D&D 5E What are your favorite/non-favorite house rules?

[Legatus Legionis]

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[Jd Smith1]

Would that be considered a favorite house rule - No random treasure generating?

I don't know; I've never used them, going all the way back to 1979. Since I don't make my players aware of my habits when building or modifying scenarios, I doubt any are aware of it.

I don't use random encounter tables much, if ever, and my layers certainly don't know that.

 

[billd91]

Would that be considered a favorite house rule - No random treasure generating?

I don't think that would count as a house rule since all editions have assumed the DM can exert editorial control over things like treasure content. The random tables are a useful tool, never a straight-jacket.

 

[billd91]

One of my favorite house rules has been rolling twice for hit points and taking the better roll. It still leads to a random distribution but skews the expected value a bit higher.

Least favorite - just about anything that overly complicates a game element or hoses its playability based on a DM's specialized knowledge. Example: the netbook of Non-weapon proficiencies obviously included contributions by someone who knew something about medieval heraldry but little about playability because it included a set of heraldry proficiencies that a charactier had to have to be able to identify and make heraldric devices. I think. all told, upwards of 5-6 proficiences may have been involved - clearly bogging down a system meant to be a lot lighter. because they couldn't handle abstracting away the minutiae they knew for playability's sake.
A similar thing happened in a game I played in - the bard had been adjusted so that he had to not just spend a standard action to start singing to inspire courage, it took a standard action (not a free action) to maintain. This was based on his background and skill as a singer and knowing how difficult it was to do even though it really screwed the playability of the bard.

 

[clearstream]

As a counter-counterpoint, great mechanics generate great narrative!

That's not a counter-counterpoint: it's the same point! Don't let narrative get in the way of great mechanics, which will then deliver great narrative. Consider for example the core mechanic - instead of always dictating what happens, roll a die to see instead...

To get further into it would take a very complex discussion, with many definitional difficulties.

 

[Monayuris]

Favorit house rule in my game:

Over / Under Initiative rolled every round in place of cyclical initiative.

It works like this:
1. Everyone rolls initiative, I roll one initiative for the monsters.
2. Everyone who rolls equal to or better than the mosnter, acts (in any order they like).
3. Monsters act.
4. Everyone who rolls less than the monster acts (in any order they like).

I have found that combat runs faster and has much more tension this way.

Least Favorite house rule:

I tried out having players roll all their hit dice on each level and if it is lower than their current they get +1 hit point. The intention was that the hit point total would trend towards the average and even out a series of poor rolls / high rolls. Ended up being too much trouble and too confusing for newer players.

 

[billd91]

Over / Under Initiative rolled every round in place of cyclical initiative.

It works like this:
1. Everyone rolls initiative, I roll one initiative for the monsters.
2. Everyone who rolls equal to or better than the mosnter, acts (in any order they like).
3. Monsters act.
4. Everyone who rolls less than the monster acts (in any order they like).

I have found that combat runs faster and has much more tension this way.

I did this with the play-by-post games I've run on messageboards, but I haven't tried it at the tabletop. It seems virtually necessary for PbP just to manage combat with any efficiency, a need I haven't experienced yet around a tabletop. That said, I've played other games in which an individual player doesn't roll their space in the intiative order (like the Fantasy Flight Star Wars games) and I do like the process.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Hahaaha. Really? They didn't compare notes at all? What are the odds of that wow

Probably waaaaaaaay higher in 1994 when Jurassic Park was still a massive thing.

Personally, favourite house rule is, yes, alternate ways of doing Inspiration. Boring I know!

Least favourite, for me is, again yes, crit fumbles tables. Players always think they will be fun but tables/rules ensure they turn a serious or slightly silly game into outright slapstick, usually at the worst possible moment.

 

[Nebulous]

My least-favorite house rule: anything that makes Advantage even more common.

I hate that optional flanking rule in the DMG that gives you advantage. It is lazy and unbalanced, especially toward PCs who will normally be the ones swamped by smaller, more numerous foes. I changed it to +1 damage if you hit, my own houserule. It's not enough to be too much, but enough to make you think twice about getting flanked, and enough to position yourself for bonus damage.

EDIT - And I would raise the flanking bonus at higher levels to +2 and +3 so it scales.

 

[Benjamin Olson]

We max the first set of dice, then roll the weapon dice again on top. This has worked well for us. ONCE someone rolled a double 20, and we maximized everything, no dice rolled.

I think your basic crit rule was just RAW for 4th edition. I always used it because I came to the game via watching Acq. Inc. and that's what they did. It's never seemed unbalanced and matches the spirit of a critical hit best.

And since a double 20 is a one in 400 occurrence and only that from among times when you roll double dice I think the sky can more or less be the limit.