Heroes and sages view the far realms in a different light. Heroes view it as they a dragon, an enemy to face or obstacle to overcome. Sages view it as they view death, inevitable and nearly impossible to overcome. The far realms are eternal. We cannot win. -Codex Vesania, Introduction
The world is broken.
Ten centuries ago, life as they had know it changed forever. The inevitable conflicts between Good and Evil had reached their peak, as countless armies clashed across the plains of the Great Kingdom. The soils of Aerdy were stained red with the blood of the Iron league, as the High King's fiendish armies looted and burned all in their path. Despite their valour, they alone were no match for the dark magic commanded in the name of the king of kings. Angels and Demons clashed high above, as fire and brimstone schorched the earth. For it was the war to end all wars, every single force of light and darkness clashing on those plains, the Raiders and the Princes dueling it out on the seas as the sharks swarmed underneath, The Drow and the Elves engaged in a battle of attrition, the Giants waring amoung themselves as Iuz, lord of deceit cleaved a dozen men in twain with a single stroke. Mordenkainen and the Dread Lich Acererak laid the land to waste as they called forth great magics upon the land, colourless fire burning the very mountains to ash, as the Clerics of Pelor held firm against the legions of the Scarlet Brotherhood.
Or they would have, were Pelor not utterly insane. Powers were working behind the scens, powers greater than even the strongest diety, fair or foul. Powers older than the multiverse itself. And these powers had corrupted the God of the sun over many millenia, 'till he was nothing more than their puppet, a mere slave to their will. And that was when they played their card. The minions of Pelor rounded on their allies, slaughtering all in their path, the angels warped abominations impervious to blade or spell. And this force beyond the stars was enough for Tharizdun to escape.
Tharizdun was one of the first deities, perhaps the first, a being imprisoned by his own creation, wishing no more than the destruction of all things, and one of the few creatures powerful enough to open a true planar gate to the Far Realms. Which he then did. Monstrous beings unglimpsed in the sane mind poured forth from the skies, warping the land by their mere prescence, corrupting and destroying with merely a gaze. Heroes and vilains alike sacrificed themselves by the thousands to buy the gods enough time to seal the gate once more, but the damage had been done: Oerth was forever changed.The plane of Shadow and the Ethereal plane were bound ever tighter to the prime material, while the gods were cut off from their mortal worshippers, and the worshippers from their divine benefactors. Clerics went insane as the power of the Elder Ones filed their minds, Sorcerors were ripped apart by their powers, and wizards perished as their powers failed them forever. A new Ice age came, clutching the land in it's icy talons as the Abberations arose to take their new place in the world.
And now, you are here. By Fortune, Fate, Or Providence, you have gathered here. For whatever reasons you have, the time is your to seek your fortune, or die trying.
Currently intrested:
Full!
Method of play: Roll 20.net
Method of chargen: use the following array: 18, 16, 16, 14, 12, 10
House rules:
Heavy crossbows (including their repeating forms) have their base damage die increased by one step. As this is a modification to the base item, it stacks with any other effects of that type.
Crossbows can be made to utilize the user's Strength bonus by mechanisms that provide more resistance, and recoil when fired that requires a stronger user in order to utilize properly. This otherwise works just like composite bows, including the +75 (light) or +100 (heavy) gold per + of strength bonus on the 'pull'.
Crossbows, but not bows can ignore a number of points of armor or natural armor bonus equal to the strength bonus of the crossbow or the strength bonus of the wielder, whichever is the lower. Crossbows do not bypass AC that is not armor or natural armor, and if the target has less armor or natural armor than you have penetrating power the remainder has no effect. Yes, this does effectively give you Str and Dex to hit with a crossbow against armored foes.
Composite bows and crossbows can have their pull increased, but not decreased by a skilled bowyer. This requires materials of a total cost of the price difference between the current and the new item + 50 gold, 1 hour of time, and a successful Craft (bowyer) check made at the end of this process. The DC on this skill check is 10 + the new composite bonus of the bow + 2 if the bow or crossbow is an exotic weapon. Failing this check requires the bowyer to restart the hour long process from the beginning but their materials remain intact. Failing by 5 or more ruins the materials but does not harm the bow or crossbow. Yes, the DC is intentionally low. That's because...
