4 House Rules my D&D Players LOVE 

You have fun taste.

A couple movies later a pirate says that and get shot by the keeper of the code and says: "the code is the law"

Love it when the villains get the best lines haha, but you know what, there's some great lines all around in those movies: "a dishonest man, you can always trust to be dishonest..." lol

I repeat this Same Quote at our sessions ... Only because this is the TRUE Intention of D&D. Yes - some rules Do help .... but others Just Get In The Way of the REAL FUN & EXCITEMENT that awaits you at the Game Table!! NO MORE INITIATIVE - NO MORE SPELL SLOTS - NO MORE MOVEMENT CALCULATIONS... These are just absolute Thrill Killers and completely Unnecessary.

@@-WolfMan- what do you do without spell slots? Does everyone just spam their highest level spells, or do you use a different mechanic to manage that resource?

If only positioning mattered in 5e as it did in previous 40k editions...

I struggle to keep the relative position of all creatures in an encounter in my head without some sort of map in a game written like D&D. I can keep narrative track of them games with combat that's more narrative-space, but with modern D&D and similar games (e.g. Pathfinder) I kind of need the map to keep things straight in my head. ...I don't need a good map - a sketch of one on blank paper is fine - and I don't play games where I need a map to keep track of things that often (Most games I play and run don't even have near/medium/far abstract ranges like the example Bob showed) - but running D&D combat how Bob describes I would be the player (or, worse, GM) who needed to ask where everyone is relative to each other again often enough to be annoying.

I agree, i feel like this would take half the fun out of the game. Combat is 1/3 of the pillars but i get ppl being more story driven

People forget that D&D literally stems from war gaming

There's a balance to be struck in TTRPGs. I'm an OSR guy, so the war gaming roots of D&D are pretty important to me, but I do try to avoid turning D&D into a battle simulator generally speaking. Here's where I make the distinction--in a war game, we are manipulating units, vehicles, etc. That's when you're pulling out the tape measures, taking in distance to target, managing obstacles to achieve battlefield objectives. In D&D, we are focused on dramatic individual characters who are probably trying to loot a dungeon. In my personal opinion, the perfect D&D movie is probably 13th warrior or the Clive Owen King Arthur movie. Where the combat is gritty and believable. To capture that, you need more common sense rather than crunch.

Definitely not just you haha, that's the default!!

I don't think it's a bad thing to take away or keep. I definitely understand your reasoning, however I think what he meant was to speed the game up by making it so that the players aren't 'nitpicking' distances, he's trying to make it flow more easily. For example. "You want to attack the goblin?, Well he's just out of your range, you can run about 2/3 of the way, or just take out your bow and shoot". Rather than going "Okay you're. . . . . . . . . . 45 feet away, you could dash but then you'd lose 15 ft and your attack, but if you take out your bow he's still within . . . . . *Counts again* 45 ft and thus within your bows ran. . .. what's short bow again?. . . . . . . . 80! Got it, so what do you want to do?" Especially with some of my players, the amount of options paralyze them easily, I just played with one in another game last night and she stopped the game for a smoke break so she could think of her options (it was about time for one anyway), and then afterwards still asked what we thought her character should do (no one else was anywhere near her). That's why the cheat sheets exist in the first place. But again it is your game and you are able to keep it however you want, hell you can make each square 6.576 meters if you really wanted to.

Movement speed is another resource and another thing players can play around with, you know that tabaxi build with insane speed, I couldn't take that away from my players

yeah, i've run characters (namely certain ranger or rogue builds) whose strengths rely on moving around the battlefield, hitting and running while avoiding attacks of opportunity and maneuvering for flanking and hiding for sneak shots. If I'm running a group that has characters like that, I'd have to keep some form of movement mechanics, albeit simplified. One thing I've done before is have a simple pass/fail d20 roll (1-10 fail, 11-20 pass) for moving up to 10' farther than their move speed, avoiding a movement based attack of opportunity, and being able to do certain full actions that I think should probably be minor actions or free actions without sacrificing their attack for that round. Basically if they want to do it, I have them attempt and then roll the d20, if they fail then they only move their base move instead of the extra, or they do provoke the opportunity attack, or they are unable to do the extra action in time. Also, I like to keep the enemy's move and positioning fairly simple, they bunch up or become a throng/swarm, with only a few ranged enemies breaking off from the group.

