5e campaign and home rules I will be using

[Corsair14]

I wanted to bounce some ideas about some how rules I plan on using for an upcoming Dragon Lance campaign I will be running just to see how they are received here and get any ideas on improving them. The DL stuff I will do in a nutshell form real quick. All characters are assumed to be "normal" people placed into extraordinary situations, they are not the Avengers.

Playable races. Humans, elves, dwarves, minotaurs, forest gnomes, draconians(chromatic only). Kender and Tinker gnomes only by experienced Role players who have read about them extensively.
-No tieflings, dragonborn, halflings, half orcs ect. Any of the oddball races must have approval to see if they even exist

Classes would take too long to explain. For example Solamnic knight orders are archtypes available to fighters and clerics. No paladins.

Adding a Solamnic Nobility background- grants half plate or full plate armor, and a large bonus to admittance to the Order of the Rose. Human only.

Moon magic. Sorcerers and warlocks(and other arcane casters) will become hunted renegades when they cast 3rd+ level spells. Wizards are invited to take their test at the nearest Tower of magic at level 3. They become hunted renegades if they haven't by 5. They must wear alignment appropriate robes or be classed as a renegade. You cannot multi-class into a wizard, it takes up too much time and effort. You can however say screw it, it takes up too much time and effort, and multi-class out. The people of Krynn barely tolerate wizards and that's about as far as it goes.

I also add the Order of the KingFisher which is an auxiliary wizard order to the Solamnic Knights. This is a tradition kind of like the specialist schools and has its own requirements and benefits.

Actual home rules set.

Weight and Encumbrance: Carry what they think the PC can carry, if it sounds too ludicrous then we pull out the calculator. I actually have an assortment of actual armor to show how much armor weighs in real life.

Basic Attribute Checks: After situation modifiers, roll under the affected stat. Very quick and easy, plus a lot of my adventures are old 2nd edition adventures which use these a lot for very basic actions like lifting something heavy.

Armor Use:
Higher tier armor incorporates elements of lower tier armor. A breastplate(medium) for example has chain under it. Everything has a gambeson (padded armor)or something like a gambeson under it except maybe leather. Since it didn’t actually exist then no one knows, but there likely would be some sort of cloth to prevent chafing and cushion impacts.
Due to this multi-layered armor it is possible to put only certain layers on in case of an emergency. For example if you are camping, you can in fact sleep in padded armor, its like sleeping in a heavy tunic and is quite comfortable, I have done it before.
Medium armor will take 2 rounds in a hurry where you are completely defenseless while putting it on. It wont be perfectly adjusted but good enough. Basically you are tossing on the armor and maybe buckling a buckle to keep it from flying around.
Heavy armor takes a full ten minutes, ie useless in an emergency. Half time if you have help from someone with the heavy armor proficiency or who has practiced it.
Additional Benefits:
Heavy Armor has DR vs non-magical slashing and piercing.
Medium Armor has DR vs non-magical slashing

Salvaged non-magical metal plate type armor either from battle or a horde or off the shelf munition grade has only a 25% of fitting a character. It must be brought to a professional armorer and readjusted.

Critical Hits: Are very devastating. Rolling a natural 20 will inflict max damage on one dice plus rolled damage on a second + whatever your bonus is. In addition anytime an opponent crits you or you crit them with a melee weapon, the crit has a 50% chance of stunning the target for 1d4 rounds (causing disadvantage on all rolls and no spell casting) also negating the current round’s actions. A critical hit automatically ends a concentration type spell.

Critical Fail: You are automatically last in initiative order for the next 2 rounds as you try and regain your tempo.
If multiple combatants are going last at the same time, the PCs go before the enemy and if there is still a tie, the highest dex modifier breaks the tie. If its still a tie, paper rock scissors until someone wins.

