House Rules

I include a lot of homebrew in my games, and allow homebrew for player characters as well, though all homebrew must be approved by me prior to use. I will check to make sure the homebrew makes sense for the world, is balanced, and doesn’t have any other issues that would make it unreasonable to include. Please send me any homebrew you’re considering for your character prior to character creation, however, so I can have the proper time to review it.

DM Inspiration (or “DMspiration”) is tracked with a coin. It starts heads up at the beginning of each session, and at any point can be flipped to allow you to reroll any d20 check (Attack Roll, Skill Check, Saving Throw.)

Once the coin is flipped face down, you no longer have DMspiration and can’t use it again until your coin is flipped back over.

If you roll a 1 on a d20 check at any point while your coin is face down, you regain DMspiration and flip your coin face up. You cannot use the DMspiration for the roll you just got a 1 on, however.

If you coin is face down, I may periodically tell you to flip your coin back over as a reward for exceptional role play, creative ideas, and so on.

You can still cast spells when you are out of spell slots, though at great risk to yourself. If you wish to cast a spell that you don’t have a spell slot for (that you could otherwise normally cast), you can choose to exert yourself and cast it anyway. Doing this however immediately gives you levels of exhaustion equal to the level of the spell slot needed to cast the spell, ie a 3rd level spell would give you 3 levels of exhaustion. Keep in mind that 6 levels of exhaustion causes instant death…

A natural 1 on an Attack, Skill Check, or Saving Throw is a critical failure, regardless of your modifiers. This doesn’t mean that your character, especially if they have immense skill in the action, suddenly forgets how to do the thing, but rather environmental/situational factors made success at that moment impossible, such as a lock being far too rusted to pick or a loose stone in the floor making you trip during your attack. A critical failure means you get the worst reasonable outcome from the attempted action, but the word reasonable is important there. Trying to haggle the price of bread and getting a nat 1 does NOT mean the shopkeep kills you, but he may very well refuse to serve you.

Likewise, a natural 20 on an Attack, Skill Check, or Saving Throw is a critical success. If it is an Attack then it will hit regardless of Armor Class/Modifiers and deal additional damage, and if it’s a Skill Check then you get the best possible outcome for the attempted action. Again, note best possible outcome. Rolling a nat 20 when asking the king to give you his kingdom does not mean he gives you the castle, but rather he thinks you were clearly joking and finds that joke hilarious instead of exiling you from the city.

Saving Throws work a little bit differently with Nat 1s/20s as well. Should you roll a natural 1 on a Saving Throw, you will take double the damage you would take on a normal failure, and non-damaging effects may have an extended duration, stronger effect, etc. A natural 20, however, means you only take half the damage you would on a normal success (if any damage would be dealt on a success), and for non-damaging effects you may gain some sort of temporary resistance to it, such as if you critically succeed a Saving Throw against a snake’s venom, you may not have to make Saving Throws against that same venom for the rest of the combat.

If you get a natural 20 on an Initiative roll, you gain one extra action at the start of the first round. This does not mean you gain additional movement, however, so if you want to move during this first action you must use it to take the Dash action.

If you are suprised and roll a natural 20 on Initiative, instead of getting an extra action, you lose the surprised condition for that round, meaning you can act normally on your initiative as opposed to having to wait for the next round.

When making Death Saving Throws, roll them in secret so only you and I (the DM) know the results. This helps build a sense of urgency when a player goes down, as the party doesn’t know if you’re one roll away from regaining consciousness or one roll away from death.

Additionally, when making a Death Saving Throw on your turn (before you roll), you can choose to make a Final Stand. This allows your character to get up and take a full turn, and you can choose one Attack or Skill check you make during this turn to be an instant critical success. Doing this, however, means you cannot gain any healing during this turn and you will die at the end of it.

Not so much a house rule as these are in the official books, but just as a reminder:

• If you take more than half of your maximum HP in a single hit, you must make a System Shock roll (DC 15 Constitution Saving Throw) or suffer a random effect from the System Shock table.
• If you are dropped to 0 HP and the attack still has damage remaining, if that damage is equal to or greater than your max HP then you die instantly. (Ie you have 10 HP, your max HP is 20, and you get hit for 30 damage. Damage (30) – Current HP (10) = Remaining Damage (20), which is equal to your Max HP, thus you die instantly.
• Lingering Injuries are possible, but rarer in my games. They are an optional rule that accompanies massive damage, meaning that when you would trigger a massive damage roll you risk sustaining a permanent injury such as the loss of an eye, irreparable burns, and so on. I do not impose these in standard combat, though some rare environmental situations or results from decisions you make may incur a far less permanent lingering injury. These injuries often just require additional rest time to heal properly as opposed to slapping a Cure Wounds spell on them.

Death is very real in my games, though not intended to be unfair. I do not fudge dice rolls or pull punches in combat, and enemies will act according to their intelligence/personality, thus smart bandits may very well target the back-line mage to stop the onslaught of fireballs. However, this is a magical world, so death is not necessarily permanent. Should your character die and the party not have the means to bring you back, I will chat with you about how you’d like to proceed. If you wish for your character to come back to life (barring some rare circumstances which I will inform you of at the time), then we will find a way to bring them back. This could involve the party tracking down a powerful Cleric, performing a quest to retrieve your soul, or some other means. This is not an instant fix, however, and will still often mean you must make a new character to adventure with the party as they work on reviving your character.

Total Party Kills (TPKs) are trickier, and still very possible, but I will find a way to continue the story from there, and it does not mean the end of the game!