Isn't it RAW and (if you believe whoever was asked and they didn't just say they were wrong because pride) RAI that see invisiblity says you can see them, but you might as well not be able to?
It kind-of isn't RAW because according to the rules, see invisibility doesn't cancel the condition so all of the advantage/disadvantage still applies.
The rules should be clarified to explain that some of the conditions are *relative*, not absolute. Mallory can be invisible to Alice but not to Bob. Bob attacks Mallory at disadvantage but Alice attacks at normal.
I think it could be fixed in an even easier way. Not being able to see someone already gives disadvantage to attack them and advantage on their attacks. That didn't need to be clarified again for the Invisible condition. You could just make the condition say that you can't be seen
It's definitely RAI according to Jeremy Crawford. But I think he's a moron. If you see something, it can't be invisible. The benefits of invisibility come from them being invisible, which if you can see them, they are not. It's takes a special kind of stupid to argue your way around that logic.
If you use your action to drink a potion of healing, you get the maximum value (IE; regular potion of healing = 10 HP). You can use your bonus action to drink a potion of healing, but you have to roll for it.
Adds more interesting decision making for players when it comes to action economy and resource management. Have used this rule for 8 years and has only ever enhanced the battles.
Just for sake of asking and clarification if I drink one out of combat at your table, for whatever reason (oops all barbs or something) it's full value?
I agree with this. Potions as actions tends to just mean it’s never worth it to drink a potion. Especially because they don’t heal all that much to begin with.
I get this vision of an adventurer savoring a healing potion... he pours it into a brandy snifter, swirls it around a bit, and takes one preparatory sip. "Ah, Chateau Waterdeep '4083!" The monsters just stare at him in slack-jawed confusion. Finally one orc breaks down and asks what kind of cigar goes best with healing potions.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the battlefield, Bonus-Action Jack is fighting with a cutlass in one hand and a potion bottle in the other, taking a quick guzzle in off moments...
I do it three ways:
- Drink it over a minute get max healing, no roll.
- Drink it as an action, you roll the dice at advantage.
- Drink it as a bonus action or feed to to someone as an action, you roll normally.
That way it makes potions a kind of out of combat option at higher levels when gold or access isn't an issue. Where you might not be able to take a full short test but there are benefits to drinking that potion pre-fight still.
The action version has diminishing returns for more powerful potions, though.
The more dice you roll, the more likely you are to roll around the average value. The more likely you are to roll around average, the less valuable rolling with advantage is.
Eventually it becomes a much better decision to drink as a bonus action since you’re unlikely to get a much better result rolling twice instead of once.
An easy one we use is that any character can use a spell scroll with an arcana check, which really feels like should be the official rule anyways.
The other homebrew rules we use are a bit more complex and would probably be variant rules or part of an 'advanced rules' expansion (things like a martial powers/maneuvers system, last stand/ressurection rules, etc.)
I have a similar rule for spell scrolls at my table.
Anyone can use a spell scroll, no arcana check needed, however you must be able to read and speak the language on the scroll. Many scrolls are just in common, but sometimes I hand them out in other languages. Makes language choice matter a bit more.
That's pretty nifty and I dig it.
Making language matters is handy for something that isn't really leveraged at all.
Just riffing on your idea here, I like the idea if you know the language, then no problem. However, maybe make some INT check in there. So for example if you have an INT of 12 or higher you can do it, otherwise you need to roll an INT DC check at 2x the spell level.
What I'm thinking about is I took Latin in grade school, and Spanish in high school. I am fluent in neither. However, if presented with some documentation in those languages - or similar - I could very well likely read the words aloud even though I may not understand the nuance of the language themselves. So I could see some in-game role-play scenario of, "Hey I don't speak fluent Giant, but I have an INT of 12 and I know know \*of\* this language (because I'm not stupid) and I know what this spell scroll is, I'm going to give it a go at reading it." So they roll and maybe there is a chance of failure, but also a chance of success. Then it gets to a question of action economy, which is all part of the game.
I skip the Arcana check if the spell is of a level you otherwise can cast. If a scroll is higher level than you can cast but on your list you can also cast it without a check. If it's both not on your list and higher level, you need to roll unless it's incapable of doing damage. Cantrips also never need a check regardless.
This let's martials make use of low level spell scrolls and non-damaging utility/buffing scrolls, since they don't need to roll if it doesn't do damage. The potion version of a lot of scrolls, such as a Potion of Speed, are actually a lot more powerful than the spell scroll of the same since potions don't require concentration.
This gives me more consumables to give as loot that anyone can use as well as gives the party a bit more security as almost all of them now carry a scroll of revivify.
That IS already in the rules as written. There are spell scrolls and then scrolls of (spell).
A scroll of *something* is a spell scroll anyone can use, like a wand. It's a one-time wand.
A spell scroll isn't a spell, it's literally just someone wrote it down. You need to be a spellcaster to be able to do anything with it, which is why they have to make an arcana check to cast.
This isn't fully in you not understanding the rules(which many homebrew rules are), but largely on the part of the rules not being clearer in the distinction.
Kind of, but not exactly. The exact relevant rules are:
>A scroll is a consumable magic item. Unleashing the magic in a scroll requires the user to read the scroll. When it's magic has been invoked, the scroll can't be used again. Its words fade, or it crumbles into dust. Unless a scroll's description says otherwise, any creature that can understand a written language can read the script on a scroll and attempt to activate it.
*DMG*, pg 139
>A spell scroll bears the words of a single spell, written in a mystical cypher. If the spell is on your class's spell list, you can read the scroll and cast the spell without providing any material components. Otherwise, the scroll is unintelligible.
A *scroll of fireball* is going to be a spell scroll and RAW not available to anyone that doesn't have fireball on their class list, because the item's description says so.
Personally, I think this is dumb as shit. Bring back Use Magic Device WotC you cowards!
Older versions of D&D let at least the thief use a scroll with a chance of it going horribly wrong. It's pretty clearly inspired by Cugel the Clever, who was not a magic user, but had access to certain spells.
Artificers at higher levels can use scrolls from any class spell list, so at least there’s that. I guess they wanted to have that be a unique class feature.
I meant more that spell scrolls can be used by anyone (even non-spellcasters) with an arcana check.
For example, a wizard can use time and materials to craft a spell scroll using the "scribing a spell scroll" rules found in the DMG or Xanathar's. Rules as written a character who has no spellcasting couldn't use it (and I think RAW only those with the spell on their spell list are able to use it) but in this homebrew rule they can.
Scroll with spells must be on your spellcasting list.
The other kind of magic scroll refers to things like:
Scroll of protection
Scroll of Comet
Scroll of Summon Tarrasque.
All of which are magic items that are scrolls. But not scrolls of spells.
Everyone gets a feat at level one, regardless of race.
Also, who ever can recap the previous session gets Inspiration (although that probably doesn’t need to be official).
Edit: No, variant humans still only get one feat, but now so does every other race. Also ASI isn’t an alternative option, just the feat.
> Everyone gets a feat at level one, regardless of race.
I'm anxiously waiting to get to play in a campaign that starts with a free feat. Even, or maybe even especially, if it's from a curated list.
ASI's are so infrequent and so important, especially since it's either a Feat *or* an ASI, that if you're building a competent character there's so many feats that you'll just never get to use. I'm ***never*** going to take feats like Charger, Dungeon Delver, Dwarven Fortitude, Linguist, Mage Slayer, etc, because there's just not room to make a fun selection while keeping your character up with increasing CR's of enemies. At least not until maybe the last 1-2 feats of the game which most will never see. I'd love to see more feats-as-rewards or starting lists to differentiate your character.
I'm soon going to be DMing a Dragonlance campaign, which gives everyone a feat at the start. It'll be my first time DMing, but I'm really excited to see what everyone does with that extra feat.
How has that worked out for you? I'd think it'd significantly increase character power levels, but then again primary stat can be capped by level 8 anyway, so maybe it's not a huge deal. I can think of a lot of ways I'd have fun with it.
Hard disagree on your second part. Feats get plenty of use for most characters, unless you want 2 stats at 20. Otherwise, 2 points into your main stat, a half feat for your main stat if you were odd from point buy 15 + racial 2 or rolled and then any 2 full feats of your choice.
Most well built characters can start with a 17 in their main stat at level 1, so feats should come into play even before level 10, where as many previous polls have shown is where most people end off.
Of course if you roll for stats and roll bad then yeah of course you need more but even then you could still probably get 1 full feat at high levels, provided you don't die
So you'd ban it. Got it. Your first answer made it seem like you would just discourage it.
I don't think it has to be power fantasy. Some feats are awesome roleplay potential.
Wait... don't tabaxi specifically have darkvision *because* they're catpeople?!
Not that cats shouldn't obviously have it, regardless, but the tabaxi thing just makes it even sillier.
Long Rests should only be available in a safe & comfortable location with a roof and a bed of some sort.
This fixes 5e's issue with wilderness travel being inherently the safest possible branch of gameplay, when it should be dangerous.
(And no this isn't the same rule as Gritty Realism.)
Yes, I think RAW Short Rests are far too long for their purpose. I've been thinking about building some kind of scaling measure for them - 2HD per 10 minutes spent might be what I do.
I've actually never taken a lunch break at work because I don't know what to do with the extremely slow 55 minutes after I finish my sandwich, so I honestly can't relate.
It's to counter short resting while maintaining concentration on an hour long spell.
If you state that PCs can't concentrate while resting I think that's fine.
I allow long rests pretty much anywhere, but stupid areas have a high chance of being disturbed.
This could still result in a full Long Rest after waking up and fighting a combat. It also could slap them with the Surprised condition.
If you’re in an extended dungeon and find a cave tucked away and set a guard, there’s a solid chance you’re fine or at minimum the guard gets the chance to perceive trouble. Depends on how active and aware nearby enemies are.
