Doc_Klueless
Doors and Corners
Currently I am using (I guess) quite a few variants in my On-Line game and for the couple of one-offs I ran during my vacation, but they all kind of fall in 4 broad categories:
CHARACTER VARIENTS:
Complex Skill Checks (UA81) – Awesome for increasing the nailbiting suspense of disarming that trap and opening that lock, but not really all that good with anything else, IMO. Probably will drop this as it doesn’t add all that much.
Spelltouched Feats (UA92) – Haven’t been used yet, but they’re there.
Craft Points (UA97) – This has come in really handy as it’s totally axed out the “down” time needed for the wizard to create magic items and the dwarf cleric to make her special “devotional” weapons.
ADVENTURING:
Defensive Bonus (UA109), Armor as Damage Reduction (UA111) – Much as the Behind the Curtain on UA112 states, it makes for characters that chose a balance of AC and DR. This tends, IME, to lead to lighter armored characters who can still make it in an adventure. It also makes those moments when the party is unarmored (court intrigue, duels, carousing about town) easier for the party to survive if blades do get drawn. It makes “The Court Jester” with Danny Kaye or Basil Rathbone possible.
Reserve Points (UA119) – Decreases need to holeup after every battle. Nothing bores me more than “We’ve won, now we rest. We’ve won, now we rest.” Lather, rinse, repeat.
Action Points (UA122) – Adds that extra BAM! of spice in my adventure gumbo! Like it very much.
Taken all together, these (Defensive Bonus, Armor as Damage Reduction, Reserve Points Action Points) rules have turned my more traditional hack-n-slash game into a swashbuckling, derring-do, edge-of-the-seat hack-n-slash game. (We do hack-n-slash veerrrry well.)
MAGIC:
Magic Rating (UA135) – I’ve always disliked the fact that if you switched spell-casting classes, your power-level with spells you already knew didn’t really improve (though you might be casting those spells over and over again during adventures), this fixes that to my liking.
Metamagic Component (UA139) – It’s a flavor rule, really. But a good flavor. It’s been used several times. Shopping for/collecting/questing for the components have made good adventure hooks.
Spontaneous Metamagic: Daily Uses (UA152) – VASTLY increased the number of times Metamagic has been used in my game. That can only be a good thing. My Wizard player loves it. He had all these metamagic feats that he wasn’t using because he, like me, is a complete dullard when it comes to preselecting spell for adventures, which leads us to…
Spell Points (UA153) – Personally, I dislike the Vancian Magic System. I can play it; I can run it; And I can have fun doing so. I just find Spell Point systems more fun. This variant increases flexibility without increasing World-Shattering-Power!!! Plus it’s not so complicated that my less inclined players don’t have to have calculators or sliderule to figure it out.
Item Familiarss (UA170) – It’s there to be used, but nobody’s used it yet.
Incantations (UA174) – AWESOME for that evil sorcerer in the tower who’s trying to complete his Cthulhu-Summoning incantation before the PCs can spoil the day!
CAMPAIGNS:
Honor (UA185) – Since I’ve replace alignment (see Taint), I’m using Honor as basically the opposite of Taint. It’s worked out well.
Taint (UA189) – I’ve replaced the alignment system with Taint. I wanted something sPoOoOoKiEr than just evil alignments and Taint gives that to me. Plus, it really discourages evil behavior from my more schizophrenic party members. The only complication has been using Taint with Paladins, so I made up a small houserule that Paladins cannot have a taint within 20 points of his than his Honor score. So, if Paladin’s start with a Honor Score of 25 (for Lawful Good), they can’t have a Taint score of 5 or more.
Taint Prestige Classes (UA191) – A couple of tainted NPC have used these TPCs. They’ve worked well. Scared the hell out of the group!
Level-Independent XP Awards (UA213) – I like this because it keeps the math for handing out XP to a minimum and it’s got an Old School ™ feel to it!
