it pisses me off how melee Rogues have to wait until level 3 to be useful.
ShinoAburame 01-17-07, 08:28 PM	Differant Classes Roll Differantly For Stats: At the beggeining of the game, when a character is chosen, depending on the class you chose, you roll differantly. (So far only have core for balance) Fighter/Ranger/Paladin: Roll 4d6 (re-roll 1s) six times, keep the results. Sorcerer/Bard/Barbarian/Rogue: Roll 4d6 six times, keep the results. Monk/Wizard: Roll 4d6 (drop the lowest) six times. Cleric/Druid: Roll 3d6, keep the results. No multiclassing: I guess prestige classes are still acceptable, but to prevent stat abuse, (say taking first level fighter then switching to druid) no multiclassing.
Roflwolf 01-17-07, 09:10 PM	Hm. In retrospect, hindsight's twenty twenty. I didn't mean worship, rather I meant follow since it can be confusing how to determine and keep your alignment. It can be wicked fun to realize, or even more not to realize, you've been playing an evil character instead of a chaotic neutral and your paladin is getting ******. Deities are almost never cared about, since they aren't important to those that don't cast divine spells. Just trying to bring in the creators of everything and help people know what their alignment is. And by saying that characters that refuse to believe in the deities, as if they think gods don't exist like cheese doesn't exist... as they're eating a wedge of cheese. It's like they need to be slapped in the head. But if someone really wanted to run it like that.. then there could be fun to be had. Then again, it might only confuse people. lol -- Different Classes Roll Differently For Stats: At the beginning of the game, when a character is chosen, depending on the class you chose, you roll differently. (So far only have core for balance) Fighter/Ranger/Paladin: Roll 4d4 (re-roll 1s) six times, keep the results. Sorcerer/Bard/Barbarian/Rogue: Roll 4d4 six times, keep the results. Monk/Wizard: Roll 4d4 (drop the lowest) six times. Cleric/Druid: Roll 3d4, keep the results. No multiclassing: I guess prestige classes are still acceptable, but to prevent stat abuse, (say taking first level fighter then switching to druid) no multiclassing. Since I'm being critical of my own ideas, why not others? Heh. I guess I'm just confused how this adds to the fun. What if I rolled up a druid (my favorite class) and got two scores of 3 and/or 5. Not really fun to me. And how is being kept from multiclassing fun? There's no room for creativity, in my opinion. However it might just be me. Others might find this concept really interesting; such as the ability to play a really physically weak caster but still be incredibly intelligent. Or maybe I'm just missing something, hahaha. 98. If just once during the whole campaign, have opportunities for the players to kill monsters (obvious right?), but let there be a tiny chance for the monster to drop a random magic item that more than likely cannot be used by anyone in the party. Make them question what a dire rat was doing with dwarven plate. ... I have crazy ideas. Leave me alone. :B
Reversefigure4 01-17-07, 09:36 PM	Cleric/Druid: Roll 3d4, keep the results. Bwa? So they end up with scores between 3 and 12? Aside from the fact that that's far weaker than the PHB recommends (rerolling threshold is that you don't get a single 13), it also means good odds you'll end up with a Cleric who's highest score is 9. Not even a Cure Minor Wounds for the party until he gets up to level 4 and can increase his Wisdom! The Party healer is going to have to be the Bard, who's the only one likely to actually get a decent enough score to actually cast his spells!
jagggar 01-17-07, 09:50 PM	Fighter/Ranger/Paladin: Roll 4d4 (re-roll 1s) six times, keep the results. Sorcerer/Bard/Barbarian/Rogue: Roll 4d4 six times, keep the results. Monk/Wizard: Roll 4d4 (drop the lowest) six times. Cleric/Druid: Roll 3d4, keep the results. Please tell me you mean 4d6 and 3d6, not 4d4 and 3d4. Otherwise, the average rolled scores for the Cleric/Druid will be less than the human average of 10.
mkill 01-17-07, 10:01 PM	Differant Classes Roll Differantly For Stats: (...) Fighter/Ranger/Paladin: Roll 4d4 (re-roll 1s) six times, keep the results. Sorcerer/Bard/Barbarian/Rogue: Roll 4d4 six times, keep the results. Monk/Wizard: Roll 4d4 (drop the lowest) six times. Cleric/Druid: Roll 3d4, keep the results. No multiclassing: I guess prestige classes are still acceptable, but to prevent stat abuse, (say taking first level fighter then switching to druid) no multiclassing. WTF? There are people who play clerics and druids because they like the archetype. There is even people who play clerics because they were asked to by the other players (like me in one campaign). You completely ruin those characters by giving them crappiest stats (3-12???), making them completely useless. Why not just ban those altogether and let the party have TPKs regularly because of crappy healing? The monk is pretty useless with 4d4 too. You even realize yourself that this system makes no sense and you have to ban multiclassing. So the fighter player hates you too... Ahg. It's just a bad idea. Sorry if I say that so harsh. But there are other ways to rebalance the classes if you feel that is necessary, but don't use class-independent features like ability scores for that.
jagggar 01-17-07, 10:52 PM	Oh, while we're on the subject of rolling your abilties based on the class you pick, I think I browsed this one out of an older edition book: 99. You pick your class, then roll 8d6 (drop lowest 5) for its most important score. Roll 7d6 (drop lowest 4) for your second most important score. . . . and so on until you roll 3d6 for your least important score. Sounds kinda cool. Hopefully, rolling that many dice should give a little help to people whose dice hate them.. Might be hard to decide what rolls go where with some of the MADer classes.
mkill 01-17-07, 11:21 PM	That's kind of nice. While it's pretty sure that you'll get a good score in your most important stat, you might still end up with something good in a stat that's unusual for your class. This makes a lot more individual chars than the streamlined and optimized point buy builds. It does generate pretty high scores, though.
Boraxe 01-18-07, 10:08 AM	Differant Classes Roll Differantly For Stats: At the beggeining of the game, when a character is chosen, depending on the class you chose, you roll differantly. (So far only have core for balance) Fighter/Ranger/Paladin: Roll 4d4 (re-roll 1s) six times, keep the results. Sorcerer/Bard/Barbarian/Rogue: Roll 4d4 six times, keep the results. Monk/Wizard: Roll 4d4 (drop the lowest) six times. Cleric/Druid: Roll 3d4, keep the results. No multiclassing: I guess prestige classes are still acceptable, but to prevent stat abuse, (say taking first level fighter then switching to druid) no multiclassing. Sorry, I just don't see the value of this system. What is the value of forcing your PCs to be more average and ordinary?
