Homogeneous Linear: Skill Points and Feats

[HouseRules]

A note up front: This House Rule is not meant to be Compatible with Pathfinder. It is not compatible with the bonus +3 to class skills from Pathfinder.

BLUF: no 4x skills at first level, no feat at first level, no +2 bonus good saves, free LA -3 (but everyone argues that free LA-3 doesn't really do anything, so we may get rid of it).

You know, I don't really like the way skill points and feats are set up in 3.0 and 3.5, until I try to change the intercept. Linear it is, but Homogeneous it is not. Thus, Homogeneous Linear is about changing the intercept to zero. Homogeneous in Homogeneous Linear means an intercept of zero.

Quadruple Hit Dice at First Level is the way to shift the intercept to match the numbers. Skill Points and Feats are still linear, but now also homogeneous to hit dice. This house rule is not compatible with UA Bloodlines.

Guidelines for Quadruple Hit Dice (QHD)
All characters (both player characters and non-player characters) and creatures (non-character monsters) shall undergo this change.

The first hit dice of the character or creature will quadruple. Monsters with fractional HD will also follow this change.
1/8 HD monsters becomes 1/2 HD monsters (I believe there is only 1 SRD monster with 1/8 HD)
1/4 HD monsters becomes 1 HD monsters
1/2 HD monsters becomes 2 HD monsters
1 HD characters and creatures becomes 4 HD characters and creatures
2 HD characters and creatures becomes 5 HD characters and creatures
etc.
Each HD gives 1+con hp and requires 1 week of training per addition hp until max for each HD.
DM may opt to have max or average HD for the first 4 HD instead of 1+con, however, they must leave open the option to train 1 hp per in game week.

The second is saving throws. There are no bonus +2 to saves for having good saving throws. All the characters start with 4 HD at level 1 and end with 23 HD at level 20, so characters have Good Saves in the range of 2 to 11.5 (weaker by 0.5), and Bad Saves in the range of 1+1/3 to 7+2/3 (stronger by 1.0). With the change of Good Save = BAB, and Poor Save = BAB - 1/4, Good Saves is in the range of 4 to 23 for full BAB classes, and Poor Saves for full BAB classes and Good Saves for 3/4 BAB classes is in the range of 3 to 17.25, and Poor Saves for 3/4 BAB and Good Saves for 1/2 BAB is in the range of 2 to 11.5, and Poor Saves for 1/2 BAB is in the range of 0.25 to 5.75.

The third is skill points. It is linear to hit dice without exception. UA Bloodlines must be gestalt with Commoner or Dragon HD (only for dragon bloodline) to follow this rule. We will separate the skill points into six pools, one for each attribute. The base skill points is equal to the size of hit dice, so Barbarian gets 12+. For skill monkey class, they get an extra seventh pool of skill points for a selected list of skills (their class skills). For class skills vs cross-class skills: 1 point = 1 rank (class skills, and beyond 20 cross-class points), 1 point = 3/4 rank (first 20 cross-class skills).
The following feats are converted into skills: each rank (count fractions) gives a check bonus to the skills listed for them.
Acrobat (STR/DEX)
Agile (DEX)
Alertness (WIS)
Animal Affinity (WIS/DEX)
Athletic (STR)
Deceitful (INT)
Deft Hands (DEX)
Diligent (INT)
Investigator (WIS)
Magical Aptitude (INT/CHA)
*Psionic Aptitude (INT/CHA)
Negotiator (WIS)
Nimble Fingers (DEX)
Persuasive (CHA)
Self-Sufficient (WIS)
Stealthy (DEX)
These are additional feats that should be converted to skills to balance the martial characters.
Weapon Proficiency (STR/DEX), Weapon Focus, Greater Weapon Focus merge together into a single skill for each martial weapon and each exotic weapon. Each rank +1 to hit.
Weapon Specialization (STR/DEX) Greater Weapon Specialization merge together into a single skill for each martial weapon and each exotic weapon. Each rank +1 to damage.
Armor Proficiency (DEX) splits into one skill for each armor type not groups (Light, Medium, Heavy). Each rank -5% spell failure, +1 armor class.
Shield Proficiency (DEX) splits into one skill for each shield type not groups (Non-Tower Shield, Tower Shield). Each rank -5% spell failure, +1 armor class.
Lightning Reflex (DEX) each rank increase 1/4 to save
Great Fortitude (CON) each rank increase 1/4 to save
Iron Will (WIS) each rank increase 1/4 to save

