So, this is sort of a repost of a rules alteration I suggested a short while ago. It's cleaned up, I believe, and it has a new name, as the previous name was eerily similar to the name of another poster's eerily similar idea.
The goals here are twofold: 1) Remove item dependency from the game. PC's are heroes and should be heroes regardless of what "stuff" they happen to own. 2) "Fix" the math behind the game.
Now, by "fix," I mean that I am altering the math to meet what I believe was the original goal. Players will maintain the same relative attack and defense values from level 1-30. If they hit a Lv+1 enemy on a 10 at level 1, they will hit a Lv+1 enemy on a 10 at level 30. This has the added side benefit of allowing DM's to easily calibrate enemies to match whatever difficulty they want.
Also, keep in mind that while I actually don't want any magic items or Rituals in the game at all (unless it's a very special artifact style item or other MacGuffin), there's no reason you can't use these rules, too. I'll have a special section at the end on how to keep those things in the game with my alterations in mind.
Without the treasure system, there is room for all sorts of new wrinkles to the game. You can actually, effectively, run an adventure in which money is precious. PC's might actually appreciate Gold and how rare it is--how the average person is unlikely to see even 100 gold total in their lifetime, even though PC's are throwing 100 gold around like it was pocket change, even in the latter half of the Heroic tier.
Anyway, without further ado, here's how it's done in five easy steps:
1) Characters add: their full level to attacks and defenses (rather than half their level); half their level (rounded down) to damage rolls; and their full level as a additional damage on a critical hit (so a critical hit would actually add your level 1.5 times).
2) Magic Items and Rituals are removed from the game completely. As it is now impossible to acquire Masterwork Armor, characters wearing Heavy Armor in the paragon tier receive a +2 bonus to AC, and characters wearing Heavy Armor in the epic tier instead receive a +4 bonus to AC.
3) Monsters in the paragon tier receieve a +2 bonus to attacks and all defenses. Monsters in the epic tier instead receive a +4 bonus to attacks and all defenses.
4) All powers with neither the Implement nor Weapon keywords have their additional attack bonuses removed if the power targets Fortitude, Reflex, or Will, or replaced with a +2 if the power targets AC. At some point, I will attempt to gather a full list of the powers that are changed. 5) Escaping from a Grab is now handled as either a Strength vs. Fortitude attack, or a Dexterity vs. Reflex attack, rather than as skill checks.
I will attempt to keep this updated and eventually create a complete list, rather than just generalities (though it will take a while to get all the racial damage feats, for example).
Armor (or Shield) Expertise - No longer increases AC, though it does provide any other benefits (reducing check/speed penalties).
Any Racial feat that provides a +2 feat bonus to damage or a scaling feat bonus to damage that begins at +2 in the heroic tier - Change the feat bonus into an unscaling +1 feat bonus to damage.
Any Racial feat that provides scaling feat bonus to damage that begins at +3 in the heroic tier - Change the feat bonus into an unscaling +2 feat bonus to damage.
Implement Expertise - Removed
Paragon Defenses - Removed
Robust Defenses - Removed
Versatile Expertise - Removed
Weapon Expertise - Removed
Weapon Focus - Removed
Explanation for why this works and is a good ideaShow
The normal math for players involves several different bonuses. Between level 1 and level 30, without feats, PC's will gain the following attack bonuses:
+15 from level +6 from enhancement bonuses +4 from eight attribute increases ------------ +25 total
AC Bonuses:
+15 from level +6 from enhancement bonuses +6 from some combination of attribute increases and masterwork bonuses ----------- +27 total
NAD Bonuses: +15 from level +6 enhancement bonuses +0-4 from zero to eight attribute increases ---------- +21-25 total
On the other hand, Monsters gain +29 between level 1 and 30 to all attacks and defenses, meaning that all PC's fall behind.
Now, PC's could gain a +3 feat bonus to attacks from the appropriate Expertise feat, a +1 feat bonus to AC from the appropriate Armor Expertise feat, and a +2 feat bonus to all NADs from Robust Defenses, which puts them at +28 to attacks and AC, and +23-27 to NADs, but that's actually still behind what monsters gain, and if those feat bonuses (which eclipse all other possible feats in overall effectiveness) are really part of the basic math behind the game, then they might as well just come out and say that PC's really only have 15 feats over 30 levels, rather than 18.