All in all, the UA is my favorite non-core book. It gets the most use, fondling, hugs, kisses . . . er . . . I like it a lot.
CHARACTER VARIENTS:
Complex Skill Checks (UA81) – Awesome for increasing the nailbiting suspense of disarming that trap and opening that lock, but not really all that good with anything else, IMO. Probably will drop this as it doesn’t add all that much.
Spelltouched Feats (UA92) – Haven’t been used yet, but they’re there.
Craft Points (UA97) – This has come in really handy as it’s totally axed out the “down” time needed for the wizard to create magic items and the dwarf cleric to make her special “devotional” weapons.
ADVENTURING:
Defensive Bonus (UA109), Armor as Damage Reduction (UA111) – Much as the Behind the Curtain on UA112 states, it makes for characters that chose a balance of AC and DR. This tends, IME, to lead to lighter armored characters who can still make it in an adventure. It also makes those moments when the party is unarmored (court intrigue, duels, carousing about town) easier for the party to survive if blades do get drawn. It makes “The Court Jester” with Danny Kaye or Basil Rathbone possible.
Reserve Points (UA119) – Decreases need to holeup after every battle. Nothing bores me more than “We’ve won, now we rest. We’ve won, now we rest.” Lather, rinse, repeat.
Action Points (UA122) – Adds that extra BAM! of spice in my adventure gumbo! Like it very much.
Taken all together, these (Defensive Bonus, Armor as Damage Reduction, Reserve Points Action Points) rules have turned my more traditional hack-n-slash game into a swashbuckling, derring-do, edge-of-the-seat hack-n-slash game. (We do hack-n-slash veerrrry well.)
MAGIC:
Magic Rating (UA135) – I’ve always disliked the fact that if you switched spell-casting classes, your power-level with spells you already knew didn’t really improve (though you might be casting those spells over and over again during adventures), this fixes that to my liking.
Metamagic Component (UA139) – It’s a flavor rule, really. But a good flavor. It’s been used several times. Shopping for/collecting/questing for the components have made good adventure hooks.
Spontaneous Metamagic: Daily Uses (UA152) – VASTLY increased the number of times Metamagic has been used in my game. That can only be a good thing. My Wizard player loves it. He had all these metamagic feats that he wasn’t using because he, like me, is a complete dullard when it comes to preselecting spell for adventures, which leads us to…
Spell Points (UA153) – Personally, I dislike the Vancian Magic System. I can play it; I can run it; And I can have fun doing so. I just find Spell Point systems more fun. This variant increases flexibility without increasing World-Shattering-Power!!! Plus it’s not so complicated that my less inclined players don’t have to have calculators or sliderule to figure it out.
Item Familiarss (UA170) – It’s there to be used, but nobody’s used it yet.
Incantations (UA174) – AWESOME for that evil sorcerer in the tower who’s trying to complete his Cthulhu-Summoning incantation before the PCs can spoil the day!
CAMPAIGNS:
Honor (UA185) – Since I’ve replace alignment (see Taint), I’m using Honor as basically the opposite of Taint. It’s worked out well.
Taint (UA189) – I’ve replaced the alignment system with Taint. I wanted something sPoOoOoKiEr than just evil alignments and Taint gives that to me. Plus, it really discourages evil behavior from my more schizophrenic party members. The only complication has been using Taint with Paladins, so I made up a small houserule that Paladins cannot have a taint within 20 points of his than his Honor score. So, if Paladin’s start with a Honor Score of 25 (for Lawful Good), they can’t have a Taint score of 5 or more.
Taint Prestige Classes (UA191) – A couple of tainted NPC have used these TPCs. They’ve worked well. Scared the hell out of the group!
Level-Independent XP Awards (UA213) – I like this because it keeps the math for handing out XP to a minimum and it’s got an Old School ™ feel to it!
All in all, the UA is my favorite non-core book. It gets the most use, fondling, hugs, kisses . . . er . . . I like it a lot.
