What amount of houseruling stops D&D from being D&D?

[Fenes 2]

After a rather nasty discussion on the KotDT boards, where I was pointedly told that my campaign was like a computer game, and that I was not roleplaying I would like to check what consists D&D and what not.

(I won't ask what is roleplaying and what not. Suffice to say that I have never been considered a minmaxer or a powergamer, and if my group can spend a whole session just getting ready for a reception (Buying clothes, hunting down invitations, gossipping etc.) then I do not doubt that we are roleplaying.)

But my question is: When does your campaign stop being D&D?

One of my most prominent house rules are that I do not kill off PCs without a warning, that we do not deal out XP after an adventure or session until we level, but simply deal out levels after a mini-campaign has been completed, and that we let players switch their characters without forcing them to restart at a lower level than they were.

In some minds that made my game not D&D any longer, and not a roleplaying game at all. (I do not place much faith into those opinions, because some were unable to comprehend that "I do not kill off PCs without a warning" does not equal "PCs are invincible" despite several attampets to clarify that.)

 

[S'mon]

I think your game is still D&D, although not killing PCs without a warning takes it a long way from the spirit of Gygaxian 1e.

 

[Crothian]

It stops being D&D when it feels different to you and your players. There is no magical line to cross or right or wrong answer here. I can play white wolf as if it was D&D, and it'd be D&D to me.

 

[Spatzimaus]

D&D 3E is a really open-ended system. To me, you stop being D&D when it becomes impossible to translate a vanilla 3E character into your setting.
(Example: if there are no Wizards or Clerics in your campaign, only Monte Cook Sorcerers, Psions, and Druids with Domains. Or, if I make attack rolls be a skill-based thing.)
Or, if you've changed the basic rules so much that the outcome of a typical encounter is completely different.
(Example: I remove defensive magic, remove magical armor enhancement, and lower BAB to level/2 for fighters, level/4 for rogues, and 0 for Wizards)
(Another Example: I had a DM who had decided beforehand exactly how the encounter would work out. When we started rolling unusually well or badly he fudged the DCs.)
It's still a D20 system, it may be good, but it's not D&D. This isn't always a bad thing.

What you're doing is still D&D; at least, it still fits the RULES of D&D. Their argument was that you're not following the "style". To a lot of people, "true" D&D is about Good vs. Evil hack-n-slash. Anyone who's read through Piratecat's Story Hour won't feel that way, but your mileage may vary. ((contact)'s RTTOE thread, on the other hand...)

Don't worry about it. As long as you can still keep a group of players happy, you're fine.

 

[hong]

D&D 3E is a really open-ended system. To me, you stop being D&D when it becomes impossible to translate a vanilla 3E character into your setting.
(Example: if there are no Wizards or Clerics in your campaign,

Hmm. I have no wizards or clerics in my Britannia 3E campaign. No PHB druids, paladins or monks either. Just fighters, rangers, barbarians ("berserkers"), OA shamans ("druids"), sorcerers ("mages"), knights, rogues and bards.

I still like to think the "3E" is justified, though.

 

[ConcreteBuddha]

I house-ruled that all skills are class skills for every class. (Except exclusive skills.) Then I took all of the current skills in the PHB and combined them for ease of use. Example:

I combined Move Silently and Hide into a skill called "Stealth"

Spot, Listen, Search and Scry became a skill called "Alertness"

etc...
.
.
.
We also combined the Ranger and Barbarian classes into one class, we use tech levels from Ravenloft and most PrCs have been turned into feat chains.
.
.
.
All this, and it still feels like DnD. We still smack down the bad guys, loot the bodies and get XP.

 

[Ravellion]

Another argument might be that when a new player comes into the campaign, and he doesn't mind the flavour of the campaign, but the rules are so different that he has to learn a good part of the system all over again.

Rav