A new wondrous item exists in the form of the Sniper's Bowstring. Despite its name, it also works fine with any crossbow, including magical bows and crossbows. Any bow or crossbow fitted with a Sniper's Bowstring automatically counts as composite adjusted to their current Strength score. Its market value is 1,000 gold and can be crafted by anyone with a CL of 3, Craft Wondrous Item, and Bull's Strength.
Summary: Let's face it. Crossbows suck a barrel of cocks. They were made that way intentionally because they didn't require as much training to use, thus the simple vs martial weapon thing. Fair enough. Just one problem. You can train with crossbows. And they still suck. The goal here is to make training with crossbows worthwhile, comparable to but not better or worse than normal bows. You're already paying 1-2 feats just to use the damn crossbow effectively, and you can't Manyshot with it so being able to at least do the same damage per shot with more accuracy gives it something useful. I could probably do more here. Also, the thing where an archer has to replace their entire fucking bow, and often their highly magical bow at that every time they get a better Strength belt has to stop. Making explicit rules allowing you to improve it, or just say fuck it and auto benefit despite whatever Str damage poisons and Ray of Enfeeblements and Strength buffs are thrown your way lets you skip that. This is kind of important as you still need to actually have the requisite amount of Strength to use it effectively.
Blasting spells:
To qualify as a blasting spell for the purposes of this discussion a spell must have a primary function of doing damage. If a spell only does damage it qualifies as a blasting spell. If a spell does damage and has an additional effect it only counts as a blasting spell if the additional effect is less useful than HP damage. Thus Orb of ______ spells do not qualify. Lesser Orb of ______ spells do. It should be obvious what the difference is between blasting spells and save or loses that happen to do damage.
All blasting spells have the following changes made to them:
Casting time: If the spell normally has a casting time of 1 Standard action, it now has a casting time of 1 Swift action. If the spell normally has a casting time of 1 full round or 1 round it has a casting time of 1 Standard action. In addition if the spell level of the spell, including metamagics is at least 3 lower than the maximum spell level you can cast your casting time for that spell is quickened by an additional step. If its casting time is already 1 Swift action, you can cast it as a Swift or an Immediate action.
SR: All blasting spells have SR: No.
Damage: If the base damage dice of the spell are D4, D6, or D8, add 1 damage per die. If the base damage dice are D10 or D12, add 2 damage per die. The usual damage dice limits still apply. This bonus damage is of the same type as the spell itself.
Special: By choosing to cast blasting spells slower than you are otherwise entitled to, you can apply additional effects onto them.
If you increase the casting time by one step (from Swift/Immediate to Standard, or from Standard to 1 round) your blasting spell will deal double damage of the same type as the original spell.
If you increase the casting time by one step (from Swift/Immediate to Standard, or from Standard to 1 round) you can change a spell that does any of the following elements of damage into a spell of a different element from the same list: Fire, Cold, Lightning, Acid, Sonic.
You can apply both of these to the same spell, but if this increase in spell time would result in a spell with a longer casting time than 1 round, you can't do it.
Here is an example in play:
Blaster Bob has just hit level 5, and learned the Fireball spell. The next day he makes sure to load several copies of it.
Blaster Bob and his companions soon find the enemies they were looking for. A Babau!
Everyone rolls initiative, and Blaster Bob goes first. He wants to cast his new spell. He has several options available to him to do so.
The first is to just cast it. This is a Swift action, so he's free to do other things in the round including throw up some battlefield control and buffs and such. But let's ignore that. He doesn't need be concerned at all about the Babau's SR 14 vs Fireball, but it still is entitled to save to half his 5d6+5 damage, and it has Fire Resistance 10 to boot. It's unlikely this option will do much.
