What "house rules" do you play with?
alaric_dasay
Member Posts: 2
I typically to try to keep to the following house rules.
No stealing from merchants with a good party. Less to do with ethics and more to do with the fact that it really can imbalance a game if you steal early in the game. Also don't like the only option to being caught is having to kill the witnesses. If you could get caught and pay a fine I would me much more willing to use. Evil parties can't get the really big discounts for rep, so I allow a bit of stealing to make up for that.
No stacking of potions. Different types stack but not the same type.
No dual from a Kit. This one is new for me. I am thinking that kits are less a profession and more like an innate personality so they would not be inclined to go into a new class. Plus dualing from a kit can just be soooo overpowered. Looking at you kenmage, kenthief and berskermage.
No spells into the fog of war. You must scout the area first. Makes stealthy characters more valuable.
Love to hear what your house rules are!
No stealing from merchants with a good party. Less to do with ethics and more to do with the fact that it really can imbalance a game if you steal early in the game. Also don't like the only option to being caught is having to kill the witnesses. If you could get caught and pay a fine I would me much more willing to use. Evil parties can't get the really big discounts for rep, so I allow a bit of stealing to make up for that.
No stacking of potions. Different types stack but not the same type.
No dual from a Kit. This one is new for me. I am thinking that kits are less a profession and more like an innate personality so they would not be inclined to go into a new class. Plus dualing from a kit can just be soooo overpowered. Looking at you kenmage, kenthief and berskermage.
No spells into the fog of war. You must scout the area first. Makes stealthy characters more valuable.
Love to hear what your house rules are!
6
Comments
No race restrictions for classes or kits.
If playing good, no taking items from containers in town, no pickpocketing, no taking quests that require stealing (unless its for a good reason).
*Edited to add a few I forgot*
I don't metagame party members. Which is to say, I don't hold on to useful gear ahead of time because a future party member will be able to use it. I sell it if I'm not using it right away, and then I'll re-buy it if someone I add can use it. Charname doesn't know who he will meet, so neither will act in advance.
Coming off of this, I don't beeline to certain areas to pick up certain characters, I quest in what feels like a natural order and add characters as I come across them. This might mean I don't x character until over half way throught any given game, and I'm fine with that.
When removing characres from my party, I leave them with useful gear. No leaving allies naked in the wilderness.
Another is redistributing NPC weapon prof as I see fit. This allows for some pretty powerful / cool combinations such as Anomen dual wielding hammers & flails and Mazzy dual wielding shorts words.
Of course this tends to increase the party’s strength quite a bit so I keep on insane difficulty with no damage modifier.
1). Replacing attributes is allowed as long as there exists another companion with the same set of attributes.
2). Replacing class is allowed as long as it is a legal choice - Multi/dual options only allowed if there is a canon companion with the same combination.
I know it is still cheating, but it makes for more variety, while I get to choose the characters that I like best and/or have the more interesting banters.
Difficulty Core Rules, failing to learn spells is easy to avoid with potions of Genius (with learning 25 I never failed).
I also try hard to avoid reloading, but I never completed a playthrough completely without it so far.
- 3 melee chums ( preferably warrior types )
- 1 sling user ( preferably the main cleric )
- 1 bow user ( preferably the main thief )
- a dagger thrower ( preferably the main arcane caster 0
and i do it in this order
2. team mates aren't allowed to die ( unless i need to get rid of a "duo team member combo" or the hell trial ) but if a team mate dies, reload, just the hassle to go through to bring them back to life the legit way, pass
3. must always play on insane difficulty, if i do a serious run ( which is 99% of the time )
2. No kitting
3. No metagame (including pre-buffing and trap abuse) - it is ok to prebuff when it is obvious that you're about to enter a major battle and trap to provide a safe way out or organize an ambush.
4. No enemy left alive
5. Reveal every inch of the map (except for those areas that can't be reached)
6. No stealing-buying-stealing
7. Never break NPC's pairs
8. No buying-to-recharge
9. No rest-in-dungeons (unless there's an RP reason like the party that covers you in IWD)
10. No charming-poweful-non-Hostile-NPCs (like Ithtyl)
11. No striping NPCs out of their gear to kick them out of the party
12. No spellcasting inside the fog of war (except when using Wizard Eye or Farsight... but those dismantles the fog of war)
13. No inventory use during combats (quickslot only).
14. Only Rangers and Thieves may find the hidden items (like Batalista's Passport and Ring of Wizardry) unless an in-game hint is provided.
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Basically, nothing that a DM wouldn't allow you to do.
Under those circumstances, I was able to finish a no-reload run once.
2. Each character is only allowed one set of equipment (you basically have to make do with what you are wearing and you can't carry around spare rings, belts and boots to suit the occasion).
2. Don't use unidentified items.
3. Don't kill non-hostile NPCs (like Drizzt).
4. 100% spell learn chance.
5. (only sometimes) Max HP on level-up.
I like D&D a lot but there is part of me that would prefer a system where magic was much more scarce and characters had to focus on developing their skills rather than acquiring a bunch of equipment.
Playing without them is an idea I have toyed with as well.
2. No thieving, pickpocketing or looting from towns or peoples homes when playing a good party.
3. No maximum hit points on level up.
4. No enemy left standing. When possible.
I have broken all off the above rules a number of times.
