Yet Another House Rules Thread

[capitalbill]

Ok beginning a game tomorrow, so I'm tossing these out there to see what the general consensus is. I welcome any and all feedback. I'm not sold on the last two (weapon speeds affecting initiative, and illusionists not having access to healing spells) yet, what do you all think?

Attribute Scores: roll 3d6 seven times, drop the lowest score, arrange amongst the attributes to suit.

Spell Books and Initial Spell Selection: Wizards and Illusionists will begin play with all 0 level spells recorded in their books and ten 1st level spells (five of which are chosen by the player, five at random) recorded in their books.

Clerics and Deities: All Clerics must choose one deity to serve. They will usually revere the entire pantheon (with the possible exception of evil deities, whom they will probably fear), but they have one patron who they serve.

Birthright Mounts: Knights receive either a riding horse (1-8 on a 1d10) or a light war horse (9-10 on a 1d10) at the beginning of play.

Languages: Characters receive their native language and Common as base languages. They may choose a number of languages off their races list (modified if necessary for the setting) equal to their Intelligence modifier. However, they do not know how to read and write in any languages (unless it fits their background).

Weights by Race: All weights in pounds; Humans- 140 + 6d10, Dwarves- 130 + 4d10, Elves- 90 + 3d10, Gnomes- 72 + 5d4, Half Orcs- 160 + 6d10, Half Elves- 110 + 3d12, Halflings- 52 + 5d4.

Attribute Checks: Changing the 12/18 prime/secondary attribute system to a flat 18 challenge base; just add 6 to any checks involving prime attributes.

Encumbrance: use your common sense on encumbrance, if your character is carrying too much weight (CK discretion) then his movement rate and combat effectiveness may be adversely affected.

Illusionist Spell Lists: Illusionists do not have access to healing magic as that falls under the purview of the Cleric class.

Determining Initiative: roll 1d10, add Dexterity modifier (if applicable), subtract weapon speed, highest result wins and descending order from there.

Thanks for reading.
_________________
The cheese stands alone...

[CharlieRock]

Looks good to me, except for the encumberance thing but I'm a bit of a stickler for that one.
_________________
The Rock says ...

Know your roll!

[Lord Dynel]

capitalbill wrote:
Ok beginning a game tomorrow, so I'm tossing these out there to see what the general consensus is. I welcome any and all feedback. I'm not sold on the last two (weapon speeds affecting initiative, and illusionists not having access to healing spells) yet, what do you all think?

Right there with you with the healing magic thing.

Quote:
Attribute Scores: roll 3d6 seven times, drop the lowest score, arrange amongst the attributes to suit.

This is fine, I'd say.

Quote:
Spell Books and Initial Spell Selection: Wizards and Illusionists will begin play with all 0 level spells recorded in their books and ten 1st level spells (five of which are chosen by the player, five at random) recorded in their books.

Too many spells, IMHO. Btb, it's supposed to be equal to the number they can cast at 1st level - can not a compromise be achieved? But I'm fond of having wizards find scrolls as treasure and adding them to their books, so take this advice with a grain of salt.

Quote:
Clerics and Deities: All Clerics must choose one deity to serve. They will usually revere the entire pantheon (with the possible exception of evil deities, whom they will probably fear), but they have one patron who they serve.

Nothing wrong with this.

Quote:
Birthright Mounts: Knights receive either a riding horse (1-8 on a 1d10) or a light war horse (9-10 on a 1d10) at the beginning of play.

Or this.

Quote:
Languages: Characters receive their native language and Common as base languages. They may choose a number of languages off their races list (modified if necessary for the setting) equal to their Intelligence modifier. However, they do not know how to read and write in any languages (unless it fits their background).

The read/write thing is okay. For the other (the knowing a language per Int modifier), do races like elves or dwarves know all the languages on their lists? If not, you may want to consider revising this. Early in my C&C experience, I thought the demi-human races had too many languages. But after discussing it, thinking it over, I realized that all the racial abilities (including languages) were to be considered when taking into account humans get that third prime.

Quote:
Weights by Race: All weights in pounds; Humans- 140 + 6d10, Dwarves- 130 + 4d10, Elves- 90 + 3d10, Gnomes- 72 + 5d4, Half Orcs- 160 + 6d10, Half Elves- 110 + 3d12, Halflings- 52 + 5d4.

Attribute Checks: Changing the 12/18 prime/secondary attribute system to a flat 18 challenge base; just add 6 to any checks involving prime attributes.

Encumbrance: use your common sense on encumbrance, if your character is carrying too much weight (CK discretion) then his movement rate and combat effectiveness may be adversely affected.

All these are good, too, IMHO. I've considered going a 3e-ish route with weight carried, with the caveat of "as long as it makes sense." No carrying around waterclocks, even if you have an 18 strength.

