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Alternative woudl be to stop using the new theories and keep with the old ones. You want new, different monsters, create new and diferent monsters. Let each individual DM decide which ones to use, rather than making all monsters conform to a single design theory. This is a bit different from...

Fought one a few months ago. Our thief beat it to death with a fishbat (which he had actually bought earlier that game to go fishing with) as everybody else ran away.

Keeping modifiers hidden, like keeping hit points hidden, is an old idea that pops up from time to time. For some people it works and others it doesn't. For most, I'd have to say it doesn't. It's usually easier for the DM to be open about modifiers so PCs can keep track of their own, as well as...

If our DM used a rust monster to teach us something it was not to leap without looking and attack everything we ran across without preparation. Otherwise it was usually being used by intelligent creatures as a guard dog for either a place or non-metal dependant caster. I could agree that it...

While I agree with Mearls basic point that the Ogre Magi could be revamped, I disagree with what he did. He essentially created a brand new monster and gave it an old grognard name like he did with the rust monster. I say leave it mostly the way it was and change out Charm Person for Charm...

Right, but what they should have done is given it Charm Monster (perhaps at will) or Mass Charm Monster (once per day). Plus maybe a Suggestion per day. The Polymorph stuff was already fixed in the errata.

I don't know about that. We played a game that started as ECL 6 characters with LA+2 to +5. All the special powers really threw our DM for a loop. Things that would be a major barrier to the normal human party became trivial. Half our party could fly, for example, and could carry the rest of the...

Not really the way I see it. Either way, the fighter must be in the same position tactically to act as a meat sheild. The difference is the number of actions. Given the case of a fighter protecting a mage versus two orcs, one already in a threatened square and one not. With AoO, he would get his...

I'm torn on this one. While I like it, there are some issues with it IIRC. A few OOP monsters where one wonders how they can exist next door to all the rest. There is also the issue of all the new monsters such as the Aspis. I don't think throwing in random new monsters, especially when there...

Unless the campaign is based upon a holy quest and all the other players should be of proper alignment and disposition that there'd be trouble even if there wasn't a paladin in the party, get rid of the paladin. Always get rid of the paladin as they are simply too disruptive to party dynamics...

Dude. There's always some gold peices, a few gems, or a wand that looks like an old bone in dungeon trash heaps.

Rot grub. Funny thing is, I like the rot grub. It's one of the reasons I bought Tome of Horrors along with the core three books. It served it's purpose. It taught players not to go jumping around in trash heaps and other situations without checking them out first. A little poking with a stick...

Readied Actions are already part of the game. I'm replacing provoking AoO (and generation of extra actions) for a penalty to AC (which would probably count as loss of Dex bonus for other certain abilities). Making the rules simpler is not a major design goal (or we'd just end up with another...

In 4E that I would write, a meat shield would be holding his action (or some of them anyway) to attack anybody who tried to get at the magic user though his threatened area (not sure if I'd keep 5' squares or not) rather than acting willy nilly and expecting some free actions to cover what he is...

Yep. Sucks to be a wizard with too few meat shields while the one you have is more interested in personal glory than being a meat shield.

Well, I haven't play tested it. ;-) In such a situation, the orc would suffer Dex penalty which would lower his AC. If Sir Meat Shield has not already attacked, he may do so at that time, making that his new initiative. If he has already attacked, then he's facing too many opponents or isn't...

Already answered this, but replace an AoO with Dex penalty to the person making the action that would normally create an AoO till their next initiative.

As one of those "open DMs" I must agree, and would like to think I have learned my lesson. It was way before VtM with D&D. Totaly open DMing rarely works because the players (and therfore the characters) do not live in thier world 24/7 and have no points of reference. You can do this at least...

Wow...just wow. I guess I strive to improperly run games then. Lucky you. I spend most of my time trying to get players to show some initiative and come up with their own goals. So many have been led by the nose for so long that most seem to have lost any ability to think for themselves. I...

I don't think you could make a rules-lite D&D and keep the default flavor because the rules of any game form the flavor. Change the rules, change the flavor. You might be able to change to rule-lite and keep only the bits of flavor that you want to keep, but somebody else will feel that it does...