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Message: <blockquote data-quote="airwalkrr" data-source="post: 3302437" data-attributes="member: 12460">I did it primarily as a way to encourage players to play the game using the core rules, while still allowing them enough flexibility to try new things. I got the idea for the mechanic from the Eberron: Mark of Heroes campaign which lets you spend action points to gain access to new rules features via campaign cards. In most cases, the campaign cards give you more abilities to choose from, but my system has the added flexibility of letting you choose anything you want instead of being limited to only those items on the card. Eberron also lets you choose a non-core ability each level from a specific list, but I decided that would be too much. Eberron is more high-magic than Greyhawk. I would run things a bit differently (more leniently) if I were to run an Eberron campaign.My chief interest is preserving the flavor of D&D and Greyhawk. D&D is about fighters, rogues, clerics, and wizards exploring dungeons, fighting bad guys, and taking their stuff, and like it or not, it is the base classes in the PH that normally fill these roles best. A warlock may be a decent blaster, but he is a poor substitute for a mage and does not have the ability to take hits like a fighter. Some classes approximate the role of PH classes more than others, such as the scout (which fills the rogue's role nicely, almost better than the rogue!), but on the whole, the alternate base classes are more specialized variants of the classic D&D archetypes with a narrower focus. We once ran the Shackled City campaign with a favored soul, a warmage, a rogue/temple raider, and a bard/avenging angel. The favored soul and warmage were the biggest drag on the party. Countless times we found ourselves saying "if only the favored soul was a cleric so she could cast X" or "if only the warmage was a wizard so he could cast Y." We never finished the campaign partly because it became excruciatingly difficult without these roles being suitably filled. Combat was manageable, but puzzle-solving, investigation, and travel were all difficult pursuits of herculean proportions.As I said, it was to encourage players who use the core rules. Traditionally, I have not incorporated action points into my campaigns so having them is a bonus which you reap more benefits from if you stick to the core rules. I have before put limitations on using classes, feats, etc. from outside the core rules such as lower ability scores, flaws, and so on. But I decided that positive reinforcement for those who choose to use the core rules would be preferable, and this system accomplishes that.Obviously, some parts of non-core rules are better than others. A swashbuckler certainly is not going to disrupt my game from a balance concern. And after all, you can play a swashbuckler archetype easily with many character classes. Bards and rogues do it best. Barbarians, fighters, and rangers do it well to a lesser degree. So if you want to play the swashbuckler class, chances are you want to do so for a specific reason, one which is not available in the core rules. That is fine, but it usually means using a trick that the core rules do not assume player characters have. Rather than try to balance minutiae, I decided a flat AP cost on non-core stuff was a good way to simply encourage core stuff.Whirlwind attack states that any opponents within reach can be subject to your attack so the spiked chain would still allow you to attack opponents both 5 and 10 ft away.</blockquote>

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