Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Lord_Gix 03-18-08, 09:13 PM	Ok, so I'm doing an entirely new campaign setting next semester (September) and I'm getting a head start. I decided to use all new races (for the most part they are based on things that already exist, but I'd like some input to see if you guys think that they are balanced. Also note, this campaign is completely free of arcane magic. Molior - pretty much an exact copy of warforged Medium Humanoid (Construct) Base Land Speed of 30 ft speed +2 Constitution, -2 Wisdom, -2 Charisma Gets a +2 armor bonus but cannot wear any armor When a crit or sneak attack hits you, there is a 25% chance the hit is negated and does normal damage instead Immune to poison, sleep effects, paralysis, disease, nausea, fatigue, exhaustion, and energy drain can't heal naturally, but heal spells work When at less than 0 HP, doesn't risk further injury Doesn't need to sleep, eat, or breathe Automatic Languages - Common. Bonus Languages - None Favored Class - Fighter Bramblekin - based on Skull Kids (Zelda) in terms of flavor, and based on the Killoren, from Races of the Wild in terms of mechanics Small Humanoid (Fey) Base Land Speed is 30 ft +2 Dexterity, -2 Strength Low-Light Vision Small Size: +1 bonus to Armor Class, +1 bonus on attack rolls, +4 bonus on hide checks, -4 penalty on grapple checks, lifting and carrying limit 3/4 those of medium characters +2 Racial Bonus on Handle Animal, Survive, Listen, Hide, Move Silently, and Spot +2 Initiative Immune to Sleep Effects -2 to all attack rolls with a cold iron weapon or partial cold iron weapon Automatic Languages - Common, Sylvan. Bonus Languages - Aquan, Auran, Gnome, Ignan, Terran Favored Class - Druid Abydians (desertfolk human) Medium Humanoid Base Land Speed is 30 ft 1 Extra Feat at First level +4 Racial Bonus on Knowledge (Religion) 3 Extra Skill points at first level, and 1 extra at each additional level Automatic Languages - Common and Abydian. Bonus Languages - any (other than secret languages) Favored Class - Favored Soul Falerans (cityfolk human) Medium Humanoid Base Land Speed is 30 ft 1 Extra Feat at First level +4 Racial Bonus on Knowledge (Local) 3 Extra Skill points at first level, and 1 extra at each additional level Automatic Languages - Common. Bonus Languages - any (other than secret languages) Favored Class - Knight Ursine (bearfolk) Medium monstrous humanoid Base Land Speed is 30 ft +2 Strength, -2 Charisma Darkvision 60 ft +2 Racial Bonus on Intimidate and Survival +4 Racial Bonus on Swim Bear Empathy - Communicate with bears and dire bears, and +4 racial bonus on Charisma-based checks against bears and dire bears Automatic Languages - Common. Bonus Languages - Giant, Gnoll, Sylvan Favored Class - Barbarian Caprin (goatfolk) - I got the idea to do goatfolk before I discovered the goatfolk in MM2, so these are meant in no way to be or mirror those. Medium monstrous humanoid Base Land Speed is 30 ft +2 Dexterity, +2 Constitution, -2 Charisma Immune to Sleep Effects Darkvision 60 ft +2 Racial Bonus on Listen, Search, and Spot Automatic Languages - Common. Bonus Languages - Elven, Giant, Gnome, Goblin, Sylvan Favored Class - Ranger So if you could take some time to read over these and let me know if there is anything that looks overpowered / underpowered that'd be great. Thanks!
-Dangimill- 03-18-08, 10:01 PM	Change the name from Ursines to something like Ursians. Also, a add LA+1 or make it CHA -4 or add -2 INT (minimum of 3). Isn't Favored Soul a Prestige class?