The second is to cast it slower for penetration. This is a Standard action, which means it does start directly competing with other spells again. However if Bob makes his Fireball a Sonicball, he need not fear his damage being reduced by resistance. The Babau can still save, however.
The third is to cast it slower for power. This is also a Standard action and thus directly competes with other spells, but it also does 10d6+10 fire. That is... actually half decent at level 5. Of course it still can save and shave 10 off the top.
The last is to do both. This gives him a 10d6+10 Sonicball... but it won't go off until just before his next turn!
Let's see what happens now:
The Babau attempts to interrupt Bob's spell. His attack hits, but the Concentration check is made.
Healer McHealypants does the cure bot thing, Fighter McFightington stabs the demon fool in the face, and Flanky McSneakers gets on the other side. Just one problem now. If he throws the Sonicball, he's going to blow up half his own party! More than that if he doesn't aim so far forward! Clearly a 1 round action time is not viable for something you don't want allies getting in the middle of. And since part of the point of the damage buff is to make minor energy resistances laugh at you less, this makes your party less able to work with you in that way.
So one additional rule became needed from playing out that simulation.
When casting a blasting spell with a casting time of 1 round you can select a number of targets up to the casting stat modifier of your class divided by 2, rounded down. These targets are unaffected by your spell. You make the decision on who, if anyone to exclude directly before casting. Blaster Bob has an Int of 20, which is a +5 modifier. 5 / 2 rounded down is 2. Bob casts the spell in front of him and chooses to exclude both the Fighter and the Rogue from the effect, only hitting the Babau.
If Bob were casting the spell as a Swift or a Standard action he would not be able to selectively exclude allies from the effect unless he had another ability that did so. Thus, Bob must be mindful of positioning with his quick spells but doesn't find his slow ones rendered useless by changing battle conditions.
Bob continues to gain levels by casting the spells that make the enemies fall down. When he hits level 10, Fireball hits the end of the line in direct improvement. 10d6+10 as a Swift action, or 20d6+20 as a Standard action is as good as it will get without additional help.
However when he hits level 11 he gains the ability to cast 6th level spells. As Fireball is a 3rd level spell, and 6 is at least 3 higher than 3 Bob can now cast Fireball as an Immediate action doing 10d6+10 points of damage. He still has the option to cast it as a Swift action for 10d6+10 as well, or a Standard action for 20d6+20. However if Bob wants to cast a Maximized Fireball as an Immediate action he cannot do so without either a Lesser Rod of Maximize or waiting until level 17. Otherwise he will either do 70 as a Swift action or 140 as a Standard action, using a 6th level spell slot.
Summary: Evocations (which is what most spells mentioned here are) are right up there with crossbows as things you just don't use unless you either don't know better, or don't have a choice. Ok, certain builds stack on metamagic reducers to get a level 30 spell or something retarded in a 6th level slot that does over 9,000 damage but none of that should be necessary to have a viable character. HP damage cannot compete with save or loses unless you are doing a lot of it. By making most blasting spells default to a Swift action, you're not competing with it. You can throw a Fireball and a Slow on the same turn (if you don't mind running out of spells quickly). If you do want a more dedicated approach to blasting, you can throw a Swift + a Standard Fireball for 3d6+3 * CL, and two save/energy resist checks. That's... actually decent enough to matter. See feat and item sections.
Conjuration (calling) effects no longer exist. If this is the entire purpose of the spell or item (Planar Ally, Planar Binding, etc) those spells do not exist. If the spell or item has other functions (Gate, Candle of Invocation, etc), it still has them but can no longer call creatures. Conjuration (summoning) effects are unaffected. If the entire point of a prestige class is summoning a [erma minion, that's fine.
Shapechange no longer exists. Alter Self and Polymorph remain unchanged.
The Celerity line of spells no longer exist.
Mordenkainen's (Game) Disjunction no longer exists. If you want to turn off enemy magic items, use a Chain Dispel. Then you don't destroy your own loot.
