Thelos Optional Rules

These are optional rules that have been in use in the Thelos home campaign for years. They are just suggestions to make your player character’s, and player’s experiences more interesting and engaging. They are not required changes to the game. World of Thelos Character Sheet

Quality Rating

Quality rating is an optional rule involving items bought from various craftsmen around Thelos. Most listed NPC craftsmen have a quality rating as part of their statistics. This reflects the rating of the equipment that they make. The rating is simple to use. The figure will be noted as a percentage, the higher the better. Whenever the item is misused, abused, or fumbled, the quality rating is rolled. If it fails the item is unusable and must be repaired before it can be effective again. Sometimes the quality rating also directly reflects the cost of the item, but not always. Some shoddy craftsmen charge outrageous rates for their low-quality goods, while master craftsmen may not be as greedy.

Example: Reghar purchases an axe from the local weapon smith, whose quality rating is 72%. In his first excursion he finds a locked door, but has no way of opening it. Reghar looks to his new axe and gets an idea. Taking a mighty swing he strikes the heavy door with the weapon. Because this is not a woodcutting axe it must make a quality rating check. The roll is 68 so the axe survives its misuse. Later Reghar is fighting a goblin and rolls a one to attack. The DM determines that he fumbles his axe and strikes the stone wall of the passage. It makes another quality roll and gets an 82, a failure. The stone wall proves stronger than the blade and the head breaks off from the handle, the axe is now unusable until repaired.

Quality rating also applies to items used for skills, such as lock picks and crafting tools. With these items their QR is rolled after a second failure at the skill check on the same task, the first failure is free.

Example: Tom Smoothfinger tries to pick the lock to a Lady’s strongbox. He fails his first attempt and decides to concentrate and try again. His lock picks have a quality rating of 75%, and he fails his second attempt at picking the lock. The DM rolls the QR of his picks and gets a 78%, the picks break and Tom is out of luck unless he has another set.

A skilled craftsman, using the appropriate craft skill check can determine the quality of an item. The appraisal skill is used in conjunction when it applies, giving a +1 bonus to the roll for every 5 ranks in appraise. Craft weapon is used to determine the quality of weapons, craft armor for armor and so on. The DC is up to the DM but a general rule of thumb is an item that the appraiser is familiar with will be easier to judge. You might give the appraiser a DC of 15 for a weapon he has had and used for weeks. A weapon that is crafted half a world away and is in his hand for the first time might have a DC as high as 30. Masterwork weapons have at least a 95% QR, while artifact items always have a 100% QR or otherwise indestructible.

To determine the QR of an item crafted using the craft skill, roll the craft check. For every point above the DC add one point to a base QR of 50%, i.e. Reghar wants to make a new dagger. The craft DC is 12, and Reghar rolls a craft check of 22. He crafts a dagger with a QR of 60%. 

Critical Hits and Wounds

This campaign deals with critical hits a little differently. No more are players subject to the disappointment of rolling a critical threat, but missing out on a critical. In this campaign a roll of a natural 20 on an attack is a critical. Keen and improved critical both lower the critical by one, so a keen weapon wielded by a warrior with improved critical will get a critical hit with a natural roll of 18 or better. This method will give more frequent critical hits so to offset that weapons that once had lower ‘threat ranges’ lose that benefit. Weapons keep their listed multiplier for critical damage.

When a critical is rolled, but not max damage then a major wound is inflicted on the victim. Major wounds are those that bleed heavily such as head wounds, severed arteries, loss of an eye, entire ear, broken bones, etc. Major wounds bleed for 1 hp of damage per round until healed. They can also hinder the victim if the wound is placed right. A major wound in the sword arm should inflict a –2 penalty to hit and damage rolls. The shield arm would become hard to use, requiring a strength check to get the shield up or lose its AC bonus. Head wounds would bleed into the eyes making it hard to see.

