Mixing House Rules [LONG post] [Archive] - Wizards Community

Mixing House Rules [LONG post] [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Jack Daniel
09-08-04, 06:20 PM Putting together a campaign that uses lots of house rules or variants from sources like Unearthed Arcana is one of those things that DMs just find fun, right up there with designing adventures. (If you're on this forum, you probably agree with me.) One thing I've found in playing with many, many variations of these rules is that sometimes things just click. They fit together in ways that you didn't see, but turn out looking better than you expect.

One example that I bring up a lot is the way I handled action points. I wanted to add them to my D&D game, but 5 + half the character's level in action points seemed like too much, so I lowered it to 3 + 1/2Lvl.

At the time, I was also looking for a way to redo the favored class system -- I figured, favored classes should be classes that reward one race or another for leveling up in them. As written, the favored class rules don't distinguish between an elf Wizard 19 / Something Else 1, and a Something Else 19 / Wizard 1. There's little incentive to be your race's favored class, and plenty of incentive to "dabble." The problem with writing rewards into certain race/class combinations is that they'd probably be too powerful. I don't want every elf being a wizard and every wizard being an elf, which is exactly what would happen if I added substantive "perks" to characters advancing in their favored class.

That was when it hit me to simply let characters earn 3 + 1/2Lvl action points most of the time, and 5 + 1/2Lvl action points when they advance in their favored class. And humans and half-elves? They just always get the standard 5 + 1/2Lvl action points, regardless of class. The end result was, I got the sort of rules system I wanted -- one that encouraged characters to advance in their favored class without discouraging players from advancing in whatever class they wanted -- and it didn't nerf humans or half-elves. Plus, I was finally able to do away with those awkward XP penalties for uneven levels that don't show up in any d20 game except D&D. The funny thing is, it was almost a complete accident that it worked out the way it did -- I would never have been able to change the favored class system if I didn't use action points.

Another example revolves around the fact that my campaign setting takes place during an Industrial Revolution period. Medićval armor is rare to the point of nonuse -- if characters wear any armor at all, it’s either powered clockwork or steamtech armor, or your run-of-the-mill magic bracers. Since most characters would probably be adventuring in their street clothes, it seemed natural to include rules for a class-based defense bonus. I experimented with the rules from the Star Wars and d20 Modern games, but by the time Unearthed Arcana had come out, I was thoroughly disenchanted with the whole idea. Defense bonuses didn’t fit well into D&D because if I let them stack with armor bonuses, the players would load their characters up on magical defense items and skyrocket their ACs -- and if I said "okay, defense bonuses and armor bonuses don’t stack," then they would totally forgo any sort of defensive items once they reached a level where their defense bonus was higher. "My magical trinket of +4 AC is no good anymore... might as well sell it and buy a magic weapon or something." That was a logical loophole that didn’t sit well with me -- it brought metagaming too close to the characters.

The problem, I realized, was that these defense bonuses from other books were too high -- so long as they stayed that way, they would always be better than defensive items. The logical solution was to have a lower defense bonus that stacked with armor bonuses. Now, this is where things start to come together.

I had already toyed with various systems where armors granted DR, especially since the best way to have armor in a game where firearms are common is that gunshots ignore the DR but not the AC bonus. This is also realistic -- gunshots have a lot of penetrating force, so an armor’s stopping power does nothing -- but a well-made suit of plate can deflect a gunshot at the right angle, so the AC bonus would apply. Unearthed Arcana’s armor as DR system, where half the armor’s bonus becomes DR and the other half stayed an AC bonus, was perfect, so I implemented that rule and I’ve been happy with it ever since. One thing that bothered me, though, was the flaw that the sidebar in the book warns about -- DR is wonderful at low levels, but as characters grow in power, it steadily becomes less useful. The solution? That lower defense bonus I mentioned earlier. The progression was already in the PHB, and I had just ignored it the whole time: the monk gets AC +1 at every five levels, adding up to a grand total of AC +4 at level 20. This is exactly the amount of AC that becomes DR for the best armors (full plate and +8 bracers of armor). It seemed like just the right amount to make up for the DR’s weakness at high levels. (Plus, the Call of Cuthulhu RPG used an optional +1 AC per 5 levels defense bonus, and that was rather close to the “feel” I wanted for this rule.) So, I implemented a defense bonus where characters simply get +1 to their AC at every five character levels (as for monks, I took away their class AC bonus -- they still got their Wisdom bonus to AC at 1st level, but beyond that, they earned 1 point of DR/-- at levels 7, 13, 19, and every 6th level beyond, to keep them even with armored characters).