It is my contention that the developers of the game intended for PC and monster progression to be as close as possible, but ultimately failed, so I considered ways in which this could be done. The simplest, and most direct way is exactly what I proposed here. With a full level bonus, they are even ground with monsters in that regard, and I only had to compensate for the +4 PC's get from their attributes, meaning that I had to include the +2 paragon/+4 epic tier bonuses to Heavy Armor AC and all monster stats to even it out.
Personally, I find this to be very simple and easy. Bookkeeping is minimal, as every monster in print is still usable with only the +2 or +4 tier bonus to remember.
As a side effect of removing items, I had to deal with the loss of damage that came with it. Normally, over 30 levels, PCs will have +12 to damage (from a +6 weapon/implement and one of the following: a +6 Staff of Ruin, +6 Iron Armbands, or Dual Implement Spellcaster with a +6 off-hand Implement).
I tried to come up with a damage bonus formula that results in a +12, and they were all clumsy. It was then I realized that I could kill two more birds with a single stone here. Weapon Focus results in a +3 feat bonus to damage by the end, and it is a feat I hate with a passion. It is boring, it is practically assumed (meaning PC's really only have 14 feats), and worst of all, there is no Implement equivalent (and no, the elemental feats are not the same, as you have to jump through hoops to get them to apply to all your powers, whereas a weapon user almost has to try for it not to apply).
So, ultimately, half of the PC's level added to damage compensates perfectly for the expected +12 from items and +3 from Weapon Focus, and it also allows for the damage to be added to all those other powers you might have that currently get left by the wayside (Beast powers for Rangers, racial powers, shield powers for Fighters, etc.).
Now, if you really want to play like all the cool kids, take a look at my other super great houserules that, I believe, fix other aspects of the game. They mesh well with my altered rules, but most of them can be used without them as well.
*Under Construction* Check back later and I'll have more.
These are in no particular order:
1) The only class that I've discovered is significantly impacted (negatively, that is) by my houserules is the Predator Druid. They can't really be effective Strikers without items. In order to return some of their luster, I rule that Predator Druids get the effect of Claw Gloves as a class feature. So, when a Predator Druid makes a melee attack in Beast Form with Combat Advantage, it deals +1d10 damage.
2) Also Druid related, though this has nothing to do with my houserules, the Swarm Druid currently has no good solution to acquiring AC. To that end, Swarm Druids gain proficiency in Chainmail and remove the Light Armor only restriction from their class features.
3) I dislike "feat taxes," and I also don't like interfering with game mechanics for purely fluffy reasons. So, classes gain additional proficiencies based on their role. Now, Str/Wis Rangers, Con secondary Shamans, Barbarians that actually want their secondary stat, etc. can wear heavy armor without as much issue. It is likewise silly that a Wizard can't use all simple weapons, or why Monks, whose weapon choice doesn't even impact their powers, are limited. Note that these proficiencies are in addition to the base ones given, so Paladins don't lose Plate or anything like that.
Controller - All simple weapons, Leather Armor Defender - All simple and military weapons, Light and Heavy Shields, Armor up through Scale Leader - All simple weapons, military melee weapons, Light Shields, Armor up through Chainmail Striker - All simple and military weapons, Armor up through Chainmail
4) I am a huge fan of the light-to-no-armor aesthetic. I greatly prefer the mental image of avoiding attacks to the image of taking hits and shrugging them off. As such, any class can trade their armor proficiencies for the Unarmored Agility feat.
5) Saving throws are, in my experience, too easy, and there is something unsatisfying about the fact that you save 55% of the time, rather than 50%. You need an 11, rather than a 10, to succeed on a save.
6) Also, on the topic of saves, Elite and Solo creatures have significant bonuses to saving throws. Powers that Daze, Stun, Dominate, etc. should not single handedly win fights, so the bonus is justified in that regard. However, ongoing damage is already weak enough as is without being practically useless on the enemies that last long for ongoing to have any real impact. The bonus to saves granted to Elite and Solo enemies is not applied to saves made to end ongoing damage (unless the save would also end another non-damaging effect).
7) Melee Training bothers me. It actually has a real place in the game as a feat. It should be something neat someone like, say, a Wizard could pick up. Unfortunately, it's also something required for a good number of non-strength using melee weapon classes. So, to that end, if your class has an at-will, melee weapon power that can not be used as (or in place of) a melee basic attack, you can use the stat governing that power's attack roll instead of Strength when you make a Melee Basic Attack.