ShinoAburame 01-18-07, 02:45 PM	Please tell me you mean 4d6 and 3d6, not 4d4 and 3d4. Otherwise, the average rolled scores for the Cleric/Druid will be less than the human average of 10. Yes i meant d6, bad typo.
Johnny_Angel 01-18-07, 03:23 PM	1. And the whole idea is that if you can do it, so can others do it to you. 2. If you're engaged in something and divide your attention to atack someone that you can reach, and that someone isn't doing something that lowers his defenses (like reaching into his backpack to grab a potion), no reason why you should get a free opportunity to slip in a blow while he can't retaliate. 3. In real life, if someone is moving and you're standing still, on the average he has the upper hand. 4. Turn back and have a peek at the title ("increase the fun of the game"). 1. Combat Reflex offers an awkward mechanics. it offers absofragnlutely nothing to someone with DEX 13 or less and is absofragnlutely broken for someone with DET 18 or more. It's pretty much like any other arbitrary feat you'd take and decide it evolves. What, no insight to someone who's a bit slower ?!2. As I said - if you can do it, so can they. 3. removing this feat offers some simplification to the game flow. I don't see what is so awkward about the Combat Reflexes mechanic. You can make additional AoO based on your DEX bonus. To me, that's pretty easy to understand. Also, remember that you can still only get one AoO on a specific target; you can get more than one AoO, but they have to be against different targets. I don't see how that is overpowering at all.
xandros2000 01-18-07, 07:42 PM	It was previously suggested using a characters Charisma score X 10 for starting gold. This was to make Charisma more useful, although only at first level. In my campaigns I have added the skill of Haggling. It is a Charisma based skill, That characters may use (opposing shopkeepers skill) to take 5 or 10 % off the cost of items (depending on degree of success) or add 5-10% when selling items. This not only makes Charisma more useful in an ongoing way, but also fits into the medieval theme.
Mitsukai_sama 01-18-07, 10:20 PM	Assuming the above was meant to be 100... In the group I currently DM for, we pretty much all a hybrid power gamers and either storytellers or method actors, so rules debates often hindered the flow of the game, leaving us with no means to progress the story, roleplay our characters, or make use of the overwhelming builds we've created. Sometimes a new feature or ruling allowed into the game, which seemed innocuous enough at the time, caused a major disruption in game balance (for or against the PCs), also slowing things down. So, the following rules were instituted. They aren't quite as rigid as I make them seem to be here (their coming into use was by far a more casual agreement between my players and myself), but here they are... 101. During play sessions, the DM's ruling is final. In the event of a rules dispute critical to the encounter that can't be quickly resolved by referencing game materials, a player may plead their case within two uninterrupted minutes, at most, before the DM makes their final call. This ruling may be further appealed after the game session as below. If repeated rules disputes continue to slow down play, this may be restricted to one dispute per player per game session. 102. Any ruling, be it RAW, house rule, or past adjucation, may be appealed at any time outside of a play session, for as much time as the DM and the player have available to calmly debate the issue. The DM is not obligated to change the ruling, but is obligated to listen carefully to the other side's case, just as the player is obligated to hear out the DM's explanation for the ruling in the event of a disagreement. In the event that a ruling is changed, it will go into effect for all future playing sessions, but has no bearing on play sessions prior, nor will it cause any retroactive change, unless it is agreed otherwise. 103. Any new material submitted must be reviewed by the DM, with all players consulting. The DM still has the final word on approval, but is obligated to take careful consideration of any discussion the new material generates, and should end with all players in agreement. I've seen the lack of player-DM communication happen in other games in the past with disasterous results, and I can't stress enough how important it is. DMs, talk to your players, all of them, and make them involved in your decision making. That doesn't mean you have to agree with them 100% of the time (you won't), but hear them out, because as players, they see the gaming table from a different angle than you. They'll be more likely to accept your rulings without complaint if you can demonstrate that you're willing to listen to them in turn. And players, talk to your DM, presenting any issues you have calmly and without being demanding, and you're far more likely to get a favorable response. But there is a time and place for this, and it probably isn't the gaming table during a session when such debates will slow down play. If there are rules issues, or new material to be added, be sure plenty of time is set aside where it can be discussed, either with the player in private, or the group as a whole, as appropriate. If that means making the above suggestions hard fast rules, so be it. I have work for the moment, but I'll post more mechanics-tweaks later. :]
boxter 01-20-07, 01:05 PM	104: Removed alignment restrictions on all classes except divine spellcasters. To choose a patron diety you still need to have the same alignment I cant understand why barbarians cant be lawful. Someone could be a really calm person and lawful in every meaning but in combat he uses his instincts and his rage to win, wheres the problem? Also, rage may be different from a hatred driven rampage. For a monk, rage could be a moment of perfect controll, a state where he is one with his Ki. Just because it is named Rage it doesnt need to be same kind of.
Netherek 01-22-07, 10:10 PM	105: Add Base Reflex Save to Initiative. Feats/bonuses that improve initiative or Reflex saves only apply to relavent feature. This way higher level characters are more apt to go first, yet removes confusion of bonuses applying where. {from Conan OGL} 106: Add Cha Bonus to starting wealth roll. i.e. 6d4 + Cha x 10 for Paladin. 107: Background Skills: pick 2 skills, that will have 2 ranks each at first level. {modified from Conan OGL} 108: Feats gained every odd level instead of every 3rd level. Haven't used this, but has been proposed for Conan. 109: Instead of Multiclass penalty, reward staying in Favored class by giving a bonus feat for 1,5, and 10 levels of Favored class. {Conan OGL} 110: When Dying, suffer Con Damage instead of Hp Damage. 111: Feint use BAB + Cha or Bluff to perform, suffer -5 penalty after each attempt against same opponent during the battle. This only applies to standard use of Feint, dirty tricks like playing dead, dirt in the eyes are handled normally. 112: When using Class Defense Rule, Class Defense does not apply when Flat-Footed or denied Dex/Dodge bonuses. When wearing Armor apply best AC, so when Flat-footed you get AC from Armor (unless Class is better and have Uncanny Dodge), and Class vs. Touch. 113: When using Armor as DR and Class Defense at the same time, increase the weapon damages by one die-step, include Natural attacks, but not unarmed attacks. 114: When DR reduces Damage to 0, take 1pt of Non-Lethal Damage. This only applies if you can take non-lethal damage and critical blows. 115: 0 level spells gain a bonus equal to 1st level bonus spells for high attribute. 116: For a gritty game, Cap Class HD to 10 levels, and then apply 1 pt. for d4, 2pts. for d6 and d8, and 3 for d10 and d12. 117: Spontaneous Metamagic has 1+Cha Bonus uses per day, or for higher power gaming 3+Cha bonus per day. In either case minimum is 1 time per day. 118: Casting Roll for DC, instead of base 10+relavent bonus, make it a d20 roll. In addition remove arcane spell failure and apply armor check penalty to the roll. A natural one is an auto failure. That's it for now.
