Been playing with these rules for years, hoping to revise them.

[Avianmosquito]

Basically, the guys I used to play 3.5 with have a long list of houserules that we've never played without or violated in the years I've played with them. Since I have lost contact with them, I'm looking at now as a good opportunity to make revisions before I find new people.

I should note that our houserules completely rework a number of key systems in D&D, so please keep a cool head if the changes are not to your liking. Of particular import and the way damage types have been altered to better differentiate them, the way armour has been redone, and changes to base stats make the game play quite differently from regular D&D. So different I can't really consider it the same game.

I'm almost certain this list is incomplete, but this is all I can remember at the moment. What I'm looking for is simple: help with rule revisions. There are a few problems with how these are written, and I'm looking for help changing them. I'll list problems I'd like to resolve in blue.

Damage types:

In this version of the system, every kind of damage has been given some kind of special effect.

Bludgeoning: Ignores any DR or AC provided by armour.

Piercing: Negates an amount of damage reduction equal to the damage modifier. (IE: +2 rapier negates 2 points of DR.) Critical threat and critical damage are both doubled.

Slashing: Double listed damage dice. (IE: Longsword now does 2d8.)

Fire: Subject takes 1d2 secondary fire damage next round, plus an additional 1d2 for every ten points of damage taken. (IE: a 30-damage fireball has 4d2 secondary.) Subject may make a fortitude save as a free action and with a DC equal to half the initial fire damage to negate this effect, they may also attempt to extenguish the fire manually as a move action, this uses the modifiers for reflex saves and has the same DC. Complete imersion in water automatically extinguishes the fire. The secondary fire damage triggers tertiary fire damage, tertiary triggers quaternary, and so on until a save is made or the flame is otherwise extinguished. If this effect kills a character and brings their hitpoint total to a negative with the same absolute value as their health, they are incinerated.

Electricity: Target must make a fortitude save equal to half the damage or lost their next action. If affected by several of these effects, the save DCs are added together. This effect does not function against creatures immune to paralysis.

Frost damage: Deals one point of attribute damage plus an additional one for every ten points of damage. The attribute affected is selected randomly. (d6) A successful fortitude cuts the damage in half. (Rounded down.)

Sonic: Ignores line of sight. (Meaning it can damage you through objects, although the lack of visibility impacts attack rolls.) A creature damaged is deafened for one round, plus an additional round for every ten points of damage. A fortitude save with a DC equal to half the damage changes this to a -4 penalty to listen checks and a 5% chance of spell failure to spells with verbal components.

Light: Blinds a character for one round plus an additional round for every round for every ten damage done. A fortitude save with a DC equal to half the damage changes this to a -4 to attack rolls, search and spot checks, with all enemies considered to have concealment. (20% miss chance.)

Force: Causes a character to fall over. A successful reflex save with a DC equal to half the damage negates this effect.

Nonlethal: Normal weapons can no longer cause nonlethal damage. You can't set a sword to stun. Weapons specifically built to deal nonlethal damage (such as saps) now do normal damage, but can deal nonlethal with a -4 penalty to attack rolls. However, this only applies to rolled damage, the modifier is dealt as regular damage. (For instance, a +1 sap would deal 1d6 nonlethal and 2 normal.) Unarmed strikes fall under this category. Nonlethal damage can still kill, if the damage reaches twice their health. (IE: an 8hp character taking would be killed by 16hp of "nonlethal" damage, not including the damage to their health buffer.) A character disabled by nonlethal damage can also die of exertion.

Positive/negative energy: Subtracts 1 from attack rolls and armour class, with an additional one for each point of damage. A will save equal to half the damage negates this effect.

Armour, gauntlets, helmets, boots & shields:

Body armour no longer provides a bonus to AC. (Although an enchantment on it still may.) Now, it provides two things. Damage reduction and a "health buffer" (see below.) These effects are equal to the original AC bonus. The max dex modifier now applies to all uses of the dexterity score. The armour check penalty for body armour now applies directly to the dexterity score and nothing else. (Unless you are not proficient, then it penalizes attack rolls as well.)

Gauntlets are now linked to a set of armour. They use that armour's stats for protection and armour check, providing an equal health buffer, but no damage reduction or AC bonus. This effect is stackable. They do not cap dexterity, but they apply the armour check penalty to all actions taking fine motor skills. Specifically, open lock, slight of hand and disable device.

Other skill checks may be deemed to require fine motor skills, consult your DM.

Boots are also linked to a suit of armour. They provide a health buffer. They apply an armour check penalty to move silently, jump, tumble, swim and balance checks, as well as reflex saves. They do not cap dexterity.

Helmets are linked as well, and use the same stats. They provide an AC bonus and health buffer. They do not cap dexterity, and their armour check penalty to spot, search and listen checks.

Shields are also linked to a set of armour, but are now counted as a weapon. They provide damage reduction equal to the linked armour, and have an AC bonus dependent on their size. (IE: bucklers provide 1, small shields 2, large shields 3 and so on.) They do not trigger a two-weapon penalty, even when wielded with another weapon. They give an attack penalty equal to their AC bonus, which can be neutralized by the appropriate feat. They can be struck with and do the same damage as an unarmed strike, but do not get dexterity modifiers to attack (see below), with a critical range of 20 and 2x critical damage. They their AC bonus to attack and DR to damage.

For instance, a full suit of leather, with a small leather shield, would provide a damage reduction of 4, AC bonus of 4 and health buffer of 8.

Missing adequate penalties for lack of proficiency from gauntlets, boots, helmets and shields.

Health buffer:

Health buffer is a new effect. Every character has a health buffer (normally a little more than their health) which keeps them from dying. When a character reaches 0 HP, they are now disabled and dying but not unconscious. Additional damage (including exertion) is taken out of their health buffer until it reaches 0. The dying character's health buffer and health are both damaged by one point each round due to blood loss, but regardless of health they are not unconscious unless their health buffer reaches 0. When a character takes nonlethal damage greater than their hit points, they are not considered dying (and do not bleed) but they are considered disabled (and take exertion damage) and their health buffer is reduced by further nonlethal damage. Healing a character through any means restores their health buffer by an equal amount. Armour adds to a character's health buffer when equipped, and subtracts from it when removed. A character's maximum health buffer is the sum of their health and any bonuses they are recieving. Any bonus to constitution also adds to health buffer. (IE: Barbarian rage gives +4 constitution, so it would also give +4 to health buffer.) It is quite possible to bleed to death without ever losing consciousness.

Note that characters now die at a negative number of equal absolute value to their health. (IE: An 8hp character dies at -8, a 40hp character dies at -40.)

Unarmed strike:

Unarmed strikes now have 18-20 critical threat, 2x critical damage. Medium creatures deal 1d6 bludgeoning damage, small deals 1d4, tiny deals 1d2, diminutive deals 1, fine 0. Large creatures deal 1d8, huge deals 1d12, gargantuan 2d8, and colossal 2d12. Can deal nonlethal damage at a -4 penalty to attack, although modifier damage is still regular bludgeoning. Uses both strength and dexterity modifiers on attack rolls, adds strength modifier to damage. (IE: 12STR & 12DEX = +2 attack) Unarmed attacks still provoke attacks of opportunity, which recieve a +10 attack bonus. If the improved unarmed strike is used, attacks still provoke attacks of opportunity, but the attack of opportunity no longer gains a +10, and you no longer suffer a -4 attack penalty to deal nonlethal damage. Two new feats, entitled "martial artist" and "pugilist" are added, which change critical threat to 16-20 and critical damage to 4x, respectively. With all of these, high strength and dexterity, hand to hand is now a decent option for melee combat. Without them it's still not as good as a melee weapon, but it isn't worthless anymore and will easily beat a ranged weapon if within range.

Children:

Most of us were children when we started playing, so naturally we wanted to play as children, but the child template was unplayable, innacurate and extremely offensive. So we changed it.

Now, there are five age categories below adult. From the eldest to youngest, they are adolescent, youth, child, toddler and infant.

Infant: 0-13% adult age.
Toddler: 14-27% adult age.
Child: 28-47% adult age.
Youth: 48-73% adult age.
Adolescent: 74-99% adult age.

For each age category they are younger than adult, they gain -1 strength as well as a -10 to intimidate checks, but +1 dexterity, +5% to all health restoration and a 10% experience bonus. For instance, an infant would have -5 strength, but +5 dexterity, with a 50% experience bonus. Adolescents are the same size as adults, youths and children are one size lower, infants and toddlers are two sizes lower.