And there are many classes, spells, and magic items that grant incremental speed bonuses that wouldn't be useful anymore

I agree that some of these are a bit too far, and they could flatten something that the players bought to personalize their style. I still approve of the sentiment and I simplified so many things in my games.

The real point of the video isn't suggesting specific rules, but to encourage people minimizing elements that don't promote fun within their own games. Tailoring to your audience is key. For most people more turns per hour = more opportunity for fun. Often the games I play are made up of 50/50 DnD-heads and normies we've convinced to play. The more we minimize number-crunching and exposed mechanics of the game the more overall fun it is; in some games we've even eliminated most of the PC dice-rolls. Shocking grasp exists only to enable disengagement by disabling the opportunity attack. Opportunity attacks are not the fun element, successfully disengaging when you think you might lose your character is. Shocking grasp could be reimplemented as crowd control that prevents or slows the mob from following you, allowing you to evade.

you have stockholm syndrome from only playing bad systems with a bunch of fiddly bullshit rules that slow the game down and put your players to sleep.

And as a Monk my entire gimmick is just flushed down the toilet, being able to move 180 feet a round is incredibly important to me and my abilities and it makes for a very fun experience.

@@TheBoardGamer and I think you can still play a Monk that clearly moves way faster than the other PCs/creatures without needing to worry about distance and counting squares.

The potion rules are super clever.

I use the same rules for potions! I like the exhaustion rule. I need SOMETHING for the pali just using 1hp of lay on hands each time.

Our top four house rules are 1) Getting rid of initiative, and using weapon reach as a means of determining who goes first. It's much more realistic and also a whole lot faster. I'll never call for initiative ever again. 2) Using movement as described in Bob's video. If it makes sense, you can do it. If it's questionable, roll a die. 3) Using attacks for parries based on comparative to-hit scores, pitting weapon skill vs weapon skill. 4) introducing spell failure--each time a mage or priest casts a spell they have to roll against their spell craft/religion ability. And introducing possible critical failure.

@@andrewlustfield6079 I like the parry rule, but I think it needs to go along with a change to armor. If armor was absorption, maybe even with a die roll mixed in (+a number for the armor, +dex I guess) for randomness, this would work better, making it so that you always hit if the enemy fails to parry.

@@plaidpvcpipe3792 While I like the basic concept of damage reduction--it makes a lot of sense in general, and even though you could point out that it has some logical flaws, too. (like how against someone in plate armor, it was often the roundel dagger that dealt the killing blow---but only after the knight or man-at-arms was knocked to the ground) In general, it's pretty logical. But every time I've seen and experienced it, it slows the combat down way too much for my taste. It's just another layer of complexity and another layer of math to get through to resolve whether or not a blow managed to damage a character or monster. The nice thing about our parry system is that it compares martial skill vs martial skill. I basically assume there's a 50% chance that someone can successfully parry an incoming blow--so 11 or better on a D:20, and then you use the difference to your character's to hit score and the enemy he or she is trying to block. So for instance if your character has a +7 to hit and they are trying to block someone with a +9--you would need to roll a 13 or better on a D:20 to succeed--otherwise the attack goes through and does damage. Conversely, if the same character with a +7 to hit is fighting someone with a +4 to hit, you would only need to roll an 8 or better on a D:20 to successfully block an incoming attack. Also, you can use this with a shield, too and cover someone directly adjacent to you, or say someone is going over your shoulder with a spear to strike the mage behind you---another way to use the same system. It's very flexible and very balanced.

Thanks! Me too haha

You can tell what part Bob was really excited about--it's the part he gets up and re-enacts.

Nice but some players can look up to book and learn if it has a attack of opportunity or not.

@@SerifErdem Sure. You can also probably guess based on what the enemy is. If it's very martial and melee based, it probably has it. A player looking something up shouldn't dissuade you from using a rule.

@@SerifErdem I mean you can say that about literally any creature ability.

Yeah that's a good in-between. Like a simple goblin grunt should probably not be able to pull it off, but the hobgoblin warrior? Or some monster with a ton of tentacles, or a quick reaction time? Sure!

