House Ruling

[slexlollar89]

I recently have become aware that I employ a large number of house rules.
This has brought my attention to them, and whether or not they are balanced or good. Then I started thinking about other peopls rulings.

What do you guys have for some big house rules?

[SoD]

As DM-if in doubt, improvise! And if you don't know the right answer-if in a session, make up something that sounds fine, if not in a session, admit ignorance with 'not quite sure about that, I'll get back to you' or talk about the topic without answering!

[Azerian Kelimon]

The whole sorcerer's spontaneous casting system is changed into having a number of spells you can spend without penalty (And having every spell already "Inside yourself"), and taking CON damage after you go past that number. Other spontaneous castings remain unchanged, tho. It gives them the ability of being actually useful when compared to a wiz.

[Tormsskull]

Some house rules I have used in the past but do not necessarily use everytime:

*Spell points instead of spell slots, no Sorcerors, all Wizards cast spontaneously, spells available drastically changed.
*Expensive material components added on to specific spells.
*Kits. I create between 10-20 kits that reflect what a character did before they became adventurers. Each kit grants minor bonuses such as adding onto class lists. Generally speaking I make players select their kits without showing them the details, but I will explain the kit in general terms. This is to combat the "Which kit expands my class skills the most?"-player.
*Each player starts with 1d3 contacts. These contacts are used to reflect a character's life before and between sessions. When the PCs run into an NPC who speaks with them, they can declare that person one of their contacts, and as such start off with a friendly relationship with that person.
*Homebrewed Perks/Flaws system, random to prevent min-maxing.
*Adapt Bloodlines from Birthright AD&D campaign setting for 3.x.
*"If it is not written down on your character sheet, your character does not have it."
*DM Points. At the begining of each session past the first, I ask 3-4 questions based on events that the characters participated in the previous session. If a player gets it right, they get a DM Point. If they get it wrong, the question goes to another player. DM Points can be spent on anything from additional skills, feats, hit points, spell slots, instant ressurection, really anything. Many of these I decide the DM Point cost beforehand, through impromptu requests are allowed too. I assign a cost to it, document it so that it is the same for each player, and reserve the right to adjust it if it proves to be unbalanced.
*EXP is not based on your level, it is based on the average party level. Generally speaking each character gets the same amount of EXP unless they do not participate in an encounter that nets EXP.
*If your character dies, you get between 50-100% of the experience point total of your former character depending on how you died. If you died doing something obviously stupid/suicidal, you get 50%. If your character dies under average circumstances, you get 75%. If your character dies due to great roleplaying you get 100%.

[Telonius]

To the OP: What house rules do you use? That could help out the analysis significantly.

My big houserules: Remove the whole polymorph spell group. Remove the Natural Spell feat. Full BAB for Monks. Monks can have their unarmed strike enchanted. Remove the +1BAB requirement for Weapon Finesse. Bards and Barbarians can be lawful, Monks can be chaotic. Paladins follow their deity's alignment. Remove multiclassing XP penalty. Sorcerers get free Eschew Materials at first level. Metamagicked spontaneous spells do not take any more time to cast than metamagicked prepared spells.

There are other more specific houserules, but those are the biggest game-altering changes I can think of at the moment.

EDIT: Oh yes, forgot a couple. Half-orcs now have +2 STR, -2 INT. The race no longer alters charisma. Half-orcs get a +2 racial bonus to Intimidate checks. (Full-blooded orcs get a +4 bonus). Half-Elves get 4 extra skill points at first level, and one extra skill point at each additional level. (They do not get an extra feat at first level).

[SadisticFishing]

Spiked chains can't deal nonlethal damage.

Not sleeping makes you roll progressively harder con checks.

[GimliFett]

Cure/Inflict Minor Wounds heals/deals 1d3, unalterable by level or metamagic.

Add your primary casting stat's modifier to the number of 0th-level spells you can cast per day.

Awareness encompasses Listen, Search and Spot, however the bonuses for the latter skills still apply based on the application of the skill.

Stealth encompasses Hide and Move Silently, however the bonuses for the latter skills still apply based on the application of the skill.

Those are the ones I can remember off the top of my head... I know there's others we employ and I'll pro'lly toss 'em in here later.

[Tyger]

The big ones we use in our group include:
Shields give double their listed AC bonus. One DM loves shields!
Falling damage is exponential. First 10 feet is 1d6. Second 10 feet it 2d6 + the first 1d6, third ten feet is 3d6 + 2d6 +1d6... yes, falling kills in our games.
Spell point system (for one game) rather than Vancian magic system
We never worry about spell components. Spells with costly components just use the GP value.