Magic Vestment and Barkskin now gives a bonus of +1 per 2 CLs, rounded down, minimum +1 and maximum +8. Shield of Faith now gives a bonus of +2, +1 per 3 CLs rounded down, max 8. Greater Magic Weapon remains unchanged, but if you prepare any of these spells in a slot 4 levels higher than the spell is for you or cast them spontaneously out of a slot 4 levels higher you can instead cast a Mass version of that type, targeting up to one target (people for Barkskin and Shield of Faith, armor or shields for Magic Vestment, weapons for Greater Magic Weapon) per caster level within 30 feet. The exceptions are Rangers and Barkskin, who can cast a mass Barkskin out of a 4th level spell slot and Artificers, who can cast a Mass Greater Magic Weapon out of a 6th level infusion slot.
Summary: Let's be honest. No one uses Conjuration (calling) effects at all unless it's to completely break the game in some way. Either by infinite Wishes, or just making something that could kill the entire party by breathing on them your bitch. Shapechange by some of the tamer descriptions is a no save, you lose that also lets you cast spells off other lists easily. And no one uses Celerity unless they're immune to Daze, then it's just free turns.
And parties are going to use some bullshit workaround to throw Greater Magic Weapon and Magic Vestment on everyone at the least. You can discourage this, but then you're discouraging teamwork, which is the exact opposite of what needs to happen. So instead of forcing someone to take an otherwise pointless metamagic, and throw money in the party fund for a metamagic rod or 3 it's just something they can do whenever they have high enough spell slots. By making it easier you encourage more teamwork.
Anyone who would normally have 2 + Int skills instead has 4 + Int skills. Those that already have 4 or more skill points per level remain unchanged.
The following skills have been combined: Balance and Tumble = Acrobatics (Dex). Handle Animal and Ride = Animal Affinity (Wis). Climb, Jump, and Swim = Athletics (Str). Listen and Spot = Notice (Wis). Bluff, Diplomacy, and Intimidate = Persuasion (Cha). Hide and Move Silently = Stealth (Dex). Disable Device, Open Lock, and Sleight of Hand = Thievery (Dex). Decipher Script and Forgery = Wordsmithing (Int). In addition Use Rope is now a function of Escape Artist and Survival is a function of Knowledge (nature).
Untrained Knowledge skills can reveal information with a DC higher than 10. Of course you're still untrained, so don't expect miracles here.
When using the Craft skill to create a non magical item, determine the time it will take to complete the item using the formula for magic items (1,000 gold/day) instead of the existing formula. If this would result in a time of less than 1 day instead use the following formula: Less than 50 gold = 1 hour, 51-250 gold = 2 hours, every 125 gold or fraction thereof = +1 hour. Yes, this does mean you can make most mundane gear rather quickly. Good for you.
Permanent increases to Intelligence provide retroactive skill points. Temporary increases to Intelligence do not grant additional skills.
Summary: Skills don't do a whole lot. Most of them are either completely useless from the start or become completely useless around level 5 or so. There's a few good ones, but either only one person needs to be good at them (Diplomacy) or the DCs are low enough you could do all of this with cross class ranks anyways (Tumble, UMD). Meanwhile the concept of class skills really gets in the way of a lot of concepts, and so do the limited and narrow nature of skills such that even so called skill monkeys can barely pay their skill taxes before they run out of resources with which to differentiate themselves. Considering that skills are a big part of non caster power, but they don't measure up to that like at all serious changes are required. With this everyone can make their skill points go further (read: actually do something you care about with them), and has at least some skill points to use because An Adventurer Is You. The change to Craft skills is also obvious - you could seriously end up with a master blacksmith taking more time to make a weapon, or a suit of armor than it would take a master Wizard to enchant said item with enough magic to blind anything short of a deity. Seriously, anything that both bases craft time on the cost of an item and then only lets you progress by a few dozen gold a day just isn't viable. Like at all. The change to untrained Knowledge skills and to retroactive Intelligence was because it was stupid to have an idiot savant with 8 Int and 1 rank in a Knowledge be able to tell you more about a subject than someone with 30 Int but no research in the field specifically, and it was also stupid to have to keep track of when you made your Wishes or put ability points into Intelligence. Which really just meant non Wizards and other Int based casters did not put level up points into Intelligence.
