I am 'rebooting' my Campaign in about 2 weeks and starting over - I've got 2 players leaving the campaign and 2 more joining my group, so I figure it's a good time to change up some of my rules and some of my campaign information.

To the point, most of my House Rules have been spoken/unspoken and I haven't actually adopted a written list of information. I've decided I should probably go ahead and do that and I've been sorting a few.

My favorite is "If you ever look at me and say 'Well, the rulebook says...' then you might as well hand me your character sheet." I don't mind questions regarding a ruling, but I hate being interrupted and accused of doing something wrong (ie Rules-Lawyering) - considering I've put a lot of heart and time into the game and while I'm doing it all for the players, it IS my game and what I say goes in it.

Anyway, I went on a tangent.

I know we have quite a few other established and experienced DM's here on staff, so I was wondering if any of you had a few House Rules of your own that you've found to work really well with your games and if you wouldn't mind posting them for the rest of us to read and talk about. My ulterior motive is to find a few I can adopt into my own list if I think they suit my game.

Yar!

Edit: Changed a bit of wording as it sounded kind of egotistical.. then realised it was hard to say it any other way. Interesting.

Bajah fucked around with this message on 02-02-2005 at 11:21 AM.

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Bajah's fortune cookie read:
My favorite is "If you ever look at me and say 'Well, the rulebook says...' then you might as well hand me your character sheet." I don't mind questions regarding a ruling, but I hate being interrupted and accused of doing something wrong (ie Rules-Lawyering) - considering I've put a lot of heart and time into the game and while I'm doing it all for the players, it IS my game and what I say goes in it.

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I don't agree with this, to a point, because there is a clear distinction between rules lawyering vs how a player learned the game by the book, and how an unwritten rule or GM's preference may contradict it.

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Out of a possible 10, D scored a straight 1 with:
I don't agree with this, to a point, because there is a clear distinction between rules lawyering vs how a player learned the game by the book, and how an unwritten rule or GM's preference may contradict it.

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Point taken, but there's things you have to take into account. All of my players never played D&D before gaming with me, so they learned to play in my game and with me helping them. I've never had a problem with answering questions or explaining things and it's very well known that I will take as much time out of my personal schedule to make sure everything's understood and there is no confusion. I'm a very fair person and the rule I listed above has never had to come into play. I don't mind if someone interpreted something a different way and asks me how it's handled and doesn't cause a fuss about it. I think this is what you're referring to. My rule/point is that I don't want someone blatantly disrupting the game and flat-out telling ME that I'm wrong and it has to be a certain way because the book says so and that's their interpretation. That's what I'm referring to by Rules-Lawyering. Arguing with the DM because YOU think it has to be a certain way instead of just asking how he/I interpret it and put it into play in my world.

Does that clear it up or make sense?

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Out of a possible 10, OtakuPenguin scored a straight 1 with:
One I use that a lot of other do too is not really worrying a lot about spell components unless it's something really big, and they have the means to acquire the components.

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There's a feat called Eschew Materials that covers that, though. I see your point on that one, but I won't alienate a feat for a lazy mage

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OtakuPenguin's unholy Backstreet Boys obsession manifested in:
One I use that a lot of other do too is not really worrying a lot about spell components unless it's something really big, and they have the means to acquire the components.

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I've always been a fan of this one, too; Spell components serve only to hobble the already injured Wizard class, and don't make much sense to a Sorceror.

I have a few standing house rules for the games I play in that have pretty much been adopted by our other GMs as well.

1> In 3.5 no weapon sizing rules. A small sized longsword is just a normal short sword, a small greatsword is just a normal longsword, etc, etc, etc. This removes the need for weapon resizing, and stops a silly penalty players had to put up with. As an added bonus it is one fewer table I have to roll on to generate random loot. Note this buggers up a bunch of feats, which we have house ruled on a case by case basis. Usually the feat ends up doing something different depending on character design and story.

