E6 in Practice: Table Rulings & Alternate Systems You've Adopted in Your Campaign(s)

[BlackOnyx]

For those of you who have taken part in an E6 campaign, what kinds of rulings and/or alternate systems have you found to work well at your table?


These can cover just about any quality of life change you've adopted, from overarching setting/cosmology changes to mechanical fixes for existing feats and classes.


***


Some adaptations I've had success with:


Throwing Out Alignment (Mostly)

In short:

- Good, Evil, Law, & Chaos are factions, not (necessarily) strict moral/behavioral codes

- Only creatures with an alignment subtype are affected by spells pertaining to that subtype

- (Most) undead are effectively neutral

With the grittier feel that E6 lends itself towards, I've found that approaching alignment as factional divide (rather than a moral/ethical/behavioral one) opens up the door to some engaging roleplay.

When you can't just cast "detect evil" to identify the true motives of a corrupt priest (or even the angels he prays to), the way players interact with the world changes. They have to rely on observation and discussion in order to decide who to put their faith in.


Milestone Leveling

Helps to minimize "level-hunting" behaviors the standard xp system tends to encourage.

As there's only 6 full levels you can take in E6, this helps set players' expectations appropriately.

(Narratively, it also just seems to flow better.)


Mid-Level Feat Progression

Offering a free feat (or two) in between levels helps to pad out/slow the usual breakneck pace of advancement and makes leveling that much more impactful.

It also serves as a good way to provide players with a sense of accomplishment when it would otherwise be too soon to award them another level.


Not Using the Feats Listed in the E6 Sourcebook

I think the amount of feats available in first party books already offer a pretty substantial number of options for players to choose from.

Restricting access to some of the old fallbacks they've gotten used to (higher ability scores, class feature bonuses, certain crafting feats) makes them get creative in ways they never had to be before.

(This said, after 6th level, I do offer one feat line that allows players to increase their effective ability scores by 2 for the sole purpose of meeting future feat requirements.

In such a feat focused d&d variant, I like giving my players as much access to them as I reasonably can.)


Applying Listed Caster Level Restrictions on Wondrous Items

Only items with a listed CL of 6th or less can be forged by mortal means. (Anything CL 7 or above is essentially an artifact.)

Perhaps an unpopular call for some, but I think it really helps if you're going for a low magic feel.

Knocking out access to some of your classics (Periapts of Wisdom, Belts of Giant Strength, etc.) helps shine a light on many of the more underutilized magic items in the MIC.

It also makes certain consumables (potions, scrolls, etc.) that much more valuable.


Fourth Level+ Spells Do Not Exist As Standard Spells

No Artificing or Versatile Spellcastering your way out of this one.

For PCs, all spells stop at 3rd level.

Monsters may have them.

Certain rituals (see Unearthed Arcana) might reproduce them.

But "I cast [4th level spell here] as a standard action" is a no-go.

[Mr Adventurer]

Great thread, thanks for starting it. I haven't run or played E6, but I do have an E6 campaign idea in the back of my head that I'd like to develop, so this thread will be really useful. I'll come back to talk about what I am currently thinking of doing, and why, if you'd be interested (it's not exactly the topic).

[BlackOnyx]

Great thread, thanks for starting it. I haven't run or played E6, but I do have an E6 campaign idea in the back of my head that I'd like to develop, so this thread will be really useful. I'll come back to talk about what I am currently thinking of doing, and why, if you'd be interested (it's not exactly the topic).


No worries at all. Always happy to unearth some more discussion on the topic of E6.


And I'd imagine speculative rulings/systems ought to be fairly close to on-topic.


(That said, if you wanted to start a new thread dedicated to your campaign ideas/planning, I'd certainly keep an eye out for it in the coming days.)

[Jorunkun]

Yes, thanks for starting this thread!

I think E6 is on its way to becoming this niche refuge for 3.5 / PF homebrew lovers who aren't into high level or high op play but like their DnD crunchy nonetheless. 90s DnD Old School, or something. And with PF updating now, I think we are going to see our numbers swell.