Thief_of_Hope 03-18-08, 10:47 PM	No, favored soul is a base class from Complete Divine. I'm curious, why did you have the humans lose one of their bonus 1st level skill points? Is it to balance out their Knowledge bonuses, because to me giving them favored classes does that already. Something else I wonder. If you are replacing the races, why do you still have languages like gnome and elven listed for bonus languages? Are these just stand-ins until you know what to call the languages for your new races? I'm not completely sure on the balance of the ursines. Especially in a setting without arcane magic, I think they need to balance their strength bonus with either another penalty (such as -2 Int or Wis) or with a more crippling one (such as -2 Dex or Con). Either that, or you could boost them up a bit (such as by throwing +2 Con on there) and give them LA +1. Anyway, these races look like fun, and it sounds like you're putting a lot of thought into your campaign. When you get the chance, perhaps you can put background and flavor out for the Ursine and Caprin? EDIT: Ack, I totally missed the Caprin abilities. They need to either lose one of their ability bonuses, or else they're in need of LA +1 as well.
Lappy9000 03-18-08, 10:49 PM	Molior - pretty much an exact copy of warforged Might wanna give them to Living Construct subtype since you probably have the Eberron Campaign Setting. Maybe even Augmented Living Construst if you want to change their racial abilities. can't heal naturally, but heal spells work If they're tailored to be like warforged, they should only take half of the healing benefit from a spell. Don't forget about the finer points here, 'cause it's real easy to overlook: Affected by chill metal, heat metal, and rusting grasp; not immune to mind-affecting abilities; Composite Plating takes up place as armor slot, etc. Also, what kind of LA's are you shooting for? If it's +0, the Caprin and Ursine are a tad over the mark. You might wanna bump down the racial bonuses of the Bramblekin as well. Love the names, though, particurally Bramblekin, Abydians, and Falerans. If you have any fluff, I'd love to hear it.
Lord_Gix 03-19-08, 06:11 AM	Thanks for the input! Something else I wonder. If you are replacing the races, why do you still have languages like gnome and elven listed for bonus languages? Are these just stand-ins until you know what to call the languages for your new races? yeah, they're just placeholders. I'm still working on naming everything, mapping things out, etc. The flavor is all still in my head, so I'm trying to get the technical aspects out of the way first. Also, what kind of LA's are you shooting for? If it's +0, the Caprin and Ursine are a tad over the mark. You might wanna bump down the racial bonuses of the Bramblekin as well. I'm definitely shooting for 0, so I'm gonna have to weaken some of the races a bit. Love the names, though, particurally Bramblekin, Abydians, and Falerans. If you have any fluff, I'd love to hear it. Thanks! I'll post some of the flavor when I get it all completely mapped out. So here's what I'm thinking for changes so far... Bramblekin - cut the +2 initiative Falerans and Abydians - bump it back up to +4 skill points at first level, rather than 3 Ursine - change swim bonus to +2 instead of +4, add a -2 to intelligence Caprin - cut the CON bonus Also, something I didn't mention - Goblins and regular humans are gonna be playable races in this campaign. I didn't post them because well, they're both straight out of the book
teshen 03-19-08, 12:25 PM	Ursine (bearfolk) Medium monstrous humanoid Base Land Speed is 30 ft +2 Strength, -2 Charisma Darkvision 60 ft +2 Racial Bonus on Intimidate and Survival +4 Racial Bonus on Swim Bear Empathy - Communicate with bears and dire bears, and +4 racial bonus on Charisma-based checks against bears and dire bears Automatic Languages - Common. Bonus Languages - Giant, Gnoll, Sylvan Favored Class - Barbarian I think I'm going to go in the opposite direction from the crowd. This is fine as is. DnD has put an emphasis on strength thanks to its use in battle. Yeah, a +1 to hit and damage is nifty (+2 to damage if you're two handing), but it's not so nifty that you should get two penaties... take the half orc as an example. He's getting one skill point less per level, and less of a bonus on a whole lot of skills. This makes them less useful outside of combat, and the games I play have a lot of out of combat situations. Now that I think about it, I'd move the penalty to either dexterity or intelligence. The dex penalty would give the impression that they're a little more ponderous than humans and that they don't favor ranged combat, so that, like bears, they run up and commence the beat down. Intelligence could be a penalty since they spend more time getting in touch with nature rather than having a formal education. You could always rip off the half giants and give them a +2 to strength and constitution and a -2 to dexterity and then it would merit the +1 adjustment. Caprin (goatfolk) - I got the idea to do goatfolk before I discovered the goatfolk in MM2, so these are meant in no way to be or mirror those. Medium monstrous humanoid Base Land Speed is 30 ft +2 Dexterity, +2 Constitution, -2 Charisma Immune to Sleep Effects Darkvision 60 ft +2 Racial Bonus on Listen, Search, and Spot Automatic Languages - Common. Bonus Languages - Elven, Giant, Gnome, Goblin, Sylvan Favored Class - Ranger And much like the hobgoblins, this race will probably wind up with a +1 adjustment... but it's on the low side. I don't think it truly merits a +1 but it's too good to be a +0 race. Think about dropping the bonus to constitution and giving them the endurance feat for free. Then you can think up a ranger substitution level or three.