Quote:
Illusionist Spell Lists: Illusionists do not have access to healing magic as that falls under the purview of the Cleric class.

I believe I'm disallowing this, for the same reason. I can find a hundred spells to take its place and I, too, feel healing is the cleric's domain.

Quote:
Determining Initiative: roll 1d10, add Dexterity modifier (if applicable), subtract weapon speed, highest result wins and descending order from there.

I don't know about this. Initative is, suprisingly, one of the most diversely debated rules I've seen on the boards. Meaning everyone has their own method of doing it. I've been rolling 1d10 and adding Dex mods, but I think that's "unfair" to the monsters. So I'll probably go 1d10 plus HD/BaB, in decending order - simple and fair. But whatever works for you.
Hope I was able to help!
_________________
LD's C&C creations - the witch, a half-ogre, skill and 0-level rules

Troll Lord wrote:
Lord D: you understand where I"m coming from.

[capitalbill]

Thanks for the feedback CharlieRock and Lord Dynel. I think I'll go with them as is for now, and just make any necessary changes as they arise.

On spell books and initial spell selection: I might have to come up with a compromise here- this would give wizards 22 spells in their spell books (12 0 level spells and 10 1st level spells); but on the other hand I don't really like the idea of a wizard who can cast 6 spells only having 6 spells in his spell book- you can't really study your spells and choose the ones you think would be best, you just memorize all of the ones you have. I think I'm also considering that if 0 level spells are "cantrips" then novice wizards would have been heavily trained in them as apprentices. I'll have to think on how to come up with a compromise (maybe 10 0 level spells, and 5 1st level spells?).

Initial languages: it does seem like a lot of languages to start with, but I'm considering going back on this. I might give a couple more languages to each race; I'm actually not even 100% sure what the rule is BTB on this- whether they get all the languages listed, or if those are just the ones they can pick from (choosing one language per point of their Intelligence mod).

Initiative: yeah, it is a bit of a funny topic. I'm not trying for an uber-realistic system, but I'd like to have some reward for players who choose fast and quick weapons (usually forgoing the ability to deal some heavy damage in the process) and a reward for those who are quick and agile. I think I'll just wing the monsters, ones that I perceive are fast/agile/quick will get an Initiative bump of +1 or +2 (same as the characters).

Encumbrance: I might have to follow a detailed system if the players abuse the common sense doctrine. Maybe I've never liked following encumbrance rules beacuse in real life I'm such a gram weenie/ounce counter as a hiker. And I'd rather not deal with it in a game.
Thanks for the feedback guys, I'm off to do some gaming!!!
_________________
The cheese stands alone...

[MacLeod]

I think your spell allotment is just fine. Low level wizards need all the help they can get. Adding the randomization to half of the 1st level spells is a good way to make sure they have some interesting spell choices, too.
_________________
In this world of LIES... the TRUTH, it means RESISTANCE!

[ThrorII]

capitalbill wrote:
Attribute Scores: roll 3d6 seven times, drop the lowest score, arrange amongst the attributes to suit.

Thats fine. I do a 24 pt. buy personally.

capitalbill wrote:
Spell Books and Initial Spell Selection: Wizards and Illusionists will begin play with all 0 level spells recorded in their books and ten 1st level spells (five of which are chosen by the player, five at random) recorded in their books.

I require my players to choose a wizard master to apprentice to. I give them a rough idea of two or three available masters, and have them pick one. I give my players the option of a)gaining spells RAW or b) getting all of their master's 0-level and 1st level spells as a reward for completing their apprenticeship, but they don't know what they are or exactly how many there are (except more than RAW).

capitalbill wrote:
Clerics and Deities: All Clerics must choose one deity to serve. They will usually revere the entire pantheon (with the possible exception of evil deities, whom they will probably fear), but they have one patron who they serve.

Me too. I work out a whole handout for them, giving them requirements of worship, faith, holy days, etc. I also give them consequences for not upholding their faith, missing holy days, etc.

capitalbill wrote:
Birthright Mounts: Knights receive either a riding horse (1-8 on a 1d10) or a light war horse (9-10 on a 1d10) at the beginning of play.

nothing wrong with that

capitalbill wrote:
Languages: Characters receive their native language and Common as base languages. They may choose a number of languages off their races list (modified if necessary for the setting) equal to their Intelligence modifier. However, they do not know how to read and write in any languages (unless it fits their background).

I am running a game centered around Verbobonc, in Greyhawk. The regional language is Velondi (spoken in Verbobonc, Veluna, Furyondy, and Dyvers). All players speak Velondi and also speak Common (the language trade and of the lands of the Eastern Flanaess). Characters may learn 1 additional language for every +1 of intelligence. As long as the character has an instructor (other PC, hireling, etc) they may learn 1 language every 2 levels--they must tell me as soon as they start learning.

capitalbill wrote:
Attribute Checks: Changing the 12/18 prime/secondary attribute system to a flat 18 challenge base; just add 6 to any checks involving prime attributes.