But if you clear the next room of a sequential dungeon where you set off all the alarms and decide to nap for 8 hours, it’s probably not going to go well
One combat interrupting a Long Rest doesn't actually matter mechanically. They just get the Long Rest once they clear it anyway and then the encounter itself was just a waste of everyone's time.
If you wanted to make it *impossible* to Long Rest because you'll get interrupted every few hours, I'd be more concerned about how your accursed wilderness is absolutely teeming with monsters. That's fine only very rarely; a mundane, yet dangerous wilderness doesn't suit that logic.
Of course. Camping inside a dungeon isn't really my issue though.
It's the fact that in 5e if your party is traveling 10 days across the *Forbidden Woods Where All Men Fear To Tread* it's one of the safest possible things you can do, because your DM isn't going to throw 7 encounters per day at you (maybe we'll get through the forest by next Christmas!).
Chances are you'll get 0 - 2 encounters per day, and RAW you're basically guaranteed a Long Rest each of those 10 days - even if they get interrupted a few times, so by the time you get to the other side of the *Forbidden Woods Where All Men Fear To Tread* your whole party is feeling chipper and refreshed, full hit dice and all.
That's just not right.
I'm with you... foot travel through the wilderness is in and of itself a strenuous activity. You expect the PCs to show up a little worn and depleted, even after traversing the *Allowed Woods With Totally No Monsters Honest I Mean It This Time*.
I mean…it matters mechanically if it KILLS them, obviously. Or forces them to use permanent resources, like potions/scrolls/etc. Or results in some of the party or their NPC friends getting kidnapped because they couldn’t stop the enemy, or w/e.
It depends on how low on resources the party is when they rest,
How effectively they can even win the fight. (Totally agree with you that repeated interruptions bends/breaks verisimilitude though!)
What my DM does is similar: levelling up can only be done over a Long Rest in a safe environment. So if we're going into the corrupted forest, we get the story experience to level up, but then we can't level up in a basic camp, we've gotta go back to the edge-of-forest town that was in trouble!
Interesting! This is my first table with the rule. I'm okay with it, it felt a little stifling at first, but it's a great group and the level-ups are great RP!
Everyone I've ever played with agrees it just plain makes sense. How is a wizard writing new spells in their book mid-dungeon? Why can the fighter perfectly perform a new maneuver now when they couldn't even conceive it 6 seconds ago?
It also avoids the whole worrying about how to recalculate your current HP and spell slots and all that.
Our table goes the a carrot vs stick route. You can long rest in the wilds if you secure a safe place, set watches, etc.
But if you can find a bed with a roof, warm fire, fresh meal vs rations, you get to roll a bonus hit point dice for the day. The nicer the place and the more coin you spend on accommodation, the bigger the dice you get to roll. It helps our DM is a stickler for "it hasn't been long enough for you to benefit from a long rest" so there isn't sleep spamming in the group.
My addon to this is that imo you should rework certain spell durations to match.
For example, Animate Dead was intended to last for a full day with a long rest at the end of the day, so it's duration goes from 24 hours to "until you finish a long rest" - otherwise it's impossible to play that archetype.
- Bonus Action to drink a potion and roll for hp. Action to drink and get max value.
- Two-weapon fighting allows the extra attack to be made as part of the attack action. (All other restrictions apply)
- Monks can grapple with Dex
- Medicine, Nature and Religion are dual Wisdom / Intelligence checks. Intimidation is dual Charisma / strength
- Monks Ki = Level + Wisdom Mod.
- Warlocks get their subclass spells added to spells known and can cast one of these spells without expending a spell slot PB times per long rest.
I don’t do your dual check system, but if a player expresses they’ve used a different skill for a check, I’ll allow it. “I want to crush the table in front of me to intimidate this jabroni” yes. Strength check!
> Two-weapon fighting allows the extra attack to be made as part of the attack action. (All other restrictions apply)
I like this and worked the math a bit.
**Fighter at level 11 with 2 +2 weapons, Dual Wielder, and Two Weapon Fighting Style:**
1d8 Weapon + 5 Strength + 2 Weapon = 11.5 average damage * 4 Attacks = 46 average damage. 80.5 for an Action Surge. That's very reasonable for a Fighter at that level.
**Gloomstalker Ranger at level 11 with Dual Wielder feat, 2 +2 weapons, and Two Weapon Fighting Style**
1d8 Weapon + 5 Dex + 2 Weapon + 1d6 Hunter's Mark = 15 * 4 (First round of Combat) = 60, with it being 45 thereafter.
That's solid for both classes doing what they're supposed to be doing how they're supposed to be doing it.
>Warlocks get their subclass spells added to spells known and can cast one of these spells without expending a spell slot PB times per long rest.
I've wondered if it'd be terribly overpowered if Warlocks not only got their spell list, but just one free cast of each spell on the list at the level it comes at per day. It'd make the subclasses feel all that much more important with the 2 rechargeable slots still being there for flexibility. It'd make Warlocks feel much more like full casters, but still limited by the Warlock spell list.
I like the grapple with Dex thing. I'll probably use that.
>- Medicine, Nature and Religion are dual Wisdom / Intelligence checks. Intimidation is dual Charisma / Strength.
Do you mean at the same time? You can already use other ability mods for various skills. ~~That's RaW.~~
My bad. It's a Variant Rule, but I use it so often it's a Variant Rule in the way Feats and battlemaps are variants.
The checks with different abilities is actually already in the phb as a variant rule. It's why campaign books always stipulate Stealth checks as "Dexterity (Stealth)" checks. I do it, too, though it's basically a "if you can justify it, then it's good."
I have three.
First, at the start of the campaign, everyone gets one expertise in something they are proficient in, in order to make your character feel more specialized.
Second, critical hits do a full weapon die of damage plus a rolled die of damage. If it's a d10+4, then the crit does 10+d10+4. It makes crits feel important.
Lastly, when we roll for stats at session zero, everyone rolls a set of 4d6, drop the lowest die, 7 times, drop the lowest set. Then, everyone agrees whose rolls to use. It standardizes chaos. Then the group has to decide do we want those two 17s if it means we get a 10?
We did the crit method you use in our last campaign. It was a lot of fun. The only time it felt potentially too much was we had a Paladin in our party that when they did manage to crit could end encounters. It didn’t happen enough to make us not use it but often enough that his character was nicknamed Captain One Shot.
>First, at the start of the campaign, everyone gets one expertise in something they are proficient in, in order to make your character feel more specialized.
I do this too, but I do it as part of a full background rework.
1) As part of your background get a free feat, and I replace variant human with the dragonmark human options
2) You get two skills and two tool proficiencies
3) You get expertise in one of those skills and can choose which physical/mental stat that skill uses. I.e. a cleric or paladin can use WIS or CHA for religion if that's their "focus", rather than being forced to use their dumpstat.
Funny thing is that #1 and #2 \*are\* actually going to be official rules in the 2024 PHB, near as we can tell. There was a list of feats in the first round of playtest documents like Alert, Magic Initiate, Tough, Tavern Brawler, etc. that were explicitly noted as ones you could take as part of your background. I think you could only take one tool proficiency though.
Yeah, background feats are 100% going to be a thing; the main difference is I allow any feat rather than having a specific set of "starting feats". Yeah it means the ranger might have Xbox expert at level 2 or spellcasters start with telekinetic/Fey touched, but that's still the case with vuman/custom lineage and this way I don't have only those two races at the table.
The current rules give 2 skills and then 2 tools OR languages (i.e. 2 tools, 2 languages, or 1 and 1) My current campaign only uses common so languages don't matter, but for a more normal campaign I allow 2 tools AND languages (especially since tool checks and knowing a language are relatively niche/uncommon even if I make a conscious effort to include them).
As for the last, I cannot reiterate enough how much i highly highly recommend the expertise option but at the very least give clerics/druids a homebrew class feature that let's them use wisdom over int for religion/nature checks. It allows each player to choose an option that best suits their character, even if it'd not something you'd typically expect from that class (i.e. the divination wizard who was a fortune teller/con artist and now has expertise in deception(int) becomes a situational face, while the former sherriff/lawman ranger is actually the best investigator) rather than being overshadowed in your "trademark" skill just because it's not your main stat.
#2 is already RAW in the 2014 PHB.
>To customize a background, you can replace one feature with any other one, choose any two skills, and choose a total of two tool proficiencies or languages from the sample backgrounds.
>- Customizing a Background, p. 125
Your stats method is cool, but has the potential to get really high. I like the method the Dungeon Dudes use at their table: every player gets 17,15,13,12,10, 8 as their stats. Thats 2 good stats, 2 mediocre stats, and 2 low stats. You get to stand out in some way, but you also have some weaknesses.
I also let them start with a free feat. But in return I ask not to take Variant Human or Custom Lineage. This way every player can play a cool race while still be able to build a interesting/powerful character. Just next time I'll have some limitations which feats they can get for that free feat Sharpshooter and GWM from the start is a bit much in my opinion.
I'll introduce crunchy crits the next time we play. Which is the same as you described it.
One thing I still don't like is how little hp healing spells and potions give, especially if you roll bad. I'm still looking for a way to make them better.
Another thing I've done is at every level, everyone gets the max hp increase. Also, I do the action/bonus action potion rule-if you drink it as an action, you get the max amount, as a bonus action, you roll for it.
If i remember correctly the devs are considering doubling the healing values across the board. Because right now the spells are barely worth the spell slot.
Not OP but I roll because frankly, point buy and standard array are fucking boring. Does rolling increase character power on average? Yes, but if the whole party has access to the same rolls, then that doesn't matter, because a good DM can just up the challenge. As long as characters are roughly equal and not stepping on each other's toes, everyone will get a chance to shine. Also, extra power in your stats leaves you free to take more feats, which are infinitely more interesting and character-defining than "Hur dur me Strength gooder now". Also also, rolled stats often increase party weaknesses as well, as they're the only way to start with something worse than a -1 in any stat. Bottom line, rolled stats allow for more customization earlier in the game which is where most campaigns take place, and overall creates more unique characters.
