House Rule Trifecta: Stat Checks, Mass Melee, Lost at Sea

STAT CHECKS

When rolling under your stat, a critical success is if you hit your stat exactly. This is purely a cosmetic change but I don't like the feeling of "Yay, I rolled a 1!"

MASS MELEE

When you have a bunch of allies and enemies fighting each other but it's not big enough to abstract as a battle - maybe it's a boarding action on a ship or an encounter between two large companies. And nobody wants to deal with all these nameless mooks instead of the cool PCs. And let's assume that because they're mooks they have no special abilities and are functionally equal to each other (e.g. all 1HD fighters).
Have some of the enemy mooks engage the PCs, however many seems reasonable. Pair up the rest of the mooks against their opposing numbers. Each round, the players roll a D6 for each 'pair'. On a 1, the ally dies; on a 6, the enemy dies. If one side is strictly twice as superior (e.g. two onto one, or a 2HD orc onto a 1HD goblin) then double that side's chances of victory. As soon as the PCs engage with the mooks, they start running on the regular combat rules.
This rule gives the mooks a fairly low chance of harming each other, and is based on the idea that in swashbuckling combat, the mooks should fight "in the background" while the PCs are the focus. Most of the mooks will keep hacking away ineffectively at each other until the PCs (or powerful NPCs) shift the tide of battle.

LOST AT SEA

Being lost at sea means you are lost with no ability to navigate and no means of propulsion, so maybe you got shipwrecked, marooned on a raft, fell off, etc. You have nothing you can do except sit around and wait. Make a save vs. death, fortitude save or luck check. If you fail, you die of thirst. What? You shouldn't have gotten lost at sea in the first place, dumbass. If you pass, you are washed up on a random island or fished out by a passing ship.

lazy wandering monster rules

OK, so wandering monsters are an integral part of old-school dungeoncrawling because they put a price on each unit of exploration/time spent in the dungeon; and mapping and movement rates are important because they relate to time in the dungeon, which relates to wandering monsters, and opening stuck doors is important because it uses up time in the dungeon which blah blah blah

anyway, that may all be true but I just don't want to deal with all this movement rate bullshit or even drawing maps for the most part. And I know my players find it tedious to draw maps from my descriptions, so why would I bother?

So I got to thinking that you could reverse engineer the risk/reward system of wandering monsters and then simplify it so it doesn't depend on precisely measuring the party's movement through the dungeon. Or on stuck doors, which are the most boring goddamn thing to waste your gaming time on. Or on stupid rules that nobody even remembers like how in LL and OSRIC you're supposed rest for one turn in every six.

Basically the rules are so complicated and varied depending on the specific retroclone and the predilections of the DM that it's impossible to crunch the numbers on how often they are 'supposed' to turn up a wandering monster. Instead, it's easier to just put it in the hands of the individual DM, which makes sense because some DMs will run relatively small dungeons where every room is stocked with important stuff, while others will do big dungeons where half the rooms are empty.

So here's how I want to do dungeons for my face-to-face group in the future:
1. Instead of grid mapping, just draw rooms as nodes with lines connecting them for corridors. A long corridor can be a node, and a large room can contain multiple nodes.
2. Assume that the PCs are mapping even if the players aren't. None of this "you drew the map wrong, so you get lost" bullshit. On the other hand, if the PCs are fleeing for their lives they don't get the privilege of full map directions.
3. A wandering monster check is triggered every time the party moves from one node to another.
4. Other things that also trigger a wandering monster check:
- making loud noises or doing other things that attract monsters directly
- searching a room
- other time-consuming activities (excavating a hole, fiddling with a puzzle, etc.)
- trying to open a stuck door, if you must insist on having stuck doors in your game
5. This means that wandering monster checks are significantly more frequent than in B/X or AD&D. To offset this, they are rolled on a D10 by default. To increase or decrease the frequency of monsters, simply change the die size for the dungeon.
6. If the party is heavily encumbered, reduce the encounter die size by one step.