Then, I sat back and asked, what have I accomplished? Are characters able to defend themselves adequately without armor? Probably not. Players are going to want some defense items anyway. Then, was adding a defense bonus worth it? Yes, in principle. Armored or not, a 20th-level character should be better at defending himself than a 1st-level character. [As to what I did about defensive items, though it’s beside the point, I looked to one of my favorite RPGs, Final Fantasy VII, for an idea. I wanted characters who could defend themselves without strapping on chainmail, and in that game, armor bracers could be purchased at any "Ţe Olde Magicke Shoppe." I figured, hey, I have no problem with that, so long as it’s only armor bracers that get that treatment and nothing else. So, I lowered the prices of armor bracers so that they were still more expensive than normal armor, but not by all that much, and gave them names from FFVII like "iron bangle" and "mythrill armlet." The end result: they typical character in my campaign wears a Victorian-era suit to go with his sabre and pistol, but he derives his AC from a defense bonus equal to 1/5 his character level, plus an armor bonus from a magic armlet -- and instead of a "+4 bracer of armor," that item is a called a "silver bracer" that grants AC +2 and DR 2/--.]

Now where exactly am I going with all this? Sure, I had already created an interwoven system of defense bonuses, armor with DR, and cheap defensive magical items that ended up being ćsthetically pleasing in terms of campaign design... but it had more far-reaching consequences once I started working out some alterations to the epic level rules.

I had a problem with the epic level rules as written. It was the same problem that many people have. A fighter 20/wizard 20 has a high base attack bonus and four attacks per round, but a wizard 20/fighter 20 has a low base attack bonus and he will never make more than two attacks per round, even if he goes on to become a wizard 20/fighter 20,000. This problem comes from two separate rules: first, the fact that base attacks and saves stop increasing after 20th level; and second, from the arbitrary "cease-and-desist order" placed on earning iterative attacks at epic levels. The first rule comes from the fact that when you scale levels to infinity, good attacks and saves become too good and poor attacks and saves become too poor. The second rule comes from the assumption that after two, three, or four attacks per round, iterative attacks with an even lower bonus don’t mean anything to epic combat – they’d just turn your full attack action into one or two potential hits, followed by a flurry of d20 rolls that tell you how often you’ve missed your opponent that round.

The solution to the first problem was simple enough: I have no desire to scale epic levels to infinity. 50th level is a perfectly adequate cap on character advancement for my campaign (if it was good enough for the original Final Fantasy game, it’s good enough for my D&D campaign). Since I’m not scaling levels forever, I don’t have to cut off base attacks and saves for no reason starting at level 21. (On a side note, monsters with 21+ hit dice continue to advance their attacks and saves at the normal rate, so why not player characters?)

Now, what this means is that a 50th-level fighter in my campaign has a base attack bonus that’s 15 points higher than a standard 50th-level fighter; a 50th-level rogue’s base attack bonus is 7 points higher than the standard; and a 50th-level wizard’s base attack bonus is the same as a standard wizard’s 50th-level attack bonus. That might be unbalancing, if I hadn’t implanted a defense bonus… but I did, and if you’ll remember, it’s equal to 1/5 of a character’s total levels. A 50th-level character has a class defense bonus of +10, regardless of class, and even though his AC is potentially 4 points lower than it might otherwise be, those 4 points didn’t just disappear; they’re DR. So, all characters have a certain enhanced degree of defense to make up for this increased attack power. Already, most of the problem is solved: base attack bonus is based on class levels, regardless of what order those levels were taken in, and so a wizard 20/fighter 20 has the same +30/+25/+20/+15 attack bonus as a fighter 20/wizard 20.