Helms: Helms are important to protect your noggin. Having an open face helm drops the critical hit stunning chance to 25%. A full helm negates this chance completely***(Strength over 20 still brings this to a 25%). There is a real reason why every soldier and conscript in history, even if they have crap or no body armor, they still have a helm/head covering of some sort and it gets thicker the higher tier you go.
-Open Face Helms also give a -2 to perception related skills due to partial hearing loss and lack of peripheral vision.
-Full Helms provide a +1 to AC but, due to the limited vision and hearing, you are at disadvantage for all perception related checks and anything that a helm would normally interfere with. Further in a hot environment, you consume double the amount of water you normally would.
-A helm takes a full action to strap on. Usually it was a chin strap either simply pulled down under the chin or a chin strap that was quick pull tightened.
-A full helm with an adjustable visor(adds 50% to the cost) acts as an open face helm until the user drops it as his bonus action to get the full helm bonus.


Feats
Feats must be realistic. Crossbow master will allow you to shoot twice with a light crossbow, you are still reduced to once per round with a heavy. There’s a Youtube video on how to shoot and reload a heavy crossbow and you will understand why you cannot shoot one 4 times in a 6 second round, it’s just not physically possible and twice is ridiculously generous. I am not familiar with every feat in the game but be warned, they aren’t giving you super powers. Ask me, the DM, for clarification ahead of time.

Exotic weapon is a new feat and must be taken to not have disadvantage with an exotic type weapon.

[Dienekes]

Well first things first. 5e is not designed around being realistic. At a fundamental level realistic is just not how the math works. Now there can still be some wiggle room to make things feel more realistic. I like what you're doing with armor and helmets. But making a few already kinda mediocre weapons worse because of realism just means no one would ever use those weapons or take the feat.

If you want to get the flavor of crossbows shoot less frequently, perhaps instead make crossbow expert increase the damage per shot of the crossbow in question. We know later era crossbows had more force than longbows so it would have a basis in realism even if the numbers aren't exactly right.

Personally I'd drop the Critical Fumbles. One because messing with Initiative Order seems more trouble than it's worth. Two because this makes being a martial class actively worse, especially classes that attack more than once per turn. So later level Fighters, the class that is supposed to be the masters of martial combat will be going last a lot.

Critical Hits seems fine-ish. I'd specify that you're maximizing only the base weapon damage and not additional damage dice. Otherwise Rogue will get quite a bit of a damage bump. Paladins too though it seems you've dropped them from the class list. I'd also make the stun somehow based on a Concentration saving throw or a Strength or something. Otherwise we get the great image of a wizard with a dagger attacking a dragon for 6 damage and stunning them for 4 rounds.

[Corsair14]

The goal is to make this very melee centric with wizard types being powerful but rare. I am coming at this from a re-enactor point of view. Sword fights in movies drive me nuts to watch. I want players to use more realistic weapons and not walk around with nothing but swords. Good idea on the crossbow feat, probably apply to polearms as well. Ignoring the DR on weapons designed to pierce armor like crossbows and polearms and grant the feats advantage on damage instead of the normal bonuses they give.

Interesting on the fumbles thing. I am trying to come up with some sort of failure for natural 1s. Everyone makes mistakes, trips, swings and misses completely because you read the opponent wrong etc. When I have done this, if the opponent presses then I am stuck fighting defensively until I can get my momentum back. I have played the last initiative thing before and yes mechanically it does get jumbled in a big fight.

Yeah, I'll clarify the crit damage thing. Only the base damage dice gets maxed out and not any extra bonus dice. As for stun effects, really only humanoids are affected by it, something with a large skull or large creatures are not affected. For ease of play, they will take the damage but ignore the stun.

[Keravath]

I would say that whatever your players would accept as house rules and will be happy to play is fine.

However, D&D especially 5e, isn't intended as a simulation. Several of your comments address how "unrealistic" certain things feel. The problem isn't necessarily the specifics you have addressed but the 6 second combat turns. Some of the activities are realistic for 6 seconds while others aren't. With D&D 5e, you draw a line somewhere between realism and simplicity.

On specifics ...

1) Your critical hit rule will be devastating on the players. Why? Often the players are outnumbered in encounters. 20 is a crit. 20 always hits. Have enough opponents and they will score crits leaving the players stunned and unable to move for 1d4 turns. If you want to guarantee that crits are more effective than a regular hit then just using the max value on one die will succeed in that goal.