Why a D10? Well, by my calculations one room takes roughly 2 turns to explore, including the time for resting, stuck doors, and other fiddly little rules. If you check for monsters once every 3 turns, then 2 turns = 2/3 of a check. A check is 1/6 of an encounter, so a room is worth 2/3 * 1/6 = 2/18 = 1/9, so close enough to 1/10 (not totally sure about this math, I did drop out after 10th grade.)

The advantages of this system are:
- It's simple.
- It's transparent to the DM. I know that the players will encounter a monster in 1 out of 10 rooms, not accounting for their other time-consuming activities.
- It's transparent to the players. They'll see me rolling my D10 and know exactly when they're drawing heat. The options they have that trigger a roll, such as searching, are all strategic tradeoffs and not just busywork.
- It's abstract. You can convert "rolls made" to "time spent in the dungeon" if you really need to know how long the PCs have been there, but generally it's a more nebulous measure of "how much danger are you in".

The disadvantages are:
- you don't get the tactile, objective feeling of actually drawing a map
- you don't get the detailed tactical tradeoff of encumbrance vs. movement speed, but it's still there in some form in point #6.
- It doesn't give you a precise measure of how much time has been spent in the dungeon. This means you can't have the players run out of torches/lantern oil, but that never happens anyway.

Dice Drop Terrain Tables for D&D4E

One of the complaints that people have about D&D 4th edition is that it encourages 'My Precious Encounter' style DMing. That is, you spend ages crafting a beautiful encounter with complex monster powers and dynamic terrain, so your players are damn well going to encounter this encounter, whether they like it or not, whether they come up with a clever way to bypass it or not! And thus, railroading.

Here's a (partial) solution to this: instead of preparing distinct terrain setpieces for every encounter, just use a table of terrain features for each environment. Toss 2-4 dice onto the battlemat when the encounter begins, and draw in the terrain features wherever they land. Of course you can still override this system when you need to, but it's just a tool. It means not only that you don't have to put so much sweat into any one encounter, but also that you can easily relocate an encounter from one area to another if the need arises. This does have the side effect of creating a world where more or less every location is full of potentially deadly environmental hazards, but I don't see this as a bug.

Examples:

City Streets (d8)
1: Winding stairs down from terrace that divides the battle area in two. Fall 10'/1d10 damage.
2: Deep ditch full of shit. DC 15 Athletics to climb out.
3: Street vendor who is angry at the combatants for driving away business. 20% chance of throwing alchemical vials for 1d8+2 damage.
4: Circular fountain 4x4.
5: Large brazier - attack roll to kick over, 2d8 damage + ongoing 5.
6: Thoroughfare 3 squares wide. Each round, 50% chance of a cart racing past at speed 8, dealing 2d8 damage to anyone it runs over.
7: Huge dungheap - anyone knocked into it it slowed and grants combat advantage - standard action to try and wipe it off (saving throw).
8: Rickety scaffolding up against a wall, with ladders. Poles have AC 15, 1hp. 20' off the ground.

Tomb (d6)
1: 1d4 coffins; Athletics DC 17 to put a lid on the coffin, whereafter anyone trapped inside must make a DC 25 Athletics check to bust out.
2: Large spikes along nearest wall - knocked into or thrown onto them, take 2d8 damage and be impaled (immobile, save ends).
3: Dart trap, triggered by pressure plate, fires across room at +10 to hit for 2d6 damage.
4: Hole to lower level 2x2, with a 1-square ring around it of unstable ground that will collapse under the weight of a person. Fall 20'/ 2d10 damage.
5: Large statue, Athletics DC 12 to push over, 2d8 damage and 50% chance to pin down (save ends).
6: Bone pile, 8-10 squares in irregular shape, difficult terrain.

