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Rule probleme ? Make a journey to mechianus. Let player rolplaying modify any rule de of the game. Methaphoricaly a gear who is the incarnation of a rule. Wensday have suddenly vanish. A week is now 6 day.
I have my Legends and Lairs I books *and* my Secret Art of Game Mastery books. They are gorgeous book sets. I also finally got my hands on Luke's Into the Fey. You produce awesome materials, I raise a glass to you and your team on all of these projects. Best wishes to you, i love your channel and your contributions to the hobby.
The real title of the video "10 ways to trick your D and D party into playing Pathfinder 2e Instead!" You're doing the good work of spreading the word.
If anything this would actually do PF2 a disservice by making its rules look terrible by inserting them into a system not built for them. There's a handful of rules that could work which were also homebrew rules people have been using since god who knows, probably the start of TTRPGs that PF2 decided to make actual rules like the "use action to remove condition".
@@shadenox8164 Of course there would be a lot of issues trying to mix systems as they focus on wildly different things. As a big fan of PF2e its math is totally different in numbers and actions. There were house rules back when I first played back in 3e, everyone is different. Most of which I would hate to use these days. Steal whatever you like, make the game you and your friends enjoy.
1:27 Attack rolls that hit by 10 or more are critical hits. 3:00 Alternate methods of initiative. 5:40 Limitations on spell and ability use to avoid spamming. 7:00 "Natural healing" and "treat wounds" rules. 9:07 Flanking. 9:54 Are you Sick? Why not just try throwing up? 11:33 Change cantrip damage scaling. 12:56 The step action. 14:05 the three action economy. 17:50 Levels of frightened, stunned etc.
I have trained my players to “pass the baton” when their turn is over. Something simple like “that’s it for me.” Or something flavorful like “I look through blood trickling down my eyes as the rogue goes next.”
One thing the three action system does is it forces the player to think from the very beginning what they're giving up in order to do anything else. So they're already thinking how to spend their three actions before they utter a word. That's the other part of why turns go faster!
I actually used the "Just throw up" rule during my first session with my current group, without knowing about it being a thing in Pathfinder. They were fighting a couple of Dust Mephits, that managed to blind the players, so instead of having the party wiped out because they couldn't see a thing, I allowed them to spend an action to try and wipe the dust from their eyes (retry the Saving Throw) and thus cure the Blinded status condition. It just made sense that they would want to try and wipe some freaking dirt out of their eyes, instead of just fighting blindly for a minute. If they had had a vial of water/holy water, I would have let them use a vial of water to clear their eyes too without a Saving Throw (because, you know, rinsing your eyes with water is generally a good way to get stuff out that isn't supposed to be there. It's why you tend to automatically tear up when you get something in your eyes, because the body wants it to not be there)
There's this great D&D 5e house rule I saw used where the group actually just took all the rules from Pathfinder, but they adopted them into the 5e system by getting rid of the 5e rules and replacing them with the ones from Pathfinder. So it was essentially a 5e campaign, but using only the rules from Pathfinder. Really incredible how robust the 5e system is, and it worked really well.
RE: Nerfing, particularly in the context of guidance, I always like a 'give and take' approach. IE if we're making it so guidance has a 1 hour cooldown per target (take), we could also make it so that it is now a reaction spell, triggered when someone rolls an ability check. (give) This takes the sting out of it and also allows Guidance to be used in new and fun ways (and honestly kind of embraces how guidance is used in most tables anyway).
I think that's how it works in the 5.25 playtest, and that's how I run it. Also, since it has a verbal and somatic component, it's less than ideal in certain situations - "Why did your friend cast a spell while we were negotiating?"
Or you could just assume that they cast it every time (like BG3) to take away the point of friction between the player and the GM. It's annoying for everyone when the cleric is on a hair trigger ready to shout "Guidance!" on all the skill checks. Just let them do it. I do like the idea of a social in game cost of the spell casting being obvious as a limitation or risk.
L take in my opinion. That's one of the clerics strengths. just remind everyone that they have your guidance on ability checks at the start of each session, and as the DM just let them take that D4. It's a game, let everyone have their fun
Guidance is also a *cantrip.* A *cantrip* is meant to be the bare-bones and basic sort of spell that a novice mage would be trained in first. It's "Baby's First Spell", the sort of magic that one would expect a child to excitedly cast while saying "Look what I can do, Mommy!" as they do something like... make the curtains turn from white to blue or something. A *cantrip* should not have Guidance's level of game-breaking abusable power behind it.
@@CooperAATE The video shows where P2 rules may benefit 5e more than seeking one to switch. Any of the House Rules may fix an issue if it exists. 🤔 I don't plan on using them all but will discuss them at the table.
'New' 'edition' or whatever we're calling it and D&Dtubers trying to fix the problems in 5e looks suspiciously close to 3.5 re-evolving itself. OneD&D might turn out to literally mean just using the best rules from all editions, which is what everyone should be doing anyway!
Limiting spells like guidance can have more in game logic. Remember, a Stealth check covers more than just the 1 minute that Guidance is working. Same with a Persuasion check. Sure, it could get you past a guard with a deception roll, but it can't get you sneaking through an entire castle on 1 roll. So, allow it to work for 1 obstacle within a conversation, or a stealth, etc.
Yeah. This is where 4E kind of had it right. Do away with hard time limits and just relate everything to scenes. Guidance could help one other player within a scene, however long it takes.
I guess the "secret" is that the game is yours so you can take tools and rules from other game systems. If they work for your group and game to have more fun, that's great. If they don't, then they're not worth having
One could also secretly implement a rule from PathFinder 2e. e.g. Critical on 5+ Simply tell players to roll Critical Damage when you 👀 see the Strike is five or more above. Do the math yourself, yet have them roll the extra damage.
@@fidyyam9470 but misleading viewers could cause some to stop watching his videos. If people want to play 5e or PF it is their choice, no one will be tricked in to playing something they do not want to play.
That was the one house rule i actually hated.. at lvl 1, the cantrips suck ass, and from lvl 3 onwards, they're stronger than they are RAW. Which is really unnecessary..
This rule is so broken tho. What about cantrips that do 1d4 and 1d6 damage? They are not in line with this silly mindless rule. What about eldritch blast? You fire 2 at lvl 3 and 4 at lvl 7? Wow, that is so bad
@@sterlinggecko3269 they scale harder in tbis homebrew than in 5e though, and while that's cool for casters, it kinda makes martials even less relevant..
Exactly, cantrip scaling already changed the balance against martials since casters also now have the "always can deal damage without resources". Now that is buffed without changing martials? Not to mention Casters already get new spells & spell levels at every odd level why is cantrips an issue...
Something I lifted from PF2 - racial hit dice. At first level, characters also get a racial HD and the max hit points for that die (but CON bonus only once). I balance this out by them getting half the class HD in HP at subsequent levels instead of half+1.
What I want from house rules is too "streamline" gameplay. Adding new rules that complicate easy mechanics like needing to think about AC + 10, or making people use different ability scores for initiative instead of just giving advantage for smart thinking of initiative complicates and slows down gameplay. I like simple things where I can roll for everyone's initiative without trouble or with a single macro click. I like my house rule of using both STR score for long and high jumps instead one using score and one using mod.
I agree with you, but sometimes certain things just dont "feel" right and then Im willing to make them a bit more complicated. As for initiative: I use poker cards like in Savage Worlds. Everyone draws a card and puts it on the table so you can instantly see everyones initiative order. DEX bonuses get ignored. Just draw a card and go, its super fast and you can move right into things.
@@janbiela8596 weeww that's a quick way of running initiative that is very easy and streamlined. And then if someone has Alert or advantage then they can draw 2 instead of 1. And yeah, some things are worth complicating if the existing rules are subpar. Examples like poisons in the video mentioned I also like, also like for crafting and downtime activities that 5e glosses over. But for combat? Most of it is already so robust I don't think complicating it even further would help. Players and DMs already struggle keeping everything together!
@@shadesofgray9 The best change I made to streamline things is enemies use a single initiative roll (they all go together), and also groups of enemies make a single saving throw for AOE spells (like fireball), it doesn't really matter if they are slightly different (I'll only separate rolls for bosses or important enemies)
been a GM for over 2 decades now and one of my favorite house rules for my game is when the PC's ask for something that might be in a room or around them or something a merchant might be selling I roll a D100 and they have to guess high (51 or above) or low (50 or below). if they guess correctly then whatever thing they asked for is there. saves me time on the gm side of looking up things. of course this applies to little stuff like a rock on the ground, some spare rope, a candle, does the merchant have any knives and so on. Also can apply it to social situations like if a PC ask if a npc is at a tavern or in the area and so on. its kinda a easy fix to alot of those random ask from PC's that a GM didnt plan for.
I’d be cautious with using the crit on AC+10 rule in 5e. Bonuses from Bless and Bardic Inspiration and even the Archery fighting style might make crits very common. One change you might make here is that Archery is now just a +1 and maybe the bonuses from Bless and Bardic Inspiration only apply if the attack would miss? Or lean into the power creep and let Bless and BI be amazing, up to table preference.
