D&D 5E Player Flavour, Skills, & Money Sinks

[Henry]

The biggest problem you will likely run into with these house rules as Gansk says is the scaling proficiency bonus. Assuming Mastery at 15th level (culmination of a long campaign) that's +10 over the most bounded accuracy would give you - you start having the 3e "my bonus is larger than your d20" problem.

Let's even say you get mastery at half that, 8th level (someone's been a busy little swordswoman or Zweihand master). That's still a +9 proficiency bonus - +6 over standard, and meaning that even that Red Dragon gets whacked 30% more frequently and dies 30% faster, and the games of Rocket Tag get a little bit closer to returning.

I wouldnt even go +2/+4/+6, i'd go more like an extra +1 or +2 - with bounded accuracy that's still a heavy incentive to train for a year, even for one tool or weapon.

as for the single weapon thing, thats not too bad, but as noted, its going to put people off martial characters to take something away, as opposed to giving something new.

 

[TornadoCreator]

It makes sense to me, if you don't assume that your setting is brimming with people with high character levels, which I don't. I kinda apply the e6 paradigm to NPCs; a level 6 character is legendary, and about as high level as NPCs get, barring an VINPC like Elminster, or villains the PCs are fighting. I've never liked the "oh, he's the king, he must be 15th level" thing. I've never liked the "oh, he's the best fighter in the city, he must be 10th level" thing. I've never liked the "oh, he's going to be interacting with the PCs, so he must be near their level" thing, either. I prefer lower levels: the vast majority of men-at-arms are 1st level fighters; the leaders are 1st or 2nd level fighters; the champion types are 3rd level fighters; above 3rd, you're dealing with true badass fighters, and a 6th level fighter is a maxed out fighter, on the verge of becoming a legend known to all the sages until men stop recording history.

Again, I mean none of this to stop you; by all means, forge ahead.

I agree. I love the lower level game. Fighting goblins, gnolls, and bandits. Doing jobs for kings, infultrating cults, stoping the evil wizard... feeling a genuine sense of dread at the thought of a dozen zombies and a necromancer. This is D&D to me. Actually facing a dragon should be the "end of campaign" scenario, at least that's how it felt to me.

I rarely have any NPCs above 10th level, though having Clerics at the temples who can cast Restoration spells and Wizard's and the Mages Guild who can teach moderately high level spells is something I like to have as a resorce... at least in the bigger cities such as Waterdeep or Neverwinter.

I assume most people are 3rd level or lower (and I start all player characters at 2nd level... it allows people to multiclass from the start without having an odd first two-three sessions where your class and backstory don't match up). Even still though, Arcane Trickster and Eldritch Knight both kick in at 3rd level, and Ranger and Paladin both gain spells at 2nd level, so having an NPC population that's not all throwing magic around like it's nothing is actually hard... I mean seriously, what moron gave the Bard full spell progression on-par with the Wizard. What idiot completely destroyed the theme and purpose of the damn Bard. My favourite class, ruined. They're supposed to be jack of all trades, master of none, not on par for arcane might as Gandalf The Gray for f*ck sake!

So yeah. As you can probably tell, I think there's WAAAAY too much magic in 5e, especially as they made magic items far rarer.

 

[TornadoCreator]

I plan to do something similar to this - here are my recommendations:

Cool, let's brainstorm a little then.

1) Drop the spell learning and limit the skills to "background" skills. "Background skills" are skills that could earn you money in another profession besides "adventurer". Performance is a "background" skill, Insight is an "adventuring" skill. Proficiency in "adventuring" skills can only be gained through race or class.

Insight is just the new Sense Motive. That's definitely a skill you could use non-adventuring. You could use it as a merchant or conman, you could certainly use it as an interpreter or diplomat for a noble, an investigator for the town guard would use it catching criminals... I honestly doubt there's such a thing as "adventuring only" skills.

2) If you insist on the apprentice/expert/master levels of proficiency, don't have it scale with level - set it to static bonuses of +2/+4/+6. IMO this is too fiddly for 5e, I decided to drop this level of detail.

I did consider this, but I do like the scaling proficiency with level mechanic. I'd be willing to change it toa static bonus if it becomes too overpowered... but let's face it, a 20th level character can cast the damn 'Wish' spell once per day; having a +18 on a skill or tool proficiency is hardly hardcore superpowered by comparison.

