Scary Tales from the Game Table: The House Rule that Wouldn’t Die!

[Jack Daniel]

Scary Tales from the Game Table: The House Rule that Wouldn’t Die!

Herein lies a dire warning to all who would make a house rule for their D&D games. But I warn you, it is not for the faint of heart. It began about a year ago, on a dark and stormy night... I had just realized that a campaign world should be more than “place to stick the adventures.” It should be a real, vibrant setting with its own nations, cultures, subraces... and house rules. House rules that illustrate the unique feel of the DM’s creation. Lucky me, the unique feature of my campaign setting was cinematic swashbuckling.
And so it started, with a little change to the hit point system here, a tweak to the classes there. I won’t deny that my now-vast experience has given me an altogether unprecedented outlook of the way the d20 system on a design level, and I’m probably better for the experience –- but is my campaign? My house rules have grown into a steaming, cantankerous pustule of tables and numbers, a disgusting cancer marring the first several chapters of my campaign setting. And they still make me feel warm and fuzzy inside. So, uh, beware! Boo! Scary stuff ahead... really...
It Begins: It all seemed so simple at first. All I had to do to make my setting feel like a dangerous-yet-heroic world was to replace hit points with the Vitality/Wounds system common to many other d20 games (ask anyone; Star Wars, at its heart, is cinematic space swashbuckling). Sure, hit points stuck around in Wheel of Time and later Call of Cuthulu, but that’s mainly because the D&D game designers all hate Vitality and Wounds (how they’ve become central to d20 Modern, I’ll never figure out). But I liked them, and after a brief tenure of calling them “hit points and mortal points” in an effort to not confuse people (i.e. you still rolled hit dice) my players got completely befuddled with hits and hit points not representing actual hits. I didn’t want to go back to calling them vitality points, so in the end, after much testing and emotional trauma, the first tack-on system looked something like this:

The Fatigue Points/Hit Points System
Characters have two point totals representing their overall physical health, fatigue points (fp) and hit points (hp). Hit points represent one’s ability to withstand hits, and they are a direct measure of natural toughness. Thus, hp are based directly on constitution and size:
Fine: Con ÷ 8
Diminutive: Con ÷ 4
Tiny: Con ÷ 2
Small: Con
Medium: Con
Large: Con
Huge: Con × 2
Gargantuan: Con × 4
Colossal: Con × 8
This is assuming a creature is alive and has constitution, of course. Creatures without constitution scores determine their hit points with dice, rolling 1d10 per construct level or 1d12 per undead level. Unless a character raises his constitution or takes a Toughness feat, hit points do not rise with level.
Fatigue points represent one’s ability to dodge a wounding blow, and they are a measure of combat skill as well as current stamina. Fatigue points are determined by rolling the appropriate fatigue die and applying the character’s constitution modifier at every level (creatures with no constitution have no fatigue because they are not alive and do not tire).
Taking Damage: Most weapon “hits” do not kill a character; the struck target has managed to turn a wounding blow into a graze or near miss, and so the weapon’s damage applies to fatigue rather than hit points. For a character with no fatigue, though, bad things happen. A character with 0 fp is fatigued (-2 Str, -2 Dex, cannot run or charge) and must make an immediate Fortitude save vs. DC 10 + any hit point damage sustained or fall unconscious for 2d6 minutes. The character no longer able to dodge blows, so any subsequent damage (including excess damage from the hit that reduced the character to 0 fp) applies to hp.
Critical Hits: A critical hit bypasses any remaining fatigue points a character may have and directly damages hit points. Since this makes fighting much more lethal than normal, however, all weapons’ critical multipliers are softened one step. In addition, bonus dice of damage (from a critical multiplier, a sneak attack, or an energy weapon, for example) still damage fp, if the character has any left. This means that a longsword is now simply a “19-20” weapon, so a 19 or 20 is a threat, and a critical hit deals 1d8 damage to hp (critically hitting a character with no fp left anyway has no special effect in this case). A battleaxe, on the other hand, is 20/x2, so on a critical hit, the axe deals 1d8 hp and 1d8 fp damage (unless the character has no fatigue points left, in which case the damage would be 2d8 hp). Finally, a scythe would now be 20/x3, dealing 2d4 hp and 4d4 fp damage on a critical hit, or 6d4 hp on a crit against a victim with no fatigue points left.
Healing: Characters heal naturally at a rate of 1 fp per level and 1 hp, every eight hours of rest. Magical healing is much faster; depending on whether Lay on Hands or cure light wounds is being used, hp and fp are healed at different rates.
▪ Lay on Hands heals an amount of fatigue points equal to the paladin’s level times his charisma bonus, and 1 hit point per paladin level in a day. For example, a 5th level paladin with charisma 15 can heal 10 fp and 5 hp.
▪ Cure spells restore a number of eight-sided dice plus a modifier in fatigue points, and the modifier in hit points. For example, a 5th level cleric casting cure serious wounds restores 3d8+5 fp and 5 hp.
▪ A note on orisons: virtue grants 1 temporary fatigue point. Cure minor wounds is a useful little guy that still heals 1 hit point.
Note: The concept of fatigue replaces subdual damage, which has a number of effects on the game. Creatures with fast healing/regeneration qualities convert hp damage to fp damage and heal that at the same rate they would normally cure themselves of subdual damage. Weapons like the sap, whip, and untrained unarmed strike only deal fatigue damage, never hit damage, even on a critical hit. A critical hit with such a weapon simply bypasses the need to damage fp to render a foe unconscious; instead, the struck target makes a Fortitude save vs. DC 10 + the damage dealt, and failure drops the target into la-la-land for 2d6 minutes.

