Hey There!!
:rolleye2: Got a DM that's great, but has a few HOUSE RULES that get on your nerves?--rules that don't make any sense
, are inconsistent, or seem to 'POP' 
out of no where? 
WELL!!! This is the place to vent about it!
Yup, that's right! By posting in this thread, it is assumed that you have the utmost respect for your DM. Thus, this gives a safe place to share and resolve your specific issues. So, instead of holding it in until you're ready to explode :headexplo or you develop a nervous twitch
, you should LET US KNOW BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE!!!!! :surrender
Note: Again by posting in this thread the user should NOT assume all risks of injury
:fight!:. If you are a DM reading this thread, these posts are not intended to flame 
, insult 
, disrespect 
or destroy 
our beloved DMs. As players we are thankful to have DMs out there willing to do so much work for us 
. After all, . . . without DMs, the game would not exist! However, despite how much we love you 
, it is worth while to have a healthy place to bring issues out into the open. So, players, . . . LET LOOSE! 
However, PLEASE refrain from vulgar language. This thread is NOT intended to insult our DMs. Please tell your side of the story in good taste. Inappropriate posts will be REPORTED.
Our group has gone through many changes, but we have a particular friend that has been our core DM. Great DM and is known for being well thought out. However, like many of us, can be very stubborn!
One rule that stuck around for ages (though in various forms), was in regards to levels. If you were a new player, you would come in at one level lower than the lowest level character. In addition, if you carried a character over from a previous game, you would sometimes come in at a level higher than everyone else. On the other hand, if you ever changed characters, you would come in at the bottom like a new player; if you did this after dying, you would come in at 2 levels lower than the lowest!
As you can imagine, there grew quite a spread of players....that one guy that was several levels higher than everyone else and that poor chum who was perhaps 7 levels lower!
Fun times :D
I've gotten a 20 here and there. Charmed a kraken, but I've also rolled a 1 which because my spell did not work, the party couldn't escape and a TPK resulted. Which do you think I remember or care about more?
The DM knows I don't like this rule, despite getting the 20 and charming a kraken the first time it applied.
I blame a former roleplaying buddy of his who moved down south whom he visited one time. It was his ridiculous house rule.
halflings suffer -1 to all rolls in a day without a “masterwork” breakfast, and -2 to all rolls if they also miss brunch or “elevensies.”
He also required a paladin to play in every game. Yarg.
I stopped browsing quickly and decided to stay far, far away. This is no small document either- we're talking 10,071 words, small font, no margins.
It was tough to take him seriously.
1: Role-master critical/fumble charts in 2nd Ed D&D.
It was fun/amusing at times but very frustrating.
2: Random encounters ( 2nd ED, same game with Role-master crit/fumble)
Every creature ffrom manuals and Dragon magazine was a possible Random encounter. TPK's from random encounters is annoying.
3: Falling (3.5), if you don't have FF or try to tumble to reduce damage etc... then the fall distance doesn't count as movement. This gem appeared so that a BBEG could get away, an on the spot rule determination, which then became a mainstay for that adventure until....
My character was falling, last round fell 300 feet per the falling rules. I was at 3 HP's, used a quick stand skill from CoScoundrel and took of running and escaped the BBEG and his flying mount, because he couldn't get turned around quickly enough.
DM of course indicated that you can't move after falling, oh how quickly they forget as the BBEG would have been defeated weeks earlier if that was the case.
Recently looking for a game I got sent a 13 page "house rules" document that included such gems as
He also required a paladin to play in every game. Yarg.
I stopped browsing quickly and decided to stay far, far away. This is no small document either- we're talking 10,071 words, small font, no margins.
May I see those rediculous house rules, if you still have a copy? Unlikely, true; but I might get a chuckle.
10 minutes of hack'n'slash later GM intervenes.
GM: You've got to run away, or this will take too long.
Player: Why? I've hit him 10 times now.
GM: Yeah, well, he's got 1000HPs !!!
Player: WTF?!!!
GM created home-brew race of monsters. Regardless of what damage was inflicted it would only take 1HP of damage per hit.
10 minutes of hack'n'slash later GM intervenes.
GM: You've got to run away, or this will take too long.
Player: Why? I've hit him 10 times now.
GM: Yeah, well, he's got 1000HPs !!!
Player: WTF?!!!
That's a level adjustment of about 50, just in hit dice!
Not 100% sure but basically they took only 1 hp damage per hit or 1 point per plus of weapon..or something like that anyway.
Of course they only had about 20 some hp's which makes a big difference.
no power gaming, this one stinks, and no better roleplaying than the dm, as an actor "Eye gots me ah edge on da lota O dem":P
Ahahaha, I love DMs like this, simply because of the awe-inspiring amount of dumb they show when describing "power gaming".
Also, glad to see ya back, Bevier! :D
Ahahaha, I love DMs like this, simply because of the awe-inspiring amount of dumb they show when describing "power gaming".
Also, glad to see ya back, Bevier! :D
+1.
With that said any DM who enforces any effect other than 'you miss' on a natural 1 attack roll is automatically lol worthy.
Oh and it gets annoying when seemingly every energy attack manages to destroy a significant amount of enemy treasure, even though it's supposed to be only 1 item, only if they roll a 1, and not necessarily destroyed assuming they follow such an obscure and pointless rule in the first place. As if blasting didn't suck hard enough already.
Specifically, the whole "acid does damage to items and objects" thing. Nope. If you got hit with acid (Like say with Acid Fog) or fell into acid, nothing bad happens until you stop being exposed to acid: then every item you have that isn't immune to acid or somehow protected makes a Fort save, that increases in difficulty every round of exposure, or is destroyed. Of course, non-magic items get no save. (Think DC of 10 for one round or exposure, and the longest I saw, 6 rounds, was DC 34.)
To top it off, quite obviously, acid weapons, spells, and such were heavily restricted for players, but for NPC's, not so much.
- All players must stay at about equal power levels
- You must check with me for each PrC you are going to enter
- Divine Casters must have their Divine Focus with them to prepare spells
- Sorcerers get a bonus metamagic feat every fourth level, starting at level 4, and d6 HD
- Fighters get an ability that is useful, and fills their dead levels. (If you want, I'll post it later)
- Massive damage threshold=half your total hp. DC equals 1/5 damage+10.
- Clobbered: If, in a single hit, you take half your starting hitpoints at the beginning of the round, you may only take a standard action for your next turn
- All Druids must use the shapechange variant from PHBII, but in return they get an Animal Companion. They may trade both for WS.
- It is reccomended to give me a background, 28 title, one 12 font empty line in between, and size 12 font indented 1 page document.
1. Clobbered: If you get hit for half of your original HP take a dc15 fort save or you can only take a single action next turn (+ swift)
2. Paladins tend to bully the party.. And I dislike detect evil. So I hardly ever allow paladins in my campaigns. When I do I try to give them a break though.
3. I don't allow Crusaders from the tome of battle because they take away everybody's thunder. I know oppinions are devided about this, but my players all agree.
4. In some campaigns I allow really well thought-and-worked-out characters an extra +1 in a fitting ability score.
5. I have some rules about attacking limbs.. I hardly ever use them though.
6. Critical misses are sometimes followed up by a balance check to prevent the character in question to fall over.
I am a DM myself.. I have some "strange" rules:
1. Clobbered: If you get hit for half of your original HP take a dc15 fort save or you can only take a single action next turn (+ swift)
2. Paladins tend to bully the party.. And I dislike detect evil. So I hardly ever allow paladins in my campaigns. When I do I try to give them a break though.
3. I don't allow Crusaders from the tome of battle because they take away everybody's thunder. I know oppinions are devided about this, but my players all agree.
4. In some campaigns I allow really well thought-and-worked-out characters an extra +1 in a fitting ability score.
5. I have some rules about attacking limbs.. I hardly ever use them though.
6. Critical misses are sometimes followed up by a balance check to prevent the character in question to fall over.
I hate you.
:P
- spot and listen are one skill: perception. MS and hide are now stealth.
- Spellcraft is no longer a skill; K: arcana lets you ID sorc/wiz spells, religion for cleric/paladin, nature for druid/ranger, and planes for warlocks/shadowcasters.
- If you take more than half your hp in damage from a single hit, fort DC 10+ 1/10 damage or be stunned for a round.
- Any books are allowed, provided you get the okay from me first.
- I use the corruption/depravity rules from HoH.
Spellcraft is no longer a skill; K: arcana lets you ID sorc/wiz spells, religion for cleric/paladin, nature for druid/ranger, and planes for warlocks/shadowcasters.
Umm, there are other things that spellcraft is useful for other than identification. Did you roll those functions into Knowledge (arcana) as well?
Umm, there are other things that spellcraft is useful for other than identification. Did you roll those functions into Knowledge (arcana) as well?
Yes. or more accurately, I rolled them into the appropriate knowledge skill. ID a potion of a cleric spell would be k: religion, for example. It makes the knowledges nicer to have, and makes magic a little more diverse.
Also, glad to see ya back, Bevier! :D
Thanks for the welcome
Good to be back. Anyone else have trouble transferring their account to Gleemax?
first of roll 3d6 6 times (not too bad, roll 4 keep 3 is better in my book)
and you couldnt assign them, you rolled 3d6 6 times, first roll was STR, then DEX, CON, INT, WIS, CHA etc.
weirdest of all was was that you chose your class BEFORE you rolled your scores, and had to stick with it.
his justification for this was Ravenloft has its crap wizards as well, to which I argued a wizard with an INT score of 8 would not finish his apprenticeship either because he was too dumb or his teacher found his mediocre intelect annoying, I argued that people tend to do what they are good at, they choose careers that make the most of their abilities, but this fell on deaf ears!
So now my awakened flesh Golem, is the most intelligent character in the party.
this combined with his dragonball Z style DMing can be quite frustrating! (by dragonball Z I mean we spent 2 months real time sat in a hut waiting for a fight that lasted about a minute of game time) but its hard being a DM as well as lots of work, so my salutations go out to him as well as my gratitude (the strangely empty sessions have led to some truly amazing conversations and new expressions which live on and will live on for all time, such as the references to the "the devils modem" and the superhero known as Lamp).
first of roll 3d6 6 times (not too bad, roll 4 keep 3 is better in my book)
and you couldnt assign them, you rolled 3d6 6 times, first roll was STR, then DEX, CON, INT, WIS, CHA etc.
weirdest of all was was that you chose your class BEFORE you rolled your scores, and had to stick with it.
Gygax is back; and this time... it's personal.
D&D: The Reckoning
-Armor check penalties apply to ALL attack rolls. This makes fighting in heavy armor infeasible. No one wears plate. Chain shirts rule the earth.
-You don't have to make a weapon +1 to give it a magical property (such as Flaming). I'm still trying to talk people out of this one.
-Elves are immune to the effects of alcohol. This was inspired by Tolkien, and not any actual D&D rules.
-For reasons I am still unable to fathom, everyone kept being outclassed by the barbarian. Yes, this includes the Cleric, Druid, AND Wizard.
-You don't have to take racial hit dice. You just slap your level adjustment onto some class levels and you have your ELC. When I told them they had to take racial hit dice, they gave themselves the hit dice for free. ARGH, I have bad memories involving a Minotaur Barbarian with Monkeygrip.
-Count Dravda
My DM in the current ravenloft game has some very odd character gen rules!
first of roll 3d6 6 times (not too bad, roll 4 keep 3 is better in my book)
and you couldnt assign them, you rolled 3d6 6 times, first roll was STR, then DEX, CON, INT, WIS, CHA etc.
weirdest of all was was that you chose your class BEFORE you rolled your scores, and had to stick with it.
We did this once, except we rolled a die to determine our class, race, weapon, and gender (each individually). I ended up with a halfling rogue with 21 DEX who fights with a bolas :D.
Half_Dragon_Infernal's Houserules
1. Nigh unenforceable and I'm not entirely sure what you mean. You mean for one character not to be built "overly" optimized if other players don't know how (or want) to optimize? It can be really hard for some players to "turn off" their optimization thinking.
2. Fine.
3. Their holy symbol? I don't think you even need to mention this, they have it anyway don't they? A written rule for something so minor is probably just going to raise more flags than it is worth.
4. I don't know how this really affects balance, but you probably still won't see many Sorcerers.
5. ?
6. I don't personally like massive damage rules or doing doing fractional math in general.
7. By "starting hit points" do you mean total maximum hit points? I could live with that I guess. Doesn't seem like it will come up frequently enough to be an issue, but if it does come up frequently then characters probably have a high mortality rate. If you mean "half of the hit points you currently have" then I utterly hate that rule as it penalizes fighter types for doing their job and being up where the action is, and engenders "cowardice" by players constantly demanding healing or to run away because they might get disabled.
8. I guess that's fine, just a little weird with the wording.
9. This is much too specific. Really the only thing that would make me question gaming with you is this last one, because it makes you seem like a control freak. Just suggest that players write "a backstory" and take whatever you get I would say.
Hey, I'm a DM and would you guys think if these house rules where in your game, they would be fine:
- All players must stay at about equal power levels
- You must check with me for each PrC you are going to enter
- Divine Casters must have their Divine Focus with them to prepare spells
- Sorcerers get a bonus metamagic feat every fourth level, starting at level 4, and d6 HD
- Fighters get an ability that is useful, and fills their dead levels. (If you want, I'll post it later)
- Massive damage threshold=half your total hp. DC equals 1/5 damage+10.
- Clobbered: If, in a single hit, you take half your starting hitpoints at the beginning of the round, you may only take a standard action for your next turn
- All Druids must use the shapechange variant from PHBII, but in return they get an Animal Companion. They may trade both for WS.
- It is reccomended to give me a background, 28 title, one 12 font empty line in between, and size 12 font indented 1 page document.
1. Nigh unenforceable and I'm not entirely sure what you mean. You mean for one character not to be built "overly" optimized if other players don't know how (or want) to optimize? It can be really hard for some players to "turn off" their optimization thinking.
2. Fine.
3. Their holy symbol? I don't think you even need to mention this, they have it anyway don't they? A written rule for something so minor is probably just going to raise more flags than it is worth.
4. I don't know how this really affects balance, but you probably still won't see many Sorcerers.
5. ?
6. I don't personally like massive damage rules or doing doing fractional math in general.
7. By "starting hit points" do you mean total maximum hit points? I could live with that I guess. Doesn't seem like it will come up frequently enough to be an issue, but if it does come up frequently then characters probably have a high mortality rate. If you mean "half of the hit points you currently have" then I utterly hate that rule as it penalizes fighter types for doing their job and being up where the action is, and engenders "cowardice" by players constantly demanding healing or to run away because they might get disabled.
8. I guess that's fine, just a little weird with the wording.
9. This is much too specific. Really the only thing that would make me question gaming with you is this last one, because it makes you seem like a control freak. Just suggest that players write "a backstory" and take whatever you get I would say.
his justification for this was Ravenloft has its crap wizards as well, to which I argued a wizard with an INT score of 8 would not finish his apprenticeship either because he was too dumb or his teacher found his mediocre intelect annoying, I argued that people tend to do what they are good at, they choose careers that make the most of their abilities, but this fell on deaf ears!
Crap wizard? You can't even cast Level 0 Spells with that. That pretty much makes you not a wizard. Even in prior editions, that falls below the minimum stat for the class.
1) In a 2e game, we almost lost the party's healer. She was standing in the doorway to a room when she was horribly injured by a skeleton. I killed the skeleton, and then said, "I'm standing between her and the rest of the skeletons so that nothing can get to her."
The skeletons walked right past me and clobbered her into the negatives (but luckily not fatally). I wasn't allowed to make any attempt to stop this. The skeletons didn't even have to attack me first. (I was uninjured in that fight.)
2) I utterly loathe Point Buy character generation. I have more fun with 3d6 6 times; assign to stats based on the order you rolled. Point Buy is too bland for my taste.
As a DM, I use the following House Rules:
1) Everyone in the party has the same amount of experience, at all times. New players. Rerolled characters. Doesn't matter, all characters have the same XP.
-Some people may object to inconsistent players getting the same reward as regular players, but the flip side is this: if you miss a game, you don't get a share of treasure from that game.
2) HP Rolls: A roll of less than half on a HP roll is considered a roll of half.
-Ex: If a Barbarian rolls a 3 on his d12 HP roll, he treats it as a roll of 6 instead. (I like this rule since it allows for variety, but doesn't screw a character for an entire game over one bad roll.)
-This rule is modified for villains. Meat shields do not get any benefit at all. "Boss Fights" use this rule as normal. Reoccuring villains treat low rolls as 3/4 maximum for their HD. The BBEG either uses the reoccuring villain rules, or (if the party has had particularly high treasure rolls) simply gets maximum HP.
3) Stat Generation: Jason's Evil Little Choice
-While the stat generation varies based on the power level I want to set for the game (typically 4d6, take 3; assign as desired), I always include the opportunity for a bonus to starting stats. You must choose which option you will use before you roll your stats. You have 3 options:
-+3 to a stat of your choice.
-Roll 1d4. You gain that many points to add to your stats, divided however you wish.
-Roll 1d6. As 1d4, but you only get bonus points on a roll of 4-6. Rolls of 1-3 earn no bonus points.
-In no circumstance may a stat start above 18 before racial modifiers. (Thus, if you take the +3 option, and apply it to a score of 16, your stat increases to 18, but you lose the final bonus point.) Interestingly, most players choose the final option, despite the 50% miss chance.
4) Critical Success & Fumbles.
-Yes, I use these rules. Yes, I know they supposedly screw fighters and other combat characters. Yet, for some reason, fate has only ever deemed that the group's casters suffer from these effects. My group has not complained. The general assumption: if you have a 1/20 chance of succeeding wildly, you also have a 1/20 chance of failing miserably.
-I also allow a Ref Save (DC 15) to avoid the effects of a Critical Fumble. Critical Success & Fumble rules apply equally to players and NPC's alike.
_________________________________________
My current campaign is highly experimental & heavily house ruled (but very popular). It includes the following elements.
1) Low magic. Skill based magic system.
2) Class Bonus to Defense. (Unearthed Arcana)
3) Armor as DR (Unearthed Arcana)
4) Weapon Groups (Unearthed Arcana)*
5) Fighters now apply Weapon Focus (and any feat that uses WF as a pre-requisite) to weapon groups, not individual weapons. Other classes use these feats as normal.
*Slightly modified. I don't use the "Exotic Weapons" rules. Instead, the exotic weapons are just added to their lists as normal. Two-Handed Weapons that could be used one-handed (ex: Bastard Sword) via an Exotic Weapon feat now gain that benefit when you apply the Weapon Focus feat to that weapon.
It has been very successful so far, and when we return to D&D, some of these features may be implemented more regularly.
Edit: I just finished taking psychological statistics, so my knowledge of all things maybe is at an all-time high.
I started this rule after I watched one player roll three 18s with his lowest stat being a 13. The other player rolled a 4 (which I bumped up to an 8) and nothing higher than a 15.
I was in a game once where I my DM said if we didn’t have at least 1 point in a knowledge we didn’t know anything about the subject at all. So if you didn’t have any ranks in knowledge religion you didn’t know anything about undead or you own patron deity. No such thing as common knowledge.
She insisted we all needed to buy at least 2 ranks in knowledge religion because this was going to be a church politics game. She didn’t realize what a huge investment that was for an Int 8 fighter.
At least 1 paladin per game.
Paladins are not bad, if your DM is lame vs there CoD then play a GrayGuard and be able to bypass it. that is IF your the Paladin person in the group
Little things like this
Anyways worst thing a DM Has done with Ridiculous house rules?
1) 5d6 Reroll 1,2 And roll 8 collums keep any 6 you want place in whatever order you want
Im more Hardcore i prever 32 Point buy or w/e not having godly Stats. No office.
Giveing players DOUBLE Experiance then what they should have.
For crying out loud the Norm XP Table = I Kill Orc tell im level 12! YAY!,
Again im kinda hardcore. I Prever to be Challange not look at the ridiculously Easy time spent to play the game. but i dont want the game to be so hardcore that its "I Make a character" "Dies auto death 1 second into game"
Crap.
Allso the Houserule the FORCES a player to play a Certain class/Race. I Dont mind if he wants 1 player to be a certain class/race, or something like "I Prever Good Aligment in this campain not evil" thats fine w/e im not going to complain about that
But Forceing people to be Half-GoldDragon Human/ LG / Paladin? = LAME
the fact that the DM Dosnt ever want to admit to over looking something or being wrong on a rule. Hell as i myself am a DM i like it when my players help me find something wrong on a rule or point out i overlooked. as long as there polite. I may not fix it right away but i'll thank them at least for it.
DMS who want to play something like RESIDENT EVIL!, And then b1^ch when players hide in a building and destroy pretty much the first two floors and hide out with a Mage or Ring of Sustence for food/water and just assassinate Zombies in the middle of the hunted City or infected city.
tho i mostly run across DMS who dont do something about the Roudy disturbing Player in the group. I hate thouse DMS as well.
1) 32 Point buy none of this 1 player haveing multibol 18's and another player having the highest stat of 15,
2) Challange Experiance changed. I Dont like the fact players can kill orcs tell there level 11/12, CRAP! I Go with the whole Experiance based on differculty of Battle/Monster/Quest thing. it might provide slower Leveling,
3) Eather Roll for your HP or take the Adverage result each level, choose before you start playing.
4) No Lets kill another Player character when they dont want it.
This is meant to be fun to ALL Players.
5) If your fighting Expect the monsters to be eather weeker on par or more powerful then the player characters.
6) There are such things as level 6 Kobolts.
7) Monsters use Tastics / Siege weapons.
8) NPCS are at least level 1 Commenors. if not higher.
9) I Dont care if your Int is 8, just so long as it remains above 3, and if anything your Wisdom can counter balance it. or w/e, But i dont care all that much.
