Making LA Races Playable - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 Andarious-Rosethorn Oct 30, 2012 15:00:29	So recently I decided to look over some of the monsters in the MM that are available for players to use. I've always considered most LA races to be underpowered compared to a moderately optimized character of the same effective character level with no LA. So I got to thinking about what specifically one could grade LA on, as it appears to in most cases be strictly arbitrary, and not even balanced from one equivilent LA race to another. Grading aught to be done on a scale for these comparing a few traits. Conservatievly, we'll look at the highest trait to base the modified LA on. Most powerful abilities: What level would a non-LA character need to be to get access to spellcasting, SLA's or other traits of the creature? Hit points: Compare to the class that would best represent the monsters abilities, what level character with a base Con of 10 would have the same HP? (Consider HD the minimum number here even if the HP could be achieived on fewer HD by a like-flavored class). Remove all HP from Con before doing this (so we're not double dipping with ability score mods below). Saves and BAB: What level would a non-LA character need to have the same base saves and BAB, while maintaining the HP and special abilities of the race? Modify for the following Utility: Additional SLA's and spellcasting, or other features that are less noteworthy than the most powerful abilities, but still not completely neglible. This may provide +1 or +2 to ECL if significant. Size: Being bigger than Medium or smaller than Small requires some kind of evaluation. +1 per size category above or below may be appropriate depending on synergy with the general flavor of the race (being Large is not generally good for a spellcaster or rogue, but is for a fighter type). Defensive abilities and immunities: Significant resistance or immunity to effects can easily be worth +1 or more ECL. Exceptional ability modifiers: +1 for a net bonus of +2 or +4, +2 for +6 up to +10, +3 for +12 to + 18, and +4 for +20 or more net. (Arbitrarily scaled for now). Am I missing anything major here? Anyone have input before I start analyzing a race?
#2 frost.fire Oct 30, 2012 15:33:55	What about ability modifiers?
#3 Andarious-Rosethorn Oct 30, 2012 15:57:45	Noted. Was thinking about that after the fact. Knew I'd missed something.
#4 frost.fire Oct 30, 2012 16:02:24	Poor hobgoblins so sub par, so expensive
#5 Andarious-Rosethorn Oct 30, 2012 16:18:26	Yeah. They get the same LA as a Goliath, it's kinda weak. The problem is the sensitivity of the scale. If the levels were a larger spread than 20 it would be easier to evaluate them differently. I'm still willing to move things around a bit on this system, just trying to get the bones of it first. Any requests for races to adjust? Right now I'm thinking of the three Yaun-ti races, Ogre, Minotaur and Mind Flayer. The tough ones are actually likely to be the templates.
#6 frost.fire Oct 30, 2012 16:24:40	I think those would be the major races people wants perhaps looking at centaur/ogre too? Since they are a fantasy cornorstone
#7 Caker Oct 30, 2012 16:27:46	Needs more pixie.
#8 Andarious-Rosethorn Oct 30, 2012 16:51:07	Pixie's a good one, I'll work with we'll say that and Ogre off the top.
#9 StevenO Oct 30, 2012 18:07:10	I know one thing to consider when evaluating a creature's LA is the racial HD it may bring with it. If you give me two creatures that are otherwise identical but one has lets say six HD of Humanoid and the other six HD of Outsider or Dragon you'd better believe I'd assign the second character more LA despite having the same adjustments.
#10 Andarious-Rosethorn Oct 30, 2012 20:48:21	Yes, that comes into play from other factors though that are already considered. Saves, BAB, special defenses, that sort of thing. I have not listed skills and probably aught to, although it's likely not going to be a big deal.
#11 Andarious-Rosethorn Oct 30, 2012 21:01:51	The Pixie Pixie characters possess the following racial traits. -4 Strength, +8 Dexterity, +6 Intelligence, +4 Wisdom, +6 Charisma. 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 limits ¾ those of Medium characters. A pixie’s base land speed is 20 feet. It also has a fly speed of 60 feet (good). Low-light vision. Skills: Pixies have a +2 racial bonus on Listen, Search, and Spot checks. Racial Feats: A pixie receives Dodge and Weapon Finesse as bonus feats. +1 natural armor bonus. Special Attacks (see above): Spell-like abilities. Special Qualities (see above): Damage reduction 10/cold iron, greater invisibility, spell resistance equal to 15 + class levels. Automatic Languages: Common, Sylvan. Bonus Languages: Elven, Gnome, Halfling. Favored Class: Sorcerer. Level adjustment +4 (+6 if the pixie can use irresistible dance).
#12 Andarious-