I mean kinda. I have a +11 now, meaning a 30 (31 is a crit anyway) max. AC 20 and less would be crits at on a 19 roll, assuming like 16ac is avg and avg d20 is 11, kinda works out well for later level stuff slaughtering minons
HB rule I"m using: Language Ranks Characters don’t automatically perfectly know a language. Proficiency in languages comes in three ranks, Novice, Experienced, and Mastery. If you don’t have any ranks in a language you are considered ignorant with that language. You gain a number of language points equal to 2 plus twice the number of your language proficiencies you would get. Spend these language points to gain language ranks. You must have Mastery (3 ranks) in at least one language. Common Language rank cost: 1 Language point Exotic Language rank cost: 2 Language points The language ranks are described in the Language Rank table. Common Languages (1 point/rank): Common, Dwarvish, Elvish, Giant, Gnomish, Goblin, Halfling, Orc, Undercommon Exotic Languages (2 points/rank): Abyssal (Demons), Celestial, Draconic, Deep Speech, Infernal (Devils), Primordial (Elementals), Sylvan (Fey) Language Rank Table 0: Ignorant. The language is totally gibberish to you. 1: Novice. You passively have some basic understanding of individual words and phrases. When you hear the language, you must make a DC 10 Wisdom (Insight) check to understand the full meaning. When you speak the language, you must succeed a DC 10 Charisma (Performance) roll in order to communicate beyond individual words and phrases. 2: Experienced. You can fully understand and communicate with this language, though you have a distinct accent and you may not understand certain complex words, phrases or idioms. You can make a DC 10 Charisma (Performance) check to disguise your accent. 3: Mastery. You can fully communicate in the language as a native speaker. Learning Languages If you find a teacher and are given enough time, you can learn languages. Choose a language that your teacher can speak. After a number of weeks equal to 6 (or 12 if it’s an exotic language) minus your Intelligence modifier, you gain a language rank (Minimum of 1 day). The teacher cannot give you a rank higher than their own language rank. Linguist [Feat] If you choose this feat you gain the following benefits: Increase your Intelligence, Wisdom or Charisma score by 1, to a maximum of 20. You gain 6 language points you can spend on language ranks of your choice. When hearing a language in which you have at least one language rank, you have advantage on Wisdom (Insight) checks to understand the full meaning. Additionally, when speaking a language in which you lack Mastery, you have advantage on Charisma (Performance) checks to effectively communicate or disguise your accent. Coder [Feat] If you choose this feat you gain the following benefits: Increase your Intelligence by 1, to a maximum of 20. You can aptly create written ciphers. Others can't decipher a code you create unless you teach them, they succeed on an Intelligence check (DC equal to your Intelligence score + your proficiency bonus), or they use magic to decipher it. You have advantage on Intelligence checks to decipher a written code.
Pretty nice rule that I might wind up stealing. I will say your timeline for learning a language is... generous if we go by real world, but probably reasonable if we go by how much downtime people usually actually put in their adventures. I'm also used to seeing proficiency in language broken down on a 0 to 5 scale, but that's probably getting a bit too complex for what should be a simple house rule for a game mechanic...
I started with the flanking rule and quickly removed it. Then, I gave everyone a feat that lets them "distract" enemies as a reaction to impose disadvantage on incoming opportunity attacks. (Enemies can do this, too.) Additionally, a creature can be hit by only one opportunity attack per movement. The Sentinel feat ignores this disadvantage on opportunity attacks. So far, this has been working well. It has certainly made movement in combat more fluid, as the players don't feel nearly as locked in melee as they did before (and neither do the enemies). But in terms of making combat encounters more interesting, all this comes a distant second to thoughtful encounter design. I also added 5ft of movement when Disengage is used (when the creature is actually in melee with something else) to make it a bit less useless.
I tried to get my table to switch to PF2 last year. I love the 3-action economy, the crit rules, the poison/disease and healing rules, the emphasis on tactical movement, etc. But for some reason, my table had 0 fun with PF2. Maybe I was messing it up, since it was new for me too. But folding these mechanical strengths into 5e as house rules could be a great stepping stone. Thanks - will try at least some of these.
I merged my 2nd AD&D with the combat system and magic damage system from Rolemaster. My players really like the faster and more specific combat and bleeding damage. Still have an ongoing Spelljammer 2nd ed. campaign going.
First: We have a house rule that players have to role for success whenever they try to cast a spell or cantrip. Each spell has a DC and each Spell is learned at skill 0. This skill can be increased like any other skill up to 4. A cantrip is spelllevel 0. To cast a spell your DC=12 + spell level - spell skill. I recently tried a rule to limit the use of cantrips by working via a dice pool. I introduced a dice pool for spellcasting. The pool receives one die for every spell the player can cast in a "Day"+ his spellcasting attribute's modifier. The pool is refilled to half size after a long rest and regains 2 dice during a short rest. A player must meet or beat the DC for a spell to go of. The player can allocate as many dice from his pool as he wants to, increasing the chance of success. We liked it so far, I'm however thinking about adding benefits if more successes are roled.
re: disengage, I have a house rule where you can disengage as a bonus action by spending half your movement. Sure it's not gonna help you run away necessarily, but it might allow you to get out of immediate dodge / to an ally.
My house rule was my D30 rule. I bought all my players D30s that they can use on any roll. For attack rolls anything over 20 crits with a 30 being a triple crit. Once they use it I get the die to use against them on any roll of my choice.
Ok this was nice for the D&D crowd. But now we need some good house rules for Pathfinder 2e too…… D&D was great back in the day, but for me Pathfinder has been the D&D replacement moving forward. So if you could do a video on some house rules that help Pathfinder that would be awesome. Even though there may not be that many lol
Advantage is probably the only D&D rule I actually like because it's so elegant. To your point that it's too swingy: using modifiers doesn't reduce swing in a d20 system
Regarding the cantrip dice, that a lot more dice to track and would bog the game down MORE than really help in anything meaningful outside of one-shot sessions. Edit: The 3 action economy set-up for pathfinder works because warrior based classes had special skills to augment their damage output. 5e's don't have jack. so that makes the martial/caster divide ginormous compared to now.
It'd also allow double levelled spells, quickened spell would obviously have to be changed reduce a levelled spell to one action and then you could use those left over two actions for a second one. Or is metamagic going to cost an action severely limiting its utility? There's a lot that needs to be changed and looked at. A lot of the bonus action stuff is a bonus action for a reason.
@shadenox8164 that's another tricky bit right there that will overly complicate the action economy that 5e has. If it's an issue with the player, then they need to either review all of their abilities prior to the session, or have a visual cue on what they CAN do per action ( main action and bonus action respectively)
I think the biggest problem with bonus actions in 5E is they are too niche and typically require a special ability to even use it. Change some of the "optional" actions that can be used as a bonus action. Not available in the PHB, btw. For some reason most of them are in the DMG (clarified and added to in Xanathar's, I think) which makes no sense to me and should not have been an "optional" rule to begin with. I'm working on a compilation mod for FG that spells out these things so players know what they are able to do. Also, clarifying the free actions available (and adding to). I'm using the 3 action rule, but only for attack actions (haven't decided if I'm going to do -2/-5 or -5/-5+disadvantage). The Extra Attack ability removes the penalty for each step (1st Extra Attack makes two attacks like normal and a 3rd at -5. When you get your 3rd Extra Attack you make 4 attacks with no penalties, as normal). Not sure if I want the penalties to apply if you are making the same attack action, like PF2, or for any attack action).
So interesting, thanks! I indeed use these principles but taking from Pathfinder 1. Still, I can see many interesting things from PF2 after your video! House rule I use "as is" from PF1 : CMB and CMD system to add more diversity to attack actions.
One of the many reasons I have switched over to running Savage Worlds -- I literally need no House Rules to run the game. Literally the ONLY house rules we have are for the medium (one game is play by post, so we have PBP rules specifically for that... one is on Foundry, and we have some 'table rules' for that). SWADE has enough "setting rules" that are published, rules-as-written variants, and you just pick the ones you want. And if you use a SWADE setting like Deadlands, even that is all taken care of for you. It's such a simple and flexible game that we have played Deadlands RAW for the last YEAR and I've only ever had to "house rule" one edge case of something that was ambiguous... and it turns out that the majority of GMs run it that way, including the lead dev of SWADE, so it's RAI instead of RAW. That's it.
With #1, I've been using 10+ hits as Criticals (called Overkill) - but only grant either a second roll of weapon damage or adding an appropriate condition (like trip, disarm, etc.). My players love this and it is easy to implement. And yes, a nat 20 critical that is also an overkill stacks. :)
My fav house rule in 5e is ASI + feat at every level you would normally get ASI or Feat. The caveats we have are that if you take the ASI the feat you pair it with can’t be one of the “required for a build” feats (e.g. resilient CON, Great weapon master, crossbow expert, etc.) we have a full list for our group and we agree as a table when a feat needs to go on list. If you want to GWM + chef feat and forgo an ASI at that level that’s totally cool too! What I’ve found doing this is that the feats that never come up actually get some air time in the game and the PCs get more horizontal progression. It doesn’t lead to PCs getting OP really that we’ve found.
