“Tumble Through does not provoke” and “Reactions are Triggered by Leaving Reach” are problematic because because creatures generally are unable to perform AoOs. Creatures that are able to perform AoOs have the damage done in that extra attack factored into their creature math, and PCs have to choose to gain the ability to perform AoOs as a class feat. AoOs are meant to be powerful, giving that creature the ability to “lock down” the area within their reach, discouraging flanking and in the case of large creatures, punishing players whom step up to melee them. This is very important, because it makes these creatures and martial PCs feel extra threatening. I can see this only being good to use if and only if you return the ability to AoO to ALL creatures for free. And perhaps give creatures that have a built-in AoO (and fighters) a boost to their AoO accuracy or something.
Excellent and practical common sense rules. I use many similar rules with my group. Also learned some new ones I will implement. Thank you for sharing. Congrats on 100 episodes.
My personal House Rules: • Aid has a DC of one step lower than what you’re trying to help with • Your starting Lore from background automatically increases proficiency ranks • If you don’t start out with an Ability at +4, Boost an Ability (to a maximum of +3) • Hero Points can be used to add +d6 to any base roll, to help push towards a crit • Hero Points can be used to perform a wild flashy maneuver and break the RAW a bit • Any melee weapon with a d8 or lower can count as a Monk Weapon • General Feats can be used for any kind of Feat
For the last house rule, it seems like it would make more sense to trigger once you leave your reach instead of the enemies. An enemy with a 20 ft reach would actually be penalized for their reach when fighting against a player with 5 ft reach. If the monster strides away 10 ft it provokes, but if the player strides 10 feet away they dont.
Also if you ever larped or somehow sworldplay, if you are wielding a sword and your opponent is wielding a lance, it's hard to get close to them. They WILL get an AOO while you are trying to get close. Not allowing that nerfs reach weapons a lot!
With a night's rest I realize the easy fix would be to make the AOO happen if you change the distance between you and the enemy. Run circle around them all you want, no problem. But try to get into close melee when they have reach and you do take an AOO, same if you back up.
his rule still works as you describe for reach weapons. as your reach isn't within 5ft, they're leaving your threatened squares by going adjacent to you. Unless they use a 5ft step
For 5 ft diagonals, one addition you should definitely add: if using this rule, turn all circles and cones into squares. It allows those spells to maintain the same range and minimizes the impact of the distance changes, while making em easier to determine and faster to use.
My favorite houserule aims to make potion of healing (and elixir of life) more reliable, by assuring half their healing For exemple: a Lesser Healing Potion does not heal for 2d8+5, but rather heal for 2d4+13 (As in: half of both d8 as a respective +4)
I really like the first one about shoving a grabbed creature: when playing my Druid wildshaped into a Huge bear, it felt silly not to be able to move the small or medium creature I just critically grabbed (immobilized)
My House Rules are as follows: -If a player rolls a Nat 20 on initiative, they are Quickened 1 for their first round. -Disarm applies a -2 penalty to attack on a success until the monster spends an action to regrip the weapon. -Lore skills you gain from your background automatically scale when they can, no points needed. -Scaling Recall Knowledge checks. For every 5 more above the Monster DC you rolled, you can ask me one yes/no question about the monster.
Nice video! I like most of these but I'll fight you to the death on the 5 foot diagonals xD. I keep my AoO standard too but I can see why it works to change it round. Good to hear your takes on it all!
@@HowItsPlayed I have a honest question: why are hexes superior in your opinion? Don't they just move the problem to other situiations? Like, if I want to move to the side by one square, wont I have to either move to the side and forwards or to the side and backwards? And if I do that over long distances, doesn't the math get just as complicated as with squares? I for one have gotten so used to the idea that the odd diagonals in a turn are 5ft and the evens are 10ft that I don't even notice them when I count out movement.
Five-foot diagonals also make obstacles a lot less meaningful. If you can freely zoom around the map on the diagonal, then obstacles often fail to slow anyone down.
@@DoubLL "And if I do that over long distances, doesn't the math get just as complicated as with squares?" The math is less complicated over any distance. Take two points on a hex map. The distance between those two spots is always simply the number of hexes between them, so long as you continue to advance toward the destination, and don't double back, etc. You can't do that with squares.
@@wichhouse I have looked into the issue a bit more since writing this comment and I am mostly fine with the abstraction that all movement through the grid can be calculated by counting fields. It’s not actually true of course, but it is a lot more accurate than doing the same thing in a square grid (while ignoring diagonals) though of course there is still some deviation. The most extreme cases would be movement from through one side, through the next center, to the hex on the opposite side of the center, versus taking the long diagonal from one corner to the opposite corner and then walking along an edge until you get to the next hex. The latter movement is about 12,5% shorter than the former (10.5x vs 12x on a 6x grid), even though both are counted as 2 hexes of movement. But I feel like that level of error is very acceptable and square grids aren’t mathematically correct either. When I wrote the comment, I hadn’t done the math yet and I had assumed the error would be a lot greater (in the 20-30% range) which turned out to completely wrong. Personally, I still like squares more for any human made environment, since we tend to build square houses and favor right angles in our architecture, but I have also stopped using any kind of grid at all in my campaigns and just measure distances directly (Warhammer style) or just eyeball it when precise distances don’t matter.
So I have simplified "resting exploration" mode. I hate having tons of rolls for healing, identification, repair during 10 minute resting blocks. Basically, I assume auto-success for Treat Wounds, and treat 2d8 as an average of 10, so spend 10 minutes healing at Trained, heal 10, Expert, heal 20 (I give everyone Continual Recovery for free)... Identification/crafting both auto-succeed up to a certain level (for example, trained is "minimum 3 or Level - 2", expert is "minimum 9 or level...). I have adjustments for rarity in this. Also rules for crafting exist. It *greatly* speeds up downtime, and keeps to the spirit of the rules without having all the burden.
I’d like to hear more on your crafting rules… it’s one of the few things that bug me about 2e (although so far I’m liking the altered rules in Treasure Vault book way better)
Hero Points to change the narrative is something we do too! Super fun and useful. We also use it to bargain with the GM to do something beyond RAW for a single moment, almost like a custom temporary houserule. It’s great for situations when our group is at a crossroads with weird interactions; the hero point becomes the tiebreaker.
Hero Points are meant to be heroic. So you can never roll under a 10 on the hero point reroll. Dice rolls 1-9 you add 10 to the roll. That's my main thing.
Agreed on most, implemented some myself. I had done the same with move+draw but with the caveat that as a prerequisite they be trained or better with the weapon. The one I'm still mulling over is letting a Hero Point shift the degree of success one step rather than reroll... But then being a little more stingy with them. Haven't fleshed it out fully yet... Disagree on diagonals, though I totally get it. ;-)
I actually tested it and unfortunately it resulted in massive changes in players strategy - e.g. changing normal hit to crit is much better for some weapons. So my advice - perhaps go with it, but without the option to change a normal success to critical success.
Definitely swiping some of these. The big house rule I use is that the ability boost system at creation is simplified: 9 Free Boosts, Max 18 in any one stat, but past that, put 'em where you want 'em. You can take the ability flaws if you want them as well.
The big houserule I use is that flanking checks the center of any space you occupy to the center of any space your ally occupies, because getting bigger should make you better at flanking!
The hero point one about getting 1 point and being conscious I think it lessens one or two feats like Cheat Death or Orc Ferocity. If you use the rule about Drawing or Stowing an item for free on a stride action then you do need a Surprise Round rule too otherwise surprise rounds aren't built in anymore. As it stands RAW, if a party sneaks up on a group of bandits around a campfire then attack, the bandits (who were not on watch or become aware) have to spend an action to "draw a weapon". So the "surprised" bandits have lost one action. There's the surprise part.
