Controversial House Rules (my new game!)

Oh, yeah baby - this is it. My new campaign begins in 2 weeks, and I am so psyched. My players are psyched too, but since I'm running a pretty unconventional game, I thought ye houserulers might be interested in the house rules:

GM Can't Introduce New House Rules
Players Roll All the Dice
Average/Static Damage
Reserve Points (from UA)
No Alignment

And the ones that you probably don't know just from the description above:
Getting Started
Problem Solving XP
"Epic" progression after 6th level
Conviction

Getting Started

PCs will created as a roundtable with the GM and the other players present. Stats will be 32 point buy, or 25 point buy for Level Adjustment +1 races. Initial PCs are created at level 2. If the rest of the party is all level 4 and above, new PCs are created at level 3. If the party is all level 6, new PCs will be created at level 4. All 3.5 LA+0 and LA+1 races and base classes are available (including ones from the Complete books, the Miniatures Handbook, and the PHB II), but Prestige classes must be cleared with the GM on a case-by-case basis.

Characters should be created with everyone's fun in mind (both mechanically and personality-wise). The GM is free to let players mix and match concepts to get the character they're looking to play (for example, letting a player use the goblin racial rules for a halfling character).

At the beginning of each session, the GM and players will chat about how the characters are connected to the world and each other, and suggest ideas for the off-camera life of the PCs. Players will create a tight party together, including a backstory that connects the PCs and explains why they are on the adventure together. Party contacts, including possible alternates and nemeses, and a few favourite PC haunts will be made or fleshed out at this time.

The GM will come prepared with ideas to help grease the wheels for all involved, and players can suggest things they'd like to see in the world (pulling out a rulebook, pointing at something, and saying "that!" is a totally valid suggestion). The goal is to have the characters start play hooked into the world, story, and party, so when the dice hit the table, the game takes off.

Experience and Advancement

The amount of experience required to hit each level is doubled, and standard advancement is capped at 6th level. Once characters have reached level 6, they continue to gain experience as normal for 6th level characters, and they can use this experience to buy feats for 5000 experience each. At the start of each session, players create a list of problems the party is trying to solve. The GM assigns CRs to these problems. When any problem is solved, the player characters get experience points as per a defeated monster of the same CR. The players can add to the list at any time, although the GM is always the one who assigns a CR.

Problems on the list aren't restricted to external problems in the world - they could include "we haven't seen the view from the top of Mount Awesome", or even party-internal roleplaying, like "we need to get that warlock out of his shell." The GM may give a problem a CR of 0 if the problem is extremely trivial, but even recurring, simple problems like "Thranish is probably hungry" can be used to gain experience if fun is had when resolving them.

All experience is always shared among the entire party (i.e., 1 PC per player present at the table) even if some PCs aren't involved in the scene.

Conviction & Death

The highest-level PCs at the table get 6 Conviction, and for each level lower than the highest that you are, you get an extra point of Conviction. This pool is restored whenever the party has a night of complete rest (this effect cannot be magically reproduced). Conviction is spent as follows:

Code:
Roll an extra d20* (before the roll) 1
Roll an extra d20* (after the roll) 2
Take an extra move-equivalent action** 1
Take an extra standard action** 2
Gain an extra use of an X/day ability 2
Show up in a scene 1
* When you roll extra d20s, you take the highest roll.
** Once per round.

PCs have a death flag that they can raise in order to get 4 extra Conviction. This flag can be lowered by spending 4 Conviction. While a player-character's death flag is raised, they can suffer death as per the standard rules. While the flag is lowered, the player character can still be captured, imprisoned, fall off a cliff into a river and left for dead - but will not actually die. NPCs with names use the normal rules for death, but NPCs without names die at 0 hit points.

This should go in house rules, I think. . .

Shifting it over. .

Thanks, as soon as I posted it I realized my mistake.

Hey there, I like the experience rules, and the wacky 6th level epic thing. I use a 1/2 experience thing myself *and i still think thats too much!*

That death flag idea is really neato, the conviction looks a little buff to me. But it should make for some interesting play *being un-affraid of death may prompt some uber-heroic acts*.

