Ruleset

Introduction

This document is a guide to running D&D Adventures at the Dice Tower Café on Wednesday nights. In here you will find both rules and guidance to play and run games of Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition.

This document is not a comprehensive guide to all possible adjudications; any queries will be answered by the Dice Tower Officials (listed in this document).

Creating a Character

Use the character creation rules as presented in the Player's Handbook (PH), with the following notes. You may begin play with either a 1st level or 5th level character.

Step 1: Choose your Race or Lineage. See the “Available Sources” section for what sourcebooks can be used. Custom lineages found in Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything are available.

Step 2: Choose a Class. See the “Available Sources” section for what sourcebooks can be used.

Step 3: Determine Ability Scores. Your ability scores are generated using one of the following 2 methods.

* Standard Array: 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8
* Point Buy – As Defined in the Player’s Handbook

Step 4: Choose a Background. See the “Available Sources”  section for what sourcebooks can be used.

* Alignment: You may choose any non-evil alignment
* Deity: Clerics and Paladins (as well as Druids) can choose a deity from Forgotten Realms, Mythology, Homebrew or even a concept such as Beauty or Truth. Just choose a Domain or Order that is relevant to your choice. If relevant, DM’s may have a deity in the sessions setting.
* If you choose a Background that does not provide a feat you can also gain one of the following feats:
	+ Skilled (PHB)
	+ Tough (PHB)
	+ Magic Initiate (PHB)

Step 5: Choosing Equipment. Your starting equipment and gold are determined by your class and background; don’t roll for gold. You can sell starting equipment using the rules in the PH and can buy equipment and spell components found in the PH.

Starting at 5th level and levelling to 5th level

When creating a character at or levelling to 5th level, you may choose one of the following magic items to possess in addition to your standard starting gear from your class and background. A character created at 5th level starts with the gold they would have at level 1.

* +1 Weapon
* +1 Shield
* +1 Rod of the Pact Keeper
* +1 Wand of the War Mage
* +1 All-purpose tool (TCE)
* +1 Amulet of the Devout (TCE)
* +1 Arcane Grimoire (TCE)
* +1 Bloodwell Vial (TCE)
* +1 Moon Sickle (TCE)
* +1 Rhythm Maker’s Drum (TCE)
* +1 Dragonhide Belt (FToD)
* +1 Wraps of Unarmed Prowess (tBoMT)
* Bag of Holding

Available Sources

The following list is all the officially published sourcebooks that can be used for creating both Characters and Adventures. Please note that the D&D Wiki contains large amounts of homebrew content, and may not be available at our tables. We do not recommend using it as a source.

* Basic Rules
* Player’s Handbook (PH)
* Dungeon Master’s Guide (DMG)
* Monster Manual (MM)
* Sage Advice Compendium (SAC)
* Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide (SCAG)
* One Grung Above (OGA)
* Locathah Rising (LR)
* Xanathar’s Guide to Everything (XGtE)
* Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes (MToF)
* Guildmaster’s Guide to Ravnica (GGtR)
* Eberron: Rising from the Last War (E:RftLW)
* Explorer’s Guide to Wildemount (EGtW)
* Mythic Odysseys of Theros (MOoT)
* Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything (TCoE)
* Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft (VRGtR)
* Fizban’s Treasury of Dragons (FToD)
* Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos (S:ACoC) \*Excluding Silvery Barbs)
* Monsters of the Multiverse (MotM)
* Spelljammer: Adventures in Space (S:AiS)
* Blood Hunter Class – D&D Beyond
* Dragonlance: Shadow of the Dragon Queen (D: SotDQ) \*Excluding additional feat rules
* Bigby Presents: Glory of the Giants (BP:GotG)
* Planescape: Adventures in the Multiverse (P:AitM)
* The Book of Many Things (tBoMT) \*Excluding Cartomancer)
* Taldorei Reborn (TR)
* Lairs of Etharis (LoE)

While the Matt Mercer’s Blood Hunter class is available for play at our tables, the Gunslinger Subclass is not, as it sadly did not receive the same balancing and love that the Blood hunter did, and so remains too unbalanced for use.

The following books are outdated, but may be allowed at DMs Discretion:

* Volo’s Guide to Monsters (VGtM)
* Wayfinder’s Guide to Eberron (WGtE)

Any rules used must be the latest version from the most recent publication. Older versions are not allowed (e.g. When making a Bladesinging Wizard, use Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything, not Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide.)

Playing Adventures

You can play in any adventures that are provided by the Dungeon Masters of the Dice Tower, provided you meet the level requirements for play. Each adventure has a Tier associated with it, which tells you what level characters can participate in it. Tier 4 games will take 2 sessions to run.