Plus dozens of others that come up on a game by game basis. :)

[its_all_ogre]

i hope you are prepared for a deluge of posts!!
i use loads of big and small ones which i will try to generalise.
max hps, fed up with rogues ending up with more hps than barbs.
crossclass skill do not cost double, max ranks remain.
total overhaul of spellcasters into one class, apart from partial casters and classes like bard/duskblade.
two weapon fighting is a standard action.
rangers get ful animal companion from level 1 and spontaneously cast spells.
paladin spontaneously cast from charisma (both get an extra spell in every slot too, basically making all 0 entries into ones etc)
monks use wisdom for all combat rolls in place of strength and full bab.
soulknife get full bab, all good saves, evasion at level 4 and shape mindblade enables them to shape into any weapon they can use.
you die at -con score rather than -10 hps.

[Reinboom]

Mine...
I have a huge list of banned items/spells/feats. I ban all campaign specific (FR/Eberron/etc.) material except specific races. And I ban Wizard, Cleric, Druid, and the Archivist - and a couple prestige classes.
Also, I generally ask to just not break my game in general.

However, if you feel something is too weak and I mutually agree, I will let you modify it or even modify it for you.

I also encourage optimization usually - with the idea/notion of "optimize and get your character's mechanically sound now so we can better focus on role playing, later."

Aside from these...
Nearly all player material from:
http://wiki.faxcelestis.net/
is available.
Also, I use my 'Fluffy Mechanics' (and all subvariants) and XP Buffer from that site.

Alignments don't exist. Mostly. Things born of higher planes have alignments reflective of that plane for spell purposes. Their deeds do not change their alignment however - so a mass murdering solar will always come up "good". But other than this, alignments don't exist. Let me see your Knight Bards!

For GM Rulings, I keep a thing of "Let me quickly find it - if it turns out to be not so quick then, I'll adhoc it and that's the new ruling."
Unless it's a larger group, then I tend to ad-hoc things more often.

There's more... I think...

[SilverClawShift]

Our DM doesn't reward XP explicitly. We don't have an amount of XP we keep track of to the number, we just level up when he decides we've leveled up. For crafting purposes, penalties in the rules involving specific amounts of XP, and similar things, the DM will either come up with some other penalty, a non-renewable resource, or just let it slide provided the group doesn't take adventage of his easy-going nature (ie, no starting the campaign 15 years late because we spent that time crafting millions of wands and potions and powerful gear).

He's also maleable on prestige class requirements (too many prestige classes, you need to have been planning on taking it from the start and have the perfect selection of feats and skills. Sometimes that's for a very good reason, but sometimes it's easier just to fudge a skill or feat for a good character concept).

Those are the only real house 'rules' i think we use.

[Khorebh]

Oh, wow. House rules? I've got a few of my own, and sometime in the next six months a couple of my players and I plan to finish and roll out something that's best described not as a house rules document, but as an alternate system. Hopefully, when it's done it'll be mirrored here for critique and opinions. (You all seem like a very cool, supportive group of editors.)

Anyway, on the the house rules.

House Rules I Use

The character pool rule, from Dark Sun

This means that the players get four characters each, connected somehow via the Law Of Seven Degrees Of Separation, to switch between at character death or when the party needs a different configuration.

I've started all my characters off at third level; I don't know if that counts as a house rule or not.


Rather than follow the XP guidelines presented in the DMG, I hand out what I like to call ' narrative XP'- Based on story progress, roleplay, and with a hefty bonus for defeating enemies, whether in combat or by working smarter, not harder. ;)


In the future, I may toy with a character system similar to Blue Rose, wherein the player chooses one new class feature at every level, basically constructing a class to their own specifications.


I'm using the 'Armour as DR' and 'Class Defense Bonus' options, because I liked them in d20 Modern and by gum I like them in D&D.


This last, I'm sure, doesn't apply to a lot of people, but since my games are played mostly over IRC or AIM chats with people on a variety of machines, several of my players don't have a dice set, and I find that referring to online dice roller sites bogs down gameplay, I roll most of the dice for the entire game (I have a d20 collection, and I'm thrilled to finally have an excuse to use it!)



Those are only the ones that spring to mind just at the moment; I'll be chiming later if more occur to me.

:eek: That's a lot more than I meant to type, especially in my first post, but I hope that's alright.

[Prometheus]

-Taking Skill Focus in anything that is not a class skill instantaneously makes it into a class skill (for all classes that you take) For example a vampire sorcerer wanted to learn how to use Survival in order to hunt small woodland creatures when needed. This is quite realistic, given that she routinely does this.
-When you sleep for the night, you gain your HD plus your Con modifier, instead of just your HD.
-Discount scrolls (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0088.html). Treat a spell as one spell level lower, although there is something wrong with it (sometimes you don't know beforehand).
-I tried combining, adding and splitting skills, but this was immensely unpopular.

[BlackStaticWolf]

I house rule extensively in a couple areas.

