Milestone works at my table by explicately telling players how to get it. In a campaign about restoring acient magic trees, each tree awards a level up In a campaign about personal character growth, each time you find a mentor to teach you something awards a level up and so on This has been the best of both Milestone and XP for my tables
This works because the default EXP systems have meta knowledge that killing stuff gives EXP. Telling players that doing stuff will make them level has the same effect
Also if you make encounters be like "Raid the Orc Temple to regrow the Tree there" it clear you are building up to that and gives tou enough time to test out your level.
That milestone XP sounds like it's for tables you don't like to run. Milestone XP is perfect for more narrative types of games, where killing stuff might not be the primary driver of player motivation.
I think milestone XP is perfect for campaigns to ensure everyone is at the approimate level but you need to balance it so it fits with your campaign + group preffered speed. Dont be that guy who says it bad after only leveling up once in a 5 year campaign (yes.. i saw that)
It's great if the GM wants to control the flow of the narrative. That's about it. You level up when you do what I want you to do which is usually following the story. That's all it motivates players to do. It also feels completely arbitrary which sucks.
@@MagiofAsurayeah milestone honestly feels like a invisible railroad imo. If my players wanna grind out 3 levels doing what they want to do before continuing with the over arching narrative I see nothing wrong with this. It shows forward planning and creativity over just following the hidden rails to achieve their goal.
I don't get why milestone would unmotivate players, I've played a lot with XP and it feels very videogame-y. People want to kill monsters just for the XP and many don't try to be creative with solutions... less experienced players lag behind and get unmotivated and feeling like they are not good enough. And to make it worse it's harder for the DM. I do milestones with an average of 2 sessions, but if a lot happens in a session it could be 1, if not much happens, which is rare, it could be 3. So players have a good idea of when it's going to happen and they prefer it this way
XP doesn't have to be for combat, just whatever you want to incentivise. The classic is 1XP for every 2gp of value looted. That'll make your players seek out dungeons and the next big heist, and try and get it with smart solutions that make them avoid combat if they can. Other alternatives can be XP per person saved if you want them to be proactively looking for the biggest evil to stop, XP for terrain explored and/or conquered in a frontiers game. What you give XP for creates a genre without ever having to restrict player choice.
I’ve always done milestone, and their complaints are fair. I would like to try xp but its a lot to track and I’m not sure if my group would enjoy it. The best way I’ve implemented milestone is through advancing their quest, usually through mcguffins. For example in Curse of Strahd finding the sunsword, holy symbol of ravenkind, and tome of Strahd each gives you a level.
@@bonjacobs6555 make your players track their xp. If they forget to mark down xp it’s on them for not leveling up. Otherwise xp and milestone aren’t much different in tracking honestly. Especially since the new dnd encounter building works off of xp budget to build the encounters instead of cr anyways. My players personally love seeing a tangible gain to their successes with xp. Just ensure that your rewarding xp for social and exploration as well as combat to avoid murder hobos.
Had a combat where a player went down and rolled fail and critical failure, dying, and when another player rushed over to try and heal her, she revealed to him that nothing happens as it is too late, and the party was shocked and shaken
@@BasicLiches yep that way the player is still responsible for the roll results and for revealing the ultimate consequence to the rest of the table that is still acting without that knowledge (unless they make a check to gauge the player's status, which they're unlikely to spend one of their actions or bonus actions on rather than just continue fighting or healing)
Just a little crazy you rated "Session Leveling" over "Milestone Leveling". All I could think about leveling by session is that some sessions are extremely slow and nothing happens (Think shopping sessions), and players will still level.
Yeah, it feels bizarre that you could get from 3rd level to 4th with a couple of shopping trips and a goblin fight, but then have to spend weeks in-game of tireless questing (months or even longer of real-world time) to get from, say, 13th to 14th. Like sure, it should slow down at higher levels... but maybe not THAT much.
Milestone xp works really well if your players know what the goal is. For instance, I was playing a campaign once where we were unraveling a conspiracy and murder among lords while portal hopping. Each time we fled a lord's manor in a failed attempt to kill him, we leveled up.
You're correct. KMO did mention that at some tables this can work REALLY well. It does depend on the group and the DM. It's possible that we've both simply had some fairly bad experiences with it. Plus, Wolf really loves XP systems in general. Thanks so much for watching and taking the time to leave your feedback! We really appreciate it!
@@BasicLichesI also want to strongly disagree with something you said in the video: the reason most people dislike XP is not because of keeping track nor keeping the levels the same. It's exactly the reason of "the carrot": your enjoyment of the game at my table shouldn't come from hunting some arbitrary high-score. If you need a carrot to play dungeons and dragons you should leave the table, buy yourself a PC and play video games. The carrot should be the story and getting to do fun stuff, not "the goblin you just killed gives you 50exp". So no, my dislike has absolutely nothing do with any of the reasons you mentioned. The entire concept of exp leveling is just stupid to me in a ttrpg.
Also is leveling up the only thing you care about in D&D? As long as the story is good and you want to know what happens next and how you can affect it you shouldn't even need to level up once.
In consideration of milestone levelling; why is the continuation of the story/adventure not enough motivation to keep going? And I mean that as a legitimate question, mind; I have just never found how close I am to levelling to be any factor in my motivation to play, so I'm curious at the other side of things.
Thanks for the question Ciran87! It's really more of a DM issue than a story adventure issue. If the story/plot hook has the players out adventuring and trying to accomplish things then it works perfectly fine. However, if the DM has a story that is meandering, not going anywhere, or gets derailed and they don't know what to do...they sometimes forget to level up. It can also occur if the DM is hellbent on keeping the party at a certain level for a specific part of the campaign. Maybe the party spent 3 or 4 sessions doing some background based side quests or maybe just helped out a town/person in need. Something that they deemed important to focus on. Goals that they felt were heroic and worthy of leveling up. But they don't level up because the players didn't actually go through the DM's story arc. Or they may not want to re-adjust things for the newly earned level. It's usually a difference between players feeling like they've done something deserving of a level and the DM basically saying no. That's when it doesn't feel good. We understand that some folks LOVE this house rule and that it works perfectly for them. We've just played at enough tables where it didn't really work. Thanks again for taking the time to watch our video and drop us a question! We really appreciate it!
Personally it starts to get stale when youve been the same level for 7 or 8 sessions like bruh let me get some new moves from a level up or at the very least hook up players with some decent magic items if you wanna be stingy with the level ups 😊
I’ve run milestone for dozens of players… and none of them ever needed the motivation of XP to ac implies things and take risks in the game. If that issue does exist, I feel like it’s got to be a small minority of players and would expect them to possibly have other issues too.
Yes! By level 11, a polearm/sentinel fighter is making 5 attacks every round with their reaction. With a 25% chance of rolling a crit fail every turn, Imagine dropping your weapon or stabbing an ally every single time that happens.
The most common way milestone is run is to level the players when they have completed something significant. Milestone works best in early levels where the players essentially complete something significant every/every other session. In later levels, the milestone system has glaring flaws as it becomes more difficult for the DM to pace this vague concept of "completing something significant" as they struggle to maintain a sense of accomplishment for the players. And if you tell your players "don't worry milestone is coming soon" that kind of kills the excitement and surprise for the players doesn't it? -Milestone is fine for new DMs to use while learning the ropes, but we think it encourages bad habits for DMs that are serious about attempting to create an immersive and exciting experience that your players can't pull away from.
@@BasicLiches The problem I usually have with XP may just be a problem at my tables, but if any of the tables I play at started doing XP leveling, it would immediately devolve into finding the nearest dungeons and grinding for XP without any roleplaying or exploration because we're not progressing our characters unless we're fighting. And then when there are no more monsters to fight we would start killing villagers for XP.
@witec83 thats when you save up a bunch of 300gp diamonds and on a boss fight that gives a bunch of xp keep reviving him at 1 hp then killing him again lmfao
When I started to DM I hated tracking XP so much. I switch to level up every 3 sessions, and it felt like a good balance. 70 sessions later I have never looked back.
In my opinion, that can be kinda fast. I usually like there being more sessions between levels, the higher in levels you go because if you do a level up every 3 sessions in a pre-written module, you'll probably out level the module pretty fast
Healing my table does 1 hp/ lvl/ long rest. You gain half your spell slots per level and half your HD You heal normally in what's considered a safe area (town, base, tiny hut, etc)
With milestone i feel there has to be something the players have as a way to say, "You guys are still doing good" so ive started adding token items that level up as well.
I am running a campaign with like 8 players. I was hesitant to run it with that may players but so far it’s working and I have to say milestone or session leveling is a lifesaver.
Fatal Falling is a bit confusing to me, I don’t see how a 20 CON Barbarian automatically dies falling from 40 feet. I think I read somewhere that you have roughly a 50% chance of surviving a 40-foot fall, and in a superhero fantasy game, I think 40 is too low. I think doubling that makes sense, falling a number of feet equal to 2 times your CON score knocks you out and 4 times your CON score kills you. Solid idea though!
Thanks for the comment! We might have explained this one a bit poorly. The house rule is not based on the amount of feet you fall. It's about the amount of damage that you take. If you take falling damage that equals or exceeds your CON score you are knocked unconscious. However, if you take falling damage that is equal to or exceeds double your CON score, the character is instantly killed. Lets say you have a character with a CON score of 10. If that character fell 40 feet and after rolling the damage dice took 12 damage they would be knocked unconscious. Because they took damage that has exceeded their CON score. If that same character fell 100 feet and took 25 damage from the fall they would automatically die because the damage is equal to/higher than double the character's CON score. Hope that makes sense! Thanks so much for taking the time to watch and comment.
It's not about the distance, it is about the damage. A 20 con pc would need to take 20 fall damage to be knocked out, or 40 to be dead... (and if the barbarian is raging, he would only be taking half damage)
Critical fumbles are not somerhing ive ever found fun because it feels like the martials are constantly punished by it for attacking a lot, and casters dont have to worry about it because theyre forcing saves. It felt targetted, even thkugh i know it wasnt.
@zachary2892 the problem is magic avoided them with saves. You cannot critically fumble on save spells, which ends up making martial classes suffer from it far more since they can't avoid having to roll like casters can.
@@toxicteapot7941I also don't like how characters who get multiple attacks get punished even more. Why is my super human 20th level fighter who has killed actual gods with nothing but his sword 4 times as likely to accidentally stab himself than my 1st level fighter who can barely win a fight against a single goblin?
My campaign has chapters, about helping or hurting dragons. As soon as a dragon is done, they level up. Everyone knows that. With xp we knew we were close so literally just wondered around the highlands triggering the random encounter tables to grind and it was not fun. As a DM. How do you give experience for finding a clue, solving a puzzle, picking a lock?