mkill 01-25-07, 11:28 AM	Let's continue the "shortening the feat list" from the beginning 119. Power Attack This is not a feat, it's a feature. Everybody can do it as a standard combat maneuver, including all NPCs and monsters. If this feat is a prerequisite, it is automaticly fulfilled. Reason: I never understood why they didn't make this a standard maneuver. I played other RPGs where that's the case for years and I really wondered why D&D characters are unable to do it unless they pay a feat. Note that this actually helps fighters, as they get to the interesting feats faster. 120. Heighten Spell Removed. Instead, adopt the following rule: The spell level of a spell is the level of the slot where it is cast. Examples: Cast Magic Missile as usual, it's a first level spell. Cast Magic Missile in a 3rd level slot, it's a 3rd level spell. Cast Empowered Magic Missile in a 3rd level slot, it's also a 3rd level spell. Cast a Sudden Maximized Fireball from a 3rd level slot, it's a third level spell. Reason: First, this removes a feat that nobody ever takes. Second, it clears up a lot of confusion about metamagic and spell level, level slots etc. 121. Eschew Materials Another feat that should be default. Really. The idea that bat guano is necessary for a fireball is stupid. And yes, material components do serve to balance the wizard, but honestly: If the game balance depends on a character to throw bat guano or eat living spiders, something is wrong. Very wrong. It's unbelievable D&D made it to 3.5th edition without getting rid of this.
Sphyre 01-25-07, 02:29 PM	120. Heighten Spell Removed. Instead, adopt the following rule: The spell level of a spell is the level of the slot where it is cast. Examples: Cast Magic Missile as usual, it's a first level spell. Cast Magic Missile in a 3rd level slot, it's a 3rd level spell. Cast Empowered Magic Missile in a 3rd level slot, it's also a 3rd level spell. Cast a Sudden Maximized Fireball from a 3rd level slot, it's a third level spell. Reason: First, this removes a feat that nobody ever takes. Second, it clears up a lot of confusion about metamagic and spell level, level slots etc. It is actually used. But by doing your houserule it makes bookkeeping so much freaking easier. You just look at the slot to determine the DC, instead of "oh well this is a 1st level spell with a quicken on it, in a 5th level slot, so even though it's in the 5th level slots with all the other DC 15+casting mod spells, it's DC 11+casting mod. Without your variant, it's just so annoying to keep track of spell slots and DCs at the same time when you're actually using metamagic feats. I beleive that truely is a minor tweak to increase the fun of the game. Although it does make metamagic (and simply casting a spell out of a higher level slot) more powerful. Then again, given the fact that you've given power attack to everyone, that's a free feat for everyone, isn't it? :)
Adrez Nesnsid 07-09-07, 06:36 PM	:bump:
eamon 07-09-07, 08:37 PM	121. Death & Dying Instead of dying at -10 hp and dropping at -1, players must make a fortitude save DC 1/2 their negative hp as soon as they drop and again at the same initiative count in each of the following four rounds. Failure means instant death. Success means they take 2 points of "dying" damage. If the character survives 5 successive saving throws, she stabilizes. The normal rules concerning automatic success and failure apply The purpose of this rule is to reduce metagaming (gee he dropped after receiving 2 damage and can be left dying for at least a few more rounds), since even a saving throw you can only fail on a 1, if performed 5 times, has a 22% chance of killing you. The second purpose is to reduce lethality on serious hits, as long as your allies can heal you extremely quickly. Thirdly, the variant should scale as the characters level and favor those who are hardier such as the fighter. Finally, the rule is extremely simple (five fort save s vs. DC 1/2 neg hitpoints, lose 2 on success, death on failure) compared to alternative implementations I've considered. Simplicity is important.
eamon 07-09-07, 08:54 PM	122. Ban Natural Spell. (Introduced after playtesting to avoid "jack-of-all trades and no drawback situation) 123. Monk's gain Wholeness of body at first level (Introduced after playtesting to increase monk low-level survivability without majorly modifying the class or provide even greater benefit to level-dippers) 124. Sorcerer's gain 4 skill points per level (to limit the disadvantage they have vs. a wizard) 125. Permit buying and creating odd-bonus magic item stat enhancers (to increase the availability of cheap but very useful items, and to increase fine-grainedness, and to slightly reduce the nastiness of MAD) 126. Ray of enfeeblement causes a penalty to strength of -4 with a further -2 per five caster levels (up to a maximum of -8 at tenth level). This to reduce the "breakability" via metamagicing these rays. (Empowered ray of enfeeblement anyone?). Similarly to Ray of clumsiness. 127. You may use only core + campaign setting + PHB2 rules. In addition, you may choose one splatbook of your choice and utilize those rules. You may not mix-and-match several splatbooks. (This to avoid a number of annoyingly oddly broken combos and to capitalize on the fact that mostly, splatbooks are well balanced with the core and break most garishly when interacting with other splatbooks in unintended ways. It also reduces the focus of the game on "knowing every d--- rule ever written").
eamon 07-09-07, 08:58 PM	128. The spell compendium institutes a vast boost to the powers of spellcasting classes. To reduce this effect somewhat, and support characters really "flavoring" their choices, these spells are initially unavailable. Researching a new spell, whether by study, method or meditation, costs 100XP per spell level. This cost applies to all classes, not just the wizard. Only the wizard may choose to use normal spell-research methods instead. The only spells exempt from this are those encountered in-game and for which the character succeeds in tricky skill checks to memorize as much detail about the spell cast as possible, in which case the XP cost is reduced.
eamon 07-09-07, 09:03 PM	129. To reduce the harshness of starting a new character, or the pain of being resurrected and losing a level, and to further simplify the determination of XP gain of a party of level N with a few individuals at level N-1 for the DM, instead of using the normal XP gain tables, simply calculate for the highest level and mulitply by 1.5 for all characters a level lower. This is slightly faster than the DMG rules, and might be explained away that you learn even faster when watching those more experiences than you handling real challenges. It, as a side effect I quite encourage, reduces the relevance of other XP costs such as those inherent in item creation.
eamon 07-09-07, 09:07 PM	130. Action Points. We use action points as per the Eberron Campaign Setting. However, to increase speed of play and remove the incentive to metagame in the current rules (normally you choose after you roll but before you hear the consequence of that roll - except that players actually paying attention to rolls can often easily determine what they need), we roll the action point die TOGETHER with the d20 roll it improves. To compensate for their admitted reduced utility because of this change, action points are increased to d8 (and feats further improving an action point instead of improving from d6 to d8 now improve from d8 to d10).