I almost did this, but it just creates more work for everyone. I'd suggest just trying to use the SIEGE engine RAW for a while, then make a decision.

capitalbill wrote:
Encumbrance: use your common sense on encumbrance, if your character is carrying too much weight (CK discretion) then his movement rate and combat effectiveness may be adversely affected.

I kind of do this, but I'm going to have an "encumberance inspection" shortly, I think.

capitalbill wrote:
Determining Initiative: roll 1d10, add Dexterity modifier (if applicable), subtract weapon speed, highest result wins and descending order from there.

I use d10 +dex. Personally, I think weapon speed is just another speed bump to a fast fun game. Yes, adding dex gives the PC's a potential advantage against monsters (who don't get a bonus), but many of my players don't have bonuses to dex (I use only a 24 point buy), and I consider most monsters and NPCs to have 9-12 range for most stats anyway.

[/b]

[capitalbill]

Adding my thanks to MacLeod and ThrorII for their comments!

One session in the books, making some revisions. Most worked well and received nods but changing a few things.

Spell Books and Initial Spell Selection: Wizards and Illusionists will begin play with 6 0-level spells and 5 first level spells in their spell books. 6 out of 12 and 5 out of 20 (respectively) seems like enough to start with to give the player some options when memorizing spells, but not overloaded. Much better than my initial 12 out of 12 and 10 out of 20 idea.

Languages: while I don't think I want to give each race their entire list of languages as freebies, just common and their native language isn't enough. I think I'll take the setting into account and give 3 languages (common, native, and one other) as freebies and allow the others listed as likely languages to choose with Intelligence modifier.

Rolling stats is good, specialty clerics is good, no knights yet- but mounts looks good, weights is fine, encumbrance went well but I'll have to keep many spot checks to cut down on abuse, and multi-classing looks solid. For now I'm not running Illusionists with healing spells, if a player wants to try it out I'll allow it as a test case and see how it goes. I like the default 18 challenge base and add +6 to primes, its been working well in the online game I play in and worked well with the novice player tonight. Using 2e weapon speeds with initiative worked well too (1d10 + Dex Mod - Weapon Speed = Result, high wins). Doesn't really add time to combat once the players know the applicable number for their weapons.
_________________
The cheese stands alone...

[Lord Dynel]

Sounds good, bill! Glad you were able to strike a compromise with the spells - it did seem like a lot (and when you pointed out 22 spells in a previous post, I cringed a little ) and your revision looks pretty good.

As far as languages go, I think the rule btb is to give demi-humans all the languages listed. But giving them Common, racial, and a few extras should be fine. I thought about restricting it, then decided to go by the book, and now talking with you I think I might flip back to a restriction.
But yeah, just keep tweaking it as the campaign goes on - eventually you'll fine tune them to something you're 100% happy with!
_________________
LD's C&C creations - the witch, a half-ogre, skill and 0-level rules

Troll Lord wrote:
Lord D: you understand where I"m coming from.

[serleran]

Quote:
Attribute Scores: roll 3d6 seven times, drop the lowest score, arrange amongst the attributes to suit.

Reminds me of many early games, but I have since decided that I like 3d6 straight down, or "write anything you want because it won't help you when you're dead" style. Certainly does no break the system, and gives more, though small, of getting that "perfect character."

Quote:
Spell Books and Initial Spell Selection: Wizards and Illusionists will begin play with all 0 level spells recorded in their books and ten 1st level spells (five of which are chosen by the player, five at random) recorded in their books.

I do the cantrip thing, essentially, as well, but would not go as far as giving so many 1st level spells as that can take some of the joy of finding a scroll, even at higher levels when you finally discover magic missile with which one can attack the darkness. I understand the intent, though, and a little more option for low level casters encourages them to become high level casters.

Quote:
Clerics and Deities: All Clerics must choose one deity to serve. They will usually revere the entire pantheon (with the possible exception of evil deities, whom they will probably fear), but they have one patron who they serve.

Has no mechanical impact so I would not consider this a rule, but a flavor injection, like Cajun into deep fried turkey. It does make the game seem a bit monotheistic, at least from a cleric point of view, which can be interesting when you have two LG people, one a cleric, and the other a paladin, and both serve different gods.

Quote:
Birthright Mounts: Knights receive either a riding horse (1-8 on a 1d10) or a light war horse (9-10 on a 1d10) at the beginning of play.

Not a bad idea. What I do is allow them to have the riding horse, with potential to be a warhorse, since in my games, not every horse can become such a thing. It takes 1-2 levels, usually, for the horse to "get its groove" and then it becomes a warhorse.