But what about those multiple attacks? I could just cap them at four per round, and that would be a perfectly adequate end to my meddling with the rules… but do those extra attacks that you might otherwise earn really not matter? Every attack hits on a natural 20, regardless of the attacker’s attack bonus or the defender’s AC. That lead me to my final house rule, which I call "extra epic attacks." It’s simple, really: tally up the number of attacks that you would have after the fourth, and record that number after your attack bonus. Our 20th-level fighter/20th-level wizard would thus write down for his base attack bonus, +30/+25/+20/+15/×2. After you make your full attack, roll that number of twenty-sided dice. If you get any natural 20s, treat those as extra hits; otherwise, just ignore them. The extra attacks don’t have an attack bonus and they don’t critically hit or fumble, but otherwise, they’re normal attacks. This really serves to separate high level attack bonuses: while a 50th-level wizard is nuking enemies with his epic spells, his attack bonus of +25/+20/+15/+10/×1 can’t really compare to the 50th-level fighter’s +50/+45/+40/+35/×6 (or the 50th-level monk’s excessively violent +37/+34/+31/+28/+25/×8! :devil: ).

When all is said and done, I have a kickarse little set of house rules. It’s balanced, fairly streamlined, and accomplishes everything that I want it to do in terms of both campaign and rules design. So, my question to you is this: have you ever put together a massive body of house rules that just “felt right” and happened to work out in play just as well as it looked on paper? Comments and reactions are welcome, folks.
Ellanon
09-08-04, 07:28 PM Well, we do not play epic, so I have no comment there. But, your defense/DR system sounds interesting. Could you go into more detail or send me a PM if you feel that would hijack your thread?
Drizzt Clone
09-09-04, 08:30 AM Hm... This all seems familar. Are you the designer of Relative Entropy?
Jack Daniel
09-09-04, 11:56 AM Ellanon: Nah, it's not highjacking. Go here (http://www.geocities.com/ivan_327/resetting.htm) and open Chapter One. That's where all this stuff is detailed.

Drizzt Clone: Yep. I thought that was obvious, given that the only link in my signature leads to the setting's website. :)
Ellanon
09-09-04, 12:12 PM Ellanon: Nah, it's not highjacking. Go here (http://www.geocities.com/ivan_327/resetting.htm) and open Chapter One. That's where all this stuff is detailed.Thank you!
Thelon Fairblade
09-09-04, 01:50 PM Having seen the thought process behind the end result, it all now makes sense. I especially like the epic analysis, and the "itterative attacks beyond the fourth" idea, although I don't know how it handles in actual play.

Have you played/GM'd this comprehensive system? How the armors and DR and defense bonsues acutally work in practice, from level 1 to level 50? (or, really, to levle 16 is all I care about for my own campaign)
Jack Daniel
09-09-04, 04:16 PM Having seen the thought process behind the end result, it all now makes sense. I especially like the epic analysis, and the "itterative attacks beyond the fourth" idea, although I don't know how it handles in actual play.

Have you played/GM'd this comprehensive system? How the armors and DR and defense bonsues acutally work in practice, from level 1 to level 50? (or, really, to levle 16 is all I care about for my own campaign)

I can tell you that it works extremely well at low levels (1st-7th) and there was hardly a noticable difference from the way the core rules played in a high-level game I ran (15th-23rd). If I ever run a game that gets up close to 50th level, I'll let you know. :)
Drizzt Clone
09-09-04, 07:53 PM Drizzt Clone: Yep. I thought that was obvious, given that the only link in my signature leads to the setting's website. :)

Well, now I feel intelligent in excess. How close are you to getting the next chapter done?

Also, the action point system seems pretty balanced, but wouldn't it make more sense to give half-elves (and possibly humans) 4+1/2 level as their adaptability is just that, not excellence at everything?