Really like the Aid change, I have been doing it intuitively, but your wording is great. I think maybe I would tie the Aid DC to simple DCs most of the time. But I would need to think more about it. I really like some of these ideas, and I will consider them. With the use of Hero Points, I have a homebrew called Story Points based a little bit in Cypher System and other story based games. For me, creating a fact about your character related to something in the story, or complicating yourself in character, awards a story point. But worldbuilding at the table (creating an NPC, or the 200ft of rope in your example) costs a Story Point. I also love using GM j, as a way to push the story in a way that I want, but rewarding the player for the inconvinience instead of just being a "gotcha". I have the rule written, if you would like to see it. I have also have a small document with some little errata-like changes to some feats. Like Point Blank Shot being 1 bonus damage per weapon damage die, instead of a flat +2 forever.
Thanks for all your videos. Great stuff. Like the Draw/Stow as part of movement. I think a compromise might be if you draw/stow you lose 5' of your stride for that move.
For remembering mundane things, I allow a "oh I think I packed that" check. It's an intelligence check. If they were somewhere recently that would have had a length of rope, the player would have thought to buy it. I also really like level up 5es destiny system. I think it would work very well for hero points.
i made so that player can have 2 belt pouches, each can contain one single consumable item, and they can retrieve that specific item as a free action. Retrieving from backpack or others additional belt pouches (that maybe are positioned on the back part of the belt) is 1 action.
Happy 100th, and thanks for all the help learning to play PF2. A favorite house rule: If you start your turn at Dying 0, you may choose to make a Flat check. On a 20, you gain 1 hit point and become conscious, but if you roll a 1, you gain Dying 1 and must begin death saves again... it's a gamble, bit can be clinch.
For the Aid action, I have any attempts to Aid have a DC equal to the same DC the person they are aiding is attempting but -5. So if a Fighter is attempting to life up a heavy gate and the DC is 22, it would only be a DC 17 for the Cleric to attempt to Aid them. This encourages using Aid as it's easier than the actual check, makes it easier at early levels, and doesn't make the check automatic succuess/critical success at high levels. If the explanation for how they are "aiding" doesn't make sense or wouldn't be very effective, I might give the Aid DC +2, making it slightly more difficult. I always forget to reward Hero Points, so my players get a Hero Point when they roll a natural 1 on the d20. Obviously, they can't use this Hero Point on the same roll that granted the Hero Point. This softens the failure and keeps the moods at the table up. It is a game after all. My players love using actions to start combat, like throwing a fireball while the villain is monologuing or stabbing the bandit as a surprise attack. But I don't like surprise rounds as it's a huge advantage. Instead I use this: When a character performs an action that initiates combat, they complete that action before rolling initiative. On their first turn in combat, they have fewer actions based on the number of actions used to start the combat. This allows them to do their action first, like a fireball while the enemies are still bunched up or stabbing the guy while he's still standing in front of them, but doesn't give everyone a whole free turn to beat the shit out of the enemies.
Since I like more gritty and dangerous campaigns, I had a personal house rule in 1e which I imported to 2e: I allow players - not my NPCs - to attempt a coup-de-grace on any enemy who is unaware of their presence, or completely convinced that the player does not pose a threat to them in any way. (For obvious reasons, this generally cannot be done in combat.) In 2e this means that they get a free attack and if they hit, the enemy must make a Fortitude Save against their class DC plus their damage dice or die outright. You could obviously change this to make it more or less likely to succeed. I also generally allow a stealth check to prevent the victim from making a loud noise and alerting others while their throat is being slit open.
My issue with letting players ask questions for Recall Knowledge is that it always results in the same questions being asked: weaknesses, special attacks, and resistances (in that order, too). I run it closer to RAW but instead of telling the players the most common information, I tell them the information that I think is most relevant to them. If an enemy is weak to electricity but I know nobody in my group uses electricity, I'd pick something else to tell them about instead. If they're fighting an enemy with a special attack they'll need to counter, I make sure to tell them about that.
I like a good number of your house rules! Great list. Personally, I think a fix for the really weak Disarm action is needed. I allow the effects of the Success to last until the start of your turn (of the creature who does the disarm action)
Great home rules, will definitely try out the hero point one and will use that magic identify one. Only "complaint" i have is the AOP one, as the step movement is made specifically for avoiding it, and allows tanky characters to trap in enemies from getting an advantageous position. Since typically only martials and skilled fighters/enemies have AOP, it feels valid to have it be an obstacle you can't stride through. Thats just my thinking on it though
I really like the thought of using Hero Points like Blades in the Dark Flashbacks! I'm doing things with Hero Points more like Bennies in Savage Worlds so I love it! I'm taking it! Here's my Hero Point
My group is converting over to Pf2e and one of the sticking points for two players is the action to stow action to draw thing. Baking 1 into the Stride seems great! I'm trying it in addition to what I thought up which is 1 action to swap weapons (stow previous draw new in same action).
I think it was one of the pathfinder developers that posted about Critical Initiative - if you roll a natural 20 for your intiative, you get a 4th action on your first turn. My players really love it, though I have yet to get it for one of my monsters, so we shall see how much they love it then...
13:17 Every other homebrew I at least sort of understand, but this seems off to me. My main question about this rule is how do you handle spells? In the current system, if you cast a burst or emanation spell, the shape of the spell is going to look like a circle, or it's going to at least look as much as a circle as possible, but in this homebrew rule, the bursts and emanations would just be squares. And if they were squares, that'd mean burst and emanation spells would be way more powerful, since they'd affect a lot more space than under the normal rules. I guess you could use this homebrow rule only when calculating movement, but wouldn't it be a bit confusing when you use two different rules for different things, when you could just use the one? Edit: Okay, I went and looked what the spell areas looked like in D&D, since I've never played it, and apparently they all just kinda use whatever rules they want? Like, there is no logical consistency between them, they're kinda just random. Which I guess is fine, but in this case I do prefer the consistent rules here in P2e, where cones are just quarters of bursts, and emanations are just bursts with added lines going through the middle. The only exception is the 15ft orthogonal cone, which I think is just randomly made up. 18:04 We also use this homebrew rule, but I don't think the other players, including my GM, know that it's a homebrew rule. I think it's just a rule that we learned in Pathfinder 1e, and assumed it worked the same way in 2e. I didn't realize we were doing it "wrong" until like a year ago. I haven't talked about this to my GM, so I'm not sure if he knows this. I myself haven't had the time to houserule a lot of stuff, but I have made house rules on throwing items into squares. I also did make houserules on throwing items to other players, but the remaster added an official rule to this, so I just scrapped my houserule.
My rules for Recall Knowledge are almost identical to yours & I have a similar philosophy on Hero Points as well, though I am influenced by the old White Wolf Exalted games. So, there are a few distinctions: First, players nominate other players for Hero Points based on cool stunts, dramatic role-playing, and similar cool stuff. Players MUST nominate the Hero Point, and then I will distribute it. This is me explicitly stating that players should pay attention to other players during their turns, or the party won't have as many Hero Points. Also, Hero Points are a limited resource. At a certain point, the coins for Hero Points will run out. The only way you refill those coins is if I, the GM, spend my Villain Points (inspired by some of Jason Buhlmans games). So, players must also nominate me for Villain Points when my villains do something cool. 😎 As for spending Hero Points, I have a few specific options my players can use: "I know a guy..." Spend a Hero Point to introduce a potentially helpful NPC with a starting attitude of Indifferent into a scene. "It just so happens..." Spend a Hero Point to change a scene detail so that your character can attempt a check otherwise impossible. (E.g.: It just so happens that I spot a rope on the floor that I can use to try & scale the wall.) I guess this also counts as a House Rule: I almost never use Secret Checks. I trust my players to roll their dice & react appropriately. I just don't like taking player agency away. I will occasionally use secret rolls for things like the Augury spell, but the vast majority of the time - nope. Also, Arcknight allows you to custom order their maps in Hex Grid. I may have spent way too much money on this...