I actually think that makes it worse. Now the trigger is even more situational, and therefore ends up as cognitive load for the DM. Brain power that could be used for cool narration.

Hmm I'll have to finally look into that! haha

I was immediately thinking the same thing. MCDM's minion rules are awesome. They even overlap with your critical rules. "Overkill" if you overcome the ho of one minion that remaining damage passes to the next minion. Even without critical hits my players have killed 3 skeletons in a single arrow/melee swing. They love killing minions.

Play 4e!

@@robertlewis4769 the 4e minion rules are different from these.

@@Athanatosti i know. But, the powers utilized can do the same thing as mentioned. MCDM attributes much of their inspiration from 4e. Honestly, MCDM pretty much just re-tooled 4e to fit 5e. I have no issue with that, Colville is awesome, but why not just play 4e? I love 4e!

It might also be a friendly mimic. They're rare, but they exist.

i think the box might be a mimic

This is my favorite thing from 4E. It is truly the only thing I miss from it.

Funny thing is that 5e has an optional cleave rule that is basically that rule only it works on any attacks not just Crits.

Was about to comment that. I give this to my casters as well though (sorcerer and paladin) It feels good and I can always make encounters harder should their effectiveness get out of hand

Well, yes, but actually no. See, there ARE Cleaving rules in the DMG, but they are awful. Not only does the first monster you hit have to be undamaged, but you also have to reduce it to 0 HP for you to be able to transfer any leftover damage. As if THAT weren't enough, you can only transfer the damage in the first place if the creature you want to transfer the damage to is ALSO undamaged. This makes Cleaving borderline impossible, even at early levels.

@@inkdragoon4547 The second creature can be damaged, but the damage only hits a 3rd creature if the second creature was undamaged. Still, I use the rule as a baseline and modify it, allowing a cleave to pound through enemies, especially if using the Minion rule from 4e. It makes fighters feel a little better against spellcasters.

@@egonhomes Ah, ok.

Yeah as someone said below, it's not. The DMG version only works if you're attacking a craeture that's at max health and it must drop all the way to zero, then any left over damage can roll onto another creature at max health

Haha you can still draw maps, just don't worry about adding a grid to it! Nah, do whatever is most fun for you. I need to look into colville's minions because now a couple comments have recommended it!

True haha

I do this as well but I use charisma as the modifier for the roll. Keeps the extroverts in check and allows for the introverts (players) to get involved. Sometimes the barbarian wins the role and... well, things get interesting.

Sorely!

I gotchu: Duck: as a reaction to being targeted with an attack, you make take the duck reaction and fall prone, potentially making hits from afar miss while leaving you open to near by opponents Readied strike (how I run opportunity attacks): if you have at least one attack unused from your turn and are not surprised, you may use one attack if the creature you are currently fighting leaves your range. Evade: as a reaction, you may move using any movement speed you did not use on your turn (maximum of half) provided you are not affected by anything that may slow you down (difficult terrain, slow, etc.)

Thanks! And yes, they definitely move more! It's still important to emphasize that there are other objectives though. In this module, a couple situations involve saving a prisoner, and those were the most exciting.

I actually try to provoke AoO from monsters when my allies might need to get away… it makes for good theater and something more interesting than just standing toe-to-toe

After fooling around with some of the same ideas as bob, I've gone so far as to simply not let *non major enemies* have AOOs - but *let some pcs keep them* - this makes the pcs feel really slick and swashbuckly. I let any player with martial weapons or a sneak attack (or monks) take aoos, and only them (and the occasional boss built along PCs paradigms, like a boss that will cinematically fight a lot of npcs) It works great. You really want your pcs to punch through a ton of baddies taking little nicks until they actually hit something worth fighting. it bumps martials an eensy bit and lets them shine for having real fighting training Another really good house rule is i said no feats by default at asi, take your stats at asi levels and we'll come up with an opportunity to train a feat per tier based on the narrative....if you want great weapon master in t2, you need to be in there swinging away in t2, etc. Some times i'll improv a little mini version of the feat's mechanic while they are working on it, like -2 for "extra damage" if they are working on sharpshooter. then i give them the feat on a level that's kind of a dead level for their class, in the middle of the tier. The players eventually realize they are trading a little planned crunch for a character that might have both stat points AND a feat and play ball. it also kind of lets players go after thematic feats like actor or healer that get overlooked for half feats.