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Jack Daniel 09-08-04, 06:20 PM	Putting together a campaign that uses lots of house rules or variants from sources like Unearthed Arcana is one of those things that DMs just find fun, right up there with designing adventures. (If you're on this forum, you probably agree with me.) One thing I've found in playing with many, many variations of these rules is that sometimes things just click. They fit together in ways that you didn't see, but turn out looking better than you expect. One example that I bring up a lot is the way I handled action points. I wanted to add them to my D&D game, but 5 + half the character's level in action points seemed like too much, so I lowered it to 3 + 1/2Lvl. At the time, I was also looking for a way to redo the favored class system -- I figured, favored classes should be classes that reward one race or another for leveling up in them. As written, the favored class rules don't distinguish between an elf Wizard 19 / Something Else 1, and a Something Else 19 / Wizard 1. There's little incentive to be your race's favored class, and plenty of incentive to "dabble." The problem with writing rewards into certain race/class combinations is that they'd probably be too powerful. I don't want every elf being a wizard and every wizard being an elf, which is exactly what would happen if I added substantive "perks" to characters advancing in their favored class. That was when it hit me to simply let characters earn 3 + 1/2Lvl action points most of the time, and 5 + 1/2Lvl action points when they advance in their favored class. And humans and half-elves? They just always get the standard 5 + 1/2Lvl action points, regardless of class. The end result was, I got the sort of rules system I wanted -- one that encouraged characters to advance in their favored class without discouraging players from advancing in whatever class they wanted -- and it didn't nerf humans or half-elves. Plus, I was finally able to do away with those awkward XP penalties for uneven levels that don't show up in any d20 game except D&D. The funny thing is, it was almost a complete accident that it worked out the way it did -- I would never have been able to change the favored class system if I didn't use action points. Another example revolves around the fact that my campaign setting takes place during an Industrial Revolution period. Medićval armor is rare to the point of nonuse -- if characters wear any armor at all, it’s either powered clockwork or steamtech armor, or your run-of-the-mill magic bracers. Since most characters would probably be adventuring in their street clothes, it seemed natural to include rules for a class-based defense bonus. I experimented with the rules from the Star Wars and d20 Modern games, but by the time Unearthed Arcana had come out, I was thoroughly disenchanted with the whole idea. Defense bonuses didn’t fit well into D&D because if I let them stack with armor bonuses, the players would load their characters up on magical defense items and skyrocket their ACs -- and if I said "okay, defense bonuses and armor bonuses don’t stack," then they would totally forgo any sort of defensive items once they reached a level where their defense bonus was higher. "My magical trinket of +4 AC is no good anymore... might as well sell it and buy a magic weapon or something." That was a logical loophole that didn’t sit well with me -- it brought metagaming too close to the characters. The problem, I realized, was that these defense bonuses from other books were too high -- so long as they stayed that way, they would always be better than defensive items. The logical solution was to have a lower defense bonus that stacked with armor bonuses. Now, this is where things start to come together. I had already toyed with various systems where armors granted DR, especially since the best way to have armor in a game where firearms are common is that gunshots ignore the DR but not the AC bonus. This is also realistic -- gunshots have a lot of penetrating force, so an armor’s stopping power does nothing -- but a well-made suit of plate can deflect a gunshot at the right angle, so the AC bonus would apply. Unearthed Arcana’s armor as DR system, where half the armor’s bonus becomes DR and the other half stayed an AC bonus, was perfect, so I implemented that rule and I’ve been happy with it ever since. One thing that bothered me, though, was the flaw that the sidebar in the book warns about -- DR is wonderful at low levels, but as characters grow in power, it steadily becomes less useful. The solution? That lower defense bonus I mentioned