Experience
I don't award EXP based upon encounter levels or anything like that. Instead, I have a rough idea of how often I want people gaining levels, and I give out EXP accordingly at the end of each session, regardless of what went on during that session.

I give bonus XP for doing things that I deem to be "awesome."

NPCs Follow their own rules
This is really a corrollary to the idea that mechanics come second to plot. I'm of the opinion that NPCs really only need stats if they're going to fight the PCs (or at least fight along side them). As such, my NPCs pretty much just do whatever it is that I need them to do when not in combat, whether they have a class ability that grants that power or not.

For example, a villain that my PCs have recognized as an enemy (he really hasn't noticed them yet) has two servants that he "created" through magical spells and rituals whose in game stats do not exist.

[Lord Tataraus]

Well, in my most recent game I don't reward XP, instead I level up the group when they've earned it. Also, crafting requires a unique item, usually uncommon for low level items to extremely rare for high level items, this is instead of XP cost.

[slexlollar89]

In response to an ealier poster, my houselrules include:

monks get a ki pool similar to a ninja (lose stuning fist, bonus feats, slowfall, still mind/various bodies) with a large list of available abilities to use.

No casting as core, there is a mage class (divine or arcane) which uses different mechanics instead of spells/day/known.

No chaos/law alignment restrictions for any class or race, and no alighnment restriction for god worship or spell access (domains still require the proper alignment).

Fighter gets 4+int skills, and a bigger skill list.

No polymorph, timestop, wish/miracle as spells (similar class abilities or invocations stay)

no hide or move silently (replaced with the sneak skill)

craft requires no exp cost, but uses a craft piont system based off level and ranks in craft

The Faith system (not the one in Comp. Div.): a character has a faith score equal to his level and his faith modifier (which is gained through pro-god actions). A faith roll is like a check, with a subjective and semi-changeabl DC set by the god(s). The roll can be for a retried critical, bonus damage, to come back to 1 hp, to cast a spell, anything. The god answers depending opn the level and faith modifier of the subject, and may even require justification before performing a miracle.

I got more, but I don't want to fill up pages :smallsmile:

[Curmudgeon]

Falling damage is exponential. First 10 feet is 1d6. Second 10 feet it 2d6 + the first 1d6, third ten feet is 3d6 + 2d6 +1d6...
Why? The impact energy from falling scales linearly with distance until air drag starts having a significant effect.

The big house rule I use is that falling damage caps at 50d6 because 500' is about the right distance to reach terminal velocity.

[chrek]

We play in a very strongly mixed world, So we have a some house rules that don't really apply to D&D directly:

D20 modern base classes are only available as NPC classes, since they don't scale as quickly as a D&D base classes.

Non powered weapons deal 1 die damage (allowing for the scythe, and great sword which do 2 dice), powered weapons, including firearms do 2 dice damage (allowing for large caliber and high powered weapons), and energy weapons do 3 dice. This basically only changes lightsabers, which now do 3d8 damage at first level.

All base classes get 5+1/2 level actions points per level, all non-base classes give 6+1/2 level.

Action points apply to a single die roll, and can be spent at a rate higher than 1 per round.

A natural 1 on any d20 roll is a failure, a 20 is a success. On a non-attack roll critical success the DM is free to embellish on how well the success happened, and what in-game bonuses are applied. On a natural 1 on an attack roll the attacker provokes an attack of opportunity from anyone that threatens his square.

Players may spend an action to make a natural 1 no longer a failure, but simply a 1, and add modifiers appropriately.

No matter how devastating the attack, unless it specifically says otherwise when a player would normally be dropped into negative hit points by any attack, he is instead unconscious, at 0, and bleeding out. Each round a Fort save DC 10 (higher if I decide, usually based on player stupidity). Stabilizes the player and he takes a full round to regain consciousness, however any non-move actions taken by the player cause him to lose consciousness again, and begin bleeding out again.

I call this a house rule to eliminate arguments, I'm not sure it is: No use of a combination of feats allows you to take more than twice the number of attacks you are allowed by your base attack, and all these attacks are at a -2. This comes from knife throwers wanting to use Rapid shot, the two weapon fighting skill tree, a a couple of feats from modern to give a ridiculous number of attacks.

[The_Blue_Sorceress]

I have an entire homebrew world that I use sometimes. Some of the odd rules found therein are as follows:

The Spellcaster generic class from Unearthed Arcana and the Binder from Tome of Magic are the only spellcasting options available. Paladins get additional feats instead of spellcasting, but maintain their ability to remove disease and lay on hands, and rangers get a d10 hit die and a few less extra feats than the paladin. Bards don't exist as a class, but bard-like abilities are re-structured as spells that use perform checks as part of the casting process.

No alignment restrictions on the ethical (law/chaos) axis, except that paladins must still be LG.

