House rules, what has worked for you

[cullynthedwarf]

Hello my fellow humans?

As the start date for my new campaign is drawing closer, I am wondering what are some house rules that you have used to make the game better/streamlined for you or your players. I have seen some of the entries on YouTube but felt I should ask here as well

Some things I'm already using is Hit die. When you go upma level no matter what you roll for new HP u will always get at least half the die in new HP. For example yuur newly level 2 barbarian might just rage quit if he only gets 1+CON for hit HP when he levels up but with this house rule he gets a 6+CON.

Another thing at my table is all magic throwers have REURNING built in to them unless it specifically says other wise. Example javelin of lightning does not return, but a dwarven thrower does.

Adding EB as a class feature at Level 1 for Warlock and at level 2 giving the PC another cantrip. Also adding the patron spell list to what the warlock has as his spell list, he doesn't get to cast any more but he now has a bigger option list.

Yes I have heard of the CLICK rule for traps but not sure about using it yet.

Just a few thoughts but please feel free to throw others at me

Cullyn

[cullynthedwarf]

Something else I'm toying with is a bought potion is maxed restoration but ones made by the party are rolled as normal.

So 2d4 +2 for a regular potion can get 10 HP when it's bought or rolled of its made by the PCs

On the other hand a potion of extreme healing 10d4 +20 is worth 60 HP or you can roll it out.

[Emongnome777]

We’ve started using a kitchen countdown timer for each persons turn. Keeps combat moving a little better and discourages cell phone use when it isn’t your turn. Still early, so there’s bugs to work out.

[cullynthedwarf]

We’ve started using a kitchen countdown timer for each persons turn. Keeps combat moving a little better and discourages cell phone use when it isn’t your turn. Still early, so there’s bugs to work out.

I tried this as well but it ended up backfiring when some one need clarification on something and their whole egg timer count down got eaten with the explanation. I have heard about a 3 second reaction buff that if you say something about your move with in an allotted quick responds time the receive a minor buff to what they are doing. Not sure how it plays out in all situations but its a good jumping off point

[Randomthom]

Flanking is a flat +2 to the attack roll. Advantage is too much and nothing feels like a slap in the face for tactical combat.

[etrpgb]

Races give no ability bonus; the ability bonuses come from the first class level.

To know where are the bonuses you use the multi class table in the line on your first class level:
if there is one ability it's a +2 (eg Barbarian +2 str),
if there are two connected with "and" its a +1 to both (eg Monk +1 Dex +1 Wis),
If there are two connected with "or" it can be +2 to one or +1 to both (eg Fighter).
You also have a free +1 you can put where you want, but you cannot have more than +2 anywhere.

[nickl_2000]

Adding EB as a class feature at Level 1 for Warlock and at level 2 giving the PC another cantrip. Also adding the patron spell list to what the warlock has as his spell list, he doesn't get to cast any more but he now has a bigger option list.


Just out of curiosity, why are you making the 1/2/3 level warlock dip more powerful? Or are you making it so EB only scopes with warlock level instead of character level?

Other common houserules I see, will add more as I think about it:
Can draw and throw a weapon as a single attack (fights can throw 4 daggers in a turn)
Free feat at level - Can allow all or only non combat ones
Rangers and Paladins get cantrips

[PhantomSoul]

Just out of curiosity, why are you making the 1/2/3 level warlock dip more powerful? Or are you making it so EB only scopes with warlock level instead of character level?


I use the EB rule too, and it only scales with Warlock Levels for us. (But we also have Cantrips scale based on when you get the Cantrip or the first level in the Class you got the Cantrip from, whichever is longer; taking only level 20 in Sorcerer while doing 19 levels in Paladin doesn't grant you a full-powered Fire Bolt.)

We also use a variant initiative, but only because we can run it by script. First round is normal initiative (rolled by players for PCs, rolled automatically by script for Monsters unless DM feels like rolling); later rounds increment that with +1d(6+DEX_MOD) [e.g. +1d8 for a Creature with +2 Dex] to have some variation across rounds, but not fully massive ones. Overall we really like it (order changes, you can aim for a fast-feeling character or slow-feeling character, and you can get homebrew to affect the earlier or later rolls so there's extra customisation), but I wouldn't run it without the script, obviously! The same update roll system gets used for training (e.g. learning tools and languages).

I use the click rules for my campaign -- it hasn't come up much, but it worked well when it did come up. It removed the feeling that a trap is a plausibly-inevitable gotcha, so it did its job.

You can drink a health potion with your bonus action -- but feeding a potion to someone or using another kind of potion takes an action.

Critical hits are max(everything) and then reroll your weapon damage die for extra damage. Your crits will always do more damage (as will the monsters'!).

EDIT: Oh, and a bigger one -- in the campaign I DM (but not the campaigns I play in), half-feats are used. You gain 1 ASI point every two levels, which you could spend on a 1-point feat, use for a +1 to a stat, or save to spend later after you get more points for one of the few 2-point feats.

[NiklasWB]

The ones I can think of right now that have worked really well are:

Fast potion drinking
Drink a potion as a bonus action. Feed someone else a potion as an action. It allows people to still perform actions and feel heroic, while giving the option to make strategic potion use viable.

Free minor feat at level 1
Give everyone a level 1 feat that is not one of the overpowered combat ones (In general, I exclude Crossbow expert, Sharpshooter, Great Weapon Master, Warcaster, Sentinel, Shield Master, Mobile, Lucky and the like). Explain to players that it's more about picking a 'background' feat than an optimized one.

Warlock spell points
Gives the warlock the same degree of overall power, but allow the spells to be cast at lower levels if they choose. Allows spells like Hex to still be viable options even at higher levels. Also allows Warlocks not to spam eldritch blast after 2 rounds of combat.

Create your own background
Not really a houserule, but allows players to pick their skills and and tools etc instead of being forced to pick skills they will never use.

Disarming moves the item away from the creature that dropped it
Moves the item just out of reach, allowing opportunity attacks for the one who disarmed the item.

Guidance is a level 1 spell but more powerful
We moved Guidance from cantrip to a level 1 spell and made it slightly more powerful. We found that a party with 2 clerics and a druid none of us liked the feeling of 'cheating' where everyone shouted guidance every 5 seconds.

I'm sure there are more, but these one have been great at our table.

Weapon re-skinning
Want a longer spear that acts as a longsword? Reskin a longsword and make it a 1d8/1d10 versatile weapon. Want your thief rogue to have a sneak-attack compatible blackjack? Make it a bludgeoning shortsword.

[Guy Lombard-O]

The only consistent house rule we use is that everyone levels up at the same time, so that all PCs are the same, party-wide level. This happens regardless of how often that player shows up and plays the PC. It doesn't necessarily make the most sense for the PCs, but it's vital for a group of adult players who often have real life issues which prevent them from coming to every session.

[CheddarChampion]

Holding a spell focus allows a caster to perform somatic components with the same hand. A cleric with a holy symbol on their shield holding a shield and a mace can now cast sacred flame, for example.

A bunch of tinkering with player options that I think should work differently:
Sharpshooter allows one effect per attack (-5/+10 or ignore long range penalty or ignore bonus AC from cover).
Shield Master's shove can be done before any attacks but it locks you in to the attack action.
Etc.

Minionmancy and other strategies that really slow down combat are not permitted. Soft limit of 3 total extra creatures from spells like animate objects, find familiar, find steed, conjure animals, etc. You don't need a homonculus, a familiar, a simalcrum, a personal retinue of better equipped skeletons, an enslaved Death Knight, and a baker's dozen of animated silverware.

[Demonslayer666]

House rules that all the DMs at our table use:
If you roll poorly on HP, you can take the DM's roll, but you have to take it.

House rules when I DM:
Long rest no longer heals you to full, HD recovery is slower. Added Very long rest to heal to full.
Flanking is +2 to hit.
Shoving takes an attack instead of an action.
Grappling can be advanced to restrained with another successful check (but at disadvantage).
Restrained also causes actions to be difficult to perform, like spell casting - requiring a Concentration check.
Advantage and Disadvantage stack, one will not cancel out all of the other.
Dropping to zero HP gives you a level of exhaustion.
Subdual damage for non-lethal attacks, tracked as negative temp HP. Heals with any rest or magical healing.
Identifying magic items during a rest only reveals 1 property per hour spent researching the item.
Bonuses to Passive perception add to Perception (Observant feat).
Bloodied - like fourth edition, I let the players know when opponents fall below half.

[Sigreid]

Ek and arcane trickster can pick any 2 schools they like.

Everyone levels up together. This makes the rotating DM thing work better.

[micahaphone]

The ones I can think of right now that have worked really well are:

Fast potion drinking
Drink a potion as a bonus action. Feed someone else a potion as an action. It allows people to still perform actions and feel heroic, while giving the option to make strategic potion use viable.

I really like this rule at my table, with the caveat that this is only for healing potions. Healing potions are small shots of elixer, potion of haste is bigger. This lets me give fun consumables as loot without effecting balance as much.

As a side note, give your players potions as loot. They're fun, impactful, and short lived. So if you accidentally make it OP, no sweat, just one imbalanced encounter, not many.

Guaranteed Crit Damage .

It sucks to get a crit but roll 2 1s on the dice, dealing less damage than other attacks. I ruled that the extra dice is maximized. So a crit goes from 2d8+3 to d8+8+3. I warned my players that this favors the monsters/ enemy, as there's usually more attack rolls coming from the DM than the players. We play with it anyway, and crits are always a big moment. This is a major buffs to Paladins, who can smite after they see the nat20.

[Demonslayer666]

...

Guaranteed Crit Damage .

It sucks to get a crit but roll 2 1s on the dice, dealing less damage than other attacks. I ruled that the extra dice is maximized. So a crit goes from 2d8+3 to d8+8+3. I warned my players that this favors the monsters/ enemy, as there's usually more attack rolls coming from the DM than the players. We play with it anyway, and crits are always a big moment. This is a major buffs to Paladins, who can smite after they see the nat20.

I like this one and have been considering it for my next campaign. Do you max damage all extra dice? Sneak attacks would get a big boost.

I would only apply it to weapon damage dice, and not to things like sneak attack dice. You would roll any other extra dice twice. I'm still trying to work it out, and just considering a flat X2 and include the bonuses for simplicity's sake.

[Pex]

Get back all HD spent on healing on a long rest. Honestly I think everyone I play with don't even realize it's only supposed to be half spent.

You must use Identify spell to identify magic items.

In 3E terms, Investigate is exclusively used when it would have been Search. Perception is exclusively used when it would have been Spot. Therefore, you always use Investigate to search for traps.

[JNAProductions]

Shoving takes an attack instead of an action.

Um... That's RAW, friendo.

[Hail Tempus]

I let Sorcerers use the spell point variant, rather than the standard spell slot approach.

I'm toying with the idea of allowing this for all spellcasters.

[Frozenstep]

For me:

You need to see your target to gain the advantage of being unseen by them when you attack. Basically, if two people are fighting in a fog cloud, they both have disadvantage to attack. Otherwise you get situations like being more accurate shooting at the long range of your bow if you first walk into a fog cloud, blinding yourself and becoming unseen.

I've also added a baseline range at which you can automatically detect invisible creatures that aren't hiding (just their location, you still have advantage/disadvantage if you can't see them), which is passive perception / 2 * 5 feet around you. I also use this range as the distance you automatically detect vocal components to spells being cast, if the environment isn't covering it up. It's not really a strict rule since circumstances will change things, but it's nice to have a base value (numbers may still need tweaking).

[Xyk]

Some houserules I use and like:

When there's an opportunity for the whole party to make a check, the party picks exactly two party members who make the check for the group. I find this cuts down on those checks that just need one success and 6 people going one after the other until somebody succeeds.

When a player wants to make a check or attack roll against another PC, they make it at disadvantage. Good for discouraging PvP within the party without banning it outright.

I've replaced Inspiration with "Fate Points" taken pretty much directly from the rpg Fate. Every player gets 2 fate points at the beginning of the session, which they can spend on advantage on a roll whenever one of their character's personality traits suggest they would do well at something. They can "buy" more fate points by accepting disadvantage on a task that involves their flaw.

