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Message: <blockquote data-quote="JustinA" data-source="post: 3492838" data-attributes="member: 51618">Prep multiple stat blocks. One for the NPC unbuffed; one for the NPC buffed.Don't spend so much customizing.1. How many skill points do they get at each level? Call this X.2. Pick X skills.3. They have max ranks in those skills.The only thing which can complicate this is boosts to Intelligence (since they don't retroactively add skill points). Simple solution? Let Intelligence boosts retroactively add skill points (just like Constitution boosts add hit points). You get a more consistent ruleset which is easier to use: Double win.Get rid of the bull rush maneuver and use these simplified grapple mechanics:1. INITIATING GRAPPLE: As an attack action you can initiate a grapple by moving into an opponent's square and making an opposed grapple check. This provokes an attack of opportunity. If the attack of opportunity deals damage or if the opposed grapple check fails, you have failed to initiate the grapple and must move back into the space you came from.2. IN A GRAPPLE: Characters in a grapple are considered flat-footed and can only move at one-quarter their normal speed. Characters in a grapple can attempt any action they could normally take, but they must make an opposed grapple check. If the opposed grapple check fails, their opponent has prevented them from taking the action.3. PINNING: You can attempt to pin a character you are grappling by making an opposed grapple check. A pinned character can do nothing except take a move action to attempt to escape the pin (by making an opposed grapple check).4. ESCAPING A GRAPPLE: You can escape a grapple by making an opposed grapple check.5. JOINING A GRAPPLE: You join a grapple the same way you initiate a grapple, but since the characters in the grapple are flat-footed they cannot take an attack of opportunity against you.6. MULTIPLE GRAPPLERS: When there are multiple characters in a single grapple, a character's grapple check to take any action is opposed by the grapple checks of all the other grapplers. (Grapplers can voluntarily fail their grapple checks just like they can with any other check.)This gets rid of all the little special-case rules which make grappling an absolute nightmare. And basically you just have to remember:1. AoO.2. Opposed grapple check.3. Grapple check to do anything (including escape or pin).4. They're flat-footed and move at quarter-speed.I also recommend resolving trip attacks using an opposed grapple check. This simultaneously removes the lack-of-scaling problem inherent in the current trip attacks, and also make them little more than a special case of the grapple rules.It's pretty easy to fold overruns into this mechanic, too.You are playing in a different game. Pick the range of levels you enjoy playing at and then slow down XP accumulation to keep the gameplay in that range for the duration of the campaign.</blockquote>

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