2> Any non expendable magical item which sells for more than 2000gp cannot be purchased. Any expendable magical item (potions, wands, etc) over 3000gp cannot be purchased. Any item made with a special material (mithril, darkwood, etc) cannot be purchased reguardless of price. The most important thing here is this gives me control over the overall wealth and power of the party, since due to flaws in the design system some very powerful magical items are not very expensive.

This rule radically modifies the feel of the game too, for example the players are no longer as dependant upon society to increase in power, they have to be dependant on each other. It also keeps the party honest, allowing me more wiggle room in campaign direction as the motivation for money is less likely to drive the characters away from the story line. Lastly it allows me to introduce story and excitement into the game. No longer is a +2 longsword a mere 8300gp at your local blacksmith, it is now "Tharendae, Runed Blade of the Last King of Jycup" which also happens to be a +2 longsword.

On special materials, if you want them you have to go find them. No more cheap 1100gp mithirl chain shirts, as mithirl is no longer avaliable on a regular basis. Usually if a player expresses interest in something like this I will throw a hook out and the player can earn the item or material to make have someone make it.

Crafting magical items is another sticking point on this rule, we have house ruled that non expendable magical items over 4000gp have special components that cannot be purchased in your average city. So as per above, if you want to make it, you have to bite on a hook and go find the proper materials.

3> In the Unearthed Arcana there is a varient for replacing a d20 with 3d6, and we have adopted it universally. I will not try to explain it in detail here, but basicly the effect upon game play is that it reduces the effect of rolling the dice and places more importance upon the bonus associated with the role. As a side effect it also keeps rogues/bards/barbarians and other skillful characters honest in their skill selection as hitting DCs over 20 is really hard.

That is pretty much it for major rules changes in our group, each GM has a few rules that they use personally but they are minor. Hope this is what you were looking for.

I. Character Creation
A. Concept
1. All characters need a concept. There will be no "I'll see what everyone else is making and make what's needed afterwards" crap. It inevitably ends up with someone bitching they didn't get to play what they wanted to play. If no one wants to play a healing class, for instance, healing potions and the like will be made more easily accessible.
a. Concepts should be a bit more than "I want to play a tank" or "I want to play an arcanist". Why? Because variety is the spice of life.
2. I reserve the right to deny any characters at this stage based on concept, proposed future prestige classes, etc. Sometimes, a given concept is just inappropriate for the game I'm planning on running. Sometimes the concept itself is cool, but it doesn't fit the campaign setting. Don't take it personal; it's very rarely a problem with the player.
B. History
1. History should be fairly juicy for appropriate starting level. No need for an epic poem outlining what the character ate on the fifth day of his fourteenth year, but hit on the major significant points, significant family members, and the "why" behind they got into adventuring. I may use significant family. I may not. Adventure hooks can come from a million different sources.
2. History should also account for where money and/or funds came from. Why? Because it gets the juices flowing. Where did the fighter get the money for his armor and sword? Were they heirlooms (and the money thus a figurative marker rather than literally a bag of gold), and if so do they hold special significance? Was your family fairly well to do? I'm apt to make certain skills like Diplomacy, etc, class skills for you if there's a decent reason why I should. Don't attempt to get obvious skills you class SHOULD pay cross-class rates for (a fighter with hide or move silent, for instance).
3. Some idea of what sort of personality you're going for would be handy. I know you won't have it all down usually until you get together with the group, but a broad idea would be nice. "Steal from anyone" kender-like generally-good-natured rake? Creepy, arrogant, talks-very-little wizard? That sort of thing.
C. Character Sheet Creation
1. Stat dispersal is universal. Either we all roll the same things, or we're all given the same number of points to disperse in stats. No exceptions.
2. I reserve the right to alter sheets at will during character creation. If you roll four 1's for a stat, then dropping the lowest doesn't help much. Likewise, if you happen to have all 18's, you're going to have to lower some (and give me your dice, as I want all the high rolls to myself )
3. GM copy of a sheet would be nice. If I notice any unusual discrepancies that can't be accounted for, prepare to get your ass reamed. I have zero tolerance for sheet finaglers who think I won't notice. I might not notice, but then again do you really want to risk my wrath if I do?
4. All sheets must be finalized and cleared by me before they are considered valid.