Chris_Moore 07-10-07, 09:39 AM	131: Two bonus Knowledge skill points are awarded each time a character advances to another level. However, the area of knowledge is chosen by the DM based on the experiences of the character. For example, a first level party clears out a dungeon full of Goblins and levels up. The DM may choose to award 1 skill point of Knowledge (Dungeonering) and 1 skill point of Knowledge (Local) to each player.
eamon 07-10-07, 10:01 AM	I like 131 ;-).
raineym 07-19-07, 10:52 AM	132: Clerics may take Weapon Specialization and Greater Weapon Specialization for their deity's favored weapon as if they were a fighter of the same level. 133: Any racial or class feature that grants immunity to a specific effect (poison, disease, fear, spell effects, etc.) now grants a +10 bonus to any saving throw against the effect. 134: Paladins can now Smite Evil a number of times per day equal to 3 + Cha modifier. 135: All skills ranks are purchased on a 1-to-1 basis, regardless of whether they are Class or Cross-Class skills, but Maximum Ranks are still in force for Class and Cross-Class skills. 136: Skill Synergy: In addition to a +2 Synergy bonus at 5 ranks, for each additional 5 ranks increase the Synergy bonus by +1. (e.g.: at 15 ranks the Synergy bonus would be +4).
bitemytail 07-20-07, 02:07 AM	137. Crit threats are removed. If you roll in the crit range, its a crit -quickens things. 138. Alignments are not set. they are values. ex1. Max is Chaotic 4, lawful 3, good 7, evil 1... so he is chaotic good. If a PC does a strong act towards any of the alignments he gains point(s) in that alignment. Ex2. Zack is chaotic 3, lawful 3, evil 2, good 8. Because chaotic and lawful are equal, they cancel. Zack is neutral good. -makes alignment more interesting. 139. Stats - roll 4d6 discard 1's and lowest arrange as desired. If a player rolls all 6's on any roll, he/she recieves a 20. (there's a 1/1296 of this happening). Whoever has the lowest total mods after all PCs mak characters recieves a free 1d4 stats, second lowest gets 1d3 (and so on depending on group size, down to 1 point, usually only a d3 is given out.)
katahn 07-20-07, 10:59 AM	140. Clerics and druids are not alignment restricted but must act in accordance to the agenda of their chosen god. Druids choose an appropriate nature god. 141. Starting a new class (multiclass) requires taking the "Multiclass" feat unless it is for your races' favored class. The "Multiclass" feat is a general feat available to all. 142. All classes get +2 skill points per level and intelligence is not a factor in getting bonus skill points. Instead being really smart makes you really good at intelligence-based skills, that's enough. 143. Playing a non-standard race (ie. an ECL race or monstrous race) is only allowable by taking the feat "Unusual Race" which can only be taken during character creation unless special approval is given by the GM due to circumstances that happen in-game (ie. bit by a lycanthrope). In this latter case, it is impossible to control the condition (for lycanthropes) and all will saves to control "monstrous urges" (ie. kill and feed on innocent people and the like) are at -4. The "preferred class" for a monstrous race is the race itself. 144. ECL races start with negative experience points equal to the minimum number of experience needed to be the class level equal to their ECL. This is in addition to spending the starting feat as described in 143. Thus a drow elf character (ECL2) starts off with no starting feats and at -1,000xp in addition to being level 1 in their starting class. They may not take a multiclass (even their preferred class) until they have paid off this xp debt and reached enough experience to advance a level. 145. All stats start at 10 +/- racial modifiers. Maximum stats are 18 +/- racial modifiers. Characters may assign up to 20pts to their stats or may sacrifice 4pts for an additional starting feat or bonus +4 skill points ( bonus skill points are not multiplied). To get an 18 would require spending 8 points, two 18s would require 16.
eamon 07-20-07, 03:18 PM	140. Clerics and druids are not alignment restricted but must act in accordance to the agenda of their chosen god. Druids choose an appropriate nature god. That's a nice one! 142. All classes get +2 skill points per level and intelligence is not a factor in getting bonus skill points. Instead being really smart makes you really good at intelligence-based skills, that's enough. This turns INT into an extremely attractive dump-stat. It's even less important than CHA now. How many people in this kind of campaign have more than 10 int? 145. All stats start at 10 +/- racial modifiers. Maximum stats are 18 +/- racial modifiers. Characters may assign up to 20pts to their stats or may sacrifice 4pts for an additional starting feat or bonus +4 skill points ( bonus skill points are not multiplied). To get an 18 would require spending 8 points, two 18s would require 16. Why not just use normal point buy which penalized MAD less, and also is more likely to lead to a slightly less "extreme" stat distribution? Does anybody except wizards ever add a single point to INT like this?
katahn 07-20-07, 04:00 PM	This turns INT into an extremely attractive dump-stat. It's even less important than CHA now. How many people in this kind of campaign have more than 10 int? Anyone who wants a bonus to any skill based on intelligence, anyone who is playing a wizard or an arcane spell using class, anyone who wants to know multiple languages, anyone who wants to have a good chance at succeeding at Lore rolls, anyone who wants to have a good chance to "spot hidden" or succeed in an int roll when presented with a riddle. A better question is "why should every class make intelligence such a huge priority even if it doesn't make sense for them to do so"? As for "dump stat" that sounds more like an issue with the kind of game one is running. If charisma is seen as unimportant then throw a few challenges at the group that require them to charm (in a social sense) or fast talk their way out of a situation. Perhaps fighting an NPC is too dangerous, but the possibility exists to talk their way by it? Such a thing is governed by charisma. Why not just use normal point buy which penalized MAD less, and also is more likely to lead to a slightly less "extreme" stat distribution? Does anybody except wizards ever add a single point to INT like this? In my games yes they do add more than a single point to INT. It all depends on the style of game you run. Intelligence governs the ability to notice or know things. Wisdom governs intuition and insight. Charisma governs the ability to manipulate or influence others without risking using magic. Typically in my system I saw characters with 18 in a primary stat, 14-16s in two secondary stats, and then 10-12s in stats that were less important to their characters. It all depended on concept. The guy who wanted to play the hulking barbarian-type dumped all of his points into strength and constitution, with a few in dexterity and wisdom. He wasn't very bright and he was most definitely NOT the "go to guy" for delicate diplomatic negotiations. Another character wanted to play a "seasoned" war-hardened grizzled veteren fighter and his stat distribution had a 16 in str, 14 in con and dex, and a 12 in intelligence and a 14 in wisdom. He wasn't a people person either, being more used to barking orders than negotiating. The wizard in that group was role-played as being the daughter of the local nation's ambassador who had also received some minor combat training. She had an 18 in intelligence, a 16 in charsima, and then a 12 in dexterity, constitution, and wisdom. The cleric was the fourth person in that group, and his concept was "recoverer of lost holy relics" and was thus planning on multiclassing into at least a few levels of rogue. Think Indiana Jones in D&D. Wisdom 18, Dexterity 16, Charisma 14 (sometimes one had to talk ones way out of things), Intelligence 12 (for the slight boost to intelligence related skills important to someone who needed to know a real relic from a fake by description or lore).