Lord_Gix 03-19-08, 06:55 PM	I think I'm going to go in the opposite direction from the crowd. This is fine as is. DnD has put an emphasis on strength thanks to its use in battle. Yeah, a +1 to hit and damage is nifty (+2 to damage if you're two handing), but it's not so nifty that you should get two penaties... take the half orc as an example. He's getting one skill point less per level, and less of a bonus on a whole lot of skills. This makes them less useful outside of combat, and the games I play have a lot of out of combat situations. Now that I think about it, I'd move the penalty to either dexterity or intelligence. The dex penalty would give the impression that they're a little more ponderous than humans and that they don't favor ranged combat, so that, like bears, they run up and commence the beat down. Intelligence could be a penalty since they spend more time getting in touch with nature rather than having a formal education. Noted. I think I'll move the penalty to dexterity, because they definitely are not supposed to favor ranged combat. So here's what I'm thinking for changes so far... Bramblekin - cut the +2 initiative Falerans and Abydians - bump it back up to +4 skill points at first level, rather than 3 Ursine - change swim bonus to +2 instead of +4, change the -2 penalty to be dexterity rather than charisma Caprin - cut the CON bonus Do you think that the Caprin would be able to have a +0 LA if I cut the CON bonus?
Thief_of_Hope 03-20-08, 01:57 PM	Noted. I think I'll move the penalty to dexterity, because they definitely are not supposed to favor ranged combat. So here's what I'm thinking for changes so far... Bramblekin - cut the +2 initiative Falerans and Abydians - bump it back up to +4 skill points at first level, rather than 3 Ursine - change swim bonus to +2 instead of +4, change the -2 penalty to be dexterity rather than charisma Caprin - cut the CON bonus Do you think that the Caprin would be able to have a +0 LA if I cut the CON bonus? I think all of those fixes look perfect for having them all be LA 0.
Lappy9000 03-20-08, 10:22 PM	Yup. Looks fine to me. Congrats on making a bear animorphic race without giving it beastly (no pun intended) racial abilities.
Lord_Gix 03-21-08, 06:43 AM	huzzah! thanks for the input :)
Lord_Gix 03-21-08, 07:35 AM	alright, so it looks like I'm gonna end up changing the races around a little bit still. The Caprin, Ursine, and Bramblekin are staying as is, but I'm gonna make the Abydians and Falerans a bit more distinct. Also, I'm cutting the Moliors and the Goblins (too many "monster" races) in favor of a couple more human-like ones. I'll post em soon.
ragoftag 03-23-08, 11:53 AM	One idea on the Bramblekin might be to not give them the +2 on Dex. I know its almost a divine law to do so, but...why? It will help trim them towards a +0 and they still get the +1 AC from size.
Lappy9000 03-23-08, 05:42 PM	Either that or leave the addition to dexterity, drop the initiative, and two of those skill bonuses (at least Hide, they already get a +4 from being small).