I rarely keep track of ammo, food, or carrying capacity, and just trust players to keep it reasonable.

[Kurt Kurageous]

A lot of good houserules here, many I use.

I've posted this before. I prioritize combat to make the table time it takes up shorter. Criticals require dice to be rerolled and retotaled, which takes time. And sometimes crits add less than dramatic damage. So to speed things up and keep criticals significant...

Roll the dice as normal, and add the maximum total of the dice thrown. Sneak attack dice count, poison does not.

Examples: A critical hit with a d8 weapon produces 1d8 + modifier + 8 hits. A d6 with sneak attack (+3d6) produces 4d6 + modifier + 24 damage.

The other thing I do as DM is have a sheet of prerolled d20s. This saves all kinds of time on mass initiatives, multiattacks, mass saves, etc. The biggest effect is it shortens the "waiting around to die" (monster turn) phase, which is not as interesting. Quickly spouting off hits, misses and damage applied makes combat feel more like a fight and less like a long ritual folk dance.

[MoiMagnus]

I think "milestone XP" (so the DM say "you guys level up" whenever it is convenient) is the houserule I'm not sure to ever play without it again in D&D, both as player and DM.

It both speed up the game (no counting XP), make it more adaptable to uncommon campaigns styles (no risk of stagnating at a level if for some reason you have almost no fights for few sessions), don't cause any problem on the table about how the XP should be shared in case someone is absent, and remove one of the things I don't like in games.

[I basically don't like anything which is both in high quantity and require long-time book-keeping. So provisions, ammunitions, XP, gold, HP (unless it refills at every fight), low-level spell slots when you're high level, ...]

[Kane0]

Some of my personal highlights:

- If you're rolling stats, each player rolls one stat and you share the results. If you don't have 6 players the DM rolls the rest.

- At level 1 you have the option of converting short rest resources into long rest ones. You get triple the number of uses but don't recover any on a short rest.

- Performance and Animal Handling are struck from the skill list, and Thievery is added (Proficiency in thieves tools becomes proficiency in Thievery)

- If you're using Flanking rules they grant +1 to hit rather than advantage

- Crits are double damage rather than just double dice

- Being knocked to 0 HP gives you a level of exhaustion

- Extra Fighting styles (Alacrity: +2 to initiative, Polearm: Reach is difficult terrain for enemies, Hand-and-a-half: +1 to hit with versatile weapons)

- Thrown weapons can be drawn like ammunition

- Dragonborn get Darkvision and Hoardsense (pretty much Stonecunning but works for valuables like currency, jewelry and art)

- Second kind of shield, the buckler. Requires light armor prof to use, grants +1 AC instead of +2 and can be donned/doffed as an item interaction rather than an action

- Potions are a bonus action to quaff

- If you double-up on the Extra Attack feature you get +1 to a stat of your choice

- Fighter Indomitable rerolls are treated as Constitution saves

- Paladins can choose either Wis or Cha for their casting and class features, and Warlocks can choose either Int or Cha

Then there's the heavier alterations, like full overhauls of the Ranger and Sorcerer, reworks of the Berserker, Four Elements and other subclasses and numerous feat and spell changes

[cullynthedwarf]

Another thing I realize I do that is a house rule is I assign stats to the PCs. You get 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, and 18 as your stats. No super lucky rolls to make a god character and no super unlucky roll to make Oatmeal the minion of the PCs

Bonus action slots. You have two spots that you can store a quick release item like your potions of heal. You can use these to use your bonus action to pull your pot and drink it. Other wise its the full action to rummage through your pack (yes even the handy haversack) to get an item out and use it

Inventory system - OK no one likes doing the weight checks for the 9 goblin leathers they took from the last encounter and the primitive weapons they had but the PCs with out a bag of holding still lug all this around until they get to spot to sell it off. So I came up with the inventory system. Very small items are worth 1 point like potions, ammo, and coins in groups of 250. Small items up to a single hand weapon or small sized light or medium armour are worth two points, two hand weapons and light or medium armour for medium creatures is worth 3 point, heavy armour for medium or light or medium armour for large size or large sized weapons are worth 4 points and heavy armour of large is 5. You can carry in points 1.5 times your STR score. At your STR you have hit your limit but can push for being encumbered with that .5 over that. So a wizard with 8 STR can carry 12 points of gear and loot while your fighter with a 20 can carry 30 points. Yes this does mean if he wanted the mage could carry large heavy armour but that is almost half of his capacity to do it. Bigger or smaller items are usually group consensus but it does work and I find while it is more book keeping the players tend to engage more in it then in the standard oh you can carry X amount before you are so heavy you sink in the sand.

[Jamesps]

I tried this as well but it ended up backfiring when some one need clarification on something and their whole egg timer count down got eaten with the explanation. I have heard about a 3 second reaction buff that if you say something about your move with in an allotted quick responds time the receive a minor buff to what they are doing. Not sure how it plays out in all situations but its a good jumping off point


When I put a time limit on an adventure, I put it on an entire section. For instance "You have one hour to raid this castle, then reinforcements arrive" and I set the timer. It encourages the players to make quick decisions throughout the game, including combat, but doesn't punish requests for clarification as long as they're not too extensive.

[Biggstick]

I use a 34 point buy, with Players being able to buy a 16 for 12 points. I mainly do this so that, as an above poster mentioned, my Players can choose to start with a set of stats that look like 18, 16, 14, 12, 10, 8.
Races other than Mountain Dwarf, Human Variant, and Half Elf have three +1's instead of their natural ability score bonuses that can be placed into any ability score. Any racial negative scores such as the Orc’s minus to Intelligence is completely ignored. They can be spread out to three different ability scores, or stacked to a maximum of +2 in one ability score and +1 in another ability score. This is to exemplify that not every Gnome is intelligent just as not every Dragonborn is strong. Any race can be just as good as the next race at something they want to excel at. If you’d like to play a Mountain Dwarf or Half Elf, you can use the three +1’s instead of what’s given in the book. Humans will use Standard or Variant stat bonuses provided by the PHB only.
PC’s can receive the benefit of multiple Auras of Protection if within the range of the overlapping areas affected by the Paladin(s). I mainly allow this because I'm totally up to DM for a group that wants to play multiple Paladins.
Now function as prepared spell casters, though they can only prepare a number of spells as per the spells known according to the Ranger chart on page 90 of the PHB. They work similarly to all other divine spell casters in that they can change out the spells prepared every day. Ranger’s Land Stride ability at level 8 also grants the Ranger a Bonus Action they can use to Dash.
In order to add more value to this undervalued ability score, additional benefits are gained by the PC once they have a certain Intelligence scores.

12: One additional Intelligence or Wisdom based skill proficiency.
14: One additional common language, tool proficiency, vehicle proficiency, gaming set, or musical instrument proficiency.
18: Expertise in an Intelligence or Wisdom based skill that you’re already proficient in.
20: Expertise in an Intelligence or Wisdom based skill that you’re already proficient in.

For 18 and 20, if you don’t have a proficiency eligible to be upgraded to Expertise, you can instead become proficient in an Intelligence or Wisdom based skill of your choice.

If you would like to use a different spellcasting ability modifier for a class, you can do so. You will have to let me know beforehand, and these changes will be made on a case by case basis. This is to exemplify that not every Bard or Warlock is charismatic, nor is every Cleric wise. To note, base multiclassing requirements will remain the same as the PHB requires (page 163). The intended effect of this change is to allow Players to play single classed characters in a way they might never have imagined in a normal game.
Will be made by the DM privately. This is to discourage metagaming.
Small creature armor doesn’t weigh as much as Medium creature armor. Divide the weight of normal armor/shields by 2 to get the weight of armor/shields for Small creatures.
If you’re using a two-handed weapon with the heavy property with both hands, you can use a 1.5 Strength damage modifier (rounded down) for your damage total. Example, if you have 18 Strength and are using a Greataxe, your damage roll will be: 1d12 + 6 instead of 1d12 + 4. This is to further emphasize the risk one makes in using two-handed weapons versus a one-handed weapon and a shield.
You can only ever have one Simulcran in existence. Healing Spirit can only heal 1 creature per round. Wish as a 9th level spell doesn't exist on any class spell list.
Regarding first level or higher spells that Charm a creature, text that reads, “When the spell ends, the creature knows it was charmed by you,” gets removed from the spell description. The text that replaces the removed text will read, “When the spell ends, the creature that was charmed will be allowed to make a Wisdom (Insight) check as an Action against your spell-save DC to determine whether they were charmed by you.” The purpose of this change is to allow PC's who wish to use magical charm to not be completely punished for doing so.
And while not a house rule, I do use the variant/additional action options available in the DMG on pages 271-272.

[TripleD]

Create your own background
Not really a houserule, but allows players to pick their skills and and tools etc instead of being forced to pick skills they will never use.

That’s actually RAW. It says right in the book that you can make your own background, and it’s not listed as an “Optional Variant”. Even adventurers league allows for custom backgrounds.

[Mongobear]

Off the top of my head...

Reroll 1s on hit dice

Can't *lose HP" when leveling from a negative Con mod

Point buy of a 35pt budget, can buy up to 16/17 for 3 points each

Free feat at 1st level, but no VHuman

Hexblade doesn't gain Hex Warrior exclusively, it is folded into Pact of the Blade

Exhaustion regenerates on short rests 1:1, completely for long rest

Restoration, Lay on Hands, and similar spells heal exhaustion equal to casting stat modifier

10 min short rest, max 2 between Long Rests

Adamantine Weapons crit on a 19-20, doesn't stack with Champion/Hexblade or any other similar things. Ignores benefit of Adamantine Armor, but crit chance reduced to 20s (even with other improvements).

EB scales with Warlock level, no more dipping

Tons of Homebrew classes/archetypes, too many to list

[BloodSnake'sCha]

I ban witch bolt.
It is a big trap for characters.

[Talsin]

Medium and Heavy Armor have a natural 1 DR to Bludgeoning/Piercing/Slashing damages. It helped to balance out combat stat choices.

[airless_wing]

I like this one and have been considering it for my next campaign. Do you max damage all extra dice? Sneak attacks would get a big boost.

I would only apply it to weapon damage dice, and not to things like sneak attack dice. You would roll any other extra dice twice. I'm still trying to work it out, and just considering a flat X2 and include the bonuses for simplicity's sake.

Only boosting weapon dice damage kinda cheats martial characters by letting Cantrips and other multi-dice spell damages get the benefits.

We ran this rule for awhile, and eventually hard-stopped. Due to enemies often having more attack than the party (due to multiple enemies, multi-attacks, or legendary actions), the players ended up being on the receiving end of most of these attacks. And most enemies have higher HP than PCs, so those crits HURT the PCs pretty hard: our Wizard went from full HP to unconscious because fo one single AoO.
A crit under vanilla rules is a 100% increase in damage (barring modifiers for now) compared to a normal hit. A crit under THESE rules is a 177% increase in damage compared to a normal hit. That's MASSIVE.

[stoutstien]

The big one: all groan-worthy puns provide inspiration but must be used within the same session.

[PhantomSoul]

Exhaustion regenerates on short rests 1:1, completely for long rest

Restoration, Lay on Hands, and similar spells heal exhaustion equal to casting stat modifier


Out of curiosity, is Exhaustion particularly common in your campaign? For mine it's relatively rare (barring planar stuff, likely) and so it's nice to keep the players freaking out when does happen, but if it's more common I expect I'd think about having similar house rules.

--

I have [partly incomplete] homebrewed rules for Curses/Corruption (planar corruption, lycanthropy, vampirism, fiendhood, medusa's petrification), but there it's almost more filling in the blanks and augmenting existing rules (e.g. the optional planar corruption) than anything else.

[Demonslayer666]

Um... That's RAW, friendo.
So it is. Thanks! It reads as a separate action, but specifies it later on. Now it's a rules clarification instead of a houserule. :smallsmile:


Only boosting weapon dice damage kinda cheats martial characters by letting Cantrips and other multi-dice spell damages get the benefits.

