gnunn
So, I read "this post":http://www.robertjschwalb.com/2011/04/stuck-in-the-middle/ over at Robert Schwalb's blog this morning, and it's got me to thinking about which parts of my 3.5 game feel broken, and how to potentially go about fixing said parts.
I have one particular spell, which I foolishly house-ruled convinced a GM to houserule, in his game, which by default became similarly houseruled in my game, because the games are played by the same game group... just with different GMs. The problem spell:
"Haste":http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Haste
Why did we houserule it? I think we were in the middle of combat when a wizard I was playing dropped the spell, and rather than drop everything to look it up, the GM made a call... unfortunately, that call stuck and has come back to bite me in my own game.
Here's the house rule:
In my game, Haste provides the usual AC and attack bonuses, the usual double movement speed. However, it also gives the character either an extra standard or move action, rather than an extra hit on a full attack. When we said, "Sure it gives you an extra action" without actually looking at the rule, it resulted in major breakage. The spell has become a guaranteed first move in any big fight, because suddenly all the spellcasters can launch two fireballs per round, the monk gets an extra hit and the rogue can slip by for an extra backstab. From a player's perspective it's kickass! from a GM's perspective, it makes my life seriously difficult.
The trouble is, we've been running with the house rule for at least a year now. It is my PC's FAVORITE tactic. I fear that if I take it from them, I might face all out revolt. I would love any thoughts on the best way to handle this.
Should I:
* Say, "sorry... I looked at the actual spell and we've totally broken the game, moving forward we go by the book."
* Give my BBEGs the ability to cast slow and negate the spell as soon as the PCs drop it on themselves?
* Give my BBEGs the ability to cast broken haste to teach the PCs what pain is (They will likely fight a dragon this Friday...)
* Modify the house rule to take the edge off without dragging it all the way back to the rule as written? (e.g. two spells only if making a full attack, or extra move or attack action, but not an extra spell)
Have any of you run into similar situations? What did you do?
Comments
Option 2: Only works if your OK with the players having the ability to gank the minions, otherwise it gets a little "wtf??" when every bad guy suddenly has the ability to counteract them (which it does sound like you want to do). If restricted to solely to BBEG then you can play it off as "the party's reputation has preceded them!"
Option 3: Sounds like it will be a once in awhile lesson rather than a permanent fix. Otherwise you run into the same "everyone can do it" problem as in option 2.
Option 4: Looks OK on its face but has the potential to come back and bite you in the butt even worse if it ends up breaking your game in an entirely different way. Then you risk having the change the rule *again,* and then it could feel like the you're being punitive because the players are using your house rules against you. At least if you change it back to the original rule it it can't be perceived as arbitrary.
~The Panda
When I was in the Living Greyhawk campaign, they had to take away access to certain items in the game because they were giving players obscene advantages. The way they presented it in my area (which was analogous to the Bandit Kingdoms) was that if *we* could use Divine Spell Power + karma beads to get caster level bonuses, so could the High Clergy of Iuz. If we thought we were badass throwing around level 20 Dictums, imagine what they'd be like throwing around level 25 Blasphemies.
For good or ill, the rule change was presented to us as "we could kill you with the RAWs if we wanted to".
I sort of feared that might be the reaction... looks like it might be time to give the players a view from the other side of the broken rule.
"A spell with a casting time of 1 free action doesn
They are among us!
XCom: Defiance - Campaign of the Month November 2016
If your players aren't grown up enough to accept that, you can offer instead to have the current house rule stand... but point out that because it is so wildly powerful, all the gameworld NPCs would be idiots to not use the same thing against the PCs at every opportunity, as well as to devise ways to counter the stratagem. Make it clear that your PCs should absolutely expect the same trick to be used against them pretty much every encounter, since in a world with that spell available, it'd be as common a tactic as "let's hit our enemies with our swords." If they still demand to keep the house rule, then they've done so in a fully informed way, and you can claim the moral high ground when the baddies rip the PCs to shreds before the PCs know what's happening.
I find that players are usually quite OK with moving from a House Rule to the Standard Rule. I am sure if you describe your reasons well enough and give a couple of examples, then your players will respect your opinion and carry on with the revised rule in play.
twigs
"I met a traveller from an antique land....."
CotM May 2016: Mysteria: set in Wolfgang Baur’s MIDGARD.
Previous CotM Aug 2012: Shimring: High Level Multiplanar Campaign
Inner Council Member
"Look, guys, we've been playing this rule wrong, and you all must see that because you've been taking advantage of it, so we've got to come up with a compromise." Sort of what Jake was saying, when he pointed out that "because it is so wildly powerful, all the gameworld NPCs would be idiots to not use the same thing against the PCs at every opportunity, as well as to devise ways to counter the stratagem" so let's get it figured out as a team and figure out the best course of action here. It's unreasonable to think that you're the only ones who've been genius enough to figure out that this is how the rule works, but a broken rule working against you is seriously gonna piss you off if I start using it for the other guys. Lets figure it out as a group, shall we?
Generally, this is actually a good thing in a few ways. It lets your players know that you are paying attention to the game and are trying to improve it for the benefit of everyone...it lets them be involved in that improvement...and it engages them in the world to a deeper degree as well, knowing that their "out of game" decisions help/hinder the moves of their foes, right? Everyone needs to be on the same page, no matter what page they're on and no matter what book they're in.