Give me your house rules!

[Susano]

In a month or two, I hope to start up a new campaign (after a hiatus of... 2-3+ years....). One thing I want to do is try and simulate a more cinematic/anime style of play. So I am interested in anyone's house rules that have proven to help speed up combat, or have proven to smooth out and bumps in the rules.

 

Thanks in advance.

[Diamond Spear]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

Well my old group almost nver used END. One less number to keep track of and since most movie/anima characters never seem to get tired it might be appropriate for the style game you are talking about.

[Derek Hiemforth]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

Here are a few possibilities...

• Use some kind of tiebreaker system to resolve all combat order ties without dice rolling during the game. This lets you make a combat order sheet in advance, and just go down it in order without having to worry about dice-offs. For example, my cinematic games resolve combat order by looking at the following elements (in this order):
  DEX (EGO for Mental Powers)
  SPD
  PRE (cool under pressure)
  INT (quick on the uptake)
  COM (the camera wants to show you!)
  Character with Tactics before character without
  "Good guy" before "bad guy"
  Experience earned
   
  
• Use the "Solioquy Rule." When your action comes around, you must immediately make a soliloquy (even if the character isn't speaking aloud... in this case, it becomes a thought-bubble soliloquy) and then take your action. If you're not ready to go with a soliloquy when it's your action, then you lose the action! (The camera doesn't cut to you if you don't have something to say and do!)
  
• Ignore END. Allow everyone one Push per adventure. To simulate tiring or seldom-used attacks, use other mechanics like Side Effect, Charges, or Extra Time.

[Susano]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

Didn't someone have an rule about taking 1 BODY per X STUN that got past your defenses?

 

Anyone recall that one?

[JmOz]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

One house rule I like is that all ranges and areas are absed on base points not active

 

so a

 

4d6 EB

and a 4d6 EB NND, Does Body, AE, AF-5, 0 Endurance

 

both have a range of 20" (Areas are also based on this so the AE above has a 4" Radius)

[Mantis]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

I was reminded of this one the other day:

 

To get a STUNx for a KA, roll 2d6, halve the result, and drop fractions.

 

EDIT: for NPCs, a STUN total = points for the base KA dice (i.e 30 for 2d6) meant the NPC would not be Stunned on an average roll, or even a slightly above average roll, even without any Resistant defences.

[Narratio]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

I agree with the forget END usage unless you're running a low point game or there's an amazingly wierd character in play.

 

Another one is having NPC's, (or even players), surrender. None of the baddies, unless you're in a 'dark' game) really want to keep on fighting after that first major stun and knock down. Allow them to give up and use the "I'll be back" line. Too many GM's and players insist on fighting to the last drop of energy or blood.

[radioKAOS]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

In a month or two, I hope to start up a new campaign (after a hiatus of... 2-3+ years....). One thing I want to do is try and simulate a more cinematic/anime style of play. So I am interested in anyone's house rules that have proven to help speed up combat, or have proven to smooth out and bumps in the rules.

 

Thanks in advance.

 

Well not so much 'house rules' but I've always loved this from an old school D6 Star Wars site. We would use this as a template and make our own version for whatever game we were playing at the time. It always helped to remind players that the game is about telling an entertaining story and the characters involved in such. That kept the action going more than any house rules we used.

 

Although for HERO we often threw out the END rules as most people have already mentioned.

 

Keeping a high level of energy is of the utmost importance though. As a GM that is primarily your responsibility. Use music, maps, models, etc. Whatever it takes to keep your players/characters on edge.

[NuSoardGraphite]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

When my group plays Hero, we normally play campaigns that are anime inspired, if not attempting to mimick a specific anime in particular (like Five Star Stories). Our current campaign is based on JRPG's such as Final Fantasy, Grandia and XenoGears.

 

There are several small changes/adjustments I make to Hero's basic rules to make the game run smoother. I'll list the one's I can remember off the top of my head:

 

No Mapped Combat: Takes too damned long. Deciding where to move, counting hexes etc...boring. Anime is all about kineticism. Move here, move there, but always do it quickly (preferrably with speed lines!). I simply describe the environment in detail and if one of the players decides they want to interact with the environment (kick over a table and use it for cover...kick a chair in the path of a fleeing opponent to trip him....swing from a chandalier to attack an opponent from across the room....etc) I deal with it then, otherwise, the surroundings are simply background not to interfere with the battle (of course, my enemies interact with the environment as well...and people get knocked into furniture all the time) If a character wants to run up and kick his opponent in the jaw, the only thing I worry about is his half move enough to get him there and whats the OCV...