10) LA 0, None of this Lesser Templates eather. and None of this +1 LA or higher templates.
11) Stick to the rules and try to follow the story plot of the game. None of this "Well i have 5000gp, My character Retires forever!"
12) Note that Skeletons can attack a Cleric standing in the doorway even with a fighter or someone standing in front of her, Why? (Directional pads) Battle Mat, Tho they get a negitive to hit and there dumb for not attacking the Fighter (Inless told so or the Cleric is the main threat) not only that but the fighter can do something about it as well.
13) Yes player Characters will die. I Aim to kill. Just not the whole Group, If the whole group is in danger then i'll try to help the players out. However please note that i said Player Character and not Whole Group. And im not targeting a player out of others. If the Only Cleric Dies. then deal with it. at least the whole group didnt die. Your not immune to death if your the Cleric.
14) Yes I Will use my monsters intelligently. Aka, "Crap super fighter is that way. Hm, Week unarmored wizard that way. I'll attack Week Unarmored Wizard with my Range weapon or Charge him with my melee weapon" This happins. if your dumb enough with the wizard to poke your head out in a battle and be Open with no defence, expect a monster who can choose rather you or a Super Barbian/ Fighter or cleric or someone eles who he has a less chance to hit. To Pick the Wizard. No office to the wizards. but the best way to win a fight? Lower there numbers so less things distract your character.
Aka, I Dont like to go easy on my players. but i dont want to kill off my players. Yes there Adventurers. There not Super heros however. they need to earn that they can become Heros of the town. not expect it to be handed to them.
No i dont care if you decide to bash door with Foot or sword rather then use open lock. Thats good thinking.
Last session the party's monk slipped into Neutral Good (the cause was iffy too. It could easily be argued either way). The DM cackled (yes, cackled) and said "You fall unconsious". I looked at him and thought "Oh ****, a disease, a curse, what happened on that monster's dying breath?" The DM said "you are now, neutral good. You lose all your monk abilities." Screeeeeeeeech "What" I said, "thats not right. Monk's don't lose their abilities, they aren't paladins. Becoming neutral doesn't negate years of training." The DM replied "Thats how it works. Monks that violate their alignment lose their powers" I pulled out the PHB and read the section on Ex-Monks (summarized) "Monks that become non-lawful retain their previous monk abilities, but cannot advance in monk levels until they atone." The DM brushed my reasoning aside with "Thats crap." He proceded to tease the player about 'how he loved taking away aligned character's powers.' I hope my warlock never does anything remotely lawful. Maybe I could play "chaotic stupid" to avoid ability loss.
Venting felt good.
I get really bugged by changes to house rules mid-game. Or new house-rules for that matter.
Last session the party's monk slipped into Neutral Good (the cause was iffy too. It could easily be argued either way). The DM cackled (yes, cackled) and said "You fall unconsious". I looked at him and thought "Oh ****, a disease, a curse, what happened on that monster's dying breath?" The DM said "you are now, neutral good. You lose all your monk abilities." Screeeeeeeeech "What" I said, "thats not right. Monk's don't lose their abilities, they aren't paladins. Becoming neutral doesn't negate years of training." The DM replied "Thats how it works. Monks that violate their alignment lose their powers" I pulled out the PHB and read the section on Ex-Monks (summarized) "Monks that become non-lawful retain their previous monk abilities, but cannot advance in monk levels until they atone." The DM brushed my reasoning aside with "Thats crap." He proceded to tease the player about 'how he loved taking away aligned character's powers.' I hope my warlock never does anything remotely lawful. Maybe I could play "chaotic stupid" to avoid ability loss.
Venting felt good.
I've been in games where the DM gets his rocks off by taking away the PC's abilities, gear, capability to do anything, etc. I quit after the first session. The part where he made me roll to hit with magic missile. That was the breaking point. The point where I just got up and left was at the end of that "fight", where I was given cursed bracers of armor (because ID doesn't show curses! durr). They explode on casting a spell. I later found out that the loot in the session after I left was a +4 flaming shocking burst longsword, a ring of 3 wishes, and a deck of many things.
Also, I had to skip over everything Korgath facerolled onto this thread. Please, learn to spell.
- Stat Scores: Average of 13. Makes it easy for new guys, and above average for the older guys. After all, these are heroes were talking about, not ordinary people.
- No Vile Darkness, Exalted Deeds, or books geared specifically for villains. I've had enough trouble with these that I could write a book.
- No 'Alignment' as such. (See next)
- Localized Honor System: Essentially, you misbehave, everyone in the area will find out sooner or later.
- Code of Honor for Paladins (and similar classes), Clerics: Replacing alignment with this has solved things and gray areas IMMENSELY.
- (For Clerics & Paladins): Ferverence; essentially, how devout the character is to his religion (specifically, how devout he is to the letter of his religion). The games I run generally shy away from white-hat/black-hat people, and delve into far more ambiguous straits.
Can't wait to here from more people. This is very intriguing.
For character generation: 4d6 drop the lowest. Roll four sets of 6 numbers. Pick which set you want. This helps avoid characters with 3s and 4s or multiple scores below 10. Can result in some very powerful characters, however.
No more than two core classes per character.
Since I based my setting on medieval Europe, no monks or other Asian-based classes.
No druids (mostly because I don't understand the rules). Harsh, no one wanted to play a druid anyway.
I've never really understood the dying (HP -1 to -10) RAW in D&D. I ported a simplified version from SWRPG. Fortitude save equal to 10+(HP*-1). So a character dropped to -1 has to make a DC 11. At -9, its DC 19. It simple, and very easy to survive. My players hate dying while face down on the ground because they bled to death. In fact, they hate dying at all. And I'm not that big of a fan of killing them. Its not fun for us. But they don't know they're practically immortal.
Before the announcement for 4th ed, I ruled that only books that were physically at the table would be allowed. No PDFs, no scans. If I couldn't read it off paper, I wouldn't even consider it. When 4th was announced, I dropped the rule. But I still had to approve the new added rule. (and i wanted a copy!)
PrCs had to be approved.
Often, I'll require players to put a skill point in one of the parenthetical skills. Craft, Knowledge, Profession, Perform... Adds to the character and 1 point isn't bad for most characters. Even characters with Int < 8 still get 4 points at level 1.
I had more for Star Wars. The biggest one there was changing Armor and Defense for players and ships.
Any thoughts?
Jason, anyone who picks #2 for your evil choice is a dimwit. Turning a 15 into an 18 is a huge boon. I can kinda see picking #3 if you have some bad gamblers in your game, though. I'd never take it because I'd rather take the sure thing +3 over the 50% 4, 5, 6. Maybe if I had 2 shots at it I take the d6 roll, but certainly not one.
Edit: I just finished taking psychological statistics, so my knowledge of all things maybe is at an all-time high.
Despite the odds, the third option is by far the most popular. I haven't kept a running tally, but thus far, no one takes the first option, and option three is chosen on about a 3:1 ratio over option two.
The main thing that turns the players off is the possibility of losing bonus points (if the +3 would take the stat above 18). Don't ask me how you can "lose" a thing like "bonus" points. I just know that my players prefer to gamble, even with a 50% chance of gaining nothing.
When some others have DM'd, and made use of my evil little choice, I've honestly found the d4 to be the best option. The ability to assign the points across all of my scores usually serves me better.
The thread is "A Place to Vent About Your Crazy DM" not "Post all your house rules and get feedback from players".
Personally I would like to hear more stories about DMs rather than lists and critiques. For example, while not standing house rules my DM has ruled that my rogue, struck with a prismatic spray and turned insane only needed to sleep for 8 hours and all effects would be removed. Later when touch attacked for 2d4 level drain (rolled 1+3) decided it would only last for 24 hours.
So-- back to players talking about crazy DMs!
I get really bugged by changes to house rules mid-game. Or new house-rules for that matter.
Last session the party's monk slipped into Neutral Good (the cause was iffy too. It could easily be argued either way). The DM cackled (yes, cackled) and said "You fall unconsious". I looked at him and thought "Oh ****, a disease, a curse, what happened on that monster's dying breath?" The DM said "you are now, neutral good. You lose all your monk abilities." Screeeeeeeeech "What" I said, "thats not right. Monk's don't lose their abilities, they aren't paladins. Becoming neutral doesn't negate years of training." The DM replied "Thats how it works. Monks that violate their alignment lose their powers" I pulled out the PHB and read the section on Ex-Monks (summarized) "Monks that become non-lawful retain their previous monk abilities, but cannot advance in monk levels until they atone." The DM brushed my reasoning aside with "Thats crap." He proceded to tease the player about 'how he loved taking away aligned character's powers.' I hope my warlock never does anything remotely lawful. Maybe I could play "chaotic stupid" to avoid ability loss.
Venting felt good.
Ah, another DM who hates his players.
I Dont know why alot of you are complaining about simple arguements or make simple commints like
At least 1 paladin per game.
If you're a DM and you houserule that there must be at least one pally per party, that says to me: you as a DM want a large ring in someones nose that you can lead the party around with.
Personally, I don't enjoy playing that way. I could care less if you bring a paladin to the table. I don't mind if the DM uses that as a hook to try to lead the party around with. But if the DM's has to make it a rule just to run a game successfully, then it's not going to be a fun game- For me. My opinion.
As far as my comment being simple- I didn't realize I'd have to explain it. But thanks for asking, I'd hate to think you continued to be confused.
In my current D&D game we use five houe rules:
1. You do not need to memorize cantrips.
2. Paladins must belong to an order (list provided). The paladin must adhere to the tenets of his order, not necessarily to good and law. When in doubt, the tenets of the order take precedent.
3. Unless you are placed in a situation where resupply becomes and issue assume you have enough food, water, ammo, etc. and that you top it up when you hit town.
4. Once you have a few hundred gold, don't worry about counting copper and silver. Just tick off a few gold every tim you hit town. You can afford a drink, a meal, and a room at the inn without counting every nickel and dime.
5. Track one XP total for the whole party. When it says level up, everyone levels up. Over time it will all pretty much average out and there is little to be gained by having people leveling up at different times during a session.
The part where he made me roll to hit with magic missile.
Ah, so he was playing 4.0?
A short list of rules we remember (DO NOT CRITIQUE! Questions on reasons are allowed)
1. You level up when we say you level up. XP is a hassle to keep track of.
2. Sorcerers can cast unlimited spells per day
3. Wizards get ALL spells of their spell level upon reaching said level (Exception: A specialist does not get the spells of his forbidden catagory)
4. Drow are just elves with darkvision and light blindness (we do not want to have an overpower drow character)
5. Gnomes, bards, and paladins are forbidden, the rest of the group hates them
6. If the DM rules against RAW, a player may show him the rule and the DM can decide if the rule is too be used (it is impolite to reject the written rule)
7. Depending on the PrC, we may allow a player to play from first level (This counts as a base class)
8. The killing of NPCs without reason is NOT TOLERATED and will result in your character dying immediately.
9. SEXUAL ACTIVITY IS NOT PERMITTED!!!
Hey, I'm a DM and would you guys think if these house rules where in your game, they would be fine:
All Druids must use the shapechange variant from PHBII, but in return they get an Animal Companion. They may trade both for WS.
[*]It is reccomended to give me a background, 28 title, one 12 font empty line in between, and size 12 font indented 1 page document.
[/LIST]
these are kinda idiotic...i would vent about both. edit- i wouldn't play at all
9. This is much too specific. Really the only thing that would make me question gaming with you is this last one, because it makes you seem like a control freak. Just suggest that players write "a backstory" and take whatever you get I would say.[/sblock]
Seems all right to me. It encourages roleplaying. He might have the same problem that I have: WoW players who don't get that they actually need a PERSONALITY in this game, not just, "I'm the tank." I myself have a questionnaire that they fill out for their characters.
-Count Dravda
Seems all right to me. It encourages roleplaying. He might have the same problem that I have: WoW players who don't get that they actually need a PERSONALITY in this game, not just, "I'm the tank." I myself have a questionnaire that they fill out for their characters.
It's not the request for the backstory it's the length requirement and formatting. The only thing it's missing is "Assignments must be turned in written in ink."
I just finished a two page backstory on my current character, complete with drop caps and father son dialog. It doesn't fit this guy's formatting requirements. That would make me chafe.
Anyway, on to your questionnaire... can I get a copy? I'd like to see how it works with my character. My email is my gleemax id @ my gleemax id .com
I myself have a questionnaire that they fill out for their characters.
-Count Dravda
Normally I'd angst about how WoW doesn't mean you can't RP, but instead I'll just say that there's as many retards who can't/won't RP playing WoW as there are playing D&D.
Now post that questionnaire so I can steal it. :P
Now post that questionnaire so I can steal it. :P
There is a good basic questionnaire in The Hero Builder's Guidebook. If you want something more advanced, you can do a search for character questionnaire in google, where a lot should be available. There are also many books on the subject.
Depth of character is my personal play-style; unfortunately, I haven't met any other players that share the same interest!
1. You can not draw a weapon during a move action. The DM in question didn't care when I pointed it out in the rules as a standard option. He stated that you could either move or draw your weapon or take the quick draw feat. This completely nerfed any first round actions by the party's Fighter and Barbarian.
2. During character creation you roll a d20 to determine a characters base AC. In a game where its easier to raise your AC then you Attack Bonus, this was completely broken. Nothing quite like a Heavy armored fighter with full plate and a tower sheild and an AC of 16 while the party wizard wears nothing at all and beats you by 2 points. All of this at 1st level.
For a fighter type it's already thought to hit target compare to spell caster we don't need an extra rule that reduce our chance of performing a complete full round action.
2 - low magic / $ world + 3 level 8 fighters + huge mobs of goblins (20-25) = TPK
fighter level 8 with no access to full plate due to shot money and only have mundane weapon = fighter level 8 with 15-16 AC with normal longsword if rich or staff if not.
3 - World of paladin but there is no evil creature. (i actually drop that game first day the dm told the subject, i appear that the game run 2 session only and the group decided to never let him DM anymore)
2. During character creation you roll a d20 to determine a characters base AC. In a game where its easier to raise your AC then you Attack Bonus, this was completely broken. Nothing quite like a Heavy armored fighter with full plate and a tower sheild and an AC of 16 while the party wizard wears nothing at all and beats you by 2 points. All of this at 1st level.
That is an alternate rule in the D&D system IIRC. In essence, the standard 10 AC represents someone "taking 10" on this AC roll.
Edit: Oh wait, I misread that. During character creation? Well that is just nuts.
That is an alternate rule in the D&D system IIRC. In essence, the standard 10 AC represents someone "taking 10" on this AC roll.
The alt rule you are thinking of is having a "defense roll", where any time you get attacked, you roll 1d20+mods instead of having the normal static AC.
Good lord, rolling at character creation for base AC is the most absurdly broken thing I've heard on these forums. You roll a 20, you're basically set for life. You roll a 3, you may as well commit seppuku.
We actually create ridiculous house rules because of our players. they have the attention span of a hyper caffeinated ADHD toddler on a sugar-rush, so we have to make all sorts of crazy house rules to keep them from completely destroying the game with complaints.
A short list of rules we remember (DO NOT CRITIQUE! Questions on reasons are allowed)
1. You level up when we say you level up. XP is a hassle to keep track of.
2. Sorcerers can cast unlimited spells per day
3. Wizards get ALL spells of their spell level upon reaching said level (Exception: A specialist does not get the spells of his forbidden catagory)
4. Drow are just elves with darkvision and light blindness (we do not want to have an overpower drow character)
5. Gnomes, bards, and paladins are forbidden, the rest of the group hates them
6. If the DM rules against RAW, a player may show him the rule and the DM can decide if the rule is too be used (it is impolite to reject the written rule)
7. Depending on the PrC, we may allow a player to play from first level (This counts as a base class)
8. The killing of NPCs without reason is NOT TOLERATED and will result in your character dying immediately.
9. SEXUAL ACTIVITY IS NOT PERMITTED!!!
1) I get this; but when you throw out Exp, to loose the ability to give out extra Exp for particularly good role-playing. I personally like it when the leveling up becomes staggered. Having different players level at different times lets them show off their new abilities to the party. When every one levels at the same time it feels less special. (to me)
2 & 3) Having sorcerers getting infinite spell slots and wizards getting all spells does preserve each classes flavor in respect to the other class but it seem incredibly over powering. One of the best things about a wizard is how you can personalize the character by choosing its spells. Giving all wizards every spell seems very powerful, but bland. I also shudder to think what impact this rule has on a wizards spell book.
4) Drow can be a pain in the *****. If you have players running a Drow I can understand taking a few abilities away to keep things sane. But Drow should never just be elves. The allure of Drow (other than the powers) is their dark and sinister nature.
5) Paladins can be a major pain with the alignment restrictions. The subjective nature of good and evil is often debated when I have a Paladin in the party. I can understand not letting immature or inept players take the class. I love bards! Granted I am not in your group, but the bard has always had a special place in my heart. They are not a kick but class but they are so useful to have around. As for Gnomes, I guess if you have people trying to play them like Kinder than genocide is the only option.
6) I don’t think its impolite, more DMs purgative. Rule debates are how you learn, though both sides need to know when to site down, shut up and get on with the game.
7) I don’t think this is a good idea. I think most Prestige Classes are designed with the assumption they will be taken after level 5. But sense I don’t know every Prestige Class out there I guess there could be some that this rule would work well for. (Black Guard?)
8) Good rule, but if it is enforced you would never need the penalty. And I am sure any one who has ever killed a Non-Player Character thought they had a good reason at the time.
9) Sex does often distract from the game. In my games in never comes up. (hah) but if it did it would be handled quickly and off screen so to speak. Something along the lines of… “P1: I go be slutty in the tavern.” DM: “We will see you in the morning. Cleric what are you doing?”
That is an alternate rule in the D&D system IIRC. In essence, the standard 10 AC represents someone "taking 10" on this AC roll.
Edit: Oh wait, I misread that. During character creation? Well that is just nuts.
The alt rule you are thinking of is having a "defense roll", where any time you get attacked, you roll 1d20+mods instead of having the normal static AC.
Good lord, rolling at character creation for base AC is the most absurdly broken thing I've heard on these forums. You roll a 20, you're basically set for life. You roll a 3, you may as well commit seppuku.
I played several game sessions with this DM and only learned that he had so many misconceptions about 3.5 it wasn't even funny. He still wasn't as bad as the DM that I mentioned in the first House rule. All that I will say about the one session I played with that guy was that I played a 8th level human rogue and the only gear I had was a pair of boots that gave me the effects of protection from the elements and a mundane Dagger. That was it. My character didn't even get armor, or lockpicks or even 'a pair of pants'.
I played several game sessions with this DM and only learned that he had so many misconceptions about 3.5 it wasn't even funny. He still wasn't as bad as the DM that I mentioned in the first House rule. All that I will say about the one session I played with that guy was that I played a 8th level human rogue and the only gear I had was a pair of boots that gave me the effects of protection from the elements and a mundane Dagger. That was it. My character didn't even get armor, or lockpicks or even 'a pair of pants'.
Ugh, I played a single session in a game like that. DM told us to start out at 7th level, but wouldn't let us have any magical gear at all. He apparently did not understand that V:tM != D&D, and gear actually is important.
1) I get this; but when you throw out Exp, to loose the ability to give out extra Exp for particularly good role-playing. I personally like it when the leveling up becomes staggered. Having different players level at different times lets them show off their new abilities to the party. When every one levels at the same time it feels less special. (to me)
2 & 3) Having sorcerers getting infinite spell slots and wizards getting all spells does preserve each classes flavor in respect to the other class but it seem incredibly over powering. One of the best things about a wizard is how you can personalize the character by choosing its spells. Giving all wizards every spell seems very powerful, but bland. I also shudder to think what impact this rule has on a wizards spell book.
1) We have that rule to make it easier for our stealth obsessed players. "HOW CAN A SLIT THROAT ONLY DO 10 DAMAGE?!?!?!" Also, our group has good and bad roleplayers. The reward for EXCELLENT roleplaying is a magic item or an amount of gold varying on the level.
Our Sam-Fisher-Sneak-Attack Rule: If a rouge takes a full action OUTSIDE OF COMBAT on a unaware NPC-Classed Character, a coupe de grace may be preformed.
2&3) the wizard actually has some strings attached. They must write the spell in their spellbook before it can be used. It only takes one page and an hour, but nobody wants to wait 50 hours per level up. Also, no wizard wants to carry nine spellbooks to remain fully effective.
A player may make a house rule WITH the DM. The rule cannot be gamebreaking and must be realistic (in the fantasy world)
Out of character speech lasting more than a minute results in a 1/4 Total HP per minute penalty. Harsher penalties may be incurred.
Another house rule which relates to house rules (it is a continuing paradox sometimes)
A player may make a house rule WITH the DM. The rule cannot be gamebreaking and must be realistic (in the fantasy world)
Out of character speech lasting more than a minute results in a 1/4 Total HP per minute penalty. Harsher penalties may be incurred.
The part of player making house rule with DM append im my games. If the come up with something balance that can save time i most of the time accept them. Usually it nothing really important, like we have a drunk chart we house ruled. A player cam with it and we modified the DC a bit to make it the most balance possible. Other example are like trying to jump from a moving object to another it has something to do with balance and jump but nothing really explicit how it work.
I have a friend who wants to run a game, but she wants to use an obscure system none of us have ever heard of, to prevent optimizing.
1) We have that rule to make it easier for our stealth obsessed players. "HOW CAN A SLIT THROAT ONLY DO 10 DAMAGE?!?!?!" Also, our group has good and bad roleplayers. The reward for EXCELLENT roleplaying is a magic item or an amount of gold varying on the level.
Our Sam-Fisher-Sneak-Attack Rule: If a rouge takes a full action OUTSIDE OF COMBAT on a unaware NPC-Classed Character, a coupe de grace may be preformed.