Watsyurname529 07-20-07, 04:32 PM	146. Weapon Finesse - Changed Prereqs to Dex 14+ or BAB +1 I've always hated that a Rouge, Ninja, etc. can't use their Dex mod on weapon attacks until 3rd level.
MCage 07-20-07, 07:25 PM	Listen and Spot for everybody? Maybe not wizards, but fighters and some other classes could really use these. Well id have to disagree, Wizards should get atleast spot. The reason being if your a wizard looking for a passage you once read in a tome your gonna skim through, much like we as players do with the PHB or DMG, sometimes we miss the passage (fail our spot check) sometimes we make it (Hurray Wis 12). Seems like durring study the Wizard would use the skim tactic often, esspecially those who are lets say reading a comprehensive tome on the schools of magic when they are a specialist and dont give a rats rear about evocation and divination. Also seems to me a Wizard would use listen, maybe more martial wizards it makes more sence. If your a Wizard and you hear some arcane words spoken loud on the wind your SoL currently, you have no chance in hearing it and rolling a spellcraft. Or if your working on combat casting and your trying to figure out what spell is being cast over the inferno of a fireball.
Dracomortis 07-20-07, 08:31 PM	138. Alignments are not set. they are values. ex1. Max is Chaotic 4, lawful 3, good 7, evil 1... so he is chaotic good. If a PC does a strong act towards any of the alignments he gains point(s) in that alignment. Ex2. Zack is chaotic 3, lawful 3, evil 2, good 8. Because chaotic and lawful are equal, they cancel. Zack is neutral good. -makes alignment more interesting. 147) I use something very similar to this, but give it a bit more fluidity so that a character isn't at risk of shifting their alignment after one or two actions. If you have 0-24 points towards an alignment, you're neutral on that alignment. Once you hit 25 points, you become that alignment. If you would gain points towards an alignment that's directly opposed to the ones you already have, you instead lose an equal number of points from the alignment you possess. For example, if I have 40 points towards chaos (and I thus have a chaotic alignment) and I commit an act that would grant 5 points towards law, I instead lose 5 points towards chaos and drop down to 35. If I were to fall below 25, I would lose my chaotic alignment and become neutral. Once I dropped down to 0 points in a given alignment, I would start moving towards its opposite (for example, if I have 1 point towards good and commit an act that would grant 5 points towards evil, I now have no points towards good and instead have 4 points towards evil, although I am still neutral on the good-evil axis). I find that this produces more realistic characters that can occasionally commit an act opposed to their alignment, if necessary, and not be at immediate risk of losing their alignment.
bitemytail 07-20-07, 09:28 PM	147) I use something very similar to this, but give it a bit more fluidity so that a character isn't at risk of shifting their alignment after one or two actions. If you have 0-24 points towards an alignment, you're neutral on that alignment. Once you hit 25 points, you become that alignment. If you would gain points towards an alignment that's directly opposed to the ones you already have, you instead lose an equal number of points from the alignment you possess. For example, if I have 40 points towards chaos (and I thus have a chaotic alignment) and I commit an act that would grant 5 points towards law, I instead lose 5 points towards chaos and drop down to 35. If I were to fall below 25, I would lose my chaotic alignment and become neutral. Once I dropped down to 0 points in a given alignment, I would start moving towards its opposite (for example, if I have 1 point towards good and commit an act that would grant 5 points towards evil, I now have no points towards good and instead have 4 points towards evil, although I am still neutral on the good-evil axis). I find that this produces more realistic characters that can occasionally commit an act opposed to their alignment, if necessary, and not be at immediate risk of losing their alignment. My examples show what a player would be like after a few sessions. Eventually Steve (random name) would be Good: 35, Evil: 4, Chaotic: 7, Lawful: 50, and he is pretty much never gonna change. Alignment changes usually only happen early on, before characters fully develop their personalities.
mkill 07-21-07, 04:21 AM	141. Starting a new class (multiclass) requires taking the "Multiclass" feat unless it is for your races' favored class. The "Multiclass" feat is a general feat available to all. This does nothing to balance the game. The most powerful characters are straight druid, straight cleric, straight wizard, and you make that even worse by nerfing everybody else. This rule just says "the DM hates multiclassing for some reason". If you really want to introduce that feat, at least throw out all other multiclassing restrictions like XP penalty and monk and paladin special rules. 142. All classes get +2 skill points per level and intelligence is not a factor in getting bonus skill points. Instead being really smart makes you really good at intelligence-based skills, that's enough. I fully agree. Contrary what others say, Int is still useful, for main casting stat, Combat Expertise, Swashbuckler damage bonus, Warmage edge etc. etc. 143. Playing a non-standard race (ie. an ECL race or monstrous race) is only allowable by taking the feat "Unusual Race" which can only be taken during character creation unless special approval is given by the GM due to circumstances that happen in-game (ie. bit by a lycanthrope). In this latter case, it is impossible to control the condition (for lycanthropes) and all will saves to control "monstrous urges" (ie. kill and feed on innocent people and the like) are at -4. The "preferred class" for a monstrous race is the race itself. Do you have a problem with players who are enamored with exotic character choices? In a normal group, monstrous characters will be unusual enough that there is no need for this. Characters with LA are usually screwed enough, there is no need for a further nerf. 144. ECL races start with negative experience points equal to the minimum number of experience needed to be the class level equal to their ECL. This is in addition to spending the starting feat as described in 143. Thus a drow elf character (ECL2) starts off with no starting feats and at -1,000xp in addition to being level 1 in their starting class. They may not take a multiclass (even their preferred class) until they have paid off this xp debt and reached enough experience to advance a level. Erm, what? I really don't get this. First of all, if you start fussing with the rules, understand how they work and use the correct terms. You obviously mixed up LA and ECL. Drow are LA +2 so a first level drow PC is ECL 3. Read the MM again. But as I wrote above, LA screwes up the character enough that there is no need for a further nerf, and the LA rules are unnecessarily complicated enough that there is no need to heap more crappy regulations on it.