Quote:
Languages: Characters receive their native language and Common as base languages. They may choose a number of languages off their races list (modified if necessary for the setting) equal to their Intelligence modifier. However, they do not know how to read and write in any languages (unless it fits their background).

I usually ignore this, but it implements some interesting side effects into a game, and makes some items and spells more useful. I do always wonder how people handle decipher script with things like this, or if they decide an unknown language cannot be understood, but then, that can't be because it works on magic, a thing that usually takes magic to decipher... so, how do you do it?

Quote:
Weights by Race: All weights in pounds; Humans- 140 + 6d10, Dwarves- 130 + 4d10, Elves- 90 + 3d10, Gnomes- 72 + 5d4, Half Orcs- 160 + 6d10, Half Elves- 110 + 3d12, Halflings- 52 + 5d4.

I never use a rule for this, letting the player pick something they feel appropriate. If it is ludicrous, like a 500 pound gnome, I'll say something. There are reasons to know the weight, but I generally ignore it until it comes up in game, like when Dwarfie wants to throw that cannon-gnome.

Quote:
Attribute Checks: Changing the 12/18 prime/secondary attribute system to a flat 18 challenge base; just add 6 to any checks involving prime attributes.

Technically, that is the rule. It is worded oddly, but there is no real change here, other than making it make more sense.

Quote:
Encumbrance: use your common sense on encumbrance, if your character is carrying too much weight (CK discretion) then his movement rate and combat effectiveness may be adversely affected.

Wow, we agree. Though, I ditch encumbrance pretty much completely. If you start to abuse my graciousness in allowing you to carry a 500 pound gnome and 13 suits of Polish Hussar plate and 14 pavis +5, then well... that was my fault. Item saving throws a Castle Keeper's friend.

Quote:
Illusionist Spell Lists: Illusionists do not have access to healing magic as that falls under the purview of the Cleric class.

Another agreement. I think the concept is cool and makes sense, but I don't want a third healing class, one of which is "arcane." If I wanted that, I'd have an alchemist... which I do.

Quote:
Determining Initiative: roll 1d10, add Dexterity modifier (if applicable), subtract weapon speed, highest result wins and descending order from there.

Understandable. I use a different system, but this is simple and gets things done fast. And, that is part of the marketing ploy "fast, furious."
_________________
If it matters, leave a message at the beep.
Serl's Corner

[capitalbill]

I appreciate the feedback everyone! I've revised the house rules that I posted earlier, tweaked a few things, added a couple, deleted a couple. I wanted to keep the rules to one page typed all pretty- so I ended up with a cap of 12 rules. I've left the weights of the races off and the birthright mount for the knight (still using those two, they're just not very important so I just penciled them in the PH- I don't feel like I have to specifically point them out).

Again, I lowered the amount of initial spells in spell books and tweaked the initial languages for characters. I'm basically set on these for the time being, the only one I'm wavering on is the critical failure/success (I know that idea has both proponents and opponents). We'll see how it goes!

Attribute Scores: players roll 3d6 seven times, drop the lowest score, and can arrange amongst the attributes to suit.

Spell Books and Initial Spell Selection: Wizards and Illusionists will begin play with six 0 level spells and five 1st level spells recorded in their books.

Clerics and Deities: All Clerics must choose one deity to serve. They will usually honor an entire pantheon but they will have one patron whom they serve.

Languages: Characters receive 3 base languages with additional languages (Int mod) chosen from racial lists. Literacy will be determined based on background.

Attribute Checks: The default Challenge Base is 18; players will add 6 to any checks involving prime attributes (in place of the 12/18 Siege system).

Encumbrance: We will be using common sense on encumbrance, movement rates and combat effectiveness may be adversely affected at the discretion of the CK.

Multi-class Characters: Players will follow the multi-class rules as detailed on pages 140-141 of the 4th printing of the Players Handbook.

Illusionist Spell Lists: Illusionists do not have access to healing magic as that falls under the purview of the Cleric and Druid classes.

Determining Initiative: roll 1d10, add Dexterity modifier, and subtract weapon speed (from 2e), highest result wins and descending order from there.

Hit Points: all characters receive maximum starting hit points at character creation, roll for hit points at second level on.

Critical Failures/Success: results of natural 1s and 20s on to hit rolls, attribute checks, and class ability rolls automatically fail and succeed, usually spectacularly (the results are at the discretion of the CK).

Material Components: it will be assumed that with the purchase of a spell component belt pouch all wizards will have sufficient material components for their spells (excluding rare/expensive components at the discretion of the CK).

Thanks again everybody!
_________________
The cheese stands alone...

[Lord Dynel]

Looks good, hoss!
_________________
LD's C&C creations - the witch, a half-ogre, skill and 0-level rules

Troll Lord wrote:
Lord D: you understand where I"m coming from.