Game Rules (Expanding always)

[Dracos]

1)This game, for the most part, uses the standard D&D 3.5 rules system, core guarenteed, Complete 'x' on request and approval.

2)All players get 80 points to build themselves up from 0 at level 1.  The players do get all benefits as according to their current level as if they had leveled up to that point (aka: feats, stat points, french noogies, etc).  Players may not have stats that are above 18 or below 3 at the beginning before racials or level bonus points are added.  Having a score below 5 in an area is highly unrecommended as being inappropriate to a heroic character.

3)There is no crossclass stuff in skills.  This is not a license to munchkin, but an encouragement to be creative with your skills.  I will modify DCs appropriately to reflect this intent and will deny particularly munchkiny skill selections or skill selections that do not mesh with your background.

4)Each player must remain true neutral or higher alignment throughout the course of the game.  You are not the bad guys, nor are you to become them.

5)Each player shall be representing a given role, defined below with specific rules for each.

Mentor: The mentor will get 9 class levels (Total level 9, not 10) to establish themselves with. They must within their background accept the duty of looking out after the other characters. They do not need to admit this to the other characters. THe mentor character must be at least middle aged or venerable with all associated penalties. Narratively, the Mentor's objective is to forge the younger into legendary heroes and/or keep them alive.  You will also need a longer backstory with a few ally NPCs in various places of the kingdom. You are required to take Knowledge Local.

Male lead: This youthful and optimistic character has 3 class levels to build themselves with. They come from a rural village which may or may not have burned down. Needless to say, they've got an enthusiastic desire for regime change and are, without knowing it so far, the legendary hero to drive off evil. Must be good alignment. He cannot be older. Narratively, his objective is to drive off the evil empire.

Female lead: This reliable friend/romantic interest/whatever has 4 class levels to build themselves with. They also come from the same rural village. For one reason or another they are traveling and staying with the male lead through thick and thin. She cannot be older. Narratively, her objective is to assist the male lead. You are also a legendary hero, if not The legendary hero and as such you can talk with the requisite magical sidekick.

Magical Animal Sidekick: Well not quite but this character may have between 4-10 levels of monster and 1 level of character. This cannot be a humanoid monster. You can work with modifying a monster base. You foresaw the coming of the legendary hero and have aligned yourself in some manner as his trusted pet. You are required to take knowledge: Legendary Heroes and utilize it in all ways animal advisors tend to be able to do. As a restriction, you may not reveal your sentienence or intelligence to any character but the two young kids. Revealing it to the mentor will invoke a -2 morale penalty to all rolls for 24 hours (This restriction may leave later). Revealing it to anyone else outside the party invokes a -4 penalty OR a -2 penalty per person revealed to for 24 hours (whichever is worse, max limit of -10). The animal sidekick is required to have an intelligence of at least 10 and a charisma of at least 12. You are also in the role of protector. Narratively, your objective is to help raise the legendary heroes and lead them around the countryside battling evil and acquiring the garbs of magical coolness that was made long ago for such a circumstance.


6)Starting gold will vary by character.
The mentor will get standard gold for his level.

The Monster will get his gold after showing the rest of his build.

Both the leads will get standard level 4 gold to build with a couple of caveats.  A preference towards role playing usage will be rewarded.  There shouldn't be a need to have a couple magic weapons at start, and any doing of such should be matched with story reasons.  If more is needed for storyline stuff (family house, inn, whatnot, family boat, whatnot, etc), talk to me.  I'm not going to mince it.

7) Death by massive damage will be used.  Critical hits are a critical check and a hit in order ( aka 19-20 would allow a 19 and then a 10 if the ten was a hit).  Critical misses will be double 1s.

8)Max HP at level 1.  Roll hp once per level, take it as given.  Constitution is important and this way I won't have to massively up numbers to keep up with 20 percent higher hps.

9)Fighter types can sacrifice proficiency in MARTIAL for '1' exotic weapon proficiency.  Free.  Effectively a straight trade of "Weapon Proficiency: Martial" feat (which there was at one point, don't think there is now) for "Weapon Profiency: Exotic"

10) Mages who DO NOT MEMORIZE spells may sacrifice a higher leveled spell slot at any time for a lower  leveled spell.  Mages who do memorize may do so as well, but ONLY while memorizing.  You cannot reassign your spells afterwards.

11) Level drain shall not be in this campaign.

12) You may not spend more than 80 percent of your starting resources on a single item without asking.

13)Everyone has basic hunting skills.  The mentor has a bit more.  Cooking is up to you to take, (GOOD RP SKILL), but outside of that, you shouldn't generally have to worry about food unless you're going to some war torn place.

14)All tactical feats require preliminary approval.  They cannot simply be taken.  Please have a good reason why I should accept the added complexity of them when you ask to take them.

15)Warblades may only recover 1 manuever per swift recovery.
Adaptive style only allows you to swap out a single unused manuever a turn.

16)"Choose X" abilities gained by levels may have the choice postponed one or more full levels by the player.  If such is decided, the player may not change their decision until next level up (No instantly picking a feat that just fits a situation when it happens).  Yes, in some cases this allows more powerful stuff.  I think this is sufficiently offset by going one or more slow levels without such abilities.

Dracos

[Merc]

How will hit points be handled? Max first level and then roll? average values? do we get rerolls if rolling?

[Rezantis]

Excuse the person relatively unfamiliar with the system, but:

'Death by massive damage will be used.' - What is this?

'Both the leads will get standard level 4 gold' - And what is that?

[Carthrat]

Death by massive damage means you have to pass a FORTITUDE SAVE if you take 50 points or more from a single attack. DC 15, according to the SRD.

You start with 5,400gp!

Nothing compared to my 36,000gp! Eat that, kids! My coat is worth more than EVERYTHING YOU HAVE.

[baka]

Do animals even have money? What am I going to buy, shoes?

[Rezantis]

A catflap?

[Merc]

Food so when the leads get hungry they don't see their magical mascot as an emergency food supply?

[Dracos]

Mystic tools for your hero.

Dracos

[Merc]

Rez gets a pretty pink pen that transforms Islen from plain ol' vanilla armored Favored Soul to hot snazzy pink armored Favored Soul of asskicking!

And a special attack that launches a giant pink heart that does 10d6 damage!

[Rezantis]

I think 'Create Water' is going to get a lot of abuse.

[Dracos]

*whistles*

*jots down notes*

Dracos

[Rezantis]

11) Level drain shall not be in this campaign.

Most stupidly fucking annoying mechanic ever.

[Dracos]

PENDING:
14)You cannot recover manuevers mid battle.  Adaptive style is banned.

This will go into effect as the first rebalancing (there won't be  many) of styles.   If you have a grudge against it, speak now or hold your peace.

Dracos

[Carthrat]

Recover manuevers *at all* or recover them with adaptive style? Why the ban?

Just give everyone the Swordsage mechanic of needing to spend a full-round action per manuever, rather than the warblade junk of a swift action. >_>

Consider allowing multiple instances of the same manuever to be prepared if you're removing the ability to use them more than once per combat at all.

[Merc]

You need to change the number of manuevers for classes if you're removing the ability to recover manuevers, or modifying it so all classes recover as a swordsage.

It's partly because warblades can recover manuevers as part of an attack or by posing and looking pretty that they get a lot less manuevers than the swordsage. Likewise, crusaders also recover manuevers automatically after spending them all, so they also get less manuevers than the swordsage, but it's still around the same as warblades because of the complexity added to their system of 'divine flashes' in spite of them getting their manuevers back automatically.