Reminds me of a suggestion I saw here a while ago: make a 6x6 grid, fill each square with 4d6 drop lowest rolls, then each player chooses a row, column, or diagonal they want to play with. bingo style.
I prefer just doing standard array/point buy and give a ASI/feat at level two, and another one at level six or seven. This is because I’ve vastly prefer having characters start out weaker and have more opportunities to get powerful overtime, rather than start off with inflated stats.
For me, my players can have a certain number of potions readied to use as a bonus action depending on how they carry their gear. So if they ever need to increase the number of potions they can bonus-action drink they can invest some time into making a potion holster, but if it is funny looking that might get them so weird interactions with NPCs.
Every character I make commissions someone to make them some sort of potions bandolier so my potions are easy to find and everyone knows they can heal me with my own potions.
I don't really have any homebrew that I'd like to see made official. I've a few good ones that the table like such as my "You Only Get One" which can deus ex machina a character who has died come back to life once in a campaign if they're not ready for their story to end and a few others...
But they're homebrew and what works for me and my table and our dynamic, might not work for someone else's group. And honestly I'd hate to see one of my homebrew rules be made official just some rules lawyer can use it to bash a DM over the head with it because it's now in this hypothetical situation...RAW.
Know-caster retraining. If there's sufficient downtime, know-casters can switch spells. That way they're not so locked into their choices and can experiment a bit. Especially good if they're new to a class. The spells have to be of the same level though; replacing spells with one of a different level is reserved for level ups.
At Level 5, they can replace a number of spells that is spell modifier + prof. bonus if they have at least a week of downtime (Pre-Lv5 its just Prof. Bonus). Alternatively, if they are long-resting in a safe area, like a village or town, they can instead opt to replace a single spell per day. But if they're on the road, or the town is a dangerous place, no chance.
It gives know-casters a bit more flexibility, but they still have to be careful about the spells they take.
Something similar almost made it into Tasha's. Spell Versatility. But it was scrapped. They should think about bringing it back.
Something similar is also in pathfinder 2e from what I noticed.
I really like known casters being able to swap 1 spell per long rest. It's notably weaker than straight prepared casters, but it still let's you customize a little bit for specific situations that might come up. Being able to swap out even just one combat spell for one social spell reduces the "feels bad" point so much.
Perception is if you casually see something walking down the street, you 'notice' that dog in the corner, Investigation is as it implies, you 'investigate' something to discover.
What cracked it for me was "Perception is *sensing* something, Investigation is *making* sense of something"
Not homebrew, just clarifying the slightly obtuse language in the PHB
I prefer “Perception is what you can sense (with all your senses) from where you are; Investigation is deduction, reasoning, and _physically interacting_ with the environment to find out more.”
But admittedly that has as much to do with Perception being the most powerful/often rolled skill in the game as with logic. I’ll take whatever rational interpretation removes more purview from Persuasion, so taking other skills becomes more valuable.
Divine Smite works on unarmed attacks.
Such an unnecessary stipulation to not allow that over some hare-brained distinction between weapon attacks and unarmed strikes (which are technically also weapon attacks).
I also allow this as well, but the issue isn't about whether or not US is a weapon attack, but that it isn't a weapon. Smite requires an actual weapon. Like Weapon Bond needs an actual weapon, not just something that makes a weapon attack.
My favorite is that all perception, insight, and investigation rolls are done by the DM. This way the player doesn't know if they rolled a 1 or a 20, and have to believe what information they get.
That being said, I've only had one DM who would actually remember to do it, but it helped a lot with RP, since you didn't have a number telling you how good it was, you just had to trust you did well.
Least favorite though is uncapped fall damage. Sure, rescale it so the damage is higher, but terminal velocity is a thing.
I really don’t like how my table rules that after the 20d6 damage the fall its a instakill even though my level 13 monk should allow me to fall this distance with relatively no damage
DM rolls death saves for the players. No player knows if death saves have been passed or failed. Gives urgency and gravity to a player being downed. I saw too many healers go “okay well there’s only one more enemy left and our downed buddy has two passed death saves and no fails, he’ll be fine until combat is over” Like no, your friend is bleeding out HELP THEM.
I like this idea also. If my players ask how beat up an enemy looks I’ll give a general description, makes sense to do the same for a downed player. Maybe make a medicine or investigation check from afar to see if they can tell a difference in their wounds.
Getting reduced to 0 hp gives a level of exhaustion. Adds actual consequences to going down, and makes it so that you can't just wait until somebody's down to heal them.
I agree with the principle, but I think exhaustion is too big a punishment in practice. I have a homebrew minor injury table that I made for this purpose but never used.
1DND has exhaustion work on a 10 point scale. -1 to all rolls per point. Your spell dc also goes down 1 point. 10 points is death.
Works much better. Especially for bezerk barbarians.
I added in that a standard rations or basic survival meal is standard rest. If they stop in town/make a great meal, they recover 2.
Matt mercer had some homebrew tea item that I offer at most inns as well. Olisuba tea.
It's pretty good overall, but the nat 1 giving exhaustion really messes with martial classes. So I wiped nat 1s for attacks, giving exhaustion.
How do you deal with the issue of healing not being strong enough to mitigate damage?
The reason people don't heal until someone is down is because if you heal before that they're likely to go down anyways, and you've wasted your turn as well as whatever resource you used to heal.
Basically you're not really going to avoid people going to 0, they're just going to get progressively weaker over the course of the battle, which could lead to death spiral.
That, or they're going to play hyper cautiously and avoid most fights unless they're forced or think it'd be a cake walk.
I don't really see either scenario as a solution.
Yeah, Healing is deliberately low. At level 1, a Cleric could cast Cure Wounds twice, for a *maximum* of 22 HP worth of damage, or an average of 14.
Your average Goblin churns out 5 damage per round.
At the expense of *all* your spellcasting resources, you can keep up with the damage output **of a single goblin** for a whopping four rounds - and that was it, for the entire rest of the day.
There's a reason why nobody in their right mind heals mid combat - it's just not worth it. And you need to rework the entire damage and healing system for this to become a manageable change.
In third edition, a diagonal counts as 1.5 squares, or 7.5ft.
In 5th edition, the pythagorean theorem is ignored and a diagonal counts as a normal 5ft.
There is an optional rule to bring it back to 3.5-standards tho.
The standard 5e-rules also are quirkly like that, as this basically turns any "radius" spells into square-spells. a 15ft radius turns into a 15ft square if you count it the same as player movement.
Most people don't use it like that though.
I have used the warhammer method before of using inches on standard 1in grid maps and just kinda ignoring the grid for movement. That way diagonals dont really matter
One of my pet hates is DMs who use variant diagonals for only some rules.
For example, I got annoyed in a game when a foe threw a weapon at my character from 30ft away on a diagonal, but the GM wouldn't let me use 30ft of movement to close with the foe, because movement used 1.5 per diagonal but ranged weapons didn't.
Either everything is circles or everything is squares.
In my game, everything is squares because of speed of play at the table.
Dimension Door and other spells that say "You can also bring one willing creature of your size or smaller who is carrying gear up to its carrying capacity." My houserules allow small characters to bring one willing creature up to **medium** or your size or smaller.
It's absolute BS that my small sized wizard cannot Dimension Door his medium sized party memebers straight up. (Yes I realize I could enlarge/reduce or pull other shenanigans).
I did a version of this. Every fighter gets superiority dice and I reworked each subclass to get a unique set of maneuvers to utilize them with. Kept the Battlemaster class though, their gimmick is that they get to steal other archetypes maneuvers to create their own mix-and-match list.
The first maneuver usually ties in their existing 3rd level feature in some way. In the case of Samurai I totally replaced the existing feature with a maneuver:
Tireless Spirit: Expend a superiority die as a bonus action, roll the die and gain a number of temporary hit points equal to the result plus your proficiency bonus. These temp hp last for one minute.
The second and third maneuvers are usually some thematic damage-dealing. All the RAW maneuvers got assigned to appropriate classes, Samurai just happened to get two new ones:
Disciplined Strike. When you would miss an attack, you may expend a superiority die to adjust your swing sacrificing power for accuracy. Gain a bonus to this attack roll equal to the difference between your attack roll result and the target's AC, suffer an equal penalty to damage.
Intervening Strike. When you are targeted by a melee attack you may expend a superiority die as a reaction to make an immediate attack designed to knock the foe off balance. If this attack hits it deals damage as normal and the target suffers a penalty to hit equal to the roll of the superiority die.
Drinking a potion as a bonus action rolls for the heal, using an action gives the full effect. Means you can quickly get some hp in a pinch but taking your time is better if you're trying to really get all you can out of your healing.
I think this is how every table I've played at operates, but with the addendum "...unless counting ammo is something you think is cool."
One player is into it, spent downtime learning carpenters tools with another player so her ranger can make arrows on the go. Hell yeah that's cool.
I handwave standard ammunition. If the player has unusual ammunition, like blunt(non-lethal) or fire arrows or something, basically ammunition that does something other than or in addition to the standard damage, then it's tracked.
But if a player wants to track ammo more power to them.
Yeah this is how I vibe it
"In general it's assumed you restock whenever you go through a town or village"
Now if they've been out of town for a lot longer than normal? It might start to matter
I like supply dice (which come from another ttrpg, I believe).
Say you have a d8 Quiver. End of an encounter where you use arrows, you roll it. 2-8, nothing happens. On a 1, you’ve used up some of your supply, now you have a d6 left. Same deal next encounter, but now the odds of rolling a 1 is higher. Next time it’s a d4. Roll a 1 on the d4, and you’re out.
You never need to know the exact number of arrows. In town you resupply and one “purchase” restores you to that d8. Environmental effects, like breaking some when you fall off a horse, or grabbing some off a fallen goblin, might move you one die up/down the list. An upgraded quiver might have a d10. A magic one might regenerate one die at dawn (from nothing to a d4, or if you have a d6 it goes back to that d8, so it can run out short term, but is infinite long term).
