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House Rules (Princes of the Universe Mark IV)

From Stormravengaming

Contents

Character Classes

Variant Classes

Expert (Unearthed Arcana p77): The variant, generic Expert class from Unearthed Arcana may be used in this game. Details may be found in the SRD at this link.

Skills

Craft

Crafting time (Player's Handbook p71): To calculate how much progress is made on a crafted item in one week, multiply the Craft check result by the DC of the item crafted and then by 7. If the result x the DC x 7 equals the price of the item in silver pieces, then you have completed the item. If this calculation equals double or triple the price of the item in silver pieces, then you've completed the task in one-half or one-third the time, and so on. If the calculation falls short of the item price, then it represents the progress made for this week.

Crafting time is subject to DM approval. At his option he may opt to use the original rules for crafting time or determine new ones.

Progress by the Day: When making Craft checks daily instead of weekly, a check result that fails by 5 or more destroys half the raw materials as usual. However, this result also forces the crafter to cease work for 1d6 days while he cleans up the mess from the failed project, obtains new raw materials, and figures out the mistake(s) that led to the failure. (This prevents successive crafting failures using daily checks from destroying more raw materials than is possible using weekly checks.)

See also: Alchemical Items.

Feats

The following feats are adopted variant feats, modifications of standard feats, or feats created for the game.

Spontaneous Summoning I

Prerequisites: Must be able to cast summon monster, must prepare spells.

Benefit: A spellcaster with this feat can drop a prepared spell in order to cast any summon monster spell of the same or lower level.

Spontaneous Summoning II

Prerequisites: Must be able to cast summon nature's ally, must prepare spells.

Benefit: A spellcaster with this feat can drop a prepared spell in order to cast any summon nature's ally spell of the same or lower level.

Description

Age

Uh... did you say "utes?"
– Judge Haller, My Cousin Vinny

Occasionally, youths may acquire levels in a character class; very rarely, children may do so. The age effects of youth are wholly negative; the only advantage to the character is the presumably longer period of their adventuring career during which they will not suffer the effects of old age, and the relatively younger age at which they may achieve high level.

A character who is adolescent, that is, possessed of many adult faculties but not yet an adult, is known as a youth. A character who is younger than this, but capable of independent action, is known as a child. The following table describes these age categories for the standard races.

Table: Youth Effects
Race Child1 Youth2 Adult
Human 7 12 16
Dwarf 21 30 41
Elf 50 70 111
Gnome 22 31 41
Half-Elf 10 16 21
Half-Orc 6 11 15
Halfling 10 15 21
1 As a child, -4 to Str and Wis; -2 to Dex, Con, Int and Cha.
2 As a youth, -2 to Str and Wis; -1 to Con and Cha

The background of a child character must make sense. The extremely rare prodigy might show an abnormal early aptitude for martial arts or spontaneous spellcasting, but they cannot select a class that is the result of extensive training, such a Wizard, or that requires adherence to an ethos (see Alignment, below).

Racial Abilities

Mostly, youths have access to supernatural, spell-like and extraordinary abilities for their race, as well as racial bonuses to skill and ability checks, saving throws, attack rolls and the like. There are two exceptions:

  • If the ability is somehow described as taking effect for adults, a youth may not use it. Examples would be abilities described using phrases such as "upon reaching adulthood," "as part of a ceremony of independence," or "after studying X during their childhood."
  • Bonuses, abilities or other racial features that require the character to decide how to "spend" them cannot be used until adulthood. Examples include the bonus feat and extra skill points humans receive.

Child characters only have access to supernatural and spell-like racial abilities, with exceptions as given above.

Alignment

Child characters do not have alignment. They are not affected by alignment-based effects, and their alignment cannot be detected. Although children are often easy to read (due to their low Wisdom scores), their actual motivation in terms of whether they wish harm or not, or on whose behalf they are acting, can be hard to determine, and Sense Motive checks to determine these sorts of things take a -2 penalty.

Most children in civilized societies tend mildly toward chaotic good in their actions, and if asked would generally state their parents' or guardians' ethical and moral preference, but they are not motivated by commitment to any such standard.

Exceptions to these cases would include children affected by taint, mental control, possession or other unnatural conditions, or those with an ancestry with inherent good or evil alignment, such as being a half-fiend.

Youth characters do have alignments, but their behavior varies more than an adult character's. Such characters are not fully able to comprehend the "larger picture" of alignment. This leads to more frequent alignment changes, and youth characters should not be held as responsible as others for acting against their alignment. It's more likely for a good-aligned youth to commit an evil act, for example, and more likely for a lawful-aligned youth to do something impulsive. These are less likely to reflect a permanent alignment drift than the same actions committed by an adult.

Size, Height and Weight

Youth characters are the same size class as adult examples of their race, while child characters are one size category smaller.

The height and weight of children and youths varies considerably as compared to adults of their race, and the rate at which they grow in size varies greatly by race and gender. For example, many human girls just entering adolescence may be very close to their adult height, while a twelve-year-old boy may gain nearly two feet, continuing to grow well into adulthood. Many elves appear to be children of their race for a hundred years or more, while adolescent dwarves are as bulky as their elders and already graced with a luxurious beard.

Becoming an adult

Assuming a character begins play as a youth or child, their statistics are generated per the usual system and the above penalties applied. When the character ages sufficiently to become an adult, the penalties are removed (their ability scores increase) and they gain access to any racial abilities from which they were formerly excluded. Similarly, child characters becoming youths apply the youth modifiers instead.

Actions in Combat

Standard Actions

Wake Up

A character sleeping normally can wake up as a standard action on his initiative. In order to awaken involuntarily (that is, without someone purposely waking the character up), the character must make a DC 20 Listen check. Other strong stimuli, such as bright sunlight, vigorous motion, intense odor, heat or cold, or the like, can also wake a character on a successful Wisdom check. In some special circumstances, the DM can allow the use of an appropriate skill, such as using Profession (seaman) to awake due to an abnormality in a ship's motion.

If someone tries to intentionally wake the character up (by shouting or shaking), or he is damaged or affected by a targeted spell, he automatically does so.

When a character first awakes, he suffers the effects of being fatigued until he makes a DC 10 Fortitude save as a free action. He can attempt this once per round. Each minute after awaking (10 rounds) he gains a +2 bonus to this save.

Magic

Arcane Magical Writings

Wizard Spells and Borrowed Spellbooks (Player's Handbook p178): By default, a wizard closely guards the form of arcane writing he uses when inscribing spells, and another wizard cannot prepare spells from a borrowed spellbook unless he has already inscribed the same spells in his own spellbook. However, when inscribing spells, a wizard may opt to use a more common rendering of the arcane symbols and glyphs used to represent spells. Another wizard who intends to prepare spells from such a spellbook must first make the usual Spellcraft check (DC 20 + spell level) to decipher them. But once a spell has been deciphered, the wizard may thereafter prepare it from that spellbook with no further Spellcraft checks, just as though it were written in his own spellbook by his own hand.

Just as the creator of a magical writing may assist another to understand it, granting an automatic success on the Decipher Script check, so a wizard who has already successfully deciphered a magical writing may also lend assistance in understanding it and grant the same automatic success on the skill check.

Spells

Nondetection (Player's Handbook p257): This spell functions only against divination spells and effects that are explicitly detect spells, locate spells, or spells used to sense remotely (such as clairaudience/clairvoyance). Nondetection will not prevent other divination effects (such as see invisibility and true seeing) from working.

Summon Monster and Summon Nature's Ally: See Control over Summoned Creatures.

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