2) Complexity. You add helms with different configurations affecting senses, some affecting the chance to crit as if crits only occur when striking a head. In real life, some strikes that hit a nerve nexus could result in stun like effects. You are essentially patching on stuff that you feel might be more "realistic" without necessarily actually being more realistic in the larger context of the game.

1e for example had a table of "to hit" adjustments for every weapon against every armor class to reflect that certain weapons were more effective against different types of armoring. Weapons could do different damage to small vs large creatures. Each weapon had a specific length and a specific amount of space needed to wield it effectively. Personally, I know very few people who actually used those tables since they were too much work for a game rather than a simulation but D&D roots were in medieval miniatures simulations so a lot of the material carried over.

3) You add some DR to different armor types but leave them with the same AC benefits - increasing the utility for heavy armor. However, you don't get into mobility issues. Where do you draw the line on realism adjustments? Heavy armor (e.g. full plate) is much harder to move around in for the long term - especially wearing it for the entire day. A heavy armor character likely should not run or sprint as fast as someone in leather, they certainly can't turn as quickly. They also probably can't dodge as effectively. Should you factor these types of effects into the changes you make? I guess the point of this comment is why make some changes on the basis of "realism" when they don't actually make things more "realistic".

4) Personally, I don't like critical fails. A 1 is simply a miss. Why? Think about a level 20 fighter compared to a level 1 - they both fail on a 1 ... however a level 20 fighter is making 4 attacks/turn. They will critically fail four times as often as a level 1 ... LOL. They have a 20% chance every combat round of critically failing - the excellent level 20 fighter will spend most of the time at the back of the initiative order. However, initiative only controls the ORDER in which characters take actions. Once a character is at the back, they are essentially at the top of the order for the next combat round. So the effect of putting them at the end of the initiative order is the same as losing an action and putting them at the top of the order :) .. so, I don't find a lot of value in changing character initiative as a penalty and don't see any point in critical failures in the first place.

5) If you want more realism, look at the hitting cover rules in the DMG for handling friendly fire when you have characters firing ranged weapons into a melee.

Anyway, if the rules make you happy then go for it but I don't really find any of them any more "realistic" than the base 5e rules, they all have elements that aren't "realistic" so I am not sure I see the point. If you want realism, switch to a different combat system but make sure that the players are onside with the book keeping, tables and modifier calculations required and if not, then just use most of the 5e system as is and narrate the "realism".

[MoiMagnus]

Critical fail: Should probably be limited at the first attack roll per turn to not disadvantage too much martial. And casting a spell should probably also have a 5% chance of being a critical failure.

Helm: Not a bad idea. Not completely certain it is worth the hassle, but you will probably see whether it works or not during gameplay.

Feats: IMO they should give you superpowers. Feats are the main way martial characters gets to reach superhero-level of powers while caster get magic. [And I personally like to consider that when characters gain Extra Attack at level 5, they are indeed able to manipulate objects twice as fast as normal humans]
But more on the balance side, by forcing some unrealistic use of feats/weapons to be nerfed, you're pushing the optimal way to play to the next unrealistic you didn't nerf (like a bow user without any Strength, etc), unless you're compensating with something of similar power while being realistic.
For example, if you don't like the multi-attack with a crossbow, I'd suggest allowing to merge two attacks into a single attack with double the damage (twice the dice, twice the modifiers).

[heavyfuel]

Oh, look! It's another edition of "house rules made to screw up martials"!

Quick, everyone, grab your favorite Druid or Wizard subclass to make these houserules moot!

[Dienekes]

The goal is to make this very melee centric with wizard types being powerful but rare. I am coming at this from a re-enactor point of view. Sword fights in movies drive me nuts to watch. I want players to use more realistic weapons and not walk around with nothing but swords. Good idea on the crossbow feat, probably apply to polearms as well. Ignoring the DR on weapons designed to pierce armor like crossbows and polearms and grant the feats advantage on damage instead of the normal bonuses they give.

Interesting on the fumbles thing. I am trying to come up with some sort of failure for natural 1s. Everyone makes mistakes, trips, swings and misses completely because you read the opponent wrong etc. When I have done this, if the opponent presses then I am stuck fighting defensively until I can get my momentum back. I have played the last initiative thing before and yes mechanically it does get jumbled in a big fight.