Any character adolescent or younger is restricted to classes with a "simple" starting age, (or a number of homebrewed child classes) but no other. At youth or younger, they gain a -10 to diplomacy when dealing with adults. At child or younger, they gain a -4 on knowledge checks, which can be fixed by spending one skill point. At toddler or younger, they gain the "Illeteracy" feat. They also have a -4 on swim, jump and balance checks. An infant cannot walk, and must crawl at half rate. They also cannot speak. These effects can be removed by spending four skill points each.

I'm at a loss as to what aging is supposed to do with child-only classes. I'm thinking about having the child-only class levels convert to levels of a normal class, but that would mean a loss of class features.

The sexes:

Sex is not an aesthetic difference, there are physical differences between men and women. This had to be addressed, but it had to be addressed in an accurate manner, and it's not going to be the same between species. How we did it was simple. Each species has modifiers to their physical abilities (NEVER mental) for each sex, some positive and some negative. The net gain is always 2. For instance, human males have +2 strength, while females have +2 dexterity. Overall balanced, but it shifts the playstyles for each sex significantly.

Pregnancy:

If you should so desire, a female character can get pregnant. This happened often enough our DM actually had to make rules for it, and here's what he came up with.

Overall, the effects of pregnancy (physical and mental) are detrimental. During pregnancy, ten times the wieght of the child is added to her encumbrance, although only three times the child's wieght is actually added to her. The wieght of the child starts at 0, and increases by 1/9th birth wieght (1/180th adult wieght) each ninth of the pregnancy. A pregnant woman recieves a -1 on balance, climb, hide, jump, move silently, ride, swim and tumble checks and -1 to AC and dexterity for each ninth of the pregnancy that has passed.

When the child is born, the mother makes a fortitude save with a DC of 10 or take 1d8 damage and an additional 1d4 constitution damage. If successful, she does not take constitution damage but still takes health damage. If it fails, roll a d2. Subtract this from the d4 roll, this amount of constitution damage is permanant. Negative values count as 0.

Generally, the child was the offspring of a PC, possibly of two PCs. There were arguements over who would get to play the baby, and in fact they were quite frequent. This isn't a request for help, just a heads-up.

The child inherits 1-10% of its parents collective experience. (Roll a d10.) It's class is treated as "commoner," but this may be changed as soon as the infant is born. It starts of classified as nine age categories younger than an infant, (see the "child" section above) and each ninth of the pregnancy that passes is one age category older. If the mother dies and the child is still alive, the child must make a fortitude save with a DC of 45 minus 5 for each ninth of the pregnancy elapsed or automatically die. (IE: 1/3 way through the DC is 30.) If successful, the child survives and is born premature. Since they took the damage their mother took, it's quite likely they'll still die.

If a child is born prematurely, a fortitude save with a DC of 90 minus 10 for each ninth of the pregnancy elapsed. (IE: 5/9 of the way through, the DC is 40.) If failed, the child suffers a permanant -1 strength and constitution for each ninth of the pregnancy skipped, if successful it suffers these penalties anyway, but they gradually wear off until the date it would have otherwise been born.

The elderly:

We aren't nice at the expense of reality. The elderly are NOT mentally superior to the young, quite the opposite. People who can't remember their own names half the time should not have a natural intelligence bonus.

Each age category above adult now gives a -1 penalty to all physical attributes, -1 to search, -2 spot and listen, -5% healing and experience. It also gives +2 wisdom, +4 to will saves, +1 gather information, bluff & knowledge, +2 appraise & concentration, and +4 diplomacy, proffession & sense motive.

Other system changes:

Melee attackers (armed or otherwise) get a +10 bonus to attacks against enemies using ranged weapons.

Base AC is now ten points lower for all creatures. You can choose to actively defend yourself at any time, which adds 5 to your AC, but takes it out of your attack.

Magic missile can miss. It now counts as a +20 ranged touch attack, using base attack modifier, caster level and intelligence (or wisdom/charisma, whatever you use to cast) as modifiers. This makes it missing virtually, but not completely, impossible to miss with.

1 is not an automatic failure, 20 is not an automatic success. You can fail with a 20, and hit with a 1. Both are quite easy, in fact.

Spot and listen are now constitution-based, not wisdom based.

[Siosilvar]

Nonlethal: Normal weapons can no longer cause nonlethal damage. You can't set a sword to stun. ...

I'll look at the rest of the post soon, but this stuck out like a sore thumb. You can hit someone with the flat of the blade. That's quite a bit more nonlethal than the edge. Likewise, you can hit someone in the stomach instead of the ribs with a blunt weapon.

It's harder to do, so you take a -4 penalty to hit when you try (under the normal rules).

---

1

Before I get into this, I should mention that the base AC is now 0. You're not going to miss somebody directly in front of you for no reason.
...
Base AC is now ten points lower for all creatures.

Base AC of 10 assumes that the person standing directly in front of you is moving around a bit and actively defending themselves. If they're not, they lose their Dex bonus (and you probably get a +4 bonus for being unseen). If they can't move at all, their Dex is effectively 0 (-5) and they take another -4 penalty to AC, so their base AC is 1, or you could coup-de-grace and automatically hit them.

Taking away 10 points of AC also terribly unbalances the game. It's already not a problem to hit people with the first two iterative attacks.

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1Slashing is strictly better than Piercing without static damage multipliers (like a Strength bonus - I'd have to do the math to figure out when Piercing overtakes). Double damage all the time is much better than double damage half the time.

Bludgeoning ignoring DR that doesn't specify bludgeoning doesn't work out well. DR never specifies the types that it defends against, only the types that are effective against it. DR 5/slashing on a zombie effectively means "Resist piercing 5" and "Resist bludgeoning 5".
Bludgeoning is also strictly better than the other two damage types, if only because making touch attacks is a big deal. Hitting with twice as many attacks (at high levels) as everybody else is more effective than doubling damage occasionally or doubling base damage only.

Electricity is terribly overpowered compared to all the other damage types. If you're set on the effect, it should stagger the target for 1 round unless they make their save.

DCs equal to damage dealt quickly outstrip even the most optimized saves. There's no chance that you're going to succeed on the saves, except against rounds 3+ of fire damage.

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1Armor as DR doesn't work too well, because damage scales very quickly. It makes some amount of sense that armor would give both AC and DR, though.

Why do gauntlets and boots give AC? They don't have much of an effect on how well you can dodge or how good your armor is at turning a blow away.

Shields giving two-weapon fighting penalties is terrible. It already wasn't worth using a shield, and now they penalize your attacks as well. I doubt the DR is worth it.

The health buffer works as a mechanic, but is rather complex. I'm not sure if the added complexity adds anything to the game, though having a bigger window for that conscious but bleeding out stage is nice.

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1The difference between the sexes isn't significant enough for most races to have a mechanical impact. I might point out that female humans have a higher pain tolerance than men, so a Constitution penalty is undeserved.

-1/+1 modifiers can't be balanced with 3.5's stat modifiers every 2 points. It's too easy to set each stat with an odd score and reap the benefits of the bonuses without the drawbacks of the penalties.

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1

The child inherits 0.5-50% of its parents collective experience.

So, two 6th-level parents produce, on average, a 4th level kid, before he does anything?

[Avianmosquito]

I'll look at the rest of the post soon, but this stuck out like a sore thumb. You can hit someone with the flat of the blade. That's quite a bit more nonlethal than the edge. Likewise, you can hit someone in the stomach instead of the ribs with a blunt weapon.

It's harder to do, so you take a -4 penalty to hit when you try (under the normal rules).

The flat of a blade would still cause lethal damage, just less of it. It'd be like hitting somebody with a steel bar, it's going to break their ribs, flatten their lungs, that kind of thing. You'd also damage your sword.

As for the stomach blow, a mace still rips a massive, jagged hole in a human body, while smashing everything in its way. You'd still kill them, it'd just take them longer to die.

The idea that a melee weapon can cause non-lethal damage is only present in people's minds because they really don't know what a melee weapon does to a human body. One look at the wounds these things leave and you'd understand just how hard it would be to hit somebody without killing them. Sword wounds aren't tiny little scratches like TSR thinks they are. They're massive, jagged wounds reaching deep into vitals every time. People wounded by these weapons are immediately incapacitated and bleed to death in seconds. Short of strapping a bomb to their chest, there's no faster death. A mace does the same thing, just less efficiently. Actual blunt weapons such as clubs and hammers destroy vitals and rip open blood vessels no matter where you hit. Even your bare hands are quite likely to kill somebody, and do so surprisingly fast. There's no way to incapacitate somebody without the potential of death, because it takes more damage to incapacitate than to kill.

[Saidoro]

Just going through this and putting down my thoughts as they come up. If any of this comes off as harsh please be aware that that was not my intent.

Bludgeoning: Ignores any damage reduction other than an outright immunity, or any that effects bludgeoning damage in particular. (For instance, it does full damage against a zombie or demon, but nothing to a ghost, and a spell that specifically reduces bludgeoning damage will still work.) Any attack dealing bludgeoning damage is considered a touch attack.