3) Regarding weapons and armor, allow some basic weapon proficiencies usable by everybody - club, staff, unarmed (or natural weapon for Moon druids and races with claw/bite attacks), and dagger (or call it a knife and not allow it to be thrown). Then give some extra free proficiencies at first level - three for warrior-types, two for clerics/rogues, and one for wizard-types. Multi-class characters do not receive the free proficiencies of their second class.

This could work but might be a bit excessive. Even monks gain proficiency with Shortsword, Unarmed, and 1 Simple Weapon, under my system. Dwarves and Elves get 4 weapon proficiencies as part of their race. It may cause te Dwarf Paladin, or Elven Fighter/Archer to wind up with 10+ weapon proficiencies and no real need for them.

4) Allow the warrior-types (fighter, barbarian, paladin, ranger) to gain proficiencies in weapon categories instead of individual weapons (all swords, all axes, etc.). You can allow fighters only to specialize in a specific weapon if they take a second proficiency, but attach a specific battle master maneuver that they can use with the weapon instead of the boring attack or damage bonus.

This still feels like you're saying "your reduction in weapon proficiencies is far too severe", and trying to moderate it. Why? Are fighters likely to need to switch between Longsword, Shortsword, Rapier etc. on a regular basis? It's not a bad suggestion, but it's kind of a half measure. Remember the fighter can still use every weapon, the proficiency bonus represents them having actively trained in that weapons use. As being a fighter, I feel, is more about the access to Heavy Armour, Shields, and the Fighting Style; I think 1 martial, 1 simple, and whatever you get from race/feats is plenty personally.

5) Use categories or armor instead of individual armor (light/medium/heavy). Light is the prerequisite for medium, medium is the prerequisite for heavy. Classes that are prohibited from using certain armor in the PHB still need to honor those restrictions.

Agreed. There's no reason to change armour. Light, Medium, and Heavy is differentiation enough. Though, from a purely personal niggle point. Chainmail is medium armour and Scale is heavy... switch the names around, nothing more. Anyone who's actually worn armour like this IRL would be shouting at the designers about this crap.

There is another thread that explored this type of weapon proficiency house rule and it also had a fair number of detractors. But there were also a few people who supported it.

I seem to have way more detractors here, not sure why. Still it's fun to discuss such things.

 

[TornadoCreator]

[MENTION=158]Henry[/MENTION]

Yeah, as I've said, at higher levels it may become unbalanced; I concede that. My main thinking though is once you get high enough that 7th level spells are commonplace is a jump in skills that big of an issue?

Rogues & Bards already have Expertise available to them, so it's already part of the system; and Mastery is designed to be rare as I said. It could well require an adventure in it's own right to achieve. So really, this rule is going to manifest in play more often, as a way to pick up that extra proficiency or gain expertise in a skill or tool that defines your character. Mastery is, if anything, a high end goal and should be powerful. The whole "my bonus is higher than your D20 score" is intentional. It's to represent say, an archmages knowledge of the arcane, a top class assassin's ability to use stealth, a world famous bards ability to use performance etc. this isn't just a bonus you get, it should express the direction of the entire character and represent weeks of active roleplaying towards that goal. I'm prepared to give a little imbalance to reward great roleplaying and push greater storytelling. We can't always assume our players will run amok and destroy the campaign because they have one skill noticeably higher than standard.

 

[Gansk]

Insight is just the new Sense Motive. That's definitely a skill you could use non-adventuring. You could use it as a merchant or conman, you could certainly use it as an interpreter or diplomat for a noble, an investigator for the town guard would use it catching criminals... I honestly doubt there's such a thing as "adventuring only" skills.

My approach is a little more medieval - I doubt that militia groups were training people in Sense Motive. But the adventuring classes are fictional, so there is more plausibility that training included Sense Motive.

This could work but might be a bit excessive. Even monks gain proficiency with Shortsword, Unarmed, and 1 Simple Weapon, under my system. Dwarves and Elves get 4 weapon proficiencies as part of their race. It may cause te Dwarf Paladin, or Elven Fighter/Archer to wind up with 10+ weapon proficiencies and no real need for them.

