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In some cases maybe, but I'm actually playing a character who I would definitely not clasify as a first-strike combat monkey. I've been playing him for three years now, and it'd certainly hurt him if he couldn't make a sneak-attack against a flat-footed foe, since that's pretty much the only way...

Psionics are one good way to go. I like me my psionics. Then again, I also would like to see the Iron Heroes system cleaned up with spell tokens and feat masteries for different sorts of spells... partially skill-based, partially feat-based, and with something along the lines of Arcana...

I agree that in principle, making judgement calls is fine. I also don't think the solution is to simply shovel more rules into the game. I do think, however, that the ideal system should minimize the amout of judgement calls a GM has to make, because for every GM making great, consistent calls...

Actually, no. It's an example of a house rule being introduced as part of a bad GMing call, and this sort of thing is encouraged when you tell the GM to make such calls. The more guidance you give GMs in how and when to make such calls, the fewer of these you'll see, even from bad GMs. If the...

No problem whatsoever with house rules, so long as everyone's on the same page. The aforementioned natural 1s and natural 20s, for instance, are a perfect example. I don't care if the DM provides me with a nice, typed document explaining all the house rules he'll use (though it's a great show of...

I'm well aware. I'm suggesting that making them NOT free could go a long way towards balancing legacy items without chopping a character's base attack bonus, hit points, skills, saves, etc.

A thought: Weapons of legacy automatically grant your character the feats needed to gain access to higher-level abilities of the items. What if you actually needed to take those three feats rather than have them granted to you automatically? How much would three feats "cost" a player?

I'm running such a game now. Psionics is the major casting force in the game, with warlocks being secondary "witches" living outside the mainstream casting method of "the scientific study of psiocalculus". The major differences I've noticed both in developing the game and running it have been...

Complete Psionic- Anything psionic makes me happy, and this is long overdue Magic of Eberron (maybe)- I like Eberron, but I'm more interested in the races than more spells Magic Icarnum (maybe)- Seems like an interesting idea, and another alternative to magic items Mastering Iron Heroes- Advice...

Well, I'll point out that the absolute first thing I posted was a counterpoint to your idea that players don't do anything for a game with an example from my own experience. That said, I do appologize for suggesting that you were only running the game for your own enjoyment. I was projecting my...

I've known players like this. I've also known players in the first 3E campaign I ever read who actually pulled out my handouts while hanging playing Madden and would spend quite awhile pouring over them, trying to figure out how everything fit together. One of my players once called me on my...

The problem is not that there is a misunderstanding that things are optional, but a misunderstanding that players and DMs can and should work together on creating characters which fit the game and the player's tastes. I've never seen a player say that he'll take PrC X... it's always that he'll...

It's not about power. Power has always been and will always be entirely arbitrary, and is not something a ruleset should look at. Groups will find the balance of power they like between the DM and the players and they'll stick to it, regardless of what's written in the rulebooks. What is the...

I discourage it in most cases but allow it when it makes sense and when it won't lead to undue hostility between players. If two characters have a definite reason in-game to want to come to blows like that and possibly try to kill one another, then they should go for it. Plus, if it reaches...

I voted "allow". I tell my players that they can use pretty much any WotC resource they want (in addition to some 3rd Party stuff I'm a big fan of), but I reserve the right to modify the flavor of selections and to work with the player in question to allow the player to have the character he...

The angle I'm approaching it from is using the Spirit Shaman abilities from Complete Divine as a base, so at level 11 you get a once per week raise dead and the ability to bar our possession at level 13. I've always liked the spirit shaman class for flavor, so I figured now would be a good time...

Here's my thoughts on an initial divine warlock's list of spells. This version is more of a shaman/spiritualist than a priest, so I focused on that aspect for the flavor of the spells and abilities. At the moment I'm just using wisdom for the prime casting ability. I used "complex" and "exotic"...

I think that captures the divine aspect of a divine warlock very nicely. A very minor quible: would it work better to make it a straight Xd8 or Xd6 instead of 2d8+1 per level? That way it could grow in power just like eldritch blast, and it will have a degree of limitation in its inherent...

The more and more I think about it, the more I think that converting to non-lethal damage is probably the best way to go. It removes the entire resource-limiting aspect (which is arguably the single most appealing aspect of the warlock). The divine warlock remains and effective healer (i.e...

They may indeed have limitless hit points, but they are paying at least a nominal fee (at higher levels) for that ability. With unlimited healing, a party will always be fully healed at quite literally no cost. So long as the divine warlock survives, he will always be at full hit points, which...