My campaigns would probably be seen as pure insanity. Every one of them overly rewards players; however, the difficulty of dungeons/monsters are greatly increased. I've always seen D&D as a game of freedom and very little restriction. I create the start of the campaign and have the players make the middle. Along the way, certain actions will trigger a milestone of the campaign. Every milestone has multiple paths, chosen by the player depending on what they choose to do. An example- A player started on a lawful good kingdom. A peasant was caught stealing food and the law of the land stated that stealing results in getting a hand chopped off. The guard, who caught the peasant, ordered the player (who was also a guard) to do the chopping to prove his loyalty to the king and the laws set in place. As DM, I didn't have anything planned until he made a decision. Player's alignment was chaotic good so I had an idea of what he would choose to do. Player killed the guard and let the peasant free. Doing so made him want to leave the kingdom as the laws didn't sit right with him. Later at night, the peasant helped the player board a ship to leave the kingdom, as a thank you. I guess my DM style would be considered 'winging' it. I make side quests but they aren't based on level of the party. The party could be higher level and land slide it. Main quests level with the party. A lot of my inspiration comes from games like final fantasy 3 (US version) and Fable. Sometimes players don't want to do storyline and just want to do a couple random battles, steal something, chat it up in the tavern, make some friends (or foes) for an encounter later. I encourage my players to forge their own destiny and the end of a campaign reflects upon their decisions. When I said pure insanity...I meant it. I use deck of many things and grossly reward players. One campaign netted the players 2 million gp to fiddle with...at lvl 10. I've given a watch that stops time (1 round/character level) for everyone else, except the player, and they could deal damage. I created a feat that allows an automatic critical if a number of skill checks and attack roll(s) are succeeded. Want to run at an enemy, flip over it, and shoot it in the face while in midair? Slide under one, slice it's legs, then end with stabbing another in the head? Shoot a fireball, while jumping off a wall, and stab another with shocking touch? I call it 'heroic maneuver'. A player can get it at lvl 5, improved HM at 10, greater HM at 15, and perfect HM at 20. Base skill check is 10 and increases by 3 for the next one. Basic HM requires 2 skill checks, improved HM requires 3, greater HM requires 4, and perfect HM requires 5. Number of skill checks are based on number of attacks/spells cast. Spellcasters still have to use quicken spell in order to cast more than one spell. Any failed skill/attack roll results in prone and/or lost spell and incurs an attack of opportunity (if possible). Any roll of a 1 results in a critical attack of opportunity (if possible). It's a full round action. 1 and 2 are rerolled for spells.
I play most of my 5e games with both gritty realism and slow healing, but some softcore versions of those. Personally, I like to do 6-8 hours for short rests, and 36-48 hours for a long rest. depending on the amount of damage the character has suffered, the healing could be 25,50 or 80% of their max hp. Honestly I believe both rules to be great, and I couldn’t play without them, but I enjoy a slower paced style of games, more akin to sword and sorcery, rather than high fantasy, so I understand it’s not something everyone would fancy.
ahh crit tables, I want to love them but as a DM using a fumble and crit table, the monsters were always fumbling their asses off , so I stopped that , but I did make a table that the players roll on when they crit kill a mob to help them describe what they do to the monster (this is a huge help on a little roleplaying for my group as they tend to not describe things much ).
Crit and fumbles tables certainly require a little TLC from the Dungeon Master to work well. Awesome idea creating that table to help facilitate some roleplaying and get your players describing their actions! Good stuff! Thanks so much for watching. Nice to see you in the comment section again. Have a great day!
One homebrew rule I implemented was that monsters "resistance to slashing, piercing and bludgeoning damage from nonmagical weapons" becomes "resistance to slashing, piercing and bludgeoning damage". Your magical weapon already gives you a +something, and is almost indestructible. Cutting through a monster resistance makes monsters extremely fragile and breakes the tension when one turn kills a big bad.
Hey Luciano! Respectfully, the liches would highly discourage folks from adjusting this stat without other checks/balances. Allowing all monsters to have magical weapon resistance will highly nerf martial classes at Tier 2+. There are other ways to balance encounters and to extend the life of your big bads! Alas, if your group is happy with it, then that's all that matters. That's the beauty of homebrew. Thanks for watching and keep it real!
@@BasicLichesanother homebrew, I also got rid of this but when I give magic weapons I also allow that magic weapon to do one of the magical damage types instead of just the physical ones. Also I play with adding vulnerabilities and resistances more than the MM does so there's more uses for damage types. Just another homebrew
I use a variation of this where regular +1,+2, & +3 are not considered magical & are instead just physically improved, this allow the resistance to slashing, piercing & bludgeoning from non magical weapons more important while also not taking too much from martial classes, it also just makes sense in world for weapons to be able to be physically improved without any need for magic
Why is it that 80 percent of homebrew I hear is just "yo those martials need to be put in an even deeper pit of agony while the wizard in the background just gets to enjoy their life" ?
I tend to run milestone levelling in one of two ways. 1: Players level up after a set number of sessions depending on the type of campaign I want to run (usually between 3-6 sessions depending on genre). This makes sure that everyone is on the same page when it comes to the intervals between levelling up and incentivises players to keep track of the sessions via session notes so that they can keep track of when their next level up is. 2: I very clearly indicate that “you will level up once you complete X part of the campaign”. My players tend to very much enjoy bouncing from plot point to plot point without much downtime so this keeps the levels coming quite quickly and at a reasonably steady pace but it does pose an issue for my prep time because they tend to get through the main narrative very quickly so I am actively trying to encourage them to take downtime with other house rules like travel exhaustion (where PCs have to spend more time resting after completing a day or more of travelling or risk suffering -1 penalties to their attack rolls and ability checks, like the one D&D exhaustion rules that I personally really like)
Regarding Popcorn Initiative, the case against picking the "bad guys" last is that the DM can then pick themselves to start the next round and go two turns in a row. Instead, get the baddies in a different part of the round... perhaps set up the heavy hitter for 2-turns in a row. I was skeptical until I used it and now I love this initiative style.
For leveling, I hate xp. I do see problems for milestones, though I've never tried it. I use pips which it very close to session xp. Two pips for a session, only one if you're not there. However you can catch up, if you have a tardy spree, but are able to start showing up later. Basically you're gett three pips if your a level behind and have show up at least three sessions in a row. Also, new characters start a level back. 6 pips for levels 1-5 8 for a while Probably 10 at 10th.
Great list! At my groups. Our dungeon masters make it so that we can use Gem dragon ancestries for our Draconic Bloodline Sorcerers in which there are between 1 to 5 off😆 Its baffingly that WotC firgot to add the gem ancestries to the list in the VERY same book they added the distinct Chromatic, Gem and Metallic dragonborns in. Same for Drake Wardens drake aspects. Also extea AC + darkvision to dragonborns aswell
I use levels 1-3 as a modified "Session 0" Giving the new players a chance to figure out the basics on a short One-Shot style module. I pair players up in groups of 2 with a joined backstory arc. I then give them an opportunity to make any changes to their character if it just didn't mesh with them. Re-assigning ability scores, changing starter weapon, armor, etc. When the party meets, they are all level 3. I generally DM for players who have never played before, so it allows me to introduce core game mechanics before there is an entire party of players to engage.
I played with a watered down version of gritty realism where basically every 7th short rest (full nights sleep) was a long rest. Best game I’ve ever played. Everything was more difficult and we actually had to worry about preserving our abilities for when we needed them, which I think was the crux of the fun for us. Hit die actually mattered. That being said, the party was a monk, a fighter, a warlock, and a rogue, and we started at level 5. Nobody was stretching 3 spell slots over a week of in game time.
We've always had different kinds of potions. Normal potions are larger and take an action to drink down if you have them on a belt slot. Advanced potions are about the size of a shot of whisky and are a bonus action to use if they're on your belt. Anything in your backpack takes an action to retrieve. Different belts have different numbers of "quick slots" and magical belts that increase this past 6 are extremely sought after.
Some great insight guys. Enjoyed the video. I had a DM that wanted to play with the gritty healing/1 week long rest. I helped create an entire system around it for spell casters and other abilities that reset on rest to level it out. Without it casters get really screwed.
The main problem with it is that Long Rest, h.p. recovery, and Class Ability recovery are tied together. Decoupling these gives you a lot of space to design.
@@MrJerks93I recently discovered The Dungeon Coach's book Alkander's Almanac of All Things and it has a very elegant rest system in there that I have now adapted to my game. That book is a wealth of amazing homebrew rules.
session xp requires your sessions to be consistent in duration and quality i think is disingenuous to say that a character would not be able to tell if they ever did poorly when they are trying to do something, they could have previously experienced what its like to do well/poorly at the thing they are trying or even seen examples from others.
I dont know what system i snatched it from, but for Exp i do this: You gain a single expirence for a new situation you've worked your way out of. When you gain Exp equal to your level you level up, and your exp count resets. Simple example: Your level is 1 and you just killed your first goblin; you gain 1 exp and level up to 2. Now you'll need 2 exp next time!
You guys are right about the milestone leveling, it depends on the DM. A good DM will adapt the milestone system if the players chose to go in a different direction than the campaign plot. Also in games that use minions, the sleep spell is S+.
I think milestone works really well if you are driving a very fast campaign. Pace is set by the dungeon master. For example, I just ran Curse of Strahd with milestone and I told the players that essentially at every location on the map there’s a significant quest, and if you complete it, you will gain a level. So they knew when they got to Valaki that there was something that they could do to level up and then they went to the Wizard of wines and knew that if they took care of whatever the main problem was there, they would level up and then if they went to any other location, there would be a problem that if they solved, they could level up. I also told them that if they found the items or companions from the tarot reading, they would get levels. I also increased the level cap that was suggested in the sourcebook, and increase the difficulty of the final fight. So they are currently at 12th level which is higher than the book suggests but I have increased the CR of the monsters that they are fighting so they are in a very fast pace campaign and they are leveling very quickly. Leveling is fun, so why not do it more often. If I were to run CoS with XP they would barely be level nine.
We always played nat 1 is just a miss nat 20 is just a hit but need to make a 2nd roll so 2 1s in a row is a fumble 2 20s in a row is critical hit at max dmg . And make the final roll so a 3rd 1 in a rowi is now for an injury or something pretty bad and 3 20s in a row is like an auto kill orsomething extremely great happens .
I love Artifact magic items. I call them "Legacy" items and they are tied to their backstory. They start out as an uncommon weapon and at certain story arc points, they have a "dream quest" or something of that nature and depending on the actions of the character the item gains an additional modifier. It gives me an opportunity to give players certain spells or abilities (some with modifications) that are lacking in the party composition. So far, the response has been overwhelmingly positive. The players never know when going to sleep on a long rest is going to spawn a quest and for some, I even include other members of the party in an Astral Projection style quest. The item never requires attunement, and they replace the Vestige-type items in the game so those are not available in the campaign. Players get to choose the type of item but not its properties.
