Cumulative Haste/Speed House Rules:

[Piratecat]

Tuzenbach, as far as I can tell, you're saying "I used a rule incorrectly in 1e that made it much too powerful, and now I want to use the same rule in 3e without the balancing effect that I should have used in 1e in the first place." Seriously, you weren't using a loophole.

I may be prejudiced, mind you; any time someone says "I want 40 attacks a round, but they're only darts," I tend to get a little dubious.

 

[Tuzenbach]

Tuzenbach, as far as I can tell, you're saying "I used a rule incorrectly in 1e that made it much too powerful, and now I want to use the same rule in 3e without the balancing effect that I should have used in 1e in the first place." Seriously, you weren't using a loophole.

I may be prejudiced, mind you; any time someone says "I want 40 attacks a round, but they're only darts," I tend to get a little dubious.

If FIVE different DMs didn't realise that every time I double-hasted I should have been rolling the system shock thing then I'd have to say, yes, it definitely WAS a loophole that I exploited to maximum effect. Granted, the loop had a lot to do with ignorant DMs as well, but who cares? We all had fun in the process. And if I get situated with more ignorant DMs in the future, guess what? I'm gunna exploit that loop again, baby! LoL

So long as everybody realises that the confines are within "fantasy role-playing, adventure gaming", I'd fully expect the fantastic and inconcievable to creep up once in a while if not once per gaming session. Forty dart attacks per round every six weeks or so of gaming for a few rounds? I'll be counting down the seconds for the next monumentous occurrence!

FWIW, the dart dude wasn't even a Magic-User, but a Fighter/Assassin. He had to rely upon potions of speed which weren't that easy to come by. He'd be saving them up (I think he had as many as four at one point) and everybody would be like "dude, just drink a potion of speed!" They didn't realise that I was 'saving up' for a rainy day.....or the REALLY BIG DRAGON at the bottom of the cavernous and seemingly endless dungeon.

IIRC, imbibing a speed potion cost you a year, *casting* haste (whether or not you were the recipient) cost you a year, and putting haste onto a scroll cost you a year. Oddly enough, neither reading haste off a scroll nor being the recipient of haste from a scroll cost you anything! It's funny that I know those "old rules" yet never heard of rolling system shock for speed/haste scenarios, no?

PS: I'm not too sure I'd have much fun in your campaigns. ;~D

 

[Tuzenbach]

OK. After further research, I learned (or relearned) that casting haste didn't age the caster, but the recipient. What was I thinking? Oh well, no bones broken.


Further, there's nothing in the DM's guide whatsoever about applying a system shock survival roll for magical aging. However, there *is* an ever-so-small blurb in the 1E PHB under the description of system shock that mentions this. It doesn't elaborate, but it's there. Sue me.


Now the "really angry" part. Not at all being as familiar with 3E rules as I was with 1E rules, I tried looking up aging in both the 3E PHB and DMG. It's not in the index. Nor is "system shock". Is this even addressed in 3E?! Then I tried looking up the ghost in the 3E MM only to find ZERO regarding magical aging. Apparently, they no longer go around aging the good guys with their rampant scariness. WTF? Why is aging (magical or otherwise) a taboo subject for 3E? This is dumb. Enlighten me, PirateCat!

 

[Anabstercorian]

Because magical aging is a negiglible danger for long-lived races such as elves while a potentially lethal danger for short-lived races such as humans. It's also just a bad way to balance a character, in my opinion.

 

[Tuzenbach]

Because magical aging is a negiglible danger for long-lived races such as elves while a potentially lethal danger for short-lived races such as humans. It's also just a bad way to balance a character, in my opinion.

Well dammit, I'm bringin' it back! Long live the Ghosts and their power to age a character 10 years in the blink of an eye! Let's bring mortality back into our D&D! LoL

 

[Thauredhel]

Back in 1.0, I had a lot of fun taking advantage of "loop holes" in rules which allowed my naturally ambidextrous drow dart specialist a whopping 40 attacks per round

I set such an abomination, but with a girdle of giant strength and weighted missiles, on the pcs

 

[Trainz]

Granted, the loop had a lot to do with ignorant DMs as well, but who cares? We all had fun in the process. And if I get situated with more ignorant DMs in the future, guess what? I'm gunna exploit that loop again, baby! LoL

PS: I'm not too sure I'd have much fun in your campaigns. ;~D

You wouldn't have fun in my campaign either.

 

[Piratecat]

I'm not actually on as high a horse as I probably appear; as a DM I didn't enforce the "any magical aging requires a system shock roll" rule in my 1e game, and I'm sure a lot of other DMs didn't either, even if they knew about it. Mind you, I didn't allow multiple haste effects either, but no biggie. We once used stacked enlarges to make a dwarf several hundred feet tall, and that was fun too.

I wouldn't allow multiple hastes nowadays in any case. Stacking spell effects is now explicitly disallowed by the rules, and I'm a little suspicious of setting weird precedents for this sort of thing without a darn good reason. If you wanted to house rule such a thing, maybe look at the fatigue and exhaustion rules for possible consequences. You could also use ability burn for constitution, when you suffer ability damage that can't be healed magically and has to heal naturally at one point a day. That might be a decent consequence, since it's an immediate tradeoff for the increased power.

Anyways, it sounds like you have a blast playing and lord knows you aren't taking the game too seriously, so I hope you have fun in whatever campaign you're in. There's a cool thread in Rules called "Sultans of Smack" which is all about power plays; check it out when you have a chance.