JulesCARV 07-21-07, 07:49 AM	148) People aren't necessarily dead at -10 HP. They're incapable of taking actions, and they are beyond the help of magical or mundane healing, but they might still be alive enough to utter a few dramatic words (not a verbal spell, other than perhaps some sort of houseruled "death curse" that isn't a standard spell). (See an old post on this (http://boards1.wizards.com/wotc_archive/index.php/t-712980.html) for more in depth examples of short "deathbed monologues" and DM discretion involved.)
qlawdat 07-21-07, 11:48 AM	Ok first I have been gathering various random rules whenever I come across them, so sorry if I am using someone else's. 149)Certain Skills are combined into one skill for the purpouse of taking ranks. This includes... Open Lock + Disable Device = Disable Device --(Disable Device can already, technically, disable locks, as they are a device. Jamming a lock's even given as an example action Open Lock is something of a legacy skill that no longer really fits, and many d20 system games have done away with the skill for a good reason. Way back, Rogues used to have a "Find/disable traps" skill and an "Open Lock" skill. Now, however, Find/Disable traps has been split into Search and Disable Device, and Disable Device has been expanded to include much more than traps (Really any mechanical or magical device). Open Lock just doesn't make sense anymore.) 150) (only if you don't use the above rule) -Open Lock gains the new ability to "scrub" a lock open as a standard action (as opposed to a Full Round Action), at a -10 to the roll. This is a real ability skilled lockpicks can use to open locks in about 1 second, but it takes a good deal of skill. 151)-Charisma now has a use other than giving bonuses to skills! Action points at each level are now 4 + 1/2 character level + Cha modifier. This only uses your *inherent* charisma, much like the skill bonus from int only uses your inherent intelligence. Thus, a Cloak of Charisma won't give you more AP. This finally gives Charisma some use for everyone, and prevents its use as a dump stat. The guy with the greater force of personality is more likely to be pulling the heroic stunts than the guy who can't work up the courage to talk to a girl or who nobody notices walking onto a stage who goes "testing, 1, 2, 3..." that no one ever notices is there. It's the guy with the heroic personality who everyone takes notice of who is more likely to jump towards the dragon's maw and throw a grenadelike weapon down its throat ;) 152)-Natural attacks can now do 0 damage, instead of minimum 1. This means that rats can no longer kill commoners unless someone gives them some serious buffs. Hurrah for common sense!
Dracomortis 07-21-07, 12:03 PM	152)-Natural attacks can now do 0 damage, instead of minimum 1. This means that rats can no longer kill commoners unless someone gives them some serious buffs. Hurrah for common sense! Careful there - WotC is watching.
qlawdat 07-21-07, 12:10 PM	Found some more 153)All spellcasting classes that need to memorize spells may memorize a number of spells equal to their spells per day, and may cast spontaneously from that pool of spells. Clerics and Druids can also use their spontaneous casting ability, as long as they have a spell slot of appropriate level to burn. To maintain the uniqueness of their class, sorcerers can cast one extra spell per day of each level, except for the highest level spell they know. This is a rule borrowed from Unearthed Arcana. It's designed for those who don't like the "fire and forget" style of magic that most spellcasters are bound by. 154) Sorcerers and bards may swap out previously known spells for new ones at every level. The 3.5 revision allows sorcerers to do this every two levels. I have yet to hear a convincing explanation as to why they shouldn't be allowed to do it at every level up. 155)There are no experience point penalties for multiclassing. Favored classes by race does not apply, and characters may multiclass freely without suffering experience point penalties. Monks and paladins also have no restrictions in their multiclassing. One of the best things that the third edition introduced was the multiclassing system. I prefer to free things up a bit more and give the players as much freedom as possible to pursue their character concept. 156)Cross-class skills do not exist. A fighter gets 2 lonely skill points per level. If he wants to spend those skill points on Craft: Cheesemaking, then I say let him. 157)All PCs and important NPCs gain a Defense Bonus equal to ½ their Base Attack Bonus. This defense bonus is lost whenever a character loses his Dexterity bonus to Armor Class. The defense bonus cannot exceed the maximum Dexterity bonus allowed by a character’s armor. Another rule modified from Unearthed Arcana. Defense bonus allows characters to avoid getting hit as they improve without having to load up on extra armor and magical items. It's best used in lower magic or swashbuckling-style campaigns. 158) Every five ranks in tumble give your character a +1 dodge bonus to AC. you loose this bonus if you are flat footed. 159) Heavy armor takes at least one person helping out to equip. I would also like to see heavy armor mean something more then +8 to your AC. Needing a squire to equip it makes it a bit more special (it also slows things down, so I would say that it should also add a good deal of damage reduction, maybe 4/-) 160)(works with the above rule) Medium armor provides DR 1/-, Heavy armor provides DR 2/- (in addition to it's normal AC bonus). Multiple DRs stack; a barbarian with DR 1/- from his class wearing a breastplate has a DR 2/-. Cast stoneskin on him, and damage first goes through the 10/adamantine of the stoneskin, with any extra being applied against the DR 2/- from class and armor. 161)Downtime rules. Two of my DMs use similar rules: One downtime action is equal to a week, or a month (by DM). Spend one action to: * Learn 1 rank in a skill in which you have less than 4 ranks. Whether the skill is cross-class or not is irrelevant. * Change out a feat you already have for a feat you want; you still have to qualify of course. * Swap out a spell known if you are a spontaneous spellcaster like a Sorcerer 162)shield bonuses stack 163)From Iron Heroes: Hit points are 1D4+remainder of die (so, d8 is d4+4, d12 is d4+8, etc.) I think this is my favorite house rule. It makes sense that a barbarian should get more hit points then a wizard. So this way there is still some randomness to leveling, and a reason to roll. And yeah I know melee types tend to have a higher CON, but so what? No fighter type wants to roll lower then the wizard.