I like the idea of the secret death saves being rolled by the PLAYER not the DM. So in an ideal world, I'd have some Death Save screens to give to a player who's dying. One side signals that they are dying, player rolls their death saves. DM takes note/ watches the roll behind the screen. If the player rolls three saves or is healed, the screen is lifted! If they die, the screen turns around to a 'dead' side.
We use the lingering injuries when you hit zero, so if a player keeps popping up in combat he gets another injury lol!! I wanted even rule that the second injury is rolled on that table with a d6 instead of a d20, making limb loss very likely…
I simply increased the cap for fall damage to 150 d6 since it's about 1500 ft when you hit terminal velocity and stop accelerating. So have fun trying to survive 516 points of fall damage
Hey Liches!!! Great to see you guys doing 5e Vids again! ❤ Great list, and great vid as always, i just gotta say i am very surprised that you guys rank milestone XP so low - it is high S tier for me! i started using it in late 3.5, used it in 4th, and still use it in 5e. I understand why you guys don't like it, I would feel the same way if the time between levels feels random/arbitrary. When i dm, i tie the milestones to major story beats and i try to pace those beats so the players level every 3-5 sessions (4 hour sessions). In other words the players level every month or so - it works for us and i'll never go back to traditional xp. 😀 Gritty Healing edit- IMO Gritty healing isn't for survival games, it is for social intrigue games - games where there is already a lot of down time and combats are infrequent. It gives you the mechanical "feel" of an adventure day but allows you to spread it out over a timeline that makes more sense for a slower paced game.
Hi Wayne! Nice to see you in the comments again. We've got videos for quite a few systems lined up in the near future. But we've been playing some DnD recently and felt inspired to talk about it! Got a few more in the pipeline/editing phase too. We knew that our take on milestone advancement was going to be fairly divisive and for some folks it is definitely S Tier. It sounds like the way you use it works really well. We've just had some DMs use it without really understanding it...AND it kind of soured us on the house rule. Also, Wolf is obsessed with XP lol. Good call on the Gritty Healing. That makes perfect sense! Thanks so much for watching and stopping by to say hello!
@@BasicLiches Sure thing! I can't wait to see the new vids! I've played a lot of ttrpgs and would love to hear your first impressions of them! If you haven't already, check out the Fate system (Evil Hat Productions) - its a super lightweight and flexible system that has a HUGE emphasis on narration - especially in combat. LOL and it uses milestone leveling 😁 See you soon!
Mostly agree with your assessments. However, I think you missed the mark with rating Session leveling over milestone leveling. Imagine your players take a whole session to roleplay a shopping spree. They want the fanciest equipment at the lowest prices. They take 3-1/2 hours of this. Next session, they want to sample every sellers wares at the market. Tasting all the breads and sweets! They ignore the plot hooks and take care of things by ignoring everything. Guest what, next session they are level 3? I don't think so. Trust the DM with milestone, so that sessions like that do not significantly contribute to their leveling time.
Good point! There is that aspect regarding Session leveling. The DM has to let the players know that just shopping and doing nothing won't award them any progress. Thanks for the comment and for watching!
Milestone is for players who are story focused anyway, I usually award it after a formative point for the players. Perhaps they defeated some boss or made a large change in the world. My players tend to like to add flavour to their new abilities though so perhaps it's more suited to them for that. Sounds like you play a little more as mechanics as motivation. Minions I don't find that exciting a homebrew as I've been using commoners for mine and it works just fine. 4 hp is enough that at higher levels a hit is a definite kill but at lower levels there is a (usually very low) chance it doesn't. Fits the theme too, these guys are just standard citizens with no real training.
Thanks for the feedback. Regarding Milestone...it's more of us just having bad experiences with it as players. We see the appeal and when done correctly, most groups do love it. Using commoners is a nice way of adding fodder to the fray...so to speak. Good idea!
I'm not a big fan of critical hit or fail tables. I can see where some groups may like the gonzo effects if they find combat boring. I think they hurt PCs too much. One of my D.s has a fumble that costs you your next attack /spell. If yiu have two attacks, you lose one as you recover. If you are a spellcaster, you are limited to a bonus action spell.
Late to the party, but according to Milestone level-up. I've collected some small adventures over the years. A bunch of them are level 3, level 4 etc. Some say they will level you half the the from level 3 to 4. I would tell my players I have these 3 different small level-3 adventures, when the are completed you are level 4. I could connect the the adventures to a campaign, or you could run an episodic West Marches style of game...
The XP system is, essentially, a pacing mechanism; you should face so much stuff before you level. The only point that matters is the one that achieves the next level. After a while running, you know how fast you want the game to advance.
I have a lot of thoughts, but I'll keep to 3 comments. But first a question (excuse my basic ignorance): What app do you use for the tier charts? 1. First rule, start at level 3, was very common in 1e, at least starting above level 1. 2. My favorite Critical tables are in Role Master, especially fumbles. in 1e, my basically RAW group always treated nat 20 as dbl dam and nat 1 as a fumble the DM chose according to circumstances. Also very common bitd. 3. Since you said Ravenloft, we played I6, original module in 1e, and slept in the castle. Risky but necessary. We played it for months (weeks in-game I suppose) and it was glorious. 4. Bonus comment. Good video.
About the Secret Death Saves. Easy fix. Only let the one doing the saving throws to know the results. Or better make him roll behind the DM screen, only the player and the DM will know. So nobody will distrust the DM. And as an additional rule to this. If the player rolling the Death Saves makes it apparent to the other players or tell them what his status. Punishes him with ONE automatic FAIL death save. because his character is inconscient so it would be metagaming letting the others know. That's how i see this.
Leveling up for 'not playing' does feel weird as a Gamemaster. It is a team game, and not a skill-based one, so having people level at the same time is the most stable but I also think the lesser talked about flipside is how your table deals with risk in session. If a player can level up but keep their PC from dying by missing sessions, yet the few who always attend stand a higher risk of losing them but get no larger reward? It does feel a bit unfair. I largely make treasure the session-by-session reward, though its not a perfect solution.
I got one. My DM doesn't doesn't crit players, a nat 20 for him is just another role. Us players are still allowed crits though, if fact we get to choose if we want 2x damage or to roll a crit table. We have a very generous god.
especially at lower levels, i roll a d4 for crits rather than another damage die. i still want crits to be a thing and for the players to not feel overwhelmingly powerful in comparison, but i don't want to be one shotting any level 2 wizards
I do a mix between sessions to level and milestones but I also communicate as much as possible the next milestone or goal they are aiming for and how many sessions I estimate that they will take. If they want to screw around and waist a session going off on a tangent that's fine but they know the next objective for the most part.
I have the player roll the death saving throws in a direct message rather that the group chat online or they roll behind my screen in person. Prevents me from being accused of fudging rolls but prevents the metagame
milestones are great, leveling up happens organically with the story and the accomplishments in game, not just because you killed enough goblins or showed up to enough sessions.
I personally hate critical tables because, as someone with notoriously bad rolls, it always feels like I'm just being punished for my dice. I did like you guys' idea of having the DM just come up with a few complications instead of actual penalties, though.
Doing XP based leveling up just reminds me of the SouthPark World of Warcraft where they butcher boars til they hit max level. Milestone all they way baby.
I used milestone, but I basically had it in my head that in the midpt of an adventure they would get the level up....I did a bunch of dungeon crawls so it was easier to track that way....this new campaign I do XP, cause 1 I miss it, and 2 I think people like the progress bar.
I like minions but I don't like the 1 hit point rule. Instead I like a Con save based on Concentration save mechanics. This way big damage is rewarded. Alternately, using a DC10 plus damage makes it a bit more likely to be effective. For area effect spells, basically just say those that fail their saves are dropped. Thise that make it are left at 1 h.p.
So I’m a PF2e guy, but the majority of my experience overall comes from D&D 3.0/3.5, Pathfinder 1, and a few other systems along the way. I’m only 1 house rule in, and it’s one of the more common ones: starting at level 3. I do realize it’s for veterans, but I’m sorry….If one of the most commonly suggested house rules of a game system is to skip 10% of the levels of that game, that’s straight up bad game design. Literally less than 3 minutes into a video and I’ve already been served a reminder of why it was so easy for me as a player and especially a GM to walk away from 5e. (Edited 15% down to the proper 10%. Apparently I’m a dumb, and basic math is hard for me. My point still stands.)
It is a house rule and it's mostly based on what tables want out of the game. Some people dislike how dangerous low level 5E play can be. Others want more powerful characters to start with. 3rd level is usually chosen because that is when every class gains access to their subclasses. We failed to mention that in the video. We've been at Pathfinder and Starfinder tables where campaigns start at 2nd or 3rd level. We don't think this is specifically a 5E thing. 5E is FAR from being a perfect game system and there are tons of bad design decisions in the final product. This doesn't seem like the worst offender of dumb game design principles to us. We also believe that you should play what makes you happy! Pathfinder 2E rules and offers such a different experience than 5E. Thanks for taking the time to drop us a comment and give us your opinion! We truly appreciate it!
i do death saves by having the player roll their death save and ONLY I am permitted to know if it was a success or a failure. Therefore no meta gaming by the other players. BUT because the player is rolling their own saves I take no blame upon that characters death because they rolled it themselves and could see what it was. This works well for me because we play online.
My games are insane. Players are broken monsters are broken. But I have one rule that could work at any table and not be broken: **Staggered Initiative:** Each team (the adventures vs the monster) chooses 1 player to roll initiative. The highest roll goes first. After that roll character and monsters alternate (the order can be chosen) turns. *Example:* there are 5 players and 5 monsters. Players win initiative. The order goes: Player 1 Monster 1 Player 2 Monster 2 Player 3 Monster 3 Player 4 Monster 4 Player 5 Monster 5 This method comes from a Taking20 video called “A Much Better Initiative System for DnD 5e” Link here: m.ua-cam.com/video/SXleyDvtqls/v-deo.html 2 of my other more broken rules are listed below My favorite house rule for players (which I don’t recommend you use unless you think that 5e monsters are terribly boring and you want to homebrew every one you make like me) is: **Free Leveling** When ever you level up you can take any level’s features from any class as long as the level is not above your total level *Example:* a level 5 character with rogue levels 1,3,5, barbarian level 5 and bard level 3. Now that may seem broken (because it is) but I have monster homebrews that are equally broken and make the game balanced. Using this mechanic I’ve almost TPKed a 15th level party in a one shot **Tick Damage** This type of damage is dealt every round at the end of the damaged creature’s turn. Each time this damage is dealt is decreases by one. If a creature takes tick damage from two sources they are added together. *Example:* A giant insect spits acid at a player and deals 5 acid tick damage. At the player takes 4 more damage at the end of his turn. The next round goes by, the player’s turn ends, and he takes 3 acid damage. This cycle protists until the damage reaches 0. *Example 2:* A giant insect spits acid at a player and deals 5 acid tick damage. At the player takes 4 more damage at the end of his turn. The next round goes by, and it’s the insect’s turn. It deals 5 more acid tick damage this is added to the previous damage so the player takes 9 damage total. The players turn starts and ends; he takes 9 acid damage. Be careful with that mechanic low numbers can be really deceiving. In the almost tpk I mentioned, one player’s tick damage got up to 50 (meaning on the subsequent rounds he would be dealt 49 then 48, 47, 46…) make sure there is a way to remedy the tick. The type of tick damage I used was fire so water put it out. The formula for how much damage you’re actually dealing (when i = initial damage and T = total damage) is T = i*(i/2+0.5)
I DMed & played DnD since 3.0 and many other systems and I have to say I prefer milestone leveling over XP. XP always feels so frindy and gamy. With Milestone leveling I have much more incentive to complete story arcs/quests and not only "kill monsters for XP" - so exactly the other way around then you guys feel. :) On the other side I would but "Session XP" into E Tier, as the amount of sessions you play say nothing about the progress and/or experience the characters get in the game (hell, I had whole session which were basically only sitting in tavern and talking).
