D&D 4E House Rule Patches to 4e

[Majoru Oakheart]

I'm not sure about #3, because I'm not sure what it's changing.

This comes out of a discussion with one of my players about Bladesinger. He felt that it was a striker. He says the Char Op boards back him up on this one. I asked how. He said that the point of playing a Bladesinger was to get as many items that allowed you to get back Encounter powers as possible and use Bladesong every round of combat.

I thought there was no way to recover it, given it isn't an attack or utility power and is a class feature with no level...thereby not qualifying for almost every ability to recover an encounter power. WOTC has errataed a bunch of rules items to say "Attack power" or "Utility power" since they've discovered this issue(it applies to a couple other classes as well)....but hasn't errated them all. So, of course, players use the ones that aren't errated yet to get it back. Thus, my house rule just changes the rest of them.

I don't like #4 because a) it kinda defeats the purpose of having high stats, and b) it looks like the 'benefit : complexity' ratio is too low to be worth the trouble.

The problem is that mathematically, any modifier higher than 5 is basically a guaranteed hit/miss/save/failed save. And if you can guarantee that, you can make an enemy incapable of saving against a stun or unable to hit. Combine this with abilities to recover powers or a psion and you can guarantee that it'll happen to the enemy every combat...possibly every round of every combat.

Maybe it is just worth saying "modifiers are capped to attacks and saves at -3 for at wills, -4 for encounters, -5 for dailies at all tiers. Modifiers to these rolls will not stack above -5, regardless of what source they come from."

 

[OnlineDM]

It sounds like your style of game is such that the rules are set out and the players try to warp them. You then propose house rules to fix the problems, and you fully expect the players to try to warp those, too.

I don't know whether this is a battle you can win, but I'd suggest not fighting it at all.

Talk to the players one-on-one. Use veto power. Use un-generous DM interpretation of powers. Decree that certain magic items or powers don't exist in your game world.

When a player brings something to the table that seems broken, ask them to make a different choice. Do it gently, but make it clear that the goal is a more-fun game, and that combinations that, in your opinion, break the spirit of the game balance are not fun for the game as a whole.

If Iron Armbands of Power are a problem in your game, then they cease to exist (or they exist in a watered-down fashion).

If multi-attack powers are a problem, have the players choose different powers.

If warlord bonuses from action points are overwhelming, have them only apply to the first person to use an action point in a round or something like that. (I'd also suggest longer adventuring days, where you don't get the opportunity to go daily-action point-daily in many battles.)

My approach would be to get specific. Rather than try to craft a general rule, which I expect will just encourage the power gamers to search for more loopholes, exercise DM veto power. It might be hard to retroactively do this at this late stage of the campaign, but I'd recommend trying it out for future campaigns at the very least - and even for this one, if you have reasonable players.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

My approach would be to get specific. Rather than try to craft a general rule, which I expect will just encourage the power gamers to search for more loopholes, exercise DM veto power. It might be hard to retroactively do this at this late stage of the campaign, but I'd recommend trying it out for future campaigns at the very least - and even for this one, if you have reasonable players.

I've already tried that approach. All through 2e and 3e, and most of 4e, I banned specific builds as they became too powerful. I discussed the reasons for it and said "Sorry, I just can't allow that, because it is making the game unbalanced and making some people have no fun."

But a couple of my players take each banning as a challenge to come up with a different build I haven't banned. I banned a build that allowed someone to teleport 6 times a turn and do 15 points of damage with each teleport to all enemies they were next to when they teleported without an attack roll(some parts of which were later errataed by WOTC). Only to have someone show up with a build that relied on immobilizing an enemy within a wall that did continual damage while lowering their saves to the point that they couldn't ever get out. I ban that one and they come up with a charging build that did 4-6 attacks per round(all free actions, which was later errataed by WOTC).

The problem is, as soon as I ban them, they just search the Char Op board for the next most powerful build and make that instead.

Over time, I've noticed a general trend in the builds that are overpowered. They rely on a couple of rules loopholes for ALL of them to work. Close the rules loopholes and you ban all of the overpowered builds at once instead of one at a time. I hate to have to constantly micromanage the player's choices. It's too much work for me, and gives me too much of a headache.

 

[OnlineDM]

Gotcha. So it's problem players, then. That's too bad. They don't sound like the kind of players I'd enjoy having at my table.

Good luck!

 

[Zero Cochrane]

Thinking back to the rules, I found a helpful one on page 194 of the Rules Compendium: "A creature can take a free action to use an attack power only once per turn."

 

[GameOgre]

Double post..yet again

 

[GameOgre]

Unless you like this type of game play I would suggest just turning the tables on them. ANYTHING the party can do as a DM you can do better!

If the players get out of hand with the mad power build ups. Have the monsters/npc's do the same thing.

Maybe even give hints that they are in a dream and hit them with everything you can by the rules with every single min/max power trick and destroy them.

After one rounding the party ask them if they really want to play this way.


Mess with the bull you get the horns. The DM is a heck of a lot more bad ass than a bull!

It took me one rounding the party twice before we all agreed to just have fun and stop trying to use loop holes to power up.

 

[ceiling90]

If you really don't like multi-hit powers, there are two obvious solutions:

1) You only make that any effect which adds damage per attack is only applied once to the entire action. After all, even the multi-attack powers are technically only one action. So something like Twin Strike which is two attacks only gets a single bonus to the damage roll from effects like leader bonuses.

2) You effectively change every multi-hit power to have this line "if one or more attacks hit, treat it as a single hit". It seriously nerfs the power, since it removes the ability to crit on any one attack. But it still solves the whole stacking of bonuses.

I think my Solution #1 is pretty much your Rule #1...

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

There is another option. The majority of charop builds use dailies and are one trick ponies.

So..start using 5 to 6 encounters in a day and in one of those use tactics that target the pcs weakness.

Or..play lower level.

IMC I allow pretty much anything and the group has reached epic levels. Recently I had a 13 encounter day...and last session had a battle against 4 Elites. A recent fight included a solo ancient dragon, an elite lich, and 8 gargoyle minions...held atop a 100 foot tall tower.

Let them be charop as they obviously enjoy it...just amp up the campaign to match.

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