We ran this rule for awhile, and eventually hard-stopped. Due to enemies often having more attack than the party (due to multiple enemies, multi-attacks, or legendary actions), the players ended up being on the receiving end of most of these attacks. And most enemies have higher HP than PCs, so those crits HURT the PCs pretty hard: our Wizard went from full HP to unconscious because fo one single AoO.
A crit under vanilla rules is a 100% increase in damage (barring modifiers for now) compared to a normal hit. A crit under THESE rules is a 177% increase in damage compared to a normal hit. That's MASSIVE.

You did the 2x with bonuses or the max weapon dice damage? Crits are very disappointing when they do less damage than your last regular hit. It feels wrong when that happens. For me, crits should always do more than a normal hit.

[Mongobear]

Out of curiosity, is Exhaustion particularly common in your campaign? For mine it's relatively rare (barring planar stuff, likely) and so it's nice to keep the players freaking out when does happen, but if it's more common I expect I'd think about having similar house rules.

Yes, probably somewhat more common than an average game. My group likes Berserker almost exclusively over Totem/Zealot/Ancestral, and this was originally implemented as a way to keep the Barbarian from suiciding via Exhaustion.

Then, XGtE cam out and added Sickening Radiance, which our Bards and Wizards started using, without safety nets to keep the rest of the party safe, and I expanded the Exhaustion relief to more spells/effects to help.

I also just don't like the mechanic at all, and almost just dropped it entirely, but Sickening Radiance happened, and my one player fell in love.

[Theodoxus]

Ooh... lots... Let's see...

Stole the 10+ over AC = crit from PF2. Makes the guys who've ramped up their to hit at the cost of other things still feel powerful. It lets crit fishing without having to multiclass into Champion a thing (very happy barbarians). I also went with maximized dice instead of doubling dice though - faster gameplay that way.

Give feats every odd level (including level 1), though ASIs remain the same. All feats are "half" feats without a stat increase, and added a ton of new ones. Also use feats to multiclass, so you start out gestalt, if you so desire.

Added Healing Surges from 4th Ed, as well as the hit point mechanic (starting HP is Constitution score plus a set amount from your class, leveled HP is a static bonus based on class.) Hit Dice power recovery mechanics rather than hit points.

Added the Shift from 4th Edition, basically it's a 5' disengage that costs your movement (rather than your action).

Added Minor Actions. Basically, any Bonus Action that isn't a rider on another effect has become a Minor Action. You can do both a Minor and Bonus Action on your turn.

Returned provoking OAs back to their 3.x/4th Ed triggers. Differentiated between Reactions and Interrupts, for timing and effect.

Added Skill Challenges to make Exploration and Social pillars more robust.

Changed Wizard to a "Tome Implement", allowing Charisma based casters become true Intelligence based Vancian casters, with the upside of having more slots with which to memorize spells into.

Brought back the Bloodied designation and added boons/detriments that play off the status.

That's most of the rules that have "worked" for me.

One I've implemented to lesser effect is 4E's Defenses (Fort, Reflex, Will) - I'm in the second round of playtesting, as too many spells and effects in 5E are reactionary in nature, meaning there's a save associated as a rider effect (think Stunning Strike). Defenses don't work well for that - either the monk missed all the time, or they auto-stunned - neither felt right.

[Reevh]

My favorite house rule we're using by far is replacing the Feat system with this:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1VvHtaIhUOam4VkNB_lSmn-olS_oQmIYU/view

[micahaphone]

My favorite house rule we're using by far is replacing the Feat system with this:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1VvHtaIhUOam4VkNB_lSmn-olS_oQmIYU/view

I like the concept, hate the execution. These feel very strictly pigeonholed, combining separate ideas or feats into the same tree for thematic sake. If I'm playing a magic-hating fighter, why should I be forced to take the feats that recreate Ritual Caster before I can take the feats that recreate Mage Slayer?

[Mongobear]

I like the concept, hate the execution. These feel very strictly pigeonholed, combining separate ideas or feats into the same tree for thematic sake. If I'm playing a magic-hating fighter, why should I be forced to take the feats that recreate Ritual Caster before I can take the feats that recreate Mage Slayer?


"To slay the Mage, you must first become the Mage."

[Theodoxus]

I like the concept, hate the execution. These feel very strictly pigeonholed, combining separate ideas or feats into the same tree for thematic sake. If I'm playing a magic-hating fighter, why should I be forced to take the feats that recreate Ritual Caster before I can take the feats that recreate Mage Slayer?


"To slay the Mage, you must first become the Mage."

Well, this specific example is incorrect. You'd need proficiency in Arcana (or starting as vhuman with Arcana as your "feat" selection, etc). You'd gain Magical Intuition, giving you insight into how powerful a spellcaster is compared to yourself (all of whom would probably be stronger than your magic-hating fighter). Then, you'd spend 1 talent point on Disruptive Timing, forcing disadvantage on the Concentration check of any caster you hit who is concentrating on a spell (definitely nice for those nasty Warcaster types). Finally, you'd spend another talent point for the Mage Slayer "feat".

Outside of general Arcana and Magical Intuition (allowing you to determine level and school of a scroll spell), there isn't anything overtly 'magical' about that talent tree. I get that it kinda sucks to not have Mage Slayer as a 1st level vhuman... but maybe this isn't the system for you? /shrug.

ETA: After completing a cursory review, I'm a pretty big fan of these. I've forwarded it to my group to see if they'd incorporate them. I think one option I'd consider would be to use standard Point Buy, but grant out a single talent/ASI every level. Even spending all 20 points on attributes won't get you close to maxing out your stats, and you'd be missing out on a lot of customization.

[Reevh]

I like the concept, hate the execution. These feel very strictly pigeonholed, combining separate ideas or feats into the same tree for thematic sake. If I'm playing a magic-hating fighter, why should I be forced to take the feats that recreate Ritual Caster before I can take the feats that recreate Mage Slayer?

Not the way it works. If you're not proficient in Arcana, you can spend a point to pick up Arcana proficiency and Magical Intuition, a point on Disruptive Timing, and a point on Mage Slayer. You don't have to touch Ritual Caster.

If you're already proficient in Arcana, you need only spend 2 points, one on Disruptive Timing, and 1 on Mage Slayer, and you just get Magical Intuition for "free."

[micahaphone]

This is what I deserve for skimming the document. It's a pretty cool system now that I understand it.

[micahaphone]

I just thought of another house rule:

Inspiration as Flashback Fuel
You can use your inspiration to describe a flashback with your DM. This still requires DM approval/workshopping. For example, if spotlights are an issue during a prison break, maybe a player spends their inspiration to describe how yesterday, during their cleaning duty, they cut the wick on the spotlight, making the spotlights not work when the alarm is sounded.

One of my players used it when trying to pass off a silver coin as a special token to a doorman. They rolled low on the deception, then spent their inspiration to declare the guard's vision was poor. I described how Donny's left eye has become cloudy after a bad head blow, but he's self conscious about appearing old or weak to the rest of the gang. The PC noticed that and held the coin off to the side a bit, and Donny was too proud to visibly move his head around to better inspect the coin. This lowered the DC considerably, and he let them pass.

[cullynthedwarf]

I like a lot of these and will be implementing a few in the new game.

A few I pick up from YouTube is

The glancing blow - if a blow hits exactly the AC it only deals half damage.

Made vs bought heal potions - PCs can and are encouraged to make their own potions but ones from NPCs are maxed while made ones will be rolled. To go along with this I usually use special ingredients for higher tier pots to account for the higher price they spend for what's essentially the same thing.

[Greywander]

I have a few houserules that I like to use.

Free feat at level 1. This has been mentioned by a few other people. I like it because it expands your build space at 1st level and creates more variety in the characters you'll see. It's hard to distinguish one 1st level X from another 1st level X, so the free feat helps with that. That, and I often find my builds wishing for more feats.

Class levels as epic boons. Have you ever played an RPG where you actually spent more time planning out your character than actually playing the game? Analysis paralysis is a real thing, and one place it rears its ugly head is the multiclass rules. By RAW, your level caps out at 20, so whatever class levels you have is what you're stuck at. When you mutliclass, you're implicitly "giving up" the high level features of your main class. This has the effect of making players think about where they'll be at 20th level, even when they're at very low levels. I don't like that, I prefer to have the freedom to multiclass now if it makes sense to do so without having to worry about what I'll be missing out on at 20th level.

With this house rule, you can spend epic boons to gain additional class levels. I typically use the following rules implement these "extra" class levels:

Your character level stays stuck at 20. This means your proficiency bonus doesn't increase, and you don't gain hit points or hit dice normally.
Although you don't gain additional hit dice, if your new class level gives you a hit die that is larger than one you already have, you can replace the smaller one with the new, larger one.
You gain small amounts of HP, based on that class's hit die: d6 gives nothing, d8 gives +1, d10 gives +2, and d12 gives +3. This evens out average HP, making it not matter what order you took your class levels in.

Repick choices where you gain the option elsewhere. If you are given a list of options to choose from, and the option you chose is given to you later from another source, you can go back and choose a different option from the ones originally available to you. One example of this would be if you had a fighter who took the Defense fighting style, then multiclassed into paladin and wanted to take the Archery fighting style. Archery isn't available to paladins, but it is available to fighters. So you take Defense again, making it your paladin style, allowing you to go back and repick your fighter style to get Archery. In a nut shell, you can rebuild your entire character at any time, with the caveat that you have to end up with the same abilities (but they can be from different sources).

Although there is technically a distinction between the spells of different classes (e.g. Mending as a cleric spell is different from Mending as a wizard spell), I still allow this rule to apply to cantrips. So you could pick Mending as a wizard spell, then MC to cleric and take Mending as a cleric spell, letting you choose another wizard cantrip instead of Mending.

Longswords are finesse weapons when wielded with two hands. Title. It's the only two-handed finesse weapon, and it's only a finesse weapon while wielded with both hands. Makes longswords actually useful to rogues now.

Casting more than one leveled spell per turn. You can cast more than one spell of 1st level or higher on your turn. The combined level must be less than or equal to half your caster level, rounded down. For example, a 6th level wizard could cast a 1st and 2nd level spell on the same turn. By 20th level, you can cast a 1st and 9th level spell, or two 5th level spells, or other combination that adds up to 10. This one isn't quite set in stone, and I've even modified it just now from what I had written down a while back (I really need to update my houserule doc).

This removes some of the awkwardness of the existing rules. It also has the consequence of diminishing the value of things like Action Surge, though YMMV on whether this is a bug or a feature. I may amend this houserule to work more nicely with Action Surge at some point.

Variant encumbrance. Not a houserule, but a variant rule. STR scores actually matter now. A character in half plate with a STR of 8 can't carry any other items without penalties. Sometimes we'll ignore this if we aren't feeling up to it or if everyone rolled low STR.

[Reevh]

This is what I deserve for skimming the document. It's a pretty cool system now that I understand it.

To be fair, it's an enormous document and worthy of skimming on first read.

[Mith]

I have a few houserules that I like to use.

Free feat at level 1. This has been mentioned by a few other people. I like it because it expands your build space at 1st level and creates more variety in the characters you'll see. It's hard to distinguish one 1st level X from another 1st level X, so the free feat helps with that. That, and I often find my builds wishing for more feats.

Class levels as epic boons. Have you ever played an RPG where you actually spent more time planning out your character than actually playing the game? Analysis paralysis is a real thing, and one place it rears its ugly head is the multiclass rules. By RAW, your level caps out at 20, so whatever class levels you have is what you're stuck at. When you mutliclass, you're implicitly "giving up" the high level features of your main class. This has the effect of making players think about where they'll be at 20th level, even when they're at very low levels. I don't like that, I prefer to have the freedom to multiclass now if it makes sense to do so without having to worry about what I'll be missing out on at 20th level.

With this house rule, you can spend epic boons to gain additional class levels. I typically use the following rules implement these "extra" class levels:

Your character level stays stuck at 20. This means your proficiency bonus doesn't increase, and you don't gain hit points or hit dice normally.
Although you don't gain additional hit dice, if your new class level gives you a hit die that is larger than one you already have, you can replace the smaller one with the new, larger one.
You gain small amounts of HP, based on that class's hit die: d6 gives nothing, d8 gives +1, d10 gives +2, and d12 gives +3. This evens out average HP, making it not matter what order you took your class levels in.