I thought that leveling up by sessions played system sounded dodgy and then I did the math. In my current game we've played 27sessions, and the PCs are level 6 and leveling up in our next one.* It works out just about perfectly. So they'd level up next around session 36. Cool. *I have no real system for leveling characters up, but it's more like the milestone system. When they've completed a specific adventure and it's been a while, I give them the bump. (Can't understand how these guys like leveling up sessions played but not like milestones. The first seems much more generic.)
Good milestones are basically calculated to be worth the equivalent in EXP to level up, so either EXP or milestone players would level up around the same time anyway. Also for critical skill checks. If a player cannot succeed with the best possible roll why are you asking for a skill check roll? If a player cannot fail with the lowest roll, why are you asking for a skill check roll? You are not doing a skill check at this point you are asking for an outcome roll to see how well they succeed or how bad they fail.
Very true about milestones. We should have mentioned that it requires the DM to really understand how to use this house rule properly. Over the years we've played with some DMs that have sort of soured us on the house rule. And we 100% agree on understanding when to actually ask for a skill roll (or allow a player to roll one). It's not something new DMs always grasp though. In our example with the wizard kicking in the door maybe the DM should have told the wizard player asking to kick in the door..."your wizard isn't strong enough to kick in the thick wooden door with his low strength." And they don't get the roll. It's when the DM says, "sure you can try" in that situation that it creates these zany little moments, which are hilarious and totally fine, but can break immersion for some folks. We ranked these based on our personal experiences. Both of us tend to play with lots of different groups and sometimes with very inexperienced DMs. So we've just seen this particular house rule backfire at the table enough that we're weary of it. It's still perfectly fine, doesn't break the game or anything. Thanks so much for taking the time to watch the video and drop us some feedback Krampuslaws! We really appreciate it!
Not having critical tables at D or a brand new F tier is the sole reason I disliked this video. I’m convinced that if a DM used this it’s a huge red flag
So only problem I really have is saying it's not to bad to let players be way higher level than another because it's simply not fun to be the only level 3 surrounded but level 6 or 7s especially in combat
my hubby's barb was poisoned so he had disadvantage using a crowbar on some stuck doors, and I got advantage with the crowbar and so I was busting down doors flexing my puny halfling muscles lol, it was great lol i'm sure the mage busting down the door would feel great with his leg hairs blowing hehe :D
ok if "secret rolls" are bad then what use is the DM screen? What is the DM screen really for? Just to hide your notes? Just to show off you are a DM? Interesting video.
"Secret rolls" as a house rule are when the DM decides to roll the d20 INSTEAD of the player. And it is done behind the DM Screen. These differ from other rolls that a DM makes behind the screen regularly.
Sort of contradictory to say you really dislike milestone leveling, but want D&D to be more cinematic. Milestone is a way more cinematic experience. I also really wonder the tables you guys have been at where players are so unmotivated to play without experience. I've never had that experience. I really prefer to start at level 3 for background reasons. When I build my character and choose my class, I usually already know what my subclass is going to be. It allows me to share my background around it of what my character was doing before joining the party. As an example, my runk knight Goliath was the one-a-generation chosen rune cutter of his tribe and they served a giant clan, which is what he was rebelling against. Which makes a heck of a lot more sense than the "I go from second to 3rd level and now I glow for some reasons". Well, what have you been doing to develop those skills during level 2? In too many games, absolutely nothing related to your chosen subclass.
How does milestone have anything to do with a cinematic experience? Great cinematic experiences can happen all the time without all the players needing to level at the same time. If anything, it's immersion breaking to level everyone in the middle of session, when you are trying to create a cinematic experience. Instead, when the cinematic moment is over as well as the session, you hit the players with the HUGE chunk of XP they have just gained. Now they have time to cheer/revel in their victory and theory craft the new abilities their character is going to have for the next session. We have played in games that run milestone leveling, and the trouble comes at higher levels, where many DMs will string you out on rewards and leveling because they have trouble balancing encounters. We prefer Session XP over Milestone at higher levels because the consistency is miles better for player engagement. We ran milestone when first learning how to DM, but we have essentially "outgrown" it. Now it just feels like a novice skill.
Hybrid. I treat XP like gold. You can't spend gold unless you find a store, a keep, or run into an NPC that has that thing for sale. Same applies for leveling up. My players know I'll create an opportunity for them to make use of their XP. I'm flexible, even giving players XP "loans" if I know it's going to be more than a couple sessions before the player has an opportunity to level up again. Ironically, this creates a bit of dread in my players (what are we about to get ourselves into). To keep players on the same level. I just add 10% times the number of levels behind the most advanced player to the each player's portion of the XP. This slows down the leader while still rewarding attendance.
TImestamps would have made this video a lot easier to skip around to the higher-rated House Rules if one is just interested in the Higher 2 or 3 Tiers.
@quillogist2875 If the character knows that the feat is impossible, a roll makes no sense. If they don't know if it's possible or not, a pointless roll may make sense. If it's a physically possible feat, a natural 20 should offer success.
Man, I disagree with all the S tier. There are a couple A that I think are S level; ie Feats and Reroll 1s. Think Bonus action Potions are an S tier. I think the Improved Int should be higher, give that stat a use. And Secret Death Saves are REALLY table depend so C seems right. Most of the rest I dislike, though the Flanking change I have used.
Hard disagree on Milestone Leveling. Everyone in my group loves it, whether they are a player or DM. Just makes everything easier not having to track xp.
Hey Hammer! We’ve have had some great games in milestone campaigns as well and we were milestone fans for quite a while, but for this rating, we took into account that the milestone leveling system varies between DMs because it relies so heavily on their skill to pull it off correctly, at a pace that keeps their players interested. So you must be doing it very well! When we returned to a game with a more fixed leveling system, we didn’t realize how much we actually missed KNOWING when we were going to level. Milestone makes things way easier for the DM, but for us, it removes some of the excitement in character growth for later levels. Thanks for the comment and have a lichin’ day!
When it comes to 1's and 20's on skill checks, I don't use them as auto failures or successes, but you succeed or fail more OR barely succeed/fail. If you roll a 1 AND fail the check, it is more devastating than if you failed with any other number on the die. Maybe, if you were trying to use Acrobatics to get up high, you end up doing something that hurts you. If you are trying to recall something, you recall incorrect information that might come back to bite you. Etc. If you roll a 20 AND succeed the check, it is more fantastic than if you succeeded with any other number on the die. If you were trying to use Athletics to move something, you get an increased sense of strength and can do something extra (depending on what it was for). If you are trying to persuade someone, you manage to do so in such a way that they are left with a better impression of you and might be more willing to listen to you in the future (potentially lowering Persuasion DCs). Etc. If you roll a 1 AND succeed the check, then I make it so it comes off more like luck that caused you to succeed, or that you found the task more difficult and managed to barely scrape by, etc. If you roll a 20 AND fail the check, then I make it seem like you were close, or the consequences of failure are not nearly as bad, etc. It typically is more useful for RP, but it can be quite engaging. It keeps the strong feelings people get with rolling a 1 or 20, but in a way that doesn't make skill checks absurd with auto successes/failures.
I totally agree. It makes no sense that a master at their craft has a 5% chance of failure no matter what they do. It sucks when you build a character in such a way as to be really good at a specific skill (like +12 in medicine) and no matter how specialized your character is, a Nat 1 always means you fail, even if your bonuses would make you succeed. How does a level 20 rogue who rolled a 33 on their stealth check get spotted by some shmuck with one eye who has a negative modifier to their perception simply because they rolled a Nat 20? It doesn't make sense. Flavoring Nat 1's that still succeed or Nat 20's that still fail is the best way to go
Hard disagree with milestone leveling. The leveling will happen; the carrot on the stick should be the players wanting to progress the campaign, wanting to see the next cool encounter. I’ve never had a problem with it.
I think this would be more of how certain groups would prefer. I am currently using milestone/session type leveling for a large group. This is the first time I have used it as a DM and I am liking it a lot.
Milestone works at my table by explicately telling players how to get it.
In a campaign about restoring acient magic trees, each tree awards a level up
In a campaign about personal character growth, each time you find a mentor to teach you something awards a level up and so on
This has been the best of both Milestone and XP for my tables
This works because the default EXP systems have meta knowledge that killing stuff gives EXP. Telling players that doing stuff will make them level has the same effect
Also if you make encounters be like "Raid the Orc Temple to regrow the Tree there" it clear you are building up to that and gives tou enough time to test out your level.
That milestone XP sounds like it's for tables you don't like to run. Milestone XP is perfect for more narrative types of games, where killing stuff might not be the primary driver of player motivation.
Assign xp for non combat activities
I think milestone XP is perfect for campaigns to ensure everyone is at the approimate level but you need to balance it so it fits with your campaign + group preffered speed.
Dont be that guy who says it bad after only leveling up once in a 5 year campaign (yes.. i saw that)
It's great if the GM wants to control the flow of the narrative. That's about it.
You level up when you do what I want you to do which is usually following the story.
That's all it motivates players to do.
It also feels completely arbitrary which sucks.
@@MagiofAsurayeah milestone honestly feels like a invisible railroad imo. If my players wanna grind out 3 levels doing what they want to do before continuing with the over arching narrative I see nothing wrong with this. It shows forward planning and creativity over just following the hidden rails to achieve their goal.
I don't get why milestone would unmotivate players, I've played a lot with XP and it feels very videogame-y. People want to kill monsters just for the XP and many don't try to be creative with solutions... less experienced players lag behind and get unmotivated and feeling like they are not good enough. And to make it worse it's harder for the DM. I do milestones with an average of 2 sessions, but if a lot happens in a session it could be 1, if not much happens, which is rare, it could be 3. So players have a good idea of when it's going to happen and they prefer it this way
XP doesn't have to be for combat, just whatever you want to incentivise. The classic is 1XP for every 2gp of value looted. That'll make your players seek out dungeons and the next big heist, and try and get it with smart solutions that make them avoid combat if they can. Other alternatives can be XP per person saved if you want them to be proactively looking for the biggest evil to stop, XP for terrain explored and/or conquered in a frontiers game. What you give XP for creates a genre without ever having to restrict player choice.
