D&D 5E What houserules do we assume is common in the community?

[Osgood]

Slow natural healing from the DMG (I just can't get behind full healing after an 8 hour nap).

 

[Clint_L]

Wow. That would be some super alien thinking among the groups I game with. Aside from us not using combat fumble rules (which really are fun killers for fighters), my players cheer when halfling luck gets triggered.
Plus the cries of dismay when the halfling rolls a 2 (aka, the halfling "one") just get me to trot out the Nelson Munz "HA ha!" response.

I don't use specific fumble rules. The players and I collaborate on what happens when anyone, including a creature or NPC, rolls a critical failure, and we are always focused on what would be awesome/interesting in the story. Natural 1s are always a good time - the goal is not to punish but to add a surprising twist to the story. In combat, we tend to deemphasize them, actually, unless they are connected to a skill check or come at a crucial moment - it is skill checks where they really shine.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

For example, RAW, a warlock cannot use a rod of the pact keeper to cast eldritch blast. They hold the rod in their off hand and the rod adds power to the spell, but the spell cannot be cast through the rod per se, it's just their while the spell is cast freehand.

There is no rule that says you can't add additional components to a spell.

 

[Stormonu]

One of my players pointed out that fumbles generally only punished the weapon-wielding characters (and usually melee users at that) and encouraged spellcasters to rely more on saving throw spells. Rather than completely drop my fumble rules*, I modified saves so they also had fumble/crits.

* I use a "on roll of 1, roll again - only if you fail the 2nd time is it actually a fumble" (thus as the characters become more compentant through leveling, it's more likely they turn a critical fail into just a failure). On a roll of 20 for a save, not only do you succeed you can allow another individual to reroll a failed save (if an area effect) or if a single target spell (or area effect where everyone succeeded), force the caster to save against their own spell as if it reflected/backfired back against them.

 

[OldSchoolGamerGirl]

One of my players pointed out that fumbles generally only punished the weapon-wielding characters (and usually melee users at that) and encouraged spellcasters to rely more on saving throw spells. Rather than completely drop my fumble rules*, I modified saves so they also had fumble/crits.

worse it does more damage to people who make more attacks.

in spells this makes eldritch blast crit fail many times more then flame bolt
in weapons a fighter at level 11 who is the pinicale of his trade in warcraft makes 3 attacks per round and action surges 2 or 3 times a day... so in a 6 encounter day with average encounter being 3 rounds you have around 60 attack rolls... 1 in 20 will be a 1, so on average 3/day you fumble. While a sneak thief rogue with little combat training is attacking 1/round and that is 18 attack rolls per day on average, so the trained warrior is at best 3 times more likely to fumble then the rogue.

 

[Oofta]

I don't use specific fumble rules. The players and I collaborate on what happens when anyone, including a creature or NPC, rolls a critical failure, and we are always focused on what would be awesome/interesting in the story. Natural 1s are always a good time - the goal is not to punish but to add a surprising twist to the story. In combat, we tend to deemphasize them, actually, unless they are connected to a skill check or come at a crucial moment - it is skill checks where they really shine.

Fumbles on 1s never made sense to me. The wizard that casts spells that require saving throws never gets a fumble. The high level rogue doing ungodly damage rarely gets them. That high level fighter, the penultimate warrior is going to get them practically every encounter when they get to high enough level.

If you like it, fine. But I would never play a fighter in a group that uses them, if I even play with that group at all.

 

[Laurefindel]

Re: fumbles

I usually rule that natural 1s and 20s are automatic failures/successes, mostly because if I call for a roll, it’s because there’s a chance of failure/success (I used to call this the “shoestring fallacy” in 3e era).

Consequences are variable depending on context. A critical failure on an Acrobatics check when the character is jumping from roof to roof after the villain doesn’t necessarily means a fall. It probably just means that the villain got away with no way of the character catching up.

I also often include semi-scripted complications in story and combat that are triggered by PC nat 1s on skills/attacks and NPC nat 20s on skills/saves. Things like reinforcement, or “environmental attack”, and other things that complicates the characters’ life without making them looking like buffoons.

 

[ECMO3]

Of course we play with natural 1s meaning critical failures! Because we play for fun, and critical failures are fun, even more so than critical successes. We've had whole story arcs come out of critical failures. Plus, including them makes dice rolls way more exciting.

Critical failures have as a houserules been failures themselves in the few games I have played with them. I don't think most tables and players who have tried critical fails enjoy them as a mechanic.

If you have these though, then yes it makes sense to ban Halflings because the race is OP compared to others at such a table if you don't ban it or nerf it.

 

[ECMO3]

Fumbles on 1s never made sense to me. The wizard that casts spells that require saving throws never gets a fumble. The high level rogue doing ungodly damage rarely gets them. That high level fighter, the penultimate warrior is going to get them practically every encounter when they get to high enough level.

If you like it, fine. But I would never play a fighter in a group that uses them, if I even play with that group at all.

depending on the "type" of failure it is often better for such a fighter not to attack at all at high level. For example if you damage allies on a crit failure it is usually better not to attack at all at a high level because your attacks are not as powerful as the effects your allies can bring into play and you can seriously screw those up (your cleric loses concentration on Banishment because YOU fumbled and hit him with your sword).

At high level, this makes one of the weaker classes in the game (fighter) near useless or worse counterproductive in combat.

 

[Atomoctba]

Fumbles on 1s never made sense to me. The wizard that casts spells that require saving throws never gets a fumble.

Except if you also houserule that a nat 20 in a save is no damage at all, as my GM does.