The fourth is feats. Feats occur exactly at every multiple of three hit dice. See, all level 1 characters have 4 HD, so their 3rd HD (level zero) is when they gain their feat.

The fifth is ECL. A change in how ECL is calculated is necessary in this house rule. ECL = HD + LA - 3. The minus three (-3) comes from the extra hit dice that all characters and creatures are expected to have. I'm thinking of making Negative Levels = 1000 xp lost if permanent instead of actually losing a level. Recalculating character stats is an unnecessary pain. If your character has negative xp, then they just have to get more xp to level up. It's a smaller deal now.

Levels and Hit Dice
Level -6 = DEAD, Not Possible
Level -5 = 1/8 HD
Level -4 = 1/4 HD
Level -3 = 1/2 HD
Level -2 = 1 HD
Level -1 = 2 HD
Level 0 = 3 HD

The sixth is spells.
Full Casters: Minimum Spell Caster Level = 2x Spell Level.
Partial Casters: Minimum Spell Caster Level = 3x Spell Level.
Half Casters: Minimum Spell Caster Level = 4x Spell Level.
Similarly, all Psionic Powers cost increase by one point to match the above trend.
No Free First Four Cantrips. All Cantrips cost 1 Power Point you Psionics.

The seventh is Ability Scores. It still follows every fourth HD, so players get their very first ability score increase on Level 1.

Ah, the flaw. All classes have 4 HD so they have caster level 4. They all could start with 2nd level spells since 2 x 2 = 4. Well, nerfing or removing broken spells is a work in progress, and my sense of balance is not as good as others, so look up their solutions first. Best way to fix this is a flat increase spell level of all spells and equivalent abilities by one.

We need to rebuild all the classes to include these new levels (-2, -1, and 0). These Minus Levels (cannot use Negative Levels since it is already term in D&D) really slows down the power of multiclassing. Of course, without those bonus +2 saves, all the martial classes are weakened.

We hate thirds: CR 1/3 and CR 1/6 are revised to CR 3/8 and CR 3/16 respectively. We prefer the power of 2 denominators.

Hey, Someone wants a "Minus One/Minus One Dual Class" instead of starting as a Level 1 character. Yep, it is possible. "Minus Two/Level Zero" is also possible, but experience penalty may apply by yours truly Devious DM.

How about replacing those first three HD with racial paragon instead of Level Minus Two, Level Minus One, and Level Zero? This needs to be discussed. Power Balance may be an issue for some people. For high power games, sure.

TLDR: For you guys that do not like the shift in levels (free LA -3 to everything), A simple summary is no 4x skills on first HD, no first level feat, and no +2 bonus to good saves. Everything else is just other house rules.

[Kelb_Panthera]

All I see is HP bloat and some spells with HD caps on their effects being broken for virtually no gain. What was the point of this?

[HouseRules]

The point is to linearize skill points and feats. If someone wants to increase feats to once per two HD instead once per three HD, it would be easier to modify, and make the characters stronger. Divide then add is slower than direct division. I'm thinking of moving towards 8 feats per HD as a way to balance martial characters.

Hit Dice bloat is part of the it since the 4x skills at first level seems a bit unfair to characters based on the order they take levels of their classes. Yet, making those Minus Two, Minus One, and Level Zero would mean that characters would be Level 5 to be Level 1/Level 1. We may want to move away from the regular experience progression system to deal with this issue.