Me, I keep coming back to this houserule / heartbreaker thing, which is PF E6, with a limited set of classes and races, fewer skills and feats. Here's some of the - untried in play - changes I'm looking at making:


You go from level 0 to level 6, but in 12 half-level steps.
At each step you get half your hp, half skill points, plus a feat or your class abilities.
There are capstone feats available past level 6 that reintroduce some 7th level content or offer ability improvements.
Make perception a save.
Use ablative armor rules from Unearthed Arcana - this bit is tested and works well at lower levels, where the relatively low DR matters throughout.
Use Weapon Groups and related feats.
Include some of the Elephant in the Room Feat reductionism
Change rules for crafting, knowledge and languages.
Every class gets 4 skill points per level, modified by INT. Rogues and Bards get a free skill bonus feat at level 1.
Use only spontaneous casters, but allow memorization to add meta-magic feats


Still mulling over what to do with alignment, but think along the lines of OP: Alignment matters in world and for the rules, but as a kind of team allegiance / measuring stick, not a straitjacket for how to play your character.

Also, I like a lot of Nonsi's houserule work wrt the combat round, action economy etc on these here forums.

[BlackOnyx]

Change rules for crafting, knowledge and languages.

Every class gets 4 skill points per level, modified by INT. Rogues and Bards get a free skill bonus feat at level 1.



I like the idea of fixing up these areas. Especially in a lower magic setting, skill ranks & broad skill knowledge become more important than ever.

To address these issues at our table, some similar changes we've made include:


All PCs, NPCs, & Monsters Have the Able Learner Feat

Avoids dealing with half ranks and allows PCs to get the biggest bang for their buck.


All PCs Begin With Four Free Ranks in One Profession, Perform, or Craft Skill

Helps to develop the PCs' backgrounds/hobbies without taxing their limited skill points to do so.

The chosen skill remains a class skill for the purpose of determining max ranks.


Available Crafting XP is a Monthly Regenerating Pool

In a low magic setting, I like the idea of limiting the amount of magic items casters can create in some way. If you cut out xp costs completely, there's no in-universe reason why a crafter couldn't spend a month pumping out +1 longswords every other day.

To mitigate mass item production, I've allotted players a crafting pool that regenerates on the night of each full moon (30 days) in-universe:

Available Monthly XP = (10 + Relevant Casting Modifier) x (Character Level)

Unused xp does not accumulate and projects can be paused indefinitely without issue. This allows "cheap" items (1st & 2nd level potions/scrolls) to be produced pretty much as-needed while making the production of more potent items (wondrous items) more of an endeavor.

(As Quarian Rex pointed out in an earlier thread I started on milestone leveling, this regenerating monthly xp allotment is similar to the effects of a feat called Harvest of Artifice in the third party d20 book The Practical Enchanter.)

[D+1]

Haven't yet managed to get an E6 game going, though I have players asking for a Spelljammer game and I keep thinking about how well it might work if I were to use E6 instead of houseruled 1E/2E. I have a house-rules doc for E6. It's only 4 pages ( https://www.dropbox.com/s/ztghizqzgqdivv4/E6%20House%20Rules.odt?dl=0 if you're interested) and effectively replaces the original 13 page E6 PDF (less white space for starters :) ). It explains to players the concept of E6, lists a total of 24 feats (capstone feats, changes to existing feats, and new ones to solve issues), and points out some of the other implications that E6 has concerning the BTB rules and gameplay, such as rules regarding resurrection. The lack of need for any more house rules than that is WILDLY appealing to me as a DM since my most streamlined set of 1E house rules runs to 60+ pages, about half of which is changes to spells.