earlier. The progression was already in the PHB, and I had just ignored it the whole time: the monk gets AC +1 at every five levels, adding up to a grand total of AC +4 at level 20. This is exactly the amount of AC that becomes DR for the best armors (full plate and +8 bracers of armor). It seemed like just the right amount to make up for the DR’s weakness at high levels. (Plus, the Call of Cuthulhu RPG used an optional +1 AC per 5 levels defense bonus, and that was rather close to the “feel” I wanted for this rule.) So, I implemented a defense bonus where characters simply get +1 to their AC at every five character levels (as for monks, I took away their class AC bonus -- they still got their Wisdom bonus to AC at 1st level, but beyond that, they earned 1 point of DR/-- at levels 7, 13, 19, and every 6th level beyond, to keep them even with armored characters). Then, I sat back and asked, what have I accomplished? Are characters able to defend themselves adequately without armor? Probably not. Players are going to want some defense items anyway. Then, was adding a defense bonus worth it? Yes, in principle. Armored or not, a 20th-level character should be better at defending himself than a 1st-level character. [As to what I did about defensive items, though it’s beside the point, I looked to one of my favorite RPGs, Final Fantasy VII, for an idea. I wanted characters who could defend themselves without strapping on chainmail, and in that game, armor bracers could be purchased at any "Ţe Olde Magicke Shoppe." I figured, hey, I have no problem with that, so long as it’s only armor bracers that get that treatment and nothing else. So, I lowered the prices of armor bracers so that they were still more expensive than normal armor, but not by all that much, and gave them names from FFVII like "iron bangle" and "mythrill armlet." The end result: they typical character in my campaign wears a Victorian-era suit to go with his sabre and pistol, but he derives his AC from a defense bonus equal to 1/5 his character level, plus an armor bonus from a magic armlet -- and instead of a "+4 bracer of armor," that item is a called a "silver bracer" that grants AC +2 and DR 2/--.] Now where exactly am I going with all this? Sure, I had already created an interwoven system of defense bonuses, armor with DR, and cheap defensive magical items that ended up being ćsthetically pleasing in terms of campaign design... but it had more far-reaching consequences once I started working out some alterations to the epic level rules. I had a problem with the epic level rules as written. It was the same problem that many people have. A fighter 20/wizard 20 has a high base attack bonus and four attacks per round, but a wizard 20/fighter 20 has a low base attack bonus and he will never make more than two attacks per round, even if he goes on to become a wizard 20/fighter 20,000. This problem comes from two separate rules: first, the fact that base attacks and saves stop increasing after 20th level; and second, from the arbitrary "cease-and-desist order" placed on earning iterative attacks at epic levels. The first rule comes from the fact that when you scale levels to infinity, good attacks and saves become too good and poor attacks and saves become too poor. The second rule comes from the assumption that after two, three, or four attacks per round, iterative attacks with an even lower bonus don’t mean anything to epic combat – they’d just turn your full attack action into one or two potential hits, followed by a flurry of d20 rolls that tell you how often you’ve missed your opponent that round. The solution to the first problem was simple enough: I have no desire to scale epic levels to infinity. 50th level is a perfectly adequate cap on character advancement for my campaign (if it was good enough for the original Final Fantasy game, it’s good enough for my D&D campaign). Since I’m not scaling levels forever, I don’t have to cut off base attacks and saves for no reason starting at level 21. (On a side note, monsters with 21+ hit dice continue to advance their attacks and saves at the normal rate, so why not player characters?) Now, what this means is that a 50th-level fighter in my campaign has a base attack bonus that’s 15 points higher than a standard 50th-level fighter; a 50th-level rogue’s base attack bonus is 7 points higher than the standard; and a 50th-level wizard’s base attack bonus is the same as a standard wizard’s 50th-level attack bonus. That might be unbalancing, if I hadn’t implanted a defense bonus… but I did, and if you’ll remember, it’s equal to 1/5 of a character’s total levels. A 50th-level character