No Orcs, Gnomes or Halflings. No racial Int penalties, for the Orc-like race. Goblins in my world are human-height, intelligent and traditionally at odds with humans. Neither the goglins or the orc-like race are inherently or culturally evil. They don't get along with humans for much more mundane reasons than evil deities. Half-elves get additional skill points as a human does.

There's a pile more that are sort of on-the-fly tweaks if I think something is silly or overpowered, but these are the big ones in my homebrew setting.

When I run generic, or an established setting, I usually only ban particularly bad abuses of the rules and leave everything else the same.

-Blue

[Fax Celestis]

The spiked chain doesn't exist.
The Two Weapon Fighting feat allows you to attack with both hands as a standard action and includes the Improved and Greater versions.
Listen and Spot are combined into Awareness.
Hide and Move Silently are combined into Stealth.
Open Lock is folded into Disable Device.
Use Magic Device and Spellcraft are combined into Use Magic.
Balance and Tumble are combined into Athletics.
My homebrew material is available, all other homebrew available on a case-by-case basis.
Half of Level Adjustment, rounded up, is converted into Racial Hit Dice.
Rope trick, mage's magnificent mansion, and similar spells do not exist.
Clerics use the Cloistered Cleric variant.
Druids use the Shapeshift variant.
Shadowcasters use a recharge system akin to ToB.
Truenamers alter DCs for their utterances to 15 + (2*Utterance Level), but cannot apply any bonuses to Truespeech.
Halfcasters (such as a Paladin, Hexblade, Ranger, or Spellthief) treat their Caster Level as their class level -3.
Rangers have an animal companion as a Druid of class level -3.
No class has an alignment restriction.
That's off the top of my head. I'm sure I have more.

[Gerrtt]

I have a couple. The most notable is:

Upon level up, you may only add 2 + int modifier maximum skill points in any given skill.

This rule was invented because someone in a campaign I was in was planning on dumping every skill point into his Tumble skill to essentially not have to roll tumble anymore, but it seemed odd that he would suddenly become a master tumbler when he had never used the skill before. So to promote the development of skills, rather than just the purchase of them, we made this rule up. Said player was rather upset, but everyone else in the game agreed to the rule when we voted. It has been in my games ever since.

[Lord Tataraus]

I have a couple. The most notable is:

Upon level up, you may only add 2 + int modifier maximum skill points in any given skill.

This rule was invented because someone in a campaign I was in was planning on dumping every skill point into his Tumble skill to essentially not have to roll tumble anymore, but it seemed odd that he would suddenly become a master tumbler when he had never used the skill before. So to promote the development of skills, rather than just the purchase of them, we made this rule up. Said player was rather upset, but everyone else in the game agreed to the rule when we voted. It has been in my games ever since.

Wait, what? The skill cap is fine, if he was planning on doing that, either he had very low int (the character) or he was wasting tons of skill points. Unless you use some weird rule that over rides the skill cap, but then you're just making it overly complicated.

Anyway, in my games Fighter is replaced with Warblade, Monk with Unarmed Swordsage and Paladins are either Crusaders or that revised Paladin somewhere in the homebrew that works for all four non-neutral alignments. Also, I tend to weed out some spells on a case-by-case basis and ban artificer, archivist and require the shapeshift variant druid. Though I plan on using the Martial Artist (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=61352) I've been working on for the Avatar D20 in the homebrew forums.

[Fax Celestis]

that revised Paladin somewhere in the homebrew that works for all four non-neutral alignments.

I'm surprised at how popular that's become.

[SilverClawShift]

I have a couple. The most notable is:

Upon level up, you may only add 2 + int modifier maximum skill points in any given skill.

Well, you can only have your level + 3 ranks in any skill by the rules anyway. If his INT was 14, then the cap is the same. It's your table, but there's really no problem with the 4-max starting skill ranks.

[MCerberus]

Well, you can only have your level + 3 ranks in any skill by the rules anyway. If his INT was 14, then the cap is the same. It's your table, but there's really no problem with the 4-max starting skill ranks.

I think what he means is - level 4 rogue levels up. Now he's gone from having a skill with 0 points in it to max ranks.

[Lemur]

You can power attack with light weapons (at a 1-for-1 tradeoff), but you cannot power attack and use weapon finesse at the same time.

[Jayabalard]

The big ones we use in our group include:
Falling damage is exponential. First 10 feet is 1d6. Second 10 feet it 2d6 + the first 1d6, third ten feet is 3d6 + 2d6 +1d6... yes, falling kills in our games.<nitpick> That's increasing in a geometric progression, not exponential .... n(n+1)/2 is the number of dice that you roll, where n * 10 is the number of feet that you fall.
</nitpick>

[SilverClawShift]

MCerberus, that makes a lot more sense :smallsmile:

[BardicDuelist]

Feinting is a move action, changed to a swift action with improved feint.