Wild Forest (d6)
1: Beehive hanging from tree. Can be grabbed & thrown, DC 13 Nature or Thievery to not get stung, if you hit them they get stung, stinging is ongoing 5 damage and grant combat advantage (save ends).
2: Embankment dividing up the play area. When sliding down, DC 10 Acrobatics to not fall prone. When climbing up, DC 13 Acrobatics/Athletics.
3: 2d4 thickets, 2x2 each, difficult terrain.
4: Stream bisecting the play area. 3-4 squares wide, difficult terrain.
5: 2 animate thorn bushes that get angry if anyone runs into them. 2x2, will attack at +6 for 1d8+5 damage.
6: Tarn, takes up all the space from the die to the nearest side of the map; some banks are up to 5' high, can't be climbed out except with a DC 20 Athletics, so you're better off swimming around.

Sadly, the damage expressions and hit bonii and the like are still going to become obsolete fairly quickly as the PCs' and monsters' stats inflate with every level. Sigh...

Item Tracker Escape Clause

So there's this thing which seems awesome though I haven't tested it. And there's this thing that everyone probably knows about already. I love the idea of letting PCs avoid direct damage in exchange for losing something else. Because although death should be a real possibility, it's still the least interesting thing that can happen to the PC. Much more fun to prolong their agony a bit further.

So how's this for a houserule-upon-a-houserule: In a game using Matt Rundle's Item Tracker, whenever a PC is a) being attacked by an enemy as they're running away, b) being grappled by an enemy or c) any other escape-y type action that they can get the DM to accept, then they may sacrifice one of their item containers to guarantee their escape. The fireball roars behind you, but only burns your backpack; the tentacle reaches out to grab you, but only snags your bandolier; the wolf leaps as you climb to safety, and its jaws tear a hole in the bottom of your treasure sack.

With the following caveats:
1. The container that's lost is chosen at random.
2. The player's decision must be made before damage is rolled.

(Hopefully you will get situations like "I'm on 4hp and the bite does d6, but if I take it on my items then there's a 1/4 chance that it'll swallow my treasure sack..." "Yeah, but there's a 1/4 chance that it'll swallow your highly unstable explosives!")

3. If the attack requires a saving throw, then sacrificing your item gives you an automatic pass on the saving throw. That means you still take half damage from the fireball, etc.
4. Circumstance will dictate what exactly happens to your items, whether they are grabbed, dropped, incinerated, swallowed, transported to the birth of the universe, etc.
5. The same monster can't be fobbed off with an item sacrifice more than once. (Or, alternatively, you must make a DEX check for each sacrifice you want to make beyond the first.)

80 Alternative Class Titles

One of my favourite D&D moments in memory was when one of my players fought and subdued a giant caterpillar. When he asked me, I told him I couldn't see any reason why he shouldn't be able to train the monstrous insect and ride on it. In response he gleefully crossed out the word 'Fighter' on his character sheet and replaced it with 'Caterpillar Knight'.

& in FLAILSNAILS games where character mortality is high, people often don't seem to bother much with putting any unique spin on their character. It's just "I'm a Fighter." And I know that your character is supposed to emerge from play over time, but you could *also* give a little bit of a twist to your guy at 1st level, which seems only fair to him since he's probably going to die soon anyway.

So how's this for a houserule: after you pick what your character class 'really' is, you then have to pick what you will call it. You're allowed to pick any name you like except for the following four: Fighter, Specialist, Magic-User, Cleric.
If you're unsure about what you want your class to be, or you just can't be bothered because you're probably going to die anyway - then roll or choose from the following table:

(d20)	Fighter	Specialist	Magic-User	Cleric
1	Man-at-Arms	Cutpurse	Wizard	Clergyman
2	Barbarian	Assassin	Warlock	Witchfinder
3	Brigand	Con Artist	Pyromancer	Sun Worshipper
4	Huntsman	Tomb Robber	Necromancer	Satanist
5	Crusader	Gambler	Alchemist	Druid
6	Mercenary	Bastard	Prestidigitator	Hermit
7	Monster Hunter	Harlot	Summoner	Monk
8	Swashbuckler	Bard	Illusionist	Preacher
9	Blade Dancer	Dandy	Psion	Shaman
10	Zealot	Urchin	War Mage	Nun
11	Treasure Hunter	Smuggler	Enchantress	War-Priest
12	Duellist	Poisoner	Sorceror	Vampire Hunter
13	Samurai	Cattle Rustler	Scholar	Healer
14	Hoplite	Tinker	Lunatic	Medicine Man
15	Blacksmith	Pirate	Apprentice	Taoist
16	Squire	Burglar	Voodoo-User	Prophet
17	Skald	Forager	Witch	Theologian
18	Refugee	Mummer	Cartomancer	Death-Priest
19	Berserker	Acrobat	Dreamwalker	Gnostic
20	Wild Man	Charlatan Priest	Mystic Chef	Rabbi

Most of these 'classes' should be self-explanatory. For the few that aren't:
A Refugee is a character like the Flame Princess. You were probably just some ordinary peasant until your family/village was destroyed by monsters/soldiers, and since then you've gotten pretty good at fighting because the people who weren't good at fighting are all dead.
A Berserker is not a Barbarian. Duh! A Barbarian is like Conan or Red Sonja, a Berserker is a Viking who froths at the mouth.
A Bastard is just you're a shit. You don't have any particular profession other than treating people terribly.
A Charlatan Priest is a Rogue pretending to be a Cleric.
A Cartomancer is like, you have a deck of tarot cards and you say something like "In your future, all I predict is... *pulls out card* Death." (then you cast Finger of Death.)
A Monk is just a bald guy from a monastery, let's not get into the kung fu angle at this point.

Note: Some of these concepts might require minor mechanical support from your DM. For example, a Pyromancer's Magic Missile will probably be a little fireball, so it should be able to set things on fire. Check with your DM first! (FLAILSNAILS players, remember: you only have to get one DM to agree to it and then all the DMs have to go along with you.)

Note 2: All this is for Lamentations of the Flame Princess but I'm sure you can figure out how to use it for whatever game you're playing.

thinkin' 'bout combat maneuvers

Everybody seems to have a different idea about how to do combat maneuvers in old-school D&D (i.e. tripping, blinding, pushing, etc.). This system is sort of stuck together from a bunch of different sources, but I've tried to make them fit elegantly.

Part 1: Getting Damage Dice
Usually you only roll one damage die. There are three main ways to get more than that:
1. Criticals: If you roll a 20, you roll an extra damage die. But furthermore, you can increase your chance of getting a critical by fighting wildly, but this increases your chance of fumbling as well. So if you want to crit on a 15+, then you will fumble on a 6 or less. If you're desperate or just mental, you can go all the way to crit 11+/fumble 10-.
2. Combat advantage: If you have an advantage over your opponent, such as being uphill of them, or flanking*, or they're entangled by animated intestines or whatever, then you get +2 to hit AND you roll an extra damage die.
3. Stunts: If you just want to do something cool, then that's a stunt. Backflipping off the stairs, tipping over the bookshelf, distracting the enemy by pointing over their shoulder, whatever. Just say what you want to do and then we will make up rules for it. But usually the rule will be that you have to make an ability check, and if you suceed then you get to roll an attack and add one damage die if you hit. If you fail your ability check you can't attack this round, and you might suffer some other consequence as well.

Part 2: Trading Damage Dice
To perform a combat maneuver other than just hitting the enemy, you can trade one damage die for an effect. (You have to do this before you roll the damage dice.)
These effects include, but are not limited to: push back (distance = your move rate); knock prone/trip; disarm; stun for one round; etc.
The following effects cost two damage dice: blind; sunder shield/armour; force morale check (requires you to say a suitably terrifying one-liner); etc.
You still have to narrate what you're doing to cause this effect, and it has to be plausible**. If you say "I trade my combat advantage die for the disarm effect" then you get cheetos thrown at you.

