Design Day: House Rules: The Basics

Hello and welcome to my third design day! Sorry it’s a little late. I’ve been…well, not busy, but I recorded Walking Dead and Hell on Wheels last night and…yeah.

But now I’m here. And this week, I’ve decided, is going to be House Rule Week! Today and Thursday, I’ll be posting some of my favorite, crunchy house-rules. And on Friday, I’ll have some of my more flavorful rules on display.

First off, we’ll start with some game basics. The constant stuff that affects everyone.

Ability Scores:

Wisdom: Wisdom is no longer master of Will saves. It now represents, almost exclusively, one’s self-awareness and awareness of one’s surroundings, as well as their spirituality and “one-ness with the universe/deity of their choice” As such, Wisdom now controls the bonus one receives on their ranged attack rolls, instead of dexterity controlling that bonus.

Now why would I want to do that? Dexterity seems appropriate for ranged attacks, doesn’t it? Well…not really. Anyone who has gone target-shooting, whether it’s with a gun, a bow, a crossbow, or a slingshot can tell you that it’s not about how dexterous you are. It’s about your ability to focus, calculate for distance and get your aim dead-on. And that’s what wisdom represents. That and Dexterity is also such a powerful score on its own, does it really need ranged attacks in addition to AC, reflex saves AND initiative?

So, in summary, Wisdom no longer controls one’s Will saves. Instead, it controls ranged attacks.

Charisma: Charisma has always been a problem in 3^rd-edition D&D, and that problem followed it up into pathfinder. That problem is, quite frankly, that it gives next-to-no mechanical bonus to a character. Its usefulness is purely flavorful. My modification changes that.

Charisma no longer controls one’s physical appearance. That is instead governed by the flavor of the character, as it should be. Instead, it is a measure of a character’s force of personality and their presence. It is their strength of will and of character. Those strong in charisma are most often recognized as leaders and commanders, and it is usually quite easy for them to garner sympathy and gain allies. Their ideas will almost always be listened to, even if they are bad ones. Those with a low charisma are usually meek and naturally do not attract attention to themselves—they’re wall flowers. Just as bad ideas proposed by a charismatic character will be listened to, even good ideas will be ignored if one’s charisma is low. Thus, because of this, Charisma now governs Will saves instead of Wisdom.

Why the Change?

Well, this is a pretty easy answer. Dexterity was too strong, and charisma too weak. These changes help to fix that mechanical problem. And, to make things even better, the flavor fits perfectly.

How does this affect the game?

Well, it does create some interesting changes, as certain ability scores now have different weights when it comes to character creation. For instance, certain classes will now be weighted toward certain disciplines rather than others. For instance, a Ranger or an Inquisitor, who derive their spells from Wisdom score, are now much more likely to be ranged combatants since it means they have to focus on one less ability score. In addition, this really helps sorcerers, bards, and other classes who focus on charisma, as it boosts their Will saves (with most of them, to incredibly high bonuses, since they already have high will saves). Overall, it spreads out the usefulness of ability scores, so it’s harder to dump one without taking a major hit to your statistics in-game. Remember that fighter with 7 charisma and 20 strength at level 1? A single casting of Charm Person or Cause Fear should make him see what’s what.

Now. Of course I’m not just going to leave you with that. I’ve got one more house rule to drop on you.

Canny Defense

This is a pretty simple modification, and it doesn’t really affect the game all that much. The short of it is…you know that ability called Canny Defense that the Duelist prestige class gets? Yeah, now everyone can get that at level 1.

Canny Defense: At 1st level, many classes can choose, instead of their armor proficiency, an ability called Canny Defense. When using Canny Defense, they do not gain proficiency with armor, and instead can add their intelligence bonus to their AC as a dodge bonus as long as they are wearing light or no armor (they must still gain proficiency with the armor normally through taking the feat). This bonus cannot exceed the character's level.

A character cannot gain proficiency with armor by gaining levels in another class if they select Canny Defense at 1st level. Likewise, a character who selects armor proficiency at 1st level cannot select Canny Defense by gaining levels in another class.

Classes that do not gain armor proficiency cannot select Canny Defense at 1st level.

Pretty simple. Doesn’t affect the game much. Just something nice for people who don’t want to run around with armor on all the time (and it’s an AWESOME choice for the Magus).

Thursday, I’ll continue with House Rule Week by presenting some new skills, new uses for skills, and some modified feats and new feats for my house rules. Have a good time, folks, and Good Gaming!

-Chris