When a critical is rolled and max damage is done then a critical wound is inflicted. Critical wounds include loss of limbs, both eyes, disembowelment, hamstringing, shattered bones, etc. Critical wounds bleed for 2 hit points per round until healed and impose much heavier restrictions on the victim.

Weapons must be taken into consideration when determining the type of wound. A war hammer is unlikely to sever an arm, while a long sword is just as unlikely to shatter bones.

See Critical Hit Tables.

Starting 0th Level Characters

A great way to begin a campaign and give the players a sense of starting out as ‘ordinary’ people thrown into extraordinary circumstances is to start them out as 0th level characters. This does require some creativity on the part of the DM and player.

Classes: When creating a 0th level character the player will determine what class he would like to take, but does not write it down as his class, he will take a profession which coincides with his future class. Common examples are listed below:

Barbarian or fighter: Smith apprentice, miller, lumberjack, etc.

Cleric or monk: Alter boy, scribe, midwife, etc.

Ranger or druid: Hunter, wilderness guide.

Rogue or bard: Orphan, street urchin, musician apprentice, rogue apprentice.

Wizard or sorcerer: Wizard apprentice, street illusionist, etc.

0th level characters start out with half their max hit points plus constitution bonus. When they reach first level they receive the other half of their hit points. They do not start with any feats.

Skills: All 0th level characters start with 2+int skill points, but the type of skills they will have is up to the DM. They will probably have professions and craft skills according to their chosen profession. Scribes, alter boys, and wizard apprentices may have knowledge skills, spellcraft, and scry. Hunters and wilderness guides will probably have animal handling, knowledge nature, and wilderness lore. Orphans, street urchins, and rogue apprentices may have rogue abilities such as hide and move silently. Ultimately it is up to the DM which skills are allowed. At first level the character may fill out the rest of his skill points for that level.

All saves and base attack bonus are +0 for this level, and all characters will have no armor proficiencies and only simple weapon proficiencies.

Any 0th level arcane or divine spell casters have 0th level spells and can memorize/pray for 1 per day.

0th level characters will reach 1st level when they receive 500 experience points, and can apply the remainder of their level 1 abilities and stats.

Hit Points

Hit point values have always been used to denote the health of a character, but this system does not always represent a realistic approach and can encourage a subtle form of metagaming. While it is understood that a character is going to know how they feel, they do not have a numeric value to apply to this. Players make decisions based on this numeric value, sometimes reckless decisions that they would not otherwise make without an exact number of hit points. One way to handle this is for the GM to keep track of the numeric value of the character’s hit points while only giving the player a realistic idea of how their character feels. “Dizzy and lightheaded,” “Bleeding from several wounds on your arms,” and “Everything is getting blurry and all black around the edges,” are some much more realistic ways of dealing with a character’s health status.

This system has one inherent flaw. How does a cleric know how much healing an injured hero needs? A healer can make a healing check to determine how much healing is required. The DC for the check is 15 +1 for every 10 points of damage sustained by the patient. A successful check will give the healer an idea of how much healing is required, which spell would work, etc. At no time is an exact number given though. A failed check will result in a failed diagnosis, either the healer will think a spell too powerful is needed, or a spell too weak.

Skills

One facet of this optional rule deals with a skill that a character has ranks in but does not use. The GM or player will keep track of when and how often a character uses a skill. If it is used regularly, i.e. whenever the opportunity comes up, he can apply ranks whenever he has points available. If a skill is left unused for long periods of time the player may not apply any skill points to that skill. The character may receive training when they level to rank up a skill they rarely use as well.

Second, many GMs will find it helpful to roll some skills themselves out of sight of the players. In the event that a failed roll would give the player knowledge that his character would not have, a GM roll is recommended. For example, a rogue searching for a trap would not know whether a trap is there unless they actually found it. If the player fails the roll, or rolls extremely low they would know that there still might be a trap there, and might use that knowledge. The rogue, on the other hand, only knows that they did not find the trap. By taking that roll out of the player’s hands, it allows them to feel the same apprehension that their character might.