TS' Tome of Collected House Rules up for Download!

[Tequila Sunrise]

The Tequila Sunrise Tome of Collected House Rules and Variants (http://lucasbuchanan.com/Downloads)

Inside you'll find dozens of simple and effective variants to make your game more streamlined and more fun, organized by Player's Handbook chapters (and a DMG chapter).

TS

[Nebo_]

The background is horrific. It makes my eyes bleed.

Mostly this is just a heap of variant rules from official rule books, but I can see why you complied them.

I only skimmed the document, but a few things stuck out as overpowered. Your pounce feat is far too powerful, even more so than a one level dip into lion totem barbarian; you don't even need to charge. Your brew potion is too powerful as well. There's a damned good reason it's limited to 3rd level spells.

[Tequila Sunrise]

First, thanks for the comments even if it's criticism.

The background is horrific. It makes my eyes bleed.
Yeah I got a similar comment on another board; any suggestions other than just black text on a white background?



I only skimmed the document, but a few things stuck out as overpowered. Your pounce feat is far too powerful, even more so than a one level dip into lion totem barbarian; you don't even need to charge. Your brew potion is too powerful as well. There's a damned good reason it's limited to 3rd level spells.
Yeah, Pounce is overpowered compared to the class ability. The reason I made it that way is that it doesn't make sense that if I can take a full attack after running sixty feet, I can't take a full attack after running thirty feet. I personally would rule that any similar ability would work the same way; maybe I should have made a note of that with my Pounce feat.

As to Brew Potion, do you mind giving an example or two as to how potions of above 3rd level would unbalance the game?

[Nebo_]

Yeah, Pounce is overpowered compared to the class ability. The reason I made it that way is that it doesn't make sense that if I can take a full attack after running sixty feet, I can't take a full attack after running thirty feet. I personally would rule that any similar ability would work the same way; maybe I should have made a note of that with my Pounce feat.

I know that it makes a lot of sense that way, but it isn't great for game balance. Sometimes you just have to let stuff like that slide. Pounce shouldn't be a feat in the first place.


As to Brew Potion, do you mind giving an example or two as to how potions of above 3rd level would unbalance the game?

Suddenly everyone is a CoDzillaa. Bite of the Were x, Divine power, Righteous Might... the list goes on.



Yeah I got a similar comment on another board; any suggestions other than just black text on a white background?

To be honest, black on white would be just fine. Just give it a pretty border if you want it to look nice. Your font isn't easy on the eyes, either.

[Tequila Sunrise]

Spells with personal range can't be made into potions. There may be spells which become problematic if made into potions, but that situation is no different from any other type of magic item, all of which require DM judgment anyway.

Sorry you don't like Pounce, but I wrote this pdf specifically so that readers could pick and choose the variants they want to use in their games. I still don't think it's a big deal, but if you do feel free to ignore it.

I'll take out the background to make it a little more reader friendly.

[Lakoda]

Yeah I got a similar comment on another board; any suggestions other than just black text on a white background?


I've found that a medium (60% or so) gray with white text is surprisingly easy to read.

[Baron Corm]

One of the first things I thought when I first saw this was, "this background is pretty...". Maybe I'm just weird. Overall a neat collection of houserules and I took some of them, though I don't think UA ones need to be reprinted.

You should add the "no absolutes" houserule that someone posted in another thread. Basically, instead of energy immunity you get like 100 resistance, depending on the monster, instead of knock unlocking all locks it gives a bonus to Open Lock, instead of "not subject to critical hits", you must roll a 20 on the confirmation roll to critical hit or make an appropriate Knowledge check. This was to prevent abilities which overcame "immunities" to things and the whole thing about power levels raising due to this over time. I use it.

[GoC]

Could you add this houserule to your list?

Increase the amount of hitpoints a creature gets by an amount equal to the sum of the creatures Con score and Size bonus to grabble checks.

This means housecats have 4 hitpoints while commoners have 12 hp instead of both having 2 hp. It's my favorite houserule.:smallcool:

[Tequila Sunrise]

You should add the "no absolutes" houserule that someone posted in another thread. Basically, instead of energy immunity you get like 100 resistance, depending on the monster, instead of knock unlocking all locks it gives a bonus to Open Lock, instead of "not subject to critical hits", you must roll a 20 on the confirmation roll to critical hit or make an appropriate Knowledge check. This was to prevent abilities which overcame "immunities" to things and the whole thing about power levels raising due to this over time. I use it.

I modded some of those spell absolutes, but didn't have a complete list of them all and was feeling too rushed to search thru the entire spell chapter. If anyone would care to provide such a list, I'll certainly find the time to add mods to the pdf. About the other absolutes, I decided not to mod them because I don't think they're a big deal. The difference between fire resist 100 and fire immunity is just...:smallconfused:...I dunno, you're welcome to try to convince me otherwise. Similarly I never thought crit immunity was an issue except for its impact on rogues, which is fixed with the Penetrating Strike variant from Duneonscape.


Could you add this houserule to your list?
Eh, I've never seen the issue with house cats and commoners. If anyone is actually playing out a combat between the two...I think they have bigger issues than vaguely misrepresenative game stats.

[Tequila Sunrise]

*Bump* A list of absolute spells anyone, or a linky to Rich's article?