Favorate Home Rules

[Richard_Chilton]

We have threads for custom powers, IoPs, and other custom things - but what are people's favour home rules?

What templates do people like? Do some groups ditch templates entirely? Make moving between templates easy?

Personally, I treat some of the templates as very elastic.  When someone in our group makes a sorcerer or minor talent, I always have a "where do you want to take this" talk with them.  Some people like playing a character whose mystic powers will never increase while others just don't have the refresh available to make what they want - and in a couple of cases people wanted to play out the "I'm still learning but someday will be" learning process.  In one case - imagine everything on the wizard's template except Soulgaze (which would be free) because the person wanted to play an apprentice and saw the development of Soulgaze as the last step to becoming a wizard.

So, anyone else want to share what homebrew worked for you and what didn't?

Richard

[Sanctaphrax]

I ignore templates entirely, I view them as a tool to keep character creation simple for new players.

I also let Lawbreaker add to power and complexity.

Plus I roll for initiative, and I use a modified version of spin.

And I use a fair bit of homebrew content, as you might expect.

(Online, at least. In RL I'm not the GM.)

[sinker]

I ignore templates entirely, I view them as a tool to keep character creation simple for new players.

Same here.

I like to play with Lawbreaking quite a bit, so sometimes I offer "Lawbreaking debt" instead of requiring that the player take the power (though I still require an aspect change).

I'm also quite liberal with debt in general (though like with sponsored magic I like to make the compel fit the debt).

[Silverblaze]

We ignore social combat.  Entirely.

Our group finds it slows down flow of play.  Social skills are generally still used for blocks, maneuvers, and glossing over chats with mooks.  Social skills are slightly less useful in our game since we roleplay a lot and don't worry quite so much about the skills; yeah.  However, sometimes the GM sets a difficulty to hit if he thinks the situation merits it.  I.E. a  white court vampire could totally seduce a same sex trucker.  The player can't imagine how to do that.

I think templates need to exist for one reason.  I think they could afford to be a lot less strict however.  I will say that High Concepts need to clearly lay out which powers are allowed for the most part.  I have gamed with a fair amount of muchkins who will run roughshod without rules keeping them penned in.  YMMV.

I guess our houserule is templates are lossely used, unless you become a super-munchkin then we smack you.

Sanctaphrax: what is your houserule on spin?  I may very well like it.

EDIT: good thread idea Richard.  Many people may learn ways to enhance their play here.

[Richard_Chilton]

Thanks.

As an aside, seeing people's positions on Templates as a whole goes a long way to understanding why they would have a certain position in another thread.

Richard

[Sanctaphrax]

Spin houserule is that I give an extra aspect tag or some other benefit of roughly equal value when people get really excessively high results.

Personally I prefer rules that make munchkinning into a positive experience for everyone involved. Because people want to play that way, and there's no wrong way to play. Compels are my go-to example here.

If you want to pen in munchkins, I suggest not using the current template system. It enables munchkinry quite well.

Which other thread do you mean? I'd guess devonapple's, but I haven't had the time to follow Cowboy's so I'm not sure.

[Richard_Chilton]

Sorry - I should have been clearer.  If a group doesn't use Templates then I can see them having a different take on isolated parts of a template, such as the refresh bonus given to the Pure Mortal template.

Richard

[Malraza]

That one seems fairly straight forward to me. Do you have any power that's not a stunt? If yes, then you loose the pure mortal bonus.

I agree with templates being a good guideline but mostly should be viewed as example characters, possible ways that you could combine the powers in the book to create different character types.

[Richard_Chilton]

The reason "no templates" is being listed as a house rule is that, in the RAW, they are mandatory.

But it seems that many groups find making them optional works well... I wouldn't be surprised if Paranet (or another of the new books coming out this year) talked about making them optional.

Richard

[Gatts]

So far, the only house-rule our group has made is the 'templates are guidelines' thing that everyone takes, apparently.

[Richard_Chilton]

Not all of us.

Richard

[Sanctaphrax]

Well, there's no meaningful difference between ignoring templates and letting players invent their own templates freely. So it's only sort of a houserule.

PS: Why would you use templates, given enough skill to make characters without them? I seriously can't think of a reason.

[Ghsdkgb]

We use Templates as a jumping-off point, mostly. Start with the template, but then make it something else; fudging the rules where appropriate.

[Silverblaze]

Not all of us.

Richard

I'm with you.  Most players need limits.  I'll let experienced ones fudge them to create new ones...with established limits.

Well, there's no meaningful difference between ignoring templates and letting players invent their own templates freely. So it's only sort of a houserule.

PS: Why would you use templates, given enough skill to make characters without them? I seriously can't think of a reason.

One World by Night.

Skill at making a character does not remove a need for limitations.  From my experience it means the opposite.  It means that skill can be a destructive force limited only by creativity and thus likely imbalancing to the game.  Especially when the player is more skillful, efficicent, and clever than the GM.  It can lead to frustration on behalf of other players and the GM.  i've seen it a lot in my fifteen years of Tabletop and LARPing. (Not saying my experiences trump others or that I have the most experience ehre...only that I've played long enough to see some serious trainwrecks) 

(click to show/hide)

Munchkins><

[Silverblaze]

So we went from a house rule topic to template debates.

Maybe we can make a thread for that and try to keep this as something fitting for the resources board.  A tool for gamers.  i think that'd be great.