@@TheLocalDisasterTourGuide I really loved F.A.T.E. for that exact mechanic, and I think your system for 2e sounds really cool but I'm too much of a coward to ask my players to tell me when my characters did something cool - what if they never nominate me for villain points because all my characters are too boring 🙈
I'll also point out that vancian spellcasting "quickens" the pace of fights because prepared casters don't spend 10 minutes wondering "what combination of spell/rank is the most appropriate". The array of choice they have is "limited", and as such the time they need to think is lowered because of the lower amount of choices.
Your surprise round rules can be implemented RAW without issue; just have a surprising group declare that they are Readying Actions for whatever trigger is indicative of the start of combat.
i do diagonals the same way , for magic items if they already identify the item before they can recognize it again. ex. if they id a +1 rune then they know if they find another but if they find a +2 rune they have to roll to id it. for recall knowledge on a creature if they roll a success i give them the name and type and one special ablitiy they have
My one counterargument to the "hero point keeps you up and fighting instead of stable" rule: being unconscious keeps the PC out of the line of fire of monsters who have other targets to prioritize. If the goblin who felled you sees you get back up they'll hit you again. And then you're back to dying, with no hero point to save you. I think it is a better rule to give the player the choice. Do they stay down but safer out of aggro, or do they risk staying conscious to try and pull a hail mary?
I've not been GM'ing PF2 long... but many are very similar, and carried over from other systems. My house rules are: 1. Disarm Success imposes the penalty of the opponent to the end of their round, and that success penalty imposes an additional requirement for the opponent to make a flat 5 roll to use the item. 2. Surprise attack only usable once per round. 3. "Press Actions" cannot be the character's first action, but that first action need not be an attack. 4. Until a character spends an action making a Recall Knowledge then there is a 1 in 6 chance that their opponent has an appropriate combat reaction (i.e. Opportunity attack or shield block). 5. Treat Wounds & First Aid, do not require a healing kit, but the DC is 5 higher if attempted without one. Healing Kits have 6 Uses. Using a Healing Kit, successfully has a 1 in 6 chance of diminishing a charge, a failure automatically diminishes it by 1.
I started with only a few house rules for Pathfinder 2e, but they grew and grew until they became a 27 pages pdf of house rules (and new books coming out month after month with even more things I had issues with), I finally decided if I had so many things I wanted to change, maybe P2e wasn't the game for me. So I left the second edition, after more than a decade of playing Pathfinder 1e. However, I'm enjoying Pathfinder for Savage Worlds now! (I have some house rules for that too, but only 5 pages. It's much closer to the style of game I enjoy.)
One of my group's house rules that I personally use when I'm GMing is, because our group only plays about 3-4 hours once a week, I give out hero points to every player every hour instead of the 1 that is recommended in the CRB. This gives everyone chances to use them, and I still award heroic actions hero points as well(or perhaps someone said or did something that made laugh).
We use 5' diagonals, too. It's not as realistic but it works well enough. I like your use of hero points to drive story elements. I'll have to implement that. Always looking for stuff for them to spend their hero points on.
In my 30+ years of playing TTRPGs, I have always adhered to 5' diagonals. I never understood how, or why, people got caught up with actual measurements. A map with minis was never meant to be an accurate portrayal of anything. It was just a tool, originally added to DnD, just to roughly represent character placement so as to help everyone cohesively visualize the scene.
Huh, I ran my first session the other day and used the asking questions about monsters one inadvertently, I thought that was what the rules were trying to say lol
It hasn't come up yet, so I'm not sure how balanced it will be, but my group is trying out a house rule for rolling initiative. Basically, if you roll a natural 20 on initiative you get an extra action on your first turn on the first round, but if you roll a natural 1 then you lose an action on your first turn. Might make things a bit swingy, but we'll see.
Nice. I’m about to start my first ever PF campaign and I’ll be adopting some of these. The only house rule is been thinking about is giving shields the Shove trait. Makes no sense to me that you can’t shove with a shield.
Yeah. It makes sense. For those not homebrewing this. There's an attachment you can put on your shield now to give it shove and some other combat maneuvers.
I am doing the same. Also, i don’t like the way weapons are potraited, seems to me that oriental weapons are far better than western ones (comes to mind katana and bastard sword… it drives me crazy) so i am going to put some love into those.
@@albertofilosa3541 you're getting Deadly in sacrifice for a smaller Hit Dice. I see what you mean but there it does have a trade off. How it looks like numbers wise. One handed averages: Bastard sword average 4.5 Bastard sword Crit average 9 Katana average 3.5 Katana Crit average 11.5 Two handed Bastard sword average 6.5 Bastard sword Crit average 13 Katana average 5.5 Katana Crit average 15.5 So yeahm sacrificing some base power for a bigger Crit. I think it would probably depend on the build. The Bastard sword may still be doing more damage over time if you're not critically hitting every 3-4 strikes. But then again, the katana is also versatile piercing while the bastard sword isn't. I think they're both very valid weapons to use regardless.
@@Unikatze it’s part the philosophy behind uncommon weaps and part some realistic choice i don’t want to lose. I explain myself: katanas are excellent weapons at dealing slashing damage, but very poor compared to westerns swords in dealing piercing damage… but still they get versatile. Bastard swords get 2h, and nothing more to compare it with the versatile katanas have. The uncommon tag should not be seen as a way to limit it, cause u can always find a way to explain the reasons why ur char have such weapon. Then there’s the cost, and for no apparent reason bastard swords cost more than katanas. Now, i didn’t check enough weapons so take my statement with the grain of salt, but as a general rule i think that in designers’ mind oriental weaps> weatern weaps, and that’s just bs.
@@albertofilosa3541 I haven't looked at the other Asia inspired weapons. And I think a lot was made similarly due to game balance stuff. Bastard sword was not given versatile even though it has the piercing aspect in the item description for balance issues. If it did there'd be no reason to ever use a Greatsword. Kind of a necessity for just game reasons. I'm mostly happy both weapons are valid choices to play with if it fits the aesthetic you're going for with your character.
I would love to hear how these surprise round rules play out. 1 action is great for a martial but nothing for a wizard/Caster who mostly need 2 actions.
I've on the fly made a similar ruling for shoving in different directions. In your case. Does that action still have the Attack trait? Read aura and identifying items is something a lot of people seem to dislike. I've used it before but also wouldn't know how to handle it if they Crit failed. I'd tell them it's something else and then I have to keep track in my mind that what they think is a +1 striking longsword is just a regular +1? Ugh. I usually just have them identify the first one. And if they find another +1 Weapon I tell them the rune is exactly the same as the one they've already identified. I like the tumble through one. Not really necessary in my table since we don't use it much. But maybe a more cinematic option would be to have a +2 bonus to AC against that AoO? That way they could also make the enemy waste their reaction. For your recall knowledge one. Are the questions they can ask limited to Yes/No questions? Or can they ask "what's it weak against?" Or "what's their lowest save?" With the Heroic Recovery. I understand why they made the change. At 1HP an enemy will want to attack you again (specially after spending pretty much your full turn grabbing your gear and standing up), making it a lot more deadly. But game wise it's really boring for a player to just sit there unconscious.
I usually bundle the Grapple and Shove into one 2-action activity so it only impacts MAP once. For the ID Monster rule, it can vary from creature to creature. If weaknesses are similar enough that I figure knowing one would mean knowing the other, then I would give them both for one question. Don't think I've ever had a player ask what the lowest save is, but I'd probably be okay with that too. I'm easy and if the player succeeds on their roll I want them to feel good about it.
The distance from a center of a square to one of it's corners isn't 50% longer than the distance to the edge, it's actually 1.41...x, so we're approximating anyways :-P.