II. The Social Gaming Contract
A. Fair practices
1. I, the GM, will not go out of my way to specifically kill any player character who works well with the party. I will not go our of my way to shaft players. I will remain open to polite criticism handled at the appropriate time (IE don't interrupt things in the middle of a combat to have a hissy fit over how I handled a botched action or whatever). The predominant philosophy is that we, that is to say the players and the GM, are attempting to tell a story together. A GM who kills off the main characters left and right in his story loses momentum and the players eventually lose attachment to their characters.
a. This does not save characters from spectacularly stupid maneuvers, actions, etc. If a Great Wyrm Dragon or a High Priest or Grand Wizard shows up and you start acting like a punk, expect to be treated like a mouthy punk who's getting what's coming to him.
2. You, the Players, will not go out of your way to make my life difficult. While I am accessible, and generous, I do have limits. Don't whine or bitch excessively. Take your fellow players into account. Wait until a proper time to air grievances. Don't disrupt the gameplay by going on about off-topic subjects (conversations on the side are fine, particularly if you're not in the "on camera" scene at the moment; just don't disrupt the "on camera" stuff)
b. I don't consider creative plans to overcome the situation du jour to be "making my life difficult". Nor do I consider problems that have to be solved right then and there to be disruptive. Use your judgment and try to use common sense. If I seem off about something, try to meet me halfway but if I'm acting like an ass and everyone knows it, feel free to call me on it.
B. Fair Play
1. No one likes an attention hog. In my games, one of the boons granted to people acting appropriately in character, players who work with me and the party, etc, is additional "on camera" time, reputation bonuses, and a little leeway here and there. But try not to overdo it. The reward is on a sliding scale. Someone not good at things who really tries will be encouraged. People who try to do everything dramatically will usually end up being laughed at, or worse, ridiculed by their peers. Don't hog the camera, GM's attention, action in combat, speaking roles, etc
2. Keep in mind two things about NPC's: first, if I intend for them to be a re-occuring villain, they're probably going to get away with bending the rules (an extra casting of quickened teleport to escape, a scroll of dimension door, etc). You still get full credit for them, XP-wise and treasure-wise. You just don't get them. yet. Secondly, what's good for the goose is also good for the gander. If I allow a rules variant for the players, I will allow the same variant for the villains.
3. Don't haggle the GM. No really. You can haggle with NPC's over monetary worth of whatever you're buying or selling, but as the GM, I know how much wealth, gear, etc I want the players to have. Some vendors plain won't have the 100,000gp your pile of loot is worth. Some might have difficulty making change for 10gp. Especially in small towns. Likewise, if you carry around insane amounts of money, it (or at least some of it) might get stolen or lost. I won't be an ass about it, but there comes a time when suspension of disbelief is a little too much.
C. Fair Time
1. If you're going to be late or absent, let me know ahead of time. I can be contacted through multiple means online and via phone. Nothing is more frustrating to me than not having someone around and not knowing why.
a. If you're going to be late, try to let me know some idea of when you'll be coming in. If you're going to be twenty minutes late, I can shoot the shit til then. If it's an hour or more, I'll get started.
2. If *I'M* going to be late, I will attempt to contact everyone well ahead of time, or in the very least as soon as I'm able. Feel free to touch base with the other players if you like, especially the difficult-to-reach players or players who (in the case of tabletop games) don't live nearby.
3. Missing games hurts. First session missed you lose 10% of whatever XP was gained by the party that night. By the second week, you lose all the XP gained that night. If you flat out miss three weekly sessions, you're falling badly behind. You don't know all the story details, nor do you have the XP other people may have accrued. At this point, you get a warning and we discuss what's going on. If you aren't back by Week 4 or haven't been in contact with me to hash things out, you're out. It becomes difficult for me to explain where you are for so long on the off chance you might show up.