I’ve always done milestone, and their complaints are fair. I would like to try xp but its a lot to track and I’m not sure if my group would enjoy it. The best way I’ve implemented milestone is through advancing their quest, usually through mcguffins. For example in Curse of Strahd finding the sunsword, holy symbol of ravenkind, and tome of Strahd each gives you a level.
@@bonjacobs6555 make your players track their xp. If they forget to mark down xp it’s on them for not leveling up. Otherwise xp and milestone aren’t much different in tracking honestly. Especially since the new dnd encounter building works off of xp budget to build the encounters instead of cr anyways. My players personally love seeing a tangible gain to their successes with xp. Just ensure that your rewarding xp for social and exploration as well as combat to avoid murder hobos.
I was super surprised to hear people dislike milestone because their goal is to level up not create a story...
People play dnd for all kinds of reasons. Some like to forget that number crunching nerds were the og dnd players.
I liked BA healing potion for rolling, and action for full healing. Still an action to feed someone (with rolling)
In my recent campaigns, we did hidden/secret Death Saves, but the players rolled them, not the DM
Had a combat where a player went down and rolled fail and critical failure, dying, and when another player rushed over to try and heal her, she revealed to him that nothing happens as it is too late, and the party was shocked and shaken
So the player would roll it and hide the result from the other players? That's a cool way to do it. And I bet KMO would approve! - Wolf
@@BasicLiches yep that way the player is still responsible for the roll results and for revealing the ultimate consequence to the rest of the table that is still acting without that knowledge (unless they make a check to gauge the player's status, which they're unlikely to spend one of their actions or bonus actions on rather than just continue fighting or healing)
THIS I like. In fact, I have a session tomorrow and I was thinking of asking my players how they'd feel about that then.
Just a little crazy you rated "Session Leveling" over "Milestone Leveling". All I could think about leveling by session is that some sessions are extremely slow and nothing happens (Think shopping sessions), and players will still level.
How in the world do you spend a whole session shopping?
Yeah, it feels bizarre that you could get from 3rd level to 4th with a couple of shopping trips and a goblin fight, but then have to spend weeks in-game of tireless questing (months or even longer of real-world time) to get from, say, 13th to 14th. Like sure, it should slow down at higher levels... but maybe not THAT much.
Milestone xp works really well if your players know what the goal is. For instance, I was playing a campaign once where we were unraveling a conspiracy and murder among lords while portal hopping. Each time we fled a lord's manor in a failed attempt to kill him, we leveled up.
You're correct. KMO did mention that at some tables this can work REALLY well. It does depend on the group and the DM. It's possible that we've both simply had some fairly bad experiences with it. Plus, Wolf really loves XP systems in general. Thanks so much for watching and taking the time to leave your feedback! We really appreciate it!
@@BasicLichesI also want to strongly disagree with something you said in the video: the reason most people dislike XP is not because of keeping track nor keeping the levels the same.
It's exactly the reason of "the carrot": your enjoyment of the game at my table shouldn't come from hunting some arbitrary high-score. If you need a carrot to play dungeons and dragons you should leave the table, buy yourself a PC and play video games. The carrot should be the story and getting to do fun stuff, not "the goblin you just killed gives you 50exp".
So no, my dislike has absolutely nothing do with any of the reasons you mentioned. The entire concept of exp leveling is just stupid to me in a ttrpg.
Also is leveling up the only thing you care about in D&D? As long as the story is good and you want to know what happens next and how you can affect it you shouldn't even need to level up once.
In consideration of milestone levelling; why is the continuation of the story/adventure not enough motivation to keep going?
And I mean that as a legitimate question, mind; I have just never found how close I am to levelling to be any factor in my motivation to play, so I'm curious at the other side of things.
Thanks for the question Ciran87! It's really more of a DM issue than a story adventure issue. If the story/plot hook has the players out adventuring and trying to accomplish things then it works perfectly fine. However, if the DM has a story that is meandering, not going anywhere, or gets derailed and they don't know what to do...they sometimes forget to level up.
It can also occur if the DM is hellbent on keeping the party at a certain level for a specific part of the campaign. Maybe the party spent 3 or 4 sessions doing some background based side quests or maybe just helped out a town/person in need. Something that they deemed important to focus on. Goals that they felt were heroic and worthy of leveling up. But they don't level up because the players didn't actually go through the DM's story arc. Or they may not want to re-adjust things for the newly earned level.
It's usually a difference between players feeling like they've done something deserving of a level and the DM basically saying no. That's when it doesn't feel good. We understand that some folks LOVE this house rule and that it works perfectly for them. We've just played at enough tables where it didn't really work.
Thanks again for taking the time to watch our video and drop us a question! We really appreciate it!
Personally it starts to get stale when youve been the same level for 7 or 8 sessions like bruh let me get some new moves from a level up or at the very least hook up players with some decent magic items if you wanna be stingy with the level ups 😊
@@flygonkick93😂 Both the other rules make that happen way more
My players have always refused to play where all characters don't level up at the same time, and we've always used milestone
Lots of players/groups are like this. We're probably in the minority for sure! It's all about what works best for your table/group.
I’ve run milestone for dozens of players… and none of them ever needed the motivation of XP to ac implies things and take risks in the game. If that issue does exist, I feel like it’s got to be a small minority of players and would expect them to possibly have other issues too.
Critical fail fumbles impact martials more than casters. The higher level you get the worse it is. Its a trash rule and deserves a trash tier.
Yes! By level 11, a polearm/sentinel fighter is making 5 attacks every round with their reaction. With a 25% chance of rolling a crit fail every turn, Imagine dropping your weapon or stabbing an ally every single time that happens.
Milestone works best if the players know the milestone they are working towards. The downside is that tends towards the railroad.
The most common way milestone is run is to level the players when they have completed something significant. Milestone works best in early levels where the players essentially complete something significant every/every other session. In later levels, the milestone system has glaring flaws as it becomes more difficult for the DM to pace this vague concept of "completing something significant" as they struggle to maintain a sense of accomplishment for the players. And if you tell your players "don't worry milestone is coming soon" that kind of kills the excitement and surprise for the players doesn't it?
-Milestone is fine for new DMs to use while learning the ropes, but we think it encourages bad habits for DMs that are serious about attempting to create an immersive and exciting experience that your players can't pull away from.
@@BasicLiches The problem I usually have with XP may just be a problem at my tables, but if any of the tables I play at started doing XP leveling, it would immediately devolve into finding the nearest dungeons and grinding for XP without any roleplaying or exploration because we're not progressing our characters unless we're fighting. And then when there are no more monsters to fight we would start killing villagers for XP.
@witec83 thats when you save up a bunch of 300gp diamonds and on a boss fight that gives a bunch of xp keep reviving him at 1 hp then killing him again lmfao
@@flygonkick93 yep, that is exactly what would happen.
When I started to DM I hated tracking XP so much. I switch to level up every 3 sessions, and it felt like a good balance. 70 sessions later I have never looked back.
In my opinion, that can be kinda fast. I usually like there being more sessions between levels, the higher in levels you go because if you do a level up every 3 sessions in a pre-written module, you'll probably out level the module pretty fast
That's how Pathfinder Society does it.
Healing my table does 1 hp/ lvl/ long rest. You gain half your spell slots per level and half your HD
You heal normally in what's considered a safe area (town, base, tiny hut, etc)
With milestone i feel there has to be something the players have as a way to say, "You guys are still doing good" so ive started adding token items that level up as well.
I am running a campaign with like 8 players. I was hesitant to run it with that may players but so far it’s working and I have to say milestone or session leveling is a lifesaver.
As a player I hate Milestone, but as a DM it is so much better. Also everyone leveling up separately is a very bad idea I hate it a lot.
I like combat exhaustion, but I would use simplified exhaustion where each level of exhaustion is a -1 to all rolls.
It would have been handy if you had included a compilation of all these rules in your notes area as a downloadable document.
Fatal Falling is a bit confusing to me, I don’t see how a 20 CON Barbarian automatically dies falling from 40 feet. I think I read somewhere that you have roughly a 50% chance of surviving a 40-foot fall, and in a superhero fantasy game, I think 40 is too low.
I think doubling that makes sense, falling a number of feet equal to 2 times your CON score knocks you out and 4 times your CON score kills you. Solid idea though!
Thanks for the comment! We might have explained this one a bit poorly. The house rule is not based on the amount of feet you fall. It's about the amount of damage that you take. If you take falling damage that equals or exceeds your CON score you are knocked unconscious. However, if you take falling damage that is equal to or exceeds double your CON score, the character is instantly killed.
Lets say you have a character with a CON score of 10. If that character fell 40 feet and after rolling the damage dice took 12 damage they would be knocked unconscious. Because they took damage that has exceeded their CON score.
If that same character fell 100 feet and took 25 damage from the fall they would automatically die because the damage is equal to/higher than double the character's CON score.
Hope that makes sense! Thanks so much for taking the time to watch and comment.
It's not about the distance, it is about the damage.
A 20 con pc would need to take 20 fall damage to be knocked out, or 40 to be dead... (and if the barbarian is raging, he would only be taking half damage)
Critical fumbles are not somerhing ive ever found fun because it feels like the martials are constantly punished by it for attacking a lot, and casters dont have to worry about it because theyre forcing saves. It felt targetted, even thkugh i know it wasnt.
They have a book called Critical Rolls that covers ranged, melee, and magic as well as ones for different damage types.
@zachary2892 the problem is magic avoided them with saves. You cannot critically fumble on save spells, which ends up making martial classes suffer from it far more since they can't avoid having to roll like casters can.
@@toxicteapot7941I also don't like how characters who get multiple attacks get punished even more.
Why is my super human 20th level fighter who has killed actual gods with nothing but his sword 4 times as likely to accidentally stab himself than my 1st level fighter who can barely win a fight against a single goblin?
My campaign has chapters, about helping or hurting dragons. As soon as a dragon is done, they level up. Everyone knows that. With xp we knew we were close so literally just wondered around the highlands triggering the random encounter tables to grind and it was not fun.
As a DM. How do you give experience for finding a clue, solving a puzzle, picking a lock?
My campaigns would probably be seen as pure insanity. Every one of them overly rewards players; however, the difficulty of dungeons/monsters are greatly increased. I've always seen D&D as a game of freedom and very little restriction. I create the start of the campaign and have the players make the middle. Along the way, certain actions will trigger a milestone of the campaign. Every milestone has multiple paths, chosen by the player depending on what they choose to do. An example- A player started on a lawful good kingdom. A peasant was caught stealing food and the law of the land stated that stealing results in getting a hand chopped off. The guard, who caught the peasant, ordered the player (who was also a guard) to do the chopping to prove his loyalty to the king and the laws set in place. As DM, I didn't have anything planned until he made a decision. Player's alignment was chaotic good so I had an idea of what he would choose to do. Player killed the guard and let the peasant free. Doing so made him want to leave the kingdom as the laws didn't sit right with him. Later at night, the peasant helped the player board a ship to leave the kingdom, as a thank you.