 

Fragile world: As suggested in the UMA (or is that Ninja Hero?) most "furniture" in my campaigns are quite fragile...during fight that is. If someone is hit with a chair, it will shatter into fragments. A solid table can only take a few solid hits before splitting in two. A character can barrell through a door and it will barely slow him. And knockback....well lets just say there are a lot of walls with holes in them in my campaigns!

My general rule is this: If the base DC of the attack (i.e. Standard Effect Damage) is enough to do severe damage to an object (several body over the objects DEF characteristic) it is usually enough to break the object.

 

Bring the Damage on: I use Hit Locations and Impairing/Disabling rules..keeps the PC's on their toes. In addition to those rules, I treat unimportant toughs and ruffians as though they are dead if they get an Impairing wound to the head, chest or vitals. A disabling wound to any part of the body (cept maybe hand or foot) is pretty much a death sentence for such enemies (we call them SCRUBBS). Also, any such unimportant enemy that reaches negative Stun is outta the fight...they don't get recoveries. This makes the fights much faster, because there is far less bookeeping for the GM. Besides, these enemies in an Anime inspired campaign are merely there to make the P.C.'s look damned good at what they do, so it should be easy to take them out. Elite troops, sub-bosses and bosses are subject to the same rules and advantages as the PC's, so its not too easy for them. Also, any Disabling wound a PC achieves on an enemy is a greivous wound...limbs are crushed or severed (and fly several meters before landing with a squish) Stomachs bleed profusely, and heads roll.

 

See also the thread about "Cool Surprise Moves" and the bonuses we give when such things occur. That applies in an anime style campaign...

[Sean Waters]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

You could re-roll (and add) each time you roll a 6 on a damage roll. Makes damage a little less predictable and more (IMO) cinematic

[JmOz]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

Another house rule (blatyenly ripped of of Savage Worlds):

 

Luck power: You roll at the start of game, each body you roll you get a "Luck token"

 

Each token may be used to:

* reroll one roll of the dice (Better ressult)

* add or subtract 2 to a roll (must be spent before the roll)

* Take a free recovery

* +1 DC

* Make minor alterations to a scene requiring GM's permision (this can actualy cost more than one token, depending on how unlikely the incident is. GM is the final arbitrator on cost. A vial of acid to throw in a villain's face while in a lab may be 1 token, but a meteor happening to land on his head outside would probably cost 15-20)

 

The GM can also reward luck tokens to any player at any time as an ingame reward

[Phil]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

One house rule I like is that all ranges and areas are absed on base points not active

 

I quite like the idea of fixed range for all powers, say 50". You want longer range, you buy the advantage. 15d6 EBs have enough advantages as it is

[NuSoardGraphite]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

Another house rule (blatyenly ripped of of Savage Worlds):

 

Luck power: You roll at the start of game, each body you roll you get a "Luck token"

 

Yeah, I was thinking about using something similar, but haven't implimented it yet. (I'm currently not running the Final Fantasy game, but when its my turn to run, I probably will use it)

 

What I was thinking is that all PC's get 1 Die of luck for free, and any additional luck must be purchased (up to a limit determined by the campaign specifics...generaly somewhere between 3D6 and 6D6 maximum)

 

At the beginning of each game session, the player rolls his luck dice and the amount of body rolled is how many Luck points (or Action Points, I haven't decided on the name yet) they get for the session. The Body is treated as Normal Damage, so 0 Luck is possible.

 

During the game session, Luck Points (or LP) can be spent in several ways.

 

spend a point to:

 

Turn a Critical Failure into a normal failure (avoids severe penalties)

 

Turn a normal failure into a normal success

 

Turn a normal success into a critical success

 

An automatic success (no roll necessary)

 

Choose a Hit Location (this is after a successful to-hit roll. No hit location penalty is accrued. This simply replaces the Hit Location roll and allows the Player to choose where the attack landed)

 

Pre-emptive Strike (doing this allows a character to go first in a phase irregardless of the Dex order)

 

Luck protection (this allows a PC to spend a luck point to cancel out the luck point of an enemy. The enemies LP has to directly affect the PC for this to be possible. Note that enemies can also do this to a PC's luck expenditure!)

 

Damage Reduction (A Player can spend a LP to reduce the damage from an opponents successful hit to the minimum on the dice. A definate life saver!)