Scimitars are finessable.

Longspears may be used in one hand if used with a shield, but you take a =2 penalty.

Factotum's Cunning Insight is limited by level (you cannot gain more than [level]d6 extra damage with it).

Factotum's Arcane Dillante is usable [number of spells you can "prepare"]/encounter, but costs 1 IP for 0/1, 2 for 2/3, 3 for 4/5, 4 for 6/7. Used in a solo dungeon to give me a bit more versitality (since I only had 10 hours ingame, and as such no rest time), but it worked wonderful and so the DM kept it.

You may use perform on any other type of performance than the one you have taken (so if I take string, I can also do oratory without spending skill ranks), but you take a can only use 1/2 you skill ranks.

You may take AoOs with a whip as if you threaten anywhere within 10 ft (range is still 15 ft).

Sorcerers do not need to use Material Components (but still must use Foci and XP costs).

Wizards cannot take Eschew Materials.

Weapon Finesse does not have +1 BAB as a pre-req.

[Reinboom]

This last, I'm sure, doesn't apply to a lot of people, but since my games are played mostly over IRC or AIM chats with people on a variety of machines, several of my players don't have a dice set, and I find that referring to online dice roller sites bogs down gameplay, I roll most of the dice for the entire game (I have a d20 collection, and I'm thrilled to finally have an excuse to use it!)




I recommend either OpenRPG or MapTools. Both are free and should be available to all primary OSes and distros.
(Windows, Mac, Linux)

[Gerrtt]

I think what he means is - level 4 rogue levels up. Now he's gone from having a skill with 0 points in it to max ranks.

Yes, that's it...apparently I need to re-word how my rule reads, because you guys aren't the first person to think that was what I was saying...

It exists to keep someone from going from rank 0 to rank 9 or 10 without ever having used said skill.

[Lord Tataraus]

Yes, that's it...apparently I need to re-word how my rule reads, because you guys aren't the first person to think that was what I was saying...

It exists to keep someone from going from rank 0 to rank 9 or 10 without ever having used said skill.

Ah, that makes sense.

[Gerrtt]

Ah, that makes sense.

Yup, basically, you are bound by the limits of your intellect in how good you can get at any given skill in a given period of time.

So if you are of average intellect (10-11) you can only raise a skill a max of 2 ranks when you ding.

If you are very smart (18-19) you can raise a skill 6 ranks, as long as doing so does not bring you above your max ranks total.

It made enough sense to my whole group to be voted on and agreed (except the guy who was going to get enough ranks to never have to roll a tumble check ever).

[Lord Lorac Silvanos]

(except the guy who was going to get enough ranks to never have to roll a tumble check ever).

Never is a lot of skill ranks.

Tumbling to the other side of an opponent in a narrow corridor on an angled ice covered natural cavern floor is a DC 37. (Effectively DC 47 if he wants to do it at normal speed.)

[The VP]

I won't go into all the changes to races/classes for my current homebrewed world, but some of the house rules we use are:


Weapon Finesse doesn't require a +1 BAB
Two-weapon fighting encompasses Improved and Greater TWF: you get just as many attacks with your offhand as you get with your main without having to take extra feats.
Toughness grants +1 HP per level, rather than a static +3. Higher levels of Toughness (Dragon's Toughness, Giant's Toughness, etc.) grant the amount they'd normally grant divided by 3 per level (eg. Dragon's Toughness, which normally gives you +12 HP, gives you +4 HP per level)
Ability scores are generated by rolling 4d6, rerolling ones, dropping the lowest. This gives a minimum score of 6, if you roll all twos, and overall scores slightly higher than normal (averaging 13-15 or so).
All skills are class skills; you can take your level +3 ranks in any skill you want. There are some exceptions to this, such as classes that normally couldn't do so can't take ranks in UMD.


That's all I can think of off the top of my head, but I'm sure there are others.

[Gerrtt]

Never is a lot of skill ranks.

Tumbling to the other side of an opponent in a narrow corridor on an angled ice covered natural cavern floor is a DC 37. (Effectively DC 47 if he wants to do it at normal speed.)

Well he was mostly referring to the standard 15 check. He had a enough dexterity so that after Armor Check penalties he was able to only need 9 ranks in the skill to not have to worry about avoiding an attack of opportunity in normal circumstances.

That's not really the issue. The issue is that he was going from 0 ranks to 9 and we all thought it was a little silly considering he had never used the skill in his career and was going to suddenly master the most simple and common tumbling task. What he was doing less like the style of play we like at our table, so we voted on it and it passed.

