House Rule Updates for my OD&D Game

Back in February, I presented my players with some updates to my house rules.  I handed them a paper at the start of a session and asked everyone to read it before we started.  I did this for both groups, and nobody had any issues so we implemented immediately.

For ability checks, I’ve been using d20 against the appropriate stat.  From now on, we’ll use a number of d6 based on the difficulty of the task against the appropriate stat:

Trivial - 1d6

Easy - 2d6

Average - 3d6

Tough - 4d6

Gruelling - 5d6

For every 5 levels you've attained, you may subtract 1d6 before you roll.

For experience, I'm updating the method.  I've been using this:

10 xp for each point of damage caused to the individual who caused it.

20 xp for each point of damage sustained, to the person who sustained it.

20 xp for each point of damage sustained (by everyone) divided equally by all

I'm changing it to this:

5 xp for each point of damage caused to the individual who caused it

5 xp for each point of damage caused (by everyone) divided equally by all

10 xp for each point of damage sustained, to the individual who sustained it

30 xp for each point of damage sustained (by everyone) divided equally by all

And we'll retain the 1 xp per gold piece value of treasure brought back from an adventure, divided equally by all PCs.

Since then, I've heard from one player who isn't happy with the experience change.  He pointed out that this directly impacts the draft mechanic on "growing" magic items, slowing down the process.  He is correct.  It cuts the rate of advancement in half.  I'm sticking to it though.

You may recall I borrowed this directly from Alexis Smolensk, and his blog "The Tao of D&D."  I still really like the idea of experience being based on combat damage (both caused and sustained), but found that it was leading to some players going against type in order for their PCs to earn more experience.  With the change, the distribution of experience is leveled somewhat, taking it closer to the OD&D baseline, which of course is an equal division of the total earned by the entire group.

As for the change to Ability Checks, you need to know that for character creation, I've stuck strictly with 3d6, in order, for character stats.  This makes the even distribution of results on a d20 a lot tougher on the PCs than if I allowed 4d6 drop the lowest, or some other method of character generation.  So far, the new method has worked admirably.  Definitely a keeper.

The next change I intend to make is to update Critical Hits and Misses.  More on that in the near future.