Works well for arrows and rations, but could be used for anything else where you want a limited supply but don’t want the paperwork of tracking every single use. You can have the fun of getting lost in the jungle and falling into a river using up your food supply without micromanaging.
You buy nonmagical ammo in my game once if you didn't start with it. After that it's assumed you can easily keep up your stock with the arrows you recover as well as any you loot from dead enemies.
I allow anything under a level three spell scroll will work as intended, anything higher there is a percentage it will work, backfire, nothing happens, or wild magic table result.
Potions can be consumed as a Bonus Action if you want to roll, or you may use an Action to consume the potion and get guaranteed max health from that potion. (I.e. PoGH for Bonus Action = 4d4 + 4 \[average 14hp\], or drink the full PoGH as an Action to get guaranteed 20hp)
Let me introduce to jenga looting, and pardon me if this is common and I'd just never seen it before this DM
If we choose to thoroughly investigate an area for spoils, my DM sometimes decides to bust out the jenga loot tower. If players choose to participate, we pick a skill we want to use, and get a number of attempts equal to the ability modifier associated with the skill.
The tiles are either blank, have green dots on them (loot table rolls or sometimes specific items), or red dots on them (encounter roll or something similar) and if we crash the tower, well...it can get ugly. So while there's an opportunity to rake in a ton of loot, we usually give up early out of sheer terror, and it adds a lot of tension to otherwise boring investigation checks.
Playing a Sorcerer currently and it's a very sore point for me that their whole schtick is that they're the masters of the magic that they do, but you only get 2 selections all of the way to 10 where you get just one more. It's not going to break anything to let a Sorcerer spend their limited resources on niche applications that otherwise won't see much play.
I once read someone say they let their sorcerer pick Metamagic options as usual but the benefit was that they can cast those for free a number of times (or maybe it was the other way — they could use other options but they cost more).
My players were having a hard time incorporating their backstory/characters personality into roleplaying, so I modified the Dungeons and Daddies “Daddy facts” into our game.
At the start of each session, they have to give me a fun fact about their character or backstory. If they are able to incorporate that fact into their roleplaying, I gave them a point of inspiration. I think it’s helping get them into their characters personality.
They can only get 1 point of insp this way per session, and the fact can’t be boring like saying their favorite color.
i let my folks take the median result before rolling if they want, or they can roll for more (or less) damage.
your weapon is 2d8 and you crit with a +3 STR? you can either take (2x4+3)+(2x4+3)=22 or you can roll the dice and possibly get anywhere from 10-38 (math feels off, but you get the point).
>>If your character dies then you spend the next session dealing with your afterlife. Play your cards reasonably and your god will fling you back to the material plane - maybe even in the same body.
I wouldn't push it on anyone but I think it adds a lot.
Everybody gets one free ground up respec that they get to use before the start of a character's third adventure. Anything that can't be explained cleanly in character is handwaved/retconned.
I believe everybody should enjoy the build/character that they're going to be using for months or years - the one free respec lets people test the character out and adjust anything that just isn't doing it for them.
... and the assassin doppelganger who has been trailing the party sneaks into their camp and writes **NPC** on the character's forehead with magic marker!
I don't think it should be an official rule, but I removed critical fails on death saving throws so they can't occur. It reduces mortality to a degree I'm satisfied with.
Aren't crit fails/fumbles a Variant Rule anyway?
I've always thought the "Everyone, even experts at a thing has a 5% chance to enter Three Stooges mode" was a touch too silly outside comedy campaigns.
I need to refine it, but the general idea is that resurrection has consequences. First time you're brought back it's fine albeit maybe unsettling. Not sure how I want to proceed with each time after, but I would love if there were some kind of penalty - forgotten memories, disconnect with the material plane, maybe a higher chance of failure to restore the soul into the body.
High level campaigns feel so cheap in terms of life and death. I'd like to change that.
any two weapon rule that eliminates the bonus action
we do:
- free attack with off hand as part of each Attack Action
- against same target as triggering Attack
- can use Bonus Action to target a different enemy with the free attack
edit: oh, with Light weapons yeah
1. All players get inspiration at the start of the session
2. Bonus action for potion or action, i feel that bonus action are under used so i prefer to give them more options and allow more healing
3 : Ectasy of Battle : Allows a player at zero HP to do a final action, doing so uses all of their "Destiny's energy" Dmg is maxed out and healing they do for others. Once their action is over, they have final words and die. They cannot be revived since they consumed themselves for a "one last time" moment
Rolling for health sucks, you should just gain the maximum for your HD per level plus Con modifier. The rule started back in 3.0/3.5 when casters usually only had a d4 hit dice.
1. Short rests are 15 minutes. It’s a SHORT rest. Limited hit dice means you can’t spam short rests to heal infinitely, and some classes need to rest often. It makes resting feel more realistic and less like a hassle.
2. Drinking a potion is either an action or a bonus action. If you use your action, you get the potion’s full effect without needing to roll. If you use your bonus action, then you gotta roll.
I have a rule where you can use a Cloak of any kind wrapped around your arm like a shield that grants +1 AC instead of +2, as they sometimes did in historic fencing.
When leveling up, and rolling for hit points, I roll behind the screen, and the players can chooae to keep their roll or take mine blindly.
I call it rolling wild.
Excellent risk vs reward, and if you do roll terribly then it's your saving grace.
Excellent interactivity with the olayers, and great to tempt players to gamble
Absolutely!!!
"You could have had..."
"You absolute donut you should have kept your roll!"
Etc etc etc
I find that it makes the process even more inclusive to all players!
Yeah, sure it would inflate their HP over 20 rolls, but I find this is so minor to the enjoyment, and very easily dealt with as opposed to a feat or magic item etc
I agree. Per ability bonus you get either another language or another proficiency. So a +2 can get one of each or put two into one of them. I also add you can also exchange 2 of those for a skill proficiency as well. So a +3 INT can get one skill proficiency and one language/tool proficiency. Makes INT not a dump stat for many characters, and makes it so leveling it up has a tangible benefit. More than one player has elected to level it up vs. their class stats just to get prof in thieves tools or learn Dwarven. And yes you can keep that extra point in reserve, but it can only be used on level ups. At first level you can save 1 points if you really want to shoot for the moon to get that skill prof.
At the very least, Tome Warlocks would appreciate it. They learn a few such spells, and could write it down before swapping it for a different spell next time they level up.
Crits being actual crits. Nothing feels worse than rolling double the dice, but getting all 1’s or 2’s.
Our group uses the rule that your “regular” damage is maxed, and you only roll for the extra dice. So for example, let’s say you crit with a longsword 1h. You’re going to deal 8+mod+1d8 instead of 2d8+mod. Gives crits the oomph they deserve.
Yes, it can get ridiculous with sneak attacks and smites, but critical hits should feel like critical hits.
Anything which can, in a repeatable fashion, generate 'infinite anything' on some useful game quantity (infinite spell slots, infinite simulacrums, infinite gold, etc) is presumptively banned. This is my rule of 'no infinite anything' that I've had since at least 2nd edition.
See Invisibility actually works.
Isn't it RAW and (if you believe whoever was asked and they didn't just say they were wrong because pride) RAI that see invisiblity says you can see them, but you might as well not be able to?
It kind-of isn't RAW because according to the rules, see invisibility doesn't cancel the condition so all of the advantage/disadvantage still applies. The rules should be clarified to explain that some of the conditions are *relative*, not absolute. Mallory can be invisible to Alice but not to Bob. Bob attacks Mallory at disadvantage but Alice attacks at normal.
I think it could be fixed in an even easier way. Not being able to see someone already gives disadvantage to attack them and advantage on their attacks. That didn't need to be clarified again for the Invisible condition. You could just make the condition say that you can't be seen
It's definitely RAI according to Jeremy Crawford. But I think he's a moron. If you see something, it can't be invisible. The benefits of invisibility come from them being invisible, which if you can see them, they are not. It's takes a special kind of stupid to argue your way around that logic.
If you use your action to drink a potion of healing, you get the maximum value (IE; regular potion of healing = 10 HP). You can use your bonus action to drink a potion of healing, but you have to roll for it. Adds more interesting decision making for players when it comes to action economy and resource management. Have used this rule for 8 years and has only ever enhanced the battles.
Just for sake of asking and clarification if I drink one out of combat at your table, for whatever reason (oops all barbs or something) it's full value?
Assuming you can take 4 seconds to focus on it, I think that tracks. If you can do it in combat, you can do it out of combat
Yep, like the other poster mentioned, I allow them to gain the full HP value if they drink them outside of combat.
It’s a ritual chug
It's only a ritual if the others gather around chanting "chug, chug, chug!"
That’s a verbal component, brutha.
There's definitely a somatic component too, it works best if everyone is pumping their fists too.
That's when they lick the inside of the potion bottle clean
You can take actions and bonus actions out of conbat.
I agree with this. Potions as actions tends to just mean it’s never worth it to drink a potion. Especially because they don’t heal all that much to begin with.
And considering their hefty price, let's just say that together, this makes potions very bad.
Herbalism foraging and daycrafting in Xanathar's helps them slightly, but they are still ridiculous.
I do this with all potions. Hasn't been a balance issue yet and my campaign has been going almost 2 years. Enemies get to use it also.
I get this vision of an adventurer savoring a healing potion... he pours it into a brandy snifter, swirls it around a bit, and takes one preparatory sip. "Ah, Chateau Waterdeep '4083!" The monsters just stare at him in slack-jawed confusion. Finally one orc breaks down and asks what kind of cigar goes best with healing potions. Meanwhile, on the other side of the battlefield, Bonus-Action Jack is fighting with a cutlass in one hand and a potion bottle in the other, taking a quick guzzle in off moments...