Those are some of my basic rules and regs concerning the basic setup of the game.

Ja'Deth Issar Ka'bael fucked around with this message on 02-02-2005 at 12:23 PM.

Common crap can be restocked anywhere for a nominal fee. It's usually something like 5 gold a spell level, for spell levels 1-4, then 10 per spell level after that. So when you're in town, getting reagents for a character who can cast tier six spells will run you 40gp (5*4 = 20 + 10 + 10). This doesn't include particularly expensive-to-cast spells which require reagents worth more than 50g, or particularly exotic reagents (if it calls for dragon's blood, you're going to pay for dragon's blood). Frankly, though, you can usually get something comparable off of critters you kill. Never leave a dragon carcass laying around.

There are certain spells I never just allow the PC's to prepare, for whatever reason. I don't care if you DO have five 9th-tier spells per day. You don't get to cast "Wish" or "Miracle" five times a day. Why? Because at best it slows things down while you work out the details of your wish, and at worst, you could potentially warp a major part of the gaming world. So reagents for things like Wish and Miracle tend to be even more rare and/or expensive than most. Sometimes, they're even a quest-only item (IE you have to quest to get one casting). No I'm not shafting players. I've long been of the opinion that things like Wish and (since 3.x) Miracle are a little too risky to just let players run around with in their spell repetoirs.

Likewise, because I don't go out of my way to kill PC's, True Resurrection is a very rare occurrence. Raise Dead, Lesser Rez, and Reincarnate are all options available. Why do I limit True Res?

Simple. If you can cast True Rez X number of times a day, then death no longer becomes a terrible thing. It's a bit like Phoenix Downs in FF7. In theory they restore you to life, right? Then why couldn't Aeris be restored? So they start saying that you're KO'd rather than dead. I'd just as soon not wantonly kill off a PC or a valuable NPC for no good reason. That way when it does happen, restoring them is an epic element. There's fifty million ways to save someone until you can finish a quest. The "Gentle Repose" spell is the big one, but there are other options, including Magic Jar to hold their soul for safekeeping.

So if I feel this way, why do I allow things like Raise Dead, Lesser Rez, etc? Because frankly, sometimes bad shit happens on the roll of the dice. Something that is wholly inconceivable kicks in and X person dies. Okay. That sucks. The reagents for restore life spells will be EXPENSIVE, but you'll only be dead until the next city.

Reincarnate is something I usually reserve for heroes who give it up. A player decides that their battered, bloody, heroic character is going to jump in front of and intercept the fireball aimed at the crowd of civilians before it can catch them, or whatever, gets killed. If there isn't enough of a corpse left, or if it can't be preserved or whatever, you can get a Reincarnate. I don't just hand these out, though. It's always a significant thing. You're essentially going to have to rebuild your character.

You said that's your basics.... what are your advanced? I'm curious and I certainly consider you one of my peers in the DM seat.

As for the 3d6 Method, Tyewa, I think I might actually look into that. The weapon resizing is nothing I've ever had a problem with, though, but I'll remember it if I ever have to worry about it.

Thanks for your responses so far, all, I appreciate it a lot!

Since I know you live nowhere near me I must ask: Do you play online? If so, next time you start a game I'm running to it so fast my shoes catch fire. (If you'll have me, of course)

Vallo fucked around with this message on 02-02-2005 at 01:20 PM.

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Vallo probably says this to all the girls:
...Deth....

Since I know you live nowhere near me I must ask: Do you play online? If so, next time you start a game I'm running to it so fast my shoes catch fire. (If you'll have me, of course)

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Good luck, I've been trying for years

Taking out the Critical Miss takes out a hilarious (and sometimes frustrating) part of D&D.