2&3) the wizard actually has some strings attached. They must write the spell in their spellbook before it can be used. It only takes one page and an hour, but nobody wants to wait 50 hours per level up. Also, no wizard wants to carry nine spellbooks to remain fully effective.
I think that is very similar to how the coupe de grace rule actually goes. Any one can take a full round action to coupe de grace a helpless opponent, not just rogues; in or out of combat. Then you get a critical hit and the “victim” has a fort save or die.
A normal wizard can choose two spells at level up to add to his book. Then he has the option to add more spells from scrolls and other spell books. Your wizards are not limited in the number of spells they can write in their books each level but it takes them an hour per spell to write the spell down? Couldn’t they just take a week of “game time” to write all the spells then carry the books around in a bag of holding?
1. You can only summon creatures that you are familiar with, despite the options listed in the spell description.
2. The creatures do not automatically attack your enemies, despite the spell description. You have to tell them who to attack, in a way that they understand, and hope that your message is not misinterpretted. For a druid, communication requires that he be wildshaped into a form that matches the summons.
3. The creatures are not automatically obedient to you, you have to make a successful Handle Animal roll.
4. The creatures might attack you if they don't like your form. I once summoned wolves, gave them instructions while in wolf from, and then changed to a snake. The summoned wolves started circling the snake (my druid).
Also, my DM is convinced that Faerun has no cats... pet cats, yes, but no large cats as wildshaping options.
Edit: if anyone finds a FR novel with references to a cat (lion, tiger, etc., but native to Faerun (not Drizzt's cat)) please PM me. Thanks!
What did you do to make him want to nerf you so bad?
Also, how come there are people critiquing Emissary666's houserules? He already established they are crazy and tailored to his crazy group.
Recently looking for a game I got sent a 13 page "house rules" document that included such gems as
He also required a paladin to play in every game. Yarg.
I stopped browsing quickly and decided to stay far, far away. This is no small document either- we're talking 10,071 words, small font, no margins.
I don't suppose you could be willing to share? I could use a good lol.
2) I utterly loathe Point Buy character generation. I have more fun with 3d6 6 times; assign to stats based on the order you rolled. Point Buy is too bland for my taste.
I would have really no shame to get down on my knees and beg any dm to please allow us to create our ability scores by any other system! :D
I don't really see why I have to play a character that is simply the best I can do with some random rolled scores, instead of creating a character I like. I think I would have no problems with letting it die at the first opportunity to be allowd to make a new one and hope the new scores are actually useable for what I have in mind.
I would have really no shame to get down on my knees and beg any dm to please allow us to create our ability scores by any other system! :D
I don't really see why I have to play a character that is simply the best I can do with some random rolled scores, instead of creating a character I like. I think I would have no problems with letting it die at the first opportunity to be allowd to make a new one and hope the new scores are actually useable for what I have in mind.
Here, here! It's not about being good or optimizing either. If I get a cool concept going in my head and finally join a game where I can play him, I don't want to have to hope that I get a good dex, int, and wis. I want to play my veteran guerrilla jungle fighter who hasn't adjusted to life after the war, can't communicate well (even to family) and has a trash charisma score to prove it.
...and hope the new scores are actually useable for what I have in mind...
Almost all attribute scores are usable for almost all character concepts. If you have questions regarding specific instances that you think cannot be overcome, PM me and I will explain further or make a new thread. No sense derailing this thread.
A house rule I hated:
Any item can be purchased at any time, even mid dungeon, by simply subtracting the cost from your treasure.
I have quite a few house rules.
Since I based my setting on medieval Europe, no monks or other Asian-based classes.
No druids (mostly because I don't understand the rules). Harsh, no one wanted to play a druid anyway.
PrCs had to be approved.
Any thoughts?
WTF no asian themed classes? ninja fans could just alter the rogues flavor, swap a few proficiencies, and say asian immigrant.
i happen to be playing an emancipated 12 year old asian female rogue in medieval europe, I swapped the sap for the Shuriken, and said my spiked gauntlets were really padded sleeves with retractable daggers. (swapped proficiencies) too bad i dumped strength (only a 10) +7 jump modifer (5 ranks) +14 tumble (9 ranks 2 synergy 3dex) +9UMD (9ranks) and the party won't let me touch a wand, oh yeah +10 diplomacy (6 rankks 4, two synergies, bluff, sense motive, highest modifer) +6 sense motive (6 ranks) +9 bluff (9 ranks) and the party doesn't want me as the face.
My rapier is actually a striaght slenderbladed tachi with a 2 sided sheath across the lower back, i happen to have arrows like crazy, (50 silver arrows, 78 normal ones picked up from bandits who obviously had more than 4hd in a 4th level adventure, i'm 6th level yippie. when your S.A. deals 24 damage twice in a row (on the same bandit, no magic involved, not even an enhancement bonus) in a cr 4 adventure and a bandit (struck twice for 48 damage from 2 turns) is still standing, somethings gotta be wrong, and these are just the lesser lackeys.
I was in another campaign where the PCs were part of a rigidly structured mercenery organization. All our treasure had to be turned over to the organization, with use getting credited for (I believe) half its value. Then, we could buy equipment from them-- half price for weapons, armor, and shields, or full price for anything else. And no, we didn't have the option to just keep a piece of loot that dropped, like Gloves of Dexterity; we had to turn it in (for half price) and then buy it back (at full price).
A themed character must be ACCURATE! All samurai, ninjas, spartans, eskimos, everything, must have appropriete equipment, backstory, personality, skills, feats
Newest player brings the Oreos, failure to bring Oreos is punishable by PC DEATH
Food is ABSOLUTELY REQUIRED! A character can go up to three days plus their con modifier without food or water.
Players MUST describe their attacks, otherwise it is considered unproficient
Magic is pointing your finger and shouting the name of the spell, any other way is consider fake.
Two from our old DM
When a player dies, they go on the the afterlife, where they act as bonuses to players. we tricked him into letting us be a fiend of possession while we were dead.
A character may pray and roll a D100, a 20 or lower means your prayers are answered
Dex mod is added to the damage of a ranged attack
Yamishinobi, reading your posts is like staring into the void. Your stream-of-consciousness, loli-oriented ramblings blast all coherent thought from my brain.
sorry.
Yamishinobi, reading your posts is like staring into the void. Your stream-of-consciousness, loli-oriented ramblings blast all coherent thought from my brain.
+1!
I AM THE DM!
My stupid (I say in the most loving manner) players insist on it. They laugh at the folly if their weapon drops and laugh in evil glee if it happens to an opponent. Perhaps at higher levels where more monsters have natural weapons and spell like abbilities they will start to hate the rule, but they will not be swayed at this point. I actually had to argue to allow the reflex save.
Otherwise we all rotate DMing different games, so we are pretty sensitive to both sides of the screen.
This pretty much made melee warriors, of which I was playing a fighter, bite the big one and otherwise not fun to play. Only because I had an 18 CON did I have any chance of survivability. Instead of the 90 hit points I had, I really only had 28 or so because once a limb was so damaged, I couldn't fight anymore.
I really hate it when DMs sacrifice game play for "realism". D&D is not real life set to dice. I don't care what the laws of physics say or how fragile to injury people really are. It's a GAME! Don't divide my hit points among body parts. Don't give me penalties to rolls just because I'm at 1/4 my maximum hit points to reflect fatigue, bodily injury, or near death circumstances. If a rogue is checking a room for traps, don't demand the player specify every action he's doing and every nook and cranny he's searching and then spring the trap because the player didn't say he looked at the ceiling or a particular spot on a wall or floor. Stop making game play experience such a chore.
Don't hate your players!
1) If you give a background that is good and sound, DM gives a bonus feat, or a bonus ability point, whatever he deems adequate.
2) In-game, if you have a reason to take a prestige class, and have a completel y in-game reason for doing so, you can undergo a "training lesson" (generally a successful skill check under a specific condition) and if you succeed, you get a bonus (usually a feat).
3) You don't HAVE to take racial hit die, those are argued as natural for one of their upbringing, like for Lizardfolk it's in response to growing up in their tribe. Natural toughness and all that. So if you want to argue that your Lizardfolk Paladin grew up amongst humans, he doesn't have to take the racial hit die that lizardfolk get, but some things are also diminished (such as it's natural armor bonus is also reduced to a +3, for the same reason)
4) Because my group is full of jokers, a Natural 1 has a result of... whatever is the most comical thing that can possibly happen at that exact moment in time.
A.like throwing a live chicken into his/her attackers face
B.doing something unlikely during battle like reading,singing etc.
the basics roll a d100
and see what would happen
could be TPK or be kissed by a blind old lady walking backwards through time
at a 37.57 degree angle(don't ask me how)or even "you broke reality the game is over have a nice day!"
"Huggy Huggy Bo Buggy!!!!"
*hugs folowed by a sneak attack with dual Keen flaming, shocking, sonic, acid, cold, anarchic, ruleslawyerbane, optimizerbane, Vicious, Vorpal, arctic burst, sonic burst, flaming burst, acid burst, shocking burst +10 Epic Humanshapebane omnibane nekogami required Finesseable Sabers a total of 68 times as a free action, adding double dex, double int and double cha to each Damage roll at +??? Bab +trillions of Sneak attack dice, Followed by a quickened empowered maximized heightened Blitzkrieg rush (untyped spell mistaken for lightning) dealing 3decillionx18 (d12+6) + trillions of sneak attack dice, also maximized and empowered, 10,000 vorpal kicks to the nuts with the 10,000 x trillions of sneak attack dice all dice are d12's
and she has become invisible, ethereal, gained +??? decillions of armor class, as a free action, Teleports away as a free action (everything else was a free action) comes back and feeds you all to sentient awakened panthers who then raid the local subway.*
the ultimate epic loli ( way underpowered by gaia online standards)
I regularly play with one DM whose houserules really aren't bad, per se, just that he has a lot of them every time, and rarely compiles a complete list. It's mostly just bouts of rememberence when he says, "Oh yeah, and X works like Y now, foo's gone but bar is twice listed, and everyone gets a free quux." We had to scramble to write it down at first, but then we just learned to not bother and keep asking him over and over how things work again when they come up in-game.
The final one is hearsay. One of the players in my group recently described that he played with a DM that required players to state when they were using the restroom, and secretly applied penalties if the players forgot to state that their characters were doing so.
*more lolicon crap goes here*
...How are you not banned yet?
I played several game sessions with this DM and only learned that he had so many misconceptions about 3.5 it wasn't even funny. He still wasn't as bad as the DM that I mentioned in the first House rule. All that I will say about the one session I played with that guy was that I played a 8th level human rogue and the only gear I had was a pair of boots that gave me the effects of protection from the elements and a mundane Dagger. That was it. My character didn't even get armor, or lockpicks or even 'a pair of pants'.
Psychological warfare?
Bandit: "Alright simps, give me your... your..."
Rogue: "Whaddya want buddy?"
Bandit: "I, uh, errr... Give me, um..."
Rogue: "Lemme narrow it down for you. I can either give you the boot, the shiv, or the pain. Which'll it be?"
Bandit: -Runs-
Rogue: "COME BACK! YOU HAVE TO PICK ONE!"
...How are you not banned yet?
Or in prison/mental health facility?
Psychological warfare?
Bandit: "Alright simps, give me your... your..."
Rogue: "Whaddya want buddy?"
Bandit: "I, uh, errr... Give me, um..."
Rogue: "Lemme narrow it down for you. I can either give you the boot, the shiv, or the pain. Which'll it be?"
Bandit: -Runs-
Rogue: "COME BACK! YOU HAVE TO PICK ONE!"
Zombie_Babies: Touche. :P
Zombie_Babies: Touche. :P
When a guy is so infatuated with young girls that Humbert Humbert himself would be sickened, there is little hope. ;)
Good lord, rolling at character creation for base AC is the most absurdly broken thing I've heard on these forums. You roll a 20, you're basically set for life. You roll a 3, you may as well commit seppuku.
Or play a shadowcraft mage.
Psychological warfare?
Bandit: "Alright simps, give me your... your..."
Rogue: "Whaddya want buddy?"
Bandit: "I, uh, errr... Give me, um..."
Rogue: "Lemme narrow it down for you. I can either give you the boot, the shiv, or the pain. Which'll it be?"
Bandit: -Runs-
Rogue: "COME BACK! YOU HAVE TO PICK ONE!"
Congrats!! You just made one my PC from a really hated game to a fully functional NPC for my future game. Thx
4 Houserules that make summoning annoying in the campaign I play a druid in:
1. You can only summon creatures that you are familiar with, despite the options listed in the spell description.
2. The creatures do not automatically attack your enemies, despite the spell description. You have to tell them who to attack, in a way that they understand, and hope that your message is not misinterpretted. For a druid, communication requires that he be wildshaped into a form that matches the summons.
3. The creatures are not automatically obedient to you, you have to make a successful Handle Animal roll.
4. The creatures might attack you if they don't like your form. I once summoned wolves, gave them instructions while in wolf from, and then changed to a snake. The summoned wolves started circling the snake (my druid).
Did you point out that YOU'RE A ****ING DRUID?
I mean, to get all analogy-ous, I imagine I'd have trouble operating a gun, but I'd assume somebody whose entire role in life was centered around guns would be able to use them competently at the least.
:heehee You people have it easy. Here are some of the ridiculous houserules that my group uses.
1. Players add their hit dice to damage rolls. Example: A fourth level barbarian in normal rules would deal 1d12+6 dmg (Weilding a greataxe with Str of 18). In this system, that same barbarian would deal 1d12+4d12+6 dmg.
2. Armor class is replaced with a reflex save. Armor class doesn't seem to have any point, but the rest of the players still wear armor for some strange reason.
3. Characters do not add Str to melee attack rolls or Dex to ranged attack rolls. Example: 4th level barbarian has a +8 attack bonus according to normal rules (assuming Str of 18), but in these rules, he only gets +4. Dex modifier applies to ranged damage.
As you can see, these changes make Str usless, Dex only useful for reflex saves and initiative. These rules do balance out... kinda... But if the origional system works great then why change anything? Total party kills are an everyday event and WAY too much is based off chance. I order to avoid dealing with most of these rules, I just play a wizard.
A house rule I hated:
Any item can be purchased at any time, even mid dungeon, by simply subtracting the cost from your treasure.
As a Free Action?
That could come in handy. ;)
As a Free Action?
That could come in handy. ;)
Who needs soulknives? *free action* FEAR THE WEALTH BY LEVEL SWORD!
I don't suppose you could be willing to share? I could use a good lol.
Not my work, sorry.
He started telling us damage numbers when (god bless me and my rules lawyering) I informed him that since we were helpless the attacks were coup de grace's. The ensuing TPK was blamed on me for pointing out the rules, not the DM for setting up an auto-fail scenario.
Maybe not quite a house rule, but I played with a DM who told us his world was newly created and that monsters didn't exist, therefore our 1st level characters would not know to set up watches or be alert for danger. Then he had us get attacked by goblins in our sleep.
He started telling us damage numbers when (god bless me and my rules lawyering) I informed him that since we were helpless the attacks were coup de grace's. The ensuing TPK was blamed on me for pointing out the rules, not the DM for setting up an auto-fail scenario.
Now where's that hammer gun pic when you need it...
Also, jage gets a
as well.Maybe not quite a house rule, but I played with a DM who told us his world was newly created and that monsters didn't exist, therefore our 1st level characters would not know to set up watches or be alert for danger. Then he had us get attacked by goblins in our sleep.
He started telling us damage numbers when (god bless me and my rules lawyering) I informed him that since we were helpless the attacks were coup de grace's. The ensuing TPK was blamed on me for pointing out the rules, not the DM for setting up an auto-fail scenario.
Well, as long as you're quoting rules about it.... A CdG is a full round action. The goblins are starting in a surprise round. They can start the CdG as their standard if no one heard approachingthem in their sleep. Personally, I'd tend toward thinking that the action of starting the CdG would wake up any targetted PC. I'd rule that a newly awakened PC is no longer helpless and no longer a target for the CdG.
Personally, your DM's setup about lack of monsters and a peaceful land is interesting and creative if followed through. If it's just a way to ambush unknowing PCs...yeah...Ridiculous.
David
Well, as long as you're quoting rules about it.... A CdG is a full round action. The goblins are starting in a surprise round. They can start the CdG as their standard if no one heard approachingthem in their sleep. Personally, I'd tend toward thinking that the action of starting the CdG would wake up any targetted PC. I'd rule that a newly awakened PC is no longer helpless and no longer a target for the CdG.
A vanilla Goblin Warrior out of the Monster Manual has a +5 Move Silently; Goblin Rogues would probably have about +11 with the Elite array. A starting Druid with 18 Wisdom and max ranks in Listen (but no feats devoted to it) has a -2 Listen modifier while asleep; most characters will be worse off, either dumping Wisdom or neglecting the Listen skill. So it's pretty plausible that nobody in the party would hear them even after rolling opposed checks, and fairly likely that no more than two would wake up immediately.
A vanilla Goblin Warrior out of the Monster Manual has a +5 Move Silently; Goblin Rogues would probably have about +11 with the Elite array. A starting Druid with 18 Wisdom and max ranks in Listen (but no feats devoted to it) has a -2 Listen modifier while asleep; most characters will be worse off, either dumping Wisdom or neglecting the Listen skill. So it's pretty plausible that nobody in the party would hear them even after rolling opposed checks, and fairly likely that no more than two would wake up immediately.
Yeah, it is reasonable that the gobbos got in position without being heard. However, in surprise, they can only start the CdG vs. the sleeping target. It requires their standard action from the next round to finish it. I'm suggesting that the act of methodically killing someone could reasonably be interpretted to wake up the target without a Listen check; if you can nudge someone to break their sleep automatically, inserting a knife in their throat should do the job.
At which point, the target is no longer helpless, and thus not a target of the CdG. Listen figures into it only for those targets who aren't attacked. If you take the PoV that the target is still helpless when flatfooted (still asleep, say), a good goblin init would finish the job.
If you take the PoV that starting a CdG is akin to lining up the blow rather than delivering it or otherwise touching the target, than I can see the CdG succeeding to repeated Listen failures and the PCs never waking up.
David
My favorite ridiculous house rule: 5th level feat, Improved Spontaneous Casting, allows Druids and Clerics to cast ANY spell on their spell list spontaneously -_-.
Since elves are a 'wise, elder race', you have to make a will save or believe anything they tell you, even if in direct contradiction to your experiences, sensory input, common sense, or laws of physics.
If an elf tells you the sky is red, and you fail the save, your character must think that there's something wrong with his eyes. If he says swords are bashing weapons, that means yours was made wrong.
I just ... got up and left.
The only house rule that was ever a) sprung on me mid-game and b) made me immediately pack up my stuff and leave rather than sitting out the rest of the session.
Since elves are a 'wise, elder race', you have to make a will save or believe anything they tell you, even if in direct contradiction to your experiences, sensory input, common sense, or laws of physics.
If an elf tells you the sky is red, and you fail the save, your character must think that there's something wrong with his eyes. If he says swords are bashing weapons, that means yours was made wrong.
I just ... got up and left.
Elf fanboy senses tingling! Burning! Oh god make it stop!!
Elf fanboy senses tingling! Burning! Oh god make it stop!!
Oh, indeed. That was just the one that broke my stupidometer, there was a lot of other elf-fanboi'ing going on. I was the only person who wasn't playing an elf despite them getting bonuses to every stat at no LA ...
Yeah, I hate elves.
Oh, indeed. That was just the one that broke my stupidometer, there was a lot of other elf-fanboi'ing going on. I was the only person who wasn't playing an elf despite them getting bonuses to every stat at no LA ...
Yeah, I hate elves.
I like dwarves. And elves. And gnomes. Not in that order, thought. It's actually gnomes, dwarves, and elves.
There was a houserule that really stuck in my craw. I don't know what number we're on, but no one's been keeping score for the last couple pages anyway.
Every player had to eventually multiclass into a dragonslayer or dragonstalker at the closest opportunity. Even if say, you were a sorcerer, bard, or monk, and if you really wanted to stay with the flavor of this campaign, you could multiclass them into dragon adept, dragonsong lyrist, or initiate of the draconic mysteries.
But even then, he had a dragon in every single adventure. I've always been a firm believer in spare use of dragons (Anyone ever get tired of fighting orcs by level 3?) and this irked me. Finally, when the day of truth came, the DM looked over his copy of my sheet, and said,
"Hey! If you took Blind-Fight last level, you could have gone dragonslayer!"
So I told him I don't want to be a dragonstalker; I want to be a straight paladin. Maybe Platinum Knight, if I felt tempted.
He didn't say anything, but first thing he said when we started playing was,
"Suddenly, the lights go out. Completely. Everyone hears a loud tearing and shearing of metal. The lights come on again, and you see the mangled corpse of (my character.) Too bad he couldn't fight a dragon in the dark without the Blind-Fight feat!"
I lost my temper then, I'm afraid. I knocked my glass of water on his battlegrid and ran out before he could follow up, and never saw him again.
stuff
Ignoring the fact that he was being an ass****, wouldn't you have gotten a reflex check or something? Or hell, take 1 level in the required class and then continue on your way :D
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That campain was short lived. (and insane) I only play with real spontaneous casters (Sorcerer is a favorite).
Another house rule we have (much less insane): Grappling doens't exist, AT ALL. It's physically impossible to grab and immobilise someone in our world. Makes combat so much easier.
Oh, indeed. That was just the one that broke my stupidometer, there was a lot of other elf-fanboi'ing going on. I was the only person who wasn't playing an elf despite them getting bonuses to every stat at no LA ...
Yeah, I hate elves.
Brother!