Repick choices where you gain the option elsewhere. If you are given a list of options to choose from, and the option you chose is given to you later from another source, you can go back and choose a different option from the ones originally available to you. One example of this would be if you had a fighter who took the Defense fighting style, then multiclassed into paladin and wanted to take the Archery fighting style. Archery isn't available to paladins, but it is available to fighters. So you take Defense again, making it your paladin style, allowing you to go back and repick your fighter style to get Archery. In a nut shell, you can rebuild your entire character at any time, with the caveat that you have to end up with the same abilities (but they can be from different sources).

Although there is technically a distinction between the spells of different classes (e.g. Mending as a cleric spell is different from Mending as a wizard spell), I still allow this rule to apply to cantrips. So you could pick Mending as a wizard spell, then MC to cleric and take Mending as a cleric spell, letting you choose another wizard cantrip instead of Mending.

Longswords are finesse weapons when wielded with two hands. Title. It's the only two-handed finesse weapon, and it's only a finesse weapon while wielded with both hands. Makes longswords actually useful to rogues now.

Casting more than one leveled spell per turn. You can cast more than one spell of 1st level or higher on your turn. The combined level must be less than or equal to half your caster level, rounded down. For example, a 6th level wizard could cast a 1st and 2nd level spell on the same turn. By 20th level, you can cast a 1st and 9th level spell, or two 5th level spells, or other combination that adds up to 10. This one isn't quite set in stone, and I've even modified it just now from what I had written down a while back (I really need to update my houserule doc).

This removes some of the awkwardness of the existing rules. It also has the consequence of diminishing the value of things like Action Surge, though YMMV on whether this is a bug or a feature. I may amend this houserule to work more nicely with Action Surge at some point.

Love all of these ideas.

On the levelled spell and Action Surge, what if Action Surge is a "self Haste" in a fashion, so it doesn't interact with spell casting. War Magic (Eldritch Knight) makes the exception.

[KorvinStarmast]

We’ve started using a kitchen countdown timer for each persons turn. Keeps combat moving a little better and discourages cell phone use when it isn’t your turn. Still early, so there’s bugs to work out. There are some small hour glasses ( miniute, two minutes) in some games that we have used at some tables.

Rangers and Paladins get cantrips We had one table where the Ranger spells were prepared like all other divine casters. Was kinda cool. But he died at level 4 due to a crit (at low HP) massive damage and poison from the Giant Scorpion. It was a bit of a shock to everyone. (The dice are fickle)

Fast potion drinking
Drink a potion as a bonus action. We might do that.

Another thing I realize I do that is a house rule is I assign stats to the PCs. You get 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, and 18 as your stats. No super lucky rolls to make a god character and no super unlucky roll to make Oatmeal the minion of the PCs
Neat idea.
The big one: all groan-worthy puns provide inspiration but must be used within the same session.Yeah, we do that but at two tables most of our players forget to use inspiration.

House rule: level up only after a short rest.
House rule: Ranger spells prepared like Paladin.

Those are the only ones we do that I can think of.

My brother has a house rule: clerics get a free bonus cantrip that is based on their domain. He picks it. It's a gift from the deity.

[Theodoxus]

I have a few houserules that I like to use.

Longswords are finesse weapons when wielded with two hands. Title. It's the only two-handed finesse weapon, and it's only a finesse weapon while wielded with both hands. Makes longswords actually useful to rogues now.

I created an "elven thinblade", dealing 2d4 that was finesse and versatile (dealing 3d4). But I think I like this better.

For anyone who played Dark Age of Camelot (MMORPG), running around with a kobold rogue wielding a longsword two-handed, this evokes that memory :smallbiggrin: I always wanted to do that in 5E, especially with a halfling when I realized rogues had proficiency with longswords - but there wasn't really any reason to use one...


Casting more than one leveled spell per turn. You can cast more than one spell of 1st level or higher on your turn. The combined level must be less than or equal to half your caster level, rounded down. For example, a 6th level wizard could cast a 1st and 2nd level spell on the same turn. By 20th level, you can cast a 1st and 9th level spell, or two 5th level spells, or other combination that adds up to 10. This one isn't quite set in stone, and I've even modified it just now from what I had written down a while back (I really need to update my houserule doc).

This removes some of the awkwardness of the existing rules. It also has the consequence of diminishing the value of things like Action Surge, though YMMV on whether this is a bug or a feature. I may amend this houserule to work more nicely with Action Surge at some point.


As one who moved attunement to Proficiency Bonus +1, this would be a good fit in my campaign. I like Mith's take on Action Surge.

[cullynthedwarf]

Casting more than one leveled spell per turn. You can cast more than one spell of 1st level or higher on your turn. The combined level must be less than or equal to half your caster level, rounded down. For example, a 6th level wizard could cast a 1st and 2nd level spell on the same turn. By 20th level, you can cast a 1st and 9th level spell, or two 5th level spells, or other combination that adds up to 10. This one isn't quite set in stone, and I've even modified it just now from what I had written down a while back (I really need to update my houserule doc).

This removes some of the awkwardness of the existing rules. It also has the consequence of diminishing the value of things like Action Surge, though YMMV on whether this is a bug or a feature. I may amend this houserule to work more nicely with Action Surge at some point.

I may borrow this but add in that dbl casting like that has a chance of exhaustion. Maybe even a guarantee of exhaustion. A 12th level wizard/sorc can cast dbl fire ball but they need to dig deep into them self to pull it off. This way a words meta feats still hold value while making this offer to bring more magical bombardment to bare.

[Mith]

I may borrow this but add in that dbl casting like that has a chance of exhaustion. Maybe even a guarantee of exhaustion. A 12th level wizard/sorc can cast dbl fire ball but they need to dig deep into them self to pull it off. This way a words meta feats still hold value while making this offer to bring more magical bombardment to bare.

10 plus combined spell level Con check?

I assume that cantrips need a special niche carved out for this idea.

[TripleD]

Inspiration as Flashback Fuel
You can use your inspiration to describe a flashback with your DM. This still requires DM approval/workshopping. For example, if spotlights are an issue during a prison break, maybe a player spends their inspiration to describe how yesterday, during their cleaning duty, they cut the wick on the spotlight, making the spotlights not work when the alarm is sounded.

One of my players used it when trying to pass off a silver coin as a special token to a doorman. They rolled low on the deception, then spent their inspiration to declare the guard's vision was poor. I described how Donny's left eye has become cloudy after a bad head blow, but he's self conscious about appearing old or weak to the rest of the gang. The PC noticed that and held the coin off to the side a bit, and Donny was too proud to visibly move his head around to better inspect the coin. This lowered the DC considerably, and he let them pass.

I too enjoy “Blades in the Dark” :)

I’m thinking of tying it to INT instead. You would get “1 + INT Mod” (minimum 1) flashbacks per long rest. Makes INT more valuable to every character that way.

[cullynthedwarf]

10 plus combined spell level Con check?

I assume that cantrips need a special niche carved out for this idea.

No CON just straight caster level. Can trips could be used but not exhausting like actual spells. Would probably rule the could only dbl cast once they could cast third level spells. Let the cantrip be a nice surprise

[Sparky McDibben]

I let my player choose two feats per ASI (or split 1 ASI point and one feat). I also let them take healing potions as a bonus action, but I use static values (5 / 10 / 20 / 40) rather than roll.

[CheddarChampion]

I let my player choose two feats per ASI (or split 1 ASI point and one feat).

So (GWM + PAM) or (+2 Str) or (HAM and +1 Str for +2 Str and DR combined) or (HAM and Athlete for +2 Str and addons)?

Surely I don't understand this correctly.

[Sparky McDibben]

So (GWM + PAM) or (+2 Str) or (HAM and +1 Str for +2 Str and DR combined) or (HAM and Athlete for +2 Str and addons)?

Surely I don't understand this correctly.

Yep, you got it.

[micahaphone]

So at level 4 I could get +2 strength or GWM and PAM? That seems to really incentivize feats.

A fighter at your table must be swimming in feats!

Does variant human still only get 1 feat?

[Gignere]

I allow my players to gain a sh1tty feat at level 3 and every 4 levels after that. They are tied to character levels instead of class levels. Basically the feats that no one will ever pick if they had to spend an ASI on it.

[Sparky McDibben]

So at level 4 I could get +2 strength or GWM and PAM? That seems to really incentivize feats.

A fighter at your table must be swimming in feats!

Does variant human still only get 1 feat?

Not as much as you would think, actually. I play 1:1, so I crank up the power knob for my player because she likes feeling like an heroic badass.

Also her favorite class is rogue, so I don't usually have to deal with a feat-heavy fighter.

[Tangleweed]

So, wow. Really some neat stuff in here. I am more interested in the narrative and acting aspects of the hoby, but gladly take it with a side-order of structured play and action following rules. I had not hought about the "hindsite-inspiration", but I am totally gonna steal that. I use a house rule did I did not see anyon else mention. I might have missed it.

When I DM, 0 hp is not unconcious. 0-hp means con save. Fail and unconcious, succed and be concious but unable to move and defend yourself or really help out. Still bleeding out. That allows cool stuff like downed characters looking on in fear as their frinds despereatley do battle, two players can lay dieing next to each others saying their last fairwells or being knocked to 0 hp and screaming out to their friends to save them as the gnolls drag them away to be eaten.

[Arcturus]

Not for every campaign, but this is a really interesting one if you want to up the sense of danger in combat.

Hidden HP
The players track damage taken instead of HP remaining. Secretly determine each character’s HP every day by rolling their hit dice (max HP for level 1 as usual).

You might give them a hint as to unusually low or high results by telling them something like “you are feeling a bit under the weather today” or “you wake up feeling bright eyed and bushy tailed!”

Should also give the same sorts of hints as you would for monsters as they fall lower and lower: “you are able to shrug off the blow” or “you are feeling really rough.”

[snickersnax]

All Sorcerer's get Subtle Spell on sorcerer spells as a free metamagic and it doesn't cost sorcery points. This creates the flavor distinction that I want between sorcerers and other spell caster. Other casters are using words and gestures, sorcerers just make the magic happen. If they learn some other class way of doing magic the subtle spell doesn't apply to those spells. Also Sorcerers use spell point variant.

[KyleG]

All Sorcerer's get Subtle Spell on sorcerer spells as a free metamagic and it doesn't cost sorcery points. This creates the flavor distinction that I want between sorcerers and other spell caster. Other casters are using words and gestures, sorcerers just make the magic happen. If they learn some other class way of doing magic the subtle spell doesn't apply to those spells. Also Sorcerers use spell point variant.

Isn't that quite a buff, I like it but I'd probably limit it in some way, like a check to see if you could hide your gestures. Sleight of hand perhaps, performance If they were hiding their movements with other movements perhaps.

[MrStabby]

I house rule that you can eat three meals per day corresponding to rests. Two short rests and one long rest. The long rest must be taken by everyone at the same time but you can break out a snack as an individual whenever you want to.

I run a slight variant initiative system for those entering combat:
1) Keep the initiative scores rolled at the start
2) Is another enemy (or PC) joints the combat and is seen by hostiles, they don't go immediately.
3) Roll their initiative
4) See, in the initiative order how many enemies (that are still surviving) would be ahead of that rolled number
5) Count through hostiles from the current place in initiative order a number of places equal to enemies with higher initiative
6) Add the newcomers to initiative order here, this may involve looping to the top of initiative
7) Proceed as normal

This means that if you are in a fight, someone in the next room hears you and opens the door to fireball the party some of the PCs are likely to get a chance to respond.

[cullynthedwarf]

So, wow. Really some neat stuff in here. I am more interested in the narrative and acting aspects of the hoby, but gladly take it with a side-order of structured play and action following rules. I had not hought about the "hindsite-inspiration", but I am totally gonna steal that. I use a house rule did I did not see anyon else mention. I might have missed it.

Something I had seen but this is a RP thing rather than a house rule is the camp fire rule used sparingly it can help your players flesh out there characters, when your PCs break for the night after the watches are assigned and food prepped you roll a dX x is as close to the number of players. The player roled asked a question of one person from the table. That asked most answer it. Points for creativity are of course encouraged. Read the room though, if they group is just anxious to get to the next part then hold campfire stories in reserve.

