Arcadia:House Rules

See also: Pathfinder:Rules for rules clarifications that are NOT House Rules

General Rules

Rolling

Things You Should Already Know

Dice rolls are d20; previously I have used 2d10, but will not be using this.

On attack rolls, natural 20's always hit and always threaten a critical hit if an attack is permitted. Natural 1's always miss.

If a die lands cocked, reroll that die. You may not roll dice to hit other dice that are already rolled in an attempt to cock them to a more favorable result. If a die falls off the rolling surface, reroll it. If you roll a die before you announce an action, you may not use that roll. This includes failing to specify which enemy you are attacking or what ability you are using. Seriously. You may roll a die as you announce an action, and you are encouraged to roll damage when you roll an attack roll. If you are vague about an action, I will assume you do whatever you did last time, or I'll insist you specify and roll again.

Dice are supposed to be fair. If your "lucky die" *really* rolls more 20's, it's probably not a fair die. All dice have a bias, but they shouldn't be doing the impossible.

Don't be a dick about rolling dice, don't fudge, don't cheat, and try not to do that thing where you go, "19... wait! 20! ... 21? ... 22!"

Advantage and Disadvantage

I will be experimenting with using the Advantage and Disadvantage mechanics presented in 5th Edition D&D.

While you have Advantage on an action, roll 2d20 and drop the lowest.

While you have Disadvantage on an action, roll 2d20 and drop the highest.

If you have Advantage and Disadvantage, they cancel out, and multiple instances of Advantage or Disadvantage do not stack.

Transferability

A Standard Action may be substituted for a Move or Swift action. A Move Action may be substituted for a Swift Action. A Standard Action and a Move Action may be substituted for a Full Round action.

Normal: Under the standard Pathfinder rules, there is no action substitution. If, for example, you cast Cold Ice Strike, it exhausts your Swift action. You may use no other Swift actions that turn.

Additional Actions

This rule is meant to compensate for the large number of players

Abilities that grant additional actions are generally forbidden or modified to not grant additional actions. This does not include, for example, effects such as Flyby Attack which changes how you can allocate your actions. A character may not have more than one Standard, Move and Swift action per turn. Some effects that cause ongoing damage may also be subject to this rule.

Hirelings, Animal Companions, Familiars, Eidolons and Summoned Monsters

This rule is meant to compensate for the large number of players

Actions: While all such companions are permitted, you may NOT gain additional actions by having such a creature. If you use your summoned creatures in combat, for example, you have, in total, one Standard Action, one Move Action and one Swift Action (or one Full Round Action and one Swift Action) to divide between any number of such creatures.

Example: You have an Eidolon and a summoned celestial eagle, you could cast a quickened spell (Swift), have your eagle fly high above combat (Move) and have your Eidolon make an attack (Standard).

Attacks of Opportunity: Any such creature you have that is permitted to take an attack of opportunity may do so; however, this uses your attack of opportunity for the turn. If you have an ability that allows multiple attacks of opportunity, you use one from ALL your companions' pools each time you or ANY of them takes such an attack.

Example: You have an Eidolon with the Combat Reflexes feat and 16 Dex. You have the Combat Reflexes feat and 14 Dex. Your summoned celestial eagle does not have any such ability. If you take 2 attacks of opportunity, your eagle may not take an attack of opportunity but your Eidolon may. If you Eidolon takes 2 attacks of opportunity instead, neither you nor the eagle may. If your eagle takes one, your Eidolon may still take two and you may still take one. Attacks of opportunity happen chronologically, so you cannot take two and have your eagle take one. If a creature then provokes both you and your eagle, you MUST have the eagle attack first in order to use your own attack.

Specific Spells

This rule is meant to compensate for the large number of players

Haste: No longer grants an additional attack, but the bonuses granted by this spell increases by 1 (+2 dodge bonus to AC and Reflex, and +2 untyped bonus on Attack Rolls).

Summon Monster / Summon Nature's Ally: Because of reduced utility of these spells, the duration is in minutes rather than rounds. The summoner class special ability, in turn, summons monsters for a duration in increments of 10 minutes.

Defenses

I really like the system of Defenses in 4th Edition D&D, but I have no specific plans to use it in Pathfinder. I do like the way, though, that it turns aggressive actions into dice rolls and makes defense passive.

Classes

Gunslinger

Emerging Guns will be used for this campaign. Advanced firearms do exist, but all are custom pieces made by master artisans. Cannons, bombards and other black powder siege weapons are common enough that most everyone has heard of them.

Typically, rain spoils black powder. Without precautions, there is only a 50% chance that an unprotected black powder weapon will fire in rain. A powder horn protects powder, and any waterproof container can protect cartridges, but reloading a weapon in even light rain takes twice as long if the user wants to eliminate the risk of the powder being spoiled. The only saving grace is that spoiled black powder never misfires.

Clarification: You cannot misfire on a critical hit confirmation roll.

Rogue

Base Attack Bonus

The rogue's Base Attack Bonus is a +1 per level progression, with iterative attacks gained at +6, +11, and +16. This is the same as the fighter, ranger

Normal: Rogues have a +2/3 per level Base Attack Bonus progression.

Flat-Footedness

While a strict interpretation of the rules frowns upon stealth-in-combat, you may treat as flat-footed any foe who was not aware of your presence at the beginning of your action (DM's discretion). This rule will, however, apply to your enemies as well. In general being "aware of a foe's presence" means "can reasonably predict from whence a specified foe will emerge." Hearing a rustling in the bushes is typically sufficient to be aware of a foe (but would represent a failed Stealth check with concealment). Furthermore, for rogue iterative attacks (that is, if you have multiple attacks in a round) you will get your sneak attack on all such attacks against flat-footed foes.

Meanwhile, as a clarification, the invisibility spell causes you to become visible the moment you make a hostile action. That means that only your first in a series of attacks will receive that bonus. (Provided you were previously aware of the enemy - if they used invisibility to ambush you, they'll probably get to use Sneak Attack on every roll, barring some reason they cannot).

Lighting

Remember that you can conceal yourself in dim illumination with a Stealth check opposed by Perception. Again, the official errata is pretty unforgiving of characters who want to disappear in combat, but I want to give as much leeway as reasonably possible. If you can hop behind something and disappear from sight, that's fine. If you then leap out from the shadows for a sneak attack, that's doubly fine.

Space, Reach, Threats and Cover

I actually hate the way that using squares affects cover, reach and space, making certain nonsensical situations normal. I'd much prefer no grid and circular geometry.

My preferred method would be measuring from the middle of a mini, preferably with a circular 1" base, and treating any line that can be drawn from the middle of the attacker's mini to both sides of the defender's mini as clear, and anything less as cover.

AoE would have to cover the middle point of the mini.

This won't sit well with the few of my players who know the rules well enough to care.