I plan to cut the racial weapon proficiencies down to one or two weapons. Elves only get longbow, for example.

This still feels like you're saying "your reduction in weapon proficiencies is far too severe", and trying to moderate it. Why? Are fighters likely to need to switch between Longsword, Shortsword, Rapier etc. on a regular basis? It's not a bad suggestion, but it's kind of a half measure. Remember the fighter can still use every weapon, the proficiency bonus represents them having actively trained in that weapons use. As being a fighter, I feel, is more about the access to Heavy Armour, Shields, and the Fighting Style; I think 1 martial, 1 simple, and whatever you get from race/feats is plenty personally.

The main complaint you are going to get is when a fighter finds a glaive +1 as his or her first magic weapon. It is worthless unless he or she is trained in glaive. After training, a long sword +2 is found. Now the time spent training in glaive feels worthless. YMMV.

 

[TornadoCreator]

My approach is a little more medieval - I doubt that militia groups were training people in Sense Motive. But the adventuring classes are fictional, so there is more plausibility that training included Sense Motive.

Good point, but it could get needlessly fiddly if we start excluding certain skills but allowing others. Especially as I don't think there's anything inherently overpowered about the insight skill, particularly as Detect Evil and Zone Of Truth spells exist in this world.

I plan to cut the racial weapon proficiencies down to one or two weapons. Elves only get longbow, for example.

That's actually a really good idea... I may do the same and perhaps increase proficiencies granted by "all martial" and "all simple", to be "two martial of your choice" and "two simple of your choice".

The main complaint you are going to get is when a fighter finds a glaive +1 as his or her first magic weapon. It is worthless unless he or she is trained in glaive. After training, a long sword +2 is found. Now the time spent training in glaive feels worthless. YMMV.

I can be a cruel GM at times, but I'm not that cruel... becides I'd likely allow people to move the enchantment across from one weapon to another by doing a ritual and spending say 100gp in components. I'd make things like the enchantments on artifacts unable to move, but basic magic is fine. I also intend to bring back elemental enchantments. Swords that glow red hot, or feel cold to the touch and are tinged a faint blue doing an extra 1D6 fire or cold damage respectively. It just seems boring that the magic weapons are just +1, +2, or +3 ...what a yawn-fest especially when most classes can throw spells around by third level.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

Aaaah, see, I play every week for about 5-6 hours per game so advancement is far faster for me. I think that likely radically changes my perception on advancement.

Yeah, I just do a level per adventure, and normally it takes 3-4 sessions to finish one. NPC henchmen normally get 1 per 2 adventures. I get wanting some granular advancement, but think this overly penalizes fighter types whose main strength is in part due to being a versatile combatant. I know you said they could just take weapon master, but come on, that is just a terrible feat that should have never seen print.

As for limting spells knwn by spellcasters, I wasn't planning to, but it could make 5e feel less over-the-top wen it comes to magic. They really did overdo the amount of magic in this game. I might reduce spells known; but as casters don't start with all spells, it's not necessary yet. It seems to work fine as it is.

Clerics, druids and paladins start with all spells known.

 

[Wik]

I've been thinking about the bad points of 5e...

There are three big flaws with the system, and I think there's a simple way to fix all three.

1. Player characters are all the same. You have the same attributes by point buy, you have the same proficiencies, you have the same equipment, you have the same class features.... so where's the character flavour?

I haven't noticed that. We don't use point buy, though. But the gear is different, and no one has the same class features. But I'm assuming you mean that two fighters will be similar? To me, that's a feature, not a bug, but your tastes may vary.

2. There are no skills anymore. You have proficiency or you don't. That's it, so no fine tuning your character to give them that extra flair; hell there's not even any feats (not really, the few feats that do exist are bare bones at best and you have to give up the attribute increase).

Again, this is a difference in taste. I LOVE the new skills and feats system. It's simple, it lets players try things even if they're unskilled, and the feats always mean something (as opposed to the weapon finesse/toughness/skill focus issue of 3e). I'm all for simpler gameplay.

3. With no magic item economy, the players are easily finding themselves with literally thousands of gold and having little of tangible GAMEPLAY reward to spend it on. Sure they could buy a keep in the mountains but that's flavour, not tangible gameplay bonus. Even if they do buy magic items, there's FAR less magic items.... which would be fine if every damn character didn't get magic, and loads of it. Rangers and Bards get far more magic now, and Rogues and Fighters both have an arcane spellcaster archetype; so making magic items rare and difficult to source makes no sense now.