[DarknessEternal]

Short rest takes only one minute. You can only take two total short rests per long rest.

The game functionally balances it’s short rest effects on its stated goal of 6 to 8 encounters per day with two short rests.

But no adventure they’ve ever published, nor any gaming I’ve witnessed (which is a thing now with streaming/tubing) ever makes an allotment for two separate hour long breaks where the pc’s can do nothing, not even walk.

I’m not convinced anything else is a systemic problem enough to be houseruled at this time.

[snickersnax]

Isn't that quite a buff, I like it but I'd probably limit it in some way, like a check to see if you could hide your gestures. Sleight of hand perhaps, performance If they were hiding their movements with other movements perhaps.

Sleight of hand is what other casters do to hide gestures. Sorcerer's don't have any in this house rule.

[Damon_Tor]

Not really a "houserule" but once a fight is clearly going one way or another NPCs will usually attempt to surrender or flee, or else will demand the surrender of the PCs. Depending on the encounter, this could take place after just a single round of combat if it's clear who is outmatching who. It would be terrible to have to slog through all the hitpoints every fight.

[etrpgb]

If your character dies at the end of the encounter you can go back to 0 hit points, BUT with a lingering injury. (The DMG table was actually changed a bit, but that is the idea)

[cullynthedwarf]

If your character dies at the end of the encounter you can go back to 0 hit points, BUT with a lingering injury. (The DMG table was actually changed a bit, but that is the idea)

I like the idea of this put I can see it becoming damping quickly. Is you died and are brought back at the end of combat but now have a hideous scar, that scar drops your CHA by X or makes it so you have permanent disadvantage in some area. OR the scarring is a big knot and your muscles don't bend right any more. This results in permanent disadvantage on DEX or a minus to your score.

Now the next fight its even harder to get through with this disadvantage and you die again. Now you have even more disadvantage or a bigger negative.

Like I said it sounds good but I think it would ultimately lead to players being upset in the long run.

But that's just my opinion and I could be wrong

[etrpgb]

I like the idea of this put I can see it becoming damping quickly. Is you died and are brought back at the end of combat but now have a hideous scar, that scar drops your CHA by X or makes it so you have permanent disadvantage in some area. OR the scarring is a big knot and your muscles don't bend right any more. This results in permanent disadvantage on DEX or a minus to your score.

Now the next fight its even harder to get through with this disadvantage and you die again. Now you have even more disadvantage or a bigger negative.

Like I said it sounds good but I think it would ultimately lead to players being upset in the long run.

But that's just my opinion and I could be wrong

I think you missed the keyword "can" in the new rule. Nobody stops your for roiling a new character if you prefer.

Edit: perhaps to explain a bit more how the DM changed the table is a good idea. The new table was similar to the one in the DMG at page 272, but we weaken effects that would make the character heavily non functional (like lose an arm or a foot) and mainly kept disadvantages in some checks.
Since it is meant to help survivability in low level game (at high level "regenerate" basically solves everything and resurrection is very common anyways) quite few players actually liked it. I clearly remember a Fighter that got a terrible scar; when the player smelled he was going to make checks with disadvantage for his deformity he always said something on the lines "I lost an eye in the battle!"

On the other hand, if the die actually hits your character so hard to make it really ineffective... you can just roll another one as earliest convenience and make him retire. "I used to be an adventurer like you, then I took an arrow in the knee."

[cullynthedwarf]

I think you missed the keyword "can" in the new rule. Nobody stops your for roiling a new character if you prefer.

Edit: perhaps to explain a bit more how the DM changed the table is a good idea. The new table was similar to the one in the DMG at page 272, but we weaken effects that would make the character heavily non functional (like lose an arm or a foot) and mainly kept disadvantages in some checks.
Since it is meant to help survivability in low level game (at high level "regenerate" basically solves everything and resurrection is very common anyways) quite few players actually liked it. I clearly remember a Fighter that got a terrible scar; when the player smelled he was going to make checks with disadvantage for his deformity he always said something on the lines "I lost an eye in the battle!"

On the other hand, if the die actually hits your character so hard to make it really ineffective... you can just roll another one as earliest convenience and make him retire. "I used to be an adventurer like you, then I took an arrow in the knee."

I didn't realize this was from the book, thought this was home brewed and most home brewed lists tend toward the painfully imbalanced which is what I was worried about.

[Trask]

- I roll initiative for monster groups, so 5 orcs will roll initiative once for all of them, and their human wizard master will roll initiative for himself.
- You can use your opportunity attack to grapple or shove
- You lose your Dex bonus to AC when unconscious, incapacitated, paralyzed, stunned, or restrained. I think this helps balance dexterity to strength, especially since i dont usually use feats and GWM or PAM doesnt exist.
- When you are grappling a creature you can attempt another grapple check if you have both hands free and cause it to be restrained and reduce your own speed to 0.
- You have advantage to grapple or shove any creatures smaller than you, and disadvantage to grapple or shove and creatures larger than you
- You always have advantage to hit creatures smaller than your mount with melee attacks while mounted
- Two weapon fighting: When you take the Attack action with a light melee weapon, you may make an equal number of attacks at disadvantage with a light melee weapon you are wielding in your other hand. However, you may not add your Strength or Dexterity modifier to the attack rolls made by the offhand weapon.

[crayzz]

- I roll initiative for monster groups, so 5 orcs will roll initiative once for all of them, and their human wizard master will roll initiative for himself.
- You can use your opportunity attack to grapple or shove
- You lose your Dex bonus to AC when unconscious, incapacitated, paralyzed, stunned, or restrained. I think this helps balance dexterity to strength, especially since i dont usually use feats and GWM or PAM doesnt exist.
- When you are grappling a creature you can attempt another grapple check if you have both hands free and cause it to be restrained and reduce your own speed to 0.
- You have advantage to grapple or shove any creatures smaller than you, and disadvantage to grapple or shove and creatures larger than you
- You always have advantage to hit creatures smaller than your mount with melee attacks while mounted
- Two weapon fighting: When you take the Attack action with a light melee weapon, you may make an equal number of attacks at disadvantage with a light melee weapon you are wielding in your other hand. However, you may not add your Strength or Dexterity modifier to the attack rolls made by the offhand weapon.

That first one is RAW.

Whenever I hear people complaining that they dont want to have more fights per day (usually suggested as a balancing fix against PCs unloading all their abilities in a single fight each day) because fights take too long, I wonder how much of that is just because the GM isnt using simple things like this that make the fights much faster.

Though I would suggest breaking up particularly large groups of enemies into subgroups. 1.5×#PCs makes a good max group size imo e.g. if you have 4 PCs, break that group of 12 goblins into 2 groups of 6.

[Trask]

That first one is RAW.

Wait really? I never knew for all this time. Probably because every group I started playing with always rolled it individually and so I never bothered to check :smallbiggrin:

[crayzz]

Wait really? I never knew for all this time. Probably because every group I started playing with always rolled it individually and so I never bothered to check :smallbiggrin:

Everyone seems to. I do it too when I DM most of the time, but I usually prefer 2 or 3 strong enemies to large groups.

But it's a life saver if you have a dozen mobs mixed in with the real threats. "Every goblin and kobold gets their own initiative and turn" grinds the game to a halt.

[blackjack50]

Shared food is shared. But still. Ask permission before eating or drinking anything.

Alcohol is encouraged.

Lol

Oh! You meant in game?

Oh. Um. Nothing consequential.

[TheUser]

Finesse Bows e.g. you can use strength for + to hit and damage instead of dex for a bow.
Works for emersion (draw strength is huge for bows and being stronger means more penetration and steadier aim) and gives strength based characters a solid ranged option.

[Reevh]

That first one is RAW.

Whenever I hear people complaining that they dont want to have more fights per day (usually suggested as a balancing fix against PCs unloading all their abilities in a single fight each day) because fights take too long, I wonder how much of that is just because the GM isnt using simple things like this that make the fights much faster.


Heh, my DM was complaining the other day that if he throws several "normal" encounters at us per day to try to soften us up, we end up spending no resources and murdalizing the fight. So he ends up having multiple 2-5x deadly encounters per day instead, and as a result of that, in every encounter, there's a higher than normal chance that one of us dies. Since rolling up my new character (after my last one's skull was crushed by a Duergar), he has gone unconscious in 7 out of the 8 encounters we've had thus far, and in the 8th, he was down to 3 hit points.

[Zhorn]

When rolling for HP on level up; 1's are treated as the die's average for your class.

Floor dice don't count.

When rolling multiple dice, if order is important; order is highest to lowest.

TWF (baseline) and Frenzy (Berserker Barbarian), at level 11 you can make 2 bonus action attacks instead of 1.

Frenzy (Berserker Barbarian), exhaustion levels caused by using this feature are "Temporary Exhaustion", and fully clear all stacks on a long rest.

Attempting a non-lethal attack is a 1d4 bludgeoning damage attack with the melee weapon. Crits are never non-lethal.

[Whit]

Weapon critical failure.
Rolling a 1 critical failure. Roll again
1-5 weapon breaks 6-10 weapon drops 11-> nothing. Magic items break on 1/1
This gives some laughs and “oh,oh” or cheers when a player or villain breaks, drops a weapon.

[JNAProductions]

Weapon critical failure.
Rolling a 1 critical failure. Roll again
1-5 weapon breaks 6-10 weapon drops 11-> nothing. Magic items break on 1/1
This gives some laughs and “oh,oh” or cheers when a player or villain breaks, drops a weapon.

Because feth martial characters, right? While there's not some vast divide like there was in 3rd, this still punishes a select group of people and leaves others untouched.

[PhantomSoul]

Weapon critical failure.
Rolling a 1 critical failure. Roll again
1-5 weapon breaks 6-10 weapon drops 11-> nothing. Magic items break on 1/1
This gives some laughs and “oh,oh” or cheers when a player or villain breaks, drops a weapon.

Out of curiosity, what levels do you play and is there a counterpart for spellcasting?

[Kane0]

When rolling for HP on level up; 1's are treated as the die's average for your class.

Floor dice don't count.


If you can't hit the table, you can't hit the target.

[airless_wing]

Any player, Before they make an attack with a weapon that they are proficient with, can choose to take a penalty equal to their proficiency bonus to the attack roll. If the attack hits, they add double their proficiency bonus to the attack's damage.
It basically gives everyone a chance to have a well-rounded SS/GWM option, that isnt as powerful as those feats at lower levels.

[Theodoxus]

Weapon critical failure.
Rolling a 1 critical failure. Roll again
1-5 weapon breaks 6-10 weapon drops 11-> nothing. Magic items break on 1/1
This gives some laughs and “oh,oh” or cheers when a player or villain breaks, drops a weapon.


Because feth martial characters, right? While there's not some vast divide like there was in 3rd, this still punishes a select group of people and leaves others untouched.

Halflings, halflings everywhere! I don't play well with critical fumbles...

[DarknessEternal]

Weapon critical failure.
Rolling a 1 critical failure. Roll again
1-5 weapon breaks 6-10 weapon drops 11-> nothing. Magic items break on 1/1
This gives some laughs and “oh,oh” or cheers when a player or villain breaks, drops a weapon.

On A 20 to save against an offensive spell, does the offender lose all of their spell slots half the time?

Critical fumbles of this type are preposterous.

[Hail Tempus]

On A 20 to save against an offensive spell, does the offender lose all of their spell slots half the time?

Critical fumbles of this type are preposterous. With critical fumble rules, a 20th level fighter is much more likely to break his weapon/injure himself or whatever than a first level wizard with a Strength of 8 swinging a greatsword. As you roll more D20's, you get more chances to screw up.

Basically, critical fumble rules mean that as you gain martial prowess, you also become more likely to hurt yourself with your weapon. That makes no sense. And no one ever thinks to institute a similar system for spellcasters.