@@toddgrx That reminds me of XCOM Long War and the skill "Lightning Reflexes". There should definitely be a feat that let's you run past enemies, baiting out their reaction, so they can't use it on opportunity attacks towards your teammates.

I don’t want to remove it conpletely so I’m thinking about modifying it so that if you move away while facing the enemy you can without triggering an opportunity attack but you can only move half the distant since I see it as a moving backwards movement. If you turn your back then you can move full distant but you will trigger an opportunity attack (same with dash).

Exactly, it's more of an attack sequence. The AoO represents how on your turn (to roll, combat was constant) you would have had a better chance to get past their guard.

Thanks! And that's a great addition. I didn't mention it in the video, because I don't have any specific advice on it, but generally if the bad guys were getting whooped bad, or if their leader was taken out, I'd roll something to see if any surrender or flee. It definitely makes a fight more interesting!

Nice! I like static monster initiative sometimes, and I've also been sharing the DCs more and I find that it adds a little more suspense to each roll--or I suppose it just makes the roll result more exciting when it hits the table. And hey, you can always have that boss/caster type B-line away from them! If it's an open square room, that might get old fast. But depending on the environment (varied elevation, dungeon coridors, etc) it can get really interesting without opportunity attacks.

Much appreciated! :)

Love it! So simple

Thanks! And that's fair enough haha, PF 2e has plenty of rules to work with already! :P

Not counting squares still works well in PF2e. DM just has to tell the player how many actions it'll take to reach where they want to go (it's what I did for pretty much all of our Abomination Vaults campaign). The killing lots of creatures in one go is a little trickier, but is similar to making more enemies work like troops when you want lower tier enemies to stand a chance, but still let the players mow through hordes of baddies. One thing I'm probably doing in my next PF2e campaign is treating initiative like a standard check (I hate rolling initiative) and the players roll their initiative vs the highest Perception DC of the enemies. Players who succeed can go in whatever order they want, then the enemies in whatever order the DM wants, then the players who failed can go in whatever order they want. Tis similar to how I did initiative during my last campaign (each side rolls a d10, winners go in whatever order followed by losers in whatever order), but requires the ignoring of less rules and my players like rolling individual initiative for whatever reason.

@Jonathan Cormier I like the grittiness, and depth of tactical options presented by having the minutiae of details in PF2E so I won't be tweaking anything for those games. I run plenty of abstract systems though such as the Star Wars RPG by FFG and Conan 2D20 by Modiphius where zones, or distances such as short-medium-long are used. They also use mobs of enemies which makes big combats easy to run and initiative lite rules such as "the players go and then the Game Master unless the Game Master spends a point of Doom to allow a mob of enemies or a toughened or nemesis enemy to go before the players" etc.

@@byronkooper neat. Wasn't sure if you were looking to use similar rules in PF2e or not. I like the amount of player options supported by mechanics in PF2e, there's just a handful of things I either don't care about or want to streamline on my side of the table. The 2d20 system looks real neat, but every actual play I've seen of it ends up feeling like you're playing the momentum pool more than playing the game (if that makes sense), which was always a turn off for me

Thanks very much! House rules are all about personal preference, so it depends on what your goals are for the game, and what you like to see happen at the table

@@BobWorldBuilder yea for sure! I've been running games for a decade and have a whole book shelf full of different systems but Ive never considered half of that for d&d

That's a cool set-piece. Also, I played in a pub once (one of my players was only in town for an afternoon so we chose a locale close to the bus terminal). Do you find it contributes to game atmosphere?

I don't think people really "prefer" d&d in the same way other people like other games. Most of the time people are playing 5e because they haven't tried anything else, not because they like it for it's merits.

This is my thoughts also. I have similar problems with his weird takes on initiative that makes Alert significantly worse, along with robbing a lot of classes/subclasses of features that boost / give advantage to initiative with no compensation. I like what he's trying to do but a lot of it seems to remove any kind of perk you'd get from playing a particular class so you're better off playing something else and you can get that benefit anyway, or at least not have it ignored. Edit: for example, everyone is basically getting Mobile for free, just in a really convoluted way which punishes Rogues, Monks and anyone else who can disengage or prevent AoO, or have high movement speeds naturally or movement perks (tabaxi for example).