Case:

We are fighting a Demonic cookie. Everyone but two people take bites, and the last bit to be eaten starts glowing. Fighter rolls To Hit, rolls a 1 (crit miss), faceplants and breaks his nose.

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This is what Redmage Darkrayver is doing. This is what I want Redmage Darkrayver to do :

We are fighting a Demonic cookie. Everyone but two people take bites, and the last bit to be eaten starts glowing. Fighter rolls To Hit, rolls a 1 (crit miss), faceplants and breaks his nose.

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Kids, this is why Pot and D&D don't mix.

There is a table for doing critical hits with the 3d6 system.

20 = 17-18
19-20 = 15-18
18-20 = 14-18

All in all you have a smaller chance of rolling a crit with a lower threat weapon but it gets much better as the threat range increases. As for fumbles a 3 or a 4 would constitute rolling a fumble, so it is included but it is far to much to try and explain the math here. Pick up a copy of Unearthed Arcana for the full rules set.

Tyewa Dawnsister fucked around with this message on 02-02-2005 at 02:13 PM.

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Bajah was listening to Cher while typing:
Very nice, Deth. Mind if I borrow your little contract and spruce it a bit to suit my campaign? I see we handle regeants the same way, that's nice to know.

You said that's your basics.... what are your advanced? I'm curious and I certainly consider you one of my peers in the DM seat.

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Sure go ahead. A lot of GM's think it's common sense stuff, but the way I figure it, better to codify it. I've had players come from some harsh dungeon crawls where they could go through two or three different characters in a couple of weeks due to GM hostility or whatever. The rule about True Res came from a game where the GM killed off the players once a month (we played once a week) and always had some GM fiat for how we came back to life. Now that's okay if death is part of the story...I myself plan on running a Ghostwalk campaign at some point...but in 95% of campaigns it's just a mood killer. If you don't fear death, what's the point in anything?

Advanced rules...let's see...

Most of my "house rules" are geared to two things: Streamlining and GM ease. Before I tamper with any rules I ask myself "Does this needlessly convolute something?" and "Does this make more work for me?"

For instance, Doc came to me with some rules for flying. They were in fact pretty realistic. The problem was that they opened the door for needing a variety of new feats, and in the very least a brand new skill, which only applies to people and creatures who can fly, and it more or less upset the existing rules for maneuverability and so forth. It did NOT streamline things (exactly the opposite) and it would slow things down considerably for me as the GM.

Another example is in racial selection. Either everyone has a character of similar ECL or everyone uses base races. Why? Because keeping up with two or three or (in my case) five different level/XP point sheet balances was tedious.

On the other hand, an argument could be made that an unintentional absence of game puts you 10% behind everyone else and that adds math to the GM's figuring of XP. Not really. You have to miss ten sessions unannounced before you effectively lose a level. It stings enough to get the player's attention without hobbling their character, especially at low levels where 10% of a level is the difference between killing four orcs as opposed to three. Plus everyone's likely to miss a session unannounced for whatever reason.

That's also why I don't reward good RP, keeping decent notes about what's going on, etc with XP. Adds math, and frankly most of the people I've played with would like some in-game unquantifiable yet very real kudos. A reputation, or more "on-camera" time rather than 10% more XP. It also balances things out nicely; because even great players occasionally miss games unannounced, I can evade or erase the XP void.

What I did forget to mention is that players who do tell me ahead of time that they're going to miss a session don't lose the XP for that first session. At two sessions, they lose the XP from one session, as opposed to all the XP from one session and 90% from a second. Likewise, people who warn me far enough in advance don't get permanently written out. One of my players, Terry (Taeolas on the EC boards) had to go out of the country for his job for a couple of weeks. He was going to be on a significantly different time schedule (plus he was there on call to work, not there to play on his laptop at set times). He let me know about his impending absence literally months in advance, and reminded me every two weeks or so up to the event. Needless to say, Terry's character (named Taeolas) didn't suffer any penalties. Likewise, Malbi (from around here) plays in my current game and he's religious about letting me know ahead of time. The only time I haven't invited a player back for the next campaign I run was based heavily around their unreliability of schedule and the fact they were terrible about fair warnings.