I guess my DM style would be considered 'winging' it. I make side quests but they aren't based on level of the party. The party could be higher level and land slide it. Main quests level with the party. A lot of my inspiration comes from games like final fantasy 3 (US version) and Fable. Sometimes players don't want to do storyline and just want to do a couple random battles, steal something, chat it up in the tavern, make some friends (or foes) for an encounter later. I encourage my players to forge their own destiny and the end of a campaign reflects upon their decisions.
When I said pure insanity...I meant it. I use deck of many things and grossly reward players. One campaign netted the players 2 million gp to fiddle with...at lvl 10. I've given a watch that stops time (1 round/character level) for everyone else, except the player, and they could deal damage.
I created a feat that allows an automatic critical if a number of skill checks and attack roll(s) are succeeded. Want to run at an enemy, flip over it, and shoot it in the face while in midair? Slide under one, slice it's legs, then end with stabbing another in the head? Shoot a fireball, while jumping off a wall, and stab another with shocking touch? I call it 'heroic maneuver'. A player can get it at lvl 5, improved HM at 10, greater HM at 15, and perfect HM at 20. Base skill check is 10 and increases by 3 for the next one. Basic HM requires 2 skill checks, improved HM requires 3, greater HM requires 4, and perfect HM requires 5. Number of skill checks are based on number of attacks/spells cast. Spellcasters still have to use quicken spell in order to cast more than one spell. Any failed skill/attack roll results in prone and/or lost spell and incurs an attack of opportunity (if possible). Any roll of a 1 results in a critical attack of opportunity (if possible). It's a full round action. 1 and 2 are rerolled for spells.
I play most of my 5e games with both gritty realism and slow healing, but some softcore versions of those.
Personally, I like to do 6-8 hours for short rests, and 36-48 hours for a long rest.
depending on the amount of damage the character has suffered, the healing could be 25,50 or 80% of their max hp.
Honestly I believe both rules to be great, and I couldn’t play without them, but I enjoy a slower paced style of games, more akin to sword and sorcery, rather than high fantasy, so I understand it’s not something everyone would fancy.
ahh crit tables, I want to love them but as a DM using a fumble and crit table, the monsters were always fumbling their asses off , so I stopped that , but I did make a table that the players roll on when they crit kill a mob to help them describe what they do to the monster (this is a huge help on a little roleplaying for my group as they tend to not describe things much ).
Crit and fumbles tables certainly require a little TLC from the Dungeon Master to work well. Awesome idea creating that table to help facilitate some roleplaying and get your players describing their actions! Good stuff! Thanks so much for watching. Nice to see you in the comment section again. Have a great day!
One homebrew rule I implemented was that monsters "resistance to slashing, piercing and bludgeoning damage from nonmagical weapons" becomes "resistance to slashing, piercing and bludgeoning damage". Your magical weapon already gives you a +something, and is almost indestructible. Cutting through a monster resistance makes monsters extremely fragile and breakes the tension when one turn kills a big bad.
Hey Luciano! Respectfully, the liches would highly discourage folks from adjusting this stat without other checks/balances. Allowing all monsters to have magical weapon resistance will highly nerf martial classes at Tier 2+. There are other ways to balance encounters and to extend the life of your big bads! Alas, if your group is happy with it, then that's all that matters. That's the beauty of homebrew. Thanks for watching and keep it real!
@@BasicLichesanother homebrew, I also got rid of this but when I give magic weapons I also allow that magic weapon to do one of the magical damage types instead of just the physical ones. Also I play with adding vulnerabilities and resistances more than the MM does so there's more uses for damage types. Just another homebrew
I use a variation of this where regular +1,+2, & +3 are not considered magical & are instead just physically improved, this allow the resistance to slashing, piercing & bludgeoning from non magical weapons more important while also not taking too much from martial classes, it also just makes sense in world for weapons to be able to be physically improved without any need for magic
@@BasicLiches I wouldn't take the design opinions of people who unironically run 5e very seriously lmao
Why is it that 80 percent of homebrew I hear is just "yo those martials need to be put in an even deeper pit of agony while the wizard in the background just gets to enjoy their life" ?
I tend to run milestone levelling in one of two ways.
1: Players level up after a set number of sessions depending on the type of campaign I want to run (usually between 3-6 sessions depending on genre). This makes sure that everyone is on the same page when it comes to the intervals between levelling up and incentivises players to keep track of the sessions via session notes so that they can keep track of when their next level up is.
2: I very clearly indicate that “you will level up once you complete X part of the campaign”. My players tend to very much enjoy bouncing from plot point to plot point without much downtime so this keeps the levels coming quite quickly and at a reasonably steady pace but it does pose an issue for my prep time because they tend to get through the main narrative very quickly so I am actively trying to encourage them to take downtime with other house rules like travel exhaustion (where PCs have to spend more time resting after completing a day or more of travelling or risk suffering -1 penalties to their attack rolls and ability checks, like the one D&D exhaustion rules that I personally really like)
Regarding Popcorn Initiative, the case against picking the "bad guys" last is that the DM can then pick themselves to start the next round and go two turns in a row. Instead, get the baddies in a different part of the round... perhaps set up the heavy hitter for 2-turns in a row. I was skeptical until I used it and now I love this initiative style.
Glad to hear it's not as bad in practice as we initially thought! Thanks so much for the feedback and for taking the time to watch our video.
I rolled a nat 20, I'm ripping the redwood out of the ground.
For leveling, I hate xp. I do see problems for milestones, though I've never tried it. I use pips which it very close to session xp. Two pips for a session, only one if you're not there. However you can catch up, if you have a tardy spree, but are able to start showing up later.
Basically you're gett three pips if your a level behind and have show up at least three sessions in a row. Also, new characters start a level back.
6 pips for levels 1-5
8 for a while
Probably 10 at 10th.
Great list! At my groups. Our dungeon masters make it so that we can use Gem dragon ancestries for our Draconic Bloodline Sorcerers in which there are between 1 to 5 off😆 Its baffingly that WotC firgot to add the gem ancestries to the list in the VERY same book they added the distinct Chromatic, Gem and Metallic dragonborns in. Same for Drake Wardens drake aspects. Also extea AC + darkvision to dragonborns aswell
That’s great Odin! Yeah those Dragonborn changes were much needed! Thanks for watching!
I use levels 1-3 as a modified "Session 0" Giving the new players a chance to figure out the basics on a short One-Shot style module. I pair players up in groups of 2 with a joined backstory arc. I then give them an opportunity to make any changes to their character if it just didn't mesh with them. Re-assigning ability scores, changing starter weapon, armor, etc. When the party meets, they are all level 3. I generally DM for players who have never played before, so it allows me to introduce core game mechanics before there is an entire party of players to engage.
I played with a watered down version of gritty realism where basically every 7th short rest (full nights sleep) was a long rest. Best game I’ve ever played. Everything was more difficult and we actually had to worry about preserving our abilities for when we needed them, which I think was the crux of the fun for us. Hit die actually mattered.
That being said, the party was a monk, a fighter, a warlock, and a rogue, and we started at level 5. Nobody was stretching 3 spell slots over a week of in game time.
We've always had different kinds of potions. Normal potions are larger and take an action to drink down if you have them on a belt slot. Advanced potions are about the size of a shot of whisky and are a bonus action to use if they're on your belt.
Anything in your backpack takes an action to retrieve. Different belts have different numbers of "quick slots" and magical belts that increase this past 6 are extremely sought after.
Some great insight guys. Enjoyed the video. I had a DM that wanted to play with the gritty healing/1 week long rest. I helped create an entire system around it for spell casters and other abilities that reset on rest to level it out. Without it casters get really screwed.
The main problem with it is that Long Rest, h.p. recovery, and Class Ability recovery are tied together. Decoupling these gives you a lot of space to design.
@@MrJerks93I recently discovered The Dungeon Coach's book Alkander's Almanac of All Things and it has a very elegant rest system in there that I have now adapted to my game. That book is a wealth of amazing homebrew rules.
session xp requires your sessions to be consistent in duration and quality
i think is disingenuous to say that a character would not be able to tell if they ever did poorly when they are trying to do something, they could have previously experienced what its like to do well/poorly at the thing they are trying or even seen examples from others.
A lot of the optional rules are old school rules that I do use. Especially secret roles for sneaking and search or perception checks.
I dont know what system i snatched it from, but for Exp i do this:
You gain a single expirence for a new situation you've worked your way out of. When you gain Exp equal to your level you level up, and your exp count resets.
Simple example:
Your level is 1 and you just killed your first goblin; you gain 1 exp and level up to 2. Now you'll need 2 exp next time!
You guys are right about the milestone leveling, it depends on the DM. A good DM will adapt the milestone system if the players chose to go in a different direction than the campaign plot. Also in games that use minions, the sleep spell is S+.
I think milestone works really well if you are driving a very fast campaign. Pace is set by the dungeon master. For example, I just ran Curse of Strahd with milestone and I told the players that essentially at every location on the map there’s a significant quest, and if you complete it, you will gain a level. So they knew when they got to Valaki that there was something that they could do to level up and then they went to the Wizard of wines and knew that if they took care of whatever the main problem was there, they would level up and then if they went to any other location, there would be a problem that if they solved, they could level up. I also told them that if they found the items or companions from the tarot reading, they would get levels. I also increased the level cap that was suggested in the sourcebook, and increase the difficulty of the final fight. So they are currently at 12th level which is higher than the book suggests but I have increased the CR of the monsters that they are fighting so they are in a very fast pace campaign and they are leveling very quickly. Leveling is fun, so why not do it more often. If I were to run CoS with XP they would barely be level nine.
We always played nat 1 is just a miss nat 20 is just a hit but need to make a 2nd roll so 2 1s in a row is a fumble 2 20s in a row is critical hit at max dmg . And make the final roll so a 3rd 1 in a rowi is now for an injury or something pretty bad and 3 20s in a row is like an auto kill orsomething extremely great happens .
I love Artifact magic items. I call them "Legacy" items and they are tied to their backstory. They start out as an uncommon weapon and at certain story arc points, they have a "dream quest" or something of that nature and depending on the actions of the character the item gains an additional modifier. It gives me an opportunity to give players certain spells or abilities (some with modifications) that are lacking in the party composition. So far, the response has been overwhelmingly positive. The players never know when going to sleep on a long rest is going to spawn a quest and for some, I even include other members of the party in an Astral Projection style quest. The item never requires attunement, and they replace the Vestige-type items in the game so those are not available in the campaign. Players get to choose the type of item but not its properties.
