What is the most overlooked rule in dnd?

[R-man]

Actually our group has used all of the above rules at one time or another, including recently we had to look up the starvation rules when we were exploring some haunted forest that among other things was causing all our food and water to go rotten, and we didn't have a cleric.

General upkeep rules are not presently in D&D, i.e. taking time to bang out the dents in your armor and sharpen your sword etc. And the above poster reminded me that we have never made mention of doing this, if only for the Rollplaying aspect.

We make good use of the encumbrance rules we have hit the maximum party load on many occasions due to our being a scour the dungeon clean style group.

The armor equiping rules have been very important every time that we are attacked at night. So much so that in one campaign the party fullplate fighter keeps a chain shirt +1 to sleep in so he has something on when we get awoken.

And yes the endurance feat is really really nice when you play with this rule (allows PC to sleep in heavy armor).

 

[silver_wizard]

The following include some of the rules I never saw enforced in both AD&D 2nd edition and D&D 3.X (I am not claiming I agree with all):

- Demihuman maximum level limits
- 10% more XP if character has 16 or more in class primary ability
- Ammunition: ordinary (i.e. non magical) arrows, darts, bullets, bolts etc. never seem to end
- Armour damage: it doesn't matter if the fighter just got out of a fight against demons in which he got so many hits as to lose all his hp but one, his armour will be shining like new the following morning!
- encumbrance: only non-encumbered and fully encumbered matter. All intermediate categories do not exist.
- Penalties for sleeping in armour / need assistance to get into armour
- food and drink: unless special conditions prevail (i.e. characters trapped in a room with no visible exits for a long time), it is assumed that characters always have adequate rations with them.

 

[diaglo]

Encumbrance.

ditto.

i carry infinite slings with every single d02 PC i create.


another one is food and water.


go for a trip to put X in slot Y and get there in one week. no talk about food or water.



also environment. no talk about the proper gear. like winter clothes. or armor in the desert. or sunburning or potty breaks. or...

 

[NiTessine]

Those aren't so much "overlooked" as they are "untrue."

Intriguing. There's at least one PC who would live if it weren't for a contrary rules interpretation.

 

[dagger]

A natural 1 (the d20 comes up 1) on a saving throw is always a failure (and may cause damage to exposed items; see Items Surviving after a Saving Throw).



Bolded part gets overlooked all the time.

 

[Krelios]

Spell Components

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

At higher levels, we ignore questons about inn cost and other travel expenses.
We also get more generous with encumbrance, though usually, at high levels, fighters have incredible amounts of strength and the group has extradimensional carrying equipment, so it's not really an issue.

At low levels, all these matters are an issue. And even at high levels, we usually don't ignore most special rules. (and some become especially interesting, like the rules for massive damage, or rolling 1 on reflex saves...)

 

[jodyjohnson]

I would say anything having to do with having hands free.

Drinking potions with a shield in one hand and a weapon in the other.

Reading a scroll with a weapon in the off hand.

Divine spellcasters with shields and weapons out and casting.


Also retrieving items always seems to end up taking up a lower cost action (HHH is free, pouch is free, bandolier is free, backpack is move, etc)

 

[satori01]

Death from Massive damage.

 

[Garnfellow]

Death from Massive damage.

I just used this rule for the first time ever this last monday. The kenku rogue/assassin and the human monk were mixing it up with a couple of fire giants. Both giants critted with their greatswords (beefed up with Power Attacks), doing 6d6+34 damage. This was enough to hurt both PCs badly, but not drop them outright. But both triggered massive damage checks.

The kenku had a terrible Fort save, but the player rolled a natural 20.

The monk had an excellent Fort save, but the player rolled a 3. Dead monk.