My issue with AoO only on leaving Reach is it kinda punishes Reach weapons by making the enemy have more room to Maneuver around you. I believe in PF2e the Step is meant to be the circling around. Plus that means part of the design of Reach interacting with AoO is lost. I know this is on my mind as there's a potential Starfinder game I'm hoping to bust out my Dragonkin, who's build uses the reach and AoO to his advantage, plus Reach in 5e just feels... So underwealming... Like, I only JUST remembered as I wrote this a character I've gotten to Level 10 actually DOES have a 10' reach via a natural weapon, as it's generally better to use the 5' reach ones. So hey, I'll try and remember that.
I don't know how often this has been mentioned but I would like your take on Magical Trickster combined with Magus' Spellstrike. What do you think, does sneak attack damage trigger once or twice? Thanks and I love the series! This episode was especially helpful. Even though you are obviously very rules savvy, it doesn't seem you are a "rules lawyer" and modify rules for fun and pacing. Setting a good example :)
We still use Bless as the old way. Cast it once. Get your +1 and move on. None of this concentrating to make it expand 5 feet each round. Who would ever use that spell as written?
I'm a little surprised that people would switch between playing Dungeons and Dragons and Pathfinder. In terms of types of Adventure I think they covered the same ground and I would think that people would either like one system or the other. I can definitely see place for games that just have fundamentally different tropes and mechanics lend themselves to different styles of play, like call Cthulhu and blades in the dark, and Dungeon Crawl classics, and others like that, not to mention all the different sci-fi genres 4 games that are especially roleplay oriented or mechanics oriented like fate or Warhammer, but I see Dungeons and Dragons and Pathfinders occupying the same niche and I would think that everybody would prefer one or the other
I like the option of using a hero point that way though. I dont really like use hero points to put yourself into safety by just using a hero point. When facing big danger my players tend to play less careful, because they have a hero point and can just "pass the death rolls", but with your ruling they are alive and dont have to sit there waiting AND they are in danger, because they are awake, which I really like. Atm I just took that rule out and allow them to reroll any of their D20 rolls which includes death rolls. I also like to do it so my players can fudge the dice of the enemies basically, and use a hero point to make them roll their D20 again. The other Hero point rule I use is that bbeg, key NPCs, or other characters that are like the PC also have Hero points. It makes the world feel more like "you arent the only special person" and that other PCs have their own big story going on I also give these characters their own death saving throw, except if them being instantly dead makes the scene better ofc A small nitpick: I would argue that you let your guard down when striding, or at least somewhat down. That is what the step action is for afterall
I like some of your rules, and the ones I'm "meh' about I can at least see the benefit for both parties. I haven't played enough 2e to know what I might want to HR, but when I do play, I play in the PFS public setting so HRs are no-go. Ironically I only play PFS to try to find people for a homebrew, but so far I can hardly find anyone in Nashville TN playing.
I house rule aid DC to typically the check DC -5 (very easy). That's not really a house rule since the rules say the GM can change it, but I want people to do this. DC 20 is way too hard at level 1 and is trivial at high level.
The heropoint recovery from death thing was only half true in the original printing, it had the correct rule (which was also on the gm screen) and the wrong rule.
Hi, Dave. Do you use Stamina Points Variant Rule in GM Guide?? If you do, Con modifier should then be added to SP, and use Str modifier for HP. After all, the ability to take damage is muscles = Str modifier.
My main house rule is that when a player uses an Heroic point to re-roll something, he re-rolls with "advantage" (like 5e). The reason is that I was tired of seeing players use an Heroic point to re-roll and roll equal or less than the previous roll, so, there was literally nothing "Heroic" about it :(
lots of house rules makes class feats or skill feats useless, or at the very least require them to be changed, which can trigger need for further changes in other actions or feats, and then we have the rule-change avalanche. eg. the Disarm action is weak, so people houserule it better, then making a Swashbuckler specialising in disarm not very special, etc... house rules can be a bit too messy for me, but it is interesting to see what people comes up with...
If you play that reactions are triggered only by leaving enemy's reach does standing up in your games trigger reactions? I was also wondering about your Recall Knowledge homerule, is "what are this creature immunities" a specific enough question?
Your hero point use to have an impact in narrative sense sounds interesting. I am just wondering if you give hero points to players in similar fashion as the PF2E rules say - like giving it when players succeed at doing something amazing or are you more into giving them in the steady pace, like 1 hero point for every passing hour of the game session? :)
Honestly, I have a tendency to forget about them and not award them as often as I should. But my plan is typically everyone starts each session with 1 and then they can earn another for something they do outside of the game (bring snacks or offer to track effects, etc), and they can earn 1 more by doing something inside the game that's either really cool or really funny.
Surprise round is free action? How about READY ACTION! Player's and Enemies can take Ready Action to Ambush someone by stating "we attack when enemies get within everyone's range" thus you roll initiative but before anyone moves you resolve all ready actions. BENEFIT is that if one player or NPC is searching for CREATURES they might spot the hidden ambush 😁 and if that happens you start the encounter before they are within the reach "Someone noticed you" style giving you more different starting position for different encounters and taking READY ACTION before initiative where you already pulled your weapons wont cause problems with drawing weapons. So there is not really much need for me to house rule those
My standard house rule is that any die that rolls off the table and lands on the floor is the worst possible result. This tends to eliminate players being lackadaisical about losing their dice on the floor. (BTW, As a GM I've been affected by this too.)
I disagree with most of these rules, but mainly because they simply make the game so much easier for the players, especially when you put them all together. The funny thing? The two rules I disagree with most in this video are the two that actually make the game harder for the players. The Two Session Lemon Law. This sounds like contractually obligating players out of negotiation, discussion, and communication in the long run. Saying, you can change your mind, but only if these conditions are met, is counterproductive to the most important component to any functioning TTRPG, communication. If a player is truly miserable with their choices, actions, and decisions, then it's time to sit down with them and set aside the rules, hand written or otherwise, and just talk to them about what is bothering them and how you, as the GM, can enable their enjoyment and entertainment. Hero Points can be Used to Alter the Narrative. Why do players need to spend resources to suggest changes that you may or may not have previously considered? Why are they not allowed to offer criticism, advice, and suggestions freely? Are you running a railroad constructed from recycled pieces of railroad?
Love this channel, not many people cover the rules in pathfinder so in depth
Thanks!
“Tumble Through does not provoke” and “Reactions are Triggered by Leaving Reach” are problematic because because creatures generally are unable to perform AoOs. Creatures that are able to perform AoOs have the damage done in that extra attack factored into their creature math, and PCs have to choose to gain the ability to perform AoOs as a class feat.
AoOs are meant to be powerful, giving that creature the ability to “lock down” the area within their reach, discouraging flanking and in the case of large creatures, punishing players whom step up to melee them. This is very important, because it makes these creatures and martial PCs feel extra threatening.
I can see this only being good to use if and only if you return the ability to AoO to ALL creatures for free. And perhaps give creatures that have a built-in AoO (and fighters) a boost to their AoO accuracy or something.
I think it was the only house rule I didn't like
I think it would be fair enough for a crit success but not a regular success.
Excellent and practical common sense rules. I use many similar rules with my group. Also learned some new ones I will implement. Thank you for sharing. Congrats on 100 episodes.
Thanks! :)
My personal House Rules:
• Aid has a DC of one step lower than what you’re trying to help with
• Your starting Lore from background automatically increases proficiency ranks
• If you don’t start out with an Ability at +4, Boost an Ability (to a maximum of +3)
• Hero Points can be used to add +d6 to any base roll, to help push towards a crit
• Hero Points can be used to perform a wild flashy maneuver and break the RAW a bit
• Any melee weapon with a d8 or lower can count as a Monk Weapon
• General Feats can be used for any kind of Feat
For the last house rule, it seems like it would make more sense to trigger once you leave your reach instead of the enemies. An enemy with a 20 ft reach would actually be penalized for their reach when fighting against a player with 5 ft reach. If the monster strides away 10 ft it provokes, but if the player strides 10 feet away they dont.