There are no HD caps on spells, unless those come with the standard rule. We may want to remove those HD caps entirely for spells. Evocation is not that strong of a school of magic.

It gains survivability for low level characters, but maybe the greater amount of hit points on both sides may make the combat last longer, so there needs to be a way to increase damage to negate this overall effect. It is true that larger numbers reduces the randomness of the game.

Greater Survivability and Less Randomness on the life and death of low level characters would improve new players staying with the game. Of course, some people are in the mindset of gritty game for non-casters only.

[Kelb_Panthera]

The point is to linearize skill points and feats.

I got that but to what end? So that somebody who wants a rogue/ fighter doesn't have to choose between 8 and 2 at first level? HD related benefits are already spitting-distance from linear. It feels like you're trying to make a V8 diesel mouse trap here.


There are no HD caps on spells, unless those come with the standard rule. We may want to remove those HD caps entirely for spells. Evocation is not that strong of a school of magic.

Top of my head; basically all of the spells that put a target to sleep are capped by the targets' HD such as the 4HD cap on the 1st lvl sleep spell. There're quite a few spells that check HD like that. Virtually all calling spells are also so limited.

[Seerow]

Hit Dice bloat is part of the it since the 4x skills at first level seems a bit unfair to characters based on the order they take levels of their classes. Yet, making those Minus Two, Minus One, and Level Zero would mean that characters would be Level 5 to be Level 1/Level 1. We may want to move away from the regular experience progression system to deal with this issue.

Nothing here actually changes that though. Unless I misunderstand, the bonus hit dice at level 1 are still the same type as your first level class, giving you the same overall advantage for dipping your high skill class as the first level, though it does now at least equally reward a high HD first class. It does have a slight side effect of making constitution more important, giving every character in the game 3*con mod additional hit points.



Personally, I agree with the fundamental problem, that being that 1HD is too squishy to be a good starting point for most characters/creatures. But I disagree with your methodology for fixing it here.

I've tried a few different iterations of things aimed at fixing similar problems in the past. One I tried a while back was:

Every adult humanoid has between 3 and 6 levels in an NPC class. After advancing to level 6 in an NPC class, characters start gaining PC class levels gestalted on to their NPC class levels. So your first level Fighter might be an Expert 6//Fighter 1.

The problem I wound up running into with this one is progression felt stilted for that first 6 levels where you're gestalting on levels (HP and skill ranks didn't grow, or if they did, not by much), it also screwed with several spells (blasting and hd based spells felt even weaker than normal, summoning was borderline useless). Also calculating gestalt saves, especially whenever multiclassing got involved, confused several of my players, and overall it was pretty cumbersome.

In the end, we took a break from the campaign around level 5-6 and when we picked it back up I had the players retool to regular characters, but let them keep one attribute upgraded to a permanent Good as a gestalt style bonus (so players could pick up 6+int skills, Good BAB, a good save of their choice, or increased HD) to reflect the benefits they were previously getting from the NPC class gestalt.


If I were to go back to the start and try it again... I'd probably give up on the bonus hit dice entirely. Go with the Pathfinder style of skills (+3 when you invest 1 rank into the skill), and a flat bonus to HP at level 1 (most likely either con score or doubled hit points from hit die at level 1, so a barbarian starts with 24+con hp, fighter 20+con, etc). I hadn't actually considered the saving throws aspect of it, but I do agree with your general argument and would probably let the player choose two saving throws to get a +2 bonus in, and then remove the +2 for a good save from level 1 in a class. At that point probably switch to using Fractional Saves/BAB so you don't get punished too hard for multiclassing at the wrong time.

[BowStreetRunner]

It feels a little bit like you are attempting to apply science to something that is a mixture of science and art. Just because something looks good on a graph doesn't necessarily guarantee that it is playable.

