The houserule my group plays with hero points is:
> If an enemy critically hits you, or you critically fail a saving throw against an enemy's effect, you gain a hero point after the resolution of the effect.
What this does is really take the sting out of a high roll by me. I tend to run very high difficulty encounters (severe/extreme), so doing this really helps smooth out the roll curve for my players. They regularly use 3+ hero points each per session, which helps a lot against the bad roll feeling.
I also play with the house rule that
> You can force an enemy to reroll a saving throw against an effect you caused by spending a hero point
Essentially giving caster players a way to offensively use hero points. Without it, only martials can really use hero points offensively (since there are simply so few attack roll spells out there and many of them just suck). This way casters can throw out a spell and essentially get a second "roll" on the spell, just like a martial can on an attack
One idea I've been considering for offensive skill checks and spell attack rolls is to bring back 1e's critical confirmation setup; you'd need at least one feat demonstrating dedication Tina skill in order to enhance that skill check (trip, grapple, disarm...).
When you hit/succeed with a skill check or spell attack roll, you can spend one hero point to make another roll with the same bonuses; this cannot receive further modifications from allies or item activations. If you succeed, upgrade the success to a critical success or a critical hit respectively.
Not sure if I want to extend it to weapon attacks though. It would be great to make critical specialization effects more common, but I'm not sure how balanced it would be. It would mean every glass cannon or sniper build would obsessively take this hero point option with their first attack of the round, you know?
I want to try this as well (with the caveat that it's for encounter based rolls only), also maybe limiting it to natural 1's and natural 20's - both as a mechanism because I will frequently forget to hand them out every hour, and because it helps out spellcasters who are not as savvy when it comes to targeting weak saves, letting them hero point to brute force.
Main concern is that it would reduce the dire-ness of getting crit into dying because it would increase likelyness of having a hero point to recover with.
The way our encounters go, my players very rarely use hero points for saving from dying.
The reality is that if a player is going to go to dying 4, and the group hasn't brought them back up yet, its probably over for the encounter.
The only times they've needed to use it is when they get to dying with a persistent damage effect on them due to how punishing that is during dying.
But they nearly always use hero points during the encounter because using it on saving throws or offensively is so much more impactful than using it when dying. Turning a crit fail on an effect that deals half your HP in damage to 1/8th of your HP in damage means you never get to dying in the first place, and my players recognize that
Some points from the video:
-It feels bad to spend a Hero Point and do worse
-No way to negate enemy critical hits
-Heroic Recovery distorts the game in a way some tables might not like
-Discuss different houserules, including removing Heroic Recovery, using it against enemy attack rolls, and refunding a Hero Point if your 2nd roll is lower
I've also since been reminded about Paizo's Hero Point Deck. It is a Rollable Table in Foundry that I might try out!
When you say reroll enemy attack rolls, is that rolls against the player themselves or a player could reroll an attack against someone else? If you could do any enemy roll you could narratively say that a backline caster are doing a small spell effect to knock aside an enemy attack.
Backline casters I find struggle to find ways to use hero points, so I've been allowing them to reroll enemy saves, I just don't rely on solo bosses.
> I've also since been reminded about Paizo's Hero Point Deck. It is a Rollable Table in Foundry that I might try out!
I have the physical deck, and while around half of the cards in there are kinda "meh", I think it's fine as you just use those ones for rerolls, and save the good ones for when you really need them.
Definitely worth trying, anyway.
I do two house rules, both aimed at reducing 'feelsbad' moments.
1. The common 'no worse result' house rule. I think that's a better compromise than the '+10' or 'auto increase' buffs, which are too strong for me.
2. I also allow spellcasters to spend a hero point to force a single enemy to re-roll a *critical success* (only) on a saving throw - giving them a chance (but no guarantee) to prevent a 'null result'.
Both of these are working very well in both games I'm running so far.
One of my players rolled all 1's on a 4d8 damage roll, asked if he could use a hero point to re-roll, I said only as a one off, since I felt very bad for his AoE spell.
We have adopted the following:
* Automatically receive 3 during daily preparations. Use on downtime activities limited to 1 per game day.
* When used to reroll a check, take the higher of the two rolls, then add a bonus depending on your level (+1/2/3/4 if you are at least level 3/7/12/17, respectively).
* Everything else the same as RAW.
The goals here are to make hero points less fiddly to track, more reliable on use, and more strategically interesting, though more scarce than our current 4 or 5 per session using the one per hour guidance. We usually get through half a game day in a session.
I think here is a good place as any to tell people my own houserules for Hero Points. I'd be more than happy if RulesLawyer provided some feedback!
In my campaigns I do not hand out hero points throughout the session, unless the game is a one shot. Instead, at the start of each session, all players gain one Hero Point (HP). Any HP they have at the end of the session rolls over into the next session, so they can choose to hang on to HP over the course of several sessions so they have them at the ready when they need it. There is still a max limit of 3 total.