Feats:
Some feats have been rendered unnecessary or less useful. See other sections for details.
The Weapon Focus line automatically scales with HD. At 4 you are considered to have Weapon Specialization for all purposes, at 8 Greater Weapon Focus, and at 12 Greater Weapon Specialization. Note that it does not matter what class those levels are in. And yes, that does include monsters. All of these extra feats apply to the same weapon type as the original, which must be acquired normally. In addition this line of feats applies to a category of weapons rather than a single type chosen from the following list: Bludgeoning, Piercing, or Slashing. You can still take Weapon Focus more than once, but it must apply to a different category each time.
The Toughness feat grants 3 + HD HP, and cannot be taken more than once.
Improved Toughness grants 3 + HD HP, requires Toughness and a base Fortitude save of +2, and can still only be taken once.
Metamagic cost reducers cannot reduce the cost of any given metamagic below 1 or by more than 1. Thus Extend Spell cannot be reduced below a +1 spell level metamagic, Empower Spell cannot be reduced below a +1 spell metamagic, and Maximize cannot be reduced below a +2 spell metamagic. Metamagic rods and Sudden Metamagic feats still work normally. Divine Metamagic also works normally, however Nightsticks are considered to grant the Extra Turning feat and the Extra Turning feat no longer stacks with itself. Thus, more than one Nightstick is pointless. In addition Divine Metamagic can only be fueled by Turn Undead, and not any other Turn abilities you might have.
Improved Two Weapon Fighting and Greater Two Weapon Fighting no longer exist.
Two Weapon Fighting grants you a number of offhand attacks equal to the number of main hand attacks you are entitled to, and does not impose additional to hit penalties for a one handed weapon in the off hand. It also no longer has any prerequisites. Happy birthday.
Two Weapon Defense provides an Insight bonus to AC equal to the number of mainhand attacks you can make derived from BAB.
A third feat exists in the Two Weapon Fighting line called Two Weapon Parry. It requires both of the previous feats and a BAB of 11. With it you can 'hold' a pair of attacks from Two Weapon Fighting, and use those attacks as an Immediate action against an attack made on you. This pair of attacks can either be your primary pair or one of your secondary pairs. If either of your attack rolls are higher than the attack roll of the attack, the attack is parried and does not harm you. If both attack rolls are higher, the attack is parried and if the attack rolls are also sufficient to hit the enemy's AC + 4, you hit them normally with your attacks. If neither are higher, the parry fails and the attack is resolved normally. You must choose to use your stored Parry before learning the result of the attack roll. Parries not used by the start of your next turn are lost.
Improved Trip no longer requires Combat Expertise.
Improved Critical and Keen stack. Happy birthday. In addition Improved Critical applies to a category of weapons rather than a single type chosen from the following list: Bludgeoning, Piercing, or Slashing.
Improved Sunder, and anything else relating to breaking magic items no longer exists. You can still tunnel through dungeons with your adamantine greatsword if you want, but the gods will smite you if you think about breaking that shiny magic sword. Just kidding, but seriously. Don't be a Sundertard. Not all of these effects are feat related, but the ones that aren't also do not exist. If they were needed somewhere as a prerequisite... well now you don't need them. Enjoy using your feats to actually help yourself.
Any of the feats that give +2 to 2 different skills no longer exist. If they were needed somewhere as a prerequisite, now you don't.
All three of the feats that give +2 to a save still do, except that if your base save bonus of that type is at least +6 you also no longer auto fail saves of that type on a natural 1. You must still actually roll high enough to save normally. If your base save bonus of that type is at least +12 you gain the following additional effect: Fortitude/Will: Mettle. Reflex: Evasion. If you already have these abilities for any reason you instead get a 1/day reroll on a failed save of that type. You must choose to use it after you know you failed the save, but before knowing what the result of doing so is. If the reroll is worse than the original roll, well too bad.