Piercing: Negates an amount of damage reduction equal to the damage modifier. (IE: +2 rapier negates 2 points of DR.) Critical threat and critical damage are both doubled.

Slashing: Double listed damage dice. (IE: Longsword now does 2d8.)

It's worth noting that in a moderate or higher optimization environment slashing is rather less powerful than the other two(at least once you get past the first few levels, anyway.) Also, bludgeoning is the strongest, touch attacks mean power attacking for full and still hitting. Not sure if that's a problem in the sort of games you play but I'm putting it out there anyway.

Fire: Subject takes 1d2 secondary fire damage next round, plus an additional 1d2 for every ten points of damage taken. (IE: a 30-damage fireball has 4d2 secondary.) Subject may make a fortitude save as a free action and with a DC equal to the initial fire damage to negate this effect, they may also attempt to extenguish the fire manually as a move action, this uses the modifiers for reflex saves and has the same DC. Complete imersion in water automatically extinguishes the fire. The secondary fire damage triggers tertiary fire damage, tertiary triggers quaternary, and so on until a save is made or the flame is otherwise extinguished. If this effect kills a character and brings their hitpoint total to a negative with the same absolute value as their health, they are incinerated.

Those are some really high DCs, recall that at tenth level a caster will be doing on average 35 points of damage with a fireball, but a spell of the higest level they can cast will have a DC of 19-21.

Electricity: For one round, plus an additional round for every ten points of damage, the target must make a fortitude save with a DC equal to the damage or lose their action. Once a save is made, this effect is terminated. If affected by several of these effects, the save DCs are added together. This effect does not function against creatures immune to paralysis.

Again, massive DC. I guess I'll stop mentioning that because the rest are probably the same.

Force: Causes a character to fall over. A successful reflex save with a DC equal to damage negates this effect.

It's a bit underpowered. Any ideas on how to balance this effect against the others?

Force is generally balanced by the fact that it works against absolutely anything.

Positive and negative energy are unnafected.

Again, a bit underpowered. I guess their ability to heal is something, but it isn't enough. Anything I can do to balance these two? I would prefer something symettrical, so their effects are opposites when applied against the living and the undead.

A small temporary penalty to d20 rolls and caster level that stacks with itself. Think negative level-light.

Gauntlets are now linked to a set of armour. They use that armour's stats for protection and armour check, providing an equal health buffer. Instead of damage reduction, however, they provide an AC bonus. (IE: Leather gloves provide a health buffer and AC bonus of 2.) This effect is stackable. They do not cap dexterity, but they apply the armour check penalty to all actions taking fine motor skills. Specifically, open lock, slight of hand and disable device.

Other skill checks may be deemed to require fine motor skills, consult your DM.

Why would you even need to separate this out from the rest of your armor?

For instance, a full suit of leather, with a small leather shield, would provide a damage reduction of 4, AC bonus of 8 and health buffer of 8.

Missing adequate penalties for lack of proficiency from gauntlets, boots, helmets and shields.

That is a lot of AC. So basically no one will be hitting each other at low levels without bludgeoning weapons. Also, all your rogues will be using quarterstaffs now.

Health buffer is a new effect. Every character has a health buffer (normally a little more than their health) which keeps them from dying. When a character reaches 0 HP, they are now disabled and dying but not unconscious. Additional damage (including exertion) is taken out of their health buffer until it reaches 0. The dying character's health buffer and health are both damaged by one point each round due to blood loss, but regardless of health they are not unconscious unless their health buffer reaches 0. When a character takes nonlethal damage greater than their hit points, they are not considered dying (and do not bleed) but they are considered disabled (and take exertion damage) and their health buffer is reduced by further nonlethal damage. Healing a character through any means restores their health buffer by an equal amount. Armour adds to a character's health buffer when equipped, and subtracts from it when removed. A character's maximum health buffer is the sum of their health and any bonuses they are recieving. Any bonus to constitution also adds to health buffer. (IE: Barbarian rage gives +4 constitution, so it would also give +4 to health buffer.) It is quite possible to bleed to death without ever losing consciousness.

Not just possible, likely. You haven't done anything about the fact that characters die at -10 and at higher levels it's really easy to overshoot those 10 hit points entirely.

Most of us were children when we started playing, so naturally we wanted to play as children, but the child template was unplayable, innacurate and extremely offensive. So we changed it.

DnD is by it's very nature an inaccurate game, and I really don't see what could be so offensive about a template. But then I've never seen the template in question so maybe it is just that bad, who knows.

Now, there are five age categories below adult. From the eldest to youngest, they are adolescent, youth, child, toddler and infant. For each age category they are younger than adult, they gain -1 strength and wisdom as well as a -4 to intimidate checks, but +1 dexterity and intelligence, +10% to all health restoration and a 20% experience bonus. For instance, an infant would have -5 strength and wisdom, but +5 dexterity and intelligence, with a 100% experience bonus. Adolescents are the same size as adults, youths and children are one size lower, infants and toddlers are two sizes lower.

Any character adolescent or younger is restricted to classes with a "simple" starting age, (or a number of homebrewed child classes) but no other. At youth or younger, they gain a -10 to diplomacy when dealing with adults. At child or younger, they gain a -4 on knowledge checks, which can be fixed by spending one skill point. At toddler or younger, they gain the "Illeteracy" feat. They also have a -4 on swim, jump and balance checks. An infant cannot walk, and must crawl at half rate. This effect can be removed by spending four skill points.

The initial idea was that children would start of weaker than adults, but level faster and be able to shed some of their weaknesses, becoming stronger than adults if given enough time. This is working fine, but I'm at a loss as to what aging is supposed to do with child-only classes. I'm thinking about having the child-only class levels convert to levels of a normal class, but that would mean a loss of class features.

You have completely failed at your initial idea. Not only are children not significantly less powerful than adults they are actually far stronger in some cases(toddler rogue == death). Also there's the fact that "suck now, awesome later" mechanics are generally seen as bad. Finally, some of the bonuses just don't make sense. Why is a toddler smarter than a wizard? or faster than a rogue? You don't generally see children going into high-risk areas because in just about every sense except learning certain types of new things children are at an objective disadvantage compared to adults. That's not to say there's no way of making child adventurers but I think you're going about it the wrong way.

Sex is not an aesthetic difference, there are physical differences between men and women. This had to be addressed, but it had to be addressed in an accurate manner, and it's not going to be the same between species. How we did it was simple. Each species has modifiers to their physical abilities (NEVER mental) for each sex, some positive and some negative. The net gain is always 0. For instance, human males have +2 strength but -2 dexterity, while females have -1 strength and constitution but +2 dexterity. This means that if their stats were rolled the same, he would have three higher strength and one higher constitution, but she would have four higher dexterity. Overall balanced, but it shifts the playstyles for each sex significantly.

Odd racial adjustments are bad game design. They mean that a character can either get a negligible benefit (if the stat enhanced started off even) or a significant benefit(if the stat started off odd) based on a fairly random factor.
Also, a dexterity differential of 4 points between sexes is rather massive, that's bigger than the difference between dwarves and elves.

Overall, the effects of pregnancy (physical and mental) are detrimental. During pregnancy, ten times the wieght of the child is added to her encumbrance, although only three times the child's wieght is actually added to her. The wieght of the child starts at 0, and increases by 1/9th birth wieght (1/180th adult wieght) each ninth of the pregnancy. A pregnant woman recieves a -1 on balance, climb, hide, jump, move silently, ride, swim and tumble checks and -1 to AC for each ninth of the pregnancy that has passed.

This is really harsh. It pretty much takes her out of combat for the duration. It needs to be lightened, the question is how. I'm thinking about shedding some of the skill penalties, possibly the AC penalty too, but which ones to keep?

Or you could just say pregnant women shouldn't be adventuring... I mean really, there are reasons why pregnant people don't go into combat in real life, if anything the later penalties aren't large enough.

Each time you rest, determine the effects of your hormones, which can be positive or negative. Take two four-sided die, choose one to subtract from the other and then roll. This is the modifier for your intelligence. Repeat, this time wisdom, and again for charisma.

This is...strange.

The child inherits 0.5-50% of its parents collective experience. (Roll a d100, divide by 2.) It's class is treated as "commoner," but this may be changed as soon as the infant is born. It starts of classified as nine age categories younger than an infant, (see the "child" section above) and each ninth of the pregnancy that passes is one age category older. If the mother dies and the child is still alive, the child must make a fortitude save with a DC of 45 minus 5 for each ninth of the pregnancy elapsed or die. (IE: 1/3 way through the DC is 30.) If successful, the child survives and is born premature.

