Ruling Down the House

One of the strengths of RPGs is the ability to tweak and customize. While I do greatly enjoy 4E right out of the box, I am looking at some potential house rules for this game. Some affect character building, and another isn't so much a rule, as an adjustment to some of the default assumptions about running the game.

First, I will be implementing global Expertise. I don't have a horse in the “were these patches for broken game math” race. However I do feel these feats are just too good, and kind of boring. While some builds may feel they can do without the +1 to attack in favor of other things for a while, it is an autopick when it upgrades to +2 at 15th level. Also, missing sucks. I don't want to trivialize the potential to miss, but I don't want to see the game get too whifftastic. Thus, I will be dropping the whole series of Expertise feats, and just granting their bonuses as an automatic up grade.

Second, under consideration but with a strong chance of being used, is two level 1 encounter powers at level 1. In my experience, low level play can be a little boring due to the lack of options. While many races and classes bring some additional encounter powers, many of these are of a more utilitarian nature. The PCs get one chance to pop something cool each encounter, along with their daily every so often. It makes for fallback on a lot of at-will spam. So I would let the players take a second level 1 encounter power. Then, at 3rd level, they would just upgrade one to 3rd level, instead of getting a new one. It will provide more options and choices in every encounter, and I think the overall power boost is minor enough to not cause any headaches.

Third, and this is more of a “develop for possible later use,” ties back into “missing sucks.” Various people have proposed some sort of mechanic where you gain a cumulative bonus each time you miss, which you can expend, all at once, on a later attack. It is a little more fiddly, requiring an extra element to track. I'm not going to use it right off, but will keep it in mind.

As a “behind the scenes” change, I'll be handing out some extra utility magic items, i.e. those that aren't primary bonus items or that give significant direct combat buffs. There's a bunch of cool, weird items to had, especially with access to the Adventurer's Vaults and DDI. I figure dropping an extra one per level will give more toys to play with, without significantly affecting the power curves.

All in all, nothing that will significantly alter the way the game plays, but I think it will have a positive effect on pacing and giving some more choices for the players to work with.