[Lord Lorac Silvanos]

That's not really the issue. The issue is that he was going from 0 ranks to 9 and we all thought it was a little silly considering he had never used the skill in his career and was going to suddenly master the most simple and common tumbling task. What he was doing less like the style of play we like at our table, so we voted on it and it passed.

Well, the house rule seems ok, but coming up with it in the middle of the player's assignment of skill points could be a little unfair whether he was correcting for past mistakes, just got the idea or had it planned from level 1.

[Dizlag]

Here are a few of my house rules:

Heal Skill - for every 5 ranks in the Heal skill, when casting a Cure spell you may add +1 to each die roll provided it doesn't raise it above the max on said die. For example, a 3rd level cleric with 6 ranks in Heal casts Cure Moderate Wounds (2d8+3) and rolls an 8 and a 3 on each die. Since he's got 6 ranks in Heal, he may add a +1 to the second roll, but not the first because doing so will raise the total die roll higher than 8. This applies to healing potions as well based on the heal skill for one who brewed the potion. This has made the Heal skill more viable for clerics.

Hit Points - when rolling for Hit Points during a level up, the lowest you can roll at my table is half the die. For instance, a barbarian would roll a d12 and would take a 6 if he rolled lower than 6. A Wizard would take a 2 if he rolls a 1, etc. I do this with my "boss monsters" as well. The players like it as there characters feel alittle tougher.

Skill checks - When rolling a skill check, a 1 equals -10 and a 20 equals a 30. For us it simulates a critical failure or success, since auto failure and success doesn't apply to skill checks.

A few house rules that I may apply after reading this thread are: Promethius' Skill Focus feat making the skill a class skill. Very nice. And Fax's combinations of skills into one ... Balance and Tumble into Athletics, Open Lock a part of Disable Device, Hide and Move Silently into Stealth, Spot and Listen into Awareness, and Use Magic Device + Spellcraft into Use Magic. Very kewl, both of you! I've seen other ones I may use as well.

Thanks for posting yours everyone and reading mine.

Dizlag

EDIT: changed Fax' Awareness skill to it's correct name instead of Alertness. =)

[Saph]

Here are mine:

Resurrection/Raise Dead/Reincarnate doesn't cause the loss of a character level. Instead there's a mini-RP quest where the one casting the resurrection has to explain why the character should be brought back from the world of the dead (sometimes to a divine representative of the character's patron deity, like a planetar, sometimes to the deity himself if the character's high-level enough). Our games tend to be high-lethality, and character death already means a lot of work and loss of equipment, so knocking off a level as well is a bit much.

Spells, spell scrolls, and custom magic items aren't universally available. Whether one can be found in any given city is determined by a percentile roll - the higher level the spell and the more obscure the splatbook it comes from, the less likely it can be found.

Multiclassing doesn't give an experience penalty. Multiclass levels are usually suboptimal anyway, so stacking an XP penalty on top of that is just mean. On the other hand, excessive dip-classing is frowned upon, especially in prestige classes.

When rolling for HP each level, you're allowed to take an average result instead of rolling. If you choose to roll, though, you're stuck with what you get.

Infinite loops do not work, ever, unless you want to deal with the consequences of every NPC who's ever existed having access to them, too. (You don't.)

- Saph

[Gerrtt]

Well, the house rule seems ok, but coming up with it in the middle of the player's assignment of skill points could be a little unfair whether he was correcting for past mistakes, just got the idea or had it planned from level 1.

I'm pretty sure he just got the idea. I think the session prior to that he had been on the receiving end of a few movement based AoOs and heard tumble could be a way out of them, so he looked it up and decided to make life easier for himself by putting all his skill points in it next level up, or at least enough so that he wouldn't have to roll under normal circumstances.

[Kompera]

For GM Rulings, I keep a thing of "Let me quickly find it - if it turns out to be not so quick then, I'll adhoc it and that's the new ruling."
I've encouraged my DM to do ad-hoc rulings where necessary for game flow, but then to sit down and review the rules so that they may be implemented as written in the future, or house ruled if he still finds that to be necessary.

There is nothing more frustrating to a player then having their concept for their character ruined by a house rule which was implemented on the fly without much thought being given to the ramifications.

As an example, my character in his game is a Barb2/Ftr1 using a spiked chain and with the Combat Reflexes Feat. My goal with this was to be able to do what my character needs to do in this group: Tank. There are very few ways to force a foe to fight you and not mow down the guy in the robes and pointy hat, and of the ways which do exist most are outside of my ability due to class or characteristic issues (10 CHA). So I thought it'd be nice to be able to react to people charging at my fellow adventurers with my 25' diameter of reach. The first time I did so my GM flipped, and summarily ruled that the AoO rules were broken and overpowered (!!), and that he was going to nerf them on the spot. After a lot of reading of the rules he grudgingly allowed my AoO, and later I did suggest that he become familiar with them more thoroughly and then decide if they were overpowered or not. I never even considered that this might occur, and my weapon and Feat selections were specifically made so that I could take advantage of the AoO rules. If he rules against them I'll ask for a bit of retro-design, since I'll probably just use a Greatsword to kill things faster conventionally if I can't use the reach to it's best advantage.