 

Lucky Strike (After a successful to-hit roll in combat, a Player can spend an LP to maximize the damage roll)

 

Limitations: Luck points have some limitations. First of all, only 1 luck point can be spent per Turn of combat. Thus one can't spend a Luck point to get an automatic hit, then spend one to get max damage, then another to choose the Head location all in the same phase. Only 1 LP per turn keeps LP's from getting outta hand (and keeps PC's from spending them haphazardly)

 

Bad Luck or The Karma System: Just as each PC (and major NPC) gets 1 Die of Luck for free, each gets 1 Die of Unluck for free as well (additional dice are bought as Disads). At the start of each session, just as with Luck, the Unluck is rolled (by the GM) and tallied. At any time during the session, the GM can hit the PC with Unluck, foiling a roll or action. It can even be used to cancel out the use of Luck on the part of the player. However, just as PC's are limited to using 1pt of Luck per Turn, the GM can only inflict 1pt of Unluck per turn as well. Fair is fair.

Karma comes into play in the case of a PC who uses his Luck in an unseemly manner...the GM can determine that the PC gains a point of Unluck because of Karma...what goes around, comes around. However, a PC who uses Luck in a particularly altruistic manner might get a point of Unluck erased (or an extra point of Luck to spend later). Good Karma.

 

I'm probably going to play with this system extensively the next time I run a game. I think it will help the PC's achieve success in over-the-top actions that might be too difficult to pull-off otherwise...

[Mike W]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

Things I've toyed with at one time or another:

 

1. A natural "3" is a critical success. You get 1.5 or 2x damage.

 

2. Standard rule for making NPCs: Major NPC(front line hero or villain like Batman or Joker) +10 STUN above figured. Notable NPC(good hero or villain but not as iconic e.g. Poison Ivy or Blue Beetle) +5 STUN above figured. Minor NPC:(someone people may not have heard of or who counts as "two-bit" like Demolition Man or Magpie gets only Figured STUN).

 

3. Hunteds never get rolled. They'd appear all the time if they did. An 11- Hunted would appear in about 60% of all sessions if you rolled every time and included them whenever you made the roll. The GM simply decides if someone comes up.

 

4. The GM can override any Contacts roll in the interest of the story. I don't care if you rolled a "3", Batman isn't answering. You may have to explain next time what happened(e.g. - Batman calls back to say he was in Turkey fighting Ra's Al Ghul).

 

5. You get assigned experience for contacts and most perks(like Wealth). Once the game starts, you don't put regular experience into them. They only change through roleplaying/story events.

[JmOz]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

Yeah, I was thinking about using something similar, but haven't implimented it yet. (I'm currently not running the Final Fantasy game, but when its my turn to run, I probably will use it)

 

What I was thinking is that all PC's get 1 Die of luck for free, and any additional luck must be purchased (up to a limit determined by the campaign specifics...generaly somewhere between 3D6 and 6D6 maximum)

 

At the beginning of each game session, the player rolls his luck dice and the amount of body rolled is how many Luck points (or Action Points, I haven't decided on the name yet) they get for the session. The Body is treated as Normal Damage, so 0 Luck is possible.

 

During the game session, Luck Points (or LP) can be spent in several ways.

 

spend a point to:

 

Turn a Critical Failure into a normal failure (avoids severe penalties)

 

Turn a normal failure into a normal success

 

Turn a normal success into a critical success

 

An automatic success (no roll necessary)

 

Choose a Hit Location (this is after a successful to-hit roll. No hit location penalty is accrued. This simply replaces the Hit Location roll and allows the Player to choose where the attack landed)

 

Pre-emptive Strike (doing this allows a character to go first in a phase irregardless of the Dex order)

 

Luck protection (this allows a PC to spend a luck point to cancel out the luck point of an enemy. The enemies LP has to directly affect the PC for this to be possible. Note that enemies can also do this to a PC's luck expenditure!)

 

Damage Reduction (A Player can spend a LP to reduce the damage from an opponents successful hit to the minimum on the dice. A definate life saver!)

 

Lucky Strike (After a successful to-hit roll in combat, a Player can spend an LP to maximize the damage roll)

 

Limitations: Luck points have some limitations. First of all, only 1 luck point can be spent per Turn of combat. Thus one can't spend a Luck point to get an automatic hit, then spend one to get max damage, then another to choose the Head location all in the same phase. Only 1 LP per turn keeps LP's from getting outta hand (and keeps PC's from spending them haphazardly)

 

Bad Luck or The Karma System: Just as each PC (and major NPC) gets 1 Die of Luck for free, each gets 1 Die of Unluck for free as well (additional dice are bought as Disads). At the start of each session, just as with Luck, the Unluck is rolled (by the GM) and tallied. At any time during the session, the GM can hit the PC with Unluck, foiling a roll or action. It can even be used to cancel out the use of Luck on the part of the player. However, just as PC's are limited to using 1pt of Luck per Turn, the GM can only inflict 1pt of Unluck per turn as well. Fair is fair.