I like the idea of the secret death saves being rolled by the PLAYER not the DM. So in an ideal world, I'd have some Death Save screens to give to a player who's dying. One side signals that they are dying, player rolls their death saves. DM takes note/ watches the roll behind the screen. If the player rolls three saves or is healed, the screen is lifted! If they die, the screen turns around to a 'dead' side.
We use the lingering injuries when you hit zero, so if a player keeps popping up in combat he gets another injury lol!! I wanted even rule that the second injury is rolled on that table with a d6 instead of a d20, making limb loss very likely…
I simply increased the cap for fall damage to 150 d6 since it's about 1500 ft when you hit terminal velocity and stop accelerating. So have fun trying to survive 516 points of fall damage
Hey Liches!!!
Great to see you guys doing 5e Vids again! ❤
Great list, and great vid as always, i just gotta say i am very surprised that you guys rank milestone XP so low - it is high S tier for me! i started using it in late 3.5, used it in 4th, and still use it in 5e. I understand why you guys don't like it, I would feel the same way if the time between levels feels random/arbitrary. When i dm, i tie the milestones to major story beats and i try to pace those beats so the players level every 3-5 sessions (4 hour sessions).
In other words the players level every month or so - it works for us and i'll never go back to traditional xp. 😀
Gritty Healing edit- IMO Gritty healing isn't for survival games, it is for social intrigue games - games where there is already a lot of down time and combats are infrequent. It gives you the mechanical "feel" of an adventure day but allows you to spread it out over a timeline that makes more sense for a slower paced game.
Hi Wayne! Nice to see you in the comments again. We've got videos for quite a few systems lined up in the near future. But we've been playing some DnD recently and felt inspired to talk about it! Got a few more in the pipeline/editing phase too.
We knew that our take on milestone advancement was going to be fairly divisive and for some folks it is definitely S Tier. It sounds like the way you use it works really well. We've just had some DMs use it without really understanding it...AND it kind of soured us on the house rule. Also, Wolf is obsessed with XP lol.
Good call on the Gritty Healing. That makes perfect sense! Thanks so much for watching and stopping by to say hello!
@@BasicLiches Sure thing! I can't wait to see the new vids! I've played a lot of ttrpgs and would love to hear your first impressions of them!
If you haven't already, check out the Fate system (Evil Hat Productions) - its a super lightweight and flexible system that has a HUGE emphasis on narration - especially in combat. LOL and it uses milestone leveling 😁
See you soon!
used slow healing in every campagin for the last 6 years, played some two-shots recently without it and long rests felt so powerfull xD
Mostly agree with your assessments. However, I think you missed the mark with rating Session leveling over milestone leveling. Imagine your players take a whole session to roleplay a shopping spree. They want the fanciest equipment at the lowest prices. They take 3-1/2 hours of this. Next session, they want to sample every sellers wares at the market. Tasting all the breads and sweets! They ignore the plot hooks and take care of things by ignoring everything. Guest what, next session they are level 3? I don't think so. Trust the DM with milestone, so that sessions like that do not significantly contribute to their leveling time.
Good point! There is that aspect regarding Session leveling. The DM has to let the players know that just shopping and doing nothing won't award them any progress. Thanks for the comment and for watching!
Milestone is for players who are story focused anyway, I usually award it after a formative point for the players. Perhaps they defeated some boss or made a large change in the world. My players tend to like to add flavour to their new abilities though so perhaps it's more suited to them for that. Sounds like you play a little more as mechanics as motivation.
Minions I don't find that exciting a homebrew as I've been using commoners for mine and it works just fine. 4 hp is enough that at higher levels a hit is a definite kill but at lower levels there is a (usually very low) chance it doesn't. Fits the theme too, these guys are just standard citizens with no real training.
Thanks for the feedback. Regarding Milestone...it's more of us just having bad experiences with it as players. We see the appeal and when done correctly, most groups do love it.
Using commoners is a nice way of adding fodder to the fray...so to speak. Good idea!
I'm not a big fan of critical hit or fail tables. I can see where some groups may like the gonzo effects if they find combat boring. I think they hurt PCs too much. One of my D.s has a fumble that costs you your next attack /spell. If yiu have two attacks, you lose one as you recover. If you are a spellcaster, you are limited to a bonus action spell.
Late to the party, but according to Milestone level-up. I've collected some small adventures over the years. A bunch of them are level 3, level 4 etc. Some say they will level you half the the from level 3 to 4.
I would tell my players I have these 3 different small level-3 adventures, when the are completed you are level 4. I could connect the the adventures to a campaign, or you could run an episodic West Marches style of game...
The XP system is, essentially, a pacing mechanism; you should face so much stuff before you level. The only point that matters is the one that achieves the next level. After a while running, you know how fast you want the game to advance.
I have a lot of thoughts, but I'll keep to 3 comments. But first a question (excuse my basic ignorance): What app do you use for the tier charts? 1. First rule, start at level 3, was very common in 1e, at least starting above level 1. 2. My favorite Critical tables are in Role Master, especially fumbles. in 1e, my basically RAW group always treated nat 20 as dbl dam and nat 1 as a fumble the DM chose according to circumstances. Also very common bitd. 3. Since you said Ravenloft, we played I6, original module in 1e, and slept in the castle. Risky but necessary. We played it for months (weeks in-game I suppose) and it was glorious. 4. Bonus comment. Good video.
About the Secret Death Saves. Easy fix. Only let the one doing the saving throws to know the results. Or better make him roll behind the DM screen, only the player and the DM will know. So nobody will distrust the DM.
And as an additional rule to this. If the player rolling the Death Saves makes it apparent to the other players or tell them what his status. Punishes him with ONE automatic FAIL death save. because his character is inconscient so it would be metagaming letting the others know.
That's how i see this.
Leveling up for 'not playing' does feel weird as a Gamemaster. It is a team game, and not a skill-based one, so having people level at the same time is the most stable but I also think the lesser talked about flipside is how your table deals with risk in session. If a player can level up but keep their PC from dying by missing sessions, yet the few who always attend stand a higher risk of losing them but get no larger reward? It does feel a bit unfair. I largely make treasure the session-by-session reward, though its not a perfect solution.
I got one. My DM doesn't doesn't crit players, a nat 20 for him is just another role. Us players are still allowed crits though, if fact we get to choose if we want 2x damage or to roll a crit table. We have a very generous god.
especially at lower levels, i roll a d4 for crits rather than another damage die. i still want crits to be a thing and for the players to not feel overwhelmingly powerful in comparison, but i don't want to be one shotting any level 2 wizards
I do a mix between sessions to level and milestones but I also communicate as much as possible the next milestone or goal they are aiming for and how many sessions I estimate that they will take. If they want to screw around and waist a session going off on a tangent that's fine but they know the next objective for the most part.
I have the player roll the death saving throws in a direct message rather that the group chat online or they roll behind my screen in person. Prevents me from being accused of fudging rolls but prevents the metagame
milestones are great, leveling up happens organically with the story and the accomplishments in game, not just because you killed enough goblins or showed up to enough sessions.
I personally hate critical tables because, as someone with notoriously bad rolls, it always feels like I'm just being punished for my dice. I did like you guys' idea of having the DM just come up with a few complications instead of actual penalties, though.
Good set of rules to consider. I generally cleave close to the base rules.
I use milestone leveling but also give XP that players can spend on things like extra uses of limited features, feats, extra spell slots, etc
Doing XP based leveling up just reminds me of the SouthPark World of Warcraft where they butcher boars til they hit max level. Milestone all they way baby.
I used milestone, but I basically had it in my head that in the midpt of an adventure they would get the level up....I did a bunch of dungeon crawls so it was easier to track that way....this new campaign I do XP, cause 1 I miss it, and 2 I think people like the progress bar.
Does Fatal Falling apply to PCs only? Otherwise everyone is taking abilities to knock flying monsters out the sky.
I like minions but I don't like the 1 hit point rule. Instead I like a Con save based on Concentration save mechanics. This way big damage is rewarded.
Alternately, using a DC10 plus damage makes it a bit more likely to be effective.
For area effect spells, basically just say those that fail their saves are dropped. Thise that make it are left at 1 h.p.
So I’m a PF2e guy, but the majority of my experience overall comes from D&D 3.0/3.5, Pathfinder 1, and a few other systems along the way. I’m only 1 house rule in, and it’s one of the more common ones: starting at level 3. I do realize it’s for veterans, but I’m sorry….If one of the most commonly suggested house rules of a game system is to skip 10% of the levels of that game, that’s straight up bad game design. Literally less than 3 minutes into a video and I’ve already been served a reminder of why it was so easy for me as a player and especially a GM to walk away from 5e.
(Edited 15% down to the proper 10%. Apparently I’m a dumb, and basic math is hard for me. My point still stands.)
It is a house rule and it's mostly based on what tables want out of the game. Some people dislike how dangerous low level 5E play can be. Others want more powerful characters to start with.
3rd level is usually chosen because that is when every class gains access to their subclasses. We failed to mention that in the video. We've been at Pathfinder and Starfinder tables where campaigns start at 2nd or 3rd level. We don't think this is specifically a 5E thing.
5E is FAR from being a perfect game system and there are tons of bad design decisions in the final product. This doesn't seem like the worst offender of dumb game design principles to us.
We also believe that you should play what makes you happy! Pathfinder 2E rules and offers such a different experience than 5E. Thanks for taking the time to drop us a comment and give us your opinion! We truly appreciate it!
My DM gave me a B tier change for my subclass. I am playing a spore druid. The change he made is when I am in my spore form I have an extra attack.
i do death saves by having the player roll their death save and ONLY I am permitted to know if it was a success or a failure. Therefore no meta gaming by the other players. BUT because the player is rolling their own saves I take no blame upon that characters death because they rolled it themselves and could see what it was. This works well for me because we play online.
I treat a twenty on the dice as a 25 and a 1 as a -4. I like the possibility for people to succeed at something hard but not to impossibility.
That sounds interesting. I may experiment with some form of this.
My games are insane. Players are broken monsters are broken. But I have one rule that could work at any table and not be broken:
**Staggered Initiative:**
Each team (the adventures vs the monster) chooses 1 player to roll initiative. The highest roll goes first. After that roll character and monsters alternate (the order can be chosen) turns.
*Example:* there are 5 players and 5 monsters. Players win initiative. The order goes:
Player 1
Monster 1
Player 2
Monster 2
Player 3
Monster 3
Player 4
Monster 4
Player 5
Monster 5
This method comes from a Taking20 video called “A Much Better Initiative System for DnD 5e”
Link here: m.ua-cam.com/video/SXleyDvtqls/v-deo.html
2 of my other more broken rules are listed below
My favorite house rule for players (which I don’t recommend you use unless you think that 5e monsters are terribly boring and you want to homebrew every one you make like me) is:
**Free Leveling**
When ever you level up you can take any level’s features from any class as long as the level is not above your total level
*Example:* a level 5 character with rogue levels 1,3,5, barbarian level 5 and bard level 3.