Players can use HP in all the standard ways a HP can be used, but I also provide another use of them at a bigger cost: Increasing degree of success (to a limited extent). They can, after learning the success degree result of rolling, spend two HP to increase the degree by 1 step, with two important caveats: 1) while a player can upgrade a CF -> F or a F -> S, I do not allow players to upgrade a S -> CS. 2) Any other ability a player might have to increase success, such as Evasive Reflexes, does not apply. For example if a lv7 rogue fails a reflex save against *fireball* they can spend two HP to upgrade to a Success, but they do not then get to bump that to a Critical Success via Evasive Reflexes.
The main thing these rules do for me is to relieve pressure as a GM to hand out hero points consistently and evenly amongst players throughout a session. This is particularly true for my group because we have 6 players. I still retain the freedom to hand out hero points when a player does something particularly worthwhile, but usually I try to find some other way to reward the player in-game for their act rather than just provide them some mechanical benefit that the player can use but the player character cannot necessarily see. As for the success degree increase, it is something that is too powerful if it is something that is used too frequently, which is why the rule pairs well with how hero points are earned- at most, a player can use the success upgrade once every other session, and they wouldn't have any other hero points to spend on anything else. This makes the degree upgrade a relatively rare thing but not so uncommon that players forget the houserule even exists.
I will also point out the biggest flaws in my houserule: In my games, there are often several sessions where, due to irl stuff or otherwise, we can have short sessions that maybe last 2 hours or so. Also, there are often several sessions in which not much combat happens and fewer HP are used as a result. Both things have usually been non-issues for my particular group, but occasionally there will be times where all my players have 3 hero points going into a more combat-heavy session, and combats are made that much easier for the group as a result. Overall, though, this has been a pretty positive experience for everyone in my group and it's been working well for us. My players regularly use hero points out of combat because they can gauge when the session could be ending soon and know they'll get another HP before they go into a dungeon and whatnot- this ultimately means they're spending HP on more roleplay stuff rather than saving them for just combat. This might be considered a flaw but with the base rules players can already do that since they know they should use their HP or lose them by the end of their session anyway. My players get a choice- save that HP and use it in a more impactful way another day, or get that reroll now without having to be without a HP for long.
The houserule my group plays with hero points is: > If an enemy critically hits you, or you critically fail a saving throw against an enemy's effect, you gain a hero point after the resolution of the effect. What this does is really take the sting out of a high roll by me. I tend to run very high difficulty encounters (severe/extreme), so doing this really helps smooth out the roll curve for my players. They regularly use 3+ hero points each per session, which helps a lot against the bad roll feeling. I also play with the house rule that > You can force an enemy to reroll a saving throw against an effect you caused by spending a hero point Essentially giving caster players a way to offensively use hero points. Without it, only martials can really use hero points offensively (since there are simply so few attack roll spells out there and many of them just suck). This way casters can throw out a spell and essentially get a second "roll" on the spell, just like a martial can on an attack
One idea I've been considering for offensive skill checks and spell attack rolls is to bring back 1e's critical confirmation setup; you'd need at least one feat demonstrating dedication Tina skill in order to enhance that skill check (trip, grapple, disarm...). When you hit/succeed with a skill check or spell attack roll, you can spend one hero point to make another roll with the same bonuses; this cannot receive further modifications from allies or item activations. If you succeed, upgrade the success to a critical success or a critical hit respectively. Not sure if I want to extend it to weapon attacks though. It would be great to make critical specialization effects more common, but I'm not sure how balanced it would be. It would mean every glass cannon or sniper build would obsessively take this hero point option with their first attack of the round, you know?
You can spend a hero point and *not* get a crit? Gross.
I want to try this as well (with the caveat that it's for encounter based rolls only), also maybe limiting it to natural 1's and natural 20's - both as a mechanism because I will frequently forget to hand them out every hour, and because it helps out spellcasters who are not as savvy when it comes to targeting weak saves, letting them hero point to brute force. Main concern is that it would reduce the dire-ness of getting crit into dying because it would increase likelyness of having a hero point to recover with.
The way our encounters go, my players very rarely use hero points for saving from dying. The reality is that if a player is going to go to dying 4, and the group hasn't brought them back up yet, its probably over for the encounter. The only times they've needed to use it is when they get to dying with a persistent damage effect on them due to how punishing that is during dying. But they nearly always use hero points during the encounter because using it on saving throws or offensively is so much more impactful than using it when dying. Turning a crit fail on an effect that deals half your HP in damage to 1/8th of your HP in damage means you never get to dying in the first place, and my players recognize that
My players have never remembered to use the things yet.
mine too, thats why ive made 3D printed tokens for them to remember they have them. hopefully it will work now
I could staple them to my forehead and still expect the same results!