It Grows: That wasn’t so bad, was it? Well that’s what I thought, at least. Until, despite my best precautions, monster and character mortality got a bit too high. I thought I could help by reworking character defense. In keeping with the spirit of cinematic swashbuckling, I implemented the unarmored AC system used by most cinematic d20 games, particularly Star Wars and later Pulp Heroes. But I wanted to keep armor balanced, and I found a way to do so while also providing a way to keep the PCs alive a little longer.

Armor and Natural Armor
A character’s innate, experience-based defense is based on two factors: fatigue points, which tell how much stamina a character has to dodge with, and natural armor, which for PCs, gauges exactly how good the character is at dodging. Natural armor for a PC works just like natural armor for anything else: it’s ignored by touch attacks, doesn’t stack with worn armor, and should be treated like an armor bonus to AC in all respects. The formula for figuring natural armor is simple: it’s equal to a character’s base Fortitude save + 2. Oftentimes this makes for a much better AC than armor would provide.
So why wear armor and put up with the check penalty if the AC bonus is just going to get overtaken by your level? Two changes were made, the first because we liked the idea, and the second because armor had to be reworked to actually protect characters. First off, arcane spell failure was just all-out scrapped. A wizard could function just fine unarmored now, so there wasn’t much of a reason to keep them away from armor anymore (plus, we all really like the concept of armored mage knights). So the first new quality of armor is that instead of rolling a failure check, an arcane caster simply applies the armor’s check penalty to all his spell DCs.
The second new quality of armor is its ability to reduce hit (but not fatigue) damage. Each type of armor carries with it a die range representing DR. Every time a character would take hp damage, such as from a critical hit or a final blow, make an armor DR roll and subtract it from the damage taken.

[color=white]Armor Type          Base DR     Superior Materials
Padded Cloth        1d2         2d2
Leather Jerkin      1d2         2d2
Studded Leather     1d4         2d3
Chain Shirt         1d4         2d3
Hide                1d4         2d3
Scale Mail          1d6         2d4
Chainmail           1d8         2d5* 
Breastplate         1d6         2d4
Splint Mail         1d8         2d5*
Banded Mail         1d6         2d4
Half-Plate          1d10        2d6
Full Plate          1d10        2d6

Unarmored Monk**    [1d3 + 1/2 wisdom bonus + 1/5 monk level]
--
*Never seen a d5?  Just halve a d10.  I’ve never seen a d3 
either, but those are everywhere in D&D.
**Monks get innate DR replacing their wisdom- and level-based
AC bonus.[/color]

The DR works much like a damage roll, and it’s modified by an armor’s enhancement bonus (though firearms impose a general –4 penalty to the armor DR roll regardless of its quality). The DR values are not related to or based on the armors' ACs. An armor’s AC bonus represents its deflection quality; the DR, by contrast, is its stopping power. Superior materials, even ones that don’t boost AC (like dragonhide and mythrill) improve an armor’s DR. Adamant is probably the best material, since it uses the superior DR roll and adds an innate enhancement bonus.

It Spreads: Okay... so far, so good, right? I’ve got a groovy health system, nifty armor rules that aren’t half as sissified as the DR house rules people are posting on these boards (or including in the revised Star Wars d20...ick!) and you’d think I was done, right? Sadly...
There just wasn’t enough spirit yet. Cinematic swashbuckling meant deeds of dashing daring in the face of danger! It wasn’t just enough to make life more dangerous for the players; I needed to make them think that lady luck was on their side and ready to reward them for taking risks. And besides, by now things looked so much like a bastardized hybrid of d20 and video games, I figured what the hell? I wouldn’t be the first to implement a luck system, or a stunt system. Inspired by the stunt system of Dragon Fist, the core system of Alternity, and the various luck/desperation systems gracing Star Wars, d20 Modern, and Arcanum, this became the finished offspring:

Luck Points, Stunts, and Two Lucky Results

All player characters have available to them six stunts, one tied to each ability score. They are the stunts of Might (Str), Agility (Dex), Stamina (Con), Genius (Int), Perception (Wis), and Charm (Cha). At any time, a character may attempt a stunt by spending a luck point (described later). The benefit of a stunt is adding +1d4 to any d20 roll or base 10 value keyed to that statistic. Some common examples are listed below:
Might: Attack rolls, Jump checks
Agility: Initiative rolls, Reflex Saves, Armor Class, Hide checks
Stamina: Fortitude saves, Concentration checks
Genius: Wizard spell DCs, Knowledge checks
Perception: Cleric spell DCs, Will saves, Spot checks
Charm: Sorcerer spell DCs, Bluff checks
Just as characters earn feats at every 3rd level, they earn stunts at every 4th level – or rather, a boost to a stunt. At every 4th level the character may raise the die step of the stunt of his choice, from d4 to d6, d8, d10, d12, and finally d20. The stunt increases replace stat increases -– that’ll be explained in a bit too.
First, luck points. Luck points are necessary to power stunts, and characters begin with a mere 1d4 of them. Once spent, they’re gone forever, but a character earns another 1d4 with every level-up to replenish his supply (when creating a character above first level, that character should begin with 1d4 + one-half his starting level in luck points). Monsters have luck points too, equal to half their fatigue dice or hit dice (you didn’t forget already, did you? ) but for simplicity’s sake, they don’t bother with stunt increases. Just use +1d4 for all of a 1st-level monster’s stunts, and +1d6 for tougher monsters (luck generally favors the players, after all).
The First Lucky Result: Luck points provided a great way to free up the multiclassing system. As a general rule, my players and I never liked EXP penalties for multiclassing. Favored classes were too integral to balance, though, so the solution to the problem seemed to lie in keeping favored classes but ditching multiclass restrictions. How to do it? Easy: characters advancing in their favored class earn 1d6, instead of 1d4 luck points. Humans and half-elves always use six-sided dice to determine their luck points. That was painless, wasn’t it?
The Second Lucky Result: I’ll bet I’ve had you in suspense ever since I mentioned characters not earning stat increases at every 4th level (well, unless you’re one of the, like, five people who’s seen me post this house rule before). I hit upon what I felt to be a better way of increasing stats as characters advance, and it hinges on the graduated point buy and yet another “something-p” point pile: character points (cp). This system requires using the point-buy method of character creation, at whatever starting value the DM sets. Then the fun begins.
Make sure you save the base values for your stats –- keeping this system balanced requires ignoring racial, enhancement, and innate bonuses to ability scores for the purpose of stat increases. It’s a simple rule, really: you earn 1 cp every time you level up, and it costs the same as the point-buy to raise a stat, so everything up to 14 costs 1 point, a 15 or 16 costs 2 points, a 17 or 18 costs 3 points, and everything above 18 costs 4 points (4 points is the cap because standard characters are able to raise any stat every four levels, which is what this system does while dropping “slots”).

And now it won’t die: There you have it. D&D as I play it, geared towards high adventure, daring, chaos, and fatality rate. What are some of your earth-shattering house rules? If you have anything as drastic as this, post it for the world to see (and no, cat ninjas with special limb-lopping critical hit charts does not constitute drastically creative house-ruling). Ω

 

[Crothian]

I used to until I looked at it and went "I don't want mess with it anymore." It became too much and got confusing when we added new players. So, now I like to go with simple. But yours dounds pretty good and I hope it works well for you.

 

[Jack Daniel]

Used to what, make house rules?

 

[Jerrid Al-Kundo]

Ehr... Not so bad. Not quite what I've used, but not nearly as horrid as some garden-utensil wielding individuals would like to make house rules sound like. I mean, of course one change feeds another; I'm sure it happened when the Core Rules were being developed as well. Natural part of development.

Personally, I just use W&V with Defense Bonuses (=Ref+2) and a simple Armor/DR system. No problems there.

 

[Crothian]

Used to what, make house rules?

Used to have long and complex house rules like what you have posted. I still have house rules, but I try to keep them simple.

 

[Corinth]

This is one of the reasons why I've come to hate house rules, and I refuse to use any unless it is absolutely necessary to get the job done.

 

[Jack Daniel]

This is one of the reasons why I've come to hate house rules, and I refuse to use any unless it is absolutely necessary to get the job done.

What is one of the reasons? My goodness, but people love saying things without explaining what they mean on these boards! We're not telepaths, ya know.

 

[Breakstone]

Yeah, I don't like to unless it happens.



On houserules: I very rarely find myself using house rules in my campaigns. Occasionally I make a new race, or use an alternate class, but it just seems to complicate things up.

 

[gyn ruhmie]

.. sometimes when your digging yourself into a deep hole - you should take the time to admire your construction

 

[Jack Daniel]

Yeah, I don't like to unless it happens.



On houserules: I very rarely find myself using house rules in my campaigns. Occasionally I make a new race, or use an alternate class, but it just seems to complicate things up.

I like that.