Common rules new players/DMs don't know?

[Biggus]

Wild Shape:Despite the RAW doen't say what is "familiar", I believe there must be a Knowledge check (mostly "nature", but "the planes" for Elemental shape, "dungeoneering" - for Aberrations, "arcana" - for Magical Beasts and Dragons, "religion" - for Undead, and "local" - for Humanoids)

That's how I play it. Note that the same applies to Shapechange "you can become just about anything you are familiar with". Requiring knowledge checks for anything they haven't encountered in-game goes a long way towards reducing the OP nature of those abilities.

[rrwoods]

Sleep has a one round casting time.

Okay maybe most people know that but I don’t play casters and have always assumed it was a standard action!

[Darkstryder401]

This is the exact language of the spell



Everything that follows in the same paragraph is a description of what "another form of living creature" is. So we have enough "language and logic" that says the size restriction replaces, and the official examples are the tie breakers.

Unless you provide us with an oxford created language logic chart you have no proof that your reading is more logical than ours.

edit: To elaborate
Alter self has the size category restriction
"another form of living creature" does not have the size restriction.
"another form of living creature" replaces Alter Self so it does not inherit the size category restriction.
"another form of living creature" replaces Alter Self so its size category restriction replaces size category restriction.
Official Examples and Author of PHB says we're right.
You have nothing.

So we are not the ones house ruling.

When polymorphing into say a 10 headed hydra would I be able to use all the heads to attack in a turn? My DM said they are limbs and I don't have the ability to use more then two since I am a human.

Also would I use my base attack or the Hydras +10 per head?

[Crake]

When polymorphing into say a 10 headed hydra would I be able to use all the heads to attack in a turn? My DM said they are limbs and I don't have the ability to use more then two since I am a human.

Also would I use my base attack or the Hydras +10 per head?

The rule in alter self talking about not being able to make more attacks is referring to iterative attacks. If you only have 4 bab, you can still only make 1 iterative attack, even if you have 20 arms. However, the hydra's heads are natural weapons, and natural weapons do not adhere to the normal limits of iterative attacks, you can attack with all of your natural weapons, even if 5 or less bab. Additionally, hydras have a special rule that says they can attack with all of their heads even if they move. This is not listed as a special ability, but rather is written in the combat section of the monster's entry, and thus most people see it as a natural ability, and thus one you gain from polymorph. So if you polymorph into a hydra, not only should you be able to attack with all of your heads, you should also be able to attack with all of them after moving.

The attack bonus you would use while in hydra form would be your bab, + the hydra's strength modifier (varies based on the number of heads, +5 for 10 headed), -2 from being huge. Since your bab will be terrible, it would almost certainly be a better option to polymorph the party fighter instead of yourself.

Shadowy illumination provides a 20% miss chance unless the attacker has low-light vision. I'm guilty of forgetting this one myself embarrassingly often.

This isn't necessarily true. Light levels are relative, and low-light vision will often result in what is normally shadowy-illumination being normal light levels for the creature in question, but not always. The darkness spell for example creates shadowy illumination, and low-light vision will not help at all.

[Doctor Awkward]

This isn't necessarily true. Light levels are relative, and low-light vision will often result in what is normally shadowy-illumination being normal light levels for the creature in question, but not always. The darkness spell for example creates shadowy illumination, and low-light vision will not help at all.

On a related note, the rules regarding light and dark, concealment and hiding and how they interact. Whether or not you you can use the Hide skill to conceal yourself is entirely relative to each individual creature you are attempting to hide from.

For example, say you have a goblin with Darkvision at the end of a pitch black 80-foot room. A dwarf, and a human carrying a torch both enter and the goblin hunkers down in a corner to hide, using the darkness as concealment. Due to the torchlight, the goblin can easily see both the human and the dwarf in the distance even though they would otherwise be out of range of his Darkvision, meanwhile neither the dwarf nor the human can see him.

When they approach within 60 feet, the human still cannot see the goblin due to the torch only providing 40 feet of shadowy illumination. Meanwhile the dwarf notices the goblin automatically because he has nothing but the darkness to use as concealment and he cannot use darkness to hide itself within range of his Darkvision.

On the other hand, if it were an elf carrying the torch instead of a human, he would be entitled to an opposed Spot check to notice the goblin from the moment he entered the room, since his low-light vision would extend the shadowy illumination from the torch out to 80 feet, while the dwarf would not be able to see him at all until they moved 20 feet forward.

[StevenC21]

Apparently, "Cones" are actually two-dimensional quarter circles.

[Zanos]

This isn't necessarily true. Light levels are relative, and low-light vision will often result in what is normally shadowy-illumination being normal light levels for the creature in question, but not always. The darkness spell for example creates shadowy illumination, and low-light vision will not help at all.

On that note, Darkness cast in a dark area will actually make the area brighter.

[Crake]

Apparently, "Cones" are actually two-dimensional quarter circles.

can you provide a citation on this? Because the strafing breath weapon feat seems to suggest otherwise.

[Morcleon]

can you provide a citation on this? Because the strafing breath weapon feat seems to suggest otherwise.

From the Cone listing under Area:

A cone-shaped spell shoots away from you in a quarter-circle in the direction you designate. It starts from any corner of your square and widens out as it goes. Most cones are either bursts or emanations (see above), and thus won’t go around corners.

[Crake]

From the Cone listing under Area:

that would indeed be what a cone looks like on a 2d cross-section.

[StevenC21]

Yes.

But there is no evidence except for the name to suggest that they are, in fact, three dimensional.

[HouseRules]

Yes.

But there is no evidence except for the name to suggest that they are, in fact, three dimensional.

The New and the Old.

[Malphegor]

wait, so do cones not work as actual 3d cones if one is flying overhead? It's still a horizontal 2d plane? That's... silly.

dang, I was hoping to get out the formulas and work out the diameter some spells would have based on the angle of casting. Bit annoying to do but mechanically rad since if casting from directly overhead you can theoretically hit a bigger surface area (because circles are magic) than whilst on the ground...

[RoboEmperor]

wait, so do cones not work as actual 3d cones if one is flying overhead? It's still a horizontal 2d plane? That's... silly.

It is silly which is why it doesn't work like that. The rules did not mention height so some people are trying to make that look like a dysfunction when, you know, height is also 2D when viewed from the side instead of the top.

[StevenC21]

The argument is that because a circle is an inherently two dimensional construct, so too is a D&D 3.5e cone.

If you look at it from many angles, it would then become multiple cones, or rotate the single cone.

:p

[PoeticallyPsyco]

For all DMs with players wanting to play cool races, LA Buy-off rules are in Unearthed Arcana.

[Malphegor]

Grease (level 1 spell) probably shouldn't be able to be lit on fire, given that a Level 2 spell, Incendinary Slime is Grease but instantly flammable (although it destroys the grease effect if you do set it on fire), and Grease itself makes no mention of the Grease itself being flammable...

my group houseruled in that grease can be lit on fire and it burns slowly because it was handy to have an early aoe in our early dungeons but it's 1d6 per round of fire damage to contrast against IS's 4d6 immediately, and it's not been something we've abused to be honest.