[Odessa333]

I've seen several of these work well (flanking, fast potion drinking, etc) though I think the most....unique? rule I've seen was using a system of pun points. You make a joke terrible enough to elicit a laugh/moan/sigh/etc you get a point, and can use them to get boosts from inspiration to a free feat if you save up enough. It sounds bizarre I know, but in the few times I've seen it in play, the players love it, and keep trying to outdo each other with puns.

[etrpgb]

Used only once, but I still think is a good idea. Wisdom-based initiative. The master that suggested it said it was based on the idea that the initiative was more about being quick thinking and having good insight than with a good coordination, but also admitting it was mainly to reduce the "god-stat" status of Dexterity.

[MrStabby]

Used only once, but I still think is a good idea. Wisdom-based initiative. The master that suggested it said it was based on the idea that the initiative was more about being quick thinking and having good insight than with a good coordination, but also admitting it was mainly to reduce the "god-stat" status of Dexterity.

Interesting you chose wisdom for this - I tried the same with Int. It seemed solid enough. It made wizards a bit good though.

[Mith]

Interesting you chose wisdom for this - I tried the same with Int. It seemed solid enough. It made wizards a bit good though.

A good balance I have heard if you do roll and announce every time is that high dexterity goes first, but you announce general intention from loeest to higher Intelligence.

[snickersnax]

Club, quarterstaff, sling, whip, blowgun and unarmed strike are non-lethal weapons, monks can choose lethal for their unarmed strikes and monk weapons.

Longsword is versatile when used two handed.

Heavy crossbow has advantage on damage rolls (roll 2d10 take the highest).

+1 point of exhaustion when reduced to 0 hit points.

Critical hits that reduce a character to 0 hit points or critical hits to a downed character result in a lingering injury (from DMG table)

[PhantomSoul]

Longsword is versatile when used two handed.

I'm not sure what you mean by this (it already has the property) -- do you mean it counts as Two-Handed when wielded with two hands (instead of Versatile)?

[micahaphone]

Club, quarterstaff, sling, whip, blowgun and unarmed strike are non-lethal weapons, monks can choose lethal for their unarmed strikes and monk weapons.


That's already true in the rules, RAW.




Knocking a Creature Out
Sometimes an attacker wants to incapacitate a foe, rather than deal a killing blow. When an attacker reduces a creature to 0 hit points with a melee attack, the attacker can knock the creature out. The attacker can make this choice the instant the damage is dealt. The creature falls unconscious and is stable



So it's a tiny buff to blowgun, I always felt like blowgun was missing a poison coated dart option, fleshed out somewhere.

[DarknessEternal]

Blowguns in the real world weren’t historically poisoned. You don’t usually want to poison your food.

If you’re going to claim blowguns deliver poison a lot in fiction, so does basically any weapon.

Also, blowguns and slings being non-lethal is highly suspect. Those weapons are definitely designed for killing, and only for killing. You may as well blanket all weapons as non-lethal capable. That would at least be consistent.

[Reevh]

Blowguns in the real world weren’t historically poisoned. You don’t usually want to poison your food.

If you’re going to claim blowguns deliver poison a lot in fiction, so does basically any weapon.

Also, blowguns and slings being non-lethal is highly suspect. Those weapons are definitely designed for killing, and only for killing. You may as well blanket all weapons as non-lethal capable. That would at least be consistent.

All melee weapons are currently capable of non-lethal damage per RAW. I guess the designers decided it's easier to crack someone across the skull with the butt of a melee weapon than it is to perfectly land an arrow or bolt or bullet just right so that it knocks an enemy unconscious without killing them. Kind of makes sense.

[micahaphone]

Blowguns in the real world weren’t historically poisoned. You don’t usually want to poison your food.





Projectiles include seeds, clay pellets, and darts. Some cultures dip the tip of the darts in curare or other arrow poisons in order to paralyze the target. Blowguns were very rarely used by these tribes as anti-personnel weapons, but primarily to hunt small animals such as monkeys and birds.


You can use poisons for hunting, it depends on the poison and how much care you take around the hunting wound when dressing/butchering the animal. Take the Ainu culture of northern japan for example, they used several lethal toxins on their arrows.


I guess I want more fleshed out rules for poisoning weapons/ammo in general. Blowguns could have a cool niche of being extra stealthy - you'd notice a bolt/arrow sticking out of a person, but a small enough dart can be a much more subtle delivery system.

[Theodoxus]

With critical fumble rules, a 20th level fighter is much more likely to break his weapon/injure himself or whatever than a first level wizard with a Strength of 8 swinging a greatsword. As you roll more D20's, you get more chances to screw up.

Basically, critical fumble rules mean that as you gain martial prowess, you also become more likely to hurt yourself with your weapon. That makes no sense. And no one ever thinks to institute a similar system for spellcasters.

I did, but the implementation was meh.

Basically, my "melee critical fumble" rule allowed your opponent to make a OA against you with disadvantage.
My "magic critical fumble" granted vulnerability if it was a 1 on a save (fireball, sacred flame, etc), or if it was a status effect, it automatically failed the following round (so, Hold Person would last at least 2 rounds on a roll of a 1) or would extend an extra round for a 1 round effect, like Stunning Strike.

I never really got a decent idea for rolling a 1 on a ranged attack that didn't feel hokey though.

[Gignere]

I did, but the implementation was meh.

Basically, my "melee critical fumble" rule allowed your opponent to make a OA against you with disadvantage.
My "magic critical fumble" granted vulnerability if it was a 1 on a save (fireball, sacred flame, etc), or if it was a status effect, it automatically failed the following round (so, Hold Person would last at least 2 rounds on a roll of a 1) or would extend an extra round for a 1 round effect, like Stunning Strike.

I never really got a decent idea for rolling a 1 on a ranged attack that didn't feel hokey though.

You shoot a party member if one can even be reasonably be shot. That’s how we roll. In fact range attacks is the only time we have critical fumbles.

[Whit]

No multi class and and strict vision rules. Humans and light. Darkvision as its suppose to be

[Theodoxus]

You shoot a party member if one can even be reasonably be shot. That’s how we roll. In fact range attacks is the only time we have critical fumbles.

But why a party member? I could see rolling a d3 or d4 and shooting an unintended target in that direction (basically, the arc in front of you), but even then, a you re-rolling to see if you hit? Or is a 1 as good as a 20, and is an autohit, just against your buddy (sans crit, of course).

I'll never be a fan of critical fumbles though... a horrible gamist spin on a game that's pretty gamey already.

[Gignere]

But why a party member? I could see rolling a d3 or d4 and shooting an unintended target in that direction (basically, the arc in front of you), but even then, a you re-rolling to see if you hit? Or is a 1 as good as a 20, and is an autohit, just against your buddy (sans crit, of course).

I'll never be a fan of critical fumbles though... a horrible gamist spin on a game that's pretty gamey already.

We just say it hits the closest friendly. I did it as a joke on a NPC a while back, but for whatever reason my players found it hilarious and so they decided to stick with it.

[cullynthedwarf]

We just say it hits the closest friendly. I did it as a joke on a NPC a while back, but for whatever reason my players found it hilarious and so they decided to stick with it.

Well, if it works...

[Vegan Squirrel]

I've never used critical fumble rules, but I do have an idea to mitigate the problem of master warriors making more mistakes. Critical fumbles only occur if every attack taken that turn (or as part of that attack action) is a natural 1. This way, any class with extra attack would become less likely to fumble, as they'd need to critically fail twice or more in a row in order to fumble. I still don't love it, but it's an option that I haven't seen mentioned before and I know some players love them some fumble rules. Personally, I think a 1 is a good opportunity to playfully describe a comically bad miss, but there's no need for further mechanical consequences.

One ruling I'll probably use if a player decides to try a called shot, like hitting a basilisk's eyes to blind it or damaging a flying creature's wing to limit its flight, is to roll 2d20. If either is a natural 20, you pull off the shot (9.75% chance of pulling it off; alternatively, maybe a hitting PF2-style crit of AC+10 would also work). If not, treat it as a normal attack at disadvantage, using the lower d20. This is up to the DM's discretion on whether it can be attempted and what kind of consequences are achieved. The idea is it takes a critical-level effect to do a special attack like this, but this way you can up your chance of the critical effect, at the expense of the effectiveness of your attack if you miss.

[Damon_Tor]

Basically, critical fumble rules mean that as you gain martial prowess, you also become more likely to hurt yourself with your weapon. That makes no sense. And no one ever thinks to institute a similar system for spellcasters.

You could have a penalty for whenever concentration breaks on a spell. Some spells (Haste, Demon Summoning, Arguably Flying just because gravity) already have one built in. Build that into more spells. Break concentration on invisibility? You're blinded for 1d4 rounds. Bless: becomes curse (and vice versa). I'm sure you could be creative.

[PhantomSoul]

One ruling I'll probably use if a player decides to try a called shot, like hitting a basilisk's eyes to blind it or damaging a flying creature's wing to limit its flight, is to roll 2d20. If either is a natural 20, you pull off the shot (9.75% chance of pulling it off; alternatively, maybe a hitting PF2-style crit of AC+10 would also work). If not, treat it as a normal attack at disadvantage, using the lower d20. This is up to the DM's discretion on whether it can be attempted and what kind of consequences are achieved. The idea is it takes a critical-level effect to do a special attack like this, but this way you can up your chance of the critical effect, at the expense of the effectiveness of your attack if you miss.

Any planned interaction for with Advantage/Disadvantage?

[cullynthedwarf]

Something an old group of mine tried and it was good for 3.5 game was a nat 1 resulted in a - 10 to your roll so while you might not hit the giant dragon the kolbold army would still be fair game. Not sure how something like this would play out in 5e

[CheddarChampion]

Something an old group of mine tried and it was good for 3.5 game was a nat 1 resulted in a - 10 to your roll so while you might not hit the giant dragon the kolbold army would still be fair game. Not sure how something like this would play out in 5e

As in you take the 1, add your bonuses, then subtract 10 and see if you still hit?
In 5e a level 20 fighter with a +3 bow, +5 Dex, and the archery fighting style has +16 to hit. Rolling a 1 normally results in automatic failure but with this rule it'd be a total roll of 7 (which would probably miss as well).
This might be more applicable in the case of a paladin rolling a charisma save (they can get up to +17 with 20 Cha) or the like, since base rules don't have those as automatic failures.

[Sparky McDibben]

I don't use initiative. Players act before monsters, unless they are surprised.

Also, if you roll a nat 1 on a saving throw, the damage is doubled. But, if you roll a nat 20, the damage is quartered (if success would halve). It adds more crits and is a lot of fun.

[MrCharlie]

Basically, four initiatives in complex fights. Party rolls, we determine if initiative will go clockwise or counterclockwise from highest to lowest initiative. Enemies roll, we determine if any enemy beat entire party; I sort them into high and low enemy initiatives.

Assuming party wins
Party High (first half of party, starting with highest party initiative)
Enemy High (First half of enemies)
Party Low (Second half of party)
Enemy Low (second half of enemies

Reset.

The reason I do this is because I have run eleven person groups before, which was @#$%ing chaos.

Otherwise:
You can hide only if you've broken line of sight, and are automatically seen if you are ever not obscured to a creature-but can still be hidden from other creatures (house rule or not depends on your rule interpretation)

You automatically succeed checks where there is no time constraint, no penalty for failure, and a chance of success. Unless I want to add some comedy, which depends on time constraints.

It's possible to swim in armor, but tiring. Water breathing also protects you from pressure. If your flying with magic, the same is true when flying.

Crafting magic items can be sped up tremendously with appropriate reagents.

If you crit fail bad things can happen, situational to what's around you. If you somehow crit fail into the negatives, hold on, it's gonna be a wild ride! And if you crit fail on a check you cannot fail, there is a consequence to your success.

The duration of a short rest is determined by the orbit of the planet Dungeonins Masterous Fiatius, with an extremely eccentric and wobbly orbit that takes it through three black holes, a negative space anomaly, and three portals into the past. Basically, if you have an hour you can short rest, but if you have a break I'm not timing you.

Also, as a corollary, you can walk during a short rest.

Passive insight is also my friend as a DM. I also allow passive stealth's even if the party is not explicitly using the ability; otherwise, all stealth is a group check, or simply triggers initiative rounds.

