Darmort's page

Hi guys,

First of all, sorry if this is the wrong forum, but I am genuinely interested in advise on this.

Anyway!

I'm a long standing GM and for the longest time I've often not delved into house rules. Usually because every time I start a new campaign it has a new player and I end up having to explain any small details that may change or because I dislike limiting my players from all the available resources (Basically if it's on the SRD my players can run wild).

Although recently, I've been shaping up my game world all proper like. This started innocently enough with saying "There's no Gunslingers on this continent" or that I'm using the Draconomicon for all my dragons (because really, why wouldn't I). You know, easy stuff.

Basically, I'm looking on advice on how to implement house rules for my next campaign, which is set in a largely unexplored continent (Think Europe, Africa, Asia and Oceania combined).
What I've got so far are several different "races" of humans to reflect the different cultures (For example, the humans that make up most of Europe are Aulustians, it's heavily Greek themed with a smattering of 40k and Percy Jackson inspirations (Humans vs Monsters. All the time). These humans get Weapon Focus with any one weapon, Weapon Proficiency with Martial Weapons and any one Bonus Combat Feat, as well as a +2 racial bonus to Perception. They're effective at fighting because they have to be, but they can't do much else outside of war because they don't know what life is outside of war - I'm hoping)
Then I'm working on a skill overhaul as well - Make things a lot more like 5th Edition Skills so that there are no Skill Ranks, you just have a bonus or you don't, and classes will get a flat amount of skill points at 1st level and that's it. Difficulty Classes will be made so that rolls can be accomplished.

So, to you GMs who do have various house rules...
How radically do people alter things? How drastically do these things affect your campaigns?
Can you offer any advice about informing players of various house rules that alter the game in these regards?

Quite a simple one, but I'm unsure because of how I initially interpreted it compared to a friend.

With School Understanding, you gain a School Power. Fine, I get that. Using Arcane Reservoir gives you the other Level 1 Power. Fine.

If you take a single Level of Wizard, along with 19 Levels of Arcanist;

Do you count as a 20th Level Wizard for every from your Arcane School, extra School Spells Memorised and all (as well as the Opposed Schools)? This is how my friend interpreted it.

Or do you only get the School Powers? My interpretation.

As for the Bloodline Development, the same situation really. 1 Level of Sorcerer, 19 Levels of Arcanist.

Does this give you all of the Bloodline Powers as well as the extra spells known and additional feats?

Or just all of the Bloodline Powers?

Looking at the Weapon Master Fighter Archetype, there's a few things missing from a couple of the descriptions.

Firstly, Weapon Training. It replaces Armour Training 1, 2, 3 and 4 at their respective levels, which is fine. It does not, however, state that it otherwise works like standard Weapon Training, in that it states a specific weapon, rather than weapon groups.

Secondly, but not as importantly, Unstoppable Strike is gained at Level 19. It doesn't mention what skill it replaces, but I would presume it replaces Armour Mastery.