Now that may seem broken (because it is) but I have monster homebrews that are equally broken and make the game balanced. Using this mechanic I’ve almost TPKed a 15th level party in a one shot
**Tick Damage**
This type of damage is dealt every round at the end of the damaged creature’s turn. Each time this damage is dealt is decreases by one. If a creature takes tick damage from two sources they are added together.
*Example:* A giant insect spits acid at a player and deals 5 acid tick damage. At the player takes 4 more damage at the end of his turn. The next round goes by, the player’s turn ends, and he takes 3 acid damage. This cycle protists until the damage reaches 0.
*Example 2:* A giant insect spits acid at a player and deals 5 acid tick damage. At the player takes 4 more damage at the end of his turn. The next round goes by, and it’s the insect’s turn. It deals 5 more acid tick damage this is added to the previous damage so the player takes 9 damage total. The players turn starts and ends; he takes 9 acid damage.
Be careful with that mechanic low numbers can be really deceiving. In the almost tpk I mentioned, one player’s tick damage got up to 50 (meaning on the subsequent rounds he would be dealt 49 then 48, 47, 46…) make sure there is a way to remedy the tick. The type of tick damage I used was fire so water put it out.
The formula for how much damage you’re actually dealing (when i = initial damage and T = total damage) is T = i*(i/2+0.5)
I DMed & played DnD since 3.0 and many other systems and I have to say I prefer milestone leveling over XP. XP always feels so frindy and gamy.
With Milestone leveling I have much more incentive to complete story arcs/quests and not only "kill monsters for XP" - so exactly the other way around then you guys feel. :)
On the other side I would but "Session XP" into E Tier, as the amount of sessions you play say nothing about the progress and/or experience the characters get in the game (hell, I had whole session which were basically only sitting in tavern and talking).
Hidden death saves: there is a middle option. You let the player roll them not the DM just don't let the other players know.
I thought that leveling up by sessions played system sounded dodgy and then I did the math. In my current game we've played 27sessions, and the PCs are level 6 and leveling up in our next one.* It works out just about perfectly. So they'd level up next around session 36. Cool.
*I have no real system for leveling characters up, but it's more like the milestone system. When they've completed a specific adventure and it's been a while, I give them the bump. (Can't understand how these guys like leveling up sessions played but not like milestones. The first seems much more generic.)
Good milestones are basically calculated to be worth the equivalent in EXP to level up, so either EXP or milestone players would level up around the same time anyway.
Also for critical skill checks. If a player cannot succeed with the best possible roll why are you asking for a skill check roll? If a player cannot fail with the lowest roll, why are you asking for a skill check roll? You are not doing a skill check at this point you are asking for an outcome roll to see how well they succeed or how bad they fail.
Very true about milestones. We should have mentioned that it requires the DM to really understand how to use this house rule properly. Over the years we've played with some DMs that have sort of soured us on the house rule.
And we 100% agree on understanding when to actually ask for a skill roll (or allow a player to roll one). It's not something new DMs always grasp though. In our example with the wizard kicking in the door maybe the DM should have told the wizard player asking to kick in the door..."your wizard isn't strong enough to kick in the thick wooden door with his low strength." And they don't get the roll. It's when the DM says, "sure you can try" in that situation that it creates these zany little moments, which are hilarious and totally fine, but can break immersion for some folks.
We ranked these based on our personal experiences. Both of us tend to play with lots of different groups and sometimes with very inexperienced DMs. So we've just seen this particular house rule backfire at the table enough that we're weary of it. It's still perfectly fine, doesn't break the game or anything.
Thanks so much for taking the time to watch the video and drop us some feedback Krampuslaws! We really appreciate it!
Exaustion also makes so healing is much better and less metagame around letting the person hit 0 hp so i can heal more type thing
Have different opinions from you, but thx for a great thought experiment 😃
Not having critical tables at D or a brand new F tier is the sole reason I disliked this video. I’m convinced that if a DM used this it’s a huge red flag
So only problem I really have is saying it's not to bad to let players be way higher level than another because it's simply not fun to be the only level 3 surrounded but level 6 or 7s especially in combat
my hubby's barb was poisoned so he had disadvantage using a crowbar on some stuck doors, and I got advantage with the crowbar and so I was busting down doors flexing my puny halfling muscles lol, it was great lol i'm sure the mage busting down the door would feel great with his leg hairs blowing hehe :D
Milestone XP can be S Tier for long campaigns
The hidden death saves but the player roles it is the better option. The player keeps it a secret.
With background skills i would just say advantage does that job :)
I start at level 3 because I think all characters should get their subclass from the get go.
ok if "secret rolls" are bad then what use is the DM screen? What is the DM screen really for? Just to hide your notes? Just to show off you are a DM? Interesting video.
"Secret rolls" as a house rule are when the DM decides to roll the d20 INSTEAD of the player. And it is done behind the DM Screen. These differ from other rolls that a DM makes behind the screen regularly.
Why not give Gust of Wind the same damage of Shatter? Both are 2nd level spells and GoW could be limited to throwing an opponent against something.
Milestone C/D is crazy
The +2 for flanking is from 4e
secret death saves is amazing but DO NOT let the DM roll them... have them roll without seeing the result so that it is still in their hands
Sort of contradictory to say you really dislike milestone leveling, but want D&D to be more cinematic. Milestone is a way more cinematic experience. I also really wonder the tables you guys have been at where players are so unmotivated to play without experience. I've never had that experience.
I really prefer to start at level 3 for background reasons. When I build my character and choose my class, I usually already know what my subclass is going to be. It allows me to share my background around it of what my character was doing before joining the party. As an example, my runk knight Goliath was the one-a-generation chosen rune cutter of his tribe and they served a giant clan, which is what he was rebelling against. Which makes a heck of a lot more sense than the "I go from second to 3rd level and now I glow for some reasons". Well, what have you been doing to develop those skills during level 2? In too many games, absolutely nothing related to your chosen subclass.
How does milestone have anything to do with a cinematic experience? Great cinematic experiences can happen all the time without all the players needing to level at the same time. If anything, it's immersion breaking to level everyone in the middle of session, when you are trying to create a cinematic experience. Instead, when the cinematic moment is over as well as the session, you hit the players with the HUGE chunk of XP they have just gained. Now they have time to cheer/revel in their victory and theory craft the new abilities their character is going to have for the next session. We have played in games that run milestone leveling, and the trouble comes at higher levels, where many DMs will string you out on rewards and leveling because they have trouble balancing encounters. We prefer Session XP over Milestone at higher levels because the consistency is miles better for player engagement. We ran milestone when first learning how to DM, but we have essentially "outgrown" it. Now it just feels like a novice skill.
@@BasicLiches Got it. You're playing chess and all us milestone DM's and players are playing checkers. Great job.
Hybrid. I treat XP like gold. You can't spend gold unless you find a store, a keep, or run into an NPC that has that thing for sale. Same applies for leveling up.
My players know I'll create an opportunity for them to make use of their XP. I'm flexible, even giving players XP "loans" if I know it's going to be more than a couple sessions before the player has an opportunity to level up again. Ironically, this creates a bit of dread in my players (what are we about to get ourselves into).
To keep players on the same level. I just add 10% times the number of levels behind the most advanced player to the each player's portion of the XP. This slows down the leader while still rewarding attendance.
So my take away is I never want to play at their table. No offense.
TImestamps would have made this video a lot easier to skip around to the higher-rated House Rules if one is just interested in the Higher 2 or 3 Tiers.
20 as an auto skill success is awesome. As you said, though, if a success isnt possible, you dont get a roll.
I'm not thrilled with this rule. Maybe if the DM is really strict about not having characters roll for things that are not possible.
@quillogist2875 If the character knows that the feat is impossible, a roll makes no sense. If they don't know if it's possible or not, a pointless roll may make sense. If it's a physically possible feat, a natural 20 should offer success.
Man, I disagree with all the S tier. There are a couple A that I think are S level; ie Feats and Reroll 1s. Think Bonus action Potions are an S tier. I think the Improved Int should be higher, give that stat a use. And Secret Death Saves are REALLY table depend so C seems right. Most of the rest I dislike, though the Flanking change I have used.
Hard disagree on Milestone Leveling. Everyone in my group loves it, whether they are a player or DM. Just makes everything easier not having to track xp.
Hey Hammer! We’ve have had some great games in milestone campaigns as well and we were milestone fans for quite a while, but for this rating, we took into account that the milestone leveling system varies between DMs because it relies so heavily on their skill to pull it off correctly, at a pace that keeps their players interested. So you must be doing it very well!
When we returned to a game with a more fixed leveling system, we didn’t realize how much we actually missed KNOWING when we were going to level. Milestone makes things way easier for the DM, but for us, it removes some of the excitement in character growth for later levels. Thanks for the comment and have a lichin’ day!
When it comes to 1's and 20's on skill checks, I don't use them as auto failures or successes, but you succeed or fail more OR barely succeed/fail.
If you roll a 1 AND fail the check, it is more devastating than if you failed with any other number on the die. Maybe, if you were trying to use Acrobatics to get up high, you end up doing something that hurts you. If you are trying to recall something, you recall incorrect information that might come back to bite you. Etc.
If you roll a 20 AND succeed the check, it is more fantastic than if you succeeded with any other number on the die. If you were trying to use Athletics to move something, you get an increased sense of strength and can do something extra (depending on what it was for). If you are trying to persuade someone, you manage to do so in such a way that they are left with a better impression of you and might be more willing to listen to you in the future (potentially lowering Persuasion DCs). Etc.
If you roll a 1 AND succeed the check, then I make it so it comes off more like luck that caused you to succeed, or that you found the task more difficult and managed to barely scrape by, etc.
If you roll a 20 AND fail the check, then I make it seem like you were close, or the consequences of failure are not nearly as bad, etc.
It typically is more useful for RP, but it can be quite engaging.
It keeps the strong feelings people get with rolling a 1 or 20, but in a way that doesn't make skill checks absurd with auto successes/failures.
I totally agree. It makes no sense that a master at their craft has a 5% chance of failure no matter what they do. It sucks when you build a character in such a way as to be really good at a specific skill (like +12 in medicine) and no matter how specialized your character is, a Nat 1 always means you fail, even if your bonuses would make you succeed.
How does a level 20 rogue who rolled a 33 on their stealth check get spotted by some shmuck with one eye who has a negative modifier to their perception simply because they rolled a Nat 20? It doesn't make sense.
Flavoring Nat 1's that still succeed or Nat 20's that still fail is the best way to go
Hard disagree with milestone leveling. The leveling will happen; the carrot on the stick should be the players wanting to progress the campaign, wanting to see the next cool encounter. I’ve never had a problem with it.
I think this would be more of how certain groups would prefer. I am currently using milestone/session type leveling for a large group. This is the first time I have used it as a DM and I am liking it a lot.
Once every session the players have the right to hit the DM.
I didin't really agree with some of the comments but still, listing them is a public service.