What's the best homebrew you've seen?

[ErrantX]

Instead of having an incredibly negative thread where we bash on homebrew or talk about why folks don't allow it, let's instead talk about the best homebrew we've seen on this site or others and why we feel that way!

Providing links to it provides for major kudos as well.

I'll start by saying one of my favorite pieces of homebrew has to be our very own Djinn_In_Tonic's Seidkona of the Iron Bands. It's one of the most original and flavorful classes I've seen on Homebrew and it has great rules and mechanics to back them up. Open for lots of great potential vestiges. This class is what got me to give the binder a chance and now the binder makes my shortlist for favorite classes. Another favorite of mine is another well known Playgrounder, Lord_Gareth's Children of the Mausoleum from one of the past PrC contests. Such incredibly creepy druids that give off a sort of intensity of cool that doesn't usually come from druids. The flavor text alone in this class is worth the trip to check it out.

So, what all do you like?
-X

[The Rose Dragon]

Hellfire Ballet Style.

I can't really comment on the mechanics, but it's good to have a nice martial arts style that you can use with firewands and flame pieces.

[Lord_Gareth]

D20 Rebirth. That is all.

[Ormur]

I've never paid much attention to home brew and I admit I'm a bit prejudiced against it but Oslecamo's monster classes made me want to play some of them, like the dragons and Rakshasa. I think it's also a very useful addition since the HD and LA of most monsters pretty much make them unplayable normally.

[Fawsto]

Must agree: this thread is much, much more positive. Nice iniciative.

Unfortunatly I have not read any homebrews lately that really impressed me, however.

Cheers,

[Fax Celestis]

D20 Rebirth. That is all.

Spoiler

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[Lord_Gareth]

I have an outstanding question on your Pyrearch thread you still need to answer, you bardic bastahd!!!!EXCLAMATION POINT!!111!!!ONE

[Fax Celestis]

I have an outstanding question on your Pyrearch thread you still need to answer, you bardic bastahd!!!!EXCLAMATION POINT!!111!!!ONE

You lie. <_< I totally didn't just go answer it right now.

EDIT: Also I am a big fan of Flickerdart's Implacable Man.

[Lord_Gareth]

'Brewers in general can learn from Fax's example in opening themselves up to critique, seriously considering it, and being willing to change your creation. For some reason my Harrowed class (see siggy) has a cult of obscure posters who worship at its feet, but it would have never gotten there if I hadn't been willing to admit when I had bad ideas (often) and fix them.

[SurlySeraph]

Since d20r has been covered, I'll bring up The Demented One's ToB disciplines.

[ErrantX]

'Brewers in general can learn from Fax's example in opening themselves up to critique, seriously considering it, and being willing to change your creation. For some reason my Harrowed class (see siggy) has a cult of obscure posters who worship at its feet, but it would have never gotten there if I hadn't been willing to admit when I had bad ideas (often) and fix them.

I'd agree with this. d20r is a huge undertaking and one man cannot do it alone. While I may not always agree with some of Fax's choices in d20r (I love a lot of it but... sorcerer is going away from where I'd be happy but I see why), I am mostly on board with it and enjoy his changes. I'm a little envious of your Harrowed Cult Lord_Gareth, I've yet to write anything that's half as big a hit as that. Maybe one day! Perhaps my Libram of Battle will get there?

-X

[mrcarter11]

I try to keep up to date with D20r, I find it to be very good in most cases. As for cults.. I'm generally a big fan of anything Errant makes.. Having playtested most of his stuff at one time or another.. As for LoB, I still love that project and regularly use some of it.

[aje8]

Xenotheurgy has to take the cake for me. Awesome flavor, great (if complex) mechanics. Simply awesome.

[Morph Bark]

Sadly, the best homebrew I've seen was on the gleemax WotC forums, but that stuff is all lost now. I've seen good stuff here and I've saved a lot of it, favourited it, etc, so that it may see use someday, but few of it has really made me jump up and down. I do have to say though, that while I am not really a fan of a lot of his work, DragoonWraith's Midnight Occultist has me adrool for wanting to play binders or meldshapers. Especially together.

Oh, and some planetouched homebrew races. Because I love planetouched and they were made very well in the likeliness of the official ones.

[ErrantX]

Yeah, I totally forgot about that system. Xenotheurgy was pretty rad. Realms of Chaos and those that assisted on that project definitely get props.

DragoonWraith has made a bang of really great homebrew as well, yeah. The Midnight Occultist won a PrC Contest, as have a few of his other works. Chtonic Serpent / The Bound was also a pretty good 'Brew as well.