8) I've always found it odd that Paladins would have two primary stats, but base their core marking feature off of only one of them. Paladins can choose to base the damage their Divine Challenge deals on either Charisma or Strength. The Mighty Challenge feat (DP) now adds whichever of the two stats you did not choose to your Divine Challenge damage.
9) Multiclassing, and Paragon Multiclassing specifically, is a total feat sync. When you choose a Multiclass feat, you are also considered to have one power swap feat of your choice that you qualify for. Paragon Multiclassing does not require any feat beyond the initial Multiclass feat. In the epic tier, you may retrain your Paragon Multiclass Encounter power to a 17th level power.
10) Hybrid's do not exist.
You may also be curious about how to use my houserules without step 2, so that you can keep magical items, rituals, the parcel system, etc. Well, look no further. Here's the scoop on how.
How to use my math alterations without removing Magic Items and RitualsShow
It's actually easier than you might think. Here's the secret: 1) Enhancement bonuses and item bonuses do not apply to attack rolls, damage rolls, or defenses (but can still add to skills, saves, or whatever else).
2) When you score a critical hit with a magic item, you can either add d6s equal to 1/5 of your level (rounded up) to your damage, or use the item's normal Critical hit entry as if it's enhancement bonus was equal to 1/5 of your level (rounded up).
3) Make the following changes to the parcel system, based on your party size:
8 Characters - Remove parcels 1 and 6 7 Characters - Remove parcels 1, 6, 7, and 9 6 Characters - Remove parcels 1, 3, and 6 5 Characters - Remove parcels 1, 3, 6, 7, and 9 4 Characters - Remove parcels 1, 2, 5, 6, 7, and 10 3 Characters - Remove parcels 1, 2, 4, 6, 7, and 9 2 Characters - Remove parcels 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 8 and 10 1 Character - Remove parcels 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, and 9
The goal of this change is to make magic items special again. They are not awesome because they provide you with some boring math bonus that you need, they are cool because they turn your sword into fire, or let you breath underwater, or create a ladder in thin air. They are meaningful and interesting, but not required.
My reasoning with the parcel changes is that a party of five characters, using the normal system, obtains the equivalent of 6 magic items each level, which translates to 180 magic items over 30 levels. Characters are expected to upgrade three slots (weapon/implement, armor, and neck) once every 5 levels (6 times totals). That means players need 90 items over the course of 30 levels in order to keep pace with the expected stat values. That's half of all the magic items a party acquires going towards necessary upgrades.
So, because my system alteration means that magic items are no longer necessary to meet expected stat goals, I can safely remove half of the effective magic items that players receive over the course of the game. I split the difference between lost magic items and lost cash as best I could, erring towards lower power, since the items are really there for awesomeness rather than power.
This also allows you to keep Rituals in the game if you like, since they actually acquire enough money to use them.
But i Love my +2 flaming great sword , my bag of holding , my armor of living water and my inmovible rod .
And why i shouldn't need cool toys to be cool be it doesn't hurt . Infact dnd is all about cool toys infact the whole econimomy is baised around those redicious items.
Because he wants to give you your cool toys, not take them away.
MPL, I love this idea with the following change if you want to keep magic items, and I hope this is where you were going.
Still allow normal magical items, but cut the following.
1.) All enhancement bonuses from items
2.) All Critical dice
3.) Any permanent bonuses to Att/Dmg/Def items (i.e. Boots of Quickness, Radiant Weapon, Staff of Ruin, Iron Armbands). These flavorless husks are all gone. You may even go so far as to restrict any items with Properties that add any mechanical mathmatical bonus, but this would be DM perogative.
What this means, is that people actually take your Bag of Holding, your Armor of Living Water and your immovable rod. Magic items are about cool and fun again, NOT MECHANICAL BORING BONUSES. Lets face it, no one takes those items now, everyone simply takes the base bonus stuff necessary for their role and then just upgrades as time goes on. Snooze.
The only shortcoming I see with this, is I am not sure that the motivation is there to upgrade many items (though some may still have it, there is always the chance someone could ride a level-independent Item Level 2 weapon or armor all the way to 30). This may or may not be a problem depending on how many treasure parcels you place in the game.
Despite this, I think the system you are proposing has a great deal of promise, it puts the cool back in items again, eliminates the parcel headache for the DM and frees up some serious space to take neat character building feats and not boring mechanical bonus feats.
But i Love my +2 flaming great sword , my bag of holding , my armor of living water and my inmovible rod .