eamon 07-21-07, 12:28 PM	I fully agree. Contrary what others say, Int is still useful, for main casting stat, Combat Expertise, Swashbuckler damage bonus, Warmage edge etc. etc. Hmm... well, I would compare this to wisdom, a far far more powerful stat after whis nerf. It's relevant for more casters (I rarely see wizards, but that's because people I know prefer sorcerer's), it's useful for what's probably the most powerful and important two skills in combat - spot& listen, is required for a saving throw - and one which warrior types aren't good in, is used by the monk on AC etc etc etc. The primary point however is not that you can do something with wisdom, it's that every character has some interest in it. In any case, especially as levels rise, ranks become far more relevant than ability scores for your key skills. A few more points in INT are going to be irrelevant to the vast majority of characters (all characters except the wizard in my campaigns, as nobody's ever played the warmage or swashbuckler, both of which aren't core). Nerfing INT has serious balance issues, as it makes most chacters more powerful not only by granting extra skill points, but also more powerful by making it possible to have another dump stat.
qlawdat 07-21-07, 04:42 PM	I agree. Every stat is pretty balanced. STR: to hit and damage CON: hit points and fort save. DEX: AC, reflex, to hit (with a feat), a lot of skills, initiative, and damage (if you are a sword sage). Int skill points, bonus spells, plenty of skills. WIS; will saves, bonus spells, lot of skills. Cha; Social skills (and UMD)
Rhialto 07-21-07, 04:47 PM	Wizards and clerics (plus those variant and prestige classes that are based off the "taught/educated caster" concept") get Speak Language as a class skill.
Rhialto 07-21-07, 04:59 PM	142. All classes get +2 skill points per level and intelligence is not a factor in getting bonus skill points. Instead being really smart makes you really good at intelligence-based skills, that's enough. This would absolutely destroy the rogue as a viable class. Rogues are supposed to be the game's skill monkeys. How would the game be affected if bonus skill points from high Int could only be spent on Int/Wis/Cha-based skills? (But leaving the basic class-based points per level intact).
eamon 07-21-07, 07:15 PM	This would absolutely destroy the rogue as a viable class. Rogues are supposed to be the game's skill monkeys. How would the game be affected if bonus skill points from high Int could only be spent on Int/Wis/Cha-based skills? (But leaving the basic class-based points per level intact). That's a great modification! I don't think it's wise to change the skill system at all, but if you want to do it, this is the way to go! It even makes sense too somewhere... really, a much better house rule :)
Fanaticreasercher 07-21-07, 11:34 PM	158) Every five ranks in tumble give your character a +1 dodge bonus to AC. you loose this bonus if you are flat footed. 161)Downtime rules. Two of my DMs use similar rules: One downtime action is equal to a week, or a month (by DM). Spend one action to: * Learn 1 rank in a skill in which you have less than 4 ranks. Whether the skill is cross-class or not is irrelevant. * Change out a feat you already have for a feat you want; you still have to qualify of course. * Swap out a spell known if you are a spontaneous spellcaster like a Sorcerer Hurrah! I love skills and dodge bonuses, and i love tumblin'! however, tumble already grants +2 on jump and balance checks if you have 5 or more ranks.
qlawdat 07-22-07, 12:45 AM	Hurrah! I love skills and dodge bonuses, and i love tumblin'! however, tumble already grants +2 on jump and balance checks if you have 5 or more ranks. How about +1 dodge to ac for every five ranks after 10 ranks?
qlawdat 07-22-07, 09:23 AM	Bump!
Cheza 07-22-07, 10:18 AM	This would absolutely destroy the rogue as a viable class. Rogues are supposed to be the game's skill monkeys. How would the game be affected if bonus skill points from high Int could only be spent on Int/Wis/Cha-based skills? (But leaving the basic class-based points per level intact). I think a rogue has more advantages than "skills".
qlawdat 07-22-07, 02:58 PM	Yeah, however I often find myself playing rogues with an 18 int, and I still feel like I dont get enough skill points.
eamon 07-23-07, 09:31 AM	How about +1 dodge to ac for every five ranks after 10 ranks? It's good, but actually, considering who can get it maxxed out, +1 dodge AC per 5 ranks is fine. I made it a feat, so there's some cost there, but waiting until 10 ranks... well.. why?
BobbyMac 07-27-07, 11:48 PM	121. Death & Dying Instead of dying at -10 hp and dropping at -1, players must make a fortitude save DC 1/2 their negative hp as soon as they drop and again at the same initiative count in each of the following four rounds. Failure means instant death. Success means they take 2 points of "dying" damage. If the character survives 5 successive saving throws, she stabilizes. The normal rules concerning automatic success and failure apply The purpose of this rule is to reduce metagaming (gee he dropped after receiving 2 damage and can be left dying for at least a few more rounds), since even a saving throw you can only fail on a 1, if performed 5 times, has a 22% chance of killing you. The second purpose is to reduce lethality on serious hits, as long as your allies can heal you extremely quickly. Thirdly, the variant should scale as the characters level and favor those who are hardier such as the fighter. Finally, the rule is extremely simple (five fort save s vs. DC 1/2 neg hitpoints, lose 2 on success, death on failure) compared to alternative implementations I've considered. Simplicity is important. That is such a great rule. I had a thought about how to use this mechanic for tweaking save or die spells. (I pretty sure everyone hates save or die situations!) Say you're in combat, kicking butt and takin names, when that pesky NPC sorcerer pops you with a insert death spell here. OUCH! Normally you would have to roll a saving throw of some kind (normally fortitude but sometimes others) or instantly, do not pass go, do not collect 200 gold pieces, die! Assuming you fail your saving throw, what if ...instead of deathination... you are instantly reduced to the save DC in negative hp after which eamon's wonderful negative hp death mechanic (quoted above) kicks in? This seems simple, and to my simple mind, seems to scale with level as well... Perhaps the save DC in negative hp needs to be tweaked or something? double it? halve it? take the negative square root and integrate? I leave that as an exercise for the reader and would also love to hear your thoughts on it....
eamon 07-28-07, 10:08 AM	I had a thought about how to use this mechanic for tweaking save or die spells. [...] Assuming you fail your saving throw, what if ...instead of deathination... you are instantly reduced to the save DC in negative hp after which eamon's wonderful negative hp death mechanic (quoted above) kicks in? This seems simple, and to my simple mind, seems to scale with level as well... Perhaps the save DC in negative hp needs to be tweaked or something? double it? halve it? take the negative square root and integrate? Sounds simple and fine. It's probably not really useful to make it more complex by halving, doubling or sqrt+integrating ;-). It's not going to happen that often anyhow! Would you require another saving throw for dropping into negative HP right away though? (i.e. save vs. spell and upon fail drop into neg HP, and then save vs. death right away?)