I’m curious how you guys feel about attrition in PF2e. I’m running it now and it’s probably my big complaint. Wizards have it but no one else does unless they have magic items. I ended up implementing a Fatigue & Delay blades in the dark clock to help fix this for my game. Every fight they get fatigue, if it reaches a certain point, flat neg to party AC. They can spend some time resting to clear it but spending too much time (too many delays) cause a random encounter roll.
I’ve used the 3 actions points since the start of my recent dnd campaign, only when they got multi-attack it got sticky and slowed right down. Now I’m about to fix that with giving an extra damage dice instead
Vomiting to clear a condition IMHO should be a full round action. Bend over and force vomiting, wipe mouth, then move on. Has anyone taken less than 6 seconds to throw up? I like a lot of these (but I also really like PF2 and wish my party did too).
Got a tip like the stunned ones for banished? And keen to hear your take on the diseases and poisons for 5e. My first dnd experience was the gold box and there was level draining, disease causing, and age altering mechanics which i was shocked not to find when i got to play dnd as a ttrpg for the first time in 5e
Yes, I imagine the Three Action Economy really would speed things up. No checking one's character sheet or looking things up in the book or online, and as you say, it makes things more dynamic. Also, thanks for laying the ground work on how that would actually play out. The idea about "bonus action spell=1 action and standard spell equals 2" and other stuff.
#4: Loss hp isnt always wounds so this again doesnt work, its more like Stamina, in 4e the first time you hit half health you are wounded (Bloodied) and in 5e its actually only when you hit 0. People struggle with this, but thats why hp is easily recovered in 5e. You would need to actually implement a wound system, and maybe cut max hp by wounds or something for this to work within the system of 5e.
I love a lot of what this video is putting out and I want to try some of these mechanics. Something that should be reconsidered is the 'Vomit Mechanics'. We, irl, have so many chemicals that state on their SDS Sheets, DO NOT INDUCE VOMITING. MAY CAUSE PERMANENT DAMAGE TO LUNGS. By using this mechanic, players, in a real emergency situation, cause more damage because of what they are used to. Just a thought.
A house rule I use is (within reason and with valid narrative substance) a player can choose a monster race to play as a PC race and I work out with them ability score bonuses, abilities, and proficiencies, usually the players I've had didn't like the options available for play (prior to me getting volos or Multiverse of monsters which added more playable player races, that seemed to curb the issue mostly) and thus when they looked at me disheartened that they didn't like the options but still wanted to play we would look through the monster manual with guidelines and restrictions to find something better that they wanted to play. It was more work for me during session 0 but it allowed many people I've played with the best opportunity to have fun
That part about the turn being over but not actually being over, and the dm constantly asking if they're done, hits home hard. I ran a 5 year campaign, and this came up constantly..
I would rule disengages to be more similar to 3.5e. In that system, dashing triples your movement instead of doubling it, and disengaging instead doubles it, along with the benefit of the disengage action. So I'd either do exactly that, or a lighter version. The lighter version would allow disengaging to add +10ft of movement along with the disengage benefits. And so it works with slower creatures, this additional movement cannot exceed your base movement, meaning monsters with 5ft base movement will only get +5ft from disengaging. I much prefer this to your proposal, as it has the intended effect of allowing a retreat to be a feasible option against enemies with similar speed, while still allowing Rogues to have their special trait.
3 actions, I guess I am too used to D&D, PF2 I was either trying to do to much or not enough! One thing I do in face to face games is make a special character sheet for my son or new players and it lists a table with Action, bonus action, free action and then I put their abilities and such in the table so they can see oh 1 action and I have these 5 things to choose as said action.
I love how much time we spend fixing 5e. And this is a fantastic examination of that: There's lots of great stuff in PF2 that makes 5e better! Like... umm... playing Pathfinder 2! =)
An alternative I've seen for rule 8 that I intend to playtest is Extended Combat Zones. TLDR: combat zone is melee range +5ft. AoO can only be triggered by leaving a combat zone and require the opponent to first move 5 ft in order for the AoO to reach, which may cause a chain of AoOs. It's a house rule made by another TH-cam creator and they've documented it quite well in their main video and 2 videos going over example cases.
But when you say anyone that rolls +10 us a crit, you take away from classes that get built in skills and abilities to get better crits, such as some Barbarians that can have advantage, or champion fighters some warlocks that can crit on 19s.
@shadenox8164 part of my problem is then why doesn't a fighters weapon damage increase to keep in line. Multiple attacks don't really scale like cantrip damage.
For disengage i created a house rule that allows 5' of movement away from the creatures you are disengaging from. So if you disengage and move 30' it should put you out of reach for those creatures with the same movement speed to simply move and attack you. I also allow everyone to use their bonus action to sprint, if they used their action to move as well. Its just that creatures get advantage on attacks against them if they do so.
I recently used a House Rule which I think may be worth considering though whether you want to use it or not would again, depend on the preference of you as a DM and Players. If your party is facing off against an enemy that is severely weaker than they are, like a level 6 party fighting a bunch of monsters that are all lower than CR 1, consider simply deciding that the party wins. Basically just tell the players, "The enemies that are attacking you have 0 chance of victory. You win. Feel free to describe how your character wins this battle."
You don't - the three action system replaces iterative attacks. A happy compromise might be to replace the fighter's extra attacks with a bonus on the same number of attacks as they lose. PF2 doesn't seem to have iterative attacks, but most of these changes were introduced in Pathfinder Unchained (PF's Unearthed Arcana book) for PF1e, which is a lot closer to 5e than PF2e is, so the conversion info there would probably be more useful to 5e players that just grabbing rules from a very different game with no info on what those unintended side-effects may be.
For flanking, I do setting similar but opposite. I gube +1, +2, and +3 to attack rolls to flanking characters based on how many people are flanking. Players like the feeling for seeming stronger as opposed to the enemy being weaker. However. The problem was with ranged not getting the benefit. So, i may change it to an armor deficit like this.
You use dexterity for initiative because it's a measure of how quickly you can physically react to the change in situation. Your character with a high wisdom score can use their perception to detect a threat and initiate combat getting to act on a surprise round.
dexterity is a super stat that means whatever people want it to mean at any given moment being quick with your fingers doesn't make your reflexes any better, neither does it make you act quickly if anything, proficiency should be what determines initiative
#7: For cantrip scaling (Aside from EB) there's nothing that will unbalance the game by just adding Cantrip + prociency without changing anything else. This be 1d10+3 ect going up. With EB it gets out of hand, so you might employ a only on one blast kinda thing. I wouldnt change the dice because this could lead to feeling way weaker.
Doesn't work for EB cuz Agonizing Blast exists lol. I don't really think cantrips need much changing tho. If you're spamming firebolt and getting bored of it when ur playing a caster, are you really playing a caster?
Disengaging as a bonus action is something that might invalidate other classess shine, I would do it like this: - Attacks of opportunity happen when a creature moves more than 5 feet out of the threated range of another creature. For me the main thing that makes 5e combats boring and static are Attacks of opportunity, even when there is a disengage action, nobody ever wants to move, so you waste your full movement. With this rule you enable movement even if it is a luttle bit, in some circumstances it would be even more beneficial.
I use an initiative system that my friend said he got from someone else...each type of action rolls a different die. A light weapon may be a D4 or D6 while a two handed sword or axe or powerful attack spell might be a D10. Of course there are ways to affect these with bonuses/penalties.
I use some house rules, but the one I like to mention is the Stamina system and Dash action changes. I don't really like that you need to use your action to run, so now Dash is just movement, but if you use Dash you would consume 1 Stamina. Stamina is a resource that players have, the formula to get is simply [Constitution Modifier + Proficiency], taking a rest will restore Stamina. If you don't have Stamina left you can try to use Dash anyways by succeeding a Cons Check [DC 10], but every time you Dash with no Stamina the DC will be harder by 3, if you fail the Check you won't be able to Dash until you rest and you'll gain 1 Exhaustion level. This is the main purpose of the Stamina, but you can use it in other ways if you want, maybe you can give Advantage to players in certain rolls if they use 1 or more Stamina. Or for example, the Owlfolk race has an ability to make a Dash (I talk Spanish, so Dash Action is called Carrera (Sprint), Owlfolk's Dash is different) in any direction, it's like a fast step that you can use to avoid attacks or go high (to somewhere) if needed, you need to use 1 Stamina to use this ability. Using this mechanic you can also get a better Disengaging experience.