And why i shouldn't need cool toys to be cool be it doesn't hurt . Infact dnd is all about cool toys
If you feel that way, these changes are clearly not for you. To me, D&D is all about being a hero. It's about overcoming challenges, monsters, evil plots, etc. and saving the day. In my heroic fantasy, the heroes are heroic themselves. If they drop their cool sword, they still punch the big bad guy out.
And really, with the exception of King Arthur and Excalibur, just about all the old hero stories involved heroes who didn't need any special items to win the day. Beowulf ripped Grendel's arm off with his bare hands. Gilgamesh and Enkidu were strong enough to carry hundred pound axes and swords into battle.
Even in the Lord of the Rings, they had awesome named swords with history behind them, but what did those weapons actually do? Glow when orcs came by? Whoopdeedoo. He didn't need that to carry the ring to Mordor.
No, in my games, the players do amazing heroic things because they are heroes, and it has nothing to do with the "stuff" they carry around
infact the whole econimomy is baised around those redicious items.
The whole economy is actually not, which makes the existance of such expensive things really weird and out of place. The average person in D&D world will never see 100 gold in their lifetime, despite PC's starting with it. By level 5, they're throwing around a farmer's yearly wages like it was pocket change. By 15th, their armor costs more than the local church. It's silly. They always list Immortalities for Epic Destinies. How come none of them so far have been, "You sell your back up sword and feed the entire world's poor for a decade."
In my game, the players are heroes, but they're not automatically filthy stupid rich just because of it. They might get some free lodgings and food now and then, but that's it. They're heroes, not movie stars. And I don't think word really gets around in a D&D style word. There's no real communication between points of light.
Anyway, if you see something actually wrong with it mechanically, please let me know, but I never said everyone would like my changes.
Because he wants to give you your cool toys, not take them away.
MPL, I love this idea with the following change if you want to keep magic items, and I hope this is where you were going.
Well, sort of. That was indeed what I was going for with my section on how to use magic items with my math fixes, but honestly, I really do play without any magic items whatsoever.
If I want them to get special things they don't get from classes, I customize boons for them. Well, they're not the boons from the DMG2, that's for sure (I dislike just about all of them, and I've done this even before 4e), but they basically work the same way.
What this means, is that people actually take your Bag of Holding, your Armor of Living Water and your immovable rod. Magic items are about cool and fun again, NOT MECHANICAL BORING BONUSES. Lets face it, no one takes those items now, everyone simply takes the base bonus stuff necessary for their role and then just upgrades as time goes on. Snooze.
Yeah, that's pretty much what my changes allow for, and it seems like quite a bit of fun could be had playing that way, since magic items could actually be wonderous and not necessary.
I am still not a big fan of the parcel system, but it works, I suppose.
The only shortcoming I see with this, is I am not sure that the motivation is there to upgrade many items (though some may still have it, there is always the chance someone could ride a level-independent Item Level 2 weapon or armor all the way to 30). This may or may not be a problem depending on how many treasure parcels you place in the game.
It should not be a problem with the parcel system I suggested in my section on using my system with magic items. I just removed all the parcels that would have theoretically gone to upgrading, and the rest can be used freely on whatever fun or flavorful items you want.
Despite this, I think the system you are proposing has a great deal of promise, it puts the cool back in items again, eliminates the parcel headache for the DM and frees up some serious space to take neat character building feats and not boring mechanical bonus feats.
I think your system should work just fine for a low magic campaign. Having talked such things over with my players I know I could never use such a system with them. They don't care about the underlying math and think it is much more fun to have a magic weapon +6 than to have the bonus built into the character, but to each their own.
For your "How to use my math alterations without removing Magic Items and Rituals" section, it seems to me that #2 is too simple. This may have been discussed in your previous thread - I can't remember - but if it hasn't then here it goes. The size of the critical die (or in a few cases ongoing damage of some type) is intended to be part of the balance with item powers and properties. Weapons with d6 criticals should have better powers/properties than weapons with d10s. That d12 weapon (vicious IIRC) doesn't even have a property or a power. It's whole thing is the massive critical damage. The critical damage die is also part of the flavor for "bane" weapons. An example critical line might be "d6, d10 vs dragons." So just thinking about it, it would seem simply removing the critical line from a weapon will not affect all weapons equally.
...I had one other thing, but I forgot it while typing the previous paragraph. That's probably a sign to go to bed.