So your world works on Lamarkian evolution then? I suppose stranger things have happened in fantasy worlds. It might be better to say that the parents are able to raise a child to have the average of their experiences if they take the time to do so though.
Also: 1 in 20 fetuses can survive having their mother killed one week after being conceived, gotcha.

We aren't nice at the expense of reality.

Yeah, you kind of are.

The elderly are NOT mentally superior to the young, quite the opposite. People who can't remember their own names half the time should not have a natural intelligence bonus.

So, newborns shouldn't have an intelligence bonus, gotcha.

Each age category above adult now gives a -1 penalty to all physical attributes as well as intelligence and charisma, -1 to search, -2 spot and listen, -5% healing and -10% experience. It also gives +2 wisdom, +4 to will saves, +1 gather information, bluff & knowledge, +2 appraise & concentration, and +4 diplomacy, proffession & sense motive. Classes with older starting ages now get at least one small advantage to balance out the weakness of being old. (IE: Wizards now get two additional cantrips and one additional level-one spell to start with, and a few extra bonus spells as time goes on. The end number is now 10 cantrips, 5 of every other spell.)

It's hard deciding on appropriate bonuses for non-caster classes. I might need some help with that, but I'm not sure yet.

It feels really weird to be making children significantly better adventurers than adults when in reality they would be much worse and simultaneously making the middle aged significantly worse adventurers when in reality they would be about the same.

Base AC is now ten points lower for all creatures.

Oh, so that's how you're counteracting the major AC expansion of using armor, okay carry on then.

Magic missile can miss. It now counts as a +20 ranged touch attack, using base attack modifier, caster level and intelligence (or wisdom/charisma, whatever you use to cast) as modifiers. This makes it missing virtually, but not completely, impossible to miss with.

Why?

1 is not an automatic failure, 20 is not an automatic success. You can fail with a 20, and hit with a 1. Both are quite easy, in fact.

Why?

Characters die at a negative number of equal absolute value to their health. (IE: An 8hp character dies at -8, a 40hp character dies at -40.)

Disregard what I said above at health buffers, you may want to put these two rules next to each other.

Spot and listen are now intelligence-based, not wisdom based.

Why?

[Avianmosquito]

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1Base AC of 10 assumes that the person standing directly in front of you is moving around a bit and actively defending themselves. If they're not, they lose their Dex bonus (and you probably get a +4 bonus for being unseen). If they can't move at all, their Dex is effectively 0 (-5) and they take another -4 penalty to AC, so their base AC is 1, or you could coup-de-grace and automatically hit them.

Taking away 10 points of AC also terribly unbalances the game. It's already not a problem to hit people with the first two iterative attacks.

When this rule was made, we had another rule in place that greatly increased modifiers. Since that has been scrapped, this one can be too.

---

1Slashing is strictly better than Piercing without static damage multipliers (like a Strength bonus - I'd have to do the math to figure out when Piercing overtakes). Double damage all the time is much better than double damage half the time.

The balance was supposed to be that piercing damage was more effective against DR of all forms. This way a rogue with a bow isn't completely hopeless against absolutely everything undead. Basically, the few points removed from all DR was supposed to make it better against armoured opponents than slashing, and the additional critical chance and damage was supposed to even it out overall.

Bludgeoning ignoring DR that doesn't specify bludgeoning doesn't work out well. DR never specifies the types that it defends against, only the types that are effective against it. DR 5/slashing on a zombie effectively means "Resist piercing 5" and "Resist bludgeoning 5".
Bludgeoning is also strictly better than the other two damage types, if only because making touch attacks is a big deal. Hitting with twice as many attacks (at high levels) as everybody else is more effective than doubling damage occasionally or doubling base damage only.

This was set to allow it to bypass armour. The effect was supposed to be so it was only affected by immunities, like that a ghost possessed. We also had spells that affected only one kind. Still, just making it a touch attack and setting armour to DR X/bludgeoning should do it.

Electricity is terribly overpowered compared to all the other damage types. If you're set on the effect, it should stagger the target for 1 round unless they make their save.

DCs equal to damage dealt quickly outstrip even the most optimized saves. There's no chance that you're going to succeed on the saves, except against rounds 3+ of fire damage.

How about half the damage? And yes, one round for electricity will work.

---

1Armor as DR doesn't work too well, because damage scales very quickly. It makes some amount of sense that armor would give both AC and DR, though.

Why do gauntlets and boots give AC? They don't have much of an effect on how well you can dodge or how good your armor is at turning a blow away.

Actually, DR should be fine. Full plate armour would be DR 8/bludgeon. I suppose it should be a bit higher, though. As for AC from gauntlets and boots, it only makes sense for the former. It's a deflection bonus, you can't use a bare hard to deflect the weapon away from yourself. I suppose that should be an active thing, really, and the boots shouldn't do it at all.

Shields giving two-weapon fighting penalties is terrible. It already wasn't worth using a shield, and now they penalize your attacks as well. I doubt the DR is worth it.

Hmmm... How about removing the two-weapon fighting penalty, and just going for a normal attack penalty? 1-5 points, depending on size, reduced to 0 by a feat. That's better than what they had. Hell, the shield doesn't count towards arcane spell failure or cap dexterity anymore, and it doesn't even give an armour check penalty. You're got to have a trade off somewhere.

The health buffer works as a mechanic, but is rather complex. I'm not sure if the added complexity adds anything to the game, though having a bigger window for that conscious but bleeding out stage is nice.

It's always worked out fine for us. There's probably a more elegant way to do it, but this is what we have.

---

1The difference between the sexes isn't significant enough for most races to have a mechanical impact. I might point out that female humans have a higher pain tolerance than men, so a Constitution penalty is undeserved.

Would you rather -2 strength instead?

-1/+1 modifiers can't be balanced with 3.5's stat modifiers every 2 points. It's too easy to set each stat with an odd score and reap the benefits of the bonuses without the drawbacks of the penalties.

Alrighty then. +2/-2 only that should fix that.

---

1
So, two 6th-level parents produce, on average, a 4th level kid, before he does anything?

Strong parents should mean a strong child, although I see what you're getting at. 1-20% would be better. It starts the little one off nice and strong, but still shows his complete lack of experience.

[Avianmosquito]

Just going through this and putting down my thoughts as they come up. If any of this comes off as harsh please be aware that that was not my intent.


It's worth noting that in a moderate or higher optimization environment slashing is rather less powerful than the other two(at least once you get past the first few levels, anyway.) Also, bludgeoning is the strongest, touch attacks mean power attacking for full and still hitting. Not sure if that's a problem in the sort of games you play but I'm putting it out there anyway.

Well, how about just explicitly saying it ignores armour AC/DR and leaving it at that? That way anything but armour will work as it did previously, but armour itself won't help. (Because really, armour doesn't help with a blunt weapon.)

Those are some really high DCs, recall that at tenth level a caster will be doing on average 35 points of damage with a fireball, but a spell of the higest level they can cast will have a DC of 19-21.

Again, massive DC. I guess I'll stop mentioning that because the rest are probably the same.

I'll set that to 1/2 damage, rounded down. That should do it. When we made this rule, another rule was boosting modifiers by 5 points, but that one doesn't exist anymore so I should change to compensate.

Force is generally balanced by the fact that it works against absolutely anything.

Well, yes. I suppose that's true.

A small temporary penalty to d20 rolls and caster level that stacks with itself. Think negative level-light.

Right. One, then another for each point after, DC 1/2 damage.

Why would you even need to separate this out from the rest of your armor?

That is a lot of AC. So basically no one will be hitting each other at low levels without bludgeoning weapons. Also, all your rogues will be using quarterstaffs now.

Yeah, I'm removing the boot AC entirely and making guantlet AC an active defense. That should do it.

Not just possible, likely. You haven't done anything about the fact that characters die at -10 and at higher levels it's really easy to overshoot those 10 hit points entirely.

Actually, I have. You die at a negative number equal to your hit points, and your enemy isn't waiting for you to bleed out. Your health buffer will probably be overshot entirely at higher levels, and at lower ones it keeps you on your feet another couple rounds.

DnD is by it's very nature an inaccurate game, and I really don't see what could be so offensive about a template. But then I've never seen the template in question so maybe it is just that bad, who knows.

It really is. It basically says "Cut all stats in half, including hit points, give massive attack penalty. Lock XP in place so children never gain XP at all ever." I started playing D&D when I was ten years old, when I read that I took my sourcebook outside and blasted it with a shotgun.

You have completely failed at your initial idea. Not only are children not significantly less powerful than adults they are actually far stronger in some cases(toddler rogue == death).

...Except they are forced to use a tiny bow, which deals 1d3 damage. Don't forget how crippling size adjustment is.

Also there's the fact that "suck now, awesome later" mechanics are generally seen as bad.

