House Rules
Every campaign has its own set of house rules. Most are added to allow for ease of
play. With all the rules that there are for AD&D and all the expansion rules. As
Dungeon Masters we have to adopt rules that make life for us and our players easier. Below
is a list of some of my common House Rules.
Alignment
- No set alignment is used. Player Characters follow their own path and play their
characters according to how they feel. Setting a strict alignment is not done in my
campaigns. Spells like Know Alignment determine the base of a person whether good or evil.
Creatures such as the baatazu will have a marked alignment as will a Paladin.
Demi-Human Level Limitations
- When a demi human reaches their level maximum. I have allowed the player to advance
further by needing twice the experience points for each level after. a dwarf seeking a
level past his or her max would need 500,000 experience points instead of 250,000. My
thought is that there is no way some 1500 year old elf would only get to be a 12th level
wizard. It makes no sense. It does make sense that it would take the longer lived races to
accumulate enough experience to advance to higher levels. Humans would still have the
advantage of increasing faster.
The Player Character Death Rule or (fudge
factoring in favor of players)
- Yes, there are times when a Player Character is just begging to be blasted with a 30
Dice Fireball. And sure the character that just had his last life level sucked by a
vampire should be dead. So unless a player does something absolutely stupid and their is
no way even a fudge of the dice can help. I personally can't kill off a character based
solely on the role of a dice. The campaign is a story. I one had a player who had a tough
elven fighter. I had the character have a dream about a struggle against overwhelming odds
but it was up to him to choose whether his character would sacrifice himself in order to
save his fellows or not. He stood at the rift to an outer plane facing numbers of Tanarri
and stayed inside until the breach sealed with him inside. Needless to say his sacrifice
lead to a great story. He was taken to the Great Elven Forest and made an Archon for his
services. No dice rolls were made. The outcome was predetermined. I also allowed this
person to start with a character who was just below the characters levels to be fair.
Killing a player without a good reason is just not good story telling and to be honest
that's what a good DM does is put together a story that the players can feel part of. So
next time instead of killing the player off. I have gone so far as to have a character
maimed slightly and lose a point or 2 of dexterity. This gives a character depth and
history.
Players Have a Choice
- Players should have a choice in their destiny. Yes there are times when as a DM, we must
steer obstinate characters along a certain path but this should not be the norm.
Characters have ideas and plans for their characters and these should not be overlooked. I
know there are times I have come up with the nights adventure and the characters come up
with their own plans. I can shoot from the hip and come up with adventures in the
spur-of-the-moment. Saving what I had for another night of adventure. If your world is
detailed enough making up adventures to suit the players should never be a problem.
Good vs. Evil Campaigns
- Simply put I run campaigns based on heroic adventure. The players on the side of good
fighting against overwhelming odds to defeat the evil. I don't run Evil based campaigns
where the characters beat and murder innocents. NOT an option in my humble opinion. Now
that's not too say I didn't have 2 players, an elf and a dwarf, that went into a tavern as
mid level adventurers and happened to rob it. Nobody was killed and the story was fun.
That's not to say I didn't have them knocked around during the next adventure I ran them
through. The same elf was of warrior and rogue class. One time he decided to take some
coins when the money was tight and got caught. Spent a few nights in the city lock up.
People as well as characters will do what they need to do, to survive. Many a good joke
has lasted even to this day about that one little incident.