TIERS BY CHARACTER LEVEL

 1 – 4
 5 – 10
 11 – 16
 17 – 20

Rewards

When completing an adventure your character gains a series of rewards. These rewards are dependent on what Tier you are playing. These rewards include:

* Character Level Up
* Magic Items
* Coins and Treasure
* Story Awards

Character Level Up

You gain a level at the end of each adventure, at your discretion. If you’d like to continue playing at your current level, you can decline to gain a level. You still keep other rewards earned.

You gain hit points listed as the fixed value for your class (plus any modifiers) when you level up.

At Tier 1, when you gain a level, you may rebuild any aspect of your character. This cannot be done for Tier 2, 3 or 4 characters.

At Tier 2 and beyond you only gain a level if your character is still alive at the end of the session (see Death, Disease and Curses).

Magic Items

During your adventures, the party will find a variety of Magic Items. The players determine who has this item for the remainder of the adventure. At the end of the adventure the party must decide who will be keeping the item. Unlike normal D&D Adventurers League, magic items are not available to all players at the end of every session. The Dungeon Master will decide on what items are present in the adventure. Each player may keep as many magic items as they are awarded but must limit which items are used in each adventure. Limits are defined in the table below.

 1
 2
 3
 4

While a character may acquire many items over the course of their adventures, they are limited in the number they can take on an adventure with them. At the beginning of an adventure, a character may choose a number of items up to the Max Number for their tier to take with them on that adventure. Regardless of the number of items carried, a character still may only attune to up to 3 magic items at a time, unless they have a feature that states otherwise.

The rarity of the items you hold depends on the Tier you are playing at. As an example, a Tier 2 character can hold up to 3 Magic Items ranging from Uncommon to Rare and up to 10 Consumables. Consumables include items such as potions, scrolls, magical ammunition, etc. A character may carry an unlimited number of Common Magic items. Items created by class features such as Artificer’s infusions do not count against this item limit.

If you gain a magic item with a Rarity higher than your Tier allows you cannot use it until you play the corresponding Tier.

If an item is destroyed, consumed, or lost during play then you must remove that Magic Item from your character sheet. It cannot be used again unless you re-acquire it as a reward.

Coins and Treasure

Whenever your party finds a treasure with a monetary value, they keep it with them to use during play. Any remaining treasure unused at the end of the adventure is converted to gold pieces and divided equally between all the players. The Dungeon Master can assist in this process.

Story Rewards

Some official publications will have story rewards that can be awarded to the players. This special award or item can take a variety of forms and may have significance in future stories. The Dungeon Master will determine whether these rewards are given to the whole party or an individual player to hold.

Death, Disease and Curses

Adventuring comes with risks, and this section will explain how things can go wrong for even the bravest of heroes.

If you die during an adventure of Tier 2 or higher and not healed or revived before the session ends, then your character is retired and no longer usable. However, you do have the option to revive a deceased character if the following conditions are met:

* Your character's body was recovered.
* You must sacrifice a Magic Item of rarity equivalent to the limit of your Tier, 2 Magic items of rarity equivalent to the limit of your last tier, or pay 150gp per character level. At Tier 3 and beyond both gold and an item/items must be paid.

If you die at the end of a Tier 1 adventure your character is revived after the session.

In both cases, you receive the rewards you gained up until the point of your character's death. Tier 1 characters still gain a level.

In some adventures, your character may succumb to the lingering effect of a disease or curse. Unless your character is cured of this ailment in the session it lingers until the effect is removed. You can remove these effects during a session or during downtime

Between Adventures

Buying and Trading Gear

You can sell and buy equipment and spell components using the rules in the Player’s Handbook. Spell Scrolls and potions can be purchased for prices listed under Appendix A: Shared Campaigns in Xanathar’s Guide to Everything in addition to any component costs.

* Equipment and consumable items can be lent to other characters during an adventure but must be returned at the end of the session (unless it’s consumed or lost).
* You can use your gold to purchase from Edgar Allspice’s Grand Item Shop
* Permanent magic items can be traded between characters but must be done on a one-to-one basis and both items must be the same rarity.

Downtime

You can earn a number of days of downtime after each adventure. The number of Downtime Days earned depends on your Tier as shown in the table below.

 1
 2
 3
 4

Your character can participate in downtime activities between adventures as listed under “Downtime Activities” on page 187 of the Player’s Handbook. The following additional downtime activities are available; all others are unavailable unless offered in an adventure.

Copying Spells. If you can copy spells, you may use the rules presented in the “Your Spellbook” sidebar in the Player’s Handbook to copy spells found in adventures, except it costs 1 downtime day for each spell up to 4th level and 2 downtime days for each spell 5th level and above. If you are copying spells from another characters spellbook, you may do so immediately after an adventure in which both characters were present. You are always successful when copying from spell scrolls.