Also if you ever larped or somehow sworldplay, if you are wielding a sword and your opponent is wielding a lance, it's hard to get close to them. They WILL get an AOO while you are trying to get close. Not allowing that nerfs reach weapons a lot!
With a night's rest I realize the easy fix would be to make the AOO happen if you change the distance between you and the enemy. Run circle around them all you want, no problem.
But try to get into close melee when they have reach and you do take an AOO, same if you back up.
his rule still works as you describe for reach weapons. as your reach isn't within 5ft, they're leaving your threatened squares by going adjacent to you. Unless they use a 5ft step
For 5 ft diagonals, one addition you should definitely add: if using this rule, turn all circles and cones into squares. It allows those spells to maintain the same range and minimizes the impact of the distance changes, while making em easier to determine and faster to use.
My favorite houserule aims to make potion of healing (and elixir of life) more reliable, by assuring half their healing
For exemple: a Lesser Healing Potion does not heal for 2d8+5, but rather heal for 2d4+13 (As in: half of both d8 as a respective +4)
I really like the first one about shoving a grabbed creature: when playing my Druid wildshaped into a Huge bear, it felt silly not to be able to move the small or medium creature I just critically grabbed (immobilized)
The new reposition action has made the first rule official!
Finally!
My House Rules are as follows:
-If a player rolls a Nat 20 on initiative, they are Quickened 1 for their first round.
-Disarm applies a -2 penalty to attack on a success until the monster spends an action to regrip the weapon.
-Lore skills you gain from your background automatically scale when they can, no points needed.
-Scaling Recall Knowledge checks. For every 5 more above the Monster DC you rolled, you can ask me one yes/no question about the monster.
18:55 until I heard this was a house rule I had no idea. I play it this way as well.
Nice video! I like most of these but I'll fight you to the death on the 5 foot diagonals xD. I keep my AoO standard too but I can see why it works to change it round. Good to hear your takes on it all!
LOL -- yes, I knew that was going to be the controversial rule. WE'RE OLD AND SET IN OUR WAYS!!
@@HowItsPlayed I have a honest question: why are hexes superior in your opinion? Don't they just move the problem to other situiations? Like, if I want to move to the side by one square, wont I have to either move to the side and forwards or to the side and backwards? And if I do that over long distances, doesn't the math get just as complicated as with squares? I for one have gotten so used to the idea that the odd diagonals in a turn are 5ft and the evens are 10ft that I don't even notice them when I count out movement.
Five-foot diagonals also make obstacles a lot less meaningful. If you can freely zoom around the map on the diagonal, then obstacles often fail to slow anyone down.
@@DoubLL "And if I do that over long distances, doesn't the math get just as complicated as with squares?"
The math is less complicated over any distance. Take two points on a hex map. The distance between those two spots is always simply the number of hexes between them, so long as you continue to advance toward the destination, and don't double back, etc. You can't do that with squares.
@@wichhouse I have looked into the issue a bit more since writing this comment and I am mostly fine with the abstraction that all movement through the grid can be calculated by counting fields. It’s not actually true of course, but it is a lot more accurate than doing the same thing in a square grid (while ignoring diagonals) though of course there is still some deviation. The most extreme cases would be movement from through one side, through the next center, to the hex on the opposite side of the center, versus taking the long diagonal from one corner to the opposite corner and then walking along an edge until you get to the next hex. The latter movement is about 12,5% shorter than the former (10.5x vs 12x on a 6x grid), even though both are counted as 2 hexes of movement. But I feel like that level of error is very acceptable and square grids aren’t mathematically correct either. When I wrote the comment, I hadn’t done the math yet and I had assumed the error would be a lot greater (in the 20-30% range) which turned out to completely wrong.
Personally, I still like squares more for any human made environment, since we tend to build square houses and favor right angles in our architecture, but I have also stopped using any kind of grid at all in my campaigns and just measure distances directly (Warhammer style) or just eyeball it when precise distances don’t matter.
So I have simplified "resting exploration" mode. I hate having tons of rolls for healing, identification, repair during 10 minute resting blocks. Basically, I assume auto-success for Treat Wounds, and treat 2d8 as an average of 10, so spend 10 minutes healing at Trained, heal 10, Expert, heal 20 (I give everyone Continual Recovery for free)... Identification/crafting both auto-succeed up to a certain level (for example, trained is "minimum 3 or Level - 2", expert is "minimum 9 or level...). I have adjustments for rarity in this. Also rules for crafting exist. It *greatly* speeds up downtime, and keeps to the spirit of the rules without having all the burden.
I’d like to hear more on your crafting rules… it’s one of the few things that bug me about 2e (although so far I’m liking the altered rules in Treasure Vault book way better)
Hero Points to change the narrative is something we do too! Super fun and useful.
We also use it to bargain with the GM to do something beyond RAW for a single moment, almost like a custom temporary houserule. It’s great for situations when our group is at a crossroads with weird interactions; the hero point becomes the tiebreaker.
Hero Points are meant to be heroic. So you can never roll under a 10 on the hero point reroll. Dice rolls 1-9 you add 10 to the roll. That's my main thing.
Agreed on most, implemented some myself. I had done the same with move+draw but with the caveat that as a prerequisite they be trained or better with the weapon.
The one I'm still mulling over is letting a Hero Point shift the degree of success one step rather than reroll... But then being a little more stingy with them. Haven't fleshed it out fully yet...
Disagree on diagonals, though I totally get it. ;-)
I actually tested it and unfortunately it resulted in massive changes in players strategy - e.g. changing normal hit to crit is much better for some weapons. So my advice - perhaps go with it, but without the option to change a normal success to critical success.
I like these! I'm still trying to get comfortable enough with the game to GM, but when I do I know I'm going to use a good chunk of these for myself.
Definitely swiping some of these. The big house rule I use is that the ability boost system at creation is simplified: 9 Free Boosts, Max 18 in any one stat, but past that, put 'em where you want 'em. You can take the ability flaws if you want them as well.
The big houserule I use is that flanking checks the center of any space you occupy to the center of any space your ally occupies, because getting bigger should make you better at flanking!
Happy #100 episode!!! You do a great job with your videos!
You make learning PF2e so easy, thank you for your work and time!
The hero point one about getting 1 point and being conscious I think it lessens one or two feats like Cheat Death or Orc Ferocity.
If you use the rule about Drawing or Stowing an item for free on a stride action then you do need a Surprise Round rule too otherwise surprise rounds aren't built in anymore.
As it stands RAW, if a party sneaks up on a group of bandits around a campfire then attack, the bandits (who were not on watch or become aware) have to spend an action to "draw a weapon". So the "surprised" bandits have lost one action. There's the surprise part.
Really like the Aid change, I have been doing it intuitively, but your wording is great. I think maybe I would tie the Aid DC to simple DCs most of the time. But I would need to think more about it.
I really like some of these ideas, and I will consider them.
With the use of Hero Points, I have a homebrew called Story Points based a little bit in Cypher System and other story based games. For me, creating a fact about your character related to something in the story, or complicating yourself in character, awards a story point. But worldbuilding at the table (creating an NPC, or the 200ft of rope in your example) costs a Story Point. I also love using GM j, as a way to push the story in a way that I want, but rewarding the player for the inconvinience instead of just being a "gotcha". I have the rule written, if you would like to see it.
I have also have a small document with some little errata-like changes to some feats. Like Point Blank Shot being 1 bonus damage per weapon damage die, instead of a flat +2 forever.
Thanks for all your videos. Great stuff. Like the Draw/Stow as part of movement. I think a compromise might be if you draw/stow you lose 5' of your stride for that move.
For remembering mundane things, I allow a "oh I think I packed that" check. It's an intelligence check. If they were somewhere recently that would have had a length of rope, the player would have thought to buy it.