A LOT of people have trouble imagining the scene without a visual cue. I didn't realize that until a player thought we were lying when we said we could!

@@yzfool6639 If I was just dealing with say my character and one monster, I could probably keep track of it in my head. When it's multiple characters and mobs though, nope I need something. I don't doubt some can hold all that in their head, if you can more power to you!

For an example you can listen to Not Another D&D Podcast or Dice Camera Action, two podcasts that are entirely played with theater of the mind. There is no particular skill btw, I learned to play D&D with theater of the mind and it was just natural. Later we switched to a grid for a more tactical combat, but if you want a faster paced game with more cool things happening - although at the cost of a less strategic game - theater of the mind is cool.

Yep! When I run a game, if a PC cuts a head off, the rest of the PC's party are energized and get an extra +1, while the opponents seeing their buddy get decapitated have to make a Wisdom check or run away.

I use this but modified 1- bad, and 2- bad 3- bad, but 4- good, but 5- good 6- good, and

Funny you should mention that house rule! I've also been doing something like that, but depending on what exactly the players want to happen, it may only happen on a 5-6, or even only a 6. The best instances were in dungeons where one player kept wanting to pin doors shut, so we'd roll 50/50 chance each time, and his reactions were priceless either way. It's wild what players can find fun xD

Yeah, I can't imagine playing like that. It would sick all the fun out of the game and make it nothing but a grind to count HP. Not to mention imbalanceing the class abilities completely. Rip anyone wanting to play a rogue.

Opportunity Attack makes sense in a duel, where the enemy is only focused on one character and, if that character lowers their guard, the enemy is going to see an opportunity. When battling a bunch of undisciplined goblins who are frantically darting glances at all the other adventurers in the room, the chance of one of them recognizing that moment of weakness and taking advantage of it goes down exponentially.

@@rgilbert3614 Yes, but the "story" of the combat is it's not actually one person taking a turn, and then waiting half an hour for their turn to come back around - it's all happening at the same time. You don't just make "one attack." You're poking and trying to get past the guard. It's not "your turn" when you turned around and fled. You fled while they were attacking you. An attack that was just another stab you would have blocked was one that you didn't block because you ran. Or otherwise dropped your own guard. Now, this is an entirely separate issue as to whether or not AoOs are good (for your group).

@@SangoProductions213 I agree that it is all happening at one time. The round is supposed to take 6 seconds (although I have players at my table who take so long to min-max their turns that another player once got up and baked cookies from scratch between their turns). However, since it IS all happening at one time, it would seem impossible for most low-level combatants to be aware of every opportunity around them at all times. Plus, if one's blade is already clashing with the enemy before them, they are not going to have that opportunity to lash out at other foes rushing past. So only a creature focused on their target would see that an opportunity from their target if that target disengaged. Basically, it should require a "fog of battle" mechanic which, to keep it simple, says only the target of a creature's attacks is vulnerable to attacks of opportunity from that creature. Or, if one of my players wanted to roll for opportunity, I would say it was a Wisdom check and set the target's DEX as the number to beat (which simulates their speed at closing that window of opportunity v. the attacker's ability to recognize the opening).

I think telling it like you're dropping your defence to turn around and run is not congruent with what would actually happen. You'd carefully but quickly step away until you're out of reach, and then turn around. Opportunity attacks only really makes sense if you're engaged with multiple enemies and trying to move past or between them, not moving away from them. Against one enemy you can most of the time keep up your defence, even if you're trying to get past them.

@@AnotherDuck As represented by the withdraw action or 5 foot step.

I see what you mean, but 100% if a player designed their character to be fast or effective at slowing enemies, I would take that into account. That character would just be able to move farther than "normal" distance, or they'd be able to slow enemies to a crawl. We had situations where our druid transformed into creatures with faster speeds, and when our cleric turned undead, and everything worked great!

Thanks! I feel that those two work well together, but test em out and stick with what's for for your group!