Yeah, I'll clarify the crit damage thing. Only the base damage dice gets maxed out and not any extra bonus dice. As for stun effects, really only humanoids are affected by it, something with a large skull or large creatures are not affected. For ease of play, they will take the damage but ignore the stun.

Have you thought about just playing Riddle of Steel or any of its various knockoffs?

It seems designed from the ground up to do what you want out of a system.

[Amechra]

Have you thought about just playing Riddle of Steel or any of its various knockoffs?

It seems designed from the ground up to do what you want out of a system.

I second this.

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If you're dead-set on doing this in 5e, I'd skip critical fumbles. A 1st level Fighter has a 5% chance of one happening each round. A 20th level Fighter has a ~18.5% chance of having one happen. Crit fumbles only make sense in systems where increasing in competence reduces the chance that you screw up royally.

I'd also dump the changes to critical hits, since you're screwing over the characters that take the most damage again, since the melee characters that you want to encourage will be taking more hits over the course of the campaign than anyone else, so they'll end up taking the most crits.

If you wanted to make crits way deadlier (and combat much swingier), I'd widen the crit range based off of armor.

No armor? You take crits on a 16-20.
Light armor? 17-20.
Medium Armor? 18-20.
Heavy Armor? 19-20.

If you're wearing a good helmet or a solid shield, shrink that range by another step. If you have both, they stack. Yes, this does mean that the Fighter in full kit doesn't take critical hits, and yes, this does mean that lightly-armored people are kinda screwed. It wouldn't be my preference, but it'd fulfill your design goal of encouraging heavily armored melee people.

[Corsair14]

Some good ideas, some I will implement.

Players expect something on a 1 or 20. 30 years of gaming has taught me this. Maybe like someone said, reduce the fumble to the first attack on multi-attack makes a lot of sense. Do the same with crits.

For crits I wonder if having maybe max die on one die higher would be enough plus the possible stun effect. A satisfactory hit but not possible double damage + and bonuses. Could also go 3rd edition and have to confirm the hit

The reason for the helm thing effecting stun. Yes technically other areas of the body hit can cause it. But in years of fighting, the #1 hit location for all fighters is the head. Its the hardest to protect and easiest to hit. Your shield cant be there all the time, you have to be able to see. Yes there are defensive fighting stances that can make the head next to impossible to hit, especially for lefties, but then they have a slower time switching to offense from those stances. The head is almost always the most heavily armored spot for a reason. If you get hit hard enough even with a helm you can get stunned, deafened, concussed, knocked the F out(seen it). I have seen flanged maces penetrate 12ga stainless steel, but thankfully not the head under thanks to the wearer wearing a full period kit but it did take him out of the fight for safety reasons. Your body can flow with a hit and lessen the blow, your head is stuck on the end of this spine-like thing and has extremely limited mobility and ability to take damage. If I was forced to go into battle today on a medieval battlefield with a sword and shield and only could bring one piece of armor, I'm bringing a helm. The problem is that DnD ignores the most essential piece of equipment you can have. I think my solution is the most simple that I have seen. You want to fight in melee, then you better bring something for your head.


Armor does weigh a lot, its not stealthy in the least and is fairly hot, however warriors who wear armor day in and day out get used to it. Talk to the Romans who marched 20ish miles a day in their armor and helms and then dug out a camp/fortress. Brigadine was fairly common for your average soldier(and nobles) and was marched in as well. But knights in full plate didn't generally travel long distance in their armor, they also didn't ride their warhorses around either. They kept it in water proof armor boxes and rode riding horses. With their typically bad attitude, trained warhorses were tied to be trailing them so it didn't nip or kick anyone. It also preserved the strength of the warhorse for actual battle instead of tiring it out riding cross country. I am ignoring this, general disease, and many other facts of life of this age like most of us do.

Casters aren't exactly OP in this world. Moon stages affect wizards ability. Sorcerers and warlocks become hunted individuals, even by any knights or actual wizards in the party lest they become renegades themselves. Magic in general is very not trusted. Druids have their own restrictions on weapons and armor. Campaigns rarely last more than 7 or 8 levels past the start so I am not worried about late game imbalance of casters.