My DM in the current ravenloft game has some very odd character gen rules!
first of roll 3d6 6 times (not too bad, roll 4 keep 3 is better in my book)
and you couldnt assign them, you rolled 3d6 6 times, first roll was STR, then DEX, CON, INT, WIS, CHA etc.
weirdest of all was was that you chose your class BEFORE you rolled your scores, and had to stick with it.
We had a similar house rule for one of our DM's. It worked out awesome for me.
It was 3d6, reroll any stat below 6. If you roll 18 (all three sixes, yay!) you get an [i]additional[i] d4 on top of it. Roll three sets, and pick one.
You had the option, after rolling your three sets, of taking a 4th set. The 4th would have an additional point added to each roll. The kicker is, you have to take it.
My rolls sucked hard. I think the highest number was 13. So I opted for the fourth column.
I rolled amazingly well. The one I remember is an 18 (became a 19) and the d4, which was a 4. I started my sorcerer with 23 charisma.
AWESOME
The rule didn't last. We do 4d6 drop the lowest now, but there is a house rule that persists. It's called Steve's Challenge. Basically, if you can roll a stat column with no stat having 2 digits, you get all 20's.
Nobody in four years of gaming has done it.
A short list of rules we remember (DO NOT CRITIQUE! Questions on reasons are allowed)
1. You level up when we say you level up. XP is a hassle to keep track of.
Hey I'm all for that houserule. I'm using it in one of my campaigns and its working out pretty well!
2. Sorcerers can cast unlimited spells per day
3. Wizards get ALL spells of their spell level upon reaching said level (Exception: A specialist does not get the spells of his forbidden catagory)
Ultimate magus + versatile spellcaster=Gold-pressed Latinum.
7. Depending on the PrC, we may allow a player to play from first level (This counts as a base class)
I'm curious how this is determined.
8. The killing of NPCs without reason is NOT TOLERATED and will result in your character dying immediately.
Sounds very heavy-handed to me. But if it works for you...
9. SEXUAL ACTIVITY IS NOT PERMITTED!!!
I agree. I do not allow Sex at my gaming table either. Its such a mess to clean up afterwards. And I'm still afraid to touch one set of dice. :p
Another house rule we have (much less insane): Grappling doens't exist, AT ALL. It's physically impossible to grab and immobilise someone in our world. Makes combat so much easier.
So how do vampires work?
Interesting. However, I would like to posit that just because a CDG is a full round action, it does not take the entire time to land the killing blow. You aim precisely. That's what takes the time. If someone were to wake up in the middle of it, that would mean that the attacker was slowly pushing the blade into said sleepy head. You don't need to stab in slow motion. You just need to line it up. Those PCs were toast. And if they did wake up from the blade entering their bodies, it would have been just long enough to see the green bastard that stabbed 'em. Then it's right back to black.
What exactly is being done is abstract. That it takes a full round action (std to start, standard to finish when started in surprise round) is clear. I do understand the point of view you provide; I anticipated it in the last paragraph of my post. It is possible, but not necessary.
What is clear is that you have the start of something that results in the PC's death if not interrupted. To arbitrarily rule that it is outside of sensory perception is something that I wouldn't do; I think it is abusive. What chance the PC has of knowing...that's certainly subject to variance. But seriously, what point is served by a TPK to start the story? The DM had a PoV that didn't necessitate CdG, and the player then objecting, asking for CdG. It isn't a houserule issue, as I see it.
The blatantly wrong thing is the GM telling the Players what their PCs do. GMs never decide what the PCs do.
The blatantly wrong thing is the GM telling the Players what their PCs do. GMs never decide what the PCs do.
Except when they say "You die". ;)
But it seems like a totally pointless TPK. The DM might just as well go with: "Oh, and by the way, there's an asteroid strike, Faerun is disintegrated and you all die".
What would be the point in those kinds of TPKs?
Except when they say "You die". ;)
But it seems like a totally pointless TPK. The DM might just as well go with: "Oh, and by the way, there's an asteroid strike, Faerun is disintegrated and you all die".
What would be the point in those kinds of TPKs?
Hey now, there's something to be said about starting a session with "rocks fall, everyone does."
Hey now, there's something to be said about starting a session with "rocks fall, everyone does."
I did this once, sort of.
I told everybody to make 3rd level characters, then did the hackney'd tavern intro.
"So, after a hard day, four 4th level heroes --"
"Uh, you said make 3rd level characters."
"Well, yeah, you're third level now, after the Meteor Storm."
"Wait, WHAT?!"
"That's what you get for interrupting me."
I actually stole a bit from the Curse of the Azure Bonds computer game; the PCs were raised by someone and 'bound' to him, though as they did the tasks he asked, they were slowly unbound.
My DM had a 'no multiclassing' rule.... I'm all for pure classes, but come on! Multiclassing gives characters skills and strengths that are essential at high levels! I had an elf character that had all the feats and skills to become an Arcane Archer (level 12). I asked him politely, and he established this arbitrary rule the minuite I did! Needless to say, I quit after a few downhill sessions, that featured arguments and unsatisfied players all around...
well, prestige classes don't suffer multiclassing XP penalty (you know, that thing many groups ignore because its really stupid?), so there's definitely an argument to be had there (weak as it may be). but, yeah, that kind of sucks.
If he thought the XP penalty was unfair, why didn't he say so?Yeah... I know... I think my DM was scared of trying it, (he was a bit of a novice) and this lead him to forbid it.... still, it sucked!
A DM should never be afraid to try new things, or test things out. All it takes is a sunset clause. "You can have this, and if it turns out to be unbalancing, we'll figure something else out." A blanket ban on something you don't understand is always a bad idea.
Most HRs I know are small tweeks, clarifications, or flavor changes on the most part...
and yes, any dm who tells a player what their character does is just... bad...
A blanket ban on something you don't understand is always a bad idea.
I disagree. I've heard lots of stories from people whose games were ruined by psionics, incarnum, pact magic, or martial adepts because the system was being used improperly. I think it's better to ban something you don't understand (until you learn about it) than to allow something you don't understand, and then ban it later (and tell other people it's bad) because you misunderstand it.
What exactly is being done is abstract. That it takes a full round action (std to start, standard to finish when started in surprise round) is clear. I do understand the point of view you provide; I anticipated it in the last paragraph of my post. It is possible, but not necessary.
What is clear is that you have the start of something that results in the PC's death if not interrupted. To arbitrarily rule that it is outside of sensory perception is something that I wouldn't do; I think it is abusive. What chance the PC has of knowing...that's certainly subject to variance. But seriously, what point is served by a TPK to start the story? The DM had a PoV that didn't necessitate CdG, and the player then objecting, asking for CdG. It isn't a houserule issue, as I see it.
Too true. The PCs should have been allowed a listen check at least. Even though they would most likely have failed, they still get a chance. If I remember this one correctly, they also should have been allowed to set up a watch. That was some BS there. It was the proper way to rule their deaths after two improper decisions. Telling players what they do or do not do is pretty much the worst crime to commit against them. You are also correct stating that this was not an example of a houserule. This was just a DM behaving badly.
I disagree. I've heard lots of stories from people whose games were ruined by psionics, incarnum, pact magic, or martial adepts because the system was being used improperly. I think it's better to ban something you don't understand (until you learn about it) than to allow something you don't understand, and then ban it later (and tell other people it's bad) because you misunderstand it.
See, I am of the opinion that a DM should read and understand what is being asked for before making a decision, rather than "ban first, ask questions later". See also the sunset clause, aka the retcon. If psionics is too powerful for the game, then you back up and change things, and ask your players (who hopefully understand that this is a team effort) to just roll with it. As long as the DM isn't a dick and actually talks to the player(s) before making a change, there shouldn't be any problems.
See, I am of the opinion that a DM should read and understand what is being asked for before making a decision, rather than "ban first, ask questions later".
Do you think it's fair to the other players to postpone the game while the DM familiarizes himself with the new system? What I was talking about was more along the lines of "Not right now, I don't really understand the system. Maybe next week after I've had a chance to read up on it."
If psionics is too powerful for the game
...then arcane and divine magic are far too powerful for the game.
Do you think it's fair to the other players to postpone the game while the DM familiarizes himself with the new system? What I was talking about was more along the lines of "Not right now, I don't really understand the system. Maybe next week after I've had a chance to read up on it."
I've never, never ever, ever ever ever, had a game where the first session was "okay, make your characters and let's get going." In my current game, a player wanted to play a shadowcaster (ToM). So I read that third of the book a few times (about 2 hours), looked around for any potentially horrible conflicts (too strong, too weak, too anything else, etc.) and found it fine. Psionics (and let's not go all ****ing rabid over psi being weak or broken or made of lollipops because I don't care; it was an example ffs) has 2 books associated with it, so that took me about a day or so.
So yes, I find it incredibly fair, because it's never been an issue. My players take their time to make characters and write up backstories while I take time to make a few NPCs, flesh out a plot, and answer the other players' questions and handle requests.
I got to play my psion, and he later agreed that it worked just as well as any other character. Also opened the other players' eyes to the subject of psionics, which has been enrichening to our games since.
On the topic, though:
The only really stupid houserule was suggested to me by a friend who roleplays but dislikes D&D, so he rarely plays. He suggested the following rule: If a character ever receives a negative value on a saving throw, any saving throw, he dies instantly. Brain hemorrage, sudden choking, trips and breaks neck, whatever is appropriate. Sudden, unexpected death. He thought the rule would make the game more interesting if this could happen.
I had to explain very carefully that the only way this could happen was if the character was very low-level, had an abysmal score to mod that save (like con 3), and he'd still have to roll below five or so for this to even happen. Besides being a once in a blue moon occurrence and thus nothing that would happen often enough to affect the game meaningfully, a character with those ability scores has enough problems to deal with to need further complications.
I've never, never ever, ever ever ever, had a game where the first session was "okay, make your characters and let's get going."
I have... And no, I didn't think it was a good idea.
My players take their time to make characters and write up backstories while I take time to make a few NPCs, flesh out a plot, and answer the other players' questions and handle requests.
Which is exactly the way I think the game should be handled. You and I would probably get along just fine.
First time I wanted to play a psion, my DM objected because he didn't know how it worked. So I cut a deal with him; I'd keep track of all the heavy math and details myself so he wouldn't have to, I explained the fundamental rules for it, such as max point spend on each power, in as simple and concrete manner as possible, and promised to tell what each power I used did and avoided any cheesy tricks. And if, after two sessions, he still thought the class was gamebreaking, I'd retire the character and play something else.
I got to play my psion, and he later agreed that it worked just as well as any other character. Also opened the other players' eyes to the subject of psionics, which has been enrichening to our games since.
That's another good way to handle it.
Problems seem to arise mainly when the DM is being excessively obtuse, or when the player is trying to cheat. You two appear to have avoided those problems; others haven't been so lucky and have blamed alternative magic systems instead of identifying the real problem.
Other things were edited for continuity only.
Thank you.
Recently looking for a game I got sent a 13 page "house rules" document that included such gems as
He also required a paladin to play in every game. Yarg.
I stopped browsing quickly and decided to stay far, far away. This is no small document either- we're talking 10,071 words, small font, no margins.
LOL...where can I find a copy of this?
1) if you played a ranger, the DM picked your feats for you. I think you could suggest feats, but the DM could overrule you.
2) sorcerer's first two feats had to be martial weapon proficiency: rapier and weapon focus: rapier. This was because sorcerers all were forcibly recruited into a world spanning global organization when they are infants and forced to train in rapiers.
3) 9th level spells are usually banned. Apparently, only one person in the world can know meteor swarm, and until you take that NPC out, you can't have the spell.
4) Barbarians couldn't be played at all unless the campaign started in the one part of the campaign world where barbarians came from.
5) on an attack roll of 1, you roll again. If this attack misses, you drop your weapon. I tried to explain that this meant a high level warrior was more likely to drop his weapon than a low level one, but to no avail.
6) If you talk out of turn too often, your character takes damage. I understand the guy needs to keep control of his game, but this is a game played among friends, isn't it? Having my character go unconscious and near death because I talked to the guy next to me ranks as one my worst gaming experiences ever.
7) many classes came with a very inflexible background built in. Besides the aformentioned sorcerer, all wizards were all librarians from an island nation (but wizards aren't supposed to be players in this campaign), all rangers work for the elves, druids are elven royalty, etc.
Maybe not quite a house rule, but I played with a DM who told us his world was newly created and that monsters didn't exist, therefore our 1st level characters would not know to set up watches or be alert for danger.
Yeah, cos lord knows it's only monsters that present a threat. No human has ever been a danger to any other human. Why, our own real world is an idyllic Shangri-La free of fear and violence in the absence of orcs and trolls.
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Other things were edited for continuity only.
Thank you.
Do I get to keep my cookie?
Problems seem to arise mainly when the DM is being excessively obtuse, or when the player is trying to cheat. You two appear to have avoided those problems; others haven't been so lucky and have blamed alternative magic systems instead of identifying the real problem.
I've been privy to both, many times. It gets tiresome and usually tears a group apart faster than a staved wolf on a steak.
Also, <3 Chaos.
On the plus side I have seen some very good house rules. Way back in 2nd edition I played a wizard under a DM that let you pick one school of magic that you could cast the spells of you choice from. You knew all the spells and could choose at will, ala sorcerer. You still had limited spells per day, however. Very forward thinking DM.
One house rule (also back in the days of 2nd ed) that was very broken, but in my favor ;) , was a misunderstanding about some references to "rate of fire", or some such nonsense, in weapon tables. Basically I was able to bluff my way into the DM letting my character make multiple attacks per round with thrown weapons. Take the basic dart, add an a high strength and weapon specialization, and I was making something like 4 attacks per round at 1d4+6 dammage. It was a fairly low level campaign, and when you are fighting orcs and goblins and such stuff DIES, and dies horribly, when you start chucking that kind of damage around. No sword, just two bandoleers and a backpack FULL of darts.
Inorder to score a multiplyer hit, you roll an independent d20. I called this the conformation roll, and it allowed me more oppurtunities to diversify the weapons. Here's an example.
Bastard Sword
Damage: 1d10
Critical: 19-20
Confirmation: 20
Multiplyer: x3
Not too shabby, but kindof underpowerd, so I also ruled a bastard sword was automatically considerd a martial weapon and could be used one handed. It's balanced to the longsword cause it's heavier and costs about twenty more gold..
Some weapons also did extra die in damage like for example..
Crossbow
Damage: 1d10+1d4
Critical: 19-20
Confirmation: 19-20
Multiplyer: x3
Much more powerful weapon, that extra d4 can mean a world of difference on a confirmation roll. Luckiely ranged weapons (besides composite bows) can't apply stat modifiers to damage.
Another houserule I made improved weapon finnease that allowed you to apply dex mod to melee/throwing damage rolls as well as attack rolls. Two feats seems worth making a stat (strength) completely useless...
It's not the request for the backstory it's the length requirement and formatting. The only thing it's missing is "Assignments must be turned in written in ink."
I just finished a two page backstory on my current character, complete with drop caps and father son dialog. It doesn't fit this guy's formatting requirements. That would make me chafe.
Anyway, on to your questionnaire... can I get a copy? I'd like to see how it works with my character. My email is my gleemax id @ my gleemax id .com
In a Warhammer FRP game I wrote a six or seven page backstory as an interview. (The PC was being interviewed by an imperial investigator.) The GM refused to give me any points for it (he had promised xp for a backstory), since in his world the investigator would have just telpathically extracted any information he needed.
The worst house rules I've seen:
1. No dex bonus while mounted. This after I'd been running a character who practiced mounted combat for months.
2. No xp in the session in which you died.
3. Characters who die can still be saved if you heal them the round they die. Also, divine casters can cast all spells spontaneously. The GM didn't tell me these rules until after a session in which a PC was killed in front of my character. (Someone said "why didn't you heal her", and I said "cause the DM said she was clearly dead.)
4. If someone says they are taking 20, then no other PC can interrupt them. (Or something like that.) A character fell unconcious in battle. After the battle was over, someone took 20 on a heal check to see if she was still alive. "Well, she isn't now since you took 2 minutes to find out."
1. In the first adventure, each PC had to get involved with a guild type organization in order to have someone to train with, for him to hand out quests that they were obligated to eventually complete, and so the PC got a badge that allowed him/her to attend the baron's banquet to receive the first quest.
(My self trained dwarven dungeon delver (a not a thief, thief) bluffed his way in as the fighter's manager so I wouldn't have to join the thieves guild)
2. You have to role play your shopping experience, and most cases their wasn't a benefit to it.
(After 5 sessions with my dwarf just hording gold he finally realized I wasn't into it and allowed me to just buy what I wanted.)
3. If the rogue finds a trap that is triggered by a trip wire, points it out to everyone, and marks it out with sticks, each player has to make a balance check DC10 to step over it. (Which of course means the trap is going to be triggered by some unlucky person)
It's balanced to the longsword cause it's heavier and costs about twenty more gold..
LOL :D
I want to share my crazy experiences here, although it's not exactly venting.
Anyway, I just started DnD, and my DM uses special crit rules and a fumble chart...
It's been cool so far, with our level 1 characters. Some really great things have happened...
Early on, I got sneak attacked by a were-rat while on watch.
The DM made the attack roll, and a 1 came up!
The Were-rat's hand slips, and it FLINGS its rapier past my Ranger's ear.
I turn around, fletch the thing with my longbow, then it tries to bite me...
And another 1 comes up.
Apparently the Were-rat's pulled a muscle in its jaw.
I shoot it again, it dies, we're all happy. I retrieve the fallen rapier and use it as a backup weapon for my character.
Later on, me and my rogue friend are starting to attack a cockatrice. He makes the first attack... and it misses. The cockatrice ignores it, but my shot hits. It comes towards us, and the rogue tries to shoot it again...
And he fumbles! Instead, he ends up shooting me in the back with his crossbow. I'm left at 1 hp, and the cockatrice is dangerously close now. We roll our attacks again, convinced we're going to die or be petrified eternally...
The rogue goes first, and thank the heavens, he rolls a crit! (x2)
Then he rolls to confirm and gets another 20. Under our rules, this means he can roll again for MORE damage. (x3)
Then rolls again for that one and gets a 19, good enough for crit with a crossbow still! (x4)
The next roll is a five, a miss negating the last one... but the damage is still a
x3, into the 20s!
Then I roll... and it's a 20! Again!
The next roll is a 19... unfortunately, I'm using a longbow. As it is, it's still another huge hit for 20 something damage, and the Cockatrice falls over, dead, with twin arrows protruding from its eye sockets.
Everyone was shocked, but you especially should have seen the look on our DM's face... :evillaugh
Afterward, I figured out the probabilities...
First crit from Crossbow: 1/10 (20)
Second: 1/100 (20)
Third: 1/1,000 (19)
Fourth, my Longbow:1/20,000 (20)
One in TWENTY THOUSAND.
I think I somehow ended up with the DM's loaded dice...
Also, in my Celts games, wizards automatically suffer a negative alignment shift every five levels unless they have levels of fighter or ranger.
When I run a historical Celts game, I make my players roll off for starting equipment. Sometimes no one gets a sword.
Also, in my Celts games, wizards automatically suffer a negative alignment shift every five levels unless they have levels of fighter or ranger.
Care to explain?
Care to explain?
I assume:
1. Because armor and swords are rare artifacts left behind by the romans when they left.
2. Because magic in his setting is EEEEEEVILLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL!!!!!!1 and corrupts you kinda like it does in Warhammer.
I assume:
1. Because armor and swords are rare artifacts left behind by the romans when they left.
2. Because magic in his setting is EEEEEEVILLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL!!!!!!1 and corrupts you kinda like it does in Mage: The Awakening.
WFRP's magic has a chance of backfiring or otherwise screwing you over. It rarely corrupts you from the inside (3 of the possible rolls on the basic table caused you to become corrupted slightly. On the expanded on it is incredibly less-likely). Mage, however, does have the corruption added into it.
2. You have to role play your shopping experience, and most cases their wasn't a benefit to it.
(After 5 sessions with my dwarf just hording gold he finally realized I wasn't into it and allowed me to just buy what I wanted.)
I did this in my early games. I also put up dominoes to make the shops (I use dominoes on the long end to make dungeons) every time the PC's went into one. Of course, at the time I was also offering food as a suitable reward (food which included a bowl of green soup and a loaf of garlic bread.)
Care to explain?
In my Celts game, the players usually start off as level 1 characters that have just had their coming of age ceremony. The more fit and well spoken the character is, and the better job he has done showing off for the community, the more powerful of a noble will give him his weapons.
So I have them all roll off three times against a group of mostly weaker NPCs.
A DEX roll, for sports, for a ranged weapon. A STR roll, for status, which is for the armor. Finally, a CHA roll, for friendship, which gives you the melee weapon.
I only played with it once or twice, and I'd make a better chart, having weapon and armor packages based on the characters final and total standing in the community instead of the way I was doing it, but the idea would be the same.
Some characters would get a spear and a sling. Whoever wins out gets a longsword.
As far as the evil thing for wizards - Celts believed that anyone with a gift for magic should become a druid. Anyone that didn't, and just delved into the magical arts would be corrupted by the power it offered and become evil unless they had a warrior's discipline.
So how do vampires work?
They whack the characters and give them negative levels.
Cranewings, I have a might yearn to play in one of your celtic games now. Thats some intresting house rule fun.
You are the only one then. I promised I wouldn't anymore. I was such a jerk / bad dm for it last time. It was all different players, but it was BAD and it is mildly famous.
I killed 6 player characters from 4 people over 4 weeks and only 1 person leveled the whole time... seriously... it was bad.
Fighting gnolls, cattle raiding, talking to frightening pointy teeth 7' tall elves...
It was a kinda harsh world.