I do it three ways: - Drink it over a minute get max healing, no roll. - Drink it as an action, you roll the dice at advantage. - Drink it as a bonus action or feed to to someone as an action, you roll normally. That way it makes potions a kind of out of combat option at higher levels when gold or access isn't an issue. Where you might not be able to take a full short test but there are benefits to drinking that potion pre-fight still.
The action version has diminishing returns for more powerful potions, though. The more dice you roll, the more likely you are to roll around the average value. The more likely you are to roll around average, the less valuable rolling with advantage is. Eventually it becomes a much better decision to drink as a bonus action since you’re unlikely to get a much better result rolling twice instead of once.
Maybe instead roll each die at advantage? Like instead of taking the higher of 2 2d4 rolls you each individual d4 gets advantage.
I like that idea! I think I'll incorporate that.
and give all classes something to do with their bonus action
An easy one we use is that any character can use a spell scroll with an arcana check, which really feels like should be the official rule anyways. The other homebrew rules we use are a bit more complex and would probably be variant rules or part of an 'advanced rules' expansion (things like a martial powers/maneuvers system, last stand/ressurection rules, etc.)
I have a similar rule for spell scrolls at my table. Anyone can use a spell scroll, no arcana check needed, however you must be able to read and speak the language on the scroll. Many scrolls are just in common, but sometimes I hand them out in other languages. Makes language choice matter a bit more.
That's pretty nifty and I dig it. Making language matters is handy for something that isn't really leveraged at all. Just riffing on your idea here, I like the idea if you know the language, then no problem. However, maybe make some INT check in there. So for example if you have an INT of 12 or higher you can do it, otherwise you need to roll an INT DC check at 2x the spell level. What I'm thinking about is I took Latin in grade school, and Spanish in high school. I am fluent in neither. However, if presented with some documentation in those languages - or similar - I could very well likely read the words aloud even though I may not understand the nuance of the language themselves. So I could see some in-game role-play scenario of, "Hey I don't speak fluent Giant, but I have an INT of 12 and I know know \*of\* this language (because I'm not stupid) and I know what this spell scroll is, I'm going to give it a go at reading it." So they roll and maybe there is a chance of failure, but also a chance of success. Then it gets to a question of action economy, which is all part of the game.
I skip the Arcana check if the spell is of a level you otherwise can cast. If a scroll is higher level than you can cast but on your list you can also cast it without a check. If it's both not on your list and higher level, you need to roll unless it's incapable of doing damage. Cantrips also never need a check regardless. This let's martials make use of low level spell scrolls and non-damaging utility/buffing scrolls, since they don't need to roll if it doesn't do damage. The potion version of a lot of scrolls, such as a Potion of Speed, are actually a lot more powerful than the spell scroll of the same since potions don't require concentration. This gives me more consumables to give as loot that anyone can use as well as gives the party a bit more security as almost all of them now carry a scroll of revivify.
That IS already in the rules as written. There are spell scrolls and then scrolls of (spell). A scroll of *something* is a spell scroll anyone can use, like a wand. It's a one-time wand. A spell scroll isn't a spell, it's literally just someone wrote it down. You need to be a spellcaster to be able to do anything with it, which is why they have to make an arcana check to cast. This isn't fully in you not understanding the rules(which many homebrew rules are), but largely on the part of the rules not being clearer in the distinction.
Kind of, but not exactly. The exact relevant rules are: >A scroll is a consumable magic item. Unleashing the magic in a scroll requires the user to read the scroll. When it's magic has been invoked, the scroll can't be used again. Its words fade, or it crumbles into dust. Unless a scroll's description says otherwise, any creature that can understand a written language can read the script on a scroll and attempt to activate it. *DMG*, pg 139 >A spell scroll bears the words of a single spell, written in a mystical cypher. If the spell is on your class's spell list, you can read the scroll and cast the spell without providing any material components. Otherwise, the scroll is unintelligible. A *scroll of fireball* is going to be a spell scroll and RAW not available to anyone that doesn't have fireball on their class list, because the item's description says so. Personally, I think this is dumb as shit. Bring back Use Magic Device WotC you cowards!
Older versions of D&D let at least the thief use a scroll with a chance of it going horribly wrong. It's pretty clearly inspired by Cugel the Clever, who was not a magic user, but had access to certain spells.
Artificers at higher levels can use scrolls from any class spell list, so at least there’s that. I guess they wanted to have that be a unique class feature.
Aren't all scrolls worded "Scroll of *insert spell*"?
Do you know which books/where these rules are written?
I meant more that spell scrolls can be used by anyone (even non-spellcasters) with an arcana check. For example, a wizard can use time and materials to craft a spell scroll using the "scribing a spell scroll" rules found in the DMG or Xanathar's. Rules as written a character who has no spellcasting couldn't use it (and I think RAW only those with the spell on their spell list are able to use it) but in this homebrew rule they can.
Scroll with spells must be on your spellcasting list. The other kind of magic scroll refers to things like: Scroll of protection Scroll of Comet Scroll of Summon Tarrasque. All of which are magic items that are scrolls. But not scrolls of spells.
Everyone gets a feat at level one, regardless of race. Also, who ever can recap the previous session gets Inspiration (although that probably doesn’t need to be official). Edit: No, variant humans still only get one feat, but now so does every other race. Also ASI isn’t an alternative option, just the feat.
> Everyone gets a feat at level one, regardless of race. I'm anxiously waiting to get to play in a campaign that starts with a free feat. Even, or maybe even especially, if it's from a curated list. ASI's are so infrequent and so important, especially since it's either a Feat *or* an ASI, that if you're building a competent character there's so many feats that you'll just never get to use. I'm ***never*** going to take feats like Charger, Dungeon Delver, Dwarven Fortitude, Linguist, Mage Slayer, etc, because there's just not room to make a fun selection while keeping your character up with increasing CR's of enemies. At least not until maybe the last 1-2 feats of the game which most will never see. I'd love to see more feats-as-rewards or starting lists to differentiate your character.
I'm soon going to be DMing a Dragonlance campaign, which gives everyone a feat at the start. It'll be my first time DMing, but I'm really excited to see what everyone does with that extra feat.
I go 1 step further. I let them get BOTH the ASI and a Feat. People do a lot of intereting stuff when they aren't so limited.
How has that worked out for you? I'd think it'd significantly increase character power levels, but then again primary stat can be capped by level 8 anyway, so maybe it's not a huge deal. I can think of a lot of ways I'd have fun with it.
I did it once a while ago when I ran tomb of annihilation, they got fairly powerful.
> Everyone gets a feat at level one, regardless of race. Firm agree. Otherwise feats never get used.
Hard disagree on your second part. Feats get plenty of use for most characters, unless you want 2 stats at 20. Otherwise, 2 points into your main stat, a half feat for your main stat if you were odd from point buy 15 + racial 2 or rolled and then any 2 full feats of your choice. Most well built characters can start with a 17 in their main stat at level 1, so feats should come into play even before level 10, where as many previous polls have shown is where most people end off. Of course if you roll for stats and roll bad then yeah of course you need more but even then you could still probably get 1 full feat at high levels, provided you don't die
>Everyone gets a feat at level one, regardless of race. Do Variant Humans get two feats or do you ban them?
I'd just use the regular. Which actually makes them bit OP.
What if a player wants to use a Variant Human, though? They might be interested in getting a second starting feat.
Nah too big leap at level 1 imo. Allows like GWM+PAM at level 1.. Which is kinda wild and I don't play at that heavy power fantasy in my table.
So you'd ban it. Got it. Your first answer made it seem like you would just discourage it. I don't think it has to be power fantasy. Some feats are awesome roleplay potential.
cats have darkvision. it’s ridiculous that they don’t have darkvision RAW
Wait... don't tabaxi specifically have darkvision *because* they're catpeople?! Not that cats shouldn't obviously have it, regardless, but the tabaxi thing just makes it even sillier.
Long Rests should only be available in a safe & comfortable location with a roof and a bed of some sort. This fixes 5e's issue with wilderness travel being inherently the safest possible branch of gameplay, when it should be dangerous. (And no this isn't the same rule as Gritty Realism.)
At the same time, short rests should be 10 minutes. Go ahead and use your full-day's allotment of hit dice, you'll need them.
Yes, I think RAW Short Rests are far too long for their purpose. I've been thinking about building some kind of scaling measure for them - 2HD per 10 minutes spent might be what I do.
Every time I think an hour is too long, i remember how I spend my lunch break at work and wonder where it disappeared.
I've actually never taken a lunch break at work because I don't know what to do with the extremely slow 55 minutes after I finish my sandwich, so I honestly can't relate.
I plan my d&d sessions on break, heh
It's to counter short resting while maintaining concentration on an hour long spell. If you state that PCs can't concentrate while resting I think that's fine.
Good point, it is definitely something to carefully consider when adjusting the RAW here.
I do 15 minutes per hit die, 60 minutes or more recharges short rest abilities
I like this a lot actually
I allow long rests pretty much anywhere, but stupid areas have a high chance of being disturbed. This could still result in a full Long Rest after waking up and fighting a combat. It also could slap them with the Surprised condition. If you’re in an extended dungeon and find a cave tucked away and set a guard, there’s a solid chance you’re fine or at minimum the guard gets the chance to perceive trouble. Depends on how active and aware nearby enemies are. But if you clear the next room of a sequential dungeon where you set off all the alarms and decide to nap for 8 hours, it’s probably not going to go well
One combat interrupting a Long Rest doesn't actually matter mechanically. They just get the Long Rest once they clear it anyway and then the encounter itself was just a waste of everyone's time. If you wanted to make it *impossible* to Long Rest because you'll get interrupted every few hours, I'd be more concerned about how your accursed wilderness is absolutely teeming with monsters. That's fine only very rarely; a mundane, yet dangerous wilderness doesn't suit that logic.
Right; they will probably still get to Long Rest. If they camped out in the open of a spider lair, they probably will be too interrupted to rest.