Some of these rules nerf core class or feat features like cunning action, PAM, mobile just to name a few. You take hit and run and give it to everyone you destroy the rogue.

I really appreciate that!

We run facing rules instead of flanking. So a creature can choose to turn around as a reaction, or to op attack, but not both. Many creatures have different reactions as well. From extra defense to retaliation. And loads of class abilities, feats and spells are all about reaction. Like shocking grasp. It's incredibly useful for a caster to both attack and get away from melee. It would be pointless without opportunity attacks. Movement rules are half the game. Removing them is like wanting to remove HP because it's too much bother keeping track of it.

Yup, cleaving through creatures I believe. Been using it for years.

Yo, what!? T1J is here? Wow. Worlds collide. I agree about the Opportunity Attacks too. They're way too strong and, consequently, every fight becomes heavily influenced by who exploit / avoid Opportunity Attacks the most. They don't even make much in-game sense to me for the reasons Bob described in the video. I've always suspected that Flanking was the personal darling of someone on the design team, and they didn't take it well when they realised that Flanked characters would choose to move out of the way rather than just stand there gritting their teeth, surrounded by enemies.

If you're still interested in trying it, I recommend just ditching the grid. You can still use a map and tokens for visuals, just don't worry about squares and focus on what seems like a reasonable amount of movement. That would be a decent in-between method

As I replied to another comment, I didn't want my PCs to be able to kill a goblin by throwing a rock at them lol, so 3 HP and 1 HP still have an important difference :P

@@BobWorldBuilder I see, that's understandable. In any case, tweaking monsters HP and AC sounds a lot more fun than reducing number of monsters. Action economy might be against the party at the start (and being surrounded by enemies could create a cool dramatic moment) but as the battle rages on, they get to turn odds on their favor and defeat the bad guys. I might try this on my next session, they're gonna fight a lot of Red brands on the streets of Phandalin 😁

Sure, I could have simply learned a simpler system, but this way has been more fun for me hehe

That's how my first group played and it was awesome!

Love the emphasis on fun! And yep I've been toying a little with side initiative too. It's great when players try to combo their actions together

@@BobWorldBuilder The way I do it is if the players are ambushed the enemy goes first, otherwise players first. Main advantage of that setup is you don't have to halt everything to tediously roll initiative, don't have to track turn order, and the biggest one is that players aren't waiting for 20 minutes for their go (Everyone kind of acts at the same time, so downtime is massively reduced and combat itself goes so very much faster). I also use bulk rolls for the enemy/allies, so if 5 goblins are attacking I roll all 5 attacks then figure out who got hit. Unrelated question, do you have any idea how someone could publish a homebrew system? Been working on my own for a while and have been running a campaign in it for just over a year but I have no idea how to get it out to the public. Any help would be great.

How do you tweak class features that depend on character turn? Do you let them always play first, because if they build the character with that in mind (like a Gloom Stalker/Assassin build I did once), and have invested heavily in Initiative (high Dex, Feat, etc.) to deal the extra damage or effects, then not allowing them to do this will be bad.

@@OnigoroshiZero I would let them have the first turn gimmicks like they should. I would also be upfront about the turn thing so they dont go ham on Initiative bonuses.

In 3.5 they used something along the lines of opposed constitution checks where the winner either pulls away or catches up.

The raiding rules in Wolves of God would like a word. But yeah, basically a more flavored/structured opposed checks using appropriate abilities/skill [depending on system]. Way more interesting than "ruler D&D" and stale math. Can watch the indy 500 for that kind of varied excitement.

We had at least one legitimate chase through a dungeon where our druid (transformed into a tiger) was chasing a dashing spellcaster enemy. The caster had a head start and acted before the tiger in initiative, but the tiger had a faster overall speed. The caster also stopped to try closing a door behind him. I think it took 2 rounds to officially catch him. Ultimately, you just gotta be reasonable. This was a tiger chasing a human man, and the tiger was faster, so the tiger won. If the caster had spells or traps to slow the tiger more effectively, he might have escaped.

Thanks @Skoozi @AyarARJ @Bob World Builder. I think I'll lean into giving bonuses based on anatomy. While also using opposed skill checks to add tension to skill or I guess movement rolls.