Dungeons and Dragons 3rd Edition: Variant Rules

 

ACTION DICE
Adapted from AEG's Spycraft d20 Role-Playing Game

Action Dice (AD) are d20 die roll modifiers that a player can add to his totals in order to achieve success where he or she would otherwise have failed. If you as the DM choose to use this optional rule, be aware that you are giving the players a "heroic" edge that they would normally not have. This will undoubtedly change the balance of your encounters in favor of the PCs making this advantage perhaps inappropriate to certain campaigns.

Basic Usage: Whenever a player fails to achieve success on a d20 (and only a d20) roll, he or she can the expend action dice to increase that roll's total. At first level, the action die is a d4 and though that might sound insignificant, that die can also "explode" and then be rolled again for cumulative effect. In order to "explode" a die the maximum number on that die needs to be rolled (4 on a d4, 6 on a d6, and so on).

So for instance, if Redgar needs an 18 to hit the heavily armored orc but only rolls a 15, he can opt to use an action die to try and increase his attack roll to 18 (needing a 3 or a 4). If his attack roll was actually a 12, he would need to roll a 4 on his first action die (bringing his total to 16), have it explode, roll again, and then hope to roll a 2 or higher. There are no limits as to how many times an action die can explode allowing even the most impossible of feats to be achieved by the unlikeliest of heroes.

Each player begins play with 3 action dice. These are renewed at the start of the next session (though the player's total dice can never exceed 3 at the beginning of any session regardless of any dice he failed to use up during the last session).

Action Dice and Critical Success and Failure: With the action dice system, players and dungeon masters need no longer re-roll attack rolls to achieve a critical success or failure on any given d20 roll. Instead, they must now use an action die to "activate" the critical. This automatically makes any critical threat a critical success.

Conversely, critical failures must now be activated as well, but by the DM (or in the case of the DM's critical failures, by the PCs). Neither players nor DM are obligated in any way to activate every critical threat or failure.
The DM begins play with 2 plus the number of players in the group action dice.

"Core" Abilities: Each class has a "core" ability that allows them to spend an additional action die (using up two for that day) on any single roll. Obviously even greater feats can now be achieved in this one area by this one class as the average and chance to explode both double.

Redgar, for instance, is a fighter making his core ability the option to use two dice on any attack roll. So in the above instance, he would have had two d4s to roll which almost certainly would have guaranteed success on the first example.

Barbarian
Indomitable: melee attack roles and fortitude saves

Bard
Enchanting: bardic lore and charisma skills

Cleric
Determined: turning attempts and willpower saves

Druid
Natural: ride, handle animals, wilderness lore, and knowledge (nature)

Fighter
Deadly: all attack rolls

Monk
Esoteric: unarmed attack rolls and all saves

Paladin
Inspirational: can add action dice to any other sympathetic PC or NPC
*Special: Paladins receive an extra action die per game session

Ranger
Self-Sufficient: fortitude saves, attack rolls against favored enemies, and wilderness lore checks

Rogue
Unpredictable: ranked class skills

Sorcerer
(Undefined)

Wizard
Focused: concentration and intelligence based skills
*Specialist wizards gain an extra action die for spell penetration with their chosen school.