has a class defense bonus of +10, regardless of class, and even though his AC is potentially 4 points lower than it might otherwise be, those 4 points didn’t just disappear; they’re DR. So, all characters have a certain enhanced degree of defense to make up for this increased attack power. Already, most of the problem is solved: base attack bonus is based on class levels, regardless of what order those levels were taken in, and so a wizard 20/fighter 20 has the same +30/+25/+20/+15 attack bonus as a fighter 20/wizard 20. But what about those multiple attacks? I could just cap them at four per round, and that would be a perfectly adequate end to my meddling with the rules… but do those extra attacks that you might otherwise earn really not matter? Every attack hits on a natural 20, regardless of the attacker’s attack bonus or the defender’s AC. That lead me to my final house rule, which I call "extra epic attacks." It’s simple, really: tally up the number of attacks that you would have after the fourth, and record that number after your attack bonus. Our 20th-level fighter/20th-level wizard would thus write down for his base attack bonus, +30/+25/+20/+15/×2. After you make your full attack, roll that number of twenty-sided dice. If you get any natural 20s, treat those as extra hits; otherwise, just ignore them. The extra attacks don’t have an attack bonus and they don’t critically hit or fumble, but otherwise, they’re normal attacks. This really serves to separate high level attack bonuses: while a 50th-level wizard is nuking enemies with his epic spells, his attack bonus of +25/+20/+15/+10/×1 can’t really compare to the 50th-level fighter’s +50/+45/+40/+35/×6 (or the 50th-level monk’s excessively violent +37/+34/+31/+28/+25/×8! :devil: ). When all is said and done, I have a kickarse little set of house rules. It’s balanced, fairly streamlined, and accomplishes everything that I want it to do in terms of both campaign and rules design. So, my question to you is this: have you ever put together a massive body of house rules that just “felt right” and happened to work out in play just as well as it looked on paper? Comments and reactions are welcome, folks.
Ellanon 09-08-04, 07:28 PM	Well, we do not play epic, so I have no comment there. But, your defense/DR system sounds interesting. Could you go into more detail or send me a PM if you feel that would hijack your thread?
Drizzt Clone 09-09-04, 08:30 AM	Hm... This all seems familar. Are you the designer of Relative Entropy?
Jack Daniel 09-09-04, 11:56 AM	Ellanon: Nah, it's not highjacking. Go here (http://www.geocities.com/ivan_327/resetting.htm) and open Chapter One. That's where all this stuff is detailed. Drizzt Clone: Yep. I thought that was obvious, given that the only link in my signature leads to the setting's website. :)
Ellanon 09-09-04, 12:12 PM	Ellanon: Nah, it's not highjacking. Go here (http://www.geocities.com/ivan_327/resetting.htm) and open Chapter One. That's where all this stuff is detailed.Thank you!
Thelon Fairblade 09-09-04, 01:50 PM	Having seen the thought process behind the end result, it all now makes sense. I especially like the epic analysis, and the "itterative attacks beyond the fourth" idea, although I don't know how it handles in actual play. Have you played/GM'd this comprehensive system? How the armors and DR and defense bonsues acutally work in practice, from level 1 to level 50? (or, really, to levle 16 is all I care about for my own campaign)
Jack Daniel 09-09-04, 04:16 PM	Having seen the thought process behind the end result, it all now makes sense. I especially like the epic analysis, and the "itterative attacks beyond the fourth" idea, although I don't know how it handles in actual play. Have you played/GM'd this comprehensive system? How the armors and DR and defense bonsues acutally work in practice, from level 1 to level 50? (or, really, to levle 16 is all I care about for my own campaign) I can tell you that it works extremely well at low levels (1st-7th) and there was hardly a noticable difference from the way the core rules played in a high-level game I ran (15th-23rd). If I ever run a game that gets up close to 50th level, I'll let you know. :)
Drizzt Clone 09-09-04, 07:53 PM	Drizzt Clone: Yep. I thought that was obvious, given that the only link in my signature leads to the setting's website. :) Well, now I feel intelligent in excess. How close are you to getting the next chapter done? Also, the action point system seems pretty balanced, but wouldn't it make more sense to give half-elves (and possibly humans) 4+1/2 level as their adaptability is just that, not excellence at everything?