D&D 5E Your Favorite 5e Houserule

[auburn2]

One of my favorite things to do as a DM is to fiddle with the RAW to adjust them to my liking. And I am sure that most of you do too. I always like to hear what other people come up with in that regard. It is great inspiration and sometimes you find a well thought out houserule that you ask yourself how you could have ever played without it.
Therefore I want to ask you, what your favorite 5e houserule is, that you just can't live without anymore.

As a DM there are two house rules I always play with:

1. Picking up a weapon off the ground takes an action. You can kick it with your free action, but you need to use an action to actually pick it up. Drawing a weapon from a scabard is a free action and dropping a weapon is completely free. This has a substantial effect on gameplay, for casters in particular. As a player, most DMs I play with have not implemented this, however one of my normal players wanted to try and DM a game with our group and me as a player and she did implement it. I found out when I tried to pick up a weapon off the ground ... what is good for the goose!

2. I allow versatile weapons to gain -5 hit/+10 damage from GWM if they are wielded with 2 hands. This does not affect gameplay that much. Usually the only thing it does is let the one player who always gets this feat use magic longswords when he would otherwise not. This could be a big boost for a Monk with spears and staffs, but I have not had that at my table yet.

 

[Stormonu]

As a DM there are two house rules I always play with:

1. Picking up a weapon off the ground takes an action. You can kick it with your free action, but you need to use an action to actually pick it up. Drawing a weapon from a scabard is a free action and dropping a weapon is completely free. This has a substantial effect on gameplay, for casters in particular. As a player, most DMs I play with have not implemented this, however one of my normal players wanted to try and DM a game with our group and me as a player and she did implement it. I found out when I tried to pick up a weapon off the ground ... what is good for the goose!

Curious on why there is no action cost (even bonus action) for drawing weapon from scabbard if you are requiring an action to pick objects up? Also, have you considered changing the "picking up" to a free action, but provokes AoA? I can see someone picking something up in the clear easily, but not if an armed opponent is standing over it.

 

[cbwjm]

Only problem I saw with Guidance is the Cleric wanting to retroactively apply it to every skill check another PC made, as if it were a Reaction. Just enforcing play procedure & RAW sorts that out.

This is what I do, no retroactive applications sortsor any issues. In particular knowledge or perception checks are typically to late to apply guidance. Anything that allows time to be taken is generally fine though so it can, for instance, easily be applied if the thief is going to go stealthy to shoot ahead or is going to attempt to remove a trap.

 

[auburn2]

Curious on why there is no action cost (even bonus action) for drawing weapon from scabbard if you are requiring an action to pick objects up? Also, have you considered changing the "picking up" to a free action, but provokes AoA? I can see someone picking something up in the clear easily, but not if an armed opponent is standing over it.

Drawing one weapon is interact with object, which I call a free action above. RAW picking up off the ground should be the same. In my mind and in my game, drawing from a scabbard or off your back where it is slung or whatever is an easy and it is probably something you even practice in front of a mirror at night. Picking up off the ground in combat is a lot harder and it made sense to me and my table to not allow this. To be honest when we started 5e, we were learning as we went, and made it an action before I fully understood the rules. When I finally did understand them, by that time, that is the way we had done it, and it made sense.

 

[Doc_Klueless]

The only house rules I've been using lately are:

• Characters gain 1/2 proficiency bonus on Non-proficient Saving Throws. I like for character to grow across the board and having certain saving throws stagnant bothered me.
• I use what I call The Heroic Array (16, 15, 13, 12, 11, 10). Basically, the Standard Array (15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8) with a few bumps equivalent to about two ASIs. I use this for a few reasons. I like the feel of it. I don't like Negative Ability Score Modifiers. The increase in Odd numbered Abilities make it so the first ASI taken by players sees a change in Ability Score Modifiers. And since my campaign arc seldom go past 10th level, it makes feats more of an options instead of having to bump stats. Feat selection by players seemed to increase. This is a BIG change though and really changes the dynamics of the game.

I've pretty much discontinued all the others I had used.

 

[embee]

Drawing one weapon is interact with object, which I call a free action above. RAW picking up off the ground should be the same. In my mind and in my game, drawing from a scabbard or off your back where it is slung or whatever is an easy and it is probably something you even practice in front of a mirror at night. Picking up off the ground in combat is a lot harder and it made sense to me and my table to not allow this. To be honest when we started 5e, we were learning as we went, and made it an action before I fully understood the rules. When I finally did understand them, by that time, that is the way we had done it, and it made sense.

I always play with picking up a weapon as an action. It's also why if player rolls a 1, I don't have them auto-fumble their weapon. Though a lot of folk do, that's insane for an experienced adventurer. It says that 5% of the time, an adventurer will drop his/her weapon (and not do any damage) and then not be able to attack the next round (not being able to do any damage). I prefer to have a player roll a d20 again when rolling a 1. Roll 2 or higher and the attack misses. Roll a 1 again and then, and only then, do they fumble a weapon.

Picking up a weapon should require an action. To keep things fair, no auto-fumbling.

 

[S'mon]

I have picking up a weapon = standing from prone, so half move (which provokes Opp Att in my game). I think that's a nice middle road, and also makes sense in-world.

 

[Rabulias]

Curious on why there is no action cost (even bonus action) for drawing weapon from scabbard if you are requiring an action to pick objects up?

Not to speak for Auburn2, but to me, scabbards and holsters and the like are made to provide quick and easy access to a weapon; it's part of their design. I imagine anyone who has to fight with a weapon will usually carry it in a way to make it as accessible as possible.

 

[Greg K]

On the issue of Guidance, some thoughts I have had since seeing the spell
1. For clerics, limiting its use to abilitychecks related to the domain of a cleric's deity.
2 Basing it on a documentary that I saw on an indigenous South American shaman. In the documentary, the shaman could not identify for the illness afflicting a sick girl so he cast a ritual to send his spirit companion out to ask other spirits to identify the illness and how to treat it. It took some time for the spirit to return with an answer. So, for druids, I am thinking of increasing the casting time and then setting a waiting for the spirits to return with an answer. In addition, I am thinking of limiting the benefit to the druid and for use on Medicine and knowledge checks- perhaps removing it from the spell list and allowing the druid to cast it once per short or long rest (not sure which).

 

[jayoungr]

Making casters roll to cast. Magic should never be automatic.

So you mean they have to succeed on two rolls for a spell to damage an enemy? Or do you mean that missed attack rolls are spell failures?