Monks are proficient with their own bodies (finally! They still fail though). They are also automatically proficient with gauntlets, which are considered a Monk weapon and do the listed damage or their unarmed strike damage, whichever is the greater.
Craft feats no longer grant a discount on the gold cost of an item, and no longer have an XP cost. They still cost the usual amount of time, but are granted automatically to anyone with a sufficient caster level.
Summary: Feats are perhaps the section that needs the most work of all. Even this is not nearly enough, but some feats should just be intrinsic to the character, or should auto scale. Of course breaking the RNG doesn't help matters, but in some aspects of the game either the RNG is already broken in favor of you being off it, or is broken in favor of you needing more bonuses to get back onto it. Some feats just suck, and were removed or rewritten as a result. Some had to be redone due to interactions with other aspects of the game. And Sundertards can fuck right off.
As for the crafting bit, with raised WBL (see item section) the main purpose of craft feats is to get double wealth. Since there's no longer a need for tricky workarounds with pocket crafters that loophole should be closed. Craft feats maintain some utility by giving you items you'll need to stock up on (mostly scrolls and wands and staves) but in any case, since it's free even if you never use them you lose nothing. Their other main use is to dodge power tripping DMs who try and restrict magic item access, but if any of those are reading this, I've already melted their brain with the glorious light of optimizer truth so it's safe to say anyone that is actually using these house rules is smart enough to know that a proverbial, or a literal mage mart is required for character functionality.
Items:
WBL has been increased by 50%. This also means enemies will have 50% more treasure (and use that treasure against you). Beware!
Keen and Improved Critical stack. A winner is you.
Burst type effects (elemental burst, holy burst, etc) have the burst aspect of their damage doubled. The basic on hit damage remains unchanged.
Magic armor, magic shields, enhancement bonus to natural armor items, and deflection bonus to AC items have the cost of said properties cut in half. Thus armor and shields are 500 * bonus squared and natural armor and deflection items are 1,000 bonus squared. Magic weapons keep the same cost.
The maximum enhancement bonus possible on such items is now +8, not +5. Magic armor and shields can still only have up to +9 worth of special properties in total. Magic weapons keep the same limitations.
There is no such thing as Dust of Sneezing and Choking. The Thought Bottles swallowed it all, before they were also erased from existence.
Monks suck a barrel of cocks. But if you really want to play one anyways, gauntlets are considered an unarmed strike and can be enchanted the same as any other weapon.
The following items do not exist: All of those minor SR items in the DMG, the Brilliant Energy weapon property (it's just bad), and all those shitty named items in the DMG (It's a trap!).
Vorpal now triggers on a critical hit, not just on a natural 20. Yes, I am aware that lets a fool with IC: Slashing and a Keen Vorpal slashing weapon behead people 45% of the time or so. It's a fucking +5 enchantment, it needs less fail and more awesome. To dual wield with it you need two such weapons, at a minimum cost of 196,000 gold. Also Vorpal was errataed so Death Ward blocks it, and if some dumbass is running around without Death Ward at these levels they deserve what's coming to them. This also makes Heavy Fort block it. See previous comment.
The Bane weapon enchantment also bypasses all damage reduction by creatures of that type, even if you could not normally bypass that type of damage reduction with that type of attack and even if that type of damage reduction normally cannot be bypassed at all! Now non Artificers might actually use it!
Any weapon labeled as 'finesseable' will allow you to use your Dexterity for attack and damage instead of your Strength if you so choose.
Summary: The first thing that is needed here is a boost to WBL, because you don't get enough of it to even cover the needs, much less the wants. The second thing that is needed is to make critical hits maybe not have an expiration date by boosting the not blocked by the Heavy Fort everyone has effects. And even ignoring those, Bursts do less damage than just adding a 1d6 of a different element even factoring in the best crit weapons and assuming that Keen and Improved Critical stack. With the change Bursts are now better than normal elemental hits provided you have both Keen and Improved Critical and are using a high crit weapon on average, which is also intentional. It's still not much, and I still wouldn't recommend playing such a build because and I quote "Critical hits are irrelevant in the context of D&D 3.5." but it at least lets critical hits get a breather before going back to sucking a barrel of cocks.
