I've Finalized My House Rules!

[airwalkrr]

I have wanted to make some changes to 3.5 for a long time. There are a lot of proud nails that I think need to be banged in just a little bit more to make the system better. Additionally, there were a few things that I wanted to "restore" to the system to make it feel a little more like 1e. The attached document is a labor of love comprising nearly 2 years of research, play-testing, and comparing notes in online rules forums. It is designed to work almost seemlessly with the core rules as written, and requires very little conversion to use in any standard 3.5 campaign. I have come up with a fairly novel approach to allowing players to pick and choose which supplements they can choose their abilities from to both ensure the flavor of the campaign and to prevent excessive power-gaming. Perhaps you will find this document to be a good basis for your own campaign. Perhaps you will merely glance over it looking for the occassional gem that you find intriguing. Either way, I hope it is a filling read and provokes you to thinking about ways to make your campaign fun.

Now I must say before you begin that not all of the work herein is my own. I would have an acknowledgements section, but the truth of the matter is I have drawn from so many different ideas over the last two years, that distinguishing who was the original source would be worse than looking for hay in a needlestack. Many people have contributed ideas which I have adopted for my campaign and I am very thankful to many ENWorlders in particular for your inspiring ideas, helpful advice, and patience in dealing with my constant probing.

This document is probably not yet final, but it represents the first complete version that I plan to use for my campaigns in the future. As new sourcebooks are released, it shall be updated and corrected. I will also do occassional editing and errata, but the project is at a point where it is polished enough to be presented to the world. And so without further ado, I give you my Greyhawk Campaign Sourcebook.

click here
or click here

Note: I do not believe this document contains any copyrighted material, as I have adapted everything that I have borrowed from other rulebooks. However, because some of the names and such might be considered copyrighted, reproduction of this document for the purpose of profit might be considered illegal.

 

[Bagpuss]

I'm a bit confused, how do you gain action points, you haven't used the table from UA that shows they go up with level, so they appear to be fixed at 5 Action points, that refresh every time you level up. Except for characters that start at a higher than 1st level. Do you actually use the table from UA or do you have some other method of awarding action points?

 

[airwalkrr]

See page 6:

A beginning (1st-level) character starts the game with 5 action points. A character above 1st level starts the game with a number of action points equal to 5 + 1/2 his new character level.

They are the same kind of action points most people are used to. You gain more as you level up.

 

[Bad Paper]

click here

data transfer limit exceeded. Sorry, can't read it, but I'd like to. My current campaign is getting ripe for the killing, and I'll be cooking up a much tighter set of house rules (vs. current lassez-faire anything-WotC-goes) for my next campaign. I'd love to pick your brain.

 

[airwalkrr]

Yea, I just noticed that.

Unfortunately, the limit is 4.2 mb per hour which apparently has been exceeded several times since posting this. The file is to big to upload to ENWorld though. Can anyone else recommend a free hosting site with a higher limit where I could make it available?

 

[seans23]

I just copied it onto my server. Feel free to distribute the link.

http://donkeyshow.org/d20/GCS_1.0.pdf

 

[Bagpuss]

A beginning (1st-level) character starts the game with 5 action points. A character above 1st level starts the game with a number of action points equal to 5 + 1/2 his new character level.

I read that bit before raising the question because to me starts the game means character creation. As written if I created a 1st level character I would start the game with 5 action points and never gain any more. If I created a 10th level character because my last character had died, I would start the game with 10 action points, and then never gain any more.

I suppose the other way of reading starts the game is at the beginning of each session, starts the game that evening. In which case yes the character would get more action points as I they levelled up, but again this doesn't match the Action Point system in Unearthed Arcana, as in that you only get action points when you level up.

Is either case what you intended as this is how it is phrased.

 

[babomb]

The Paladin gets 8 bonus abilities chosen from a list of 2? (I'm assuming they stack with themselves, but still....)

I'm not sure about the Pureblood feat. Baklunish and Rhenee have fairly minor offsetting penalties, and Flannae is a +2 Con with no drawback for non-wizards (apart from the opportunity cost of selecting a different feat, of course).

 

[airwalkrr]

I read that bit before raising the question because to me starts the game means character creation. As written if I created a 1st level character I would start the game with 5 action points and never gain any more. If I created a 10th level character because my last character had died, I would start the game with 10 action points, and then never gain any more.

I suppose the other way of reading starts the game is at the beginning of each session, starts the game that evening. In which case yes the character would get more action points as I they levelled up, but again this doesn't match the Action Point system in Unearthed Arcana, as in that you only get action points when you level up.

Is either case what you intended as this is how it is phrased.

I'll make sure to fix it. The intent was for them to work like normal action points with regard to leveling up.

 

[airwalkrr]

The Paladin gets 8 bonus abilities chosen from a list of 2? (I'm assuming they stack with themselves, but still....)

Yes that is the intent. I will try to make the wording more clear. Incidentally, this is based on a recent WotC article on "Dead Levels." It can be found here.

I'm not sure about the Pureblood feat. Baklunish and Rhenee have fairly minor offsetting penalties, and Flannae is a +2 Con with no drawback for non-wizards (apart from the opportunity cost of selecting a different feat, of course).

I borrowed this idea from the Greyhawk Player's Guide, only I made it a feat. I see it as an incentive for roleplaying since it encourages players to identify their character with a specific subrace of humanity. Certainly, some players will choose it for power, but given that humans do not gain very many special abilities, I don't find it unbalanced, especially considering that the bonus can not raise the ability above 18.