I think this situation was accentuated due to the fact that my character is pretty much at his prime with regards to his relative potency relative to the rest of the party. With a healer to assist me I'm pretty much mowing down the monsters twice or three times as fast as the rest of the party, so the DM was seeing the AoO on top of the occasional Cleaves I get as just too many attacks. But that's not my fault... (And when I take a level of Cleric so I can Enlarge Person on myself (Strength Domain) to extend my covered diameter to 45' I'm expecting even more shock and awe...)

[Quietus]

I've encouraged my DM to do ad-hoc rulings where necessary for game flow, but then to sit down and review the rules so that they may be implemented as written in the future, or house ruled if he still finds that to be necessary.

There is nothing more frustrating to a player then having their concept for their character ruined by a house rule which was implemented on the fly without much thought being given to the ramifications.

As an example, my character in his game is a Barb2/Ftr1 using a spiked chain and with the Combat Reflexes Feat. My goal with this was to be able to do what my character needs to do in this group: Tank. There are very few ways to force a foe to fight you and not mow down the guy in the robes and pointy hat, and of the ways which do exist most are outside of my ability due to class or characteristic issues (10 CHA). So I thought it'd be nice to be able to react to people charging at my fellow adventurers with my 25' diameter of reach. The first time I did so my GM flipped, and summarily ruled that the AoO rules were broken and overpowered (!!), and that he was going to nerf them on the spot. After a lot of reading of the rules he grudgingly allowed my AoO, and later I did suggest that he become familiar with them more thoroughly and then decide if they were overpowered or not. I never even considered that this might occur, and my weapon and Feat selections were specifically made so that I could take advantage of the AoO rules. If he rules against them I'll ask for a bit of retro-design, since I'll probably just use a Greatsword to kill things faster conventionally if I can't use the reach to it's best advantage.

I think this situation was accentuated due to the fact that my character is pretty much at his prime with regards to his relative potency relative to the rest of the party. With a healer to assist me I'm pretty much mowing down the monsters twice or three times as fast as the rest of the party, so the DM was seeing the AoO on top of the occasional Cleaves I get as just too many attacks. But that's not my fault... (And when I take a level of Cleric so I can Enlarge Person on myself (Strength Domain) to extend my covered diameter to 45' I'm expecting even more shock and awe...)

How exactly are you getting a 25 foot reach? Spiked chains normally give you 10, or 20 if you're enlarged. Also, if you're ALREADY mowing down things faster than the rest of the party, being capable of enlarging yourself is really just being silly, isn't it? Are you really aiming to take the limelight all for yourself?


Anyhow, my most common houserule is MAD : Mutually assured destruction. I've opened up my forum to allow all the complete books, despite some of the cheese inherent in them and my co-DM's belief that they should be called "Complete Cheater", though I do disallow three specific PrC's, because they're just... way too much. We decided to go ahead and allow feats and PrC's from them, so players have a much larger range of things to pick from, but right in the rules we give the warning - if you start going to super cheesy levels of optimization, we will too. Anything your character does is fair game. That ought to help some of the most horrible exploits, particularly idiot things like Forcecage/Cloudkill.

[MCerberus]

How exactly are you getting a 25 foot reach? Spiked chains normally give you 10, or 20 if you're enlarged. Also, if you're ALREADY mowing down things faster than the rest of the party, being capable of enlarging yourself is really just being silly, isn't it? Are you really aiming to take the limelight all for yourself?


Anyhow, my most common houserule is MAD : Mutually assured destruction. I've opened up my forum to allow all the complete books, despite some of the cheese inherent in them and my co-DM's belief that they should be called "Complete Cheater", though I do disallow three specific PrC's, because they're just... way too much. We decided to go ahead and allow feats and PrC's from them, so players have a much larger range of things to pick from, but right in the rules we give the warning - if you start going to super cheesy levels of optimization, we will too. Anything your character does is fair game. That ought to help some of the most horrible exploits, particularly idiot things like Forcecage/Cloudkill.

Well he said Diameter so that means 10' radially (the reach of the weapon) on all sides plus the 5' square he occupies.

[Lord Tataraus]

Oh yeah, I don't do multi-classing xp penalties (when I use xp). And magic items, except for low level stuff like 1st and 2nd level scrolls, healing potions, and healing wands, have to be contracted with a crafter or crafted yourself.