I also really like level up 5es destiny system. I think it would work very well for hero points.
i made so that player can have 2 belt pouches, each can contain one single consumable item, and they can retrieve that specific item as a free action. Retrieving from backpack or others additional belt pouches (that maybe are positioned on the back part of the belt) is 1 action.
Happy 100th, and thanks for all the help learning to play PF2. A favorite house rule: If you start your turn at Dying 0, you may choose to make a Flat check. On a 20, you gain 1 hit point and become conscious, but if you roll a 1, you gain Dying 1 and must begin death saves again... it's a gamble, bit can be clinch.
For the Aid action, I have any attempts to Aid have a DC equal to the same DC the person they are aiding is attempting but -5. So if a Fighter is attempting to life up a heavy gate and the DC is 22, it would only be a DC 17 for the Cleric to attempt to Aid them. This encourages using Aid as it's easier than the actual check, makes it easier at early levels, and doesn't make the check automatic succuess/critical success at high levels. If the explanation for how they are "aiding" doesn't make sense or wouldn't be very effective, I might give the Aid DC +2, making it slightly more difficult.
I always forget to reward Hero Points, so my players get a Hero Point when they roll a natural 1 on the d20. Obviously, they can't use this Hero Point on the same roll that granted the Hero Point. This softens the failure and keeps the moods at the table up. It is a game after all.
My players love using actions to start combat, like throwing a fireball while the villain is monologuing or stabbing the bandit as a surprise attack. But I don't like surprise rounds as it's a huge advantage. Instead I use this: When a character performs an action that initiates combat, they complete that action before rolling initiative. On their first turn in combat, they have fewer actions based on the number of actions used to start the combat. This allows them to do their action first, like a fireball while the enemies are still bunched up or stabbing the guy while he's still standing in front of them, but doesn't give everyone a whole free turn to beat the shit out of the enemies.
Since I like more gritty and dangerous campaigns, I had a personal house rule in 1e which I imported to 2e:
I allow players - not my NPCs - to attempt a coup-de-grace on any enemy who is unaware of their presence, or completely convinced that the player does not pose a threat to them in any way. (For obvious reasons, this generally cannot be done in combat.)
In 2e this means that they get a free attack and if they hit, the enemy must make a Fortitude Save against their class DC plus their damage dice or die outright. You could obviously change this to make it more or less likely to succeed.
I also generally allow a stealth check to prevent the victim from making a loud noise and alerting others while their throat is being slit open.
My issue with letting players ask questions for Recall Knowledge is that it always results in the same questions being asked: weaknesses, special attacks, and resistances (in that order, too). I run it closer to RAW but instead of telling the players the most common information, I tell them the information that I think is most relevant to them. If an enemy is weak to electricity but I know nobody in my group uses electricity, I'd pick something else to tell them about instead. If they're fighting an enemy with a special attack they'll need to counter, I make sure to tell them about that.
I like a good number of your house rules! Great list. Personally, I think a fix for the really weak Disarm action is needed. I allow the effects of the Success to last until the start of your turn (of the creature who does the disarm action)
That's cool! I agree that Disarm is hilariously underpowered RAW
I've opted to remove the Attack trait from it
This channel is rapidly becoming my favorite gaming channel. I've stolen about 60% of these house rules and documented them. Thanks for that!!
Great home rules, will definitely try out the hero point one and will use that magic identify one.
Only "complaint" i have is the AOP one, as the step movement is made specifically for avoiding it, and allows tanky characters to trap in enemies from getting an advantageous position. Since typically only martials and skilled fighters/enemies have AOP, it feels valid to have it be an obstacle you can't stride through. Thats just my thinking on it though
Thanks for these homerules!
Would love if there was a timeline for each houserule to find them easier 😀
Great suggestion! I've added times in the description so you can jump to a house rule.
@@HowItsPlayed Awesome thanks!
I really like the thought of using Hero Points like Blades in the Dark Flashbacks! I'm doing things with Hero Points more like Bennies in Savage Worlds so I love it! I'm taking it! Here's my Hero Point
Thanks! :)
I'm going to use most of them! =O
Thanks for sharing! ♥
My group is converting over to Pf2e and one of the sticking points for two players is the action to stow action to draw thing. Baking 1 into the Stride seems great! I'm trying it in addition to what I thought up which is 1 action to swap weapons (stow previous draw new in same action).
One my group uses is on a failed long jump you leap the distance you rolled rounded down to the nearest 5 instead of a normal leap.
When shooting from cover you can do a step to peek around the cover. So your own cover don't give cover to your targets
I think it was one of the pathfinder developers that posted about Critical Initiative - if you roll a natural 20 for your intiative, you get a 4th action on your first turn. My players really love it, though I have yet to get it for one of my monsters, so we shall see how much they love it then...
Interesting!
13:17 Every other homebrew I at least sort of understand, but this seems off to me. My main question about this rule is how do you handle spells? In the current system, if you cast a burst or emanation spell, the shape of the spell is going to look like a circle, or it's going to at least look as much as a circle as possible, but in this homebrew rule, the bursts and emanations would just be squares. And if they were squares, that'd mean burst and emanation spells would be way more powerful, since they'd affect a lot more space than under the normal rules. I guess you could use this homebrow rule only when calculating movement, but wouldn't it be a bit confusing when you use two different rules for different things, when you could just use the one?
Edit: Okay, I went and looked what the spell areas looked like in D&D, since I've never played it, and apparently they all just kinda use whatever rules they want? Like, there is no logical consistency between them, they're kinda just random. Which I guess is fine, but in this case I do prefer the consistent rules here in P2e, where cones are just quarters of bursts, and emanations are just bursts with added lines going through the middle. The only exception is the 15ft orthogonal cone, which I think is just randomly made up.
18:04 We also use this homebrew rule, but I don't think the other players, including my GM, know that it's a homebrew rule. I think it's just a rule that we learned in Pathfinder 1e, and assumed it worked the same way in 2e. I didn't realize we were doing it "wrong" until like a year ago. I haven't talked about this to my GM, so I'm not sure if he knows this.
I myself haven't had the time to houserule a lot of stuff, but I have made house rules on throwing items into squares. I also did make houserules on throwing items to other players, but the remaster added an official rule to this, so I just scrapped my houserule.
My rules for Recall Knowledge are almost identical to yours & I have a similar philosophy on Hero Points as well, though I am influenced by the old White Wolf Exalted games.
So, there are a few distinctions:
First, players nominate other players for Hero Points based on cool stunts, dramatic role-playing, and similar cool stuff. Players MUST nominate the Hero Point, and then I will distribute it.
This is me explicitly stating that players should pay attention to other players during their turns, or the party won't have as many Hero Points.
Also, Hero Points are a limited resource. At a certain point, the coins for Hero Points will run out.
The only way you refill those coins is if I, the GM, spend my Villain Points (inspired by some of Jason Buhlmans games). So, players must also nominate me for Villain Points when my villains do something cool. 😎
As for spending Hero Points, I have a few specific options my players can use:
"I know a guy..."
Spend a Hero Point to introduce a potentially helpful NPC with a starting attitude of Indifferent into a scene.
"It just so happens..."
Spend a Hero Point to change a scene detail so that your character can attempt a check otherwise impossible. (E.g.: It just so happens that I spot a rope on the floor that I can use to try & scale the wall.)
I guess this also counts as a House Rule:
I almost never use Secret Checks. I trust my players to roll their dice & react appropriately.
I just don't like taking player agency away.
I will occasionally use secret rolls for things like the Augury spell, but the vast majority of the time - nope.
Also, Arcknight allows you to custom order their maps in Hex Grid. I may have spent way too much money on this...
This so f.a.t.e.
@@9652769 F.A.T.E. is one of those systems that I've never gotten to play, but I hope to try out one day.