I like the 10 rolls max during character generation idea. I tend to roll for ages trying to make the perfect character and it might be fun to see how far you can get with someone with serious flaws. Do you reassign points or do you stick with what the dice gods grant you?
Probably better for balance purposes would be to enable only one potion effect at a time, so if you drink another you lose the buff from the first. Healing potions would have to be an exception as they are one-time effects. But then the game would need rebalancing in other ways (it would be another change in favour of spellcasters vs warriors).
- No more than 12h of angkheg farming in BG1
- No more than 5 pre-created characters in my team
- ...
:-*
Nah, more seriously, my personal home rules change from game to game. I like adding rules on the go or to imagine a new set of rules and create a run on this basis. Makes every game different. So rules change all the time.
My last game was: no meta-gaming (I have to play RP like my toon would, which made me spend a lot of time writing his background / personality), and for magic items, the moment I find them: I keep 1, I discard the next 2 ones (regardless of which items, which in combination of rule 1 is quite interesting), with the exception of crafted items, but I am allowed to 1 crafted item in SoA and 1 in ToB. Makes magical items so much more epic... In SoA I chose the silver sword, because my character likes flashy douchebaggery. This moron (6WIS) can't even use 2h swords... Ao help us!
Also, no scroll and no cheese.
- Must use a non-edited roll of 75
- Can re-roll as many times as desired
- May not min/max any stats or edit any abilities at all
- May not resurrect any party members
- Core rules
- No reloading
- Random HP's
- Random Chances To Learn Spells
- Weather and Gore On
Additional that I can think of at the moment:
- Potions of Master Thievery & Perception don't stack
- all gems & potions must be ID'ed
- approach first-talk/ fight after, only using fog of war after I'm in range and enemies can see me and/or give chase (if needed-I use invis. potions/spells, alchemical smoke bombs to disappear often).
- Playing often as one of the humanoid races, I stick close to stats and guidelines in the 2nd ed. Complete Book of Humanoids.
Interestingly enough, restartitis gives me reason to start over more than anything else.
2. Usually, no changing of rolled abilities. Take them as they come. Maybe 1 or 2 changes are allowed.
3. Core in BG:EE, BGII:EE and IWD:EE, Insane in SoD.
4. No-reload, including on stealing.
5. Always explore the map fully before moving to the next one.
6. Random HPs.
7. Identify magical items before using them.
LOB with SCS full install.
Never steal from merchants.
No fully heal on rest.
Random HPs.
Identify Magical items before use.
Always fully explore maps and destroy all enemies in the game.
No auto roller for stats.
I use all of the hardest settings for SCS so the economy is pretty tight in BG2 with no stealing.
All 6 party members must survive each fight or I reload.
In the past I have rolled uber characters. My last one was a FMT with a 98 point roll. I think I may start limiting my character stats in some way going forward but I haven't decided how yet. I like the idea of having maybe 10 rolls and that's it. Can't decide on what character I want to play next. I would like to wait for IWD in EET but I think it's going to be a while so I may start another run for fun in the meantime. Probably be a dwarven defender or a fighter / mage multi.
EDIT:
Using the first roll for stats and not redistributing any of them sounds like a pretty hardcore challenge. I may do that next time now that I have thought about it some more. No save scum on spell learning is something I have never done in the past, I may try it this time. I've got to boost the challenge somehow. Don't know if I will be using Ascension on the next run, I'm not sure I can beat it on LOB/SCS with all classes, it near wasted me even with an OP FMT. I used a lot of timestops and backstab to complete Ascension last time and I'm not sure I can come up with a way to beat the final battle with some of the character classes on the settings I'm playing at.
One last thing I just thought of. I explore the game world in what I consider to be a logical way. I don't bee line toward powerful items using pre existing knowledge from previous playthroughs. (This can help tremendously on high difficulty) but I have found a way to roleplay the game my way without resorting to these types of cheesy exploits and I stick to it when I play. I required this before I could fully accept LOB in the first place, which took a few attempts before I could adjust. I also try to limit kite tactics. Sometimes I might get caught with my pants down but I have pretty much eliminated it after beating the game a few times with LOB.
- No roll at character creation: I decide on a "roleplay" distribution beforehand (usually total 86, sometimes 88) and go with it (ctrl-8 then lower).
- No death, ever. As soon as someone die, I reload.
- Max HP at level up.
- 100% spell learn.
- I've always used the "don't wear unidentified items" unconsciously.
- Used to have the "no potions" one but my current SCS playthrough proved too hard. Irenicus Dungeon with a single rest with no healing potions was not doable...
- Made an exception to the "no stealing" yesterday for the first time in years in the drow city (seemed like it would make sense for a Chaotic Neutral PC to take advantage of those guys).
- Core rules with SCS (and very limited modding other than that) even though more and more components have been activated other the years.
And probably some more that I've used for so long they're obvious to me.
Banned powerful combinations of equipment.
A hero should not look like a christmas tree, and fighting is satisfactory if won with help of luck to some extend.
Not using cloak of mirroring except solo run, and not abusing use it.
On my latest run I haven't used any antidotes so far but I am carrying them. I was hoping my Bhaalspawn power of Slow Poison might see me through but it didn't have much effect when I got stung by a baby wyvern last time out.
I normally manage reputation so that I get horror instead. That doesn't add much in a party, but is really useful for a solo character (though that's less true now as the fear effect is not working well in v2.5).