thoroughlyS
2021-03-30, 12:04 AM
Index (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?620527-Dungeons-amp-Dragons-5-1E-%97-Houserules-to-Revise-amp-Revamp-the-Game)
I have been playing Dungeons & Dragons for about half of my life, first introduced to the game at the tail end of v3.5. I have been playing 5E since its release, and it is my favorite version of the game. I feel like the rules are simple, elegant, and cohesive... for the most part. But no game is truly perfect, even to an individual, and there are some rules that I feel were suboptimally implemented. Some build options in the game outshine others, leading to an oversaturation in play. Meanwhile, other build options are so underwhelming that they are neglected an are often called for reworks.
In this thread, I present my list of houserules (listed in red) which have the sole purpose of trying to make bad options good, and the best options merely great. In doing so, I hope to allow players at my table a greater breadth of concepts to explore, simply by making everything worth playing. These changes are to the barbarian, to clean up so clunky design and give players more reasons to stick to the class at higher levels.
Barbarian (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1gomfqPqsqCPAQcV5CkZxodTavCTITItJ/view?usp=sharing)
Rage
In battle, you fight with primal ferocity. On your turn, you can enter a rage as a bonus action.
While raging, you gain the following benefits if you aren’t wearing heavy armor:
You have advantage on Strength checks and Strength saving throws.
When you make a melee weapon attack using Strength, you gain a bonus to the damage roll that increases as you gain levels as a barbarian, as shown in the Rage Damage column of the Barbarian table.
You have resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage.
If you are able to cast spells, you can’t cast them or concentrate on them while raging.
Your rage lasts for 1 minute. It ends early if you are knocked unconscious. You can also end your rage on your turn as a bonus action.
Once you have raged the number of times shown for your barbarian level in the Rages column of the Barbarian table, you must finish a long rest before you can rage again.
A barbarian can only lose rage if knocked unconscious. It feels bad to take rage away from a barbarian. This is the thing they are supposed to do, so let them do it.
Driving Vigor
Beginning at 3rd level, you recover stamina at an exhilarating rate. When you finish a short rest, you can reduce your exhaustion level by one. You must eat at least half a pound of food and drink at least 1 quart of water during this short rest. You can't use this feature again until you finish a long rest.
Not only does this cleanly fix the Berserker, it also feels like a fun thematic thing all barbarians should be able to do.
Brutal Critical
Beginning at 7th level, your melee weapon attacks using Strength score a critical hit on a roll of 19 or 20. Also, you can roll one of the weapon’s damage dice one additional time and add it to the extra damage of the critical hit.
This increases to two additional dice at 13th level.
The official version of Brutal Critical really feels like too little too late. I expand the critical range (at the recommendation of Treantmonk), but also slightly lower when you get this feature so that more barbarians will get to use it. This also has the added benefit of making the greataxe a better choice than the greatsword for the barbarian.
The second time you gain this feature, it is fine, but the third time really feels like a kick in the ribs. I replace it with something much more valuable below.
Feral Instinct
By 9th level, your instincts are so honed that you have advantage on initiative rolls.
Additionally, if you are surprised at the beginning of combat and aren’t incapacitated, you can act normally on your first turn, but only if you enter your rage before doing anything else on that turn.
I had to push this feature back to accommodate the new placement of Brutal Critical.
Relentless Rage
By 11th level, your rage can keep you fighting despite grievous wounds. If you drop to 0 hit points while you’re raging and don’t die outright, you can make a DC 10 Constitution saving throw. If you succeed, you drop to 1 hit point instead.
Each time you use this feature after the first, the DC increases by 5. When you enter your rage again, the DC resets to 10.
A minor change to allow a barbarian to benefit from this feature a little more.
Punishing Strikes
Starting at 15th level, whenever you make an opportunity attack using Strength, the target takes damage equal to half your barbarian level (whether you hit or miss).
Persistent Rage was made obsolete by my changes to the base feature, so I replaced it with something flavorful but not overpowered.
Reckless Assault
Starting at 17th level, whenever you have advantage on a melee weapon attack using Strength, you can reroll one of the dice once.