Seriously, it had potential, but wasn't in a game mastering mood back then (:
the idea of a dealt your hand style game would give some intresting potential roleplay
Off note, I just thought of my next dnd character. I'm going to play a bard. When he learns a new spell for leveling, he is going to think of it while sitting in a tavern, and write it on a napkin...
I agree. Next game I run I want everyone to make the character they want, but then I'm going to make charts a let everyone roll for their starting social possition and equipment.
I was in an AD&D game where we did that.
It doesn't usually work out too well.
I was in an AD&D game where we did that.
It doesn't usually work out too well.
I've done it a couple of times. It worked fine for me, it just doesn't work for very long. Usually within a month the players have enough gold and respect to do what they want in town, reguardless of their original social standing.
DM: You just killed (insert random noble sounding name here)
JP: Was she important?
Jack: Dude, she's quoted on the front of the rules packet!
On to our own house rules:
Roll 4d6, drop the lowest, roll four sets and pick one, arrange as you like. After this you get to replace one stat with a free 18 before racial mods because your the ****ING HEROES!
We let Druids cast spontaneously. Only for one player though. She's ADD and spacey and just plays the druid to be a healer with a nature flare. Though once she went to the bathroom and told her fiance to play her character. Her fiance has been playing for over a decade and has played every edition. Her quote upon returning: "So what did I miss?... Why is there a T-Rex? Where'd all the bad guys go?"
Any how thanx for sharing found this thread entertaining.
On to our own house rules:
Roll 4d6, drop the lowest, roll four sets and pick one, arrange as you like. After this you get to replace one stat with a free 18 before racial mods because your the ****ING HEROES!
That is what we do in our D20 based games, sans the 18 thing and we re-roll ones and twos. It sometimes results in some crazy stats, but honestly it rarely feels like one character is stronger than others. It only results in noticibly stronger character at early levels, after that things seem to even out.
You need a 13 strength to wield a dwarven war axe was one of our gaming groups silly house rules. This came out early on after 3rd edition came out and as a Dm I was still unsure about the game rules. I had a hobgoblin weilding dual dwarvern war axes, and a sorcerer cast enfeeble on the hobgoblin. Then he said, "You need a 13 to wield dwarven war axe. I'm sure I read that in the PHB. That's why I cast enfeeble on him." So we played it out that way. After finding out that I was had, I just kept the rule. Later as others started to DM our games the rule stuck.
Any how thanx for sharing found this thread entertaining.
Choose a type of exotic weapon. You understand how to use that type of exotic weapon in combat.
Prerequisite
Base attack bonus +1 (plus Str 13 for bastard sword or dwarven waraxe).
You drop below Str 13, you lose proficiency. You can still use the weapon, but at -4 penalty.
You drop below Str 13, you lose proficiency. You can still use the weapon, but at -4 penalty.
Actually, I think you can still use it as a martial two-handed weapon...
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/equipment/weapons.htm#swordBastard
Actually, I think you can still use it as a martial two-handed weapon...
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/equipment/weapons.htm#swordBastard
Not the dwarven waraxe which is what we're discussing, but yeah, the bastard sword can be used that way.
Seeing as how a handful of people have posted up their own lists of house rules, I figured I might as well join in.
Just because other people are derailing a thread does not mean that you should as well.
The most unbalanced houserule I've had to suffer with was in an old-school 2nd Edition campaign that used the Players Options rules...including the critical hit tables.
This was bad enough as is, but the DM wanted more extreme results and ruled that a large variety of the "weapon specialization" options increased your effective weapon size... until decapitations and such were more-or-less automatic on a crit.
And I cannot tell a lie.........it was FUN at the time.
But definitely crazy.
Well it isn't a house rule, but I had a DM who's town was named "Generic", the town inn was named "Generic" and the towns inn keep name was "Generic". He said,"Everything is called Generic? Now you don't have to ask me such stupid questions."
Asking for names is a stupid question? I think if a DM said that I'd have to respond with "well excuse the **** out of me for trying to be in character and get a bead on the world our characters live in." followed by me leaving the table and not coming back. If a DM can't come up with basic names for the people, places, and things in his world, he shouldn't be on that side of the screen.
Is this entirely unreasonable? I am also thinking of using the CG paladin variant in case he doesn't want to be lawful. (Or making a NG verison, since the god is NG)
Has anyone played with characters of different power levels and had it work?
I suspect they had been asking for the names of the same things repeatedly.
Then the DM should tell them to write it down. If the DM puts so little thought into the world that he is content calling everything "generic" then why the frak should the players give a damn about it?
Green Yawgmoth is dead-bang on with his response. I'd give the DM a generic "frak you" and go do something fun instead.
(Hopefully) going to be starting my first campaign, and I am wondering if it unreasonable to make a potential paladin player fill out a questionnaire. (12 questions in all, but the last one is "List anything else about your order") And of course, working with him on making a order and tenets, and hopefully list them in order of importance to help with certain sticky situations.
Is this entirely unreasonable? I am also thinking of using the CG paladin variant in case he doesn't want to be lawful. (Or making a NG verison, since the god is NG)
Actually, I think that it is a good idea. You might also want to do similar for players who want their characters to be part of another organization.
But I might make a modified form for certain prestige classes. As in, if they just need the class for mechanics, then they don't have to, but if they want the RP and benefits of the organization behind the prestige class(If there is one) then they need to follow some code.
But thanks for the input, now I don't feel so bad for giving the paladin homework.
The world is slowly regaining it's ability to support magic. Upper level spells (Level 3 or higher spells) become castable based on time, not on your level.
Right now I'm a level 12 wizard and I can't cast anything higher than level 5 spells without causing a warped rift in the space-time continuum.
To be fair, the DM and I are currently working out a way I can modify some fairly powerful artifacts and use them together to allow me and ONLY me to power my spells to maximum levels. Retribution will be so much fun.
Another house rule I hate is "Core spells only, you have to manually research all the other spells" while the fighter classes can pull from any splatbook they want. My group seems to limit spellcasters hard while letting fighters get away with a lot.
Another house rule I hate is "Core spells only, you have to manually research all the other spells" while the fighter classes can pull from any splatbook they want. My group seems to limit spellcasters hard while letting fighters get away with a lot.
Even restricted to Core spells, a Wizard shouldn't have much trouble dominating an encounter.
Are Clerics and Druids held to the same standard?
I suspect they had been asking for the names of the same things repeatedly.
Has anyone played with characters of different power levels and had it work?
Like 6 years ago, I was running for my GREAT group. They were the best, but they only played the same crap everytime. So one night, I ran a 1 shot adventure about a princess in trouble.
I wrote up everyone's characters the week before and handed them out.
The power gamer played the 2nd level fighter / princess.
The story teller guy got the 12th level paladin.
The angsty guy got the 6th level bard, side kick to the paladin.
The girl that always played elf rogues and assassins got a 6th level dwarf fighter.
Someone else got her dwarven brother....
The game turned out to be a blast. I mean, they were ready to go back to their normal characters, but it was really, really funny.
Another house rule I hate is "Core spells only, you have to manually research all the other spells" while the fighter classes can pull from any splatbook they want. My group seems to limit spellcasters hard while letting fighters get away with a lot.
Do you play in my group? That's how I do.
I got tired of trusting people to pick fair spells from other books, and then having to nerf them constantly. For example, Hail of Stone is a first level spell that functions exactly like Ice Storm, a 4th level spell, except that it gets d4s. If you used metamagic to bumb it up to 4th level, it would be vastly superior.
The core spells are good. They make sense. Not to mention the fact that wizards are already too good as it is. Giving them extra power ups is really unnessessary.
Worst house rule I've ever played under:
The world is slowly regaining it's ability to support magic. Upper level spells (Level 3 or higher spells) become castable based on time, not on your level.
Right now I'm a level 12 wizard and I can't cast anything higher than level 5 spells without causing a warped rift in the space-time continuum.
To be fair, the DM and I are currently working out a way I can modify some fairly powerful artifacts and use them together to allow me and ONLY me to power my spells to maximum levels. Retribution will be so much fun.
This sucks. Yes, spells are powerful, but it's not a sin for PCs to be powerful.
Another house rule I hate is "Core spells only, you have to manually research all the other spells" while the fighter classes can pull from any splatbook they want. My group seems to limit spellcasters hard while letting fighters get away with a lot.
I don't find this sucking. I could see the aesthetics where the PHB are the standard spells spellcasters acquire by achievements of their levels where as Spell Compendium spells are more esoteric.
While even divine spellcasters can research spells, flavor text on how they get spells implies they wouldn't or shouldn't. Therefore, when a divine caster player would like a spell from Spell Compendium, it would behoove the DM using this house rule to have the character find a long lost prayer book or rune or something that has the spell. To be fair to wizards, the divine character still has to pay the equivalent in research costs, only for flavor text it's charitable contributions or other church related costs where as the deity recognizes the character's fealty and grants access to the long lost spell.
Like 6 years ago, I was running for my GREAT group. They were the best, but they only played the same crap everytime. So one night, I ran a 1 shot adventure about a princess in trouble.
I wrote up everyone's characters the week before and handed them out.
The power gamer played the 2nd level fighter / princess.
The story teller guy got the 12th level paladin.
The angsty guy got the 6th level bard, side kick to the paladin.
The girl that always played elf rogues and assassins got a 6th level dwarf fighter.
Someone else got her dwarven brother....
The game turned out to be a blast. I mean, they were ready to go back to their normal characters, but it was really, really funny.
After literally 5 real world years playing a Lawful Good cleric in two campaigns with my group, it's such a relief playing a non-Lawful Good character in our third campaign.
I started out as a Chaotic Good warlock (DM pinged me as Chaotic Neutral; I never knew I could pull off that alignment :P ) but due to in game circumstances and real world angst to play a crusader already, I changed characters to a Lawful Neutral crusader. In character I want to gravitate to Lawful Good but stuff keeps happening that makes him too irate to go into Full Nice Guy mode.
I'm having a blast.
Do you play in my group? That's how I do.
I got tired of trusting people to pick fair spells from other books, and then having to nerf them constantly. For example, Hail of Stone is a first level spell that functions exactly like Ice Storm, a 4th level spell, except that it gets d4s. If you used metamagic to bumb it up to 4th level, it would be vastly superior.
The core spells are good. They make sense. Not to mention the fact that wizards are already too good as it is. Giving them extra power ups is really unnessessary.
The problem is escalation. When monsters are pulled from splatbooks that have spells from the spell compendium in mind, life gets very hard as a caster. Especially when everything in the world has spell resistance (Your level + 14) because the DM likes to throw high CR encounters at us. The rule for researching spells out of the SC is nice but we actually have to get time to research them. I play in an extremely impatient group that never sits in town for more than 3 days. I generally can't even get spell research done for normal spells I want. Getting spells to assault the target's spell resistance is near impossible.
I don't find wizards are "too good". They're too good if they're prepared and walk into an encounter with everything they need. Wizards are great vs mobs of equal CR or lower. Once you bump the CR much higher most of your spells just bounce off them due to saves negating or spell resistance pulling a "NEENER NEENER" effect. It's not that big of a problem, as the DM and I have talked it over at length and he understands why it bugs me. (Literally one spell out of 5 I cast each combat actually has an effect. It gets frustrating.)
After literally 5 real world years playing a Lawful Good cleric in two campaigns with my group, it's such a relief playing a non-Lawful Good character in our third campaign.
I started out as a Chaotic Good warlock (DM pinged me as Chaotic Neutral; I never knew I could pull off that alignment :P ) but due to in game circumstances and real world angst to play a crusader already, I changed characters to a Lawful Neutral crusader. In character I want to gravitate to Lawful Good but stuff keeps happening that makes him too irate to go into Full Nice Guy mode.
I'm having a blast.
Nice. I know how you feel.
A long time ago I ran a science fiction game for a couple guys. One gentleman I knew from the game store for a long time, but never played with him. He was famous for playing LG characters.
Well, we got to my game, and I was waiting to hear about his noble pilot, ready to save the galaxy or whatever. Turned out, he wrote up a mercenary name, X "SoooMoney" Y... The entire game, he did nothing unless he got paid for it. The party even took him on away missions JUST SO THEY KNEW he wouldn't hijack the ship. One of the other players, who had gamed with him a lot, couldn't stop laughing about what a jerk he was playing. SooMoney has become a kind of merc steriotype for us now because of it.
The problem is escalation. When monsters are pulled from splatbooks that have spells from the spell compendium in mind, life gets very hard as a caster. Especially when everything in the world has spell resistance (Your level + 14) because the DM likes to throw high CR encounters at us. The rule for researching spells out of the SC is nice but we actually have to get time to research them. I play in an extremely impatient group that never sits in town for more than 3 days. I generally can't even get spell research done for normal spells I want. Getting spells to assault the target's spell resistance is near impossible.
I don't find wizards are "too good". They're too good if they're prepared and walk into an encounter with everything they need. Wizards are great vs mobs of equal CR or lower. Once you bump the CR much higher most of your spells just bounce off them due to saves negating or spell resistance pulling a "NEENER NEENER" effect. It's not that big of a problem, as the DM and I have talked it over at length and he understands why it bugs me. (Literally one spell out of 5 I cast each combat actually has an effect. It gets frustrating.)
I could see that happening. It could be really irritating.
When I play mages, I mostly enjoy blaster mages. I like specialist evocationists the best. Playing them with a hand full of utility spells is pretty fun, and I know it is fair. GM's never shake a finger at it, it never ends a fight in an anti-climatic way.
A seriously think blaster / utility was what the original wizard idea was.
I have played enchanters on occasion, because I like them, especially as sorcerers, but I never expect their powers to work on a named character, and that takes the edge off the problem.
So his house rule became: The DM's pronunciations are always correct.
If me DM reads this it is not an attack, this thread is about venting, so don't chew me out please!
Well it isn't a house rule, but I had a DM who's town was named "Generic", the town inn was named "Generic" and the towns inn keep name was "Generic". He said,"Everything is called Generic? Now you don't have to ask me such stupid questions."
Asking for names is a stupid question? I think if a DM said that I'd have to respond with "well excuse the **** out of me for trying to be in character and get a bead on the world our characters live in." followed by me leaving the table and not coming back. If a DM can't come up with basic names for the people, places, and things in his world, he shouldn't be on that side of the screen.
Far more fun to start refering to all the GM, players, PCs, and NPCs as "Generic", from that point on.
Not the dwarven waraxe which is what we're discussing, but yeah, the bastard sword can be used that way.
Can too!
Waraxe, Dwarven
A dwarven waraxe is too large to use in one hand without special training; thus, it is an exotic weapon. A Medium character can use a dwarven waraxe two-handed as a martial weapon, or a Large creature can use it one-handed in the same way. A dwarf treats a dwarven waraxe as a martial weapon even when using it in one hand.
Far more fun to start refering to all the GM, players, PCs, and NPCs as "Generic", from that point on.
Only if you get enjoyment out of antagonizing people you're supposed to be friends with, which I do not.
BlackDragon: I would have responded to that with "I'm trying to help you to not sound like a retard. If you can't handle being corrected, then pray you never get a real job."
No Gnomes, in his setting they were long extinct - okay, fine by me.
No Paladins, in his setting they were basically the police - okay, don't want to play a paladin anyway.
True Neutral and Chaotic Good were out of the question, and anything Evil was gone - Well, that was annoying, Chaotic Good looked fun.
I can't explain it, but he had combat rules set up to accommodate some 1st and 2ed and 3rd edition rules, as he didn't like most of 3.5 - Starting to get quite bad...
He reworked the ENTIRE spell system, scrapping the whole thing and instead using a two-word trigger mechanism, e.g. Loud Insects would produce a distracting sound loud enough to prevent enemy casting. - I really wanted to play some form of Arcane character, that was the clincher =(
The guy had an amazing setting with literally 50+ large pages of maps and schematics of large buildings, but the house rules were too much for me
Can too!
Swords and sorcery. Real men don't need an axe.
Otherwise, our wizard has never had to pay a copper or spend a second learning a spell. He just knows them all, and I don't believe he's so much as looked at a spellbook. He got awful excited when we killed a Drow wizard, but I doubt anything's come of it. He's probably just learned all the spells by virtue of his being him.
...heh. Wow, it looks like I have a grudge against the wizard. I do!
Real men tend to flee from real axes wielded by real dwarves. :P
Aye, 'cause of a certain height discrepancy, giving dwarves an advantageous target range that most real men (especially, you know, REALLY real men) are uncomfortable with.
Only if you get enjoyment out of antagonizing people you're supposed to be friends with, which I do not.
At leats half of my group would find it amusing. We might end up with a farcical game where every thing is "Generic".
And to be fair, I was saying that that would be more fun than...
I'd have to respond with "well excuse the **** out of me for trying to be in character and get a bead on the world our characters live in." followed by me leaving the table and not coming back.
Which I would defintly not do to people who, as you say, I'm friends with.
Which I would defintly not do to people who, as you say, I'm friends with.
Fortunately for me, my friends are good RPers who would take the time to do simple things like name their NPCs and cities and what have you. But on the off chance that said event occurred, my friends know that I don't take **** from anyone and that getting short with me will only result in me becoming just as short. Saying "fine, I name everything generic now shut up" is tantamount to saying "clam up or go home". In which case I would do the latter. A DM who can't even pull a name out of a google search is also a DM who can't bother with other things that fall under "basic world building", and thus is no DM I want to play with.
Again, fortunately I have culled those types from my gaming "herd" long ago, and thus have a great, yet small, group of gamers to enjoy my time with.
For example, when my friends and I first started to play D+D (2nd ed) somehow the DM misread some rule (I think it was the bonus xp percentage for having high primary stats) to mean that if a character had a high primary stat it started at higher level. So if you found a race that had a high stat cap and a nice bonus, and then 'somehow' rolled an 18, you could be a level 7 character in a group of level 1s. That destroyed our first few campaigns.
Another campaign destroyer, this one my fault, was that Nahal's Reckless Dweomer caused a wild surge and the spell effect happened normally. This led to a number of mid level wizards focusing on their first level spells, and eventual campaign deaths from wild surges.
This may have been a correct rule, but we always played that when a Wizard leveled he could pick any one spell to add to his spellbook. This became a problem with the 2ed Wizard spell compendiums, which led to my Wizards having a lot of random broken spells that were meant to be unknown or kept only in unique tomes (anyone else remember Fist of the Adder? That has to have been the most broken low level spell of 2nd ed - worse than chromatic orb, although less flexible (ok, and except Nahal's)).
There was also a group that had misread the rules for cleric spellcasting. I don't remember their exact system, but at character creation a cleric had access to only one spell, rolled randomly. The party cleric had started out knowing only detect poison, and because this was 2nd ed and they were playing with rather harsh xp divvying rules, he was many levels behind the leaders of the party when I joined.
Yay insular highschool games where odd rulings can grow like they are in petri dishes.
As for non mistake rules, there have been some odd ones for campaign setting reasons, although this has generally worked out. One DM banned the entire evocation school, except for light and daylight I think. He also rewrote humans into a number of subraces with stat mods, based on which society they were from. We had a good campaign tied to a central village/people, although it eventually bogged down due to character changeover, and died for other reasons.
Another rewrote all the classes to fit a fantasy china theme, and broke all of them (Everyone got cool ancestral magic, and iirc my kensai also had psionics and some divine magic as well as a number of great fighter abilities. He had a base speed of 120' or so and spring attack. Due to a few different powers he would have gained by 20th level he would have been able to get 12 attacks before anyone else had moved in combat every time (always had a surprise round, every time he could make one attack he could make two instead, an init check in the 20s, a few other things). We had a lot of fun though.
The current campaign has had death removed, to fit the group's play style (your character can still die if you want it to).
He also let us choose any monster race and template you wanted along with some rediculously high stat rolling method. We started at 8th level (including adjustments for race and templates and stuff).
Everyone made rediculous monster characters and I played the only human (a Barbarian/Fighter with high intelligence). I broke his house rules so bad it wasn't even funny.
This session our DM informed us that not only had our action threatened the lawfulness of the monk, it also threatened all of our goodness as well. To sum up:
The Event in Question or Defense Submits Evidence A to the Court
We found a treasure trove guarded by a bound djinni. He wasn't bound against his will, turned out he was guarded the treasure as a favor. The owner, however, was dead and gone by a couple dozen years. We offered to find a way to undo the spell, which he declined, and attempted to reason with him through a number of different ways to let us undo the magic. Stubborn as a mule, the djinni refused. Instead of striking first, we attempted to run in, snatch a bit of the treasure, and trick him into following us into a magical cage (which he could not escape). When the plan failed (by the djinni interrupting a player turn to whirlwind) and he began injuring our companion, we annihilated him. We'd actually intended to subdue him as well, but accidentally dealt him too much damage (unarmed monk cannot chose to deal subdual sneak attack, as I had previously thought).
So how do vampires work?
On third shift I imagine.
I return to complain... begin [rant]
This session our DM informed us that not only had our action threatened the lawfulness of the monk, it also threatened all of our goodness as well. To sum up:The Event in Question or Defense Submits Evidence A to the CourtWe found a treasure trove guarded by a bound djinni. He wasn't bound against his will, turned out he was guarded the treasure as a favor. The owner, however, was dead and gone by a couple dozen years. We offered to find a way to undo the spell, which he declined, and attempted to reason with him through a number of different ways to let us undo the magic. Stubborn as a mule, the djinni refused. Instead of striking first, we attempted to run in, snatch a bit of the treasure, and trick him into following us into a magical cage (which he could not escape). When the plan failed (by the djinni interrupting a player turn to whirlwind) and he began injuring our companion, we annihilated him. We'd actually intended to subdue him as well, but accidentally dealt him too much damage (unarmed monk cannot chose to deal subdual sneak attack, as I had previously thought).
