House Rules

These house rules are designed to streamline play and are built assuming the WOTC published 2014 Player’s Handbook. These house rules are specifically designed to streamline character creation, gameplay, and to support the other players and the GM at the table.

Inspiration¶

Characters begin each session with inspiration and inspiration does not carry over between sessions. Once expended, the GM may reward a character inspiration during the game as normal.

Resting¶

We’re going to use slightly more “gritty” rules for resting. Short rests are (still) an hour, and may be taken in any moderately secure place. But long rests do not restore exhaustion, hit dice, or full hit points unless you are in a “safe” area, such as a house, town, inn, etc. You cannot (at least typically) take a long rest in a dungeon and restore anything other than one hit die, spell slots, or other abilities/resources that depend on a long rest.

Exhaustion¶

Instead of the standard degrees of exhaustion, exhaustion imposes a cumulative -1 penalty on all attack rolls, saving throws, and ability checks to the exhausted creature. A creature dies if it reaches -6.

Consider the Boss Monster¶

Some monsters in our games are just more powerful than others. These “boss” monsters often have Legendary Resistance even if they’re not full legendary monsters.

Further, bosses can use Legendary Resistance to break other debilitating effects. For example, armored bosses can rip off their armor to avoid heat metal. A death knight can tear open a force cage. A dragon’s breath can sometimes break through resistances and immunities. Bosses likely cannot be charmed, suggested, or otherwise easily mentally manipulated.

Save your Save or Suck Abilities for the boss’s minions.