I certainly could start tweaking the E6 concept to a far greater degree, and as it is I STILL couldn't resist the pull of "fixing" a few classes in there, but one of the intended benefits written in E6 was player familiarity. They just don't NEED more than a minimal set of additional rules with E6 and the more rules tweaks I introduce the more of that familiarity, if any, is lost, and the more the PH becomes an unreliable resource. I want to be able to hand my players a set of used 3.5 PH's and those 4 pages of house rules and say, "Let's go!" Some house rules is inevitable as we all have different preferences for how we want our games to function (as seen by my own light tweaks), but another listed benefit was the intent to keep the game to the gritty fantasy feel (with just a slight leaning up into heroic fantasy), again as noted in the original E6 docs. It is the actual restriction to a limited set of BTB rules that makes E6 most appealing to me. The more house rules that get introduced the more _I_ feel the concept and appeal of E6 itself is being missed.

So, I read the whole original E6 thread on ENWorld and considered pros and cons of E8 and so forth, but a PH (or the d20 SRD if players prefer) and 3-4 pages is all I ever intend to need for E6. If my PLAYERS ask for substantially more then I feel I might just as well just abandon the idea of running an E6 game anyway.

Really there IS an under-the-radar but rather substantial change in those 4 pages. It is that PC's of ALL classes may acquire feats to make magical items. It's not just restricted to casters. Grond the Blacksmith can make his own magic armor and weapons at his forge. He does not need to pay Finkle the Hedge Wizard to do it. That is a change that I think will be interesting to see in play (and one that is LONG overdue in some version of D&D).

[Jorunkun]

Thanks for sharing your house-rules, very sensible stuff!

[Mr Adventurer]

Ooh, I promised to come back to this thread to talk a little bit about the game that's ghosting around in the back of my mind.

OK, so the principle is that the campaign world is adjusted in response to character levels being capped at 6. The campaign world has much more of the feel of 4e's "points of light" setting, with a lot of untamed and dangerous land in between mortal settlements; a land in need of heroes to defend it.

Then, all of the monsters in the Monster Manual are still present in the world; but, their number and role is likewise adjusted. With mortal magic normally capped at 3rd level spells, the kinds of magic (spell-like abilities or spellcasting) that start to seem genuinely godlike to such a population kicks in at around 5th level spells; likewise, monsters of around CR 10 start to exceed the capability of the best fighting groups to defeat. As well, even monsters of CR between about 5 and 10 are legendary threats, capable of murdering an entire town on their own under the right circumstances. (This assumes a population demographic shift downward of the available levels of NPCs as well).

So, people have heard of the dreaded Manticore. But they don't have nests that adventurers climb up to and clear out; a single manticore might arrive near a major trade route and spell the death of the settlements around it because the caravans simply don't have the ability to oppose it. It's a beast of legend, and the heroes that defeat it will become legendary themselves.

At the higher CRs, creatures are sufficiently godlike that we might as well treat them as the setting's gods, doing away with all the Divine rules altogether. Either they are objects of worship in a local area, or they are tremendously powerful beings. So, a Couatl (casting as a 9th level Sorcerer) has magical powers that can pretty safely make it a minor god of a civilised area, or the ruling god of a smaller number of people. Meanwhile, the Trinity are the three warring brothers who were there at the world's creation: Solar, the God Above All, the Pillar of Holy Light; Balor, the Destroyer, He Who Burns in Darkness; and the Pit Fiend, the Nameless Tyrant, Thief of Souls. And so on.

I spent some time thinking about the godlike acts a Solar can genuinely achieve with its Cleric spellcasting - it's a lot, when you are an immortal being and the spellcasting base doesn't exist in the general population to detect or stop you!

In terms of rules, I would probably do some small tweaks, but I would try not to stray too far from the 3.5/E6 baseline. What I would consider doing is adding on the Mythic rules from Pathfinder, for PCs. This could be a really nice way for them to eventually exceed their boundaries as 6th level characters without just going up the normal levelling totem-pole. I would need to think about Mythic monsters - the whole point of E6 is that you don't need to add extra stuff to the high-CR creatures for them to take on that narrative role already, but if you don't at least add the 'mythic' tag to some powerful creatures, then the PCs might end up being able to walk all over them... but, then again, maybe that would be okay! The advantage of working solely with the Monster Manual is that you could do a decent analysis of all the monsters you had to work with.

