Some D&D 5th Edition House-rules

General

  • A larger number of sources of advantage or disadvantage beats a lesser number of sources of the opposite kind. That is, each source of either advantage or disadvantage can negate one source of the other, instead of all sources. For example, gaining advantage from 2 sources can not only negate 1 source of disadvantage, but you then still gain advantage on top of that. Not only does this raise the skill ceiling of combat, but it addresses the problem of more than one source of advantage being useless, despite it being easy to get from multiple sources. The ease with which players can gain advantage from class features etc also discourages them from trying to find it by fictionally positioning their characters in an advantageous position. Note that this doesn't mean you can get "double advantage" or anything like that! You either have advantage, disadvantage, or neither.


Combat
  • If you reach 0 HP and are downed, you gain a level of exhaustion. This prevents “heal-scumming” - being healed for much smaller amounts than the amount of damage you take (since all damage below 0 HP is ignored), allowing characters to bounce up and down from 0 HP to no detriment. It also helps with roleplaying your character after being knocked unconscious!
  • In addition to the current requirements (breaking line of sight and performing the Hide Action), you are only considered to be an “unseen attacker” if you attack from a different square than where your target last saw you (or otherwise knew your location to be).
  • Donning a shield still requires an Action, but doffing a shield can be done using the free use of an object allowed by the rules, similar to drawing or dropping a weapon. This provides a little bit more flexibility in combat.
  • Drinking a potion during your turn can be done using the free use of an object allowed by the rules, and in general is considered to be a “Use an Object” Action. This addresses the problem of how drinking a potion is rarely ever worth sacrificing an Action for, given how much else can be achieved with that Action (such as several weapon attacks). Note: this rule assumes that the rarity/price of potions is a meaningful cost in itself. Use this rule if your players don't use their potions much, but not if they start using healing potions every round with an infinite supply of them. Requiring a Bonus Action might be a better rule, though this might have unintended consequences on players' Bonus Action economy and would need playtesting.


Character Creation and Classes

  • Non-human races may subtract 3 of the ability score points they gain from their race and gain a Feat. This addresses the problem of humans being the only viable choice for experienced players, or for players who want a more specialized character.
  • Intelligence is a bit of a weak ability in 5e. A possible buff is to rule that each positive modifier to Intelligence provides the character with an extra known language.
  • Barbarians that take the Berserker Path gain the following benefit: You can remove one level of exhaustion after a short rest, instead of a long rest. This assumes the use of the long rest rule described in the Adventuring Section (below). This simple adjustment gives the Path a much-needed buff, especially considering how easy it becomes to gain a Bonus Action attack from other sources after a few levels. In practice, when combined with the 0 HP rule described in the Combat Section, we found that this change made the Berserker character start fearing death less than the other characters - an unexpected flavour bonus!
  • To fix Rangers, I recommend... yeah I've got nothing here. They need a complete overhaul, and WotC's first attempt at this wasn't very satisfactory.


 Adventuring

  • You do not regain HP after a long rest, but instead regain all your spent Hit Dice. In addition, dinner and breakfast are considered to be short rests, bookending either side of a long rest. In-world, this supports the idea that wounds are only really healed by replacing bandages, applying ointment, eating and drinking, etc., represented by spending Hit Dice. Sleeping allows you to regain your energy, represented by regaining Hit Dice. This addresses the awkward situation of the characters being ambushed in the night, and the players asking whether they regain half their HP before or after the fight. It also makes health a slightly more valuable resource, since it's a little bit harder to heal, but nowhere near as punishing as the Variant Rules for healing in the DMG.
  • PC's can buy a new item in town: "Adventuring Gear". This item functions similarly to Dungeon World's item of the same name. It costs 30 gp, weighs 20 lb., and has 5 charges. Spending a charge allows the PC to pull out any mundane item that they need. Examples of mundane items include: shovel; crowbar; grappling hook; torch, caltrops; oil flask; steel mirror.
  • The DC's provided for the poisons in the DMG are each increased by 1. This makes them slightly more reliable to use, given how large of a gold-sink they are.
  • When holding your breath, the same rules used to concentrate on a spell are used to concentrate on holding your breath. For example, taking damage requires a Constitution Saving Throw. You may still concentrate on a spell that requires concentration while holding your breath. This helps make fighting underwater a bit more risky, like you would expect it to be. It helps distinguish between swimming around peacefully, and being in a violent conflict underwater; something the default rules don't do.