Brewing Potions. You may brew potions of healing as presented under “Crafting an Item” in Xanathar’s Guide to Everything. A “workweek” is defined as 5 downtime days for the purposes of these rules. You do not suffer a complication when undertaking this activity. Potions brewed count towards your Consumable Item limit.

Scribing Scrolls. You may scribe spell scrolls as presented in “Scribing a Spell Scroll” in Xanathar’s Guide to Everything. A “workweek” is defined as 5 downtime days for the purposes of these rules. You do not suffer a complication when undertaking this activity. Spell scrolls scribed count towards your Consumable Item limit.

Trade Magic Items. Whenever you trade a magic item, you spend 5 downtime days. Players to trade with can be found on the Dice Tower Discord.

Spellcasting Services. You can enlist the help of a spellcaster to heal or assist you in your downtime. Spending 1 Downtime Day and 50gp per spell level, you can have any healing spell cast on your character.

Dungeoncraft and Dungeon Master’s Guide

This section of the document provides rules and guidance for Dungeon Masters when creating and/or running Tower League Adventures.

Crafting Adventures

Adventure Duration. All adventures for Tower League games need to be designed as roughly 4-Hour sessions. This also encompasses break times, quick breaks etc. The goal is to have the sessions run between 18:00 and 22:00. When writing your own adventure it is advised that you plan for extended encounters or bonus boss fights.

Rewards

As Dungeon Master it will be your responsibility for running the adventure and distributing the rewards.

As DM you will gain rewards alongside the Players. After completing a session you may apply the following to one of your characters:

* 1 Character Level
* 1 Magic Item found by the players during the adventure
* 1 Players share of the total gold rewards. (This doesn’t take from the adventures total gold reward and is treated separately)

When using a homebrew adventure you can distribute Magic Items with the following guidelines. Selections are made from the Seasonal and Core Magic Item lists.

* 4-hour Tier 1 (levels 1 – 4): 2 Uncommon Items, 3 Common Items and up to 3 Common or Uncommon Consumables.
* 4-hour Tier 2 (levels 5 – 10): 2 Rare Items, 3 Uncommon or Common Items and up to 5 Common or Uncommon Consumables.
* 4-hour Tier 3 (levels 11 – 16): 2 Very Rare Items, 3 Rare or Uncommon Items and up to 7 Uncommon or Rare Consumables.
* 4-hour Tier 4 (levels 17 – 20): 2 Legendary or Very Rare Items, 3 Rare or Uncommon Items and up to 8 Uncommon or Rare Consumables.

Treasure such as coins, gems and art objects count towards the total monetary rewards value shown below. The total value is split evenly between each party member.

 1
 2
 3
 4

Dice Tower House Rules

The below rules are a set of House Rules agreed by DM’s.

Faster Potions. Potions can be taken or used on other creatures as a Bonus Action. Another player's healing potions can be used if they are openly available on their person. By spending a Full Action to use a healing potion, you heal the maximum possible amount.

Crunchy Critical Hits. Instead of doubling dice Crits will score 1 Maximum Dice roll plus an additional damage dice roll. Eg: Bob gets a crit with his greatsword. Instead of dealing 2d6 x2 damage, he deals 12+2d6.

Falling Damage. If fall damage exceeds your Constitution score you are reduced to 0 hit points and knocked unconscious. At DMs discretion you may split this damage by falling on another creature.

DM’s Inspiration. A DM can award inspiration to a player at their own discretion. This inspiration allows a single re-roll of a D20.

Tier 1 Healing Potion. Tier 1 players start each adventure with 1 Potion of Healing. This potion is discarded if unused at the end of the adventure.

Minions. You can only have 1 effect that summons minions active at any one time. While Mounts and Animal companions count against this rule's effect, the Find Familiar spell does not count against this effect.

Spell Scrolls. A character may use spell scrolls from any class's spell list. If the spell is of a higher level than the caster has spell slots, or does not appear on their spell list, they may attempt to cast the spell by making a Spellcasting ability check at a DC of 10 + The spells level. If the character does not have a spellcasting feature, this will simply be a D20 roll. Regardless of success or failure on the roll, the scroll will lose its magic after use.

Weapon Prefixes. At their own discretion, DMs may reward any weapon with any Magical Weapon Effect of their choice. Melee weapons may have any Melee effect, and Ranged weapons may have any ranged effect, but they cannot overlap.

Initiative. At the start of a character's turn they may voluntarily drop their initiative to any lower point in the turn. This lowers the characters initiative for the rest of combat.

Crafting Magic Items. Players have the opportunity to carve parts from monsters and use them to craft magic items, more information can be found in our Crafting documents.

Magic Item Rewards