I suspect the overall feel of the game would begin to trend toward Godbound or Exalted by the time you started to pile on the Mythic rules.

[Godskook]

I play a system similar to E6 mashed together with Gestalt.

It basically changes the multiclassing rules. Each class gets it's own class track, and you start with 1 track for free. Each additional track costs an amount(3k, 4k, 5k, etc), and that's how you multiclass, you add additional gestalt tracks that are single-class tracks.

So Paladin 2//Sorcerer 4 would cost 1k for Pal 2, 3k for a second track and 6k for Sorc 2, 3 and 4. BAB and Saves are just like fractional Gestalt, but retroactive. Skill points are per-class, but only once for Int, so the aforementioned Sorcadin would have 10+14 skill points before Int, and count as level 4 for determining skill points from Int. HP I do weird, with it being the normal max at 1st and half thereafter on the first track, but additional tracks still add HP, up until you hit cap with your best class. So max HP is like....72+Con*6+Feats.

Some classes become powerful in this rule-set that I didn't expect, like Healer, who can heal 2d4+9+Cha as an immediate action as a 2nd level spell. 19+ HP when 48 HP is -good-, is a pretty good immediate action.

[Blackhawk748]

I played around with changing various PRC's class features into feats that players could take when they hit the proper requirements. Seemed to work out ok

[Empyreal Dragon]

Lean up is the default, there is almost no upper limit.

Rebuild and retraining rules work, and no base class builds/early entry hacks are legal.

Flaws are allowed even optional flaws at every 5 levels.

Taint/corruption/depravity is a go.

One unusual thing this ends up with is builds like frenzied berserker 6, ur-priest 6.

Intensely dedicated individuals can cripple themselves with 3 flaws, sell themselves for a task of service to an outsider, and then condemn their soul for 3 feats, bathe in the taint of evil for 2 more, netting them 11 total feats by 6th level.

[Mr Adventurer]

Lean up is the default, there is almost no upper limit.

What does this mean?


Intensely dedicated individuals can cripple themselves with 3 flaws, sell themselves for a task of service to an outsider, and then condemn their soul for 3 feats, bathe in the taint of evil for 2 more, netting them 11 total feats by 6th level.

Out of interest, why would anyone want to pay these prices when you can just earn a few more XP to get the feats you want past 6th? Is it just PrC prerequisites?

[Empyreal Dragon]

It means for instance, using sanctum spell, earth spell, etc for higher potential casting, the archmage/high priest tricks, and E6 circle magic abuse are viable, and allowed. Using racial hit dice for higher skills etc. Viable. Allowed.


And yes, its mainly for acquiring prestige classes. It does have some odd situations like the majority of cheated in prestige situations are madmen sworn to fiends.



Related, one houserule I've considered is allowing pacts with any outsider.

[Seerow]

when we did E6, my group made it a thing where every 4 feats you gained from exp, you would gain one bonus hit die of the type appropriate to the class you have most levels in. (your choice if it's tied). No extra class features, but extra hp/skill points/saves. It gave a bit more room for upward growth and going against higher CR enemies without getting one shotted, while not breaking too far out of the E6 acceptable power levels.

[exelsisxax]

Progressive gestalt: after hitting the level cap, you gestalt each class level as advancements(and keep getting feats as if you were going up in level) before going purely to feat advancement.

Gives martials a lot more opportunity to branch out without crippling their primary class progression and makes prereqs a lot easier, and casters can get a bit more longevity or flexibility without much gain in instant power.

[Ursus Spelaeus]

Progressive gestalt: after hitting the level cap, you gestalt each class level as advancements(and keep getting feats as if you were going up in level) before going purely to feat advancement.

Gives martials a lot more opportunity to branch out without crippling their primary class progression and makes prereqs a lot easier, and casters can get a bit more longevity or flexibility without much gain in instant power.

I like this one.