I really like your problem solving system, goals to be set and if accomplished earn you experience. It should definetly promote roleplay! which is always a good thing. Interesting, are you going to do minor penalties if they cant resolve a problem? cause it seems to me they could just make 100 problems and try to solve as many as possible to gain bonus xp. It would be neat if there was some sort of penalty.

All in all sounds fun and very interesting

One question: If you allow +1 LA races and are starting at 2nd level, why not simply start +1 LA characters at 1st instead of penalizing their stats?

bestone said:

That death flag idea is really neato, the conviction looks a little buff to me. But it should make for some interesting play *being un-affraid of death may prompt some uber-heroic acts*.

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I think heroics are definitely encouraged by the death flag, but not because they're immune to death. Imagine this: One player decides to raise the death flag to gain extra conviction, but is in danger from low hit points. Next another two players raise their death flag and go all-out to try to save him.

bestone said:

I really like your problem solving system, goals to be set and if accomplished earn you experience. It should definetly promote roleplay! which is always a good thing. Interesting, are you going to do minor penalties if they cant resolve a problem? cause it seems to me they could just make 100 problems and try to solve as many as possible to gain bonus xp. It would be neat if there was some sort of penalty.

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If the players make 100 problems and go around solving them, that's just great in my books! Think of it like this: If the players are interested enough in something that they are chasing it constantly, then they're having fun. Also, while they're say, rebuilding some elderly widow's dilapidated barn, it's a great time for me to introduce the pack of ogres that have been terrorizing the area! As for a penalty, staring down at the unsolveable problem, and the XP they've missed, is penalty enough. Kind of like being forced to retreat from a gold-laden monster that you know you'll never see again.

Tequila Sunrise said:

One question: If you allow +1 LA races and are starting at 2nd level, why not simply start +1 LA characters at 1st instead of penalizing their stats?

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Since the xp is capped at 6th level, LA+1 characters are capped at 5th, which is teh suck by comparison. I started a thread in D&D rules about this, and 30 posts and a LOT of great suggestions later this was the clearest option.

Wow... I guess capping at 6th level, not rolling damage, and so on weren't as controversial as I thought.

rycanada said:

Wow... I guess capping at 6th level, not rolling damage, and so on weren't as controversial as I thought.

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Well they might be but you kinda already said that's what your players want.

Personally I prefer to simply let players retire at whatever point the campaign seems to have peaked which is usually just past 10th or so.

One rule I disagree with is:

GM Can't Introduce New House Rules

It's nice to have a contract of sorts with the players but it seems that if you are going to add a lot of house rules like this you have to be ready to patch them if they don't work and ultimately the DM is the one with the objectivity/perspective to do that. I just started a campaign with a fair number of house rules and I told players what things I knew would almost certainly stay the same and which I felt might need to be tweaked as we played.

Part of the decision was just the fact that, had I not just gone with that, I may never have gotten done writing all the required house rules. At some point I just had to say, "alright, let's play". But that's MY problem, I'm a perfectionist that way.

I guess I just believe that ultimately, the flaws and the clarifications needed for any sufficiently complex set of rules are things that can only be fixed after you've played with them for a while.

Are you replacing alignments with anything or just getting rid of them? I use an "allegiance" system. Players have to declare allegiance to at least three things: a goal, a person and an organization. They can do multiples if they want. These give some small guidelines to roleplay and they can also be used in placements where alignment would normally be used. For example a +1 sword that is +3 if wielded by someone with allegiance to a certain God or Organization or a shield that provides an additional bonus if you are protecting something or someone to which you have an allegiance. This makes allegiances something you want to have and can be counterbalanced with obligations that go along with each allegiance.

I find the experience and level cap bit particularly interesting - I was thinking of doing something similar myself. I would lean more towards 10th or 13th with either less XP awarded or something similar to your doubling each level.

Is it a hard cap at 6th level? As in - is there any way for them to purchase other facets of their character which typically advance upon level-up (BAB, Saves, skills, Etc) or is it just feats?