Maybe they didn't try all avenues of convincing it (Did you guys try explaining the cause you needed it for? Also, did you try disillusioning him by telling him of the torture chambers, etc?), but these actions aren't enough for immediate alignment changes. Maybe I could see a paladin falling from this, but these aren't characters as alignment sensitive as a paladin. Unless this was the end of a series of alignment changing actions, then this is in no way serious enough for an immediate alignment shift, to me.
Also, as to the lawfulness of the action, what were the monk's motivations? If you have a lawful neutral monk under orders to loot the tower to provide funds for [cause] then his actions were entirely lawful.
So they are adventuring through an evil wizard's tower (from the description he gave, the wizard sounds evil and the tower seems to be the dungeon of the day). They not only don't kill the djinni on sight, which would be pretty par for the course with many groups, but attempt to negotiate and when that fails, attempt to take the treasure nonviolently, and then when the djinni attacks them they try to subdue it, and accidentally kill it. (Not that a deadly confrontation wasn't the obvious result, but they at least seriously tried).
Maybe they didn't try all avenues of convincing it (Did you guys try explaining the cause you needed it for? Also, did you try disillusioning him by telling him of the torture chambers, etc?), but these actions aren't enough for immediate alignment changes. Maybe I could see a paladin falling from this, but these aren't characters as alignment sensitive as a paladin. Unless this was the end of a series of alignment changing actions, then this is in no way serious enough for an immediate alignment shift, to me.
Also, as to the lawfulness of the action, what were the monk's motivations? If you have a lawful neutral monk under orders to loot the tower to provide funds for [cause] then his actions were entirely lawful.
First of all I am not sure where you got that it was an evil wizard. He said that the djin was lawful good and that it was voluntarily bound. That to me says that the Wizard was not evil. Just becuase he is haunting the tower now, does not mean he was evil in life. If I die and I want all my wealth dumped in a volcano, and you instead take it (or worse yet take it from someone who is carrying out my wishes) then you are still stealing.
If the monks explicit orders or clear code entail looting of all treasure they find for the good of their order, then perhaps, but it would have to be esablished before the encounter, and in my game have a darn good reason.
First of all I am not sure where you got that it was an evil wizard. He said that the djin was lawful good and that it was voluntarily bound. That to me says that the Wizard was not evil. Just becuase he is haunting the tower now, does not mean he was evil in life. If I die and I want all my wealth dumped in a volcano, and you instead take it (or worse yet take it from someone who is carrying out my wishes) then you are still stealing.
If the monks explicit orders or clear code entail looting of all treasure they find for the good of their order, then perhaps, but it would have to be esablished before the encounter, and in my game have a darn good reason.
I guess you are right. I took the fact that the guy had a torture chamber to mean that he was evil, but I guess the ghost (which sounds quite evil now) could have had it added somehow (or he could have been neutral with a torture chamber, or there could have been unusual circumstances (the torture chamber being a part of the tower before he moved in)). I still don't think this is such a serious act that it merits an immediate alignment change (then again, I don't like the monk alignment restriction either, and probably would have removed it), especially since they made a number of attempts to end the encounter in a more reasonable way.
First of all I am not sure where you got that it was an evil wizard. He said that the djin was lawful good and that it was voluntarily bound. That to me says that the Wizard was not evil. Just becuase he is haunting the tower now, does not mean he was evil in life. If I die and I want all my wealth dumped in a volcano, and you instead take it (or worse yet take it from someone who is carrying out my wishes) then you are still stealing.
If the monks explicit orders or clear code entail looting of all treasure they find for the good of their order, then perhaps, but it would have to be esablished before the encounter, and in my game have a darn good reason.
I should clarify. All evidence we found points towards the evilness and desperation of the wizard/cleric/mystic theurge. He had a torture chamber (with long dried blood). Active mindless undead in his basement (there wasn't anyone else around to create them) and a trapped paladin that was the son of a hero that (presumabley) the wiz/clr/myt had turned into a ghast. He had trapped a quasit and a nymph in his tower and bound them so they couldn't leave, as well as a pair of earth elementals. He died because he accidentally trapped himself in his tower. He bound all the other creatures (except the djinni I guess, who was there of his own free will as well) to see if they could escape, but they couldn't, so he kept them trapped in tiny little force cages. I think its fair to assume that he was a bad bad man.
And those summoned creatures, we released them without conflict. Even the initially hostile earth elementals, we calmed them down and told them they were free. Except for the quasit, because we didn't trust him. The ex-paladin ghast did get killed though. He assaulted us in his urge to flee, so he seemed like any other ghast. After he drained a level from the monk, we didn't listen to his 'let me out, let me out'.
I can accept that it can be considered chaotic from one point of view, but not evil. Not evil unless it is always evil to fight good aligned creatures regardless of circumstances.
And no, we hadn't acted chaotic or evil prior to this. In fact we trekked down two stories of trap filled dungeon to rescue some kidnapped orphans, where the monk died the first time.
I guess you are right. I took the fact that the guy had a torture chamber to mean that he was evil, but I guess the ghost (which sounds quite evil now) could have had it added somehow (or he could have been neutral with a torture chamber, or there could have been unusual circumstances (the torture chamber being a part of the tower before he moved in)). I still don't think this is such a serious act that it merits an immediate alignment change (then again, I don't like the monk alignment restriction either, and probably would have removed it), especially since they made a number of attempts to end the encounter in a more reasonable way.
Is walking up to a Dijin that is bound to guard a chest and asking it (however nicely) to let you remove the items from said chest a reasonable thing to do?: Sure.
Is it reasonable to expect said Dijin to hand over said booty?: No
Is it reasonable to then attempt to physically take the items in question and expect the Dijin not to try and physically stop you?: No
Once the Dijin (in it's fit or unreasonablness) physically trys to stop you from taking the treasure, is it reasonable to use force to save your skins?: Yes, but since it was unreasonable to attempt this course of action in the first place, and it was reasonable to expect the Dijin to defend the treasure, any damage to the Dijin is unlawful.
A burgler comes in to your house:
Burgler: "Could you please step aside so that I can take your $3000 Alienware PC?"
You: "No!"
Burgler: "I said please, and I feel that I deserve it, so could you please stand aside?"
You: "Are you mad, get the frack out of my house!"
Burgler: "Well then I guess I will have to take it." He steps up and attempts to take the PC.
You: Pushing him away, "Try that again and I will pound you with this bat!"
Burgler: Sighs, pulls out a gun, and shoots you in the leg. The wound should not be lethal, but nicks an artery and you bleed to death. The Burgler walks away with a fancy new PC and whistling a happy tune knowing that his concience is clean because he tried to be reasonable and did not mean to use lethal force.
Does that seem like Lawful Good burgler to you? Does this situation seem "reasonable"?
I should clarify. All evidence we found points towards the evilness and desperation of the wizard/cleric/mystic theurge. He had a torture chamber (with long dried blood). Active mindless undead in his basement (there wasn't anyone else around to create them) and a trapped paladin that was the son of a hero that (presumabley) the wiz/clr/myt had turned into a ghast. He had trapped a quasit and a nymph in his tower and bound them so they couldn't leave, as well as a pair of earth elementals. He died because he accidentally trapped himself in his tower. He bound all the other creatures (except the djinni I guess, who was there of his own free will as well) to see if they could escape, but they couldn't, so he kept them trapped in tiny little force cages. I think its fair to assume that he was a bad bad man.
And those summoned creatures, we released them without conflict. Even the initially hostile earth elementals, we calmed them down and told them they were free. Except for the quasit, because we didn't trust him. The ex-paladin ghast did get killed though. He assaulted us in his urge to flee, so he seemed like any other ghast. After he drained a level from the monk, we didn't listen to his 'let me out, let me out'.
I can accept that it can be considered chaotic from one point of view, but not evil. Not evil unless it is always evil to fight good aligned creatures regardless of circumstances.
And no, we hadn't acted chaotic or evil prior to this. In fact we trekked down two stories of trap filled dungeon to rescue some kidnapped orphans, where the monk died the first time.
While I stand by my logic based on previous assumptions, I completely change my opinion about the actual situation. Your DM was a D-bag for having a Lawful Good Dijin voluntarily guard an evil wizard's treasure. That is a pretty lame alignment trap. I would not even move you a whole alignment towards chaotic. I think I would move you a tick towards chaotic and a tick towards evil, but you would keep your current alignment until you grossly abused it later on down the road.
Is walking up to a Dijin that is bound to guard a chest and asking it (however nicely) to let you remove the items from said chest a reasonable thing to do?: Sure.
Is it reasonable to expect said Dijin to hand over said booty?: No
Is it reasonable to then attempt to physically take the items in question and expect the Dijin not to try and physically stop you?: No
Once the Dijin (in it's fit or unreasonablness) physically trys to stop you from taking the treasure, is it reasonable to use force to save your skins?: Yes, but since it was unreasonable to attempt this course of action in the first place, and it was reasonable to expect the Dijin to defend the treasure, any damage to the Dijin is unlawful.
[example excepted]
Does that seem like Lawful Good burgler to you? Does this situation seem "reasonable"?
Ok, at what point did I say that the actions were reasonable? Or were Lawful Good? I said that they tried to be reasonable first rather than walking in and just killing it, and I said that the actions could have been lawful. I also said that I could see a paladin falling over it, depending on exactly how things happened, which pretty strongly implies that I didn't think this was Lawful Good. Lastly, I am arguing that what they did was not chaotic or evil enough to merit instant alignment shifts. (To me the law/chaos of the action depends on a lot of other stuff which we don't know, mostly the circumstances of them undertaking the mission, although I would probably peg it as evil).
If the world has such strict alignment, how does the LG Djinni get off serving such an evil master, and being his personal friend? If a paladin was acting like that, I would expect him to fall (in a typical game anyway, there being such variance over these things).
This is not a group of burglars breaking into a house. This is a group of adventurers suppressing a menace to the area, and seeking spoils at the same time. The treaure wasn't being used by anyone, or serving any useful purpose, and they had a noble cause which it could support. There are plenty of games where that greater good argument would have made this a good act (especially since depending on the setting, the Djinni wouldn't even be dead, just returned to its home plane). Not that they had every right to it, but it isn't an outrageous thing to do in my mind (again, from some assumptions about the circumstances of them taking the tower). They could easily have had every right to that treasure depending on the law of the land.
I'm not saying that every D+D game should treat alignment the same way, and certainly this game seems very interested in the players not just reacting to enemies as evil things to be destroyed. But this seems a bit too touchy to me, especially as evidenced by a player being so frustrated by it.
How about this analogy, which is at least as relevant as your own:
The players need to find artifact X in order to save the world, and can only be used by paladins. However it is being guarded by a Djinni, who refuses to let the players have it (not through trade, negotiations, etc) as the previous owner, now dead, had tasked him to protect it. The players take it by force, because the need is great. Now the paladin should fall and the world be doomed?
We should probably stop this threadjack - this isn't really the place to be discussing the notoriously thorny issue of alignment.
Edit: Ah, just saw your last post. I think my added example isn't really necessary now, since I see that your problem was in large part an issue of the circumstances that the encounter took place in, same as me. I just read different things into the original post.
Burgler: "Could you please step aside so that I can take your $3000 Alienware PC?"
You: "No!"
Burgler: "I said please, and I feel that I deserve it, so could you please stand aside?"
You: "Are you mad, get the frack out of my house!"
Burgler: "Well then I guess I will have to take it." He steps up and attempts to take the PC.
You: Pushing him away, "Try that again and I will pound you with this bat!"
Burgler: Sighs, pulls out a gun, and shoots you in the leg. The wound should not be lethal, but nicks an artery and you bleed to death. The Burgler walks away with a fancy new PC and whistling a happy tune knowing that his concience is clean because he tried to be reasonable and did not mean to use lethal force.
Does that seem like Lawful Good burgler to you? Does this situation seem "reasonable"?
Burgler: "Hey, whats this secret door"
You: "Do not step into this room, for I shall have to slay you if you do."
Burgler: "Calm down. Why are you locked in this room with an alienware 3000 PC that you have no use for."
You: "Tim asked me to guard it."
Burgler: "You know Tim died thirty-odd years ago, right?"
You: "I don't care, he asked me to guard it."
Burgler: "Look, Tim has no use for it, neither do you. I, however, am going to try and use it to save dozens of orphans. Please step aside and let me take the computer."
You: "No, I don't care how many orphans you want to save, Tim wanted me to guard this computer, he was my friend."
Burgler: "You know, Tim murdered people, you know that right? He pulled their organs out and turned them into undead. You know Jason, the president's son? Yeah, he did that to him to. I know you haven't gotten out of this room that he locked you in for a while, so you might not know about Jenny, who he's kept trapped in a cage, or Steve and Suzy, that he locked in a broom closet."
You: "It doesn't matter, Tim bound me to guard it."
Burgler: "Fine, I'll figure out how to unbind you."
You: "NO!"
Burgler: "Fine." runs in and tries to snag mouse
You: Hit's Burgler with baseball bat.
Burgler: "Seriously, stop that or I will beat you senseless."
You: "You've entered the chamber, you must die. I told you not to."
Burgler: "Fine" Karate chop "Well, crap. I broke his neck, didn't mean to. That really sucks. It's too bad Tim put a loyal guy in a position like that. But then again, the orphans await, I'd better not lose any time."
Thats a little bit more like how it went down. That sounds a lot like a lawful good burgler to me.
Burgler: "Hey, whats this secret door"
You: "Do not step into this room, for I shall have to slay you if you do."
Burgler: "Calm down. Why are you locked in this room with an alienware 3000 PC that you have no use for."
You: "Tim asked me to guard it."
Burgler: "You know Tim died thirty-odd years ago, right?"
You: "I don't care, he asked me to guard it."
Burgler: "Look, Tim has no use for it, neither do you. I, however, am going to try and use it to save dozens of orphans. Please step aside and let me take the computer."
You: "No, I don't care how many orphans you want to save, Tim wanted me to guard this computer, he was my friend."
Burgler: "You know, Tim murdered people, you know that right? He pulled their organs out and turned them into undead. You know Jason, the president's son? Yeah, he did that to him to. I know you haven't gotten out of this room that he locked you in for a while, so you might not know about Jenny, who he's kept trapped in a cage, or Steve and Suzy, that he locked in a broom closet."
You: "It doesn't matter, Tim bound me to guard it."
Burgler: "Fine, I'll figure out how to unbind you."
You: "NO!"
Burgler: "Fine." runs in and tries to snag mouse
You: Hit's Burgler with baseball bat.
Burgler: "Seriously, stop that or I will beat you senseless."
You: "You've entered the chamber, you must die. I told you not to."
Burgler: "Fine" Karate chop "Well, crap. I broke his neck, didn't mean to. That really sucks. It's too bad Tim put a loyal guy in a position like that. But then again, the orphans await, I'd better not lose any time."
Thats a little bit more like how it went down. That sounds a lot like a lawful good burgler to me.
Yea, that sounds more like what you said. Your DM is clearly being a D-bag.
Edit: Ah, just saw your last post. I think my added example isn't really necessary now, since I see that your problem was in large part an issue of the circumstances that the encounter took place in, same as me. I just read different things into the original post.
;)
{This lead to many requests to the DM for xp for succesfully managing to walk 20 ft. without breaking out the d4.}
He sold universal antidotes at general stores for 6gp that never worked against any poison an npc used, but was effective when I ingeniously drained and crafted a sleeping poison from a homebrew giant snake type monster and coated my daggers with it. It regained uselessness only when I roled a 1 and nicked myself. Again.
On third shift I imagine.
Burgler: "Hey, whats this secret door"
You: "Do not step into this room, for I shall have to slay you if you do."
Burgler: "Calm down. Why are you locked in this room with an alienware 3000 PC that you have no use for."
You: "Tim asked me to guard it."
Burgler: "You know Tim died thirty-odd years ago, right?"
You: "I don't care, he asked me to guard it."
Burgler: "Look, Tim has no use for it, neither do you. I, however, am going to try and use it to save dozens of orphans. Please step aside and let me take the computer."
You: "No, I don't care how many orphans you want to save, Tim wanted me to guard this computer, he was my friend."
Burgler: "You know, Tim murdered people, you know that right? He pulled their organs out and turned them into undead. You know Jason, the president's son? Yeah, he did that to him to. I know you haven't gotten out of this room that he locked you in for a while, so you might not know about Jenny, who he's kept trapped in a cage, or Steve and Suzy, that he locked in a broom closet."
You: "It doesn't matter, Tim bound me to guard it."
Burgler: "Fine, I'll figure out how to unbind you."
You: "NO!"
Burgler: "Fine." runs in and tries to snag mouse
You: Hit's Burgler with baseball bat.
Burgler: "Seriously, stop that or I will beat you senseless."
You: "You've entered the chamber, you must die. I told you not to."
Burgler: "Fine" Karate chop "Well, crap. I broke his neck, didn't mean to. That really sucks. It's too bad Tim put a loyal guy in a position like that. But then again, the orphans await, I'd better not lose any time."
Thats a little bit more like how it went down. That sounds a lot like a lawful good burgler to me.
that most definitely is not a lawful good burglar, as burglary is entering a place with the intent to commit a crime. hence, chaotic good burglar, or perhaps even neutral good :D
that most definitely is not a lawful good burglar, as burglary is entering a place with the intent to commit a crime. hence, chaotic good burglar, or perhaps even neutral good :D
I don't know. I think that following your concsience and your orders rules to re-allocate wealth from an evil wizard to a good order to pay for the care of orphans is very lawful.
I don't know. I think that following your concsience and your orders rules to re-allocate wealth from an evil wizard to a good order to pay for the care of orphans is very lawful.
Well, the money is going towards the rescue and safe return of orphans (and other assorted missing persons, including a halfing, which is a lot like a child), from the evil cult of Demigorgon. But those are similar goals.
-----------------------------------------
I'd just remembered something else, it wasn't a house rule so much as a mis-rule. But when the djinni turned into a 'whirlwind' he was "not actually the whirlwind" but rather "somewhere unseeable (not invisible) inside the whirlwind, nor is he automatically in the center of the whirlwind." The djinni could not be detected. Period. Detect Magic, See Invisible, Blindsense, or even Blindsight. The Djinni was for any and all given methods, entirely unfindable and targetable (but you could guess where in the 30ft maelstrom he was if you wanted). I had to pull out my own copy of the DMG (which I do not often do) to inform him that was utter poppycock, and that the djinni was indeed the whirlwind.
I don't know. I think that following your concsience and your orders rules to re-allocate wealth from an evil wizard to a good order to pay for the care of orphans is very lawful.
If your orders rules say "Steal from the Evil Rich and give to the Good Poor", I'd say that order isn't very lawful. ;) It sounds more like ritualized Chaotic Good to me... but , then again, ritualizing something, making it bound by rules and then follow those rules is Lawful, so.. Hmm.. Ok, maybe I should shut up ;)
1. Characters could only attack enemies that they were facing.
2. Turning around in your square provoked attacks of opportunity.
3. You could only get the +2 flanking bonus or sneak attack if you were behind the enemy.
4. 5-foot step rule was removed.
There may have been others but I can't really recall. I think monsters and NPCs also ignored some of those house rules as well. He also railroaded things big time and all NPCs were atheists and thought my Cleric of Pelor was loony and heard voices.
This isn't really a house rule but another good friend of mine who made some great stories once told me that he never gave his monsters any HP, he just said that they died when he figured they should.
Our DM had a dumb critical miss rule where if you roll a 1 to hit, you then have to roll against your own AC to hit yourself. This was because "uhh .... I don't know, something bad has to happen on a critical miss."
In one fight, our archer (who had 10 levels in Order of the Bow Initiate) rolled a 1 to hit a monster.
Our DM had him roll to hit himself. He rolled a natural 1 again.
This is where it gets screwy. The DM decided that since he had critically missed himself, he should roll to hit the enemy he was originally aiming for.
"What?"
Our master archer rolled to hit the enemy. He rolled a 20 and confirmed the crit.
And that's how our archer scored a crit with a natural 1.
There were so many things that were wrong with that campaign ... it was one enormous Deus Ex Machina. I could rant for hours.
How's this for ridiculous:
Our DM had a dumb critical miss rule where if you roll a 1 to hit, you then have to roll against your own AC to hit yourself. This was because "uhh .... I don't know, something bad has to happen on a critical miss."
In one fight, our archer (who had 10 levels in Order of the Bow Initiate) rolled a 1 to hit a monster.
Our DM had him roll to hit himself. He rolled a natural 1 again.
This is where it gets screwy. The DM decided that since he had critically missed himself, he should roll to hit the enemy he was originally aiming for.
"What?"
Our master archer rolled to hit the enemy. He rolled a 20 and confirmed the crit.
And that's how our archer scored a crit with a natural 1.
There were so many things that were wrong with that campaign ... it was one enormous Deus Ex Machina. I could rant for hours.
I actually consider that really funny myself. Though that is a screwy rule and if I had the same thing happen in a game I was playing in, I would stop the DM after the second crit miss and recommend rolling randomly on who the next target might be, even if the target wasn't in line of sight at that preticular moment as that would lead to possibly even more homurous happenings.
I actually consider that really funny myself. Though that is a screwy rule and if I had the same thing happen in a game I was playing in, I would stop the DM after the second crit miss and recommend rolling randomly on who the next target might be, even if the target wasn't in line of sight at that preticular moment as that would lead to possibly even more homurous happenings.
It would be funnier if it wasn't so sad and it didn't happen so often. His judgments weren't based on logic, they were either to maintain consistency with his previously designed rules (like above) or to maintain superiority over the players (like below).
This one makes me cry at night.
Our cleric (18th level with the Domination domain) decided to go gather up a great wyrm bronze dragon as his Monstrous Thrall. The save DC was 34, with a -4 penalty (so basically 38). The dragon would fail on a 7 or lower, and he prepared 3 of them.