You can force feed potions, cover fallen allies with your body from at least one enemy at a time (granting them full cover with your action), and occupy a fallen allies space (but if you fight in it, they have disadvantage on death saves because you are stepping on them).

You can't ask an extraplanar creature for it's True Name just because it follows your commands. If you charm it, on the other hands...

Dominated players maintain control of their character-they just have to interpret what I've said for them to do.

Edit: Also, some more dramatic things I've done in the past.

Feats are an appropriate reward for roleplaying.

I can increase a players attributes if I wish to in a similar vein.

If you want just a class feature from another class, and it's not a cheese tastic bit of nonsense, I might allow you to take it as a feat, or sub an appropriate class feature from your class in for it.

If there is a spell which is thematically appropriate for the character but not on your list, you gain access to it. Also, Sorcerer's can experiment with learning spells from other sources, and sometimes get spells for free (on list+known). Finally, if a spell is on your list and you get it from a racial feature or some other method, you can cast it with your own spellcasting class.

(Further, there is some Eberron specific stuff I've done with the above; I'd already implemented Rising from the Last War's dragonmarks with the Wayfinder's Guide spells, and a spell from a dragonmark counted as a spell on any appropriate list; Abberant marks could also be triggered for all spells)

[Mith]

On the subject of critical success and failures, I like the idea of a critical being AC+10 (crit failure as AC -10). Though I personally don't like crit failure for attack rolls. Apply this to saves, and perhaps you can save for quarter damage or take double damage. Skill checks, this works for any series of checks (3 successes/3 failures), beat by 10 counts as two successes, lose by 10 2 failures.

[Vegan Squirrel]

Any planned interaction for with Advantage/Disadvantage?

It's strange that I didn't really think about that, since I spent quite a bit of time thinking about that ruling. Human brains!

Advantage
Okay, so part of me wants to say add an extra d20 for advantage, but take the middle one if none of the three crits. Increases the crit chance while approximating the canceling out of advantage and disadvantage on a non-crit. But that seems pretty fiddly.

Another option, simply roll 1d20, but crit on an 18–20. Gives you a 15% chance of a crit, better than my original rule, while canceling out disadvantage. I like the result, but it seems too different from the normal ruling.

Disadvantage
I suppose just rolling with disadvantage as normal, achieving the called shot only if both dice roll crits (a poor option, with a 0.25% chance of critting, but at least it wouldn't hurt your chance of hitting). Or, since this is all about being a choice, you can choose to roll 3d20, taking the lowest roll unless 2 dice crit (0.72% chance). Pretty bad option.

Alternate rule
Or, just scrap the original ruling I liked, because it's too weird with dis/advantage. Instead:
Make a called shot by rolling for a 19–20 special crit. (10% crit chance)
If you fail to hit this special crit range, then roll a second d20 and take the attack at disadvantage.
If you have advantage or disadvantage, roll the first roll with advantage or disadvantage, taking the better or worse d20, as normal, and comparing it to 19–20. (advantage: 19% crit chance; disadvantage: 1% crit chance)
Then, if you didn't crit, compare that die to a third d20 for the final attack result, at canceled advantage or extra disadvantage (but by player choice, at least!).

On Topic
Since I've now posted multiple times about a prospective rule (to be fair, it was in response to the discussion of other house rules), I'll add what we've actually used in our games.

Start every session with 1 inspiration, and I hand out little tokens both to keep track and more importantly to give us all a visual reminder that inspiration's a thing, otherwise I'd forget to keep rewarding it.
Roughly 30 minute short rests. Makes it feel like less of a delay than a full hour, but still requires you to take a break.
Reroll any 1s for healing or leveling HP.
That's really about it (we had more when we played 3rd edition, not that I remember them all now). Haven't been any problems, but they're pretty straightforward and common house rules.

[Draconi Redfir]

not sure how it'd apply for 5th edition, but in a pathfinder game i played, our DM implemented a system for enchanting weapons that i thought was pretty neat.


Effectively you exchanged the gold-cost of an enchanted weapon for Experience points. Say a +1 weapon cost 2000gp, then instead you could pay 2000xp for the +1 weapon.

if you were to upgrade that +1 weapon to a +2 though, you would subtract your previous expenses. So a +2 weapon costs 4000gp, and you already spent 2000xp on it to make it +1. So you'd instead spend only an additional 2000gp the seccond time you enchanted it.

it was a bit complex and took me awhile to understand, but it was a fun addition that allowed me to fully customize my character's gear. there were some caveats though. Anyone can enchant an item/weapon due to the magic being a piece of their soul melding with it rather then actual magic enchantments. Only one person could enchant one item, If A enchants a sword and gives it to B, then B can not enchant it further then it already is. Enchantments / upgrades could only happen during "periods of extended rest" which was a bit vague, but mainly ended up being a week or more of in-game time spent not adventuring. And at any time you could "bank" some experience points to spend later. You could never Bank / spend enough experience points to de-level you, but your Banked XP had no limit, so by banking a few thousand XP every so often, you could have tens of thousands stored up in there for one big enchantment.

This didn't end up under-leveling you either. i was pretty much the only one to make use of the system and i was at MOST one or two levels under the highest-leveled player in the group. But by this time i was walking around with a +2 called, ghost-touch bastard-sword and a set of +1 shadowed ghost-touch armor.

[crayzz]

On the subject of critical success and failures, I like the idea of a critical being AC+10 (crit failure as AC -10). Though I personally don't like crit failure for attack rolls. Apply this to saves, and perhaps you can save for quarter damage or take double damage. Skill checks, this works for any series of checks (3 successes/3 failures), beat by 10 counts as two successes, lose by 10 2 failures.

This is roughly similar to what Pillars of Eternity uses for attack resolution, only they expand resolutions to miss, graze (half damage/half spell effect duration), hit, and critical hit (extra damage/extra spell effect duration).

It's kinda nice cause its generally very difficult to get criticals against enemies with defenses on par with your attack bonus, but crits can become reliable if you can debuff them to weaken their defenses (which is a feature 5e lacks in some areas AFAIK: I cant think of any ways to reduce enemy AC).

[Mith]

This is roughly similar to what Pillars of Eternity uses for attack resolution, only they expand resolutions to miss, graze (half damage/half spell effect duration), hit, and critical hit (extra damage/extra spell effect duration).

It's kinda nice cause its generally very difficult to get criticals against enemies with defenses on par with your attack bonus, but crits can become reliable if you can debuff them to weaken their defenses (which is a feature 5e lacks in some areas AFAIK: I cant think of any ways to reduce enemy AC).

Since 5e does more advantage/disadvantage, you can really only boost your attack bonus higher with Bless/Inspiration Dice, rather than lower defences.

The only thing that comes to mind is poisons to attack Dex, but that's probably homebrew territory.

[Phhase]

I ban witch bolt.
It is a big trap for characters.

Witch Bolt actually does have one good application - if you allow it to target objects. It's great at destroying emplacements, barricades, and other occluding things while minimizing attrition, since you can channel it for up to 10d12 damage to whatever inanimate thing needs breaking.


Blowguns in the real world weren’t historically poisoned. You don’t usually want to poison your food.


Ehhhh, gonna call bull on that one. Injury and ingestion poisons are actually as different in life as they are in the game. Hell, look at snake venom. If it gets into your bloodstream, you're gonna have a bad time. But drinking it is not only safe (I think...), it's part of the cure. Furthermore, if you carefully measure the amount of poison you use to the body weight of your prey, it's likely there won't even be much left in the body to be dangerous anyway - poisons are dangerous because of how they react in the body, but this process also consumes the poison.

[CheddarChampion]

Witch Bolt actually does have one good application - if you allow it to target objects. It's great at destroying emplacements, barricades, and other occluding things while minimizing attrition, since you can channel it for up to 10d12 damage to whatever inanimate thing needs breaking.

Using a 9th level spell slot will deal 10d12 if you hit, then 1d12 on subsequent turns as only the initial damage increases.

Using a 1st level spell slot deals 10d12 lightning damage over a minute. 9th gives 19d12 total. Using two 1st level slots might be more efficient.

[Hytheter]

Ehhhh, gonna call bull on that one. Injury and ingestion poisons are actually as different in life as they are in the game. Hell, look at snake venom. If it gets into your bloodstream, you're gonna have a bad time. But drinking it is not only safe (I think...), it's part of the cure.

Drinking venom is safe as long as you are totally healthy, but if you have a stomach ulcer or some internal opening then it could get into your bloodstream that way and cause problems.

Venom isn't part of antivenom though. It's used in the process but there's none in the end product. You also don't drink antivenom, it's an injection.

[Luccan]

Witch Bolt actually does have one good application - if you allow it to target objects. It's great at destroying emplacements, barricades, and other occluding things while minimizing attrition, since you can channel it for up to 10d12 damage to whatever inanimate thing needs breaking.



Ehhhh, gonna call bull on that one. Injury and ingestion poisons are actually as different in life as they are in the game. Hell, look at snake venom. If it gets into your bloodstream, you're gonna have a bad time. But drinking it is not only safe (I think...), it's part of the cure. Furthermore, if you carefully measure the amount of poison you use to the body weight of your prey, it's likely there won't even be much left in the body to be dangerous anyway - poisons are dangerous because of how they react in the body, but this process also consumes the poison.

Doesn't it only target creatures?

Since this is a thread on houserules, how about Witch Bolt damage as a bonus action? Too much or too little? Free seems too far, even though it is concentration. It would be like hitting a foe with a great axe every turn, while getting to hit them with other things.

[deljzc]

I'm a big fan of a UA homebrew initiative alternative:

https://dnd.wizards.com/articles/unearthed-arcana/greyhawk-initiative

Once the players get the hang of it, I really like it. Any action they want to do, you just create a die for initiative. Roll multiple die, lowest scores win. No dexterity or stat modifiers (although I am experimenting with that).

I've kind of homebrewed the whole system for myself and working out the kinks.

I just really don't like how strong DEX is in 5th edition and really don't like initiative RAW. This kind of fixes both issues.

[CheddarChampion]

Since this is a thread on houserules, how about Witch Bolt damage as a bonus action? Too much or too little?

How about:
1. action to cast
2. bonus action to do extra damage
3. remove the range limitation after the initial hit
4. cannot affect a creature you cannot see (full cover, invisible, hidden, darkness, fog cloud...)
?

[cullynthedwarf]

Have we hit the end?

[Man_Over_Game]

Have we hit the end?

I made a bunch, ran them threw a few veterans on the forums, and used them in real-play. They all do a good job for what they're designed for.

Improved Stealth: Summarized, if Stealth would end on your turn (from something other than an attack), it instead ends when your turn does unless you take a Hide Action and succeed on your check (Contested against all creatures who you would have revealed yourself to on your turn). Total, this means that people can actually do solo stealth missions, use melee attacks while hidden, and other shenanigans. It's fully laid out so there's no ambiguity for pretty much any situation. Let me know if you want the details.

Improved Initiative: Summarized, roll Initiative at the end of Long or Short Rests instead of at the start of combat, reroll throughout the day if good-or-bad things happen to a player. With a static initiative, the DM can call for immediate action without the dreaded "Roll For Initiative" Syndrome, where players only care about threats when Initiative is relevant. With options like Advantage/Disadvantage on a character's initiative, players will also be incentivized to prepare for their resting conditions. Let me know if you want the details.

Prestige Options: Link in my signature. Classes can utilize alternate primary stats (like Wizards using Wisdom), so long as very specific requirements are met. Should those requirements not be met, the character simply reverts to using the default stat. A few examples are Strength-Monk, Dexterity-Barbarian, Intelligence-Bard, Charisma-Druid. Balance justifications behind every single Option (with at least 1 Option per class) are provided in the link.

Adrenaline Surge: Link in my signature. Halfway through a fight, something big happens and Players get a Short Rest while badguys get a mechanic change to the encounter. This allows DMs who prefer fewer fights in a day to separate their encounters into 2 fights instead of 1 (meaning difficulty can be accounted for), Short Rest classes get their bonuses (so Warlocks aren't shafted in a 1-fight-per-day group), Hit Dice get used (important for Barbarians/Melee Classes), and fights don't get stale. The event could be triggered by a boss entering a new form, enemy waves using a new strategy, or an environmental effect creates a moment of confusion for both sides.

