Blue arrows are changes from the last campaign:

HOUSE RULES: REISA

These rules modify and clarify Old-School Essentials (Advanced) for the Reisa campaign.

When rules conflict, the Referee’s ruling always stands.
These rules describe the default state of the world, not guarantees.

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CORE RULE CHANGES (READ FIRST)

Individual Initiative (Major Change)

Combat uses individual initiative, not side-based initiative.

• Initiative is rolled each round.

• Order may change from round to round.

• Spellcasting must still be declared before initiative is rolled.

This increases uncertainty, rewards decisiveness, and makes hesitation matter.

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Ability Scores Are Flexible

Roll 4d6 for each ability score and discard the lowest roll.

Assign the scores to abilities in any order.

This allows:

• character concepts to matter

• fewer discarded characters

• intentional strengths and weaknesses

Poor Rolls:
If two or more scores are under 8, the character may be discarded and rerolled.

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Racial Advancement and Level Caps

This campaign removes all racial class and level caps.

Demihuman characters may advance without restriction in any class available to them under Old-School Essentials. Elves, dwarves, and other non-human peoples are not limited by arbitrary ceilings on power or competence.

Removing racial level caps reflects the reality that any people who survive long enough in Reisa must grow stronger, wiser, or more dangerous, regardless of origin.

Humans in Reisa

Humans remain mechanically distinct, not because they are better trained or longer-lived, but because they are favored by circumstance.

Where other peoples rely on memory, structure, or tradition, humans thrive on momentum, adaptability, and social gravity. They recover faster. They gather followers. They seize opportunities others hesitate to take.

Human characters gain the following racial abilities.

Human Racial Abilities

Ability Modifiers
Humans gain +1 CHA and +1 CON.

Blessed
When rolling hit points, including at 1st level, a human may roll twice and take the better result. They may afterwards choose the "average" number instead. 

This reflects human survivability, luck, and sheer refusal to die quietly.

Decisiveness
When an initiative roll is tied, humans act first, as if they had won initiative.

If using individual initiative, humans instead gain a +1 bonus to initiative rolls.

Humans hesitate less. They commit faster. In moments of uncertainty, they move.

Leadership
All of a human’s retainers and mercenaries gain a +1 bonus to loyalty and morale.

Humans in Reisa are natural centers of gravity. Others follow them not because they are wiser or stronger, but because they act when action is required.

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Critical Hits

A natural 20 is a critical hit.

• Critical hits deal maximum damage

• Fighters and martial specialists deal double maximum damage

Example:

• Longsword (1d8)

  • Normal critical: 8 damage

  • Fighter critical: 16 damage

No critical hit tables are used.

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Backstabs

Always do maximum damage

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I. CHARACTER CREATION

Hit Points

• Characters begin play with maximum hit points at 1st level.

• On level-up, reroll results of 1 or 2.

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Starting Wealth

Starting gold is maximum: 180 gp.

This assumes the need to buy cold-weather gear, transport, and survival equipment.

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Racial Preference Codes

• P – Preferred: actively welcomed, trusted

• G – Goodwill: generally positive, friendly assumptions

• T – Tolerant: accepted but distant or cautious

• N – Neutral: no strong bias, some suspicion

• A – Antipathy: dislike, distrust, social friction

• H – Hatred: open hostility or cultural enmity

This reflects initial social posture, not individual behavior.

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Racial Preference Table

Row = Viewer
Column = Subject

Race and Class

Who Are You? — A Quick Look at the Playable Races of Reisa

Choosing a race in this campaign isn't just a mechanical decision — it's a statement about where you fit in a world held together by ritual, endurance, and careful management of things that keep trying to go wrong. Here's a quick look at who's who.

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Reisans are the dominant people of the Mandala Kingdom — literate, civic-minded, and deeply intertwined with the Great Church; they built the cities, maintain the roads, and instinctively believe most problems can be solved through organization and proper ritual.

Velkari are the nomadic hill folk of Reisa's uplands and high escarpments, living where mandala warmth thins and permanence becomes dangerous — clan-based, seasonally mobile, and deeply skeptical of any system that requires constant external support to survive.