Usually, when I look at a house rule the first thing I consider is: "What is the problem I am attempting to solve?" You really don't make a clear case that a problem exists to match the solution you are proposing. This doesn't mean that there isn't one - you just haven't really presented WHY you want to make these changes, other than your initial statement that you " don't really like the way skill points and feats are set up in 3.0 and 3.5". Why don't you like them? How does that negatively impact game-play? How do your changes resolve this issue?

This isn't something I'd be likely to play-test in my own games simply because I have no idea what you are trying to accomplish and if you're not going to make an argument for why it is necessary I'm not going to make one for you. But if you'd like to explain your reasoning behind this I'd be interested to know what you think is being fixed.

[ben-zayb]

I'm thinking of moving towards 8 feats per HD as a way to balance martial characters.What? Do you think casters wouldn't benefit from 8 feats per HD too? If anything, giving away more feats in general augments a caster's power/versatility more than it does for martial characters

[HouseRules]

Hit point and Constitution is not getting any more important because all the optimizer know that killing a character is not by damaging their hit points. We are decreasing the front-loaded effects of classes by diluting the first level into 4. Some classes does not need that much dilution. The first 3 HD could be racial paragon, or just Humanoid HD if DM prefers those. They could even just be three levels of commoners if a DM is too lazy to dilute the 1st level of every class. Maybe we do not need to modify the ECL since the Experience System is mess up for levels 1-3 anyways.

Comparing 4E to 3E. All Hit Dice are Max and No Roll. First Level Character in 4E are 1d10 + 1dX where X is the size for your class/role. Pathfinder uses average dice roll, and that's almost equivalent to half of max, so 4E characters start with the equivalent of 3 HD relative to Pathfinder (first HD is still max), and gains the equivalent of 2HD per level.

Lot's of advice around old school says to start around 3rd or 4th level anyways since this is where the character has enough hit points to not be so dependent on the roll of the d20 for survival. Even your "Every adult begins 3 to 6 levels of NPC" is exactly not different than given extra 2 HD. My idea is to give 3 extra, just one more than the minimum of your idea, but 2 less than the maximum of your idea. So no, my idea is not too different from yours except that there is no need to Gestalt. Also, hit points is not everything for high level. Most spells kill not by attacking hit points, but by attacking an easier target such as ability score or instant death effects.

We may also need to increase base skill points to equal the size of hit dice to balance the mundane from the casters. Also, splitting the skill points into six separate pools would be an advantage to classes without Int as Primary Attribute.

As for the "eight feats per HD" would also help casters, well, I'm thinking of embedding those into the Tier 6 classes, then "four feat per HD" into Tier 5 classes, "two feat per HD" into Tier 4 classes, "one feat per HD" into Tier 3 classes, "once per 2 HD" into Tier 2 classes, and "once per 4 HD" into Tier 1 classes.
Logically, Every Spell Slot and Every Spell Known is a Level Appropriate Feat. Then "Mundane" (technically low tier) Classes need to catch up by getting more feats.

[Kelb_Panthera]

You know that one of the major complaints about 4e is that the HP bloat led to combats being a huge slog, right?

One of the charms of ultra-low level play is the gambler's rush of being fragile enough that the dice -really- matter. It's not for everyone, granted, but it is a thing.

In any case, look how much effort you're having to put into "fixing" things when simply starting at level 3~5 accomplishes the same thing without having to rewrite every creature or character that ever was. Are you familiar with the term "over-engineered?"

[HouseRules]

I'm thinking about a rule where each HD gives 1+con, and needs 1 week of training per hp up to the size of HD to prevent the huge slog. Now, it is the players that choose the slog or not. However, each time the players have down time for crafting, mundane characters would be open for the training, so they would not waste time.

Ultra low level works in this house rule. It's just that they are named Level Minus Five (1/8 HD), Level Minus Four (1/4 HD), Level Minus Three (1/2 HD), Level Minus Two (1 HD), Level Minus One (2 HD), and Level Zero (3 HD). I have below 1 HD progression!

Maybe we could skip the rewriting every creature and character, or just wait for me to grind it for you.