What's the strangest house rule you've ever heard of?

[Viking Bastard]

I'm not sure if it constitutes as weird or not, but If I'm running a
very cinematic game, I don't award players for the opponents
they kill, but how they kill them. If they can find interesting
'kewl' cinematic ways of killing them, they'd be showered with XP,
but if they'd do a standard "I stab him with my longsword" they'd
get less.

Also, the villains would get classified into two groups: Grunts and
Bosses. A Grunt would be all the goblin hordes or guards, the
name/faceless brute, while the Bosses would be the Orc captain
or the Evil Mage (tm) or other larger opponents.

When fightin' Grunts, damage would be directly proportional with
the kill method. More neat the kill, more damage given. If it was
inventive enough, autokill was guaranteed.

Oh, and you couldn't use the exact same method twice, at least
not on Bosses. You could use the same ones on Grunts, just
never twice in the same session and the 'move's' value went
down with each use.

 

[Viking Bastard]

I hate having the last post in a thread.

 

[Chronosome]

Here's a pair of "what I do" house rules related to some discussion in this thread:

-When someone's taking too long, "chessing" a combat action (in the past I've had at least two players notorious for this) I bust out "okay, you're delaying" after about thirty seconds. That way, the combat environment is changing around them, so they're forced to think a little quicker in the future... And, hey, that's part of what the delay action is! A PC taking some time to wait and think...

-If a newbie shows up to the table, or a PC dies that player's allowed to make a character one level lower than the highest PC's level. This doesn't let the new guy overshadow the fact that the original party has earned their place, IMO.

And here's two house rules you guys might think are strange:

--In a great game I've played in, run by another EN Worlder, PCs didn't roll HP--every character got 75% of their maximum. (My DM's attempt at keeping character generation less random and fairer to the players.)

--In the game I ran, getting raised from the dead incurred no level or Constitution loss...but you could only die three times. Your third death was your last. In a good, character-rich game, I think death is its own punishment...I don't believe a character should lose a level because of bad luck. I even had an ancient religious myth called "The Pact of Three" which explained it.

 

[Ashe]

We were in a play yourself campaign only it was really cool.

When we were "sucked in" on our way to the realm our bodies were transformed, knowledge, and training was given. So that way we had the stats of our characters we rolled up, and our ages were certainly older than what we actually were. It worked out really well because we had instant group closeness.

Before starting the DM did poll the players to see if we had ever been drunk, did drugs, seen a dead body, and other experiences that may shock a person when they are first confronted with it.

It was cool too because anything we knew here, prior to being transported we knew there. No one really tried to find out how to make explosives or anything, but it was cool.

Now one of the players decided to DM and where the bad idea came in is where anything you had with you that day was transported with you. Now that was dumb and needless to say, ridiculous, (but then I say it anyway so it must be needed on some level)

 

[Kahuna Burger]

I hate having the last post in a thread.

funny, it always gives me a warm fuzzy feeling...

An inadvertant houserule in a group I used to belong to gave the hide in plain sight ability pretty much free, because hide checks were opposed by straight spot checks. You could hide in a bare corridor, while opening and going through a door, in the middle of an empty street, as long as your hide check was higher than their spot.

At some point I believe situational modifiers did occur to the DM.

Kahuna Burger

 

[Kahuna Burger]

Now one of the players decided to DM and where the bad idea came in is where anything you had with you that day was transported with you. Now that was dumb and needless to say, ridiculous, (but then I say it anyway so it must be needed on some level)

Ya know, as a macgyver addict, it doesn't sound bad at all - your opinion may or may not be needed, but it doesn't go without saying...

Kahuna Burger

 

[Skinwalker]

Wierdest house rule I ever heard of: All male characters have to roll for genitalia size, all female characters have to roll for bust size. I can only imagine the racial adjustment charts! (*chuckle*)

Anyway, I sincerely hope that since then that particular DM has gotten a life, preferably one that no longer involves RPGs.

 

[Ashe]

Ya know, as a macgyver addict, it doesn't sound bad at all - your opinion may or may not be needed, but it doesn't go without saying...

Kahuna Burger

Well it got silly too in that it showed how some people think big, but really forget the details. Like bringing old army C rations. Good idea right? Only if you remember a can opener to make it easier to open.

Or how about a lighter, but forget to check if it has fluid.

I'm a Macgyver buff as well, so don't get me wrong I thought it was great, I brought my swiss army knife, my kris sword, walkie talkies, with extra batteries, oh yeah and my shotgun with lots of ammo.

Like I said, it got pretty ridiculous.

 

[Kahuna Burger]

I'm a Macgyver buff as well, so don't get me wrong I thought it was great, I brought my swiss army knife, my kris sword, walkie talkies, with extra batteries, oh yeah and my shotgun with lots of ammo.

Like I said, it got pretty ridiculous.

I think I misinterpreted... the dm actually told you in advance that anything you brought with you would be transported? OK, thats kinda silly...

My brother played in a game where they made characters for themselves with everthing they had with them on the first session - no advanced warning, and it was at the GM's house so it was just normal carry around stuff... Of course my bro being himself, his normal carry around stuff was pretty impressive.

Kahuna Burger

 

[Chimera]

I'm a Macgyver buff as well, so don't get me wrong I thought it was great, I brought my swiss army knife, my kris sword, walkie talkies, with extra batteries, oh yeah and my shotgun with lots of ammo.

Like I said, it got pretty ridiculous.

Um, yeah. Sorry, but I don't want a bunch of gamers dragging knives and possibly loaded guns into my house. Especially some of the people I've gamed with.

I own several guns, but have had some bad experiences with other people's seriously improper handling of firearms.