Harudjin are not a bloodline but a social condition — people who arrived in Reisa from one of the other Petal Kingdoms and are not yet claimed by its institutions; they go where locals won't, navigate systems they don't belong to, and are the default adventurer archetype of the setting.

Elves are a people in retreat, living in memory of a warmer world they actually experienced; their stronghold is the Shardgrove, a crystalline, carefully managed forest, and those who leave it are usually exiles, observers, or people with a very long grudge to resolve.

Dwarves trace their authority to Bharak-Kûn, a massive hold carved deep beneath the glacier line north of Bhadra — they view the world as a system under cumulative strain and respond to decline not with faith or philosophy, but with load-bearing calculations and sealed doors.

Halflings are the social connective tissue of a failing world, living in the margins of mandala cities and along caravan routes, mediating between cultures that barely tolerate each other and insisting that small continuities still matter when everything else is breaking down.

Ratlings inhabit the cracks of civilization — the under-streets of Kalorand and Trushandar, between guild jurisdictions and ritual geometry — tolerated because mandala cities quietly depend on them to manage problems that shouldn't officially exist.

Cervataur are nomadic half-caribou people of the tundra and deep taiga, who regard fixed cities and mandala infrastructure with deep suspicion; they have no stronghold and want none, treating migration itself as sacred and their presence on a given route as an early warning sign for everyone else.

Hutaakans are tall, jackal-headed humanoids who predate both Velkari and Reisans in the region; they now live deep beneath Kalorand in the Underdeep Commons, maintaining the heat tunnels, pressure vents, and ritual infrastructure that keeps the city alive — a quiet, precise people doing work the surface world prefers not to think about.

Trādharan are the oldest human people in Reisa, aboriginal survivors who remember a pre-mandala world and never forgot that artificial order creates dependence — powerfully built, blunt-featured, and regarded with antipathy by almost everyone, they live on the fringes of settled society and have strong opinions about what the mandala system has cost everyone.

Mutoids are people permanently altered by exposure to failed relic fields or collapsed containment systems — no two look the same, their bodies have stabilized, and they live primarily in the Echo Levels beneath Kalorand under Hutaakan oversight, serving as maintenance crews and guides in zones where no one else can function.

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Every race has in-world social weight. Where you're from, what you look like, and who raised you affects how strangers treat you before you open your mouth. Check the Racial Preference Table in the house rules for specifics.

OSE Advanced separate race and class is allowed.

Multiclassing is permitted. XP is split normally.

Playable Races

• Humans (Reisan, Velkari, Harudjin)
  Ethnicity carries in-world benefits and expectations.

• Elves (standard and wood elf)

• Dwarves

• Halflings

• Ratling (Carcass Crawler 5)

• Cervataur (nomadic caribou folk of tundra and taiga)

  Hutaakans: slender humanoids with jackal-like heads who prefer the underground (similar to Drow)

  Trādharan: Aboriginal, brutish survivors of a pre-mandala world (Similar to Gargantua)

  Mutoids: (Carcass Crawler 3) (when containment fails)

Demihumans follow OSE Advanced rules.

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Available Classes

All standard OSE classes are available, plus:

• Mystic Class (MYS). Home brew "monk" class. 

• Demon Hunter (Class) Home brew "Witcher" type class.

• Bard (Class) can be divine or arcane (Arcane in Carcass Crawler 4)
• Beastmaster (Carcass Crawler 3)

From Dolmenwood (approved):

• Hunter (alt Ranger)

• Thief (alt Thief, optional skill advancement)

• Knight (alt Knight)

Knights must choose a local house patron.
Knights are titled Shields (e.g. Shield Harish), not “Sir.”

Exploration bonuses in OSE:

OSE Exploration Abilities by Class

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Names

Characters use Indo-Romani–style names for Reisan and Tibetan style for Velkari. Harudjin have different cultures.

Titles and honorifics are earned through play.

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II. SKILLS & BACKGROUNDS

A modified Rules Cyclopedia Skills system is used.

• Every character has a background profession or trade from OSE.

• Skills represent training and lived experience.

• Skills do not improve over time.

Boundary Statement:
Skills provide context and options, not automatic success.
They never replace play, positioning, or judgement.

Thieves, Assassins, and Acrobats automatically know Thieves’ Cant.

The full skills system is provided separately.