@@TheLocalDisasterTourGuide I really loved F.A.T.E. for that exact mechanic, and I think your system for 2e sounds really cool but I'm too much of a coward to ask my players to tell me when my characters did something cool - what if they never nominate me for villain points because all my characters are too boring 🙈
I love the idea of hero points being used to alter the narrative!! I hope you know I am stealing this lol
I'll also point out that vancian spellcasting "quickens" the pace of fights because prepared casters don't spend 10 minutes wondering "what combination of spell/rank is the most appropriate". The array of choice they have is "limited", and as such the time they need to think is lowered because of the lower amount of choices.
Your surprise round rules can be implemented RAW without issue; just have a surprising group declare that they are Readying Actions for whatever trigger is indicative of the start of combat.
I've used a few of them already, and I love all of them, especially the Heropoints being used as narrative tools 👍🏻👍🏻
Pog #100 !
We also use the item identification rule you do :)
13:13 This is the Way
i do diagonals the same way , for magic items if they already identify the item before they can recognize it again. ex. if they id a +1 rune then they know if they find another but if they find a +2 rune they have to roll to id it. for recall knowledge on a creature if they roll a success i give them the name and type and one special ablitiy they have
My one counterargument to the "hero point keeps you up and fighting instead of stable" rule: being unconscious keeps the PC out of the line of fire of monsters who have other targets to prioritize. If the goblin who felled you sees you get back up they'll hit you again. And then you're back to dying, with no hero point to save you.
I think it is a better rule to give the player the choice. Do they stay down but safer out of aggro, or do they risk staying conscious to try and pull a hail mary?
I've not been GM'ing PF2 long... but many are very similar, and carried over from other systems. My house rules are: 1. Disarm Success imposes the penalty of the opponent to the end of their round, and that success penalty imposes an additional requirement for the opponent to make a flat 5 roll to use the item. 2. Surprise attack only usable once per round. 3. "Press Actions" cannot be the character's first action, but that first action need not be an attack. 4. Until a character spends an action making a Recall Knowledge then there is a 1 in 6 chance that their opponent has an appropriate combat reaction (i.e. Opportunity attack or shield block). 5. Treat Wounds & First Aid, do not require a healing kit, but the DC is 5 higher if attempted without one. Healing Kits have 6 Uses. Using a Healing Kit, successfully has a 1 in 6 chance of diminishing a charge, a failure automatically diminishes it by 1.
I started with only a few house rules for Pathfinder 2e, but they grew and grew until they became a 27 pages pdf of house rules (and new books coming out month after month with even more things I had issues with), I finally decided if I had so many things I wanted to change, maybe P2e wasn't the game for me. So I left the second edition, after more than a decade of playing Pathfinder 1e.
However, I'm enjoying Pathfinder for Savage Worlds now! (I have some house rules for that too, but only 5 pages. It's much closer to the style of game I enjoy.)
I like the surprise round houserule. Stealth, initiative and awarness status is the worst part of the rules, and I would like to simplify it.
I like a lot of these. I think on the tumble through one I'd definitely go with that on a critical success they avoid the AoO.
One of my group's house rules that I personally use when I'm GMing is, because our group only plays about 3-4 hours once a week, I give out hero points to every player every hour instead of the 1 that is recommended in the CRB. This gives everyone chances to use them, and I still award heroic actions hero points as well(or perhaps someone said or did something that made laugh).
We use 5' diagonals, too. It's not as realistic but it works well enough. I like your use of hero points to drive story elements. I'll have to implement that. Always looking for stuff for them to spend their hero points on.
In my 30+ years of playing TTRPGs, I have always adhered to 5' diagonals. I never understood how, or why, people got caught up with actual measurements. A map with minis was never meant to be an accurate portrayal of anything. It was just a tool, originally added to DnD, just to roughly represent character placement so as to help everyone cohesively visualize the scene.
Huh, I ran my first session the other day and used the asking questions about monsters one inadvertently, I thought that was what the rules were trying to say lol
It hasn't come up yet, so I'm not sure how balanced it will be, but my group is trying out a house rule for rolling initiative. Basically, if you roll a natural 20 on initiative you get an extra action on your first turn on the first round, but if you roll a natural 1 then you lose an action on your first turn. Might make things a bit swingy, but we'll see.
Outstanding as always
Nice. I’m about to start my first ever PF campaign and I’ll be adopting some of these. The only house rule is been thinking about is giving shields the Shove trait. Makes no sense to me that you can’t shove with a shield.
Yeah. It makes sense.
For those not homebrewing this. There's an attachment you can put on your shield now to give it shove and some other combat maneuvers.
I am doing the same. Also, i don’t like the way weapons are potraited, seems to me that oriental weapons are far better than western ones (comes to mind katana and bastard sword… it drives me crazy) so i am going to put some love into those.
@@albertofilosa3541 you're getting Deadly in sacrifice for a smaller Hit Dice.
I see what you mean but there it does have a trade off.
How it looks like numbers wise.
One handed averages:
Bastard sword average 4.5
Bastard sword Crit average 9
Katana average 3.5
Katana Crit average 11.5
Two handed
Bastard sword average 6.5
Bastard sword Crit average 13
Katana average 5.5
Katana Crit average 15.5
So yeahm sacrificing some base power for a bigger Crit. I think it would probably depend on the build.
The Bastard sword may still be doing more damage over time if you're not critically hitting every 3-4 strikes.
But then again, the katana is also versatile piercing while the bastard sword isn't.
I think they're both very valid weapons to use regardless.
@@Unikatze it’s part the philosophy behind uncommon weaps and part some realistic choice i don’t want to lose. I explain myself: katanas are excellent weapons at dealing slashing damage, but very poor compared to westerns swords in dealing piercing damage… but still they get versatile. Bastard swords get 2h, and nothing more to compare it with the versatile katanas have. The uncommon tag should not be seen as a way to limit it, cause u can always find a way to explain the reasons why ur char have such weapon. Then there’s the cost, and for no apparent reason bastard swords cost more than katanas. Now, i didn’t check enough weapons so take my statement with the grain of salt, but as a general rule i think that in designers’ mind oriental weaps> weatern weaps, and that’s just bs.
@@albertofilosa3541 I haven't looked at the other Asia inspired weapons. And I think a lot was made similarly due to game balance stuff.
Bastard sword was not given versatile even though it has the piercing aspect in the item description for balance issues.
If it did there'd be no reason to ever use a Greatsword.
Kind of a necessity for just game reasons.
I'm mostly happy both weapons are valid choices to play with if it fits the aesthetic you're going for with your character.
I would love to hear how these surprise round rules play out. 1 action is great for a martial but nothing for a wizard/Caster who mostly need 2 actions.
I've on the fly made a similar ruling for shoving in different directions.
In your case. Does that action still have the Attack trait?
Read aura and identifying items is something a lot of people seem to dislike.
I've used it before but also wouldn't know how to handle it if they Crit failed. I'd tell them it's something else and then I have to keep track in my mind that what they think is a +1 striking longsword is just a regular +1? Ugh.
I usually just have them identify the first one. And if they find another +1 Weapon I tell them the rune is exactly the same as the one they've already identified.
I like the tumble through one. Not really necessary in my table since we don't use it much. But maybe a more cinematic option would be to have a +2 bonus to AC against that AoO?
That way they could also make the enemy waste their reaction.
For your recall knowledge one. Are the questions they can ask limited to Yes/No questions?
Or can they ask "what's it weak against?" Or "what's their lowest save?"
With the Heroic Recovery. I understand why they made the change.
At 1HP an enemy will want to attack you again (specially after spending pretty much your full turn grabbing your gear and standing up), making it a lot more deadly. But game wise it's really boring for a player to just sit there unconscious.
I usually bundle the Grapple and Shove into one 2-action activity so it only impacts MAP once.
