Variant rules and PHB 2

[hopeless]

I am in the process of starting a Kingdoms of Kalamar campaign using 3.0 rules and have made some modifications prior to reading the PHB 2.
Currently I've increased the HD of Sorcerors to d6, added Bluff, Diplomacy and Intimidate as class skills and altered Paladins so that a Paladin can serve any of the gods in KOK in fact I've already run an adventure where a Paladin of the Knight of the Gods has met and bested a Paladin of the Rotlord in cahoots with a Wererat Thieves Guild.
I am wondering about altering the other classes since I find cleric's a little overpowered since the games I've played in tend to ignore the importance of domains and make the healing gods decidedly less important.
I was already thinking of removing the domain spells and only allow a cleric to spontaneous cast those spells listed under their domains instead of curing or inflict spells where in the PNB 2 they indicate it should be restricted to just one of the domains rather than both.
What do you think should I leave it to what I altered before or is there any points you want to raise regarding what I've altered before (ie Paladins or Sorcerors) or what I'm looking at now (Clerics)?

 

[delericho]

I like your changes to the Sorcerer. In fact, you might want to consider giving them 4 skill points per level, especially if you're going to allow the Beguiler and/or Warmage to be used.

I don't like your changes to the Paladin, but that's just my own biases showing - I like my Paladins LG-only.

As for the Cleric, you're likely to find that removing spontaneous healing actually makes them more powerful, as suddenly they don't find themselves dropping all their best spells to heal their comrades. One option I considered was removing their Heavy Armour Proficiency (and maybe Shield Proficiency too), which has the effect of dropping their AC by a good few points, or costing them a feat to get it back.

I do, however, agree with your analysis - the Cleric is the most powerful core class, followed closely by the Druid (pre-polymorph errata, anyway).

 

[hopeless]

Reg: Variant rules

Have been wondering about druids too since in KOK they have weapons and armour made from bronze, iron and steel and thought about removing the weapons and armour restrictions and simply saying druids cann use light & medium armour, all shields, all simple and martial weapons and then put in something that their ethos prohibits them from suing steel.
The PHB 2's take on this was to remove the Summon Nature's Ally and give them the ability to wild shape into one specific form (will reread this as it also mentions removing the wildshape ability at later levels).
I played in a Greyhawk game where another player played a Paladin and to avoid repeating myself he ran a zealot who thought nothing about killing a helpless goblin ignoring the pleas of the rest of the party when they were questioning the goblin who had been chained to a wall and abused by her clan before being found.
I recently reread a Forgotten Realms novel named Thornhold and understand where he got such ideas from but still find the idea that there can only be LG paladins ridiculous since I have always seen Paladins as holy warriors of a faith and to say only one god has Paladins when you've got players pulling these kind of stunts and claiming they're still following theior code makes it all the more important that there must be some force to balance their flawed critieria.

 

[delericho]

I played in a Greyhawk game where another player played a Paladin and to avoid repeating myself he ran a zealot who thought nothing about killing a helpless goblin ignoring the pleas of the rest of the party when they were questioning the goblin who had been chained to a wall and abused by her clan before being found.

I recently reread a Forgotten Realms novel named Thornhold and understand where he got such ideas from...

Such a paladin wouldn't have lasted in my games. He would have lost his paladin status with the killing of the helpless goblin (assuming there wasn't more to the story than has been recounted here). He would have lost his LG alignment shortly thereafter, if the behaviour you have described is indicative of his general behaviour. It sounds closer to CN or CE than LG.

but still find the idea that there can only be LG paladins ridiculous since I have always seen Paladins as holy warriors of a faith and to say only one god has Paladins

That's where we differ. I see the Paladin as the champion of all that is right and good and true in the world. They may or may not follow a god IMC. But that's just a matter of taste; your interpretation is every bit as valid as mine.

when you've got players pulling these kind of stunts and claiming they're still following theior code makes it all the more important that there must be some force to balance their flawed critieria.

Yeah. As I said, I like my Paladins LG-only. A player who doesn't want to adhere to that code of behaviour would be well advised to play something else in my campaign, because they will lose their Paladin status. (Which is not to say I forbid Paladins from acting however the player wants. But I do enforce the consequences of their actions.)

 

[hopeless]

Reg: Variant rules

The player who ran the Paladin that ran into the Paladin of the Rotlord believed that he followed a virtue rather than specifically a god and when last noted his Paladin was originally from the world of Dragonlance stranded on Tellene around the time Tiamat stole his world. The closest god to the one he served was the Knight of the Gods, but I had to admit he was the best Paladin player I've ever witnessed mnaging to use his code to defeat traps I was afraid were almost a guaranteed TPK.
After seeing this other player run his character which was effectively a noble born from the Shield Lands trained as a Paladin of Hieronymous in the order based in Greyhawk, well the slaying of the goblin was just the tip of the iceberg and I have already doen a thread on this subject just trying to understand how the heck the DM actually agreed he didn't violate his code when he's been breaking it ever since the campaign he briefly ran started!
Anyway I suspect I better limit this to Good and Evil rather than Law and Chaos since that seems more a likely basis for countering the efforts of such characters.
Out of curiosity if your dm had just told you that the little cave you've just found holds a goblin thats been chained to the wall and looks visibly abused and after questioning her since there are only two characters able to converse in goblin (and the Paladin isn't either of them) then the eprson running the Paladin deliberately attempts to kill the prisoner over the objections of a LG Monk and a NG Halfling Sorceror who is prompted to help the goblin escape only to have the Paladin run them both down so he can hack the goblin down from behind. Would you be surprised to know that the player used 1st edition rules (and he alone used since noone else knew about that detail at the time) to get his hands on a set of full plate even though he had claimed to only want the character as one off since he wanted to run a rogue...