-X

[hamishspence]

I was kind of impressed by Guide to Hell by Dicefreaks:

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showp...&postcount=105

[DragoonWraith]

I'll happily second the nomination of the Seiðkona of the Iron Bands; I really love that PrC. The Harrowed I'm also a huge fan of, though I think I've been a bit more critical of it, heh. Almost all of TD1 and Krimm Blackleaf's stuff is absolutely incredible, and I'm an especially big fan of the Sleeping Goddess discipline.

[Eldan]

Oh, and some planetouched homebrew races. Because I love planetouched and they were made very well in the likeliness of the official ones.

Didn't think I'd be named in the same thread as Djinn or TDO or Fax...

Anyway, a lot of what I love has been said (d20r: I love some things, but not others: basically, I love everything other than the classes: investing feats and skill sets are great, but I still haven't seen a single class I'd actually want to play, TDO's disciplines; the Seidkona), but I'd also like to mention Krimm Blackleaf's prestige classes. They ooze awesomeness, and he does ToB gishes. I love gishes, and I love ToB, so I love Krimm's classes.

[Morph Bark]

Almost all of TD1 and Krimm Blackleaf's stuff is absolutely incredible, and I'm an especially big fan of the Sleeping Goddess discipline.

Their work has certainly gathered its fame. I haven't thoroughly read all of it, though I will have to at some point in the near future, as I wish to run some campaigns where the classes, PrCs, races and martial disciplines used must all be homebrew, as a sort of massive playtesting gig.

Recently in another thread here I mentioned what homebrew has seen use in my campaigns and I mentioned one of Krimm's works that - sadly - I think was one of his lesser works, despite how clear it was that it was also a very great attempt. He told me that he has altered it though, but I haven't reviewed the exact changes, so I can't comment on the differences.

Didn't think I'd be named in the same thread as Djinn or TDO or Fax...

Well hey, even us smalltime 'brewers sometime need cred and you certainly deserved it there. I think I've seen more of your work that I've liked, but that's the only thing I have in my favourites on Chrome I think - and one of the very few in the "Races" folder.

[Chambers]

Two of my favorite homebrews are E6 and the Races of War Feats.

I like the concept of E6, but for maybe a different reason than most people like it. I think E6 is the best way to run Epic level games. Instead of starting at level 20 or 30 or whatever and have Epic spellcasting break the game...play in an E6 world and have the characters be level 15. Or level 10. Compared to the rest of the world, the characters are crazy powerful, yet the characters are still manageable from a DM's perspective.

I like what the Races of War feats do for non-spell casting warriors. They vastly increase the worth of a feat. I haven't used them in a game yet - I think they would need to be used carefully, with the DM aware of the implications, for them to be used correctly. But I think used sparingly they can add a lot to some of the blander non-spellcasting classes (Core Fighter, I'm looking at you).

[Lord_Gareth]

Who volunteers to make a Harrowed/Swordmage PrC?

[Morph Bark]

Who volunteers to make a Harrowed/Swordmage PrC?

No doubt that would be tempting/interesting to see...

[DragoonWraith]

Huh, I'll keep that idea in mind. I have a lot of crap going on right now, but it's a very interesting idea.

[Zaydos]

Well my personal favorite is DragoonWraith's Midnight Occultist, besides that I like Krimm and the Demented One's ToB stuff (it's actually what got me onto these forums), and any theurge style class.

[Xefas]

I'm a fan of the Hundredfold Facets of Enlightenment and Realm Guard.

The former because it did pretty much exactly what I wanted with elder Infernal stuff. The latter because not only is it useful 'brew in its own right, but because it sets a very nice framework for other homebrewers to follow in its footsteps (which I'm currently making use of).

But yeah, anything by the The Demented One is great. Before my last Exalted game, I linked my players to his repository in the Exalted wiki and said something akin to "Anything by this man is canon. You don't have to ask."

[Cogidubnus]

Seconding Oslecamo's Monster Classes, and also Gorgondantess' Alignment-based warriors.

[NineThePuma]

TG Oskar's stuff. I don't have a link handy (stupid itouch) but EVERYTHING HE TOUCHES IS AWESOME.

From the Ki-based pseudo-supernatural classes to the now much more awesome Ranger, to the Bez-Kismet's awesome debuffs, to the Warmage and Healer retools. It is all awesome. Not to mention his less retool-y stuff, including Complete Martial.

[true_shinken]

No love for the Blue Mage?!
Can't find the full class, damn. Here is the full class.
Heck, there is even a version here.

[BobVosh]

I don't really like classes, but that is because some are hard to push pass DMs despite them being awesome.

However I have used a fair amount of monsters/template homebrew from these forums. I really liked the broken template from Vorpal Tribble.

Also another vote for D20R.

I found most of Vorpal Tribble, Demented One's, and Krimm Blackleaf's stuff to be great.

[ErrantX]

Agreed on TD1 and Krimm for being excellent homebrewers. It was their work that convinced me that the Tome of Battle was definitely worth it.

-X