Comments

  1. A lot of these ideas are similar to ones I came up with (I'm the DM for our group). Lot of the same tweaks and changes to make things clearer, fairer, and most importantly - more fun.

    Good list!

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  2. Good list overall! Though my implementations are different i have houseruled many of the same things as you in similar directions. We have been playing with Advantage/Disadvantage the same way as your houserule, thinking that was the original rules. It has now been added to my own official houserule compendium! :P

    My compendium is in Swedish but i made a translation of a few of parts of my homebrew rules for a reddit post earlier. Feel free to take a look!

    https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B3mp_LunawBnblJBb1BSVFpPRTA/view

    /u/TheBigBadPanda

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    1. Nice stuff! Potions and healing spells removing a level of Exhaustion sounds overly strong, but I like your interaction between Death Saves and Exhaustion. Death is usually much more boring than having the characters suffer haha.

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  3. My Ranger fixes:

    Spells known and prepared like a Paladin (know whole list, prepared .5*lvl + WIS mod).

    Primeval Awareness doesn't cost spells slots, and instead can be used like Divine Sense (1+WIS mod).

    Hide in Plain Sight still requires 1 min prep time, but it stays "active" until you leave that environment or otherwise have it washed/burned/blown off/etc. This allows the Ranger to disengage and reengage combat more easily (most times, this means attacks from stealth every third round, depending on circumstances.)

    I also added some logical spells (like a frost arrow spell) and created a feat that adds two additional favored enemies and related languages.

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    Replies
    1. Those sound pretty solid! Primeval Awareness not being attached to spell slots makes a lot of sense.
      One change we tried was to just give the Ranger one extra favored terrain and favored enemy. Just something simple to let their class feature occur a bit more often.

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  4. My group also came up with the idea to give one (stacking) level of exhaustion after being downed by dropping to 0 HP. We toyed with some sort of lingering wound chart, but decided our faster paced, cinematic playstyle preferred a simpler approach, while still wishing to avoid "heal-scumming", as you term it.

    We also use the concentration mechanic for holding one's breath. With the exception if you lose your breath by failing the Con save, you drop to the secondary rounds remaining portion of the RAW rules. Also, if you are suddenly in a position where holding one's breath is important (falling in water, enveloped in a cloud of gas, being strangled), we allow a Dexterity check (not a save) to take a breath before the effect occurs; unless the game mechanic for the effect states otherwise to some effect.

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  5. These look fine except the feat change imo. I think our group will use these.

    But 3 stat points for a feat is nothing. It's pretty OP imo. It means you'd be able to get higher main stats than a v.human, your dump stats might be a bit lower, you'd have the overall same modifiers as you would without the 3 points negative, and you'd get all the bonuses of another race. It seems like a massive buff to all other races and in comparison that means a huge nerf to the v.human.

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    Replies
    1. I understood it to be "you lose three of the racial ability adjustment points for picking that race". Not that you still get to be a +2 DEX elf; instead you get to be a "DEX 15 max" elf, with a feat.

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    2. @rmroen yes, you're right, that was the intent.

      And in case you're interested, I've actually developed some of these ideas further in a new document! Here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1qp2IC_nsS6HBCS8B2_Wmq1X7JH60_Txr/view?usp=sharing

      Delete
    3. Wow you monitored a 4-year-necro'd thread, and responded in less than an hour, and gave me a link to a document updated just yesterday! Rock on Casesarr! I'll happily read and yoink your rules!

      Delete
    4. Haha, well I was definitely surprised to get the email notification, but also pleased that people were still finding my stuff useful :D
      Enjoy!

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  6. These are excellent. Many of them I tacitly already use. I think I need to change my own house rule document to reflect the ideas presented here.

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  7. I've adopted almost all your rules into my (much larger) set of houserules. You might be curious to look at the others I use: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1umhNgV-3pOoXtbXXIQl5Xwe9p3ORXynLXOcoFKbNz-Y/edit?usp=sharing

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    Replies
    1. Wow, that's a really solid document! I appreciate the references back to my post, thanks :)

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