D&D Rules Rewrite completed!

It's been ages since I've done anything with this site, so I figure I better put it to use. One major point of note is that I've finished the House Rules AD&D rewrite project! It took way longer than I expected. One of the biggest issues was the fact that once the core rules were tweaked and updated, all the spells for spellcasting classes had to be edited for content as well. That meant re-writing every single spell in the Players Handbook, Unearthed Arcana, 2nd Ed. Players Handbook, and adapting some spells from the Baldur's Gate video game series. But it's done!

I managed to complete a workable unarmed combat system. It is clunky, but much less so than the version in 1st edition, and much more realistic and useable than the 2nd edition system. It has rules for pushing, pushing with weapons or shields, grappling, grabbing items, pinning/overbearing, strangulation, and rules for armed or unarmed attacks for charging, parrying, disarming, two-weapon fighting style, two-handed fighting style, one-handed fighting style, and weapon-and-shield fighting style. I also have expanded weapon proficiency ranks for all weapons (and unarmed attacks). Above the Unskilled and Basic ranks, there is Specialized, Expert, Master and Grand Master, all of which offer special modes of attack and combat effects (including Skewering, Entangling, Knockback, Knockdown, Stunning and others) which vary by weapon type.

I need to fine tune how poisons work, how the Intimidation skill works (both in and out of combat), how Charging and Trampling work while mounted, and a few other things, but on the whole, I believe it is a very workable system.

The next step was to see how the rules worked in actual playtest. To that end, I adapted the classic campaign module T 1-4: The Temple of Elemental Evil to my new rules set. I even wrote up 3x5 notecards for all creature and NPC encounters in the entire module for easy accessibility during gameplay and helping to speed along combat and other potentially boggy areas. (Those cards fill three whole 3x5 card holders.) I've also slapped together electronic character sheets and combat info sheets using the Google Spreadsheet program on Google Drive, and I have electronic versions of all the characters and all the major NPCs (who have more info than can fit on a 3x5 card).

Like I said, this has been a lot of work. :)

I'll be updating this site as I go along, occasionally with rule tweaks and additions as problems reveal themselves through playtesting, but also as an adventure journal for the T1-4 campaign as it unfolds. We've only had a few meetings so far, but it has been quite entertaining for the players, and for me as a game-master.

Stay tuned for the latest adventure updates!

-Michael Keith