Getting a third Brutal Critical die as a Tier 4 feature felt awful. I replace it with super advantage. It's still not a massive boon, but it definitely makes you feel cooler.
I have been playing Dungeons & Dragons for about half of my life, first introduced to the game at the tail end of v3.5. I have been playing 5E since its release, and it is my favorite version of the game. I feel like the rules are simple, elegant, and cohesive... for the most part. But no game is truly perfect, even to an individual, and there are some rules that I feel were suboptimally implemented. Some build options in the game outshine others, leading to an oversaturation in play. Meanwhile, other build options are so underwhelming that they are neglected an are often called for reworks.
In this thread, I present my list of houserules (listed in red) which have the sole purpose of trying to make bad options good, and the best options merely great. In doing so, I hope to allow players at my table a greater breadth of concepts to explore, simply by making everything worth playing. These changes are to the barbarian, to clean up so clunky design and give players more reasons to stick to the class at higher levels.
Barbarian (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1gomfqPqsqCPAQcV5CkZxodTavCTITItJ/view?usp=sharing)
Rage
In battle, you fight with primal ferocity. On your turn, you can enter a rage as a bonus action.
While raging, you gain the following benefits if you aren’t wearing heavy armor:
You have advantage on Strength checks and Strength saving throws.
When you make a melee weapon attack using Strength, you gain a bonus to the damage roll that increases as you gain levels as a barbarian, as shown in the Rage Damage column of the Barbarian table.
You have resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage.
If you are able to cast spells, you can’t cast them or concentrate on them while raging.
Your rage lasts for 1 minute. It ends early if you are knocked unconscious. You can also end your rage on your turn as a bonus action.
Once you have raged the number of times shown for your barbarian level in the Rages column of the Barbarian table, you must finish a long rest before you can rage again.
A barbarian can only lose rage if knocked unconscious. It feels bad to take rage away from a barbarian. This is the thing they are supposed to do, so let them do it.
Driving Vigor
Beginning at 3rd level, you recover stamina at an exhilarating rate. When you finish a short rest, you can reduce your exhaustion level by one. You must eat at least half a pound of food and drink at least 1 quart of water during this short rest. You can't use this feature again until you finish a long rest.
Not only does this cleanly fix the Berserker, it also feels like a fun thematic thing all barbarians should be able to do.
Brutal Critical
Beginning at 7th level, your melee weapon attacks using Strength score a critical hit on a roll of 19 or 20. Also, you can roll one of the weapon’s damage dice one additional time and add it to the extra damage of the critical hit.
This increases to two additional dice at 13th level.
The official version of Brutal Critical really feels like too little too late. I expand the critical range (at the recommendation of Treantmonk), but also slightly lower when you get this feature so that more barbarians will get to use it. This also has the added benefit of making the greataxe a better choice than the greatsword for the barbarian.
The second time you gain this feature, it is fine, but the third time really feels like a kick in the ribs. I replace it with something much more valuable below.
Feral Instinct
By 9th level, your instincts are so honed that you have advantage on initiative rolls.
Additionally, if you are surprised at the beginning of combat and aren’t incapacitated, you can act normally on your first turn, but only if you enter your rage before doing anything else on that turn.
I had to push this feature back to accommodate the new placement of Brutal Critical.
Relentless Rage
By 11th level, your rage can keep you fighting despite grievous wounds. If you drop to 0 hit points while you’re raging and don’t die outright, you can make a DC 10 Constitution saving throw. If you succeed, you drop to 1 hit point instead.
Each time you use this feature after the first, the DC increases by 5. When you enter your rage again, the DC resets to 10.
A minor change to allow a barbarian to benefit from this feature a little more.
Punishing Strikes
Starting at 15th level, whenever you make an opportunity attack using Strength, the target takes damage equal to half your barbarian level (whether you hit or miss).
Persistent Rage was made obsolete by my changes to the base feature, so I replaced it with something flavorful but not overpowered.
Reckless Assault
Starting at 17th level, whenever you have advantage on a melee weapon attack using Strength, you can reroll one of the dice once.
Getting a third Brutal Critical die as a Tier 4 feature felt awful. I replace it with super advantage. It's still not a massive boon, but it definitely makes you feel cooler.