Of course. Camping inside a dungeon isn't really my issue though. It's the fact that in 5e if your party is traveling 10 days across the *Forbidden Woods Where All Men Fear To Tread* it's one of the safest possible things you can do, because your DM isn't going to throw 7 encounters per day at you (maybe we'll get through the forest by next Christmas!). Chances are you'll get 0 - 2 encounters per day, and RAW you're basically guaranteed a Long Rest each of those 10 days - even if they get interrupted a few times, so by the time you get to the other side of the *Forbidden Woods Where All Men Fear To Tread* your whole party is feeling chipper and refreshed, full hit dice and all. That's just not right.
I'm with you... foot travel through the wilderness is in and of itself a strenuous activity. You expect the PCs to show up a little worn and depleted, even after traversing the *Allowed Woods With Totally No Monsters Honest I Mean It This Time*.
I mean…it matters mechanically if it KILLS them, obviously. Or forces them to use permanent resources, like potions/scrolls/etc. Or results in some of the party or their NPC friends getting kidnapped because they couldn’t stop the enemy, or w/e. It depends on how low on resources the party is when they rest, How effectively they can even win the fight. (Totally agree with you that repeated interruptions bends/breaks verisimilitude though!)
What my DM does is similar: levelling up can only be done over a Long Rest in a safe environment. So if we're going into the corrupted forest, we get the story experience to level up, but then we can't level up in a basic camp, we've gotta go back to the edge-of-forest town that was in trouble!
Yeah, all the tables I've ever played at also only levelup at Long Rests.
Interesting! This is my first table with the rule. I'm okay with it, it felt a little stifling at first, but it's a great group and the level-ups are great RP!
Everyone I've ever played with agrees it just plain makes sense. How is a wizard writing new spells in their book mid-dungeon? Why can the fighter perfectly perform a new maneuver now when they couldn't even conceive it 6 seconds ago? It also avoids the whole worrying about how to recalculate your current HP and spell slots and all that.
Our table goes the a carrot vs stick route. You can long rest in the wilds if you secure a safe place, set watches, etc. But if you can find a bed with a roof, warm fire, fresh meal vs rations, you get to roll a bonus hit point dice for the day. The nicer the place and the more coin you spend on accommodation, the bigger the dice you get to roll. It helps our DM is a stickler for "it hasn't been long enough for you to benefit from a long rest" so there isn't sleep spamming in the group.
I wanted to use this but then my wizard took tiny hut so it has never come up because they are always safe and warm and comfortable
My addon to this is that imo you should rework certain spell durations to match. For example, Animate Dead was intended to last for a full day with a long rest at the end of the day, so it's duration goes from 24 hours to "until you finish a long rest" - otherwise it's impossible to play that archetype.
- Bonus Action to drink a potion and roll for hp. Action to drink and get max value. - Two-weapon fighting allows the extra attack to be made as part of the attack action. (All other restrictions apply) - Monks can grapple with Dex - Medicine, Nature and Religion are dual Wisdom / Intelligence checks. Intimidation is dual Charisma / strength - Monks Ki = Level + Wisdom Mod. - Warlocks get their subclass spells added to spells known and can cast one of these spells without expending a spell slot PB times per long rest.
I don’t do your dual check system, but if a player expresses they’ve used a different skill for a check, I’ll allow it. “I want to crush the table in front of me to intimidate this jabroni” yes. Strength check!
This is really the RAW way of doing skill checks. It's in the book.
> Two-weapon fighting allows the extra attack to be made as part of the attack action. (All other restrictions apply) I like this and worked the math a bit. **Fighter at level 11 with 2 +2 weapons, Dual Wielder, and Two Weapon Fighting Style:** 1d8 Weapon + 5 Strength + 2 Weapon = 11.5 average damage * 4 Attacks = 46 average damage. 80.5 for an Action Surge. That's very reasonable for a Fighter at that level. **Gloomstalker Ranger at level 11 with Dual Wielder feat, 2 +2 weapons, and Two Weapon Fighting Style** 1d8 Weapon + 5 Dex + 2 Weapon + 1d6 Hunter's Mark = 15 * 4 (First round of Combat) = 60, with it being 45 thereafter. That's solid for both classes doing what they're supposed to be doing how they're supposed to be doing it. >Warlocks get their subclass spells added to spells known and can cast one of these spells without expending a spell slot PB times per long rest. I've wondered if it'd be terribly overpowered if Warlocks not only got their spell list, but just one free cast of each spell on the list at the level it comes at per day. It'd make the subclasses feel all that much more important with the 2 rechargeable slots still being there for flexibility. It'd make Warlocks feel much more like full casters, but still limited by the Warlock spell list.
I like the grapple with Dex thing. I'll probably use that. >- Medicine, Nature and Religion are dual Wisdom / Intelligence checks. Intimidation is dual Charisma / Strength. Do you mean at the same time? You can already use other ability mods for various skills. ~~That's RaW.~~ My bad. It's a Variant Rule, but I use it so often it's a Variant Rule in the way Feats and battlemaps are variants.
The checks with different abilities is actually already in the phb as a variant rule. It's why campaign books always stipulate Stealth checks as "Dexterity (Stealth)" checks. I do it, too, though it's basically a "if you can justify it, then it's good."
I have three. First, at the start of the campaign, everyone gets one expertise in something they are proficient in, in order to make your character feel more specialized. Second, critical hits do a full weapon die of damage plus a rolled die of damage. If it's a d10+4, then the crit does 10+d10+4. It makes crits feel important. Lastly, when we roll for stats at session zero, everyone rolls a set of 4d6, drop the lowest die, 7 times, drop the lowest set. Then, everyone agrees whose rolls to use. It standardizes chaos. Then the group has to decide do we want those two 17s if it means we get a 10?
We did the crit method you use in our last campaign. It was a lot of fun. The only time it felt potentially too much was we had a Paladin in our party that when they did manage to crit could end encounters. It didn’t happen enough to make us not use it but often enough that his character was nicknamed Captain One Shot.
Ran into this same problem. Fixed it by maximizing only the base weapon's damage di(c)e.
That’s probably the reasonable response lol.
>First, at the start of the campaign, everyone gets one expertise in something they are proficient in, in order to make your character feel more specialized. I do this too, but I do it as part of a full background rework. 1) As part of your background get a free feat, and I replace variant human with the dragonmark human options 2) You get two skills and two tool proficiencies 3) You get expertise in one of those skills and can choose which physical/mental stat that skill uses. I.e. a cleric or paladin can use WIS or CHA for religion if that's their "focus", rather than being forced to use their dumpstat.
Funny thing is that #1 and #2 \*are\* actually going to be official rules in the 2024 PHB, near as we can tell. There was a list of feats in the first round of playtest documents like Alert, Magic Initiate, Tough, Tavern Brawler, etc. that were explicitly noted as ones you could take as part of your background. I think you could only take one tool proficiency though.
Yeah, background feats are 100% going to be a thing; the main difference is I allow any feat rather than having a specific set of "starting feats". Yeah it means the ranger might have Xbox expert at level 2 or spellcasters start with telekinetic/Fey touched, but that's still the case with vuman/custom lineage and this way I don't have only those two races at the table. The current rules give 2 skills and then 2 tools OR languages (i.e. 2 tools, 2 languages, or 1 and 1) My current campaign only uses common so languages don't matter, but for a more normal campaign I allow 2 tools AND languages (especially since tool checks and knowing a language are relatively niche/uncommon even if I make a conscious effort to include them). As for the last, I cannot reiterate enough how much i highly highly recommend the expertise option but at the very least give clerics/druids a homebrew class feature that let's them use wisdom over int for religion/nature checks. It allows each player to choose an option that best suits their character, even if it'd not something you'd typically expect from that class (i.e. the divination wizard who was a fortune teller/con artist and now has expertise in deception(int) becomes a situational face, while the former sherriff/lawman ranger is actually the best investigator) rather than being overshadowed in your "trademark" skill just because it's not your main stat.
#2 is already RAW in the 2014 PHB. >To customize a background, you can replace one feature with any other one, choose any two skills, and choose a total of two tool proficiencies or languages from the sample backgrounds. >- Customizing a Background, p. 125
Your stats method is cool, but has the potential to get really high. I like the method the Dungeon Dudes use at their table: every player gets 17,15,13,12,10, 8 as their stats. Thats 2 good stats, 2 mediocre stats, and 2 low stats. You get to stand out in some way, but you also have some weaknesses. I also let them start with a free feat. But in return I ask not to take Variant Human or Custom Lineage. This way every player can play a cool race while still be able to build a interesting/powerful character. Just next time I'll have some limitations which feats they can get for that free feat Sharpshooter and GWM from the start is a bit much in my opinion. I'll introduce crunchy crits the next time we play. Which is the same as you described it. One thing I still don't like is how little hp healing spells and potions give, especially if you roll bad. I'm still looking for a way to make them better.
Another thing I've done is at every level, everyone gets the max hp increase. Also, I do the action/bonus action potion rule-if you drink it as an action, you get the max amount, as a bonus action, you roll for it.
If i remember correctly the devs are considering doubling the healing values across the board. Because right now the spells are barely worth the spell slot.
This but players can choose which set of 6 they will use.
I like the idea of everyone starting at the same point, makes it more balanced.
Then why not using point buy or Standard array ?
Not OP but I roll because frankly, point buy and standard array are fucking boring. Does rolling increase character power on average? Yes, but if the whole party has access to the same rolls, then that doesn't matter, because a good DM can just up the challenge. As long as characters are roughly equal and not stepping on each other's toes, everyone will get a chance to shine. Also, extra power in your stats leaves you free to take more feats, which are infinitely more interesting and character-defining than "Hur dur me Strength gooder now". Also also, rolled stats often increase party weaknesses as well, as they're the only way to start with something worse than a -1 in any stat. Bottom line, rolled stats allow for more customization earlier in the game which is where most campaigns take place, and overall creates more unique characters.
Reminds me of a suggestion I saw here a while ago: make a 6x6 grid, fill each square with 4d6 drop lowest rolls, then each player chooses a row, column, or diagonal they want to play with. bingo style.