If we didn't like that kind of mechanic, we wouldn't play spellcasters at all. Still, I can always scrap it and work out new balances.

Finally, some of the bonuses just don't make sense. Why is a toddler smarter than a wizard? or faster than a rogue?

The former is because intelligence is a measure of processing power and learning ability, and children are objectively better at both of these things. The latter is because of square-cube law, which basically says "smaller scale, higher strength-wieght ratio."

You don't generally see children going into high-risk areas because in just about every sense except learning certain types of new things children are at an objective disadvantage compared to adults.

Not really. They are at a physical disadvantage only, and even then they've got better motor-control and the full benefit of square-cube law.

That's not to say there's no way of making child adventurers but I think you're going about it the wrong way.

Ug. I can just remove the mental differences, lessen their limitations and reduce their XP and health bonuses. Then it's just a question of smaller and more dextrous or larger and more powerful. If you like ranged combat, play a child. Like melee combat, play an adult. Simple.

Odd racial adjustments are bad game design. They mean that a character can either get a negligible benefit (if the stat enhanced started off even) or a significant benefit(if the stat started off odd) based on a fairly random factor.
Also, a dexterity differential of 4 points between sexes is rather massive, that's bigger than the difference between dwarves and elves.

Well, setting it so only multiples of 2 are used is easy. I can also make it so neither of them has a negative, it's just +2 strength for the male and +2 dexterity for the female. Problem solved.

Or you could just say pregnant women shouldn't be adventuring... I mean really, there are reasons why pregnant people don't go into combat in real life, if anything the later penalties aren't large enough.

Well, no they shouldn't. Maybe adding on a growing DEX penalty to compliment their increasing encumbrance?

This is...strange.

He threw it in as a joke. It stuck because the players loved gambling with their stats. I never did, so I can scrap it without remorse.

So your world works on Lamarkian evolution then? I suppose stranger things have happened in fantasy worlds. It might be better to say that the parents are able to raise a child to have the average of their experiences if they take the time to do so though.

Strong parents will have a strong child, we already know this. I decided to reduce it to 1-20% instead.

Also: 1 in 20 fetuses can survive having their mother killed one week after being conceived, gotcha.

Like anybody can really make a fortitude save of 45, when there's no more automatic success.

So, newborns shouldn't have an intelligence bonus, gotcha.

There's a difference between "not remembering because your brain is mostly dead" and "not being able to say it because you haven't learned any languages." It's an obvious one, too.

It feels really weird to be making children significantly better adventurers than adults when in reality they would be much worse and simultaneously making the middle aged significantly worse adventurers when in reality they would be about the same.

They have slightly lower stats overall. Hell, I'm just going to cut off the mental penalties and just let the physical ones sit there as they are. That would mean childhood would only affect strength, dexterity, healing and experience. Their disadvantages such as illiteracy will remain.

Being old would be -x strength, -x constitution, +2x wisdom, and -10x% experience. A 40-year old adventurer will be only slightly worse than a 20-year old adventurer. When in reality most 40-year old men can't run 100 metres without having to stop and catch their breath.

Why?

Because the spell fires a projectile. Even homing projectiles miss. The immense modifier should mean it'll only miss if fired at an opponent that dodges very well, in which case it's because they dove out of the way of a spell that normally would never have a problem.

Why?

Because a competent individual should not screw up automatically 5% of the time, and an incompetant individual should not succeed automatically 5% of the time.

Disregard what I said above at health buffers, you may want to put these two rules next to each other.

Agreed.

Why?

Because, as has been repeatedly pointed out, your wisdom score increases as you age. When you age your vision and hearing should get worse, not better. Then again, intelligence doesn't make sense for this either, so I'll tie it to constitution. A healthy individual should have better senses than an unhealthy one, after all, while brainpower and senses have little to do with one another.

Oh, and a note: You commented in a thread that was double-posted. There's a good chance that it'll be deleted.

[Talentless]

Well, how about just explicitly saying it ignores armour AC/DR and leaving it at that? That way anything but armour will work as it did previously, but armour itself won't help. (Because really, armour doesn't help with a blunt weapon.)

False. Armor does help, especially the non metal kind. Take a hammer, hit your hand with enough force to bruise. Repeat while wearing a leather work glove, the blow will be noticeably softer.

Blunt Force trauma is a great plate armor killer, but properly made plate can still block or blunt the blows from a mace. It isn't as effective as against a sword, but it still works.

I'd say Halve your current rules effect to be more accurate, and remove it's effect from the light armor classification.

It really is. It basically says "Cut all stats in half, including hit points, give massive attack penalty. Lock XP in place so children never gain XP at all ever." I started playing D&D when I was ten years old, when I read that I took my sourcebook outside and blasted it with a shotgun.



...Except they are forced to use a tiny bow, which deals 1d3 damage. Don't forget how crippling size adjustment is.

But... children aren't supposed to even BE adventurers except by necessity.
And I'd like you to find me a real life child (11 or younger) who can use a full sized English Longbow without hurting themselves. If one even exists, it is a 1 in a million longshot of genetics.

The former is because intelligence is a measure of processing power and learning ability, and children are objectively better at both of these things. The latter is because of square-cube law, which basically says "smaller scale, higher strength-wieght ratio."


Not really. They are at a physical disadvantage only, and even then they've got better motor-control and the full benefit of square-cube law.

... do you even understand what you are trying to use as justification? A child cannot apply any more strength to what they are doing than an adult can on a proportional basis. Kids do not have anywhere near as much of a strength-weight ratio as you are assuming.

As for the intelligence, it isn't just a function of learning ability, it is also a function of information retention, memory, and ability to grasp advanced concepts built from a broader base. 99% of all children cannot do that last bit.

And why would you even want to play a child in the first place? If you want to play something small, there are halflings and gnomes for that.

Well, no they shouldn't. Maybe adding on a growing DEX penalty to compliment their increasing encumbrance?

Do you even need this? Why not just DM fiat, your character is pregnant, you can't use her for *gestation period* in game months.



I can understand a bit of what you are doing. And the all this isn't meant as criticism, but you are trying to add realism to the game of Dungeons and Dragons. It isn't built to be realistic.

GURPS or other rule sets are much better for what you want done.

Also, I don't mean to be as harsh as I am, but I would really like you to actually take some time and do some research into the physics and abilities of children compared to adults in real life, then see just how much more unrealistic your children template rules are compared to the one WotC put out.

[Spiryt]

Bludgeoning damage is seriosuly broken. That for a quick tip.

Definitely all of them are a bit too potent changes, but bludgeoning screws stuff seriously.

There's absolutely no point for it either.

Then it's just a question of smaller and more dextrous or larger and more powerful. If you like ranged combat, play a child. Like melee combat, play an adult. Simple.

That doesn't make any sense.

Children are not more dexterous than adult beings, nor are they better shooters, archers, or whatever...

[Avianmosquito]

I'm going to be direct. Do not be insulted. I am not trying to offend you.

But... children aren't supposed to even BE adventurers except by necessity.
And I'd like you to find me a real life child (11 or younger) who can use a full sized English Longbow without hurting themselves. If one even exists, it is a 1 in a million longshot of genetics.

That's called a size limitation. Children are small, so they cannot use medium longbows. Just like halflings cannot either.

... do you even understand what you are trying to use as justification? A child cannot apply any more strength to what they are doing than an adult can on a proportional basis. Kids do not have anywhere near as much of a strength-weight ratio as you are assuming.

Yes they can, and then some. A male child of 8 years should have about half the strength of an adult, but a quarter of the wieght. That's a twice the strength-wieght ratio, which means ~40% better acceleration. Children can also become very strong, very fast. My daughter, age 10, is stronger than most grown men, and she got that strong through play alone. So it isn't very far fetched that a child regularly involved in actual combat would quickly gain power as well, now is it?

As for the intelligence, it isn't just a function of learning ability, it is also a function of information retention, memory, and ability to grasp advanced concepts built from a broader base. 99% of all children cannot do that last bit.

Congratulations. That was one of the most ageist things I have ever heard in my life.

Actually, there are NO differences in the basic though processes of children and adults. They can grasp any concept just as well as an adult, and the very fact that you believe they cannot is a sign of a complete and total lack of experience with children. Just having been a child once should have told you that was not true.

And why would you even want to play a child in the first place? If you want to play something small, there are halflings and gnomes for that.

I started playing D&D when I was 10. My daughter plays it now. She plays a child because she is one, just like I did. I usually play an adult, but it's her I'm concerned about.

Do you even need this? Why not just DM fiat, your character is pregnant, you can't use her for *gestation period* in game months.

Sometimes the plot can't wait that long. Especially since the math says elf gestation time is nine years.