Once that's done, it's time to boost, or boot some weak weapon properties, make unarmed attackers a viable concept (if you can find a viable class for that, Monks don't count and Swordsages don't either), and now people can actually have relevant AC totals! Physical defense working against physical attacks. What a concept!
Snark aside, scaling it by magic items is a great fix, because at low levels where you don't need much help you also don't have many magic items, and at high levels when you do need all the help you can get being able to pay the same or less, and come out 12 AC ahead actually puts you back on the RNG without needing to Persist over 9,000 spells (which you can't do anymore) to make up the difference.
Result? Non casters stop being squishy gimps, can afford all their must have items and pick up some utility effects (flight, haste, true seeing) so they aren't constantly forced to go sit in the corner and play Smash Brothers instead of playing D&D with everyone else. They can also do things like actually afford both of their weapons if a dual wielder, or a two handed fighter who also packs a ranged weapon.
General changes:
* Alignment is now relative, and alignment restrictions are no longer enforced.
Everyone gets maximum HP per HD.
There is no such thing as multiclass penalties.
Fractional BAB is in effect.
Fractional saves are in effect, but you can get the first level bonus more than once.
Iterative attacks from Base Attack Bonus have a penalty of -5, non stacking. Yes, this does mean a 20th level Warblade swings at +20/+15/+15/+15. This penalty can be further reduced with feats.
Full attacks are a Standard action. You still need Pounce in order to benefit from charge based effects on a full attack.
If you have at least 1 BAB, you can Power Attack with any weapon you are proficient in and are treated as if you have the Power Attack feat without actually taking it. Yes, this does include ranged weapons. Call it a Headshot. Also see feat section.
If you have at least 1 BAB, you can Point Blank Shot with any ranged weapon you are proficient in and are treated as if you have the Point Blank Shot feat without actually taking it. Also see feat section.
If you have at least 4 BAB, you can Precise Shot with any ranged weapon you are proficient in and are treated as if you have the Point Blank Shot feat without actually taking it. Also see feat section.
You can become proficient with any weapon by training with it for (7 days - your BAB, minimum 1 day) and making an Int check. The DC is 5 for Simple weapons, 10 for Martial weapons, 15 for Exotic weapons. You cannot take 10 on this check. If this check fails you can try again from the beginning, but if it fails by 5 or more you cannot reattempt to learn that weapon until your BAB permanently improves.
You can become proficient with any armor by training with it for (14 days - your BAB + the armor bonus of the armor, minimum 1 day) and making an Int check. The DC is 7 + the armor bonus of the armor. You cannot take 10 on this check. If this check fails you can try again from the beginning, but if it fails by 5 or more you cannot reattempt to learn that armor until your BAB permanently improves. If the armor has other negative effects such as arcane spell failure or violates Druidic oath you still suffer those drawbacks.
Summary:
The so called durable classes... really aren't. And while it isn't fully apparent how we're intending to fix this without seeing the feat and item sections (currently not written) one way they are not that durable is that bigger HD don't do much when you only get half HP. Giving everyone full HP has very little effect on low HD sizes, but a very big effect on high HD sizes. It does buff everyone at least a little though. It also buffs the monsters a little, which might be a concern were it not for the fact monsters derive an even greater proportion of their HP from things like Con than their HD. In effect this gives +30 HP at level 20, +20 for every HD size over D4 up to Barbarians, who get an extra 110 HP. Not to mention if you're comparing to actually rolled HP instead of average that you can easily end up with scenarios where the 'tank' got a 1 and a 2 on his D10s, and is currently the squishiest party member as a result. For monsters, at worst it makes them take one additional hit to die. As martial characters are considerably more mobile and can therefore full attack more often, this is not a problem.
