Are you or have you DMed for a player who has trouble remembering what dice to use for that one spell? How about one who just can't hold the numbers in one's head when rolling those 8d6 for [Tooltip Not Found]? Maybe one who just can't stop rolling a 1 or a 2 on every damn damage roll with that greataxe, despite having Great Weapon Fighting? If any of these situations are personally familiar to you, you might want to consider a "quick-dice" campaign.
What is a "quick-dice" campaign?
A "quick-dice" campaign is a campaign where the only die rolled is a d20. No more 2d4 + 2 when using a potion of healing, no more rolling all those d6s for disintegrate. This method of play can help speed everything along during your game. Instead of using damage and healing rolls, you take the average for each of those rolls.
Hit Dice and hit points
In a quick-dice campaign, you no longer need to worry about rolling that dreaded 1 when you gain a level. As the simplest part of this optional system, players always take the printed average for any Hit Dice they earn when gaining levels. So, sorcerers and wizards always add 4 + their respective Constitution modifiers; bards, clerics, druids, monks, and rogues all gain 5 + their Constitution modifiers; fighters and paladins always add 6 + Constitution modifier; and barbarians always add 7 + Constitution modifier.
When spending Hit Dice at the end of a short rest, you instead take the normal average for a die you're rolling. This brings the total down by 1 for each die type. So, if you're using d6 Hit Dice and have a Constitution modifier of +1, you regain 4 hit points for each Hit Die you spend. This means that you won't be able to top yourself off completely after a short rest unless you have other means of healing, which might add slightly to the challenge of your campaign.
Damage, healing, and other rolls
When you roll damage or roll to determine healing, you follow the same basic rules as when spending Hit Dice: take the normal average for the dice you'd normally be rolling. For example, if you're a fighter wielding a longsword and your Strength modifier of +3, you deal damage equal to the average result for a d8 (4) + your Strength modifier of +3 for a total of 7 damage on each strike.
For instances where you'd be rolling multiple dice, remember that the average result of a die is half its value + 0.5. So when you crack off that thunderwave, you'd normally roll 2d8, but with quick-dice that's 4.5 + 4.5 for a total of 9 damage. For simplicity's sake, you don't need to keep track of every little 0.5; just add them up when the same die type from the same source are combined. If you want to keep things simple, you can treat your paladin's 2nd-level Divine Smite attack as 1d8 for the weapon + 3d8 for the smite, so that's 4 for the weapon + (3 × 4.5) for the smite. 4 + 13 = 17. For a boost, you can always add up any dice that are of like value and just give the total, throwing extra points of damage to whichever source is dealing more damae. In the same paladin example, that's 4d8 total for 18 damage, puttign the extra point of damage on top of the 13 radiant damage from Divine Smite.
The table at the end of this post can help you quickly reference numbers so you can write them down and be done with all that number-crunching.
Rerolling damage
A potential snag in this variant is how it might interact with benefits like Great Weapon Fighting, Empowered Spell, and Elemental Adept. To put of simply, you can just translate such a reroll benefit into a flat bonus that you add to your damage. To find the value of this bonus, simply use the highest die result that the benefit would let you reroll. For example, Great Weapon Fighting lets you reroll a 1 or a 2 when using a weapon with the two-handed property or a versatile weapon used with two hands. As a result, we can easily say that you have a +2 bonus to damage when using a two-handed melee weapons or a versatile weapon used with two hands. This makes it a basic counterpart to the Dueling fighting style.
Die Type/Number of Dice 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15
d4 2 5 7 10 12 15 17 20 22 25 27 30 32 35 37
d6 3 7 10 14 17 21 24 28 31 35 38 42 45 49 52
d8 4 9 13 18 22 27 31 36 40 45 49 54 58 63 67
d10 5 11 16 22 27 33 38 44 49 55 60 66 71 77 82
d12 6 13 19 26 32 39 45 52 58 65 71 78 84 91 97
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Are you or have you DMed for a player who has trouble remembering what dice to use for that one spell? How about one who just can't hold the numbers in one's head when rolling those 8d6 for [Tooltip Not Found]? Maybe one who just can't stop rolling a 1 or a 2 on every damn damage roll with that greataxe, despite having Great Weapon Fighting? If any of these situations are personally familiar to you, you might want to consider a "quick-dice" campaign.
