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Old Jul 14th, 2018, 11:54 AM
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House Rules: Any edition

What are some things that you would say are nearly universal house rules in the games you play?

I am thinking those rules that you might not even realize ARE house rules, but almost everyone, in every game, defaults to them.

For instance, in DnD 3.5, I've never come across a game where Monks weren't house-ruled to be proficient in unarmed strikes. By the actual rules as written, they are not proficient with their own signature weapon/attack, but every GM I have ever played with waves that away, and gives them proficiency.

I am looking for similar things in any edition of DnD you play, or, in any popular game.
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Old Jul 14th, 2018, 12:10 PM
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Perhaps this one is almost universal as well?

in 3.5, multiclassing may give you penalties (in EXP) if you don't keep your classes roughly level. Does anyone actually enforce those rules, or is that another almost universal house rule, that they are not?
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Old Jul 14th, 2018, 12:16 PM
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In every version of D&D that has "death from massive damage", I house rule that directly out the door. It makes high level play ridiculously dumb, and causes even mid-level games to unnecessarily value rocket-tag builds. Does anyone not?

Likewise, with the strength of 3.5 arguably being the way that you can combine classes and prestige classes to make highly customized characters, the multiclass XP penalty rules seem out of place. I haven't been in a game that used them since very early in 3.0.

Speaking of XP, I don't know anyone who has ever run 3.5 with the "experience is like a river" mechanism... where the experience awards are determined based on character level on a per-character basis (so a 5th level character in a party of otherwise-6th level characters gets more experience at each XP award). It's the source of several 3.5 exploits, and it's just so, so much bookkeeping anyway. I don't think most people even realize the DMG says it works that way in the first place.

Less universally, I do a lot of rules cleanup for 3.5 games (yes, including that monk thing). Arguably the most mechanically substantive house rule I employ is:
Quote:
Worn items with charges (including items that have charges which refresh daily) must be worn for 24 hours to attune them in order to access the charges. The item then remains attuned to you until either: 1) someone else equips the item, or 2) you equip a different item in that slot. This does not apply to held items (such as wands and scrolls), nor to slotless items.
This is, effectively, to prevent characters carrying big stacks of things like anklet of translocation and, later, belt of battle and hot-swapping them as they burn through charges.
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Old Sep 9th, 2018, 03:30 AM
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These are for 3.5, as that's the system I've run with the most unintuitive things so far.

1: Diplomacy does not work as written. Ever. Usually social aspects in games I run end up resembling the 4th edition skill challenge system substituting in opposing rolls for fixed DCs.

2: Drowning does not save you from dying.

3: Free actions actually take time, but essentially aren't registered action economy. May just be the groups I play with, but everyone assumes things like you better actually be doing things while orating every aspect of that great strategy.
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Old Dec 11th, 2018, 05:05 PM
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Has anyone ever used the popcorn initiative tracker?

The idea is that you hand around a bag of popcorn or something similar to whoever's you want to take the next turn in initiative.
Of course no one goes more than once a round, but otherwise it's pretty freeform.

I'm imagining the shenanigans you can do if you delay your action in order to steal the popcorn for your own team
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Old Dec 11th, 2018, 08:27 PM
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@loganic- What happens if the DM provides the popcorn and always keeps the bags between combats? Does the DM then go first every battle?

@Auron - I've seen various DMs on here invoke a Diplomacy fix from elsewhere on the web. I want to say it was called the Rich Burlew method. Something like that.

@Qaylar - when the group I was in played 3.5, by the time we were facing enemies that regularly did 50+ with attacks, our saving throw modifiers were magicked up enough to where the save wasn't a problem.

@dirkoth - don't think I have seen that xp rule used ever.
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Old Dec 13th, 2018, 06:04 PM
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@zevonian That could totally be a possibility. Then you would have to bring your own popcorn
I reread the rules as written, and initiative is still rolled, and highest gets the popcorn first. Then it goes from there.
Apparently neither waiting nor readying an action allows you to 'steal' the popcorn. That seems moderately less interesting

Last edited by loganic; Dec 13th, 2018 at 06:04 PM.
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Old Dec 14th, 2018, 12:55 PM
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Moved to House Rules

Common House Rules
  • No multiclass penalty.
  • No distance penalty for Perception checks (actually this is usually just forgotten)
  • Crit Tables
  • Called Shots
  • Fuzzy Alignments
  • Ranged attack may hit allies in melee
  • Common/Tax feats free. Common=ones almost everyone takes anyway. Tax=near useless feat take to get later feats.

Initiative Houserules
  • NPCs initiative in groups
  • PCs go first
  • Fastest goes first, then he chooses the next to go until everyone has gone for the round. Then the last to go for the round chooses the first in the next round. This includes NPCs where the GM chooses the next.
  • Alternating between PC and NPC

-me
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