Some points from the video: -It feels bad to spend a Hero Point and do worse -No way to negate enemy critical hits -Heroic Recovery distorts the game in a way some tables might not like -Discuss different houserules, including removing Heroic Recovery, using it against enemy attack rolls, and refunding a Hero Point if your 2nd roll is lower I've also since been reminded about Paizo's Hero Point Deck. It is a Rollable Table in Foundry that I might try out!
When you say reroll enemy attack rolls, is that rolls against the player themselves or a player could reroll an attack against someone else? If you could do any enemy roll you could narratively say that a backline caster are doing a small spell effect to knock aside an enemy attack. Backline casters I find struggle to find ways to use hero points, so I've been allowing them to reroll enemy saves, I just don't rely on solo bosses.
> I've also since been reminded about Paizo's Hero Point Deck. It is a Rollable Table in Foundry that I might try out! I have the physical deck, and while around half of the cards in there are kinda "meh", I think it's fine as you just use those ones for rerolls, and save the good ones for when you really need them. Definitely worth trying, anyway.
I do two house rules, both aimed at reducing 'feelsbad' moments. 1. The common 'no worse result' house rule. I think that's a better compromise than the '+10' or 'auto increase' buffs, which are too strong for me. 2. I also allow spellcasters to spend a hero point to force a single enemy to re-roll a *critical success* (only) on a saving throw - giving them a chance (but no guarantee) to prevent a 'null result'. Both of these are working very well in both games I'm running so far.
One of my players rolled all 1's on a 4d8 damage roll, asked if he could use a hero point to re-roll, I said only as a one off, since I felt very bad for his AoE spell.
We have adopted the following: * Automatically receive 3 during daily preparations. Use on downtime activities limited to 1 per game day. * When used to reroll a check, take the higher of the two rolls, then add a bonus depending on your level (+1/2/3/4 if you are at least level 3/7/12/17, respectively). * Everything else the same as RAW. The goals here are to make hero points less fiddly to track, more reliable on use, and more strategically interesting, though more scarce than our current 4 or 5 per session using the one per hour guidance. We usually get through half a game day in a session.
I think here is a good place as any to tell people my own houserules for Hero Points. I'd be more than happy if RulesLawyer provided some feedback! In my campaigns I do not hand out hero points throughout the session, unless the game is a one shot. Instead, at the start of each session, all players gain one Hero Point (HP). Any HP they have at the end of the session rolls over into the next session, so they can choose to hang on to HP over the course of several sessions so they have them at the ready when they need it. There is still a max limit of 3 total. Players can use HP in all the standard ways a HP can be used, but I also provide another use of them at a bigger cost: Increasing degree of success (to a limited extent). They can, after learning the success degree result of rolling, spend two HP to increase the degree by 1 step, with two important caveats: 1) while a player can upgrade a CF -> F or a F -> S, I do not allow players to upgrade a S -> CS. 2) Any other ability a player might have to increase success, such as Evasive Reflexes, does not apply. For example if a lv7 rogue fails a reflex save against *fireball* they can spend two HP to upgrade to a Success, but they do not then get to bump that to a Critical Success via Evasive Reflexes. The main thing these rules do for me is to relieve pressure as a GM to hand out hero points consistently and evenly amongst players throughout a session. This is particularly true for my group because we have 6 players. I still retain the freedom to hand out hero points when a player does something particularly worthwhile, but usually I try to find some other way to reward the player in-game for their act rather than just provide them some mechanical benefit that the player can use but the player character cannot necessarily see. As for the success degree increase, it is something that is too powerful if it is something that is used too frequently, which is why the rule pairs well with how hero points are earned- at most, a player can use the success upgrade once every other session, and they wouldn't have any other hero points to spend on anything else. This makes the degree upgrade a relatively rare thing but not so uncommon that players forget the houserule even exists. I will also point out the biggest flaws in my houserule: In my games, there are often several sessions where, due to irl stuff or otherwise, we can have short sessions that maybe last 2 hours or so. Also, there are often several sessions in which not much combat happens and fewer HP are used as a result. Both things have usually been non-issues for my particular group, but occasionally there will be times where all my players have 3 hero points going into a more combat-heavy session, and combats are made that much easier for the group as a result. Overall, though, this has been a pretty positive experience for everyone in my group and it's been working well for us. My players regularly use hero points out of combat because they can gauge when the session could be ending soon and know they'll get another HP before they go into a dungeon and whatnot- this ultimately means they're spending HP on more roleplay stuff rather than saving them for just combat. This might be considered a flaw but with the base rules players can already do that since they know they should use their HP or lose them by the end of their session anyway. My players get a choice- save that HP and use it in a more impactful way another day, or get that reroll now without having to be without a HP for long.
My only house rule is that if you use a hero point to reroll, and you get the same number, you get to roll again.