BobbyMac 07-28-07, 01:37 PM	Sounds simple and fine. It's probably not really useful to make it more complex by halving, doubling or sqrt+integrating ;-). It's not going to happen that often anyhow! Would you require another saving throw for dropping into negative HP right away though? (i.e. save vs. spell and upon fail drop into neg HP, and then save vs. death right away?) Well I think after failing the s. or d., that I would do what you or someone suggested earlier where this situation occurs otherwise. In the next round, just move the initiative count of the victim? to the count just before the occurrence happened in this round. The effect of which is to not have saving throws scarily happen one right after the other...
demoniciron 07-29-07, 12:13 AM	43: Magic Resistance: All characters gain damage reduction towards magic based attacks equal to thier wisdom modifier. (For example, the cleric with an 18 wisdom reduces all magic damage done to him by -4.) Reason: To bring magic down a notch. why not SR? all have AC
eamon 07-30-07, 05:58 AM	Well I think after failing the s. or d., that I would do what you or someone suggested earlier where this situation occurs otherwise. In the next round, just move the initiative count of the victim? to the count just before the occurrence happened in this round. The effect of which is to not have saving throws scarily happen one right after the other... Makes sense, I just thought I'd bring it up - It happened in one of my games, and I had to rule on the spot, and I hate it when I have to rule of the spot for this kind of lethal thing.
Strogg 08-21-07, 06:02 PM	I do not know if this was said before but here I go 164. Do not worry about max load that a player can carry. In the end it just ends up to be too much book keeping, as long as the players do not push it this should be fine. If i think of anything else i will post again
Lesuit 08-23-07, 03:03 AM	165. Clerics can substitute any domain spell for an already memorized/selected spell. Normally clerics can only do this with healing spells. 166. Variant Stat Buy Method for low power campaigns: Characters starting as Commoners get 32 points and Toughness as a bonus feat. Characters starting as Adepts, Aristocrats, Experts, or Warriors get 28 points. Characters starting as any PC class get 25 points. This pretty much has to be combined with the free multi-classing for everyone and every class as favored rules. {Standing rule for Midwrathe (http://midwrathe.d20rpg.org/) and The Great River (http://www.thegreatriver.org/) shared campaign settings.} I really like the Class Defense Bonus lost when Dexterity Bonus is lost and combined total of Class Defense + Dexterity Bonus may not exceed maximum armor Dex bonus rules.
ShinoAburame 08-23-07, 06:29 AM	No magic device skill: Characters can use wands or whatever without having to know a spell. AC applies to spell damage: Characters can completely miss someone with thier spells, the invisible force must make a spellcraft check equal to or greater then the foe's AC. Because it's a skillcheck, auto-failure does not apply. (unless...) Skillchecks apply the 5% chance of auto-success/fumble.
schpeelah 08-26-07, 03:32 AM	WARNING: Not playtested idea. Maybe also not minor. Everyone can substitute their class level for skill ranks in skills they need to use class abilites: all full spellcasters have Spellcraft, rangers have Survival, rouges have Disable Device etc. I don't like the idea someone needs some skill because of their class. Reducing skillpoints of heavily skill-dependand classes may be needed. Profit: everyone can spend skillpoints on whatever they want, not need.
Tetsubo 08-26-07, 04:31 AM	29. get rid of Martial Weapon Proficiency. If you can swing a longspear or quarterstaff use can use a polearm. same goes for mace and warhammer. Long bows and shortbows are a lot simpler than crossbows. 30. Add new Skill Knowledge: Monster. adventures travel, fight monsters and spend time in inns and taverns listening to older adventures talk. they know about classic common monsters. 31. All classes get Listen, Spot and Knowledge: Monster as class skills. (unless they are blind or deaf or something?) 32. Clerics get access to 3 Domains while Rangers, Paladins and Druids get access to 1 Domain A quote I remember, "To train an archer, start with the Grandfather." Using a bow (any type of bow) takes far and away more training to use than a crossbow. I could train your average person to use a crossbow against massed troops in about two hours. It takes *years* to learn to use a bow accurately and effectively. Even against massed troops it would take weeks of training. Not to mention a lot more conditioning is required...
mkill 08-26-07, 11:17 AM	WARNING: Not playtested idea. Maybe also not minor. Everyone can substitute their class level for skill ranks in skills they need to use class abilites: all full spellcasters have Spellcraft, rangers have Survival, rouges have Disable Device etc. I don't like the idea someone needs some skill because of their class. Reducing skillpoints of heavily skill-dependand classes may be needed. Profit: everyone can spend skillpoints on whatever they want, not need. The whole skill point thing will be gone in 4th ed., so this one's covered (and I hope the designers took note on other points too).
BigGus 09-09-07, 10:54 PM	OK some of these have been mentioned already, but here's my versions: 167. Toughness: now gives +1HP/ 2 levels, with a minimum of 3 and a maximum of 10. - Stops Toughness being totally irrelevant at high levels, as it is if it just gives +3HPs; but also stops it from being super-powerful at epic levels, as it would be if it gave a level-based bonus with no limit. 168. Favoured classes: all races have two favoured classes. Humans treat any one class as their favoured class, rather than their highest-level class, to compensate. Half-elves and half-orcs get one favoured class from their non-human parent (chosen at first level) and their highest-level class is also treated as a favoured class (a weakened version of the "any one" humans get) from their human parent. I use: elf - wizard and ranger, dwarf - fighter and cleric, gnome - bard and illusionist, halfling - rogue and bard, orc - barbarian and rogue - Gives more flexibility without allowing rampant multiclassing. 169. Racial attributes: give all races an extra +4 skill points or the equivalent at level 1. Elf: +4 spot and listen instead of +2 Dwarf: +4 stonecunning and craft (stone, metal, gems) instead of +2 Gnome: +4 craft (alchemy) instead of +2, and add +2 hide Halfling: +4 move silently instead of +2, and add +2 hide Half-elf: +2 spot and listen instead of +1, and add +2 skill points Half-orc: add +2 intimidate and +2 skill points Human: add +4 skill points - Why would elf eyes and ears, halfling quietness, and dwarf craftsmanship be so famous if they're only 10% better at it than the other races? This differentiates the races more, and makes racial skill bonuses actually worth something.
gojumamoru 09-12-07, 01:44 PM	165. Clerics can substitute any domain spell for an already memorized/selected spell. Normally clerics can only do this with healing spells. 170. I instead say clerics can trade out memorized spells for domain spells but cant trade out for healing spells. If you want that then you get the healing domain. 180. Death at -10+level. But I like some of the options here better. 181. Smite evil is per encounter.
eamon 09-17-07, 01:37 PM	181. Smite evil is per encounter. That's a nice one. It's not like paladins are huge powerhouses, so I'm guessing you didn't nerf smite evil to compensate - Did you?