[Kompera]

How exactly are you getting a 25 foot reach? Spiked chains normally give you 10, or 20 if you're enlarged. Also, if you're ALREADY mowing down things faster than the rest of the party, being capable of enlarging yourself is really just being silly, isn't it? Are you really aiming to take the limelight all for yourself?
As MCerberus said, and as I said, it's diameter. I'm not looking to steal anyone else's limelight. I'm just trying to be able to do what my class role is in this group: Tank. The other Fighter has made a studded leather wearing bow specialist with cowardice as a part of his back story. And there is a Monk, who is 2nd level while the rest of the group is 3rd. So it's up to me alone to take the beats and protect the casters, and a reach is the only way I could see which would allow me to do so. Enlarge Person could be cast on me by the Priest as it is, but I'd be happy to take a level of Priest to be able to free up his spells for buffing the other players and for healing.

And, as I also said, at 3rd level I'm pretty much in the groove for being competent with regards to the rest of the group. I expect this to change a lot as the casters get more spells and more spell levels.

[Kaelik]

I'm pretty sure he just got the idea. I think the session prior to that he had been on the receiving end of a few movement based AoOs and heard tumble could be a way out of them, so he looked it up and decided to make life easier for himself by putting all his skill points in it next level up, or at least enough so that he wouldn't have to roll under normal circumstances.

So in other words, when a player made a mistake in designing his character, you not only didn't help him fix it, you went out of your way to punish his earlier mistake and guarantee that he would have to live with that mistake for as long as you could force him to?

Maybe you should read the PHBII retraining section. Not even the rules, just the idea that you shouldn't punish people for making mistakes a long time ago.

[Alex12]

Current game (I'm not DMing)
Considering we're dealing with absolutely insane weapons and armor, we have lots of houserules.
Ingested antimatter grenades are instakills.
Unless you're wearing sealed neutronium armor and have a way to planeshift, getting planeshifted to the Plane of Elemental Antiwater is lethal.
The tarrasque ability to only be permakilled by Wish or similar spells no longer exists. If it has been blown apart by antimatter, dropped into a micro black hole, or something similar, it is dead.
Stuff like that.

[Foolosophy]

no skillpoints instead 1d20+character level+modifiers for all class skill checks
and 1d20+modifiers for all cross-class skills checks.

characters receive feats at every odd level and a +1 stat increase at every even level

magic items and treasure are harder to find and effective wbl is reduced quite a bit

dying imposes a temporary negative level but no level or xp loss. this negative level vanishes when the character reaches enough xp to level

ressurection spells are replaced with component free rituals that result in side quests undertaken by the group to revive a fallen comrade (similar to deadlands classic)

disable device doubles as open lock if needed

combat xp is reduced quite a bit to allow for a slower level progression and more "story xp"

[kjones]

Current game (I'm not DMing)
Considering we're dealing with absolutely insane weapons and armor, we have lots of houserules.
Ingested antimatter grenades are instakills.
Unless you're wearing sealed neutronium armor and have a way to planeshift, getting planeshifted to the Plane of Elemental Antiwater is lethal.
The tarrasque ability to only be permakilled by Wish or similar spells no longer exists. If it has been blown apart by antimatter, dropped into a micro black hole, or something similar, it is dead.
Stuff like that.

Wow. Now THAT'S a D&D game I wouldn't mind hearing a little more about.

In the words of Stevil: "Gnomes with guns? That RAWKS!"

[Alex12]

Wow. Now THAT'S a D&D game I wouldn't mind hearing a little more about.

In the words of Stevil: "Gnomes with guns? That RAWKS!"

We basically got planeshifted into the plane of Supertech (that's not what it was actually called, but that's what we call it:smallwink: ) but there had recently been a war culminating in the release of a bioweapon that killed every sentient on the plane. We, being totally different biologically, were immune. It took a while, but we figured out how to reactivate and control the autofactories, and modify them to include magic in the stuff they made. The BBEG is releasing super-tarrasques. I'll explain those more later, I have to go right now.

EDIT: back now.
basically, the BBEG was a totally bats**t insane wizard who thought the tarrasque was a god (or maybe an instrument of a gods vengeance or something like that, we're not really sure)
He cast a spell that basically made a bunch of super-tarrasques (imagine a tarrasque with a neutronium carapace that's immune to any external attack short of being dumped directly into antimatter)
We were in his dungeon trying to get to him to stop him from finishing the spell. We burst in just as he completed it (DM said it was the round after he finished:smalleek: ) and killed him. Then we realized he'd finished. Crap. We've gotta go kill an army of parmanantly-awake, ravenous supertarrasques that are ravaging the planet. So, after a quick stop back to our personal supertech plane (which we magically modified so that we're the only ones who can access it) to gear up, we went to go stop them.
Now they're starting to mutate (get templates added) and get abilities like limited planeshift (to protect from "I dump it into the Plane of Elemental Antiwater" and such)