But enough about game running philosophy.

I usually don't worry about the rules for weapon scaling when figuring out treasure. It's pretty easy; I just apply the two key elements I apply to any rules alterations: Streamline and GM Simplicity. I don't randomize rewards beyond a general roll on the treasure chart (if even that; usually I know exactly how much leeway with treasure I want the party to have). I figure magic weapons are a bit like magic armor; unless it's something very specific ("This armor was worn by a great dwarven general, who blah blah blah fought at the battle of blah blah blah, killed thousands of orcs, blah blah blah sorry Hamish the Half-Orc, you can't wear it.") I assume that the armor or weapon re-sizes like rings, crowns, etc. Leaves the feats intact, but doesn't interfere with loot tables. Keeps specific armors special, and more general issue stuff (+1 Studded Leather, etc) relatively normal. Generally, it's safe to bet that anything of +5 equivalent enchantment or better probably HAS to be scaled. But that's a general rule of thumb for my campaign setting.

When it comes to characters creating anything of lasting value, be it a central home or items of magical or nonmagical nature, I find the idea of XP debt to be distasteful. Necessary, and it explains in part why you don't see lots of high magic items just laying around, but it really hampers players who want to create something.

Let's face it: With their other concerns, be they financial, adventuring, romantic, etc, there's not a lot of time to spend numerous 12-hour days working on making a golem or a magic weapon or the like. Not to mention that you can't exactly haul a loom or forge along with you, much less a fully-stocked arcanist's lab. Even with liberal use of portable holes, bags of holding, etc to store gear in (and we're talking EXTREMELY liberal use if you're trying to come up with the amount of stuff you get in a lab), you're still talking time to set everything up, accomplish a small goal, then put all the stuff away while also finding time for travel, keeping up with your spells, etc.

So I usually allow players to wave the XP cost for, say, magic items if they get enough magic reagents. The way I see it, the XP cost represents an investiture of self into a magic item. It drains you to make something powerful. But in theory anyone with the proper spells can make a +3 Vorpal weapon? No. You always need reagents, right? Right. So I just let player characters do it with all reagents. Have you seen the required time for making stuff? Or the GOLD cost? Mama mia. Make the players gather the reagents. Make them tell you they're doing so. Make them tell you how they propose to contain their harvested reagents' value (IE keep them from rotting/decomposing). It's just as satisfying, when combined with the time constraints, to make them deal with that as it would be to penalize them with XP debt, but you manage to do it without adding math or extra work.

Likewise, hoarding money comes up. A lot. Keep in mind that this is a fantasy world. Not EQ. There aren't banks. Hell Earth didn't have anything comparable to what we think of as a bank until the late 1000's, early 1100's. Give the heroes something to think about. Let them build a keep and keep building more on. Not only is it a money sink, it's also a convenient story plot point. Even more fun if the heroes take over the former domicile of a former foe. All sorts of things you can do there muahahaha.

I have a lot of anti-stupidity rules. A sizeable enough blast of breath weapon, etc will make an automatic sunder check on your shield, for instance.

First, I eschewed critical threat, and basically made a critical on the appropriate critical range. But, at the same time, keen and improved critical aren't allowed to be taken.

Second, for less annoying purposes, I ruled that if you sleep in some sort of inn or a house or something relatively comfortable and proteceted, you're automatically healed to full (aka the inn effect). Now, it doesn't heal any effects that last longer than a day (ability scores and stuff that are long lasting), and in extreme cases, it might not, but 90% it does. In wilderness settings, normal rules apply.