For the ID Monster rule, it can vary from creature to creature. If weaknesses are similar enough that I figure knowing one would mean knowing the other, then I would give them both for one question. Don't think I've ever had a player ask what the lowest save is, but I'd probably be okay with that too. I'm easy and if the player succeeds on their roll I want them to feel good about it.
Two session lemon law would get complex fast at my table since my group will usually level after two sessions.
I didn’t realize I was using your identify magic items house rule all along lol
The one house rule my group plays with is that the athletics skill action do not apply the multiattack penalty.
The distance from a center of a square to one of it's corners isn't 50% longer than the distance to the edge, it's actually 1.41...x, so we're approximating anyways :-P.
My issue with AoO only on leaving Reach is it kinda punishes Reach weapons by making the enemy have more room to Maneuver around you.
I believe in PF2e the Step is meant to be the circling around. Plus that means part of the design of Reach interacting with AoO is lost.
I know this is on my mind as there's a potential Starfinder game I'm hoping to bust out my Dragonkin, who's build uses the reach and AoO to his advantage, plus Reach in 5e just feels... So underwealming... Like, I only JUST remembered as I wrote this a character I've gotten to Level 10 actually DOES have a 10' reach via a natural weapon, as it's generally better to use the 5' reach ones.
So hey, I'll try and remember that.
I don't know how often this has been mentioned but I would like your take on Magical Trickster combined with Magus' Spellstrike. What do you think, does sneak attack damage trigger once or twice?
Thanks and I love the series! This episode was especially helpful. Even though you are obviously very rules savvy, it doesn't seem you are a "rules lawyer" and modify rules for fun and pacing. Setting a good example :)
We still use Bless as the old way. Cast it once. Get your +1 and move on. None of this concentrating to make it expand 5 feet each round. Who would ever use that spell as written?
I'm a little surprised that people would switch between playing Dungeons and Dragons and Pathfinder. In terms of types of Adventure I think they covered the same ground and I would think that people would either like one system or the other. I can definitely see place for games that just have fundamentally different tropes and mechanics lend themselves to different styles of play, like call Cthulhu and blades in the dark, and Dungeon Crawl classics, and others like that, not to mention all the different sci-fi genres 4 games that are especially roleplay oriented or mechanics oriented like fate or Warhammer, but I see Dungeons and Dragons and Pathfinders occupying the same niche and I would think that everybody would prefer one or the other
Cool rules, nothing overpowered.
I like the option of using a hero point that way though. I dont really like use hero points to put yourself into safety by just using a hero point. When facing big danger my players tend to play less careful, because they have a hero point and can just "pass the death rolls", but with your ruling they are alive and dont have to sit there waiting AND they are in danger, because they are awake, which I really like.
Atm I just took that rule out and allow them to reroll any of their D20 rolls which includes death rolls. I also like to do it so my players can fudge the dice of the enemies basically, and use a hero point to make them roll their D20 again.
The other Hero point rule I use is that bbeg, key NPCs, or other characters that are like the PC also have Hero points. It makes the world feel more like "you arent the only special person" and that other PCs have their own big story going on
I also give these characters their own death saving throw, except if them being instantly dead makes the scene better ofc
A small nitpick: I would argue that you let your guard down when striding, or at least somewhat down. That is what the step action is for afterall
Great video!!
I came in here ready to argue against all your homebrew. But damn, I am going to use half of these.
LOL - nice to hear!
I like some of your rules, and the ones I'm "meh' about I can at least see the benefit for both parties. I haven't played enough 2e to know what I might want to HR, but when I do play, I play in the PFS public setting so HRs are no-go. Ironically I only play PFS to try to find people for a homebrew, but so far I can hardly find anyone in Nashville TN playing.
Great list! Thanks for sharing! One question: does your "two session lemon law" replace the retraining rules?
No, you can still retrain beyond the two sessions.
I house rule aid DC to typically the check DC -5 (very easy). That's not really a house rule since the rules say the GM can change it, but I want people to do this. DC 20 is way too hard at level 1 and is trivial at high level.
Really great and thank you, sir! Q: So, hearing your houserule on moving out of reach, do you still say that standing up would provoke an AOO? THANKS!
The last one kinda invalidates usage of Step and Tumble Through in order to reposition in close combat scenarios.
i wuld do check DC -5 for aid
A "drag" action would be cool once you have grabbed an enemy
The heropoint recovery from death thing was only half true in the original printing, it had the correct rule (which was also on the gm screen) and the wrong rule.
The 2 sessions lemon law makes little sense in Pf2e since respec is a downtime activity..
Hi, Dave. Do you use Stamina Points Variant Rule in GM Guide??
If you do, Con modifier should then be added to SP, and use Str modifier for HP. After all, the ability to take damage is muscles = Str modifier.
No, I don't use the Stamina rules, but I would like to some day. I do like how the system works with Starfinder.
My main house rule is that when a player uses an Heroic point to re-roll something, he re-rolls with "advantage" (like 5e). The reason is that I was tired of seeing players use an Heroic point to re-roll and roll equal or less than the previous roll, so, there was literally nothing "Heroic" about it :(
Background music is too loud 😢
doesn't your tumble through rule mess with the acrobats gimmick?
lots of house rules makes class feats or skill feats useless, or at the very least require them to be changed, which can trigger need for further changes in other actions or feats, and then we have the rule-change avalanche. eg. the Disarm action is weak, so people houserule it better, then making a Swashbuckler specialising in disarm not very special, etc... house rules can be a bit too messy for me, but it is interesting to see what people comes up with...
If you play that reactions are triggered only by leaving enemy's reach does standing up in your games trigger reactions?
I was also wondering about your Recall Knowledge homerule, is "what are this creature immunities" a specific enough question?
Your hero point use to have an impact in narrative sense sounds interesting. I am just wondering if you give hero points to players in similar fashion as the PF2E rules say - like giving it when players succeed at doing something amazing or are you more into giving them in the steady pace, like 1 hero point for every passing hour of the game session? :)
Honestly, I have a tendency to forget about them and not award them as often as I should. But my plan is typically everyone starts each session with 1 and then they can earn another for something they do outside of the game (bring snacks or offer to track effects, etc), and they can earn 1 more by doing something inside the game that's either really cool or really funny.
Surprise round is free action? How about READY ACTION! Player's and Enemies can take Ready Action to Ambush someone by stating "we attack when enemies get within everyone's range" thus you roll initiative but before anyone moves you resolve all ready actions.
BENEFIT is that if one player or NPC is searching for CREATURES they might spot the hidden ambush 😁 and if that happens you start the encounter before they are within the reach "Someone noticed you" style giving you more different starting position for different encounters and taking READY ACTION before initiative where you already pulled your weapons wont cause problems with drawing weapons. So there is not really much need for me to house rule those
My standard house rule is that any die that rolls off the table and lands on the floor is the worst possible result. This tends to eliminate players being lackadaisical about losing their dice on the floor. (BTW, As a GM I've been affected by this too.)
Wow, that's harsh! :)
I stole half of these, thx
I disagree with most of these rules, but mainly because they simply make the game so much easier for the players, especially when you put them all together. The funny thing? The two rules I disagree with most in this video are the two that actually make the game harder for the players.
The Two Session Lemon Law. This sounds like contractually obligating players out of negotiation, discussion, and communication in the long run. Saying, you can change your mind, but only if these conditions are met, is counterproductive to the most important component to any functioning TTRPG, communication. If a player is truly miserable with their choices, actions, and decisions, then it's time to sit down with them and set aside the rules, hand written or otherwise, and just talk to them about what is bothering them and how you, as the GM, can enable their enjoyment and entertainment.
Hero Points can be Used to Alter the Narrative. Why do players need to spend resources to suggest changes that you may or may not have previously considered? Why are they not allowed to offer criticism, advice, and suggestions freely? Are you running a railroad constructed from recycled pieces of railroad?