First, the DM rolled the save.
DM: "He flies away."
Cleric: "Hey, I saw that! You rolled a 2!"
DM: "It doesn't work. He flies away."
Cleric: ... "Okay, I'll go and find another dragon."
DM: "There aren't any more bronze dragons."
Cleric: "I don't care, I'll go for any kind of dragon."
DM: "You don't find any."
Cleric: "What? You mean like on the entire continent? I spend 10 years searching, I think that's enough for a cleric with divinations to search the whole continent"
DM: "Nope. The one you tried to dominate warned all the other dragons, and they all ran away."
Cleric: "Ran away where?"
DM: "You don't know. Now you've wasted 10 years, and that blighted wasteland you were supposed to investigate has spread into your realm."
Then the DM tried to appease him. When we dutifully took the next step in his railroad plot and furthered the storyline, we found at the end of the session a treasure hoard with guess what? ... A bronze dragon egg, and a one-use scroll that ages a dragon to Ancient.
But wait ...
DM: "Okay, you use the scroll, and the dragon gets bigger, so it's Gargantuan now. But it's still just a wyrmling, so all of its stats stay the same."
Cleric: "I thought it actually aged the dragon."
DM: "No, it just ages the body, so it's still basically a wyrmling."
Cleric: "So its mental ability scores are still like a wyrmling's?"
DM: "No, all of its stats are still the same. It's just bigger. You have a cool dragon mount now."
Cleric: "So it's Gargantuan, but its Strength is still 10?"
DM: "Yep."
AAAARGH!!!!
the archer fumbled multiple occasions and tore an ear off. to balance this out, it was easily reattached. something like hold in place and cast cure light.
in this same campaign, each character was allowed a god call to avoid nasty things like a TPK.
the one time there was a total party kill, the DM changed it into a shared nightmare for all the characters.
AAAARGH!!!!
Why do people do this? What gain is there to this mode of action? why not just be mature and say "I'd really rather you not make a dragon into your thrall, as it will break the game." and come to a compromise with the player? Is it really that fun to fellate yourself in front of your players like that? :headexplo
AAAARGH!!!!
That DM would have gotten my foot up side his head if he pulled to many things like that. I think I could stand it happening once but if he pulled something simular in a later session or the same night, I would bring a quick end to the campaign and game. After which I would of tossed my name in for DM and moved on with my life. Being the DM should be left to those people who will work at doing it right for the sake of the Story and the players.
the one time there was a total party kill, the DM changed it into a shared nightmare for all the characters.
Bad case of deus ex machina. Reminds me of this one chapter in my latin book...
Nonetheless BAD case of deus ex machina!
It makes me mad... :headexplo
Even divine intervention (deus ex machina in its true form) would have been better than that!!!!
Perhaps a trip to the underworld....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deus_ex_machina
That DM would of gotten my foot up side his head if he pulled to many things like that. I think I could stand it happening once but if he pulled something simular in a later session or the same night, I would bring a quick end to the campaign and game. After which I would of tossed my name in for DM and moved on with my life. Being the DM should be left to those people who will work at doing it right for the sake of the Story and the players.
Thing was, he did it every session. The whole campaign was like a power trip for him. Unfortunately, I'm the regular DM for my group (nobody else wants to), and so I was pretty starved for actually playing a PC. So we put up with it for a while. We even explained to him (nicely) that we weren't satisfied with his DMing and gave some suggestions on what to improve on. It went in one ear and out the other.
So, I pulled Pun-Pun on him, because I wanted an excuse to end it without him asking every week "so do you guys want to play my game or what?" A great deal of ridiculousness later and the whole party was composed of overdeities with infinite divine ranks, infinite stats and half the universe.
His BBEG, "Noddegamra," which is Armageddon spelled backwards, was the main villain, and defeating him was the point of the entire campaign. Defeating him entailed an epic adventure, which consisted of us going from plot point to plot point following the precise path that he mapped out. Everything we fought was ridiculously easy, but accomplishing anything beyond advancing the plot in the exact way that he wanted us to was nigh impossible.
We advanced in level ridiculously quickly - during his opening session, we (inevitably) found ourselves on Noddegamra's Star Destroyer-esque flagship, and got our level 9 butts handed to us ("Bwa ha ha! He's a level 100 Sorcerer!") and he gave us two levels for it. In no time, we were level 17, but we still couldn't affect the plot any more than when we were level 6.
So, at the very end, when as deities we were able to instantly know exactly what was going on, we found out that Noddegamra was an overdeity, and we were all actually just figments in Noddegamra's mind, stray thoughts or some such. Although we ended up with half the universe (it's hard to decide a contest between two infinitely powerful beings), that was the best outcome we could have possible hoped for. In the end, it would have required another massive fricking deus ex to even think about doing anything to Noddegamra, because the DM needed to exercise his superiority.
That's when we realized that Noddegamra was our DM. Literally. It's sad that we had to resort to some stupid rules trick to prove a point.
That's my story.
Thing was, he did it every session. The whole campaign was like a power trip for him. Unfortunately, I'm the regular DM for my group (nobody else wants to), and so I was pretty starved for actually playing a PC. So we put up with it for a while. We even explained to him (nicely) that we weren't satisfied with his DMing and gave some suggestions on what to improve on. It went in one ear and out the other.
So, I pulled Pun-Pun on him, because I wanted an excuse to end it without him asking every week "so do you guys want to play my game or what?" A great deal of ridiculousness later and the whole party was composed of overdeities with infinite divine ranks, infinite stats and half the universe.
His BBEG, "Noddegamra," which is Armageddon spelled backwards, was the main villain, and defeating him was the point of the entire campaign. Defeating him entailed an epic adventure, which consisted of us going from plot point to plot point following the precise path that he mapped out. Everything we fought was ridiculously easy, but accomplishing anything beyond advancing the plot in the exact way that he wanted us to was nigh impossible.
We advanced in level ridiculously quickly - during his opening session, we (inevitably) found ourselves on Noddegamra's Star Destroyer-esque flagship, and got our level 9 butts handed to us ("Bwa ha ha! He's a level 100 Sorcerer!") and he gave us two levels for it. In no time, we were level 17, but we still couldn't affect the plot any more than when we were level 6.
So, at the very end, when as deities we were able to instantly know exactly what was going on, we found out that Noddegamra was an overdeity, and we were all actually just figments in Noddegamra's mind, stray thoughts or some such. Although we ended up with half the universe (it's hard to decide a contest between two infinitely powerful beings), that was the best outcome we could have possible hoped for. In the end, it would have required another massive fricking deus ex to even think about doing anything to Noddegamra, because the DM needed to exercise his superiority.
That's when we realized that Noddegamra was our DM. Literally. It's sad that we had to resort to some stupid rules trick to prove a point.
That's my story.
You win. Nothing can ever beat that story.
That DM would of gotten my foot up side his head if he pulled to many things like that. I think I could stand it happening once but if he pulled something simular in a later session or the same night, I would bring a quick end to the campaign and game. After which I would of tossed my name in for DM and moved on with my life. Being the DM should be left to those people who will work at doing it right for the sake of the Story and the players.
Would HAVE.
Grah. #1 pet peeve of mine.
You actually played Pun-Pun? Hardcore.
Wait...
You actually played Pun-Pun? Hardcore.
Yes. As a matter of fact, the whole party became Pun-Puns. I wasn't a kobold though, I was a 19th level half-orc warblade.
The only reason we ended up with half the universe instead of all of it was because he decided that Noddegamra interrupted our infinite action loop and immediately stripped away all of the powers we had just gained. Just when we were about to use the squirrels.
So we ripped open a gateway to another plane and did everything there, but by that time he had decided to do the same thing we were doing, and we all ended up infinite beings.
This one makes me cry at night…
…The only reason we ended up with half the universe instead of all of it was because he decided that Noddegamra interrupted our infinite action loop and immediately stripped away all of the powers we had just gained.
I feel your pain. Rarely have I seen such a vivid illustration of the fact that DMing is a privilege, not a right.
Thing was, he did it every session. The whole campaign was like a power trip for him. Unfortunately, I'm the regular DM for my group (nobody else wants to), and so I was pretty starved for actually playing a PC. So we put up with it for a while. We even explained to him (nicely) that we weren't satisfied with his DMing and gave some suggestions on what to improve on. It went in one ear and out the other.
So, I pulled Pun-Pun on him, because I wanted an excuse to end it without him asking every week "so do you guys want to play my game or what?" A great deal of ridiculousness later and the whole party was composed of overdeities with infinite divine ranks, infinite stats and half the universe.
His BBEG, "Noddegamra," which is Armageddon spelled backwards, was the main villain, and defeating him was the point of the entire campaign. Defeating him entailed an epic adventure, which consisted of us going from plot point to plot point following the precise path that he mapped out. Everything we fought was ridiculously easy, but accomplishing anything beyond advancing the plot in the exact way that he wanted us to was nigh impossible.
We advanced in level ridiculously quickly - during his opening session, we (inevitably) found ourselves on Noddegamra's Star Destroyer-esque flagship, and got our level 9 butts handed to us ("Bwa ha ha! He's a level 100 Sorcerer!") and he gave us two levels for it. In no time, we were level 17, but we still couldn't affect the plot any more than when we were level 6.
So, at the very end, when as deities we were able to instantly know exactly what was going on, we found out that Noddegamra was an overdeity, and we were all actually just figments in Noddegamra's mind, stray thoughts or some such. Although we ended up with half the universe (it's hard to decide a contest between two infinitely powerful beings), that was the best outcome we could have possible hoped for. In the end, it would have required another massive fricking deus ex to even think about doing anything to Noddegamra, because the DM needed to exercise his superiority.
That's when we realized that Noddegamra was our DM. Literally. It's sad that we had to resort to some stupid rules trick to prove a point.
That's my story.
Ouch, that story hurts my head. I guess I've been in a similar situation. Our BBEG had made wishes so that any one person could only ever do 1 damage to him total. Ever. There was some quest we were to go on to fix that, but we never did of course.
I feel your pain sir.
Well, the money is going towards the rescue and safe return of orphans (and other assorted missing persons, including a halfing, which is a lot like a child), from the evil cult of Demigorgon. But those are similar goals.
-----------------------------------------
I'd just remembered something else, it wasn't a house rule so much as a mis-rule. But when the djinni turned into a 'whirlwind' he was "not actually the whirlwind" but rather "somewhere unseeable (not invisible) inside the whirlwind, nor is he automatically in the center of the whirlwind." The djinni could not be detected. Period. Detect Magic, See Invisible, Blindsense, or even Blindsight. The Djinni was for any and all given methods, entirely unfindable and targetable (but you could guess where in the 30ft maelstrom he was if you wanted). I had to pull out my own copy of the DMG (which I do not often do) to inform him that was utter poppycock, and that the djinni was indeed the whirlwind.
Yeah... I'd go with Neutral Good.
Chaotic Good would probably have been appalled that the Djinn stood there for 30 years.
Lawful Good would have gotten evidence of the wizards illicit dealings and tried to prove it to the Djinn.
Either way, it was not Evil, or even Neutral. At least, if the characters felt remorse for killing him. If not... Neutral.
All this, along with the fact that the party is constantly running for their lives rather than having an actually fun campaign is a large part of the reason we simply don't invite him to play now.
*-Just for the record, I as a DM do not adjust rolls or boost enemies to allow them to hit. If they can only hit you on a 20, so be it.
That's when we realized that Noddegamra was our DM. Literally. It's sad that we had to resort to some stupid rules trick to prove a point.
That's my story.
It's the ultimate Mary-Sue DMPC railroad FTW!!!
Hated the idea of ToB or of any spells he was unfamiliar with being used. Use a power or spell he'd never heard of, and his first response was always, "How are you doing that?"
If a player was using a power or spell I'd never heard of, the game would come to a screeching halt. How do you wind up using material the DM isn't familiar with?
If he approved characters sight unseen, without being familiar with the material they were using or declaring which source material was permitted, he's incompetent.
not saying the rules should be ignored, but he road blocks everything players try to do if its not covered in the rules, or you try and use something in a way other than intended. he only frustrates the situation by metagaming his decisions, no that breaks balance so they didnt want you to do it like that is a typical response.
only his style of play is reflected and the encounters he likes are present, pushes his idea of fantasy and character unto players, punishing characters that dont fit his idea of what a rogue, wizard, fighter should be, ridiculing the character at the table hitting them on missed rolls and making them miss on high rolls. plenty examples if you are interested, but my biggest complaint is that dms to much more damage to every ones fun when they power game.
The Event in Question or Defense Submits Evidence A to the Court
.....wow.
I was in one where the party began play with an NPC god in the form of a child in tow. EVERYTHING we did was met with "Grandma (an Uberdeity) isn't gonna like that!"
Of course, proceeding against the directions of a six-year-old resulted in the bodily appearance of a supergod who would do things to us with no save and force our compliance. I walked after I was forcibly compelled to bless the body of a goblin we slew (the only thing thus far in the story that wasn't a shapechanged djinn with 30 class levels).
There were a ton of houserules, and I didn't learn very many as it was a 'learn as you go' thing (other than he houseruled what skills/feats/gear/background/eye color/names/thoughts my character was allowed to have).
Really, I think these DM's are better off writing a novel than trying to run a cooperative storytelling game.
My group that I now DM, however, all discuss any house rules we want before play, and I usually expect them to make up things in the world related to their characters (a guild, family home, etc) to give them a jumping off point to roleplay from.
1. One DM played things almost entirely by the books, except for a strange rule that applied only to wizards and sorcerers, and no other casters: Each spell slot was castable a number of times equal to its level, meaning that cantrips and 1st level spell slots were usable once, second level spells could be cast twice before they were considered "expended," and so on.
Oddly, nobody at that table even thought twice of it until I pointed it out.
2. Another group with which I've had some interaction begins all their campaigns as NPC classes and the DM makes the characters "earn" their PC class. I suppose that's all well and good, but I wouldn't go anywhere near a game where the DM counted a Commoner 5/Fighter2 as a 7th level character for the purposes of determining appropriate challenge levels.
3. Conversely to many of the stories about DMs barely giving their PCs clothing, let alone equipment, I had one DM begin a campaign at 5th level with two conditions: one, you must have magical ability of some sort, and two, you could take any equipment you wanted, so long as it was okayed by him.
I used the standard wealth by level charts for everything except an heirloom longbow that was somewhat central to my character concept. The DM sternly told me that the number of magical items I was wearing was completely inadequate and told me to upgrade my armor to celestial chain, my shortswords to +3 fiery and +3 icy, respectively, and handed me boots of the hinterlands, a cloak of elvenkind, rings of force shield and sustenance along with misc. other bits.
Once again, 5th level character. That campaign didn't last long.
Hmm. Those are all the bad ones I can think of for now. More later, perhaps.
Off topic: ...why does Gleemax think "Gleemax" and "DM" are typos?
Can't say for sure because I can't find the text.
Off topic: ...why does Gleemax think "Gleemax" and "DM" are typos?
It's not gleemax, it's Firefox (or whatever browser you use).
In a 2E Planescape campaign, the DM divided up your hit points among body parts. When you are hit, the location is determined and that's where the hit points come from. If your right arm hit points reaches 0, you lose the arm or otherwise have it crippled, depending upon the situation. If it's your head, so sorry so sad. If you take overall body damage, such as from a fireball, divide the damage evenly among your body parts. Therefore, despite my fighter having 90 hit points, I only really had 28 hit points as that was what each body part had. Oh joy.
1. Character creation, they can either roll the 4d6 and take out the lowest, 3d6 and replace the lowest total roll with an 18, or roll 1d20 and pray for good luck.
2. Skills-A natural 20 is an auto success, nat 1 is going to blow up in your face somehow.
Thats all I can think of right now.
House rules lets see...
1. Character creation, they can either roll the 4d6 and take out the lowest, 3d6 and replace the lowest total roll with an 18, or roll 1d20 and pray for good luck.
1d20 x6 for stats? That's ballsy. I'd go for it just for S&G.
player: ok i have this awsome idea to make a frost mage all my powers come from ice, my eyes are blue and the ground frosts over where i step,here are my stats
DM: sweet sounds cool, now here are your spells, mage hand, light, feather fall and whisper wind
player: umm dude there are no frost spells there, and come to think of it no attack spells either
DM: hmm guess not, ok are you ready to start
player: umm my frost mage is kinda underpowered
DM: not my fault, you going to play or not
I cant tell you how many arguments we had over the years!
player: ok i have this awsome idea to make a frost mage all my powers come from ice, my eyes are blue and the ground frosts over where i step,here are my stats
DM: sweet sounds cool, now here are your spells, mage hand, light, feather fall and whisper wind
player: umm dude there are no frost spells there, and come to think of it no attack spells either
DM: hmm guess not, ok are you ready to start
player: umm my frost mage is kinda underpowered
DM: not my fault, you going to play or not
Player: of course not, why would I play a game where I can't even control what my character learns? This is such a screaming beacon that you're a control freak DM that I'd literally need a <40 IQ to not notice.
Upon reaching 3 hits the Weapon is broken and you can start crying...
Player: of course not, why would I play a game where I can't even control what my character learns? This is such a screaming beacon that you're a control freak DM that I'd literally need a >40 IQ to not notice.
Player 2: Uhm, you know that ">" means "greater than", right? ;)
Player 2: Uhm, you know that ">" means "greater than", right? ;)
Player 3: Guys, how do you manage to use mathematical symbols in a conversation without saying them?
Player 2: Uhm, you know that ">" means "greater than", right? ;)
Silence you! I'm allowed a typo!
Player 3: Guys, how do you manage to use mathematical symbols in a conversation without saying them?
Player 2: It's Magic, silly! ;)
Every five fights, each used Weapon takes a hit (every 4 or less if the fights are with hard Foes)...
Upon reaching 3 hits the Weapon is broken and you can start crying...
that's more than a little harsh. if I was going to do something like that, I'd probably break out the item saves table, and a fail = -1 hit and damage, non-magic items only need to save. I'm too used to tolkien where magic swords normally last for millennia.
side note, I know item saves existed in 1e, not too sure about after that.
lets say we are facing the end monster in the expedition to under mountain campaign. Our ranger rolls a 20, crits, 20 to confirm, we give him a 3rd roll, and its 20. he automatically slays said beast.
it has only happened one time.
had a DM for ages who forced arcane spell casters to take random starting spells, no input at all from the player,
player: ok i have this awsome idea to make a frost mage all my powers come from ice, my eyes are blue and the ground frosts over where i step,here are my stats
DM: sweet sounds cool, now here are your spells, mage hand, light, feather fall and whisper wind
player: umm dude there are no frost spells there, and come to think of it no attack spells either
DM: hmm guess not, ok are you ready to start
player: umm my frost mage is kinda underpowered
DM: not my fault, you going to play or not
I cant tell you how many arguments we had over the years!
i forgot to mention he eventually let my wife take starting spells that suited her backstory (dragon blooded elf) but that was only cause he had a crush on her, and by her i mean the character not my wife, he was a strange little man
- Druids gain a +1 to everything if they touch a tree that day.
- The DM has to roll randomly for random encounters in the night. (cue desciption of crazy convoluted rules to determine what/if you get attacked by)
- since artifacts have no price, PCs should be able to get them on creation
Not to mention that every time they find gems, she asks if any of them is a chaos diamond.
They're level 6. Oh, we're gonna have fun working these house rules out of her as they come to pass.1. Our halfling rogue, who the DM loved, never was attacked first, and never had to roll anything but a reflex save.
2. In the same campaign, our wizard was always attacked first, no matter how many people (three, Our meat shield fighter, the rouge, and me the Cleric of Hextor/St Cuthbert), and he was always brought to the near brink of death, until i joined the game.
3. Before i joined that campaign, The guys would get killed at least once a month, only to be resurrected at a local monastery with all of their worldly possessions except for the wizards spell book, and the rouges thieves tools (Because why would monks either want or need these things, that tend to sell for a hefty sum) taken away
Oh yeah, some one was talking about a multiple critical roll. This is from what I've seen, usually only applied to attack rolls as an instant kill roll. And finally, Critical failure rules make sense to me, cause, well, if you have a chance to succeed unbelievably well, then should have to fail horribly. I know none of these things are house rules, but they are examples of DMs gone their own particular brand eccentricity
Same guy, had an odd way of counting challenge for an encounter. If the HD of the characters outweighed the HD of the creature, he considered it balanced. He would then wonder why we couldn't take a balor at 5th level.
In a convention game I ran, I had a minotaur take out a 7th level paladin with a single hit. I rolled the first 20 behind my screen, and the other 4 out in front of the players. Nobody (not even the player of the paladin) was upset about it, and they actually really liked the rule. Especially as I used it the same way when the rogue rolled 3 20's in a row on a sneak attack.
I had a house rule for critical hits. If you rolled a 20 to confirm, the multiple would go up by one step, and you rolled again. This continued until you stopped rolling 20's.
In a convention game I ran, I had a minotaur take out a 7th level paladin with a single hit. I rolled the first 20 behind my screen, and the other 4 out in front of the players. Nobody (not even the player of the paladin) was upset about it, and they actually really liked the rule. Especially as I used it the same way when the rogue rolled 3 20's in a row on a sneak attack.
That reminds me of Savage Worlds system where you can technically do an infinite amount of damage with a single attack.
Also, regarding another post, I don't think triple 20's causing an instant kill is a foolish idea. Sometimes you just get godlike ass whooping abilities.
Mwahaha...DM on the player boards!!!!
I had a house rule for critical hits. If you rolled a 20 to confirm, the multiple would go up by one step, and you rolled again. This continued until you stopped rolling 20's.
In a convention game I ran, I had a minotaur take out a 7th level paladin with a single hit. I rolled the first 20 behind my screen, and the other 4 out in front of the players. Nobody (not even the player of the paladin) was upset about it, and they actually really liked the rule. Especially as I used it the same way when the rogue rolled 3 20's in a row on a sneak attack.
