Back to SeanKReynolds.com home
9/16/09 Alternative Level Advancement--The Step System, a different way of advancing characters that doesn't involve XP. This originally was some unpublished house rules I wrote, which I adapted to publish in Monte Cook's World of Darkness, which I've fiddled with slightly to revert back to standard terminology for compatibility with non-MCWOD d20-based games. (PDF)
6/5/05 Variant: Fewer Absolutes--Part 2, giving variants for races, classes, and skills so they don't have absolute effects.
6/5/05 Variant: Fewer Absolutes--Part 1, a discussion of a systematic problem in some d20 rules and a proposal to fix them.
11/26/04 Variant: Recharging Items, a way to handle recharging these items without unbalancing things.
11/9/04 Variants for Forge Ring, three variant rules to make the Forge Feat worthwhile compared to Craft Wondrous Item.
5/4/04 Concentration Against Poison, a variant rule for temporarily staving off poison damage.
12/27/03 Logs, of my play by email (PBEM) game that I ran in college, set in a fantasy historical England. Sort of a funny read, looking back.
10/23/03 Feat Point System, a more precise method for rating and acquiring feats.
9/20/03 The Phil Athans Rule, for dealing with very weak creatures that somehow manage to be deadly threats.
4/1/03 Spellcasting Underwater, an opinion piece about what should be possible.
4/1/03 Bounties for Monsters, what to offer for orc ears and such.
4/1/03 How ECLs work in-character, or "Why are drow so lazy." :)
2/16/03 Variant Sor/Wiz Skills, a pair of interesting class skill options for sorcerers and wizards.
12/14/02 Iron Golems Are Hollow, an explanation why.
11/9/02 Take 20 which skills you can and can't, any why.
10/28/02 Magic Item Creation, an essay about the ins and outs of this complex topic.
10/14/02 The Difference Between Incorporeal and Ethereal, because there are some who think they mean almost the same thing.
10/14/02 Metamagic, DCs, and Ability Scores, a short primer on how any why these work.
10/14/02 Why Items You Craft Count Half, an explanation for why characters with item creation feats should get to use them when creating a character from scratch.
10/14/02 Why Monk BAB Should Stack With Other Class BAB, a series of questions and answers explaining why it is so.
10/3/02 Grappling Step By Step, since the description in the PH can be confusing.
10/3/02 Lycanthropic Wild Shape, an option for druids who want to emulate a lycanthrope.
8/26/02 Problems With High-Level Challenges, some things to watch out for.
7/24/02 Gravity, Large and Small, rules for high and low gravity (nominally for Spelljammer, but useable in regular D&D).
7/24/02 Nebulas and Quasars, theories on the D&D (Spelljammer) equivalents of these astronomical bodies.
7/24/02 Nonbinary Gravity, a short theory on why gravity is either flat or spherical in Spelljammer. Also includes three gravity spells useable in any D&D.
7/5/02 Energy Types, an article explaining that steam does fire damage, and similar almost-obvious things.
6/18/02
Fractional
Spellcasting Advancement, a new way to handle spellcaster prestige
classes.
6/5/02 Handling Large Parties, advice on designing appropriate-challenge encounters for more than 4 PCs.
5/15/02 A Theory About Peasants, or another way of determining class levels for NPC-class characters.
5/1/02 Hitting and Grabbing Ioun Stones, a clarification.
4/26/02 Donations and Intervention, or a way to convince your players of the use of making donations to temples.
4/21/02 Path magic, or the benefits of learning similar spells.
4/8/02 Poison as a spell designator, applying some common sense.
Continuing Poison Damage, a variant rule for ... poison damage.
Slower Dying, a variant rule for handling characters at negative hit points.
Explanation: CR and the Effective Characer Level: a must-read for anyone that plans to use "monsters" as PC races.
Hex paper a single sheet of hex paper (in PDF format) - I created this, but I give it up to the public domain, because it's of no real value.
My magic system - a spell system for just about any RPG, in which the desired effects are built up from different spell types (such as elements, illusion, life-force, etc.). I used it in my (now ended) PBEM for two years.
A character sheet (in PDF format) for Steve Jackson Games' IN NOMINE role-playing game.