I never reply to these but I will for this one. Here are my most game changing house rules in no particular order. 1 - spell points over spell slots. - i hate spell slots and how it works. spell points is easier and i've "normalized" how people get spell points per level. stronger early game but tapers off late game. 2 - Identify Spell and Arcana Checks to Identify - you basically learn the generic magical properties of the item. Does it have a curse? does it require attunement? Does it have a damage bonus? but not the specifics of each magical bonus. 3 - Consuming Potions - Action to search/give a potion to someone else :: Bonus Action to drink a potion 4 - Flanking - I also include adjacent creatures to the target. so across or if 2 creatures make an "L" shape. no pack tactics tho. thats too much for NPCs and all their shenanigans. 5 - Advantage on weapon/spell attacks - You get advantage on weapon and spell attacks if the target is 3 times larger than you, ie, you're medium and attacking a Gargantuan size creature, you would have advantage 6 - Threshold - Look at the boat specs. If a creature doesnt deal a minimum amount of damage they take no damage even on a crit. My formula is double the AC of the creature is the threshold, but i run high power magic, so my level 7 players are doing 40 damage on good rolls. With that, i alter what the threshold is based on their damage output while preparing for that session also taking into consideration creature abilities and other factors. 7 - My favorite one, you can ask for any rule change or game mechanic, or w/e, but if you can do it, so can my NPCs.
My INITIATIVE house rule: I use poker cards like in Savage Worlds. Everyone draws a card and puts it on the table so you can instantly see everyones initiative order. No need to write them down. DEX bonuses get ignored. Just draw a card and go, its super fast and you can move right into things. If you still want for DEX to play a role you can insert an Initiative round at the start of combat: In the first round of combat you can take a number of actions equal to your DEX modifier (at least 1). Initiative order is still determined by cards to keep it quick and easy.
The BEST HOUSE RULE ever. I roll 2 twenty-sided dice. If they match. It is a critical hit or miss depending on if they hit or miss the target. If they have advantage or disadvantage, they can adjust the second dice roll by one up or down. Hence a 15/16 roll would be a critical hit (if it hits.) Monsters or players with disadvantage is just too severe of a penalty.
It’s been driving me nuts “Do have anything else you want to do on your turn” “What can I do” “You still Have your bonus action and movement” “Do I have any bonus actions” Every single turn
I've used the +2 to atk instead of advantage for flanking. Feels good. Will be using it again for the next campaign. I also don't like how sleeping for 8 hours magically heals everything. I think I'll go to long rests only recovering half (rounded up) of the hit dice.
We modified advantage and disadvantage, so it doesn't cancle each other out flatly. So while it is not stacking in the way of more dice (that's what elven accuracy is for), one instance of disadvante doesn't cancle out 10 advantages and vice verca. It always bothered us, that it is RAW possible to be blinded, knocked prone and at exhaustion 3 but just activate reckless attack to have normal attacks. I think this makes advantage and disadvantage more meaningfull, as just granting it one time isn't the be all end all.
It is a classic understanding that, somehow, the party member at the forefront of the group scouting for trouble--and finding it--is the one who ends up last in initiative order. How much of a classic understanding is it? Read the section of sample gameplay in the introductory chapter of Pathfinder Core Rulebook (1e). Harsk is at the front looking for trouble, sees and identifies trouble, and then ends up last in initiative. HOW?
I always run the "whoeve acted first starts the Initiative regardless of Initiative order". So like in mid convo wanna attack? Rolled last? But goes first anyways then we continue from that point. Initiative barely matters past a few rounds of combat and like if it's a group ambush then most likely gonna go first anyways so party is going to go first.
PF 1, 2, and 2E has a HUGE Flaw with creating things. I chunk it for the D&D method (Even the 5E method is better than PF 1, 2, 2.1 Churning out items hand over fist in a short time, BREAKS games. And for the record, I prefer PF of 5E I also don;t allow Teleportation to work as written. Someone with Teleport could easily teleport into the King and Queens bed room and kill them when they sleep Crit. I had a Player Crit on 2 hits in 1 round killing the BBEG (rolling 2 20's and then confirming) But I still use Crit
I've erred on the side of caution with the first rule. Instead of just automatic critical hits when you hit by 10 or more, I stole from DC20's Heavy Hit system, even if it's a bit more complicated to implement. I basically went the route of the attack adding one single additional damage die to the damage roll. This is universal across all damage rolls, regardless of a creature's size. Meaning Large or larger creatures get diminishing returns. Maybe down the line I'll shift over to just using the auto crit rule instead, but fingers crossed this is good enough.
When it comes to classes that can attack twice per action and use a cantrip plus melee like bladesinger how would that work? Do I just get 3 swings and 3 cantrips and what about two weapon fighting do I still make a swing with it as a bonus action?
How about disengage would give you 50% of bonus movement speed? Still an action, but with 45ft. instead of 30ft., most of enemies won't be able to chase you down so easily.
Instead of changing disengage as a bonus action - I preferred the idea of making disengage and dash into one action sorta - where disengage gives extra movement. It's still an action, but when you use it you get to avoid AoOs and get to move far enough away that you don't immediately get hit. (unless the pursuer has the ability to Charge attack or just way more move speed than you).
I find one thing I miss from PF2e when I play 5e is Recall Knowledge. Being able to find out enemy weaknesses and abilities based on skills I invested in feels great.
@@shadenox8164 Where? There's some loose guidelines that certain skills might provide some lore for certain creatures but there's nothing I would call a "system".
I liked the rule from... I forget the system... where you get 4 actions, kind of like PF2e, but you're also allocating your reaction(s) on your turn, so you can take them later. so, you could move in between the enemies and the wizard, set your other 3 actions as reactions, then smack 3 enemies running past you.
With regards to houserules, I'm already implementing some of the 3pp rules for that company's 5.5e or 6e, and a couple of the new One D&D rules/class features. My favourite 3pp rule change is removing racial ability scores and giving it to the background and class instead. Pathfinder 2e and Starfinder do something similar, but also keep the racial scores.
I prefer how the pathfinder crpg does disengage. You can step 5 feet without attacks of opportunity, but that is all the movement you can make. It still makes rogues cunning action powerful, but gives casters the ability to step back and hurl spells.
So since you have been playing PF2E for a while now I have a question. How do you feel about magic items in the game? I have felt like they are extremely underwhelming compared to their d&d counterparts unless they are the progression based runes
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wait how did you comment this 4 days ago when this video is from 2 minutes ago?????
Rule probleme ? Make a journey to mechianus.
Let player rolplaying modify any rule de of the game. Methaphoricaly a gear who is the incarnation of a rule.
Wensday have suddenly vanish. A week is now 6 day.
I have no idea why the word accuracy is applied to bounded accuracy. It's just nonsensical.
When is the "Paths & Legends" version of "Lairs & Legends" being KickStarted?
I have my Legends and Lairs I books *and* my Secret Art of Game Mastery books. They are gorgeous book sets. I also finally got my hands on Luke's Into the Fey. You produce awesome materials, I raise a glass to you and your team on all of these projects. Best wishes to you, i love your channel and your contributions to the hobby.
The real title of the video "10 ways to trick your D and D party into playing Pathfinder 2e Instead!" You're doing the good work of spreading the word.
If anything this would actually do PF2 a disservice by making its rules look terrible by inserting them into a system not built for them.
There's a handful of rules that could work which were also homebrew rules people have been using since god who knows, probably the start of TTRPGs that PF2 decided to make actual rules like the "use action to remove condition".
or "1 way to trick you viewers into watching a video about pathfinder"
@@shadenox8164 Of course there would be a lot of issues trying to mix systems as they focus on wildly different things. As a big fan of PF2e its math is totally different in numbers and actions.
There were house rules back when I first played back in 3e, everyone is different. Most of which I would hate to use these days. Steal whatever you like, make the game you and your friends enjoy.
1:27 Attack rolls that hit by 10 or more are critical hits.
3:00 Alternate methods of initiative.
5:40 Limitations on spell and ability use to avoid spamming.
7:00 "Natural healing" and "treat wounds" rules.
9:07 Flanking.
9:54 Are you Sick? Why not just try throwing up?
11:33 Change cantrip damage scaling.
12:56 The step action.
14:05 the three action economy.
17:50 Levels of frightened, stunned etc.
18:35 I pressed send to soon.
@jonathanschmitt5762 18:35 Honorable Mention: More Cool Reactions, Fewer Attacks of Opportunity
I have trained my players to “pass the baton” when their turn is over. Something simple like “that’s it for me.” Or something flavorful like “I look through blood trickling down my eyes as the rogue goes next.”
Sometimes during intense encounters, I use an actual item to represent whose turn it is. Once the item is slid to another, the turn is done.
Me after hearing a bunch of these house rules explained: “wait, this is just 3.5 with extra steps”
One thing the three action system does is it forces the player to think from the very beginning what they're giving up in order to do anything else. So they're already thinking how to spend their three actions before they utter a word. That's the other part of why turns go faster!