I dunno about that, but I can see where you're coming from. In my games, so far, the PCs are more broke than they've been in other editions.... due to downtime expenditures. And they're looking at starting up a keep, getting hirelings, etc. But then, I also have limited magic item sales as a possibility (no one's taken me up on it yet, but we're low level).

Characters need DOUBLE the XP stated in the book in order to level up, and all player characters start at 2nd level. The idea behind this is simple; player characters need to stay at lower levels for longer.

This reminds me of Earthdawn. You can level up quickly, but if you do, you don't get all of your classes cool stuff. It's fun, I guess. And I'm all for anything that keeps the PCs lower level.

Characters who gain proficiency in weapons no longer gain them in the same way. If your class grants you 'Martial Weapon Proficiency' or 'Simple Weapon Proficiency', you get to choose ONE weapon in that category that you are proficient with. This means fighters will have to carefully decide what weapons they have trained with... and it makes racial proficiencies more important and thematic.

The racial weapons bit is cool, sure, but I'm not sure about weapon proficiencies. I really don't like em, because they force players into using only one schtick. And I'm all for fighters grabbing a weapon in a pinch and going with it (and not penalizing them for doing it). It also means that if I have a player that uses a trident, I have to suddenly make sure there are magical tridents available, despite "realism" of doing it... or let him never get a magic item. Either way, it sucks. And I've seen in play that when that's the case, all players take the same proficiencies - long sword, long bow, dagger, and club (or some variation thereof). Which is boring.

BUT, if you do it this way, might I suggest cultural weapon proficiencies for human characters?

During gameplay you can spend 250gp to learn a new tool proficiency or language, this takes approximately 6 months of in game time to achieve. This is already in the main rules in the PHB, I intend to expand on this.

I like this rule as well. I kind of want to expand it to include armour, weapons, and maybe even skills.

If you wish, you can use this same method to train in the use of a weapon, armour, skill, save, or spell. You gain proficiency in that weapon, armour, skill, save; or learn that spell. If you don't have spell slots, you cannot learn the spell as you would be unable to cast it... so in effect you're limited to cantrips for none spellcasting classes (nb. Eldritch Blast cannot be taught, attempts to do so always result in the students confusion... those that finally understand and learn the spell find they have inadvertently made a pact and must level up next level as a Warlock, such is the dangers of trying to harness raw magic). Learning spells does mean sourcing either a wizard willing to teach you, or a scroll containing the spell. This means spells above third level will likely be far more expensive than the 250gp needed for basic training, and spells of 7th level and higher will cost as much to gain tutorage in as buying a small castle. Wizards are not quick to trade away their most potent magic.

It's a bit finicky for my tastes, but it's not going to break your game.

You can speed up this learning process, halving the time to learn to only 3 months, but you must be in seclusion and doing nothing but studying. Learning over 6 months can be done while travelling and living a normal sedentary lifestyle. All learning requires either a tutor, or access to resources, such as a library.

The downside here is, you get your PCs spending a huge amount of time in school, doing... well.... not much. And what do you do as a GM if one PC goes into seclusion to learn a new spell, while everyone else wants to play?

Also, doesn't this mean longer-lived characters are going to do better in your game?

If you already have proficiency, you can still train. Doing so costs the same amount, 250gp and 6 or 3 months game time depending; at the end of which you gain Expertise (as the Rogue class feature), in your chosen tool, skill, or weapon; granting you double your proficiency bonus when using this tool/skill/weapon.

Strongly disagree. Though experience, Expertise is one of the rogue's best abilities. Giving it away for a relatively small cost (considering you expect players to spend a lot of time in downtime), is just screwing over the rogue.

If you already have Expertice in a tool, skill, weapon etc. you can train further and gain Mastery in your choed field. This last stage of training costs 1000gp and takes a minimum of a year (GM discretion), to master; it may even require an adventure in it's own right. Going to a long forgotten ancient library to gain mastery in History, finding a magical portal and travelling to the Feywilds to study first hand for mastery of arcana, travelling to the most inhospitable part of the natural environment and living off nothing but the land for months for mastery of Nature etc...