What is a "quick-dice" campaign?
A "quick-dice" campaign is a campaign where the only die rolled is a d20. No more 2d4 + 2 when using a potion of healing, no more rolling all those d6s for disintegrate. This method of play can help speed everything along during your game. Instead of using damage and healing rolls, you take the average for each of those rolls.
Hit Dice and hit points
In a quick-dice campaign, you no longer need to worry about rolling that dreaded 1 when you gain a level. As the simplest part of this optional system, players always take the printed average for any Hit Dice they earn when gaining levels. So, sorcerers and wizards always add 4 + their respective Constitution modifiers; bards, clerics, druids, monks, and rogues all gain 5 + their Constitution modifiers; fighters and paladins always add 6 + Constitution modifier; and barbarians always add 7 + Constitution modifier.
When spending Hit Dice at the end of a short rest, you instead take the normal average for a die you're rolling. This brings the total down by 1 for each die type. So, if you're using d6 Hit Dice and have a Constitution modifier of +1, you regain 4 hit points for each Hit Die you spend. This means that you won't be able to top yourself off completely after a short rest unless you have other means of healing, which might add slightly to the challenge of your campaign.
Damage, healing, and other rolls
When you roll damage or roll to determine healing, you follow the same basic rules as when spending Hit Dice: take the normal average for the dice you'd normally be rolling. For example, if you're a fighter wielding a longsword and your Strength modifier of +3, you deal damage equal to the average result for a d8 (4) + your Strength modifier of +3 for a total of 7 damage on each strike.
For instances where you'd be rolling multiple dice, remember that the average result of a die is half its value + 0.5. So when you crack off that thunderwave, you'd normally roll 2d8, but with quick-dice that's 4.5 + 4.5 for a total of 9 damage. For simplicity's sake, you don't need to keep track of every little 0.5; just add them up when the same die type from the same source are combined. If you want to keep things simple, you can treat your paladin's 2nd-level Divine Smite attack as 1d8 for the weapon + 3d8 for the smite, so that's 4 for the weapon + (3 × 4.5) for the smite. 4 + 13 = 17. For a boost, you can always add up any dice that are of like value and just give the total, throwing extra points of damage to whichever source is dealing more damae. In the same paladin example, that's 4d8 total for 18 damage, puttign the extra point of damage on top of the 13 radiant damage from Divine Smite.
The table at the end of this post can help you quickly reference numbers so you can write them down and be done with all that number-crunching.
Rerolling damage
A potential snag in this variant is how it might interact with benefits like Great Weapon Fighting, Empowered Spell, and Elemental Adept. To put of simply, you can just translate such a reroll benefit into a flat bonus that you add to your damage. To find the value of this bonus, simply use the highest die result that the benefit would let you reroll. For example, Great Weapon Fighting lets you reroll a 1 or a 2 when using a weapon with the two-handed property or a versatile weapon used with two hands. As a result, we can easily say that you have a +2 bonus to damage when using a two-handed melee weapons or a versatile weapon used with two hands. This makes it a basic counterpart to the Dueling fighting style.
Die Type/Number of Dice 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15
d4 2 5 7 10 12 15 17 20 22 25 27 30 32 35 37
d6 3 7 10 14 17 21 24 28 31 35 38 42 45 49 52
d8 4 9 13 18 22 27 31 36 40 45 49 54 58 63 67
d10 5 11 16 22 27 33 38 44 49 55 60 66 71 77 82
d12 6 13 19 26 32 39 45 52 58 65 71 78 84 91 97