I actually used the "Just throw up" rule during my first session with my current group, without knowing about it being a thing in Pathfinder. They were fighting a couple of Dust Mephits, that managed to blind the players, so instead of having the party wiped out because they couldn't see a thing, I allowed them to spend an action to try and wipe the dust from their eyes (retry the Saving Throw) and thus cure the Blinded status condition. It just made sense that they would want to try and wipe some freaking dirt out of their eyes, instead of just fighting blindly for a minute. If they had had a vial of water/holy water, I would have let them use a vial of water to clear their eyes too without a Saving Throw (because, you know, rinsing your eyes with water is generally a good way to get stuff out that isn't supposed to be there. It's why you tend to automatically tear up when you get something in your eyes, because the body wants it to not be there)
There's this great D&D 5e house rule I saw used where the group actually just took all the rules from Pathfinder, but they adopted them into the 5e system by getting rid of the 5e rules and replacing them with the ones from Pathfinder. So it was essentially a 5e campaign, but using only the rules from Pathfinder. Really incredible how robust the 5e system is, and it worked really well.
D&D5e and PF2e are essentialy the same system: d20 roll-high heroic fantasy with AC, DC and HP.
So transitioning is extrmely easy
RE: Nerfing, particularly in the context of guidance, I always like a 'give and take' approach. IE if we're making it so guidance has a 1 hour cooldown per target (take), we could also make it so that it is now a reaction spell, triggered when someone rolls an ability check. (give)
This takes the sting out of it and also allows Guidance to be used in new and fun ways (and honestly kind of embraces how guidance is used in most tables anyway).
I think that's how it works in the 5.25 playtest, and that's how I run it. Also, since it has a verbal and somatic component, it's less than ideal in certain situations - "Why did your friend cast a spell while we were negotiating?"
Or you could just assume that they cast it every time (like BG3) to take away the point of friction between the player and the GM.
It's annoying for everyone when the cleric is on a hair trigger ready to shout "Guidance!" on all the skill checks.
Just let them do it.
I do like the idea of a social in game cost of the spell casting being obvious as a limitation or risk.
I would give Guidance a 1 hour cooldown on the spell. It prevents spell spam, and makes the caster consider when to cast the spell.
L take in my opinion. That's one of the clerics strengths. just remind everyone that they have your guidance on ability checks at the start of each session, and as the DM just let them take that D4. It's a game, let everyone have their fun
Guidance is also a *cantrip.*
A *cantrip* is meant to be the bare-bones and basic sort of spell that a novice mage would be trained in first. It's "Baby's First Spell", the sort of magic that one would expect a child to excitedly cast while saying "Look what I can do, Mommy!" as they do something like... make the curtains turn from white to blue or something.
A *cantrip* should not have Guidance's level of game-breaking abusable power behind it.
so 20 mins of "just play pathfinder"? i love it ;D
Our table moved from 5e to Pathfinder almost a year ago
We never looked back
Some of us don't want to, so if that's actually what this video is about, I'll be disappointed
@@CooperAATE
The video shows where P2 rules may benefit 5e more than seeking one to switch. Any of the House Rules may fix an issue if it exists. 🤔 I don't plan on using them all but will discuss them at the table.
he literally explains in the beginning that if you or your group don't want to switch systems, you can try to apply some pf2 rules in it...
Thank you for giving me more reason to not play Pathfinder.
Your Firebolt Cantrip Damage is like the damage for Eldritch Blast in 3.5!
'New' 'edition' or whatever we're calling it and D&Dtubers trying to fix the problems in 5e looks suspiciously close to 3.5 re-evolving itself. OneD&D might turn out to literally mean just using the best rules from all editions, which is what everyone should be doing anyway!
Limiting spells like guidance can have more in game logic. Remember, a Stealth check covers more than just the 1 minute that Guidance is working. Same with a Persuasion check.
Sure, it could get you past a guard with a deception roll, but it can't get you sneaking through an entire castle on 1 roll.
So, allow it to work for 1 obstacle within a conversation, or a stealth, etc.
Yeah. This is where 4E kind of had it right. Do away with hard time limits and just relate everything to scenes. Guidance could help one other player within a scene, however long it takes.
Should this be called PF rules that would be good house rules for 5E. Rules noone talks about is misleading.
I guess the "secret" is that the game is yours so you can take tools and rules from other game systems. If they work for your group and game to have more fun, that's great. If they don't, then they're not worth having
One could also secretly implement a rule from PathFinder 2e.
e.g. Critical on 5+
Simply tell players to roll Critical Damage when you 👀 see the Strike is five or more above. Do the math yourself, yet have them roll the extra damage.
They had something similar but reuploaded. TH-cam Algo really doesn’t like the mention on non D&D I’m guessing. It’s a damn shame
Yeah but 5e fans avoid PF content like the plague so they wouldn't click
@@fidyyam9470 but misleading viewers could cause some to stop watching his videos. If people want to play 5e or PF it is their choice, no one will be tricked in to playing something they do not want to play.
I enjoy that this is basically “to fix 5e, play PF2”.
The cantrip scaling was great.
That was the one house rule i actually hated.. at lvl 1, the cantrips suck ass, and from lvl 3 onwards, they're stronger than they are RAW. Which is really unnecessary..
This rule is so broken tho. What about cantrips that do 1d4 and 1d6 damage? They are not in line with this silly mindless rule. What about eldritch blast? You fire 2 at lvl 3 and 4 at lvl 7? Wow, that is so bad
@shaclown7721 PF2e has them scale at even levels, so you only have one level of them sucking.
@@sterlinggecko3269 they scale harder in tbis homebrew than in 5e though, and while that's cool for casters, it kinda makes martials even less relevant..
Exactly, cantrip scaling already changed the balance against martials since casters also now have the "always can deal damage without resources". Now that is buffed without changing martials? Not to mention Casters already get new spells & spell levels at every odd level why is cantrips an issue...
Something I lifted from PF2 - racial hit dice. At first level, characters also get a racial HD and the max hit points for that die (but CON bonus only once). I balance this out by them getting half the class HD in HP at subsequent levels instead of half+1.
What I want from house rules is too "streamline" gameplay. Adding new rules that complicate easy mechanics like needing to think about AC + 10, or making people use different ability scores for initiative instead of just giving advantage for smart thinking of initiative complicates and slows down gameplay. I like simple things where I can roll for everyone's initiative without trouble or with a single macro click. I like my house rule of using both STR score for long and high jumps instead one using score and one using mod.
I agree with you, but sometimes certain things just dont "feel" right and then Im willing to make them a bit more complicated. As for initiative: I use poker cards like in Savage Worlds. Everyone draws a card and puts it on the table so you can instantly see everyones initiative order. DEX bonuses get ignored. Just draw a card and go, its super fast and you can move right into things.
@@janbiela8596 weeww that's a quick way of running initiative that is very easy and streamlined. And then if someone has Alert or advantage then they can draw 2 instead of 1.
And yeah, some things are worth complicating if the existing rules are subpar. Examples like poisons in the video mentioned I also like, also like for crafting and downtime activities that 5e glosses over. But for combat? Most of it is already so robust I don't think complicating it even further would help. Players and DMs already struggle keeping everything together!
Have you got document you might share. Always looking at house rules to streamline things
@@shadesofgray9 sure, can I directly DM something to you on YT? Never tried that before.
@@shadesofgray9 The best change I made to streamline things is enemies use a single initiative roll (they all go together), and also groups of enemies make a single saving throw for AOE spells (like fireball), it doesn't really matter if they are slightly different (I'll only separate rolls for bosses or important enemies)
been a GM for over 2 decades now and one of my favorite house rules for my game is when the PC's ask for something that might be in a room or around them or something a merchant might be selling I roll a D100 and they have to guess high (51 or above) or low (50 or below). if they guess correctly then whatever thing they asked for is there. saves me time on the gm side of looking up things. of course this applies to little stuff like a rock on the ground, some spare rope, a candle, does the merchant have any knives and so on. Also can apply it to social situations like if a PC ask if a npc is at a tavern or in the area and so on. its kinda a easy fix to alot of those random ask from PC's that a GM didnt plan for.
I feel like the easy thing is "Yes the merchant has this basic item."
I’d be cautious with using the crit on AC+10 rule in 5e. Bonuses from Bless and Bardic Inspiration and even the Archery fighting style might make crits very common. One change you might make here is that Archery is now just a +1 and maybe the bonuses from Bless and Bardic Inspiration only apply if the attack would miss? Or lean into the power creep and let Bless and BI be amazing, up to table preference.
Perhaps the bonuses do not stack, only the highest is applied.
I mean kinda. I have a +11 now, meaning a 30 (31 is a crit anyway) max. AC 20 and less would be crits at on a 19 roll, assuming like 16ac is avg and avg d20 is 11, kinda works out well for later level stuff slaughtering minons
I really wish I could back your new Kickstarter. I run a year long DND or Pathfinder game every year at the high school I teach at
HB rule I"m using: Language Ranks
Characters don’t automatically perfectly know a language. Proficiency in languages comes in three ranks, Novice, Experienced, and Mastery. If you don’t have any ranks in a language you are considered ignorant with that language.
You gain a number of language points equal to 2 plus twice the number of your language proficiencies you would get. Spend these language points to gain language ranks. You must have Mastery (3 ranks) in at least one language.
Common Language rank cost: 1 Language point
Exotic Language rank cost: 2 Language points
The language ranks are described in the Language Rank table.