Karma comes into play in the case of a PC who uses his Luck in an unseemly manner...the GM can determine that the PC gains a point of Unluck because of Karma...what goes around, comes around. However, a PC who uses Luck in a particularly altruistic manner might get a point of Unluck erased (or an extra point of Luck to spend later). Good Karma.

 

I'm probably going to play with this system extensively the next time I run a game. I think it will help the PC's achieve success in over-the-top actions that might be too difficult to pull-off otherwise...

 

To clarify (though NSG seems to have understood) When I say count body I do mean that a 1=0, 2-5=1 and 6=2

[gojira]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

Didn't someone have an rule about taking 1 BODY per X STUN that got past your defenses?

 

Anyone recall that one?

 

RDU Neil had this house rule. It was 1 body which cannot be stopped by any defense per 20 stun taken.

 

RDU Neil had an awsome list of house rules, including some really good ones for Luck. I'll post them if I can find them (and RDU doesn't post them himself).

[Susano]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

RDU Neil had this house rule. It was 1 body which cannot be stopped by any defense per 20 stun taken.

 

RDU Neil had an awsome list of house rules, including some really good ones for Luck. I'll post them if I can find them (and RDU doesn't post them himself).

 

Thanks. I'd really appreciate that.

[Super Squirrel]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

Taking 5 Minutes (4 steps down the time chart) causes Healing to go to Maximum Effect.

 

The rational is that a player can keep rolling until they get all 6's on the healing roll. It is better roleplay if they just concentrate on the task longer until a set time has passed and then they get max effects.

[gojira]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

RDU Neil's house rules. I hope he doesn't mind me uploading his stuff. If you can't to Word, let me know and I'll HTML it.

[archermoo]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

One house rule I almost always use in some form is "hero points". Basically points given out in some ratio to XPs that can be spent by characters to change die rolls. I've used different amounts of points handed out, as well as different things that can be modified by points, and how many points it takes to modify them. Usually get used for modifying to-hit rolls and skill rolls. I generally allow them to only be spent for rolls that player makes. I.e. no making the NPCs rolls worse, and no making teammates rolls better. Though I sometimes bend the second of those, generally at a higher point cost. I generally also put a cap on the number of points that can be spent at one time.

 

If you're interested I've got a list of most of the point costs that I've used over the years.

[ghost-angel]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

The only House Rules we realy use are

Succor should not be bought 0END.

 

If you stop respecting the game being played the game will stop respecting you and squish accordingly. I don't think I've seen this one invoked yet.

[Lord Mhoram]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

 

Fragile world: As suggested in the UMA (or is that Ninja Hero?) most "furniture" in my campaigns are quite fragile

 

Pardon my not adding much to the discussion, don't do much in houserules for combat....

 

But I have to comment on the irony of someone suggesting something for Susano that might be found in Ninja Hero.

[Lord Mhoram]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

What we do to help speed up combat:

 

We use a little blank business card, and we have everyone write on like so:

 

NAME DEX

P H A S E S

 

And the the GM arranges them in order. As an added bonus when a villian is KOed, the person who threw the KOing punch (or the person most repsonsible for KOing said villian) gets the card.

 

We use a big d12 to keep track of phases.

 

We have a big butterknife stuck in a piece of wood, and when tangegial conversations get to much, the knife is pulled back and let go resulting in a big "Bwrang" sound. This is the tanget alert.

 

Dunno how much that helps.

[Almafeta]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

My most popular one: Six stats, with each stat being 2 points per +/- 1. The stats are STR, INT, DEX, BOD, CON, and PRE; 'Comliness' is just a limited PRE, Strength is doubled, Speed becomes a derived stat that's worth 20 points/+1 (bringing it in line with damage reduction), EOCV is INT/3, and EDCV is PRE/3.

 

One that's untested: Body damage for normal attacks becomes based on margin of success. (Roll stun damage like normal; damage that's automatic has a 'margin of success' of 1d-1.)

MoS 0: Body Damage = 0.

MoS 1: Body Damage = Dice * 1/3.

MoS 2: Body Damage = Dice * 2/3.

MoS 3: Body Damage = Dice.

MoS 4: Body Damage = Dice * 1-1/3.

MoS 5: Body Damage = Dice * 1-2/3.

MoS 6: Body Damage = Dice * 2.

[Phil]

Re: Give me your house rules!

 

My most popular one: Six stats' date=' with each stat being 2 points per +/- 1. The stats are STR, INT, DEX, BOD, CON, and PRE; 'Comliness' is just a limited PRE, Strength is doubled, Speed becomes a derived stat that's worth 20 points/+1 (bringing it in line with damage reduction), EOCV is INT/3, and EDCV is PRE/3.[/quote']

Am thinking of doing something very similar for a fantasy hero variant I'm considering working on.