D&D 4E D&D 4E Homebrew Rules & Changes - Looking for feedback

Animakuro

Villager
Here is a list of houserules I’ve drafted up for use in my own 4E games. I’ve used some of them before successfully and think I am rather familiar with 4E, but want a second opinion of these to get an idea of what people think of them, help me clarify any text that isn’t obvious as to the what the rules mean, as well as people pointing out any consequences you could see arising from their use that I cannot.

As I’m told, you should only create and use houserules if you know WHY you want to change the original rule, as such each houserule will be accompanied with me explaining my intentions for this houserule and what problem I am trying to fix.

Rather than copy+paste the full list here and spend time formatting it correctly for this site, below is a link the word doc. for the houserules.

Link: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/x6vp7pyv5fhxxig/AABszn1JAizITSvEt38q3Y-Ja?dl=0

any feedback on any/all of the houserules would be greatly appreciated. Thanks :)
 

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darkbard

Legend
any feedback on any/all of the houserules would be greatly appreciated. Thanks :)

Well, I really just skimmed through them quickly, but they seemed pretty fair and interesting overall. One suggestion: rather than your recovery rules, why not implement the alternate Injury Deck rules from Dungoen 204 (a mechanic I've recently become a tad obsessed with) and tinker with those a little to fit your concept of the lingering results of constant battle? It doesn't meddle with the healing surge mechanic but rather imposes conditions, minor or major, based on the injury. The whole subsystem looks to be flexible enough to be tailored to many different implementations.
 

Garthanos

Arcadian Knight
This looked interesting it has been an off heard complaint that beside the first which purports to be almost obligatory .... subsequent ones rarely ever seem worth their chops.

Multi-classing and Power Swap Feats

Whenever a character takes a Multiclass feat, they also gain access to one of the new class’s At-Will Powers which they may use as an Encounter Power, functioning like the Half-Elves Dilettante (See Half-Elf in Race/Class Alterations) in addition to all the usual benefits from the feat. The Power Swap feats Novice Power, Acolyte Power and Adept Power now simply give the character another power when chosen, which they can take from any source they have access to. This means a character who hasn’t multiclassed can simply gain another power from his or her class or a skill power, whereas multiclassed characters can also choose a power from their secondary class.
 

Animakuro

Villager
@darkbard; I wasn't aware something already existed for injuries, I'll be sure to look that up. Still, I'm fairly proud of the rules I've created and would like to try them out in action, so I'll likely give both a shot before deciding which it is I prefer.
EDIT: Just looked it up now and whilst I still think I prefer the delivery of injuries I created in my system, I'll more than likely borrow many of the actual injury effects from that article.
@Garthanos; I've never actually seen Multi-Classing play yet - primarily because my players have always said its very restrictive and carries a lot of investment in feats for little reward - so I'll admit I'm not 100% familar with what is actually optimal for multi-classing, but have felt that it is rather sub-optimal as a whole.
 
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darkbard

Legend
I've never actually seen Multi-Classing play yet - primarily because my players have always said its very restrictive and carries a lot of investment in feats for little reward - so I'll admit I'm not 100% familar with what is actually optimal for multi-classing, but have felt that it is rather sub-optimal as a whole.

I will note that MCing is generally regarded by the character optimization community to not only be highly optimized but also generally required for any character to truly be optimized. That's how mistaken I believe your players to be. Mind you, MCing need not go beyond the initial entry feat (which usually comes with skill training, an additional power, access to implements, etc.) to be quite powerful in its own right. When you add in the ability to qualify for additional feats, powerswap for some of the strongest powers in the game (Flame Spiral, Rain of Blows, Quicksilver Motion, and on and on), qualify for the stongest Paragon Paths in the game, well....
 

Yeah, MCing in the sense of taking the full suite of power swaps and PMCing is generally not a very optimum choice, but cherry-picking a good MC feat and then possibly swapping in one or two really solid powers (I mean really, a GOLD power choice is often well worth a feat) does usually make sense. Of course many players can't be bothered or simply don't find room in their character concept, so its not like its a big deal. I don't recall it happening much in my games either, though the players did start to catch on to the awesomeness of base MC feats eventually.
 

MwaO

Adventurer
I will note that MCing is generally regarded by the character optimization community to not only be highly optimized but also generally required for any character to truly be optimized. That's how mistaken I believe your players to be.

Yeah...MC'ing is as strong as your power selection fu is. Look at the following hypothetical Fighter 4:
1: Light Blade Expertise
2: Resourceful Leader
4: Novice Power: Vengeance is Mine

Pick Rain of Blows as your E3, have a 15 Dex. Go up to someone and smack them. If they attack you back and hit, you get to do an MBA and summon up a teammate to bash them. That's 5 attacks without needing an AP at 4th level...
 