Common Languages (1 point/rank): Common, Dwarvish, Elvish, Giant, Gnomish, Goblin, Halfling, Orc, Undercommon
Exotic Languages (2 points/rank): Abyssal (Demons), Celestial, Draconic, Deep Speech, Infernal (Devils), Primordial (Elementals), Sylvan (Fey)
Language Rank Table
0: Ignorant. The language is totally gibberish to you.
1: Novice. You passively have some basic understanding of individual words and phrases. When you hear the language, you must make a DC 10 Wisdom (Insight) check to understand the full meaning. When you speak the language, you must succeed a DC 10 Charisma (Performance) roll in order to communicate beyond individual words and phrases.
2: Experienced. You can fully understand and communicate with this language,
though you have a distinct accent and you may not understand certain complex words, phrases or idioms. You can make a DC 10 Charisma (Performance) check to disguise your accent.
3: Mastery. You can fully communicate in the language as a native speaker.
Learning Languages
If you find a teacher and are given enough time, you can learn languages. Choose a language that your teacher can speak. After a number of weeks equal to 6 (or 12 if it’s an exotic language) minus your Intelligence modifier, you gain a language rank (Minimum of 1 day). The teacher cannot give you a rank higher than their own language rank.
Linguist [Feat]
If you choose this feat you gain the following benefits:
Increase your Intelligence, Wisdom or Charisma score by 1, to a maximum of 20.
You gain 6 language points you can spend on language ranks of your choice.
When hearing a language in which you have at least one language rank, you have advantage on Wisdom (Insight) checks to understand the full meaning. Additionally, when speaking a language in which you lack Mastery, you have advantage on Charisma (Performance) checks to effectively communicate or disguise your accent.
Coder [Feat]
If you choose this feat you gain the following benefits:
Increase your Intelligence by 1, to a maximum of 20.
You can aptly create written ciphers. Others can't decipher a code you create unless you teach them, they succeed on an Intelligence check (DC equal to your Intelligence score + your proficiency bonus), or they use magic to decipher it.
You have advantage on Intelligence checks to decipher a written code.
Interesting.
Thanx for including the whole enchilada.
Pretty nice rule that I might wind up stealing. I will say your timeline for learning a language is... generous if we go by real world, but probably reasonable if we go by how much downtime people usually actually put in their adventures.
I'm also used to seeing proficiency in language broken down on a 0 to 5 scale, but that's probably getting a bit too complex for what should be a simple house rule for a game mechanic...
I started with the flanking rule and quickly removed it. Then, I gave everyone a feat that lets them "distract" enemies as a reaction to impose disadvantage on incoming opportunity attacks. (Enemies can do this, too.) Additionally, a creature can be hit by only one opportunity attack per movement. The Sentinel feat ignores this disadvantage on opportunity attacks. So far, this has been working well. It has certainly made movement in combat more fluid, as the players don't feel nearly as locked in melee as they did before (and neither do the enemies). But in terms of making combat encounters more interesting, all this comes a distant second to thoughtful encounter design.
I also added 5ft of movement when Disengage is used (when the creature is actually in melee with something else) to make it a bit less useless.
I tried to get my table to switch to PF2 last year. I love the 3-action economy, the crit rules, the poison/disease and healing rules, the emphasis on tactical movement, etc. But for some reason, my table had 0 fun with PF2. Maybe I was messing it up, since it was new for me too. But folding these mechanical strengths into 5e as house rules could be a great stepping stone. Thanks - will try at least some of these.
PF2 is such a solid system. I completely understand the desire to steal PF2 mechanics to fix D&Ds numerous awkward rules. :-)
Many of these would just make the whole thing more awkward though.
I merged my 2nd AD&D with the combat system and magic damage system from Rolemaster. My players really like the faster and more specific combat and bleeding damage. Still have an ongoing Spelljammer 2nd ed. campaign going.
First: We have a house rule that players have to role for success whenever they try to cast a spell or cantrip. Each spell has a DC and each Spell is learned at skill 0. This skill can be increased like any other skill up to 4.
A cantrip is spelllevel 0.
To cast a spell your DC=12 + spell level - spell skill.
I recently tried a rule to limit the use of cantrips by working via a dice pool.
I introduced a dice pool for spellcasting. The pool receives one die for every spell the player can cast in a "Day"+ his spellcasting attribute's modifier. The pool is refilled to half size after a long rest and regains 2 dice during a short rest. A player must meet or beat the DC for a spell to go of. The player can allocate as many dice from his pool as he wants to, increasing the chance of success.
We liked it so far, I'm however thinking about adding benefits if more successes are roled.
Thank you so much for this video! I've been trying to figure out how to ease my 5e group into starting Pathfinder 2!
re: disengage, I have a house rule where you can disengage as a bonus action by spending half your movement. Sure it's not gonna help you run away necessarily, but it might allow you to get out of immediate dodge / to an ally.
There is a rules supplement for 5e called Nimble 5e that includes a playtested 3 action point system with several new reaction options
Initiative is a knee jerk to the start of battle. That's Wisdom.
01:28 · #01: +5\+10 = Critical Hit
03:00 · #02: Alternate Initiative
05:41 · #03: Cool Down Period
(Add to Spammed Spells/Abilities)
07:00 · #04: P2 Healing
(Treat Wounds for Short Rest, Adjust Long Rest Heading, Combat Medicine)
09:07 · #05: Modify Flanking
09:55 · #06: Action for Save
(Allow Action for additional Save for Sickness, Poisoning, etc.)
11:34 · #07: Cantrip Damage Scaling
12:57 · #08: Step Action
(Replace Disengage with Step)
14:05 · #09: Three Action Economy
16:40 · #09.50: MAP
(Multiple Attack/Action Penalty)
17:26 · #09.75: Spells & MAP
17:50 · #10: Condition Levels
18:36 · Honorable Mention: Reduce AoO
My house rule was my D30 rule. I bought all my players D30s that they can use on any roll. For attack rolls anything over 20 crits with a 30 being a triple crit. Once they use it I get the die to use against them on any roll of my choice.
If you do VTT campaigns, they must be constantly full. Such an elevated take on how to run a game. Very impressive. Thanks for all the tips.
Ok this was nice for the D&D crowd. But now we need some good house rules for Pathfinder 2e too…… D&D was great back in the day, but for me Pathfinder has been the D&D replacement moving forward. So if you could do a video on some house rules that help Pathfinder that would be awesome. Even though there may not be that many lol
It's actually mostly useless for D&D players unless they want to spend days fixing the problems they create.
Advantage is probably the only D&D rule I actually like because it's so elegant. To your point that it's too swingy: using modifiers doesn't reduce swing in a d20 system
Regarding the cantrip dice, that a lot more dice to track and would bog the game down MORE than really help in anything meaningful outside of one-shot sessions.
Edit: The 3 action economy set-up for pathfinder works because warrior based classes had special skills to augment their damage output. 5e's don't have jack. so that makes the martial/caster divide ginormous compared to now.
It'd also allow double levelled spells, quickened spell would obviously have to be changed reduce a levelled spell to one action and then you could use those left over two actions for a second one. Or is metamagic going to cost an action severely limiting its utility? There's a lot that needs to be changed and looked at. A lot of the bonus action stuff is a bonus action for a reason.
@shadenox8164 that's another tricky bit right there that will overly complicate the action economy that 5e has. If it's an issue with the player, then they need to either review all of their abilities prior to the session, or have a visual cue on what they CAN do per action ( main action and bonus action respectively)
I think the biggest problem with bonus actions in 5E is they are too niche and typically require a special ability to even use it. Change some of the "optional" actions that can be used as a bonus action. Not available in the PHB, btw. For some reason most of them are in the DMG (clarified and added to in Xanathar's, I think) which makes no sense to me and should not have been an "optional" rule to begin with.
I'm working on a compilation mod for FG that spells out these things so players know what they are able to do. Also, clarifying the free actions available (and adding to).
I'm using the 3 action rule, but only for attack actions (haven't decided if I'm going to do -2/-5 or -5/-5+disadvantage). The Extra Attack ability removes the penalty for each step (1st Extra Attack makes two attacks like normal and a 3rd at -5. When you get your 3rd Extra Attack you make 4 attacks with no penalties, as normal). Not sure if I want the penalties to apply if you are making the same attack action, like PF2, or for any attack action).
Sounds like he's just trying to get everybody to play Pathfinder 2 lol.
And they should
So interesting, thanks! I indeed use these principles but taking from Pathfinder 1. Still, I can see many interesting things from PF2 after your video!
House rule I use "as is" from PF1 : CMB and CMD system to add more diversity to attack actions.
One of the many reasons I have switched over to running Savage Worlds -- I literally need no House Rules to run the game. Literally the ONLY house rules we have are for the medium (one game is play by post, so we have PBP rules specifically for that... one is on Foundry, and we have some 'table rules' for that). SWADE has enough "setting rules" that are published, rules-as-written variants, and you just pick the ones you want. And if you use a SWADE setting like Deadlands, even that is all taken care of for you. It's such a simple and flexible game that we have played Deadlands RAW for the last YEAR and I've only ever had to "house rule" one edge case of something that was ambiguous... and it turns out that the majority of GMs run it that way, including the lead dev of SWADE, so it's RAI instead of RAW. That's it.
