Re: A new beginning

> Ok, I already downgraded the vampires so that they did not have level
> drain, but the vampiric touch ability.

As I said before, keep level drain but add a save vs death magic.

> And they confronted the dragons in turns, not all at once. Still I
> managed to kill 3 characters, but I once was foolish enough to give
> them access to a rod of resurrection...

Ahh, ressurection, powerful but there are ways to get rid of that. Give it
only enough charges for a certain situation. Conceal the charges from the
players. Or have the Gods refuse to return the soul - especially if the
character insulted them.

> Once I was accused of fudging die rolls in favor of my bro, so I do
> not fudge die rolls anymore, but roll in the open for everyone to
> see.

Sounds like your have a dominating group. That can be difficult. Sometimes you
need some guts to stand up to your players. Removing the ability to fudge dice
rolls severely restricts your ability to DM. A DM is a story teller and should
never need to resort to anything that might affect the plot.

> all spells. For instance, a character with intelligence 13 can only
> learn 9 spells per level. I want my PCs to learn the weaker spells as
> well and do not want them to be too selective when learning spells,
> so I do not play with that optional rule anymore.

Good idea. I prefer to keep it though.

> 12. The crew of a Spelljamming ship does not take part in any away
> team missions. My players used to take 30 level 3 warriors or so with
> them and it usually ruined every plot. In my opinion the heroes
> should be on their own when doing their usual hero business.

Fair enough. But try this. Have an away mission where they take all of their
crew, and have the crew all killed off. 1) They have to replace the crew, 2)
the crew will demand more money or mutiny because they see a threat to their
life, 3) people will hear of what the PCs have done and refuse to accompany
them, and 4) They will have less than a skeleton crew because all of the crew
are dead and thus they cannot fly the ship.

> 13. Most of the PC wizards tend to choose combat spells rather than
> "trick" spells like feign death and such. Therefore I am going to
> allow wizards to lose 2 spells of one level and cast another spell of
> the same level instead. For instance, if a character had memorized a
> fireball and a lightning bolt, he could forget those two and cast a
> different level 3 spell from his spellbook.

I dispense with memorisation. I think it is stupid and limiting. Instead I
enforce spell componants. Wizards still have to study their spells in the
morning though.

> 14. The players complained about the spelljammer space combat system,
> so I am going to convert the spelljammer ships into the Gamesworkshop
> Manowar system and will conduct future ship battles with that system.

Fair enough. Becareful you don't let the players dictate your every move
though.

> 15. As someone on this list suggested all humanoid "monsters" are
> treated in the same way as player characters with levels and higher
> hitpoints and such.

I do that for exceptional monsters.

> 16. Instead of using spellcraft, the bards ability or the identify
> spell, every character class (warrior, rogue, cleric, wizard) is
> going to have an identify skill. Warriors can identify weapons,
> armors, girdles&helms and the weird stuff. Rogues can identify rings,
> jewels, cloaks, boots, household items, musical instruments and the
> weird stuff. Wizards can identify rods, staves, wands, books, tomes
> and the weird stuff. Clerics can identify potions, oils, bags,
> bottles, dust, stones and the weird stuff.
> The identify skill is rolled with half the intelligence and reveals
> stats, at least for "simple" items like magical weapons.

Good idea but I'll keep with the original system. Otherwise Bards become
useless.

> 17. I am going to alter a few spells. For instance I believe color
> spray to be too powerful and wizards going on solo reconaissance
> missions with invisibility was anoying everyone (me and my players).

If you chose to, but colour spary is a very good spell, and not that powerful.
Read the description carefully beforehand and remember area of effects. Make
sure that you KNOW the spell before changing it. Look at all of the ins and
outs.

> 18. Spells cannot be learned from scrolls. This should encourage
> players to use their scrolls rather than keep them.

Most of my players are hoarders, they never use charged magic items so there
is little point. Also when a spell is scribed from a scroll it automatically
dissappeares. And you cannot treat a scroll spell as a spellbook either.