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III. COMBAT & DANGER

Armor Class and To Hit

Ascending AC is used.

To Hit bonuses are used (No THAC0)

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Weapons & Fighting Styles

• Weapon proficiencies are class-limited.

• Untrained weapons incur penalties.

• Martial characters may specialize.

• Parrying and disarms are possible by forgoing attacks.

• Variable weapon damage is used.

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Weapon Damage (House Rule)

The damage die for a weapon is equal to or greater than the hit die of the character's class. 

For example: a fighter with d8 hit dice using a dagger does d8 damage instead of the dagger's d4.

A wizard with d4 hit dice could use a staff that does d6 damage (greater than their d4 hit die).

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Morale & Psychology

Expanded morale rules apply to:

• monsters

• NPCs

• hirelings

Morale checks occur when:

• a leader falls

• half the group is incapacitated

• unexpected terror appears

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DEATH, NEAR-DEATH, AND RECOVERY (BOXED SUBSYSTEM)

Death Threshold

A character dies when reduced to negative hit points equal to their level.

Example:
A 3rd-level character dies at –3 HP.

While below 0 HP:

• the character is unconscious

• loses 1 HP per round until stabilized or healed

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Near-Death Condition

Any character reduced to 0 hit points or below who survives gains the Near-Death condition.

A Near-Death character remains has Disadvantage on attacks and can't cast spells for 1d4+1 rounds after receiving healing that restores them above 0 hit points.

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IV. MAGIC & THE CHURCH

General Magic

• Reversible spells are used.

• Spellbooks may hold unlimited spells.

• Scrolls may be copied.

• Spell research and transcription are allowed.

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Clerics

Clerics may prepare different spells each day.

This reflects doctrinal interpretation, not fixed or mechanical knowledge.

Clerics may have 1 "bonus" spell of any level acquired at shrines and temples.

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Turning the Undead

Each character who can, may attempt to turn undead once per encounter.

Turned undead are affected for one turn.

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V. WILDERNESS, WEATHER, AND TRAVEL (PRIMARY SYSTEM)

Travel is dangerous. The land resists certainty. 

This section governs:

• weather

• cold

• hypothermia

• fatigue

• navigation

• getting lost

Weather

Daily weather is rolled by season.

Weather affects:

• visibility

• missile fire

• shelter safety

• hypothermia frequency

• navigation

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Temperature & Hypothermia

Cold is tracked by temperature level.

Hypothermia saves are made at intervals determined by exposure.

Failure causes cold fatigue, which stacks and escalates.

Shelter, fire, shrines, and magic mitigate cold.

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Getting Lost

Chance to become lost is determined by:

• terrain

• weather conditions

• magical suppression

• travel infrastructure

Chance is rolled on 1d6.

• Minimum: 1 in 6

• Maximum: 3 in 6

When navigation cannot worsen, danger escalates through cold, fatigue, and exposure.

More at Getting Lost

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Rangers

If a Ranger is actively guiding the party:

• Reduce chance to become lost by –1

• Cannot reduce below 1 in 6

Rangers mitigate risk. They do not negate it.

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Shrines

Shrines:

• restore orientation on arrival

• accelerate recovery

• provide safe shelter

• stabilize travel routes

Shrines are infrastructure, not decoration. 

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VI. EXPLORATION & LOGISTICS

Encumbrance

Simplified encumbrance is used.

Encumbrance affects:

• movement

• fatigue

• survival rolls

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Camping & Shelter

Exposure matters.

Poor camps increase cold and fatigue risk.
Improvised shelter is better than none.

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Animals & Transport

Dogs and horses from Frozen North rules are used.

Transport is survival equipment, not flavor.

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VII. RETAINERS & LONG PLAY

Hirelings

OSE Advanced costs, morale, and loyalty apply.

Hirelings respond realistically to danger and loss.

See Pale Lodge - Kalorand for local hiring. 

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Domains & Strongholds

High-level characters may:

• build strongholds

• establish temples or towers

• influence regions

• maintain shrines

The world remembers who invests in it.

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DESIGN PHILOSOPHY

• Characters are fragile.

• The world is consistent.

• Death is possible, but not arbitrary.

• Preparation and retreat matter.

• Victory often means survival.

• The world does not scale to the party.