Animakuro

Villager
Alright. Based on these comments, I think it's fair to say that the people I've played with have never been super into optimization and my understanding of charop is limited.

The MC rule change seems to be gathering the most discussion. If MCing is something that is already fairly powerful in terms of CharOP, would these changes push it towards being far more centralizing and mandatory?

To clarify, I'm fine with the party being very powerful (I feel that overall, with these changes and me generally lowering monster HP so fights go quicker, I've skewed things in the players favour) as I'm confident I can create challenges to match the general party strength. What I don't want is to force every character into a certain option to be viable or create a massive divide in character stength, so that those who don't optimize stop contributing meaningfully.
so, would MCing now become something ever character HAS to do to be viable? Would this create an larger gap between those who optimize and those who don't?
 

Jhaelen

First Post
First off: I'm aware, this may sound more critical than is warranted, especially since it's your game, and many of your changes are more a matter of taste than 'balance'.
Still, while you're saying you're rather familiar with 4e and already tested some of these rules, I'm wondering if you first tried playing 4e as is, i.e. without any houserules first?

With that in mind, here's my comments:

Achievements: I don't really care for these; they feel too video-gamey for my taste, but I can see how some players may enjoy that kind of thing, so that's fine, I guess.

Critical Successes and Failures: I'm a big opponent of having a flat 5% chance for critical failures. It's way too high. Have you considered that Controllers and characters with AE powers will be suffering from critical failures a lot more often than other classes? Having said that, I like your approach better than most.

Saving Throws: Are you sure you want to play 4e? (Just kidding! [mostly]) Turning saving throws into a defence was a change I welcomed very much. When we started playing Pathfinder last weekend, I was painfully reminded how much I dislike doing them the old way. But that's just a personal preference, I guess.
However, I'm going to predict something: It won't take long until you drop the rule about all those additional saving throws. You're turning D&D into Yahtzee!
Have you already played 4e? There's already plenty of dice-rolling as it is. In Paragon Tier, it isn't unusual to roll four or five saving throws every single turn!

Technology: *yuck!* Entirely a question of preferences, though.

Power Swap Feats: Bad idea, as others have already pointed out.

Leveling: Well, in my 4e campaign, I got rid of XP, entirely - at least from the players' viewpoint: I still use them to calculate encounter difficulty, but the PCs level up when they reach a story milestone. It doesn't matter how many xp they'd have gained using the official system. The obvious advantage is that they're totally free in deciding how to approach problems: If they manage to reach their goals without engaging in a single fight: more power to them.
Personally, I enjoy leveling up often, but I think leveling up once per 1-2 sessions is too fast: It takes some time to test your new powers, figure out if they work for you and get used to them. You simply cannot do this in as little as one session. You'll end up with players that don't know how to play their characters effectively, because the characters are continously changing and evolving. They'll spend more time reading their powers than playing.

Class Alterations: I don't see any problems here.

Injury Rules: Again you seem to dislike a concept that is central to 4e. Having said that, in our group we've experimented with this, as well, e.g.: We enjoy overland travel/exploration themes, so we ruled that while on the road, character do not recover the full amount of healing surges. So, 'random encounters' are a thing to be feared again. We've also used the concept of 'waves' of encounters at some points: Basically, it's an extended combat encounter without any opportunity for a short rest in-between. All the characters get to recover between the 'wave' encounters is a single encounter power.
Anyway, back to your idea about injuries: I'm not sure if I understood your idea correctly: So, anytime a character takes damage larger than their bloodied value, they'll have to make a death saving throw, and if they fail, it reduced the number of death saving throws they may fail before dying? Is that it?
First, I'd like to note that this is only ever going to happen when you use 'Lurker' monsters. No other monster role could potentially deal sufficient damage. Second, you should be aware of the effect it will have on your players: I'm almost sure they'll do whatever they can to avoid having to continue adventuring if they have any kind of injuries. If this is exactly what you have in mind, then go for it.
It does seem to be a bit at odds with your desired leveling speed, though, unless in actuality, it's going to be handwaved: "Three days pass, you're all fine again." Otherwise, it may result in sessions with little progress being made.

To reiterate: It's your game, of course. I'm just trying to put myself in the shoes of one of your players, and how I'd react to these house-rules.
 

MwaO

Adventurer
The MC rule change seems to be gathering the most discussion. If MCing is something that is already fairly powerful in terms of CharOP, would these changes push it towards being far more centralizing and mandatory?

http://www.enworld.org/forum/showth...st-of-good-powers-to-poach-from-other-classes

http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?468787-Three-Step-Role-Handbook(by-MwaO)

Those two links ought to show some of the issues. There are a lot of choices that are already worth a feat in and of themselves(Dark Blue/Sky Blue)...the Dark Blue is questionable if it costs a feat, but if it were free?
 

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