With #1, I've been using 10+ hits as Criticals (called Overkill) - but only grant either a second roll of weapon damage or adding an appropriate condition (like trip, disarm, etc.). My players love this and it is easy to implement. And yes, a nat 20 critical that is also an overkill stacks. :)
My fav house rule in 5e is ASI + feat at every level you would normally get ASI or Feat.
The caveats we have are that if you take the ASI the feat you pair it with can’t be one of the “required for a build” feats (e.g. resilient CON, Great weapon master, crossbow expert, etc.) we have a full list for our group and we agree as a table when a feat needs to go on list.
If you want to GWM + chef feat and forgo an ASI at that level that’s totally cool too!
What I’ve found doing this is that the feats that never come up actually get some air time in the game and the PCs get more horizontal progression. It doesn’t lead to PCs getting OP really that we’ve found.
I do that too! And i give out less combat focused feats out as rewards too.
I’m curious how you guys feel about attrition in PF2e. I’m running it now and it’s probably my big complaint. Wizards have it but no one else does unless they have magic items.
I ended up implementing a Fatigue & Delay blades in the dark clock to help fix this for my game. Every fight they get fatigue, if it reaches a certain point, flat neg to party AC.
They can spend some time resting to clear it but spending too much time (too many delays) cause a random encounter roll.
I’ve used the 3 actions points since the start of my recent dnd campaign, only when they got multi-attack it got sticky and slowed right down. Now I’m about to fix that with giving an extra damage dice instead
Vomiting to clear a condition IMHO should be a full round action. Bend over and force vomiting, wipe mouth, then move on. Has anyone taken less than 6 seconds to throw up? I like a lot of these (but I also really like PF2 and wish my party did too).
Got a tip like the stunned ones for banished? And keen to hear your take on the diseases and poisons for 5e. My first dnd experience was the gold box and there was level draining, disease causing, and age altering mechanics which i was shocked not to find when i got to play dnd as a ttrpg for the first time in 5e
Yes, I imagine the Three Action Economy really would speed things up. No checking one's character sheet or looking things up in the book or online, and as you say, it makes things more dynamic. Also, thanks for laying the ground work on how that would actually play out. The idea about "bonus action spell=1 action and standard spell equals 2" and other stuff.
What will I do plan to implement for my next campaign? From Pathfinder 2e is hero points.
#4: Loss hp isnt always wounds so this again doesnt work, its more like Stamina, in 4e the first time you hit half health you are wounded (Bloodied) and in 5e its actually only when you hit 0. People struggle with this, but thats why hp is easily recovered in 5e. You would need to actually implement a wound system, and maybe cut max hp by wounds or something for this to work within the system of 5e.
I love a lot of what this video is putting out and I want to try some of these mechanics. Something that should be reconsidered is the 'Vomit Mechanics'. We, irl, have so many chemicals that state on their SDS Sheets, DO NOT INDUCE VOMITING. MAY CAUSE PERMANENT DAMAGE TO LUNGS. By using this mechanic, players, in a real emergency situation, cause more damage because of what they are used to. Just a thought.
A house rule I use is (within reason and with valid narrative substance) a player can choose a monster race to play as a PC race and I work out with them ability score bonuses, abilities, and proficiencies, usually the players I've had didn't like the options available for play (prior to me getting volos or Multiverse of monsters which added more playable player races, that seemed to curb the issue mostly) and thus when they looked at me disheartened that they didn't like the options but still wanted to play we would look through the monster manual with guidelines and restrictions to find something better that they wanted to play. It was more work for me during session 0 but it allowed many people I've played with the best opportunity to have fun
That part about the turn being over but not actually being over, and the dm constantly asking if they're done, hits home hard. I ran a 5 year campaign, and this came up constantly..
I would rule disengages to be more similar to 3.5e. In that system, dashing triples your movement instead of doubling it, and disengaging instead doubles it, along with the benefit of the disengage action. So I'd either do exactly that, or a lighter version. The lighter version would allow disengaging to add +10ft of movement along with the disengage benefits.
And so it works with slower creatures, this additional movement cannot exceed your base movement, meaning monsters with 5ft base movement will only get +5ft from disengaging.
I much prefer this to your proposal, as it has the intended effect of allowing a retreat to be a feasible option against enemies with similar speed, while still allowing Rogues to have their special trait.
3 actions, I guess I am too used to D&D, PF2 I was either trying to do to much or not enough! One thing I do in face to face games is make a special character sheet for my son or new players and it lists a table with Action, bonus action, free action and then I put their abilities and such in the table so they can see oh 1 action and I have these 5 things to choose as said action.
I love how much time we spend fixing 5e. And this is a fantastic examination of that: There's lots of great stuff in PF2 that makes 5e better! Like... umm... playing Pathfinder 2! =)
An alternative I've seen for rule 8 that I intend to playtest is Extended Combat Zones.
TLDR: combat zone is melee range +5ft. AoO can only be triggered by leaving a combat zone and require the opponent to first move 5 ft in order for the AoO to reach, which may cause a chain of AoOs.
It's a house rule made by another TH-cam creator and they've documented it quite well in their main video and 2 videos going over example cases.
I went down the Nimble 5e mod route for D&D to speed it up and address issues
But when you say anyone that rolls +10 us a crit, you take away from classes that get built in skills and abilities to get better crits, such as some Barbarians that can have advantage, or champion fighters some warlocks that can crit on 19s.
Problem with Cantrip damage scaling up, why do cantrips increase in damage but levelled spells need to be up cast?
Sometimes things are just game design, not in universe reasoning.
@shadenox8164 part of my problem is then why doesn't a fighters weapon damage increase to keep in line. Multiple attacks don't really scale like cantrip damage.
For disengage i created a house rule that allows 5' of movement away from the creatures you are disengaging from. So if you disengage and move 30' it should put you out of reach for those creatures with the same movement speed to simply move and attack you.
I also allow everyone to use their bonus action to sprint, if they used their action to move as well. Its just that creatures get advantage on attacks against them if they do so.
I recently used a House Rule which I think may be worth considering though whether you want to use it or not would again, depend on the preference of you as a DM and Players. If your party is facing off against an enemy that is severely weaker than they are, like a level 6 party fighting a bunch of monsters that are all lower than CR 1, consider simply deciding that the party wins. Basically just tell the players, "The enemies that are attacking you have 0 chance of victory. You win. Feel free to describe how your character wins this battle."
We mostly play Pathfinder 1. We have always let someone make a half move to disengage 5' as a move and then have a standard action
Initiative one: In PF1E, there are traits or feats that allow you to use a different stat for initiative. WIS and CHA specifically, IIRC.
How do you solve fighters extra attacks when implementing the 3 actions
You don't - the three action system replaces iterative attacks. A happy compromise might be to replace the fighter's extra attacks with a bonus on the same number of attacks as they lose. PF2 doesn't seem to have iterative attacks, but most of these changes were introduced in Pathfinder Unchained (PF's Unearthed Arcana book) for PF1e, which is a lot closer to 5e than PF2e is, so the conversion info there would probably be more useful to 5e players that just grabbing rules from a very different game with no info on what those unintended side-effects may be.
For flanking, I do setting similar but opposite. I gube +1, +2, and +3 to attack rolls to flanking characters based on how many people are flanking. Players like the feeling for seeming stronger as opposed to the enemy being weaker. However. The problem was with ranged not getting the benefit. So, i may change it to an armor deficit like this.
I'm liking pf2 so far. But I'm wondering if you've used the advantage/disadvantage mechanic in pf2?
You use dexterity for initiative because it's a measure of how quickly you can physically react to the change in situation. Your character with a high wisdom score can use their perception to detect a threat and initiate combat getting to act on a surprise round.
dexterity is a super stat that means whatever people want it to mean at any given moment
being quick with your fingers doesn't make your reflexes any better, neither does it make you act quickly
if anything, proficiency should be what determines initiative
12:57 Help me step action, I'm stuck
#7: For cantrip scaling (Aside from EB) there's nothing that will unbalance the game by just adding Cantrip + prociency without changing anything else. This be 1d10+3 ect going up. With EB it gets out of hand, so you might employ a only on one blast kinda thing. I wouldnt change the dice because this could lead to feeling way weaker.
Doesn't work for EB cuz Agonizing Blast exists lol. I don't really think cantrips need much changing tho. If you're spamming firebolt and getting bored of it when ur playing a caster, are you really playing a caster?
Disengaging as a bonus action is something that might invalidate other classess shine, I would do it like this:
- Attacks of opportunity happen when a creature moves more than 5 feet out of the threated range of another creature.
For me the main thing that makes 5e combats boring and static are Attacks of opportunity, even when there is a disengage action, nobody ever wants to move, so you waste your full movement. With this rule you enable movement even if it is a luttle bit, in some circumstances it would be even more beneficial.