In terms of buying, I mainly have certain magic items that are on sale in a certain place, and it requires a search (or gather information) check to go find these deals.

I'm also not a fan of ressurection, so I try to not incessantly kill my players (but the fights are still dangerous).

From that, this is more just a general thing, I try to give my players a sort of 'second chance'- that is, if they're going to die one time (and they're not being excessively stupid), then I try to fudge things behind the scenes to make sure they don't die that time.

If I can't, then, we'll see.

For character creation, I let the first couple people roll, and then the other people I tried to have their total bonuses be pretty close.

Also, for my campaign, I gave the bard pick lock/search/disable device, just because I wanted to use traps, and we had no rogue. It makes a small amount of sense, and, although techncally there are ways for our druid and cleric to find traps, they're both the new people, and any less stuff they need to do is a bit better.

But, as I said, I'm in a campaign with 3 new people, so I'm more trying to get the basics of the game working with them, and slowly build them into it.

It doesn't totally prevent deaths from occuring every now and then, but it gives some leeway to the party so we don't end up losing memebers very often.

Healing rules are kinda iffy. If you travel, you heal at the normal rate. Same if you have tents. If you spend an ENTIRE DAY of downtime (as opposed to overnight rest) you can heal all damage but critical hits, poison, disease, stat damage, etc. Critical hits represent serious damage. It either has to heal naturally or it has to have medical attention of some form. Stat damage has to be professionally healed or recovered as per normal. Poison and disease either need an antidote, play out their natural course, or be magically cured. Given that my party didn't have any hardcore healer types for a loooooooong time, this meant the party was having adventures in amateur field medicine.

So why need a healer at all? Why spend money on medical treatment if it goes away on it's own, or more to the point, you can just stitch your wounds closed? For one thing, try getting a party to be willing, on the job, to lose an entire day for rest if they can afford not to. Or it could be the other reason: stitching wounds closed degrades your appearance after a while in my game. Any shmuck with more than 1 skill point in healing (or Craft: Sewing) can stitch wounds closed. The trick is to do it in such a way that heals properly.

So the aforementioned half-orc is looking pretty vile at level 12. Even though the party has a dedicated healer now (an NPC I run; too many fun high level baddies have "status effect damage" spells or abilities), he, being the primary tank, has taken quite a pounding over time (including a Spawn-like incident where his face was stitched up with what essentially amounted to being a surgical shoelace). He doesn't mind looking hideous. In fact he counts on it, being an intimidating, horrific bastard with an axe. On the other hand, the charming cardsharp or the undercover "cop" in the party don't want all the distinguishing scars, but the hideous berserker loves them. He practically collects them.

Now I don't keep a numeric "Appearance" value (more work for the GM), but I do keep loose track of who's had more of what sort of damage stitched up. So if Alferd the Half-Orc Barbarian goes into town to a proper drinking establishment and tries to order a brew, people might (hesitantly...he is a pretty intimidating cut of figure, after all) try to get him to leave. On the other hand, he fits in just fine with his type of messy, gods-you-hope-that's-sawdust-on-the-floor establishments.

Also, he can be set on fire for even more damage. Of course, he gets hurt more, but, well, he's a bard.

My half-dragon monk died in the campaign she was in. And this was a HUGE thing because people don't die in the HS world during HS campaigns. We're the epic world heroes, and dying is just unheard of.

What made it nice was that it made for a really good session. Adam and I had kept our plans secret for it, so all the reactions were real, both IC and OOC. There were a lot of positive comments afterward and everyone said they had really had fun, even if it was a shock.

Of course, she later was returned to life through the sacrifice of another party member, but that's another story. It was also a character building addition and a convenient way for Adam to handle a character who's player had had to leave the game.

...and, to be honest, I'd like to know who you guys are playing with. I only play with my friends and whatnot, and we never get close to having to deal with absences. Do you guys DM at like...a Comic Book shop?