I guess this would make it pretty easy to use combat maneuvers, but I'm cool with that. If every important fight starts out with the players trying to blind and entangle their foes, then that's a good thing, right? Hopefully it won't bog down the minor combats too much, because why bother paying 1d8 damage to trip over a kobold when that's almost certainly going to kill him anyway?
I thought about saying that all these rules are available to Fighters only, but that's probably not necessary.

*Still thinking about how to handle flanking without using miniatures. Probably you aren't allowed to just say "Ok, I walk around the enemy so I'm flanking him now," because the enemy will be actively trying to prevent you from doing that. You can get flanking if you've come around by a different path, or if you come up with some cool way of getting past the enemy (i.e. swinging on a chandelier, which would require a DEX check). You could also get flanking if you greatly outnumbered your opponents, but there would need to be some sort of table for that.

**Adjust plausibility to taste. "You can do it if someone could do it in [real life/Game of Thrones/Conan/Star Wars/House of Flying Daggers/Naruto]."

Batman Points

So let's say you have a villain in your game who you want to be threatening, not because of their physical power (or not just that) but because of their genius intellect and general outwittery. Someone like Batman or Adrian Veidt; or like an ancient scheming dragon or a vicious robber baron. You know the type I'm talking about.

So one way you could create a villain who's super-prepared and ready for anything the PCs can come up with is just to write lots of preparations in advance. "The dragon's lair is booby-trapped here and here; the dragon will always cast dispel illusion on his servants when they enter his sanctum;" etc. until you think you have prepared for everything the PCs might try. But this will take a lot of time and effort.

An alternative that I've been thinking about is to give your villain a number of 'Batman Points' (or whatever else you want to call them.) Basically, by spending a Batman Point, you can retroactively state that the villain has predicted the PCs' plans and engaged some sort of countermeasure. Whatever they've come up with, he's already come up with an answer to it; he's just that good.

There are a few limitations on this ability:

1. The villain can't acquire new abilities, items or resources out of nowhere; all he can do is guess what his enemies are trying to do. So if the PCs are scrying him to learn his evil plans, then you can spend a Batman Point to say "Well too bad, he writes his diary in a code that only he can read." But you can't say "Well too bad, he has an Amulet of Anti-Scrying." (Unless, of course, he is super rich and there's a shop in his city that sells Amulets of Anti-Scrying.)
2.  The villain doesn't gain any knowledge beyond what he already had; he just has a hunch. So in the previous example, he wouldn't suddenly be aware that the PCs are trying to scry him - he just has a vague idea that his enemies might try to scry him, so he's taking precautions against it.
3. The villain's counter can't be overly specific or unbelievable. If the PCs are hiding in a bush beside the road to ambush him, you can say "He orders his guards to investigate each bush in advance" but you can't say "He orders his guards to go straight to the bush you're hiding in and stick their spears into it."
4. The DM has a limited amount of time (let's say one minute) to think of a counter; if you can't, then the Batman Point can't be spent.

How many Batman Points should a villain have? It's hard to say without testing it, but I'd guess not very many. Even a supreme chessmaster like Veidt would probably only have 3-4 Batman Points. And they would regenerate slowly, if at all.

The advantage of this rule would be that you can get that "Oh fuck!" moment like you get in fiction where the heroes realise just how smart their opponent is (in this case, the villain is much smarter than the dungeonmaster who plays him!) It would encourage the PCs to come up with more plans to wear down the enemy's supply of Batman Points, or else to come up with really tight and clever plans so that the DM can't use the Batman Points.

The disadvantage of this rule would be that it might just make the players feel like you've given yourself a license to screw them over, or that their first few gambits don't really matter because they're just used to burn through the Batman Points. (But if their gambits are too lazy, then of course you can choose not to spend a Batman Point and just counter them normally.) I'm not sure how you would communicate this mechanic to the players. You would probably need to explain it before the villain appears, or it would feel unfair. But it's a pretty obscure subsystem that will probably only crop up once or twice in a campaign, so will anyone even remember the rule by the time you get around to using it?