Pain (Note: Not playtested yet): Link in my signature. Sacrifice damage and a bonus action to make a Called Shot, which can hit a creature or a target object. When hitting a creature, you might inflict a temporary Exhaustion effect, "Pain", on a target if they fail a Constitution Save. Pain goes away when the creature is fully healed, from a Medicine Check, or when taking a Rest, but otherwise works identically to (and stacks with) Exhaustion. This gives martial combatants more options in combat, as well as forcing enemies to lose their Legendary Resistances. The downside is that the DM will occasionally have to remember that things start going downhill for units as early as 2-Pain.

[malachi]

Improved Stealth: Summarized, if Stealth would end on your turn (from something other than an attack), it instead ends when your turn does unless you take a Hide Action and succeed on your check (Contested against all creatures who you would have revealed yourself to on your turn). Total, this means that people can actually do solo stealth missions, use melee attacks while hidden, and other shenanigans. It's fully laid out so there's no ambiguity for pretty much any situation. Let me know if you want the details.


Details are good. I want them. Gimme!


My DM allows paladins to Lay on Hands as a BA, which I would ordinarily have said is bad, but it's the only thing that allowed us to avoid TPKs several times (because I spent my turn dodging and reviving allies for most of the battle). I think he might overtune combat a teeny bit.

Another houserule that works is "NPCs are only allowed to benefit from a crit 1 / round". This was after my paladin was crit 6 times in 3 rounds of combat (plus several crits on other PCs). There isn't any counterpoint to limiting the crits PCs get.


Crits deal max damage of attack + whatever the dice rolled. This was scrapped after one combat, before the limit on DM crits was imposed.




Spoilered because they haven't actually been used yet:

1. Merge all of the weapon feats (Tavern Brawler, Charger, XBE, Defensive Duelist, Grappler, GWM, Shield Master, Weapon Master, Dual Wielder, PAM, SS), into a single feat, but weaken the outliers (GWM / PAM / SS / XBE), and buff a few (Dual Wielding, Grappler, Weapon Master). This allows anyone who takes the feat to be good with ALL weapons (Weapon Master gives proficiency with all weapons, too, instead of just 4)

2. Replacing the weapon / armor tables with the info in my signature (allows a lot more variety in equipment before accounting for magic items)

3. Crits no longer deal extra damage. Instead, they impose conditions based on the damage types used in the attack / spell. Each damage type has 3 tiers of crit effects (strong, moderate, and weak). PCs deal Moderate crits. Most enemies deal Weak crits (while elite enemies would deal Moderate crits, and bosses would deal Strong crits). Lvl 5 Rogues deal Strong crits (when other martials get Extra Attack).

---The most interesting crit effect would be Radiant: the target gets a bonus to attacks and forces penalties to saves they impose, but take disadvantage to ability checks they make and take 2d8 * [attacker's Proficiency bonus] damage every turn. The effect lasts until the target spends an action to calm themselves and clear their soul.

4. Not really a houserule, but still: Full use will be made of the DMG "Skills with Different Abilities" variant on PHB 175. Also, passive checks will be used a lot (any situation that would normally have opposed rolls, the defender uses their passive score).

5. Again, not really a houserule, but enemies will be made / chosen to spread out the save effects across all 6 stats, rather than focusing primarily on DEX/CON/INT.
STR and INT become mostly for avoiding things that trap you (physical restraints | illusions).
DEX and WIS become mostly for avoiding highly damaging effects, or some other effects (prone | fear).
CON and CHA become mostly for avoiding nasty statuses (poison | possession) or being moved (pushes | teleports).
--- PC spells / abilities aren't impacted by this change.

[Man_Over_Game]

Details are good. I want them. Gimme!
The Deets:


The Rules:



You may attempt to Hide when you are Heavily Obscured from every enemy's detection (including from Full Cover)
If you move into an enemy's line of sight, you are still considered hidden until the end of your turn, when you are then revealed. You may not be revealed if you end your turn while in a location you could attempt to Hide in, and you take the Hide Action before your turn ends. This cannot be the same Hide action that you took to initiate your Stealth.

If you enter an enemy's line of sight while not Partially Obscured (I.E. dim lighting, fog, heavy rain), then they have Advantage with their passive Perception to detect you.

If you are spotted and are within 15 feet of where you were last seen, Perception Checks and Passive Perception made against your Stealth Checks have advantage until the end of your next turn.
If an enemy cannot hear you, their Perception checks and Passive Perception to detect you have Disadvantage.
Attacking is the exception; if you attack, you are immediately revealed to the target after your attack resolves.
If you are revealed to a creature, you are revealed to all other creatures that can communicate with it.

These abilities are subject to change to other abilities in-game, as in instances related to Wood Elves or the Skulker feat.

[JBPuffin]

Level 4 gives an ASI and a Feat.

Minimum HP/level before Con mod = average of your hit die, rounded down.

Group Skill Checks - When multiple people want to do the same thing, additional parties are force multipliers. Mostly applies to Stealth but could also be useful for “need X of something to advance” (pushing things, gathering food) or “get X done at what speed” (scavenger hunts, crossing a bridge tethered to each other).

[Solusek]

House rules that all the DMs at our table use:
If you roll poorly on HP, you can take the DM's roll, but you have to take it.

House rules when I DM:
Long rest no longer heals you to full, HD recovery is slower. Added Very long rest to heal to full.
Flanking is +2 to hit.
Shoving takes an attack instead of an action.
Grappling can be advanced to restrained with another successful check (but at disadvantage).
Restrained also causes actions to be difficult to perform, like spell casting - requiring a Concentration check.
Advantage and Disadvantage stack, one will not cancel out all of the other.
Dropping to zero HP gives you a level of exhaustion.
Subdual damage for non-lethal attacks, tracked as negative temp HP. Heals with any rest or magical healing.
Identifying magic items during a rest only reveals 1 property per hour spent researching the item.
Bonuses to Passive perception add to Perception (Observant feat).
Bloodied - like fourth edition, I let the players know when opponents fall below half.

I like these house rules quite a bit. All of them except for the flanking one. In a D&D edition where walking circles around an enemy doesn't provoke attacks of opportunity, even a +2 bonus is too much.

[Man_Over_Game]

I like these house rules quite a bit. All of them except for the flanking one. In a D&D edition where walking circles around an enemy doesn't provoke attacks of opportunity, even a +2 bonus is too much.

One thing I've used is +1 to hit for each other creature adjacent to that target that is its enemy. Deduct this bonus by -2 if the target has a shield, -1 if the target is wielding a different weapon in each hand, +1 for each of the target's adjacent enemies that has Pack Tactics.

So if you're surrounded by 4 creatures, each of them gets +3 to hit. If you have a shield, each of them gets only +1 to hit.

If you're surrounded by 3 creatures, and all of them have Pack Tactics, they each get +4 to hit (+1 for each other adjacent enemy, +1 for each other adjacent enemy with Pack Tactics).

It makes Great Weapon Fighting have some severe downsides, while buffing Two-Weapon Fighting and Sword-and-Board Fighting more preferable, while also encouraging your allies to engage in melee combat (which helps divide damage evenly across the party, which is optimal for 5e).


This cuts down on circling (which is easy, as you've mentioned), but still provides incentive for engaging and surrounding a solitary target, or bottlenecking enemies. Lastly, it provides a well-needed boon to melee combatants, as Ranged combat is superior in almost every way.

[Solusek]

One thing I've used is +1 to hit for each other creature adjacent to that target that is its enemy. Deduct this bonus by -2 if the target has a shield
I do like that added benefit for using a shield. Swarms of things might get out of hand with a bonus that could scale to +9 or higher! Perhaps capping out at no higher than +2 after all modifiers could be a compromise.

[Luccan]

Here's one I have used: everyone starts with a feat. I used this for a non-standard game (everyone was some kind of goblinoid) so not sure how I'd work it with V. Human (other than no double feat). It didn't go on as long as it should have thanks to college, but what play it saw wasn't broken. Mostly it freed up a few character concepts.

[malachi]

The Deets:

Thanks! It looks completely reasonable, and that it'd add fun for that playstyle.




One thing I've used is +1 to hit for each other creature adjacent to that target that is its enemy. Deduct this bonus by -2 if the target has a shield, -1 if the target is wielding a different weapon in each hand, +1 for each of the target's adjacent enemies that has Pack Tactics.

So if you're surrounded by 4 creatures, each of them gets +3 to hit. If you have a shield, each of them gets only +1 to hit.

If you're surrounded by 3 creatures, and all of them have Pack Tactics, they each get +4 to hit (+1 for each other adjacent enemy, +1 for each other adjacent enemy with Pack Tactics).

It makes Great Weapon Fighting have some severe downsides, while buffing Two-Weapon Fighting and Sword-and-Board Fighting more preferable, while also encouraging your allies to engage in melee combat (which helps divide damage evenly across the party, which is optimal for 5e).


This cuts down on circling (which is easy, as you've mentioned), but still provides incentive for engaging and surrounding a solitary target, or bottlenecking enemies. Lastly, it provides a well-needed boon to melee combatants, as Ranged combat is superior in almost every way.


I do like that added benefit for using a shield. Swarms of things might get out of hand with a bonus that could scale to +9 or higher! Perhaps capping out at no higher than +2 after all modifiers could be a compromise.

It feels like that would get a little bit more complex than is expected for 5e, and makes swarms more dangerous than they already are - up to +8 for swarms w/out pack tactics, or +16 for those with it (or +6 and +14 for a target with a shield). It fits the simulationist "its dangerous to be outnumbered, even by inferior enemies", though.

[Man_Over_Game]

Thanks! It looks completely reasonable, and that it'd add fun for that playstyle.







It feels like that would get a little bit more complex than is expected for 5e, and makes swarms more dangerous than they already are - up to +8 for swarms w/out pack tactics, or +16 for those with it (or +6 and +14 for a target with a shield). It fits the simulationist "its dangerous to be outnumbered, even by inferior enemies", though.

It'd be 1 (or 2, with PT) less than your numbers, since a creature doesn't count himself.

This'd mean that a character with a shield can take on 3 units at once before suffering Flanking problems.

Account for the +2 AC on the shield, and that means that a character with a Shield starts being hit "as normal" when surrounded by 5 creatures. That is, a shield-user surrounded by 5 creatures is just as easy to be hit as a Greataxe user surrounded by 1.

Additionally, regardless of how much bonus to hit they have, they will still be capped by their normal methods of damage (1d4+1 or whatever). 4 damage per hit, at 100% chance to hit, is still only 4 damage per attack. Compared to not being surrounded, who'd have roughly a 50% chance of being hit, would take 2 damage per attack. Honestly, it seems pretty reasonable.

But you do make a good point. As reasonable as that sounds, +14 to hit is not.

[Wuxtry]

Hi! One house rule I've used is when someone drops a dice on the floor they get disadvantage on that roll. It encourages people not to roll wildly but I've found it makes things a little more fun when people drop their dice.

[Trustypeaches]

Holding a spell focus allows a caster to perform somatic components with the same hand. A cleric with a holy symbol on their shield holding a shield and a mace can now cast sacred flame, for example.
Just pointing out that this isn’t a house rule.

You can always use the hand your using for your material component for your somatic component.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

The best houserule I played under is an alternative death and dying rules.

At 0 HP, you dont get knocked out, though someone can try it (3 saves and if they choose to knock you out, you are knocked out and not dying).

0 HP is level 1 of exhaustion

1 failed save is level 2 of exhaustion

2 failed saves is level 3 of exhaustion

3 failed saves is death.

This exhaustion doesn't stack with normal exhaustion.

[CheddarChampion]

Just pointing out that this isn’t a house rule.

You can always use the hand your using for your material component for your somatic component.

AFAIK the spell you cast needs to have 'a material component that can be substituted with a focus' for the hand with the focus to be able to perform the somatic components.

No material component -> cannot use same hand for somatic
Material component is consumed -> cannot use same hand for somatic
Material component has a listed price -> cannot use same hand for somatic

Again this is just AFAIK.