I can understand a bit of what you are doing. And the all this isn't meant as criticism, but you are trying to add realism to the game of Dungeons and Dragons. It isn't built to be realistic.

GURPS or other rule sets are much better for what you want done.

I have D&D 3.5, I do not have GURPS. I have played D&D for years. I have never played GURPS. I have played rules quite similar to these in D&D and they worked fine. I haven't a clue how they'd work in GURPS. That's about enough said.

Also, I don't mean to be as harsh as I am, but I would really like you to actually take some time and do some research into the physics and abilities of children compared to adults in real life, then see just how much more unrealistic your children template rules are compared to the one WotC put out.

What, the one that said "children are worse at everything and can never learn anything?" That one? NOTHING could EVER be further from the truth. I know kids. I spend a lot of time with kids. Being a father tends to turn out that way. I know the physical abilities of children quite well, while all you have are huge, strongly ageist preconcieved notions with no basis in fact at all. If you applied similar logic to any other group, what you just said would be considered hate speech, but for some reason, people tend to be more lenient when you're insulting children.

I have actually measured a number of these things. After all, I have a child available that will do almost anything, as long as it doesn't hurt her, and her friends are willing to pitch in as well. She has a lot of friends. Just upper body strength has been measured, by me, on over 100 different occasions across multiple age groups. Why? Because I'm bored and the equipment is available. Dexterity is another easy one to measure, and children score better univerally. I can only measure constitution as the health of the circulatory and respiratory systems, but I've done that well enough.

That's all I have, though. Intelligence is hard to measure, wisdom isn't real and charisma is subjective. All I have is a basic idea of the former from observation alone, and what I can see (and what I remember) says children are so much more intelligent than adults their view of us as mentally deficient, closed-minded morons is entirely justified.

[Avianmosquito]

Children are not more dexterous than adult beings, nor are they better shooters, archers, or whatever...

Actually, they are more dextrous. There are a number of tests for measuring dexterity. Most common one is a trace test, where a pattern is traced to measure motor control. Children perform universally better at it. Which makes sense, actually. Their joints are much looser, so their movements should be much smoother.

And also, children are naturally better shots than adults, because they have steadier hands and better eyes. I've taught my daughter, and a few other children, to fire a number of weapons, modern and historical. I've also taught adults. The children start off noticeably better shots than adults, and then improve by far faster. Their natural abilities are partitularly well suited to this, and they learn quickly.

[Ashtagon]

My daughter, age 10, is stronger than most grown men, and she got that strong through play alone. So it isn't very far fetched that a child regularly involved in actual combat would quickly gain power as well, now is it?

I think you'll find that most grown men in an arm wrestling contest with a 10 year old girl will not use their full strength, because they are well aware that they could easily hurt her.

[lunar2]

on children. this is a bit rough, but i had to work through this before, mostly for npcs related to the pcs. it's based on humans, but could be reworked for any race with a bit of effort.

ability scores are rolled at birth.

strength: an infant (0-6 months) has str 1, no matter what their roll is. at 6 months, they gain 1 str (str 2). at 1 year, they gain 1 str (str 3). every two years after that, they gain 1 str (4 at 3 years, 5 at 5, etc.) so that at 15, they will have the full (average) strength. if they rolled above average strength, then starting at 3, they gain one additional point every other year until the above average portion of their strength is gained. if there are any leftover points, such as from an 18 base strength, they are all gained at 15.

dexterity: an infant has dexterity 1. every 6 months after birth, they gain 1 point of dexterity, until they reach their base value. for an average human, this would result in full dexterity at age 5, when most kids get the hang of skills like hand-eye coordination.

constitution: start at 1, add 1 per year. at 15, any leftover constitution is gained then.

intelligence: start at 3, add 1 per 3 months. children gain proficiency with their first language when their intelligence hits 10. from the ages of 5 to 10, children get a +2 to intelligence.

wisdom:start at 1, gain 1 per month. young children don't have the developed mental aspects of wisdom, but they are extremely perceptive (spot, listen, sense motive), and often stubborn (will save), so their effective wisdom is the same as an adult from early on.

charisma: start at 1, gain 1 per year, gain leftovers at 15.

size: tiny until 4. small until 12. no ability score changes based on size.

speed: 10 until 2. 20 until 12.

experience: children under 5 are still building the underlying framework to process their experiences. they don't gain experience, do not have feats or skill points, but do have a single d4 hit die. children from 5 to 10 gain 10% more experience from encounters, because their minds are geared towards learning at this point. they can only gain levels in simple classes, however, and do not have access to class features.

[Avianmosquito]

I think you'll find that most grown men in an arm wrestling contest with a 10 year old girl will not use their full strength, because they are well aware that they could easily hurt her.

One, that's not how these things are measured. I use gravity and a machine. They show no bias. The average for a female in her age group is ~300n on their dominant arm. My sample size was small, though, so she propably offset it a fair bit. She came in at ~540n. The average for an adult male is 450n. I come in at ~840n. The wieghts were all 3 kilograms. That's as precise as I could get.

Two, she'd be pretty hard to injure with that kind of force. Childrens bones are softer and more flexible than an adult's. Her arm would bend rather than breaking, and the bending is so obvious nobody could fail to notice it in time. Especially since it would hurt.

Three, nobody ever uses their full strength unless they absolutely half to, otherwise they will seriously injure themselves. If those measurements up above had been using full strength, they would be about five times as high.

Also, adults who know her are more afraid of her than they are of hurting her. Last time an adult, other than me, pissed her off she punched him and nearly killed him.

[Avianmosquito]

on children. this is a bit rough, but i had to work through this before, mostly for npcs related to the pcs. it's based on humans, but could be reworked for any race with a bit of effort.

ability scores are rolled at birth.

strength: an infant (0-6 months) has str 1, no matter what their roll is. at 6 months, they gain 1 str (str 2). at 1 year, they gain 1 str (str 3). every two years after that, they gain 1 str (4 at 3 years, 5 at 5, etc.) so that at 15, they will have the full (average) strength. if they rolled above average strength, then starting at 3, they gain one additional point every other year until the above average portion of their strength is gained. if there are any leftover points, such as from an 18 base strength, they are all gained at 15.

dexterity: an infant has dexterity 1. every 6 months after birth, they gain 1 point of dexterity, until they reach their base value. for an average human, this would result in full dexterity at age 5, when most kids get the hang of skills like hand-eye coordination.

constitution: start at 1, add 1 per year. at 15, any leftover constitution is gained then.

intelligence: start at 3, add 1 per 3 months. children gain proficiency with their first language when their intelligence hits 10. from the ages of 5 to 10, children get a +2 to intelligence.

wisdom:start at 1, gain 1 per month. young children don't have the developed mental aspects of wisdom, but they are extremely perceptive (spot, listen, sense motive), and often stubborn (will save), so their effective wisdom is the same as an adult from early on.

charisma: start at 1, gain 1 per year, gain leftovers at 15.

size: tiny until 4. small until 12. no ability score changes based on size.

speed: 10 until 2. 20 until 12.

experience: children under 5 are still building the underlying framework to process their experiences. they don't gain experience, do not have feats or skill points, but do have a single d4 hit die. children from 5 to 10 gain 10% more experience from encounters, because their minds are geared towards learning at this point. they can only gain levels in simple classes, however, and do not have access to class features.

I prefer the way I did it. The age groups are simple and clear-cut, and the modifiers fit quite well. It plays very well, actually. Not only that, it actually fits the abilities of real-world children.

[Spiryt]

And also, children are naturally better shots than adults, because they have steadier hands and better eyes. I've taught my daughter, and a few other children, to fire a number of weapons, modern and historical. I've also taught adults. The children start off noticeably better shots than adults, and then improve by far faster. Their natural abilities are partitularly well suited to this, and they learn quickly.

Children do improve much faster than adults, it's whole point of being children.

Adults can learn that well, but still when children taught shooting will grow adult, they will be much better archers than in their kid years.

Anyway, I'm not really sure why children should have 'steadier hands and better eyes" to be honest.

Humans motion coordination gets much better after they mature, that's one of the main reason why older kids can easily bully (and do other 'richard' things younger ones in schools, even if there's not much size difference.

I, for example, was much more active as a kid than I am now, and yet I'm much more coordinated and agile than I was as a kid.

Kids are still not fully developed as far as motion goes, obviously.

Actually, they are more dextrous. There are a number of tests for measuring dexterity. Most common one is a trace test, where a pattern is traced to measure motor control. Children perform universally better at it. Which makes sense, actually. Their joints are much looser, so their movements should be much smoother.

Interesting. Any data on this? Looser joints do allow easier motion in many cases, I guess, but that would probably constitute for greater "agility" at most. Not actual precision.

