House Rules

Raise Dead and Resurrection are not automatically successful. A character's chances of being resurrected are 15%+3% a level, to a maximum of 75%. No retries. The in-campaign justification is that the Gods know when it is your “time” to go; if you come back then there is some purpose (good or evil) that you still must fulfill. I don't think it's appropriate to have this decided purely through roleplaying, to avoid the possibility of favoritism; the party will of course still have to petition to a cleric in character and make a case for why this character must come back. This also achieves my out of campaign want for a system where not just anyone can be raised, and even the greatest warriors sometimes die young (King Azoun IV, for instance). More important characters and NPCs are more likely to be raised, as they have a bigger impact on the world (certainly the case in FR).

Raise Dead can be cast one hour per caster level after the character's death, to a maximum of 24 hours.

There are two significant drawbacks to Raise Dead. First, the character loses a Level or 2 points of Constitution (I’m thinking about the PC losing both; let me know what you think) if the character was at 1st level. Second, the divine protection requires a sacrifice on the part of the recipient; they suffer a mutilating wound such as a lost hand, arm, leg, foot, eye, etc., to represent the “close call”; this sacrifice will have tangible penalties for the character until restored through magic (such as Regeneration).

Resurrection cah be case one day per caster level after the character's death, to a maximum of 20 days. Characters raised by Resurrection still lose the Level (and/or?) –2 points of Constitution, but they do not suffer a mutilating wound.

As resurrection; see PHB for conditions under which characters can be Resurrected.

Staves and Wands have 50 charges when created, unless otherwise specified in the DMG. A Staff or Wand found in the field has 1d100 charges/2 (round up) and has been recharged 1d4-1 times (min 0).

PCs or NPCs can recharge Staves and Wands, though their efforts at recharging become less effective over time; eventually it becomes more economical to just make a new item (though sometimes this might not be possible, if the components are unique). Recharging an item returns it to 50 charges.

Requirements:

1. The necessary skills (caster level, item creation feats, spells) to create the item in the first place;
2. a wizard’s workshop (with at least 1000 GP worth of equipment);
3. the item must have at least one charge left.

Time: Recharging is a ritual that requires a full day (8 hours) of intense concentration.

Diminishing Returns: Recharging a Staff or Wand is very efficient the first time you do it, but becomes harder each successive time; it is only economical to recharge an item 3 times (unless it has properties that make it unique). This reflects the high initial expenditure to create an item, and the increasingly inefficient expenditures to maintain it. Costs are as follows:

Non-magical identification can be attempted once per character level. The difficulty level varies depending on your environment and the type of item as follows.

Alchemy check DC 20+potion caster level. This takes one minute (tasting a drop, pouring it on a leaf to see the effect, etc.). You cannot take 10 or 20.

• Craft:Alchemy check DC 20+potion caster level.
• Good lab equipment, costing at least 1000 gp, gives you +2 circumstance bonus.
• Regular lab equipment costs between 100 gp and 1000 gp depending on availability in a town.
• You can take 10 or 20 because lab equipment lets you do the job right.

NPCs able to cast Identify will generally not go through the following identification process.

• Knowledge (Arcana) check DC 50+Caster Level for basic property, 70+Caster Level for full ID. This is all one roll, with the two DC's indicating the degree of success you have.
• If you want to know just the basic properties (bonus, command word, most elementary function) it takes a minute.
• If you want to know the full properties it takes one hour.
• You cannot take 10 or 20.

• Knowledge (Arcana) DC 25+Caster Level for basic property, 35+Caster Level for full properties.
• This requires a good library to perform which represents all the lore stored within the numerous volumes; most cities of at least 10,000 people will have one of these. Places where a lot of knowledge is stored such as Candlekeep or Elminster's home also qualify. Your own private library, costing at least 10,000 gp, also qualifies. Particularly good libraries or magical universities such as War Wizard Academy, Silverymoon, Candlekeep, and Elminster’s Home, a private library costing at least 100,000 gp give you a +2 circumstance bonus.
• Determining basic properties take a day, and determining full properties takes half a tenday (5 days).
• You cannot take 10 or 20 because each magical item is rare or unique.
• It is always a challenge to find an item or something resembling it in the old tomes.

Tumbling through additional spaces occupied by opponents adds +5 to the DC, not +2.

At the start of the game, a character knows his/her racial language (if intelligent enough to understand it), plus and racial or class-based bonus languages, plus a number of languages equal to their intelligence modifier.

Characters can spend 1 skill point to learn a new language (this is a cross-classed skill for all but the Bard, so normally it costs 2 points). Characters cannot know more languages (including those known at character creation) than 1/2 their Intelligence score (though I’m sure there is a feat out there that allows you to violate this). In order to use skill points to ‘buy’ a language you must announce at the start of your given level that you are working on learning it. By the time you level up enough time has gone by that you can spend the skill points and speak the language.

A wizard must announce at the start of his given level which two spells he is researching to add to his spell book. When he levels up he has adds them to his spell book, reflecting hours of study of the new spells over the course of advancement. If during that level he comes across a written form of the spell he is researching and decides to add it to his spell book in the standard way then he may do so. He ends his research of the spell and as a result he will be adding one less researched spell to his spell book when he levels up.

Stilettos are specially designed for greater penetration at the expense of balance. They cannot be thrown (treat as throwing a sword), but they give a +1 to attacks. Masterwork stilettos provide an additional +1.