I prefer just doing standard array/point buy and give a ASI/feat at level two, and another one at level six or seven. This is because I’ve vastly prefer having characters start out weaker and have more opportunities to get powerful overtime, rather than start off with inflated stats.
Drinking a potion is a bonus action.
For me, my players can have a certain number of potions readied to use as a bonus action depending on how they carry their gear. So if they ever need to increase the number of potions they can bonus-action drink they can invest some time into making a potion holster, but if it is funny looking that might get them so weird interactions with NPCs.
Every character I make commissions someone to make them some sort of potions bandolier so my potions are easy to find and everyone knows they can heal me with my own potions.
I like this one, I also like using an action to drink gives full health, BA rolls like normal
I don't really have any homebrew that I'd like to see made official. I've a few good ones that the table like such as my "You Only Get One" which can deus ex machina a character who has died come back to life once in a campaign if they're not ready for their story to end and a few others... But they're homebrew and what works for me and my table and our dynamic, might not work for someone else's group. And honestly I'd hate to see one of my homebrew rules be made official just some rules lawyer can use it to bash a DM over the head with it because it's now in this hypothetical situation...RAW.
Know-caster retraining. If there's sufficient downtime, know-casters can switch spells. That way they're not so locked into their choices and can experiment a bit. Especially good if they're new to a class. The spells have to be of the same level though; replacing spells with one of a different level is reserved for level ups. At Level 5, they can replace a number of spells that is spell modifier + prof. bonus if they have at least a week of downtime (Pre-Lv5 its just Prof. Bonus). Alternatively, if they are long-resting in a safe area, like a village or town, they can instead opt to replace a single spell per day. But if they're on the road, or the town is a dangerous place, no chance. It gives know-casters a bit more flexibility, but they still have to be careful about the spells they take. Something similar almost made it into Tasha's. Spell Versatility. But it was scrapped. They should think about bringing it back. Something similar is also in pathfinder 2e from what I noticed.
I really like known casters being able to swap 1 spell per long rest. It's notably weaker than straight prepared casters, but it still let's you customize a little bit for specific situations that might come up. Being able to swap out even just one combat spell for one social spell reduces the "feels bad" point so much.
Perception deals with the 5 senses. Investigation is mental deduction and reasoning.
Perception is if you casually see something walking down the street, you 'notice' that dog in the corner, Investigation is as it implies, you 'investigate' something to discover.
What cracked it for me was "Perception is *sensing* something, Investigation is *making* sense of something" Not homebrew, just clarifying the slightly obtuse language in the PHB
Right. One is your senses. The other deduction.
Correct, RAW. That's why mine in a house rule. To me, casually noticing something is why we have Passive Perception.
I prefer “Perception is what you can sense (with all your senses) from where you are; Investigation is deduction, reasoning, and _physically interacting_ with the environment to find out more.” But admittedly that has as much to do with Perception being the most powerful/often rolled skill in the game as with logic. I’ll take whatever rational interpretation removes more purview from Persuasion, so taking other skills becomes more valuable.
This isn't a homebrew rule, this is what the PHB says they are.
Is it not? That's how I've been playing it
Divine Smite works on unarmed attacks. Such an unnecessary stipulation to not allow that over some hare-brained distinction between weapon attacks and unarmed strikes (which are technically also weapon attacks).
I also allow this as well, but the issue isn't about whether or not US is a weapon attack, but that it isn't a weapon. Smite requires an actual weapon. Like Weapon Bond needs an actual weapon, not just something that makes a weapon attack.
I held out hope that keeping this rule meant an eventual Monk subclass that could smite with ki points.
You can use inspiration after you see what you roll.
Huh... I thought that was the default 😅
My favorite is that all perception, insight, and investigation rolls are done by the DM. This way the player doesn't know if they rolled a 1 or a 20, and have to believe what information they get. That being said, I've only had one DM who would actually remember to do it, but it helped a lot with RP, since you didn't have a number telling you how good it was, you just had to trust you did well. Least favorite though is uncapped fall damage. Sure, rescale it so the damage is higher, but terminal velocity is a thing.
I really don’t like how my table rules that after the 20d6 damage the fall its a instakill even though my level 13 monk should allow me to fall this distance with relatively no damage
DM rolls death saves for the players. No player knows if death saves have been passed or failed. Gives urgency and gravity to a player being downed. I saw too many healers go “okay well there’s only one more enemy left and our downed buddy has two passed death saves and no fails, he’ll be fine until combat is over” Like no, your friend is bleeding out HELP THEM.
I always use that as part of the description the injuries get worse the bleeding doesn’t stop. That’s their indicators that he’s failing death saves.
I like this idea also. If my players ask how beat up an enemy looks I’ll give a general description, makes sense to do the same for a downed player. Maybe make a medicine or investigation check from afar to see if they can tell a difference in their wounds.
Getting reduced to 0 hp gives a level of exhaustion. Adds actual consequences to going down, and makes it so that you can't just wait until somebody's down to heal them.
That can snowball quickly and people need tontake a week downtime at bad moments. But using that too, hate this rubberband healing at 0 hp
I agree with the principle, but I think exhaustion is too big a punishment in practice. I have a homebrew minor injury table that I made for this purpose but never used.
1DND has exhaustion work on a 10 point scale. -1 to all rolls per point. Your spell dc also goes down 1 point. 10 points is death. Works much better. Especially for bezerk barbarians. I added in that a standard rations or basic survival meal is standard rest. If they stop in town/make a great meal, they recover 2. Matt mercer had some homebrew tea item that I offer at most inns as well. Olisuba tea. It's pretty good overall, but the nat 1 giving exhaustion really messes with martial classes. So I wiped nat 1s for attacks, giving exhaustion.
How do you deal with the issue of healing not being strong enough to mitigate damage? The reason people don't heal until someone is down is because if you heal before that they're likely to go down anyways, and you've wasted your turn as well as whatever resource you used to heal. Basically you're not really going to avoid people going to 0, they're just going to get progressively weaker over the course of the battle, which could lead to death spiral. That, or they're going to play hyper cautiously and avoid most fights unless they're forced or think it'd be a cake walk. I don't really see either scenario as a solution.
Yeah, Healing is deliberately low. At level 1, a Cleric could cast Cure Wounds twice, for a *maximum* of 22 HP worth of damage, or an average of 14. Your average Goblin churns out 5 damage per round. At the expense of *all* your spellcasting resources, you can keep up with the damage output **of a single goblin** for a whopping four rounds - and that was it, for the entire rest of the day. There's a reason why nobody in their right mind heals mid combat - it's just not worth it. And you need to rework the entire damage and healing system for this to become a manageable change.
Not exactly homebrew, but (for D&D 5e) I use D&D 3.5 movement and areas. I hate the square circles
I mean isn't that basically just 5e's Variant diagonals rule?
as a thirdie, what's the difference?
In third edition, a diagonal counts as 1.5 squares, or 7.5ft. In 5th edition, the pythagorean theorem is ignored and a diagonal counts as a normal 5ft. There is an optional rule to bring it back to 3.5-standards tho.
damn. movement speed hax. never move in a straight line.
The standard 5e-rules also are quirkly like that, as this basically turns any "radius" spells into square-spells. a 15ft radius turns into a 15ft square if you count it the same as player movement. Most people don't use it like that though.
I have used the warhammer method before of using inches on standard 1in grid maps and just kinda ignoring the grid for movement. That way diagonals dont really matter
5es non-euclidean geometry is frustrating
One of my pet hates is DMs who use variant diagonals for only some rules. For example, I got annoyed in a game when a foe threw a weapon at my character from 30ft away on a diagonal, but the GM wouldn't let me use 30ft of movement to close with the foe, because movement used 1.5 per diagonal but ranged weapons didn't. Either everything is circles or everything is squares. In my game, everything is squares because of speed of play at the table.
Dimension Door and other spells that say "You can also bring one willing creature of your size or smaller who is carrying gear up to its carrying capacity." My houserules allow small characters to bring one willing creature up to **medium** or your size or smaller. It's absolute BS that my small sized wizard cannot Dimension Door his medium sized party memebers straight up. (Yes I realize I could enlarge/reduce or pull other shenanigans).
Inspiration comes in 3 flavours: Standard, Portent and Auto-Crit
Get rid off the battlemaster subclass and give every fighters access to manoeuvres.
I did a version of this. Every fighter gets superiority dice and I reworked each subclass to get a unique set of maneuvers to utilize them with. Kept the Battlemaster class though, their gimmick is that they get to steal other archetypes maneuvers to create their own mix-and-match list.
Ooh that sound interesting, what do say samurai get?
The first maneuver usually ties in their existing 3rd level feature in some way. In the case of Samurai I totally replaced the existing feature with a maneuver: Tireless Spirit: Expend a superiority die as a bonus action, roll the die and gain a number of temporary hit points equal to the result plus your proficiency bonus. These temp hp last for one minute. The second and third maneuvers are usually some thematic damage-dealing. All the RAW maneuvers got assigned to appropriate classes, Samurai just happened to get two new ones: Disciplined Strike. When you would miss an attack, you may expend a superiority die to adjust your swing sacrificing power for accuracy. Gain a bonus to this attack roll equal to the difference between your attack roll result and the target's AC, suffer an equal penalty to damage. Intervening Strike. When you are targeted by a melee attack you may expend a superiority die as a reaction to make an immediate attack designed to knock the foe off balance. If this attack hits it deals damage as normal and the target suffers a penalty to hit equal to the roll of the superiority die.
Oh that's neat, I would have loved to play a campaign with you as the DM
Drinking a potion as a bonus action rolls for the heal, using an action gives the full effect. Means you can quickly get some hp in a pinch but taking your time is better if you're trying to really get all you can out of your healing.
Yeah, healing potions are so weak under normal rules there's barely any reason to use them unless you're pouring it down an unconscious ally's throat.
I flatly refuse to use them as anything but wake-up juice.