Out of curiousity, why would you use your house rules in a convention game, especially wthout discussing it with the players before hand?
The only one I ever had a problem with was my DM who had terrible grammar. I'm a huge spelling/grammar advocate, and it just bugged the hell out of me that he couldn't say prerequisite, coterminus and a few other things. He said prerequisite as pre-quist and coterminus as coter-minus. He also has trouble starting his sentences, he would start one sentence six times before finally settling on a good beginning. One time I just snapped and told him to spit it out already and he got all ****** off and said that if I ever said that again he'd dock me XP.
So his house rule became: The DM's pronunciations are always correct.
If me DM reads this it is not an attack, this thread is about venting, so don't chew me out please!
Me thinks you are misremembering the difference between grammar and pronunciation. Someone who learns largely through reading rather than talking is likely to have good reading comprehension but doesn’t necessarily know the pronunciation. I must have read the 1E DMG a hundred times when I was kid but didn’t necessarily know how to properly pronounce “melee,” “milieu,” “ennui,” or all the other words that Lord Gygax included before they decided to make D&D books as interesting to read as a DVD player manual.
I remember as a little kid being meanly corrected for pronouncing Prague as “pray-goo” and thinking, “Jerk, how many ten years old know the capital of Czechoslovakia?”
Me thinks you are misremembering the difference between grammar and pronunciation. Someone who learns largely through reading rather than talking is likely to have good reading comprehension but doesn’t necessarily know the pronunciation. I must have read the 1E DMG a hundred times when I was kid but didn’t necessarily know how to properly pronounce “melee,” “milieu,” “ennui,” or all the other words that Lord Gygax included before they decided to make D&D books as interesting to read as a DVD player manual.
I remember as a little kid being meanly corrected for pronouncing Prague as “pray-goo” and thinking, “Jerk, how many ten years old know the capital of Czechoslovakia?”
That's near where my family is from!
a 110 pound femal elf fighter should not hanve a strength of 24 when raging Is her kid trapped uner a car?
Me thinks you are misremembering the difference between grammar and pronunciation. Someone who learns largely through reading rather than talking is likely to have good reading comprehension but doesn’t necessarily know the pronunciation. I must have read the 1E DMG a hundred times when I was kid but didn’t necessarily know how to properly pronounce “melee,” “milieu,” “ennui,” or all the other words that Lord Gygax included before they decided to make D&D books as interesting to read as a DVD player manual.
I remember as a little kid being meanly corrected for pronouncing Prague as “pray-goo” and thinking, “Jerk, how many ten years old know the capital of Czechoslovakia?”
Oh good, its not just me. I first encountered the word 'Paladin' in D&D when I was a youngster and it was many years before I learned that it did NOT precisely rhyme with 'Alladin'
Reshuffling seating every combat so that everyone sits in initiative order going clock-wise around the table...actually, I just made that up. I think I need to try that one on my group so it makes the list here.
That would make me want to KILL!
I like my warm seat. I would totally have to go RAGE on someone!
I hate it when DMs on the spot rule the MOST INSANE things.
I once took 'shrapnel' damage standing behind a heavy reinforced wall that was being pelted by giants throwing boulders. The giants were several range increments away, so it wasn't like they were close. AND it wasn't just a little damage, it was full damage with full STRENGTH MODIFIER!
Why even hide behind the wall? It was even worse, because if I had been in the open the Giant would have to hit little ol' me. Inside the castle, all they had to hit was the FREAKING HUGE 40' STONE WALL!!! :headexplo
I had to take a break, so I walked into the next room where someone was watching professional wrestling. I am not a wrestling fan, but I felt like I just had to get some realism back into my life. :D
the DM letting the fighter of the group take the Frenzied berzerker prestige class with out meeting the rquirement of having the rage ability
All you needed to say, really.
a 110 pound female elf fighter should not have a strength of 24 when raging
Fixed your typing.
In addition:
Female Wood elf, 32 point buy:
STR 18
DEX 14
CON 14
INT 12
WIS 8
CHA 12
Level 10: two points to STR. Classes: Barbarian 3, Bard 3, Dragon Disciple 4.
Base STR: 24. STR while raging: 28.
Without items.
It's not that much.
Which is fine.. I have no real issue with that...
But the I got the list. In my opinion, the items he handed out were far below our level.
+1 and +2 weapons for level 12 characters in Forgotten Realms?
massive damage is crap
same with crit fail (i have a very specific set of rolls and dcs for this but the chance of a low level char failing is ~1/2000)
here are some that apply to some worlds
if it is a particulaly hard world/adventure i have players roll 5d6 and drop 2 dice per score, arrange as desired (also if the chars will be resting in dungeon, as i do do random encounters, even while chars are asleep!)
in a no psionics campain, i occasionally put in psionic items that can be activated with the use magic device skill, but other wise magic/psi transperency is gone. in other campains the magic/psi transperency rules apply to everything relevent
my major (ie consistant from world to world) are
massive damage is crap
same with crit fail (i have a very specific set of rolls and dcs for this but the chance of a low level char failing is ~1/2000)
here are some that apply to some worlds
if it is a particulaly hard world/adventure i have players roll 5d6 and drop 2 dice per score, arrange as desired (also if the chars will be resting in dungeon, as i do do random encounters, even while chars are asleep!)
in a no psionics campain, i occasionally put in psionic items that can be activated with the use magic device skill, but other wise magic/psi transperency is gone. in other campains the magic/psi transperency rules apply to everything relevent
By the time you can actually get massive damage, the only way to fail it is a 1. It is a stupid concept though and I never bother with it. I do the same with crit failure too.
Okay, that's a joke. But I did have a GM angrly tell - his tone was an order - me once I was supposed to break the rules. He even said he would punish me when I did that. I am still not certian what he wanted or what he actually excepted.
Okay, that's a joke. But I did have a GM angrly tell - his tone was an order - me once I was supposed to break the rules. He even said he would punish me when I did that. I am still not certian what he wanted or what he actually excepted.
We are definitely going to need a lot more info on this one.
We are definitely going to need a lot more info on this one.
Well, I am not certain what to say. He did that. This happened about 10-years and so the specifics have faded though the incident in general still stands out in my memory. Everyone is the group was young (and inexperienced in dealing with people) and the GM was intractable and difficult to negotiate with on many points. For example, he was deeply set against the characters purchasing an inn – it would stop us from going on dungeon crawls and adventurers are only supposed to spend their money on ale and whores. Looking back on it now, I think he felt a deep need to control the characters and dominate the players.In any event, the group began breaking apart not long afterwards as several players departed for greener pastures.
This same GM made the Paladin PC stop distributing blankets to NPC peasants during a winter. The Paladin PC was supposed to be out killing orcs and what not.
Giving blankets to the poor? Wow...I think that's the most heart-felt thing I've ever heard of in D&D. Have to say, that's a first.
I can just imagine the DM saying..."Stop helping people! You're supposed to be killing things!" lol
I can just imagine the DM saying..."Stop helping people! You're supposed to be killing things!"
Pretty much, yeah. That was why he was opposed to PC purchasing and running inns/taverns, giving to the poor, teaching people how to read, throwing big parties and the like. The structure of the campaign included lots of down time for some characters (all the players had at least two or three different PCs in the same campaign)... but we were just supposed to be unapologetic killers.
Your DM hates his players. He wants all the power. I'm an advocate for dice rolling character creation, but that's rediculous. It's even worse than pre3E since even though 3d6 in order was the official rule, you got to pick your class after your roll. There was a reason pre3E 4d6 drop lowest was a common house rule; RAW dice rolling at the time sucked. 3d6 straight still does.
4d6, reroll 1s, ditch lowest. in all but one campaign where we used it, that was done in three sets of six(so three full sets) and then either you picked the one you liked most, or the DM picked one, depending on various factors, including the mood of the DM. :P
It worked great. We always had room to try wierd builds that otherwise would have been too MAD to live, and no one felt gipped. My bard/rogue/ranger was pretty fun.
some houserules I've seen/used:
"half-casters" use their character level, rather than class level, to determine caster level when calculating DCs and such, but for the purposes of gaining new spells.
EDIT: only the spells from their half-caster class or classes counted for this. various multi-class combos of bard, ranger, pally(not that anyone ever played one), monk and interestingly, rogue, popped up once this was implimented.
multi-classing penalties don't exist. forget them.
class alignment restrictions don't exist. forget them.
there were some reworks of LA races to get rid of their level adjustments. The masterpiece of this was the centaur, who ended up only having a level adjustment of one, while still capturing the essence of the race. we had a few centaur pcs after that, as well as satyrs and dryads.
heh...oh man...there was this one dryad pc...nevermind. I'll shut up.
no rolling hit dice. we either maxed, and fought harder enemies, or used a system that calculated an average number of hit points per level. (in star wars RCR, we used max vit, and then faced greuling encounters that threatened to tap us out of resources anyway.)
wands and scrolls were kept competitive, but not quite as good as, actual caster spells. In other words, they were useful, but couldn't outshine a real caster. there was also a lot of custom magic equipment made for pure non magic people. things like a percentage chance of a fear effect against an enemy that hits the wearer and deals damage.
in late game, there were homebrew feats that allowed various class features to have their range extended, the most obvious example being sneak attacks.
there were plenty of others, many of which were geared towards allowing non casters to compete with well made, well played casters.
Roll 4d6 drop the lowest. Keep rerolling until you get a 16 or better. Then take the next five rolls of 4d6 drop the lowest. That gives you one set. Now repeat the above twice more. Pick one set and that's what you use.
My last character ended up quite ridiculous:
18, 18, 17, 14, 10, 7
I might be able to talk them to using 18, 16, 14, 13, 12, 10.
As I have said before, elsewhere, if these issues arise the best thing to do is to simply bow out of the game politely. Discussing the issue never seems to serve any purpose but to create unnecessary conflict. You do what you are told, or you leave.
the only time i had a problem with his rules is when rolling for characters nobody was allowed allowed to have ability scores higher than 18 after racial's, which is not that bad except it makes rolling almost pointless in my eyes
o well good luck everyone
1. Moving into a square adjacent to an enemy provokes an OA unless you are charging.
2. If a mob pushes or pulls you past another mob, that other mobs gets an OA.
3. Most heal checks are minor actions (except stabilizing the dead and some other things).
4. You can spend a minor action to make a heal check. If the check succeeds, you get a saving throw
5. You can spend a minor action to make a heal check. If the check succeeds, you can use your standard action to make a saving throw.
6. An ally can use a heal check on you to grant you an immediate saving throw
I'm curious what you guys think about these houserules.
1. Moving into a square adjacent to an enemy provokes an OA unless you are charging.
I would say bad, as that would make playing a melee character a lot harder.
2. If a mob pushes or pulls you past another mob, that other mobs gets an OA.
If players get the same opportunity, I would say this could be good tactics.
3. Most heal checks are minor actions (except stabilizing the dead and some other things).
No opinion.
4. You can spend a minor action to make a heal check. If the check succeeds, you get a saving throw
5. You can spend a minor action to make a heal check. If the check succeeds, you can use your standard action to make a saving throw.
Maybe I'm reading this wrong, but they seem to contradict. Is the saving throw a free action or a standard?
What is the order of regular saving throw and the heal check? Do you have to make the heal check before the regular saving throw? If so, and if you fail the heal check, do you still get your regular saving throw? If you make the check, do you get to make 2 saving throws for the same thing?
6. An ally can use a heal check on you to grant you an immediate saving throw
This could negate several of Leader powers that allow allies to make saving throws.
Don't really like it.
2
Good if players get the same benefit
3
This could be bad considering you can use heal to allow an ally to make a saving throw or use their second wind as a free action (albeit without the +2 to defenses).
4 & 5
I assume you mean these to be different versions of the same rule? 4 seems too strong since the DC to grant a saving throw is only 15. 5 seems alright but I wouldn't see myself using it over taking a normal standard action.
6
Unless I'm mistaken this is already in the Heal skill uses.
4 & 5
I assume you mean these to be different versions of the same rule? 4 seems too strong since the DC to grant a saving throw is only 15. 5 seems alright but I wouldn't see myself using it over taking a normal standard action.
Yeah, different version of the same rule. When we were lower level he said we could use do a heal check as a minor action to make a save against immobilize. Yesterday he told me that, while dazed, I could use heal to grant myself a saving throw, but the saving throw would be a standard action. Thus, since I was dazed, I couldn't do it.
6
Unless I'm mistaken this is already in the Heal skill uses.
I don't think either of us knew that, so that probably solves all the problems.
I'm curious what you guys think about these houserules.
1. Moving into a square adjacent to an enemy provokes an OA unless you are charging.
how?
you provoke when you leave the square, not when you enter the new one....this would mean the monsters are attacking you before you're in reach of their weapon. Once you arrive in the adjacent square (and in reach), your "defenses" are back up, and you're not going to provoke....
for creatures with reach, they still can't strike quickly at ranges past adjacent.
creatures with threatening reach CAN hit you when you aren't adjacent, but, as the rules say, only when you LEAVE a threatened square, meaning they can reach you, and then you drop your defenses to move....they hit you right as you START to move (still in the threatened square for effects like immobilization or stopped movement).
PLUS this is already able to be simulated by readied actions (they ready to hit you if you move adjacent).
FINALLY, a gameplay reason why it would be ridiculous: the party melee characters would stand away from the monsters, with readied actions to attack for when the monsters ran up -> it would mean a readied attack AND an OA....all this while the ranged characters have fun and beat the other side senseless.....it would only cause both sides to stand around waiting for the other side to move up first.
FINALLY, a gameplay reason why it would be ridiculous: the party melee characters would stand away from the monsters, with readied actions to attack for when the monsters ran up -> it would mean a readied attack AND an OA....all this while the ranged characters have fun and beat the other side senseless.....it would only cause both sides to stand around waiting for the other side to move up first.
Which might actually be interesting in a homebrew deuling system. Something else would have to be added, probably, to create an advantage/disadvantage scenario for being the first to close, but completing that line of thought alone might be about enough to set up an interesting dueling subsystem that doesn't take hours to teach to someone.
I'm curious what you guys think about these houserules.
1. Moving into a square adjacent to an enemy provokes an OA unless you are charging.
how?
you provoke when you leave the square, not when you enter the new one....this would mean the monsters are attacking you before you're in reach of their weapon. Once you arrive in the adjacent square (and in reach), your "defenses" are back up, and you're not going to provoke....
for creatures with reach, they still can't strike quickly at ranges past adjacent.
creatures with threatening reach CAN hit you when you aren't adjacent, but, as the rules say, only when you LEAVE a threatened square, meaning they can reach you, and then you drop your defenses to move....they hit you right as you START to move (still in the threatened square for effects like immobilization or stopped movement).
PLUS this is already able to be simulated by readied actions (they ready to hit you if you move adjacent).
FINALLY, a gameplay reason why it would be ridiculous: the party melee characters would stand away from the monsters, with readied actions to attack for when the monsters ran up -> it would mean a readied attack AND an OA....all this while the ranged characters have fun and beat the other side senseless.....it would only cause both sides to stand around waiting for the other side to move up first.
I suppose if you want to get technical, you could say that the OA is provoked by ending movement adjacent to an enemy without shifting or charging. I'm not fond of it because it means our Warden specifically wanted an at-will that he could use while charging and our avenger usually gives up his Oath of Emnity role becuase he doesn't want to move in and provoke. I don't care so much because I'm ranged.
My current DM won't accept anything that isn't in the DDI Character Builder yet, even if the book has been released, which means I have to wait a month before busting out any new content.
I would do this voluntarily as a player!
-when creating your character you may only use races from the PHB
now on the surface this dosent sound like such a horrible thing, but then the DM shows up with a aasimar (sp?) DMPC
While running, if you enter a threatened area, you provoke an AoO, even if you enter the threatened area and don't move any more squares.
"You can't use improved disarm unless you have a free hand, and bucklers take a hand to wield."
If you make a full attack, you can only make 1 of your attacks on your turn, then wait until everyone else in the combat takes their turn in initiative order, then you can make all of your other attacks.
My DM allowed a character (ECL 10, Level Adjustment +8, 2 levels of Rogue) with no ranks in Spellcraft, or Knowledge (arcana) or (religion) or (nature), nor (the planes), to make a deal with a devil for a Wall of Stone at will item. That ticked me off, essentially a player knowledge vs character knowledge action.
Able Learner feat is broken. (I was playing a human wizard)
Moving into a threatened area provokes an AoO if you aren't fighting defensively or taking the total defense action.
I joined the group very late into the campaign (about level 11 or so, and I had never met most of the people). It was the DM's custom world so I decided to hold off on making a full background for my character until I got a feel for it and had a chance to ask him questions.
When I did though, it turned out I only get to decide half of my character's background (and to me, the least interesting half), anything after they turn 18. The DM rolls randomly on a chart to determine your character's social status and I think occupation or something else growing up (this part isn't TOO bad) and then comes up with the story of your character's childhood up until they become an adult. What!? He claims that you don't get to choose what happens to you as a child, so thus your character doesn't either. Again. WHAT!?
I'm sorry, but that's just ridiculous, and it sabotages the player's ability to create an interesting background if the most character-defining part of their life is taken away from them. Instead of my gnome cleric being driven to her faith because of some life-changing event, someone just suggested to her parents to send her to the temple because she was an average student at her school. Oh boy. Yay. So much I can do with THAT one other than make her resentful.
The DM never asked, so in my mind she didn't excel in school not because she was average, but because she was delinquent. An old priest from the temple showed her a kindness she had never known one day and she began training under him. Eventually she asked him to "suggest" to her parents that they give up their poor untalented daughter to work in the temple. It didn't entirely fit with what the DM gave me, nor was it that interesting, but whatever. It was my way of taking back the character, even if just a little.
1. Moving into a square adjacent to an enemy provokes an OA unless you are charging.
This is similar to an epic Avenger feat, Halo of Warding. The feat has some other clauses though, like the avenger has to be adjacent to OOE, doesn't trigger on shift, forced movement, or teleport. To give something like this to everyone seems pretty harsh on the melee.
If the DM was really attached to it, could tweak it so it doesn't apply to shifts, or perhaps only when the character moved more than 3 (or whatever) spaces.
If you roll a 1 on your attack misses and:
A) your weapon breaks
B) you fumble your weapon and can't attack next turn while you draw a backup or recover your weapon
C) Same as B, but drawing doesn't use your next attack
D) You hit yourself
If you get a 20;
A) nothing special, not even an automatic hit
B) auto hit
C) auto hit reroll for another attack if 20, keep going
D) auto hit reroll for another attack once
E) auto hit double damage
Double damage even varied from (for long sword)
(1d8+str bonus) x2
(2d8+str bonus)
(2d8+str bonusx2)
None of these are horrible, but I never new what to expect when I rolled a 1 or 20.
Hopefully next time we play he will just let me do that, play my character.
First, an experience from a game I played in a few years back. Our DM didn't like 3.5 as a whole but liked parts of it. So he hands us a big ass rules packet for his modified FR campaign, complete with quotes from important NPC's on the front. I can't remember most of the HRs, just that some how gods like Cyric and Bhaal existed at the same time, despite the obvious problems there. In the end the game became a problem more because of the railroading than the HRs, but it ended with this classic line, after our ranger tried to disarm the strange woman following us WITH HIS BOW: DM: You just killed (insert random noble sounding name here) JP: Was she important? Jack: Dude, she's quoted on the front of the rules packet!
Mind if I sig this? :D
I would not know if this would be so muhc a house rule or what, but I had a DM once that refused to read errata. If it was written in the books, that was it.
That would be a house rule and an arbitrary one at that. Reminds me of the guy that didn't think Kevin Bacon was in Footloose. www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqs9DYisSsg
Well, I wanted to rant about my DM, but didn't see the spot to do it other than here... my bad.
The topic close enough!
Glad for you to have a place to talk about it and I hope things are going better!-Animal Companions are chosen by the DM. The player can mention his preference, but it is the DM's choice what animal companion he can have. Personally--this seems unfair (and he refuses to allow the Distracting Strikes alternative class feature).
-Only one of each class in the party (e.g. there can't be two clerics).
-All poisons are automatic evil-alignment.
-All poisons are automatic evil-alignment.
It is interesting that poisoning someone with a blade is evil, but gutting them with it is not, necessarily evil.
-Only one of each class in the party (e.g. there can't be two clerics).
I've met resistance, but not outright disallowance of this. Imo, it makes more sense RP-wise and in many cases works out better strategically. In fact, I've had entire groups of all the same class, just with some variation and everyone worked together as a team.
-Alternate Multiclassing
Bob is a 5th level wizard and wishes to multiclass into fighter for hitpoints. If he is to gain a level in fighter, he can not use any class features (or spells) or benefits of the Wizard Class. Essentially, you may as well just erase 5th Level Wizard and write 0-Level Fighter.
I forgot the most (in)famous rule of all...
-Alternate Multiclassing
Bob is a 5th level wizard and wishes to multiclass into fighter for hitpoints. If he is to gain a level in fighter, he can not use any class features (or spells) or benefits of the Wizard Class. Essentially, you may as well just erase 5th Level Wizard and write 0-Level Fighter.
I'm not sure what' he's trying to accomplish there. The only thing I can think of is that he is afraid of people cherry-picking multiple classes and prestige classes as in 3.x Edition. I would argue that this is a non-issue in 4th Edition. If 4th Edition is anything, it’s pretty well balanced. There shouldn’t be anything that is game-breaking, especially in multiclassing.
If you guys are playing 3.x, then I would think he would ban prestige classes as well. That is another thing I can appreciate about 4th is that instead of saying no, it is recommended to find a way to say “Yes” as often as you can!