The max attack penalty of -5 is there because there's a reason why natural attacking monsters are credible melee threats and manufactured weapon users aren't and this is why. This also has the side effect of making full BAB actually worth a damn, which is also intended. All of the multiclass related stuff is also a martial character buff, as they're the ones taking at least half as many classes as they have total levels while casters are generally content to not switch to a new class, or PRC so often.
The change to weapon and armor proficiencies is there because these things don't mean a lot, they just aren't treated as such. And since you can just take some bullshit one level dip to get any non exotic proficiency anyways...
Lastly, some staple feats are just innate parts of the character now. Feat taxes to start doing the stuff you actually care about need to die in a fire.
Classes:
Barbarians gain DR x/- equal to their Con modifier or their Barbarian class level, whichever is lower. This is in addition to the DR x/- gained at level 7, 10, 13, 16, and 19 and any DR x/- the Barbarian has from items.
Barbarians of level 11 or higher also have Mettle, but only while raging.
All Tier five classes recieve a point of free LA for every level they take, or it may be gestalted with a monster class.
Monks get full BAB. Not that that will stop them from failing.
Paladin Smite Evil can be used x times per encounter instead of per day and applies to any attacks made for one round, including AoOs. In addition if you Smite a target that is neither Good nor Evil the Smite still has half normal effect. Note the change to Smite also applies to any other Smite abilities with the target lines changed accordingly.
Paladins have good Will saves, and every six levels they can take a bonus feat from the following list: Great Fortitude, Lightning Reflexes, Iron Will. Before you laugh, keep in mind what those feats do now.
Rangers need not choose between ranged and melee. They get both the ranged line and the TWF line. If you're using some alternate Ranger progression it replaces one of these (your choice).
As ITWF and GTWF no longer exist, Rangers get Two Weapon Defense and Two Weapon Parry at levels 6 and 11 instead. They still get Two Weapon Fighting at level 2.
Paladins and Rangers have full caster level. Their actual access to spells remains unchanged.
Paladin casting is now Charisma based. Happy birthday.
Ranger's Animal Companion progresses at the same rate as the Druid's.
Evoker Wizards, Warmages, and Sorcerers who have Evocation spells as at least a third of their total spells known do one additional damage per damage dice. This is applied before any multipliers, thus an Evoker Wizard 10 casting Fireball as a Standard action does 20d6+40. Such characters can also ignore a number of points of energy resistance on their targets equal to their caster level. This must be applied or not applied to all targets within the spell area and can be chosen at the time of casting.
Warmage Edge has its bonus cut in half, but it applies to each die. Minimum 1 point per die. Thus an 18 Int Warmage does an additional 2 damage per die. This ability, unlike the others is capped at your Warmage level, even if your caster level is higher for any reason. Thus a CL 20th Warmage who only actually has 15 levels of Warmage only applies the bonus to 15 dice.
Warlocks can Eldritch Blast as an attack action as long as it is your turn. Happy birthday.
There was a Hexblade fix around written by the creators. I can't find it, but it's in.
Tome of Battle classes, when using a maneuver that specifies they attack once and deliver the effect of the maneuver can full attack with the maneuver, but it will only be used on the first attack of the sequence or the first pair of attacks for those TWF maneuvers. If a maneuver does already allow you to full attack and gain the benefit on each swing you still do. Yes, this does mean Warblades can use a maneuver, then full attack and use a second maneuver while recovering both.
Swordsages get Adaptive Style as a bonus feat. It only applies to maneuvers learned from being a Swordsage. It otherwise functions exactly the same. Fuck you feat taxes.
Tier 1 and 2 base classes get teh banstickz. The following homebrew sources are open:
Descent into ShadowsXenotheurgy Increase true xenotheurgist to D8 HD
The Way Words WorkThe HarrowedYeah, this OP is pretty quick and dirty at the moment, and I'll have to remove refrences to stuff that no longer matters in the notes, which were copy pasta'd. But the fundamentals are down for now. Still needs to be edited for general coherency.
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Topic: [D&D 3.5] A world asunder. (Read 74805 times)