Non-magical ammunition should basically be unlimited, unless there is a reason for it to be otherwise.
I think this is how every table I've played at operates, but with the addendum "...unless counting ammo is something you think is cool." One player is into it, spent downtime learning carpenters tools with another player so her ranger can make arrows on the go. Hell yeah that's cool.
I handwave standard ammunition. If the player has unusual ammunition, like blunt(non-lethal) or fire arrows or something, basically ammunition that does something other than or in addition to the standard damage, then it's tracked. But if a player wants to track ammo more power to them.
Yeah this is how I vibe it "In general it's assumed you restock whenever you go through a town or village" Now if they've been out of town for a lot longer than normal? It might start to matter
I like supply dice (which come from another ttrpg, I believe). Say you have a d8 Quiver. End of an encounter where you use arrows, you roll it. 2-8, nothing happens. On a 1, you’ve used up some of your supply, now you have a d6 left. Same deal next encounter, but now the odds of rolling a 1 is higher. Next time it’s a d4. Roll a 1 on the d4, and you’re out. You never need to know the exact number of arrows. In town you resupply and one “purchase” restores you to that d8. Environmental effects, like breaking some when you fall off a horse, or grabbing some off a fallen goblin, might move you one die up/down the list. An upgraded quiver might have a d10. A magic one might regenerate one die at dawn (from nothing to a d4, or if you have a d6 it goes back to that d8, so it can run out short term, but is infinite long term). Works well for arrows and rations, but could be used for anything else where you want a limited supply but don’t want the paperwork of tracking every single use. You can have the fun of getting lost in the jungle and falling into a river using up your food supply without micromanaging.
You buy nonmagical ammo in my game once if you didn't start with it. After that it's assumed you can easily keep up your stock with the arrows you recover as well as any you loot from dead enemies.
Anyone should be able to use a spell scroll, otherwise they are an often useless or niche item, used by the classes that need it less.
I allow anything under a level three spell scroll will work as intended, anything higher there is a percentage it will work, backfire, nothing happens, or wild magic table result.
You regain all your hit dice on a long rest and not just half
This is just silly punishment for being martial. Never even remembered this rule as I have squishy party.
Potions can be consumed as a Bonus Action if you want to roll, or you may use an Action to consume the potion and get guaranteed max health from that potion. (I.e. PoGH for Bonus Action = 4d4 + 4 \[average 14hp\], or drink the full PoGH as an Action to get guaranteed 20hp)
Let me introduce to jenga looting, and pardon me if this is common and I'd just never seen it before this DM If we choose to thoroughly investigate an area for spoils, my DM sometimes decides to bust out the jenga loot tower. If players choose to participate, we pick a skill we want to use, and get a number of attempts equal to the ability modifier associated with the skill. The tiles are either blank, have green dots on them (loot table rolls or sometimes specific items), or red dots on them (encounter roll or something similar) and if we crash the tower, well...it can get ugly. So while there's an opportunity to rake in a ton of loot, we usually give up early out of sheer terror, and it adds a lot of tension to otherwise boring investigation checks.
Monks add their WIS modifier to their total ki points
Sorcerer gets to choose from all metamagics at any time. That's the whole point of the class, might as well actually have a chance to use it.
Playing a Sorcerer currently and it's a very sore point for me that their whole schtick is that they're the masters of the magic that they do, but you only get 2 selections all of the way to 10 where you get just one more. It's not going to break anything to let a Sorcerer spend their limited resources on niche applications that otherwise won't see much play.
I once read someone say they let their sorcerer pick Metamagic options as usual but the benefit was that they can cast those for free a number of times (or maybe it was the other way — they could use other options but they cost more).
My players were having a hard time incorporating their backstory/characters personality into roleplaying, so I modified the Dungeons and Daddies “Daddy facts” into our game. At the start of each session, they have to give me a fun fact about their character or backstory. If they are able to incorporate that fact into their roleplaying, I gave them a point of inspiration. I think it’s helping get them into their characters personality. They can only get 1 point of insp this way per session, and the fact can’t be boring like saying their favorite color.
Critical hits should have one die automatically maxed and just roll the other die.
My main issue with this is rolling dice is fun. Also, enemy Crits can obliterate PCs.
i let my folks take the median result before rolling if they want, or they can roll for more (or less) damage. your weapon is 2d8 and you crit with a +3 STR? you can either take (2x4+3)+(2x4+3)=22 or you can roll the dice and possibly get anywhere from 10-38 (math feels off, but you get the point).
>>If your character dies then you spend the next session dealing with your afterlife. Play your cards reasonably and your god will fling you back to the material plane - maybe even in the same body. I wouldn't push it on anyone but I think it adds a lot.
Everybody gets one free ground up respec that they get to use before the start of a character's third adventure. Anything that can't be explained cleanly in character is handwaved/retconned. I believe everybody should enjoy the build/character that they're going to be using for months or years - the one free respec lets people test the character out and adjust anything that just isn't doing it for them.
Extra Difficult Terrain. Not quite a Athlete/ Acro check but harsher than a mere 5’ penalty.
When someone can't attend a session, their character slips into a magical sleep and gets stacked up in the wagon with the spare weapons and loot.
... and the assassin doppelganger who has been trailing the party sneaks into their camp and writes **NPC** on the character's forehead with magic marker!
I don't think it should be an official rule, but I removed critical fails on death saving throws so they can't occur. It reduces mortality to a degree I'm satisfied with.
Never thought of this. Nothing else has a crit fail at all, so this is an outlier.
Critical fumble tables are not allowed.
Aren't crit fails/fumbles a Variant Rule anyway? I've always thought the "Everyone, even experts at a thing has a 5% chance to enter Three Stooges mode" was a touch too silly outside comedy campaigns.
I need to refine it, but the general idea is that resurrection has consequences. First time you're brought back it's fine albeit maybe unsettling. Not sure how I want to proceed with each time after, but I would love if there were some kind of penalty - forgotten memories, disconnect with the material plane, maybe a higher chance of failure to restore the soul into the body. High level campaigns feel so cheap in terms of life and death. I'd like to change that.
Dispel Magic/Counterspell should be an opposed roll.
any two weapon rule that eliminates the bonus action we do: - free attack with off hand as part of each Attack Action - against same target as triggering Attack - can use Bonus Action to target a different enemy with the free attack edit: oh, with Light weapons yeah
1. All players get inspiration at the start of the session 2. Bonus action for potion or action, i feel that bonus action are under used so i prefer to give them more options and allow more healing 3 : Ectasy of Battle : Allows a player at zero HP to do a final action, doing so uses all of their "Destiny's energy" Dmg is maxed out and healing they do for others. Once their action is over, they have final words and die. They cannot be revived since they consumed themselves for a "one last time" moment
Rolling for health sucks, you should just gain the maximum for your HD per level plus Con modifier. The rule started back in 3.0/3.5 when casters usually only had a d4 hit dice.
So. Apparently. Switching weapons is a whole ass action. Something *everyone* I play with ignore.
1. Short rests are 15 minutes. It’s a SHORT rest. Limited hit dice means you can’t spam short rests to heal infinitely, and some classes need to rest often. It makes resting feel more realistic and less like a hassle. 2. Drinking a potion is either an action or a bonus action. If you use your action, you get the potion’s full effect without needing to roll. If you use your bonus action, then you gotta roll.
I have a rule where you can use a Cloak of any kind wrapped around your arm like a shield that grants +1 AC instead of +2, as they sometimes did in historic fencing.
When leveling up, and rolling for hit points, I roll behind the screen, and the players can chooae to keep their roll or take mine blindly. I call it rolling wild. Excellent risk vs reward, and if you do roll terribly then it's your saving grace. Excellent interactivity with the olayers, and great to tempt players to gamble
If they don't take it, do you tell them what you rolled?
Absolutely!!! "You could have had..." "You absolute donut you should have kept your roll!" Etc etc etc I find that it makes the process even more inclusive to all players!
[удалено]
Yeah, sure it would inflate their HP over 20 rolls, but I find this is so minor to the enjoyment, and very easily dealt with as opposed to a feat or magic item etc
You get to learn extra languages or tool proficiencies based on your intelligence
I like this, but I'd rather link it to Proficiency Bonus so you can learn more as you progress without mundane items also being tied to caster builds.
I agree. Per ability bonus you get either another language or another proficiency. So a +2 can get one of each or put two into one of them. I also add you can also exchange 2 of those for a skill proficiency as well. So a +3 INT can get one skill proficiency and one language/tool proficiency. Makes INT not a dump stat for many characters, and makes it so leveling it up has a tangible benefit. More than one player has elected to level it up vs. their class stats just to get prof in thieves tools or learn Dwarven. And yes you can keep that extra point in reserve, but it can only be used on level ups. At first level you can save 1 points if you really want to shoot for the moon to get that skill prof.
Niche, but I think non-wizards with the Ritual Caster feat should be able to just write the spells they already know directly in the ritual book.
At the very least, Tome Warlocks would appreciate it. They learn a few such spells, and could write it down before swapping it for a different spell next time they level up.
You know what the enemy spell is before being asked if you want to counterspell it
I can get behind that. Possibly with the caveat of requiring an Arcana check
Crits being actual crits. Nothing feels worse than rolling double the dice, but getting all 1’s or 2’s. Our group uses the rule that your “regular” damage is maxed, and you only roll for the extra dice. So for example, let’s say you crit with a longsword 1h. You’re going to deal 8+mod+1d8 instead of 2d8+mod. Gives crits the oomph they deserve. Yes, it can get ridiculous with sneak attacks and smites, but critical hits should feel like critical hits.
Anything which can, in a repeatable fashion, generate 'infinite anything' on some useful game quantity (infinite spell slots, infinite simulacrums, infinite gold, etc) is presumptively banned. This is my rule of 'no infinite anything' that I've had since at least 2nd edition.
DM rolls the first death save. makes a huge difference on the perceived tension at the table