To be clear, I've never actually tested this rule, so I'm not recommending it so much as just putting it out there as a possibility.

From the Classics: Drunk Poetry Slam

Among many adventures depicted in the Viking romance Arrow-Odd, one of my favourite is a scene where the titular character is challenged to a drinking contest with a pair of lazy nobles named Sigurd and Sjolf. Now, drinking contests are always fun, but what's striking about this one is that it also incorporates improvised poetry. The drinkers take turns presenting a horn of mead to their opponent, but before the opponent drinks the offerer must speak a verse to them. Each verse is eight lines long and consists of alternately singing one's own valiant deeds and ridiculing the manhood of one's opponent. For example:

You weren't around,

Sjolf, when we reddened

Our steel on the earl

off Laeso Island.

Mad for sex, you

sat at home wondering

whether to cuddle

the calf or the kitchenmaid.

Sick burn! Obviously, as the competitors get more drunk, they become less able to come up with verses, and are eventually defeated. So it's one part drinking game and one part Medieval rap battle.

The following are some rules for simulating such a contest in a game of D&D:

Competitors take turns to present a horn of mead and a verse. By default, each player has two minutes to come up with a verse before they have to speak it. This might be intimidating for some players, but bear in mind that the verse doesn't have to rhyme or scan. All you have to do is tell a tale about your brave deeds and then talk some smack about your opponent. You can't talk about the same heroic deed more than once, so having a good character history will be of some help. Of course, you can choose to make something up, but this will require a Bluff check (or roll-under CHA if you're not playing with a skill system).

The characters' drunkenness is measured in terms of 'sobriety value'. Each character starts with SV 4, plus or minus their CON modifier. Each time they drink a horn, they must make a saving throw vs. poison (or CON save, Fortitude save, etc.) or else take -1 SV. The player's time allotted for composing a verse is equal to 30 seconds multiplied by their SV, so a character with SV 4 would get two minutes, but a character with SV 2 would only get one. A character with SV0 can still compete, so long as they begin to speak their verse immediately when their turn comes around. A character with negative SV passes out from drunkenness.

Contestants can be eliminated by the following means:

- Failing to provide a full verse of 8 lines containing a heroic deed and a diss

- Stumbling over words or hesitating while reciting the verse

- Being caught lying about their deeds

- Passing out

The last man standing is the winner. The game can be played 1-vs-1, free-for-all, or in tag teams. 

Alternate rule set: Ignore all the complicated crap about Sobriety Value and SV and just have each player drink an actual horn of mead when their turn comes around. Do not use this method if you are planning to carry on the session after the drinking contest is over.

Note: I don't know about you, but my players love drinking contests and will initiate them whenever they get the chance. I wouldn't use this system for that kind of ad-hoc minigame, because it's too long and involved. It would work best if something important rested on the outcome of the contest.

Rules for Lusty Wenches

The old lord had shown himself a most gracious host during the last few hours, plying them with rare wines and loading them with rich gifts beyond what they'd asked or what the Mouser had purloined in advance, and even offering them other girls in addition to Ivivis and Friska - benison which they'd rejected, with some inward regrets, after noting the glares in the eyes of those two.

- Fritz Leiber, The Lords of Quarmall

In every Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser story that I've read (admittedly, I haven't come close to reading them all) there are exactly two major female characters. One of them always ends up with Fafhrd, and the other with the Mouser. It's something of a staple in pulp fiction that winning the heart of the beloved is part of the 'treasure' that the hero acquires for his success. Where would Indiana Jones be without his Marion Ravenwood? Or John Carter without his princess waiting for him back on Mars?

This doesn't really happen in D&D, though. I remember thinking for a long time that the woman on the cover of the 1st edition DMG is a lusty babe in need of rescuing, but she's actually a member of the party. But could we incorporate some sort of rules for wench-wooing into the game?