And, this may sound really funny, and it is to people who haven't played with me...but...I don't use XP. Yeah, I don't. I like story so much that I try and limit the numerics involved. Leveling is defined as something like, "A big event in the PC's life", so, after a HUGE fight, or the completion of a mini-arc...a level!

I also wrote up tables for a point pool for crafters, they use a certain amount of points that scales per level, and they spend those to craft things.

I also wrote up rules on different "types" of combat:
-Chases
-One on One dueling

And, even more, and this probably sounds the weirdest, I have what my players lovingly refer to as, "Movie Time" which is kinda like a trigger in a game. A lot of things trigger them, and they usually bend the rules pretty bad, since it's just describing what's going on. Kinda hard to explain.

I drag in music to set the tone, find pictures to help people get the idea, and even find cinematics from games if I need to show them (my laptop is my DM screen =p)

So...actually, when it comes down to it, we play DnD only through basic rules and setting...I guess. We've formed "House Rules" into "Catered DnD"

Slow Motion? Like... your low level players have time stop?

quote:

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Verily, Elvish Crack Piper doth proclaim:
Awarding levels is fine. It keeps the game more structured and such. The last guy I gamed with did the same thing, he'd give out XP at the end of story arcs or whatnot, and small bits in between, but the only levels were when he knew about it and wanted it to happen.

Slow Motion? Like... your low level players have time stop?

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No. They, for a bit, lost control, I take over completely. Usually just to make NPCs do something, or do something drastic in the story.

Nonetheless, the last time I ran a tabletop game, it was once a week at some friends' apartment. They were always available (the guy was the local district manager of a jewelry store and his wife was a home maker), but some of the other players were flakey about showing up. So shit can happen, even in real life.

The difference is that online it's easier to find players for your game. I swear it's like I have a backlog of players who want to play the HS games I run. I'm sure a lot of the other GM's here at EC have a similar problem. You say "I'm running an X game, and was going to ask for players" and it's like blood in the water. That's why I don't advertise my games...most of the players in my existing campaigns have come back for the next, so I tend to accumulate players. So much so that I'm splitting them into two groups of five and running the next two "chapters" of the HS saga concurrently.

First off, I run things differently from a lot of GMs, in that I don't focus much on combat. We've had three battles so far in 18 sessions. My games focus heavily on roleplay, so many of my custom rules are taylored to that end. I have house rules both for policy and for mechanics, not all of which are written down. Go here for the written portions.

Case in point: Of the seven people I had playing at the start of HSX (my current campaign), two of them were new to the RP group, and one of those two was new to D&D roleplay entirely. Of the five who had played before, one had quit HS2 early due to personal reasons (and distaste regarding the choices he'd made regarding his character), and another had been brought in to replace the one who'd quit early.

So Person 1 (Malbi, who has RPed before and who was just being introduced to the group) mostly just needed to get a feel for the group. He'd watched us play HS2 before, but needed a sense for how he'd fit in with the gang.

Person 2 (Quin, the guy who'd never done D&D RP before) was a newbie. He needed to see what was expected from roleplayers in general as well as specifically what I expect from my players and to see how he'd fit in.

Person 3 (Karl, who quit HS2 for the aforementioned reasons) needed an overall discussion because Karl is the sort who tries to do everything on his own; he builds characters to try and cover every conceivable base and tends to have something of an effete loner mentality when playing. So Karl needed some grounding if he was going to rejoin the group.

Person 4 (Ric, who entered HS2 when Karl left), mainly needed the character building experience of starting with the group from the beginning and being given the opportunity to really build a character from ground up level one, rather than be added at level 10.

So for those four of the seven, it was an extremely positive group-building experience OOC. A little time for exposition, a little time to work out some group mentality. A little time to prepare mentally for the fact that you will be working with these people, so it's easier to get a general idea for things. Will the rogue get along with the overzealous paladin? Will the fighter and mage butt heads? Will the fighter and barbarian learn to tag team enemies?