My daughter, age 10, is stronger than most grown men, and she got that strong through play alone.

That's simply silly.

Don't know what are your kids doing, and how, but it's impossible for 10, at most 100 poundish girl to be stronger than any healthy male adult.

Maybe in simple, rigorously trained powerlifting activities, but it's not healthy for 10 years old girl.

The former is because intelligence is a measure of processing power and learning ability, and children are objectively better at both of these things. The latter is because of square-cube law, which basically says "smaller scale, higher strength-wieght ratio."

Seriously? There are 1 in 2000 children who are able to finish college at 12 years old, or something, but it doesn't change the fact the children are not better at processing things, performing math, chemistry or whatever. There's reason education is gradual, after all.

Not only you need some knowledge before you can gain some more complicated ones, your brain must be also more 'trimmed' into it.

There's no way in which I would get some stuff I'm able to understand now, while I was 12. And I'm much more lazy and unmotivated than when I was 12....

Also, adults who know her are more afraid of her than they are of hurting her. Last time an adult pissed her off she punched him and nearly killed him.

Are you really hoping that anyone will believe it?

No matter how strong is 10 years old girl, she cannot really hurt adult, because, as you pointed out yourself:

Her bones are smaller, softer, more flexible in joints ,so cannot in any way carry enough impact to seriously injure any adult person....

[Mulletmanalive]

Actually, they are more dextrous. There are a number of tests for measuring dexterity. Most common one is a trace test, where a pattern is traced to measure motor control. Children perform universally better at it. Which makes sense, actually. Their joints are much looser, so their movements should be much smoother.

And also, children are naturally better shots than adults, because they have steadier hands and better eyes. I've taught my daughter, and a few other children, to fire a number of weapons, modern and historical. I've also taught adults. The children start off noticeably better shots than adults, and then improve by far faster. Their natural abilities are partitularly well suited to this, and they learn quickly.

As an archery instructor, I'm going to say that this is mostly bunk. No child under 14 i've ever taught has been able to draw my bow and it's not even that powerful. It doesn't matter if a child is pretty good with a zero strain weapon, such things won't penetrate armour. That is not half adult strenght. For reference, by the weight tables, i'm about strength 11-12.

Firing a crossbow, great, but again, i don't know any children who could possibly draw a crossbow with a draw necessary to punch through armour. One of my friends is a reenactor and he has to get teams of 4 10 year olds to work together to wind his arbalest.

I work teaching art to kids as well. Fine motor control on an 8 year old is not a +3 Dex, it's a -3 and they can't grasp concepts of fine control or restraint. The idea that you can do something other than simply mash a paintbrush against the paper escapes them and i've also found that the golden age for actually retaining skills is about 9-10, where you can finally actually expect them to come back next week with what they were doing last time more or less in tact. I really doubt that leaves those younger qualifying for an XP bonus.

Feel free to disagree, you have kids and i'm just a professional educator.

A passable option is to simply make a child a small adult with a ranks cap of 1 + Level in any skill. That's -4 Strength, +2 Dexterity, +4 on Hide, massively reduced lifting and carrying and a reduced weapon size. Endurance as a bonus feat is probably also appropriate.

Also, don't assume that just because modern 40 year olds are unfit that people were historically. A good proportion of navigators [road, rail and canal builders] were 40+ and could dig for 10 hours a day without issue. I know men in their 60s who can do a great deal [perhaps not running but they aren't so inclined] without complaint and i know several folks who run marathons at that age.

[Avianmosquito]

Children do improve much faster than adults, it's whole point of being children.

Adults can learn that well, but still when children taught shooting will grow adult, they will be much better archers than in their kid years.

Anyway, I'm not really sure why children should have 'steadier hands and better eyes" to be honest.

Humans motion coordination gets much better after they mature, that's one of the main reason why older kids can easily bully (and do other 'richard' things younger ones in schools, even if there's not much size difference.

I, for example, was much more active as a kid than I am now, and yet I'm much more coordinated and agile than I was as a kid.

Kids are still not fully developed as far as motion goes, obviously.

Not true. You have more experience with most things that you did as a child, so you'd developed more skill at it, but in terms of actual coordination and agility, you'll find you've fallen quite a bit. Introduce a child and an adult at a new activity dependent on agility, the child will perform better. Same for dexterity. For instance, take a child will do better when using a game controller for the first time than an adult would. A child will perform better first time at anything revolving around complex motion than an adult would as well, freerunning for example.

Interesting. Any data on this? Looser joints do allow easier motion in many cases, I guess, but that would probably constitute for greater "agility" at most. Not actual precision.

Just my own data. The trace test is run through a scanner, the computer gives you back the accuracy. It is very sensitive. I, for instance, scored 57%. My daughter scored 89%. The average from the adult males was 32%. The average for young females was 56%. However, this is more a "sex" thing than an "age" thing. Adult females scored 44%. Young males scored 42%. So basically, children are more dextrous than adults, and females are more dextrous than males.

That's simply silly.

Don't know what are your kids doing, and how, but it's impossible for 10, at most 100 poundish girl to be stronger than any healthy male adult.

Maybe in simple, rigorously trained powerlifting activities, but it's not healthy for 10 years old girl.

She's 50kg. She doesn't train or anything. She spends a lot of time rough-housing, and she fights a lot. That's it. Yet she's still stronger than more grown men, despite being ~60% of their size. She really shouldn't be so strong, especially since she looks like any other pubescent child.

Seriously? There are 1 in 2000 children who are able to finish college at 12 years old, or something, but it doesn't change the fact the children are not better at processing things, performing math, chemistry or whatever. There's reason education is gradual, after all.

Not only you need some knowledge before you can gain some more complicated ones, your brain must be also more 'trimmed' into it.

There's no way in which I would get some stuff I'm able to understand now, while I was 12. And I'm much more lazy and unmotivated than when I was 12....

The reason they can't finish college at age 12 because it takes time to learn all the things required. Same reason you understand things that you didn't used to. You've learned a lot during the time. You're learning slower now. You're much dumber now. But you still know more because you've had time to learn.

[Avianmosquito]

As an archery instructor, I'm going to say that this is mostly bunk. No child under 14 i've ever taught has been able to draw my bow and it's not even that powerful. It doesn't matter if a child is pretty good with a zero strain weapon, such things won't penetrate armour. That is not half adult strenght. For reference, by the weight tables, i'm about strength 11-12.

Firing a crossbow, great, but again, i don't know any children who could possibly draw a crossbow with a draw necessary to punch through armour. One of my friends is a reenactor and he has to get teams of 4 10 year olds to work together to wind his arbalest.

I work teaching art to kids as well. Fine motor control on an 8 year old is not a +3 Dex, it's a -3 and they can't grasp concepts of fine control or restraint. The idea that you can do something other than simply mash a paintbrush against the paper escapes them and i've also found that the golden age for actually retaining skills is about 9-10, where you can finally actually expect them to come back next week with what they were doing last time more or less in tact. I really doubt that leaves those younger qualifying for an XP bonus.

Feel free to disagree, you have kids and i'm just a professional educator.

A passable option is to simply make a child a small adult with a ranks cap of 1 + Level in any skill. That's -4 Strength, +2 Dexterity, +4 on Hide, massively reduced lifting and carrying and a reduced weapon size. Endurance as a bonus feat is probably also appropriate.

Also, don't assume that just because modern 40 year olds are unfit that people were historically. A good proportion of navigators [road, rail and canal builders] were 40+ and could dig for 10 hours a day without issue. I know men in their 60s who can do a great deal [perhaps not running but they aren't so inclined] without complaint and i know several folks who run marathons at that age.

1. They can't fire the bow because they're too small. You need arms of a certain length to work a bow, and children don't have that. It isn't about strength because children aren't that weak.
2. Again, I've actually measured a number of these things to see how they stacked up. Dexterity was their best trait. All you can claim is a penalty to Profession(painter), and a size-based weapon restriction.
3. Technically, if their heart rate, blood pressure and lung capacity are anything to go by, they should have a constitution bonus as well. I didn't give them that because size should balance that out.
4. It's true, historical 40-year olds weren't out of shape... because they were DEAD.

[Avianmosquito]

Note: Sex modifiers are +2 for adults and adolescents, +1 for youths and children, and +0 for toddlers and infants.

I've got a better way to preserve the parent's traits than giving the child starting experience. Basically, the child gets their attributes from their parents instead of rolling.

Pick three ability scores and use the higher base ability score (before race, sex and age modifiers, but after level increases) from the child's parents. The other three use the lower measurements. At least two must come from each parent, if possible. Simple, and if the parents were high-level and rolled well, their child should have good starting attributes as a level 1 infant.