The size of the critical die (or in a few cases ongoing damage of some type) is intended to be part of the balance with item powers and properties. Weapons with d6 criticals should have better powers/properties than weapons with d10s. That d12 weapon (vicious IIRC) doesn't even have a property or a power. It's whole thing is the massive critical damage. The critical damage die is also part of the flavor for "bane" weapons. An example critical line might be "d6, d10 vs dragons." So just thinking about it, it would seem simply removing the critical line from a weapon will not affect all weapons equally.
This is completely true. I will admit that I am not completely settled on how to handle the extra critical damage in my core rules, or in the magic item option.
Yes, those items defined by their critical property might just be lost. To be honest, I was assuming most people wouldn't bother with magic weapons except maybe the damage type changers, since only their special powers would really apply, so I wasn't really concerned with effectively removing a category of gear.
Using the Critical properties straight would mean either they would stack with the normal critical damage bonus, which is excessive, or it would replace it, which means you would need to keep upgrading the weapon to keep pace with the natural bonuses you'd get otherwise. In that case, the items would still be basically gone, as they wouldn't be worth it.
The only way I could really see it happening is if the weapon's critical property altered your normal critical damage bonus. If you had a vicious weapon, all your d6s would become d12s. Or maybe only d6s equal to your weapon's enhancement would be d12s? I don't know. It's trickier than it seems, so I don't know.
Like I said, my players didn't want to do low magic, so I never got past the idea stage. What I had planned to do was use a replacement method. When fighting unarmed or with mundane weapons, the PC used d6s for critical damage. If they used a magic weapon, its critical line replaced the default d6s. Since they would be using inherent bonuses, the magic item itself would not have a +x so the number of die that they rolled would still be tied to their level. A 3rd level PC with a vicious weapon would roll 1d12 while a 13th level character with the same weapon would roll 3d12.
Like I said, my players didn't want to do low magic, so I never got past the idea stage. What I had planned to do was use a replacement method. When fighting unarmed or with mundane weapons, the PC used d6s for critical damage. If they used a magic weapon, its critical line replaced the default d6s. Since they would be using inherent bonuses, the magic item itself would not have a +x so the number of die that they rolled would still be tied to their level. A 3rd level PC with a vicious weapon would roll 1d12 while a 13th level character with the same weapon would roll 3d12.
I agree with this, and I have to admit, my main objection was how difficult it would be to word such a thing. I am actually still unhappy with the wording on my current critical hit related houserule. The problem comes becuase I don't use inherent bonuses, I just change the math to avoid that whole mess, so, the extra d6's kind of feel like some random add on that uses this weird 1/5 level math even though everything else based on your level is either your full level or 1/2 your level. I am striving to come up with a clean and easy mechanic for that, actually.
Anyway, I ultimately gave up and just wrote it out plainly, since I figure I can update it later.
As an additional update, I've added several of my houserules to the houserules section. These aren't really necessary to use my math fixes, but they do all fit into my larger goals of removing "feat taxes" and making the PC's feel more heroic themselves, without relying on outside sources of awesome. Feel free to use them, discuss them, offer suggestions, or anything else.
infact the whole econimomy is baised around those redicious items.
The whole economy is actually not, which makes the existance of such expensive things really weird and out of place. The average person in D&D world will never see 100 gold in their lifetime, despite PC's starting with it. By level 5, they're throwing around a farmer's yearly wages like it was pocket change. By 15th, their armor costs more than the local church. It's silly. They always list Immortalities for Epic Destinies. How come none of them so far have been, "You sell your back up sword and feed the entire world's poor for a decade."
In my game, the players are heroes, but they're not automatically filthy stupid rich just because of it. They might get some free lodgings and food now and then, but that's it. They're heroes, not movie stars. And I don't think word really gets around in a D&D style word. There's no real communication between points of light.
Anyway, if you see something actually wrong with it mechanically, please let me know, but I never said everyone would like my changes.
The reasons you can't sell your weapons to feed the starving is beacouse: 1) All merchants has agreed upon a conspiration to skin adventurers and sell items for alot more then any adventurer can sell his items for and give quest rewards in the form of allowing players to keep whatever they find. 2) No-one except adventurers can afford it anyways.
No the economy of DnD is seriously retarded and so is the magic item dependency so i'm happy someone does anything about it. I'd rather have a large army of mercenaries then a +5 sword any day anyways.
Thank you, I quite like it as well.