The idea is cool, but I doubt it'll see much play. A more fun idea (in my opinion) is just to grant this to PCs that have shown aptitude in play, as a result of awesome adventures. The druid who rescues a treant gets mastery in nature; the cleric who has a divine revelation gets mastery in religion; the fighter who climbed the tallest mountain without faltering gets mastery in athletics; etc.

In the case of skills and tools, gaining mastery in them gives you TRIPLE your proficiency score; while with weapons training you get to add your proficiency score to your damage (as well as the double proficiency to hit from expertise), making mastery of a weapon especially potent. Mastery of combat spells is in theory possible, though there's no real recorded examples of someone having managed such a thing.

If you go this route... it'll come back to bite you in your keister. I'd suggest your "mastery" is some sort of advantage. You could even put a rider in there. "I've got mastery history - elvish lore" So, whenever an elvish lore check comes up, the character gets advantage. Giving someone a +12 to a check is HUGE. It's big in pathfinder, even... so it's monstrously big in Fifth.

As for weapons, it's the same issue. Fighters would dish out buttloads of damage... meaning the way to take em down is to destroy their weapon. Which could be tactically fun, but it's a huge burden at the table for the player. A fighter with three or four attacks, with a strength of 20 and a +1 sword, would be doing in your system something like +10 damage per hit. So, assuming a longsword, three attacks, and they all hit, an average of 42 points of damage a round. Which is huge in fifth.

This change gives players a way to "level up" there characters without actually leveling up and the time frame means players have to actively show in gameplay or state during downtime that they're taking this extra training. This will also allow for lower level characters to specialise more, and for well complimentary teams to take down things of higher than normal CR which will naturally feel awesome.

I don't like characters specializing too much. I've played Pathfinder, Shadowrun, and other similar games. Those games reward specialization... and system mastery... and encourage the casual players to sit to the side. I'd rather have a game where everyone at least has a CHANCE to do something (and not be in "well, you could roll a 20...." territory.

But I get your idea, and if that's where you want your game to go, you can edit from there. Tastes vary and all that jazz.

 

[TornadoCreator]

Clerics, druids and paladins start with all spells known.

I wrote up a Paladin only a few days ago, I've just gone back and checked. You get spells equal to your Charisma modifier + 1/2 your Paladin levels and the spells must be at a level where you have spell slots. So for a Paladin Level 2 with Charisma 16, that's 4 spells. You can only cast 2 spells, as you only have 2 spell slots, so it makes no sense that these are "prepared spells" which is how it's written.

Simply way to make Divine casters not so damn powerful is make their spell choices permanent. So for a paladin, you learn 1 new spell every 2 levels... choose carefully.

This solves that issue perfectly and it's been how I've always ran it because it was actually EASIER to introduce newbies to divine classes this way, rather than them repeatedly choosing and switching out spells (especially as a Paladin who'd often just burn the spell pool for Smite damage).

 

[Wik]

I wrote up a Paladin only a few days ago, I've just gone back and checked. You get spells equal to your Charisma modifier + 1/2 your Paladin levels and the spells must be at a level where you have spell slots. So for a Paladin Level 2 with Charisma 16, that's 4 spells. You can only cast 2 spells, as you only have 2 spell slots, so it makes no sense that these are "prepared spells" which is how it's written.

Rules as written, nope. For a paladin, you get to prepare spells from your class list. So your paladin would have four spells from that list - those are your options, but you might not always use the ones on your list. In addition, once you take your sacred oath, you add spells to that list permanently.

It works perfectly fine for me.

And in my experience, people tend to stick to the same divine list, changing it only as needed.

Simply way to make Divine casters not so damn powerful is make their spell choices permanent. So for a paladin, you learn 1 new spell every 2 levels... choose carefully.

...which basically forces them into being the healbot. And, again, makes everyone take the same choices.

This solves that issue perfectly and it's been how I've always ran it because it was actually EASIER to introduce newbies to divine classes this way, rather than them repeatedly choosing and switching out spells (especially as a Paladin who'd often just burn the spell pool for Smite damage).

Why not just make them have a few preset lists? Or encourage the newbies to stick with an easier class? But really, why change the rules to force them to play the game differently?