IE:

If a human's mother reads:
12STR
16DEX
12CON
12INT
12WIS
12CHA
76 Total

And the father reads:
16STR
12DEX
14CON
14INT
10WIS
10CHA
76 Total

Then you might pick the mother's DEX, WIS and CHA, but the father's STR, CON and INT. The father's +2 STR(sex) and the mother's +2 DEX(sex) are removed.

For an infant this would read:
9STR
19DEX
14CON
14INT
12WIS
12CHA
80 Total

Keep in mind that the child's ability scores will rise as he/she levels.

[Keinnicht]

One, that's not how these things are measured. I use gravity and a machine. They show no bias. The average for a female in her age group is ~300n on their dominant arm. My sample size was small, though, so she propably offset it a fair bit. She came in at ~540n. The average for an adult male is 450n. I come in at ~840n. The wieghts were all 3 kilograms. That's as precise as I could get.

Unless your daughter has a myostatin deficiency, or an unusual amount of anabolic steroids in her diet, I find your numbers implausible. About as implausible as I find your claim to be able to exert enough force to lift 188 pounds with your dominant arm, and your claim that the average female "in her age group" can lift 70 pounds. Most girls around that age weigh under 70 pounds, and I'm pretty sure most of them cannot pick each other up one-handed.

9STR
19DEX
14CON
14INT
12WIS
12CHA
80 Total

Keep in mind that the child's ability scores will rise as he/she levels.

Allow me to present a counterpoint:

An infant can drown in 2 inches of water. This pretty soundly demonstrates that they have neither a wisdom nor an intelligence bonus, regardless of whether or not they'd have one later in life.

[Avianmosquito]

Unless your daughter has a myostatin deficiency, or an unusual amount of anabolic steroids in her diet, I find your numbers implausible. About as implausible as I find your claim to be able to exert enough force to lift 188 pounds with your dominant arm, and your claim that the average female "in her age group" can lift 70 pounds. Most girls around that age weigh under 70 pounds, and I'm pretty sure most of them cannot pick each other up one-handed.

You think a 50kg, that's 110lb, pubescent female can't lift that much? Really? Also, that's the force put on a plate in front and to the side of the subject from a sitting position. That's the arm and a fair bit of the trunk. I used that because it's the best way to measure punching power.

She's 10. She's chest hieght, is a bit heavy for her hieght (which is normal in puberty) and technically qualifies as an adolescent. She's growing body hair and breasts, her voice is changing, the whole deal. Development wise, she's about that of a normal 11-12 year old girl.

[Keinnicht]

You think a 50kg, that's 110lb, pubescent female can't lift that much? Really? Also, that's the force put on a plate in front and to the side of the subject from a sitting position. That's the arm and a fair bit of the trunk. I used that because it's the best way to measure punching power.

Oh, okay. That makes a lot more sense.

My issue wasn't that I didn't think they could lift that much, it was that I didn't think they could lift that much with one arm. I thought we were talking a bicep-curl style, purely arm lift.

...So you can see why I thought those numbers sounded totally nuts.

[Avianmosquito]

Oh, okay. That makes a lot more sense.

My issue wasn't that I didn't think they could lift that much, it was that I didn't think they could lift that much with one arm. I thought we were talking a bicep-curl style, purely arm lift.

...So you can see why I thought those numbers sounded totally nuts.

Yes I can, I'm sorry I snapped at you.

[Chambers]

Actually, there are NO differences in the basic though processes of children and adults. They can grasp any concept just as well as an adult, and the very fact that you believe they cannot is a sign of a complete and total lack of experience with children. Just having been a child once should have told you that was not true.

Oh really? Jean Piaget would like a word with you. In brief, you're wrong.

---

In regard to your house rules, I would stop using all of them. I recommend playing HârnMaster instead. It has intricate rules for Armor and Weapons and will be more balanced (via years of playtesting by lots of groups) than your set of house rules.

[Avianmosquito]

Oh really? Jean Piaget would like a word with you. In brief, you're wrong.

---

In regard to your house rules, I would stop using all of them. I recommend playing HârnMaster instead. It has intricate rules for Armor and Weapons and will be more balanced (via years of playtesting by lots of groups) than your set of house rules.

Psychologists are quacks, child psychologists all the more so.

[Mystic Muse]

Same warning as Saidoro. If this comes off as harsh, that was not my intent. I know there are specific things you wanted help with, but I think you definitely need to re-examine a few of these rules if you're going to be playing 3.5 with other people because of some of the changes you've made.


First I'd like to ask a question. Why did you make these rules? A few of them seem to be trying to imitate real life (The rules for old age and the difference between sexes for example) whereas others look like they're trying to make it less realistic (Rules for pregnant PCs, damage that is by definition not lethal being potentially lethal, and Toddlers and Infants adventuring)

Now I'll go on to mechanical changes that don't have anything in particular to do with those.

There's no reason to make the changes you've made to magic missile. It's already a really weak spell.

I see no reason for the +10 bonus to attack rolls on characters using ranged weapons, especially when you've already decreased AC so much, and ranged is already a pretty lousy weapon style. It doesn't need to be nerfed further.

Unarmed strikes now have 18-20 critical threat, 2x critical damage. Medium creatures deal 1d6 bludgeoning damage, small deals 1d4, tiny deals 1d2, diminutive deals 1, fine 0. Large creatures deal 1d8, huge deals 1d12, gargantuan 2d8, and colossal 2d12. Can deal nonlethal damage at a -4 penalty to attack, although modifier damage is still regular bludgeoning. Uses both strength and dexterity modifiers on attack rolls, adds strength modifier to damage. (IE: 12STR & 12DEX = +2 attack) Unarmed attacks still provoke attacks of opportunity, which recieve a +10 attack bonus. If the improved unarmed strike is used, attacks still provoke attacks of opportunity, but the attack of opportunity no longer gains a +10, and you no longer suffer a -4 attack penalty to deal nonlethal damage. Two new feats, entitled "martial artist" and "pugilist" are added, which change critical threat to 16-20 and critical damage to 4x, respectively. With all of these, high strength and dexterity, hand to hand is now a decent option for melee combat. Without them it's still not as good as a melee weapon, but it isn't worthless anymore and will easily beat a ranged weapon if within range.

This has made unarmed attacks worse actually. Let's say you're a level 11 Monk facing off against a 12 headed Hydra. You attack 3 times, and in response the 12 Headed Hydra gets to attack you twenty four times. Considering how much lower AC is, the Monk is going to be hydra food. There's really no reason to use unarmed attacks when you get attacked in response. I suggest taking out the bit about being hit by an attack of opportunity in response.

[Avianmosquito]

Same warning as Saidoro. If this comes off as harsh, that was not my intent. I know there are specific things you wanted help with, but I think you definitely need to re-examine a few of these rules if you're going to be playing 3.5 with other people because of some of the changes you've made.


First I'd like to ask a question. Why did you make these rules? A few of them seem to be trying to imitate real life (The rules for old age and the difference between sexes for example) whereas others look like they're trying to make it less realistic (Rules for pregnant PCs, damage that is by definition not lethal being potentially lethal, and Toddlers and Infants adventuring)

Now I'll go on to mechanical changes that don't have anything in particular to do with those.

There's no reason to make the changes you've made to magic missile. It's already a really weak spell.

I see no reason for the +10 bonus to attack rolls on characters using ranged weapons, especially when you've already decreased AC so much, and ranged is already a pretty lousy weapon style. It doesn't need to be nerfed further.

This has made unarmed attacks worse actually. Let's say you're a level 11 Monk facing off against a 12 headed Hydra. You attack 3 times, and in response the 12 Headed Hydra gets to attack you twenty four times. Considering how much lower AC is, the Monk is going to be hydra food. There's really no reason to use unarmed attacks when you get attacked in response. I suggest taking out the bit about being hit by an attack of opportunity in response.

Only if the hydra has the "combat reflexes" feat. And also, unarmed attacks already provoke attacks of opportunity. Finally, the damage is greatly increased, the crit and damage are much higher, and the accuracy is the best of any weapon. It's better by far.

Oh, and the infants and toddlers weren't meant to go adventuring, at least not by themselves, they were meant to function better as NPCs. That's not to say you can't have them in a party, that's quite realistic... If you and the others are related. An adventurer that can't leave their child behind has to take them with.

[Chambers]

Psychologists are quacks, child psychologists all the more so.

I'm leaving the discussion, and honestly feel sad for you that you feel that way.

[Avianmosquito]

I'm leaving the discussion, and honestly feel sad for you that you feel that way.

I apologize if I offended you, but "that which can be claimed without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence." Until they have some actual evidence other than experiments specifically designed so that any result supports their crackpot theories, I will give them 0 credit.

[Chambers]

To clarify, I'm not offended. I feel pity for you. But this is out of bounds of the rules of the forum so we should drop it