These ideas are perfect for slowly converting my D&D group to PF2E
Where can I find a list of PF2e reactions? Thanks
I use an initiative system that my friend said he got from someone else...each type of action rolls a different die. A light weapon may be a D4 or D6 while a two handed sword or axe or powerful attack spell might be a D10. Of course there are ways to affect these with bonuses/penalties.
Thanks Luke! Lots of great stuff to think about there
How does the crit if you hit by x amount interact with champion fighters' ability to crit on lower numbers?
I use some house rules, but the one I like to mention is the Stamina system and Dash action changes. I don't really like that you need to use your action to run, so now Dash is just movement, but if you use Dash you would consume 1 Stamina. Stamina is a resource that players have, the formula to get is simply [Constitution Modifier + Proficiency], taking a rest will restore Stamina. If you don't have Stamina left you can try to use Dash anyways by succeeding a Cons Check [DC 10], but every time you Dash with no Stamina the DC will be harder by 3, if you fail the Check you won't be able to Dash until you rest and you'll gain 1 Exhaustion level.
This is the main purpose of the Stamina, but you can use it in other ways if you want, maybe you can give Advantage to players in certain rolls if they use 1 or more Stamina. Or for example, the Owlfolk race has an ability to make a Dash (I talk Spanish, so Dash Action is called Carrera (Sprint), Owlfolk's Dash is different) in any direction, it's like a fast step that you can use to avoid attacks or go high (to somewhere) if needed, you need to use 1 Stamina to use this ability.
Using this mechanic you can also get a better Disengaging experience.
I never reply to these but I will for this one. Here are my most game changing house rules in no particular order.
1 - spell points over spell slots. - i hate spell slots and how it works. spell points is easier and i've "normalized" how people get spell points per level. stronger early game but tapers off late game.
2 - Identify Spell and Arcana Checks to Identify - you basically learn the generic magical properties of the item. Does it have a curse? does it require attunement? Does it have a damage bonus? but not the specifics of each magical bonus.
3 - Consuming Potions - Action to search/give a potion to someone else :: Bonus Action to drink a potion
4 - Flanking - I also include adjacent creatures to the target. so across or if 2 creatures make an "L" shape. no pack tactics tho. thats too much for NPCs and all their shenanigans.
5 - Advantage on weapon/spell attacks - You get advantage on weapon and spell attacks if the target is 3 times larger than you, ie, you're medium and attacking a Gargantuan size creature, you would have advantage
6 - Threshold - Look at the boat specs. If a creature doesnt deal a minimum amount of damage they take no damage even on a crit. My formula is double the AC of the creature is the threshold, but i run high power magic, so my level 7 players are doing 40 damage on good rolls. With that, i alter what the threshold is based on their damage output while preparing for that session also taking into consideration creature abilities and other factors.
7 - My favorite one, you can ask for any rule change or game mechanic, or w/e, but if you can do it, so can my NPCs.
You know 1 is already a variant ruleset right?
My INITIATIVE house rule: I use poker cards like in Savage Worlds. Everyone draws a card and puts it on the table so you can instantly see everyones initiative order. No need to write them down. DEX bonuses get ignored. Just draw a card and go, its super fast and you can move right into things.
If you still want for DEX to play a role you can insert an Initiative round at the start of combat: In the first round of combat you can take a number of actions equal to your DEX modifier (at least 1). Initiative order is still determined by cards to keep it quick and easy.
The BEST HOUSE RULE ever. I roll 2 twenty-sided dice. If they match. It is a critical hit or miss depending on if they hit or miss the target. If they have advantage or disadvantage, they can adjust the second dice roll by one up or down. Hence a 15/16 roll would be a critical hit (if it hits.) Monsters or players with disadvantage is just too severe of a penalty.
It’s been driving me nuts
“Do have anything else you want to do on your turn”
“What can I do”
“You still Have your bonus action and movement”
“Do I have any bonus actions”
Every single turn
I've used the +2 to atk instead of advantage for flanking. Feels good. Will be using it again for the next campaign. I also don't like how sleeping for 8 hours magically heals everything. I think I'll go to long rests only recovering half (rounded up) of the hit dice.
I use the slow natural healing variant rule.
House rule I like is pact of the blade using cha for weapon hit and damage.
We modified advantage and disadvantage, so it doesn't cancle each other out flatly.
So while it is not stacking in the way of more dice (that's what elven accuracy is for), one instance of disadvante doesn't cancle out 10 advantages and vice verca.
It always bothered us, that it is RAW possible to be blinded, knocked prone and at exhaustion 3 but just activate reckless attack to have normal attacks.
I think this makes advantage and disadvantage more meaningfull, as just granting it one time isn't the be all end all.
It is a classic understanding that, somehow, the party member at the forefront of the group scouting for trouble--and finding it--is the one who ends up last in initiative order. How much of a classic understanding is it? Read the section of sample gameplay in the introductory chapter of Pathfinder Core Rulebook (1e). Harsk is at the front looking for trouble, sees and identifies trouble, and then ends up last in initiative. HOW?
I always run the "whoeve acted first starts the Initiative regardless of Initiative order". So like in mid convo wanna attack? Rolled last? But goes first anyways then we continue from that point. Initiative barely matters past a few rounds of combat and like if it's a group ambush then most likely gonna go first anyways so party is going to go first.
That's interesting, I'm gonnna steal some of these rules for my games.
PF 1, 2, and 2E has a HUGE Flaw with creating things. I chunk it for the D&D method (Even the 5E method is better than PF 1, 2, 2.1
Churning out items hand over fist in a short time, BREAKS games.
And for the record, I prefer PF of 5E
I also don;t allow Teleportation to work as written. Someone with Teleport could easily teleport into the King and Queens bed room and kill them when they sleep
Crit. I had a Player Crit on 2 hits in 1 round killing the BBEG (rolling 2 20's and then confirming) But I still use Crit
I've erred on the side of caution with the first rule. Instead of just automatic critical hits when you hit by 10 or more, I stole from DC20's Heavy Hit system, even if it's a bit more complicated to implement. I basically went the route of the attack adding one single additional damage die to the damage roll. This is universal across all damage rolls, regardless of a creature's size. Meaning Large or larger creatures get diminishing returns. Maybe down the line I'll shift over to just using the auto crit rule instead, but fingers crossed this is good enough.
I must say I don't appreciate the misleading title, but the content is still great. Pf2e is just awesome. Monk medic for life!
I'm sure it is, but these would be a mess to try and insert into 5e.
@@shadenox8164 One of the reasons I don't play 5e. It just doesn't have enough rules systems I can point at and say "I like that."
Is PF2 the 'I use arch btw' of TTRPG?
So how would you use that rule to remove stun in 5e? You have no actions while stunned.
I love your cat t-shirt!
When it comes to classes that can attack twice per action and use a cantrip plus melee like bladesinger how would that work? Do I just get 3 swings and 3 cantrips and what about two weapon fighting do I still make a swing with it as a bonus action?
How about disengage would give you 50% of bonus movement speed? Still an action, but with 45ft. instead of 30ft., most of enemies won't be able to chase you down so easily.
Instead of changing disengage as a bonus action - I preferred the idea of making disengage and dash into one action sorta - where disengage gives extra movement. It's still an action, but when you use it you get to avoid AoOs and get to move far enough away that you don't immediately get hit. (unless the pursuer has the ability to Charge attack or just way more move speed than you).
I find one thing I miss from PF2e when I play 5e is Recall Knowledge. Being able to find out enemy weaknesses and abilities based on skills I invested in feels great.
There's a system for that in 5e too.
@@shadenox8164 Where? There's some loose guidelines that certain skills might provide some lore for certain creatures but there's nothing I would call a "system".
FOr Critic, in higher level, PC have +8/+12 to hit ... they will crit a lot ... isn't it ?
I liked the rule from... I forget the system... where you get 4 actions, kind of like PF2e, but you're also allocating your reaction(s) on your turn, so you can take them later.
so, you could move in between the enemies and the wizard, set your other 3 actions as reactions, then smack 3 enemies running past you.
You do have the delay and ready action options in 5e.
Okay, Luke, so what does Action Surge do with this 3-Action system?
Presumably quickened spell would make a two action spell one action, doesn't that mean I can now cast two levelled spells? So many problems.
With regards to houserules, I'm already implementing some of the 3pp rules for that company's 5.5e or 6e, and a couple of the new One D&D rules/class features. My favourite 3pp rule change is removing racial ability scores and giving it to the background and class instead. Pathfinder 2e and Starfinder do something similar, but also keep the racial scores.
I prefer how the pathfinder crpg does disengage. You can step 5 feet without attacks of opportunity, but that is all the movement you can make. It still makes rogues cunning action powerful, but gives casters the ability to step back and hurl spells.
So since you have been playing PF2E for a while now I have a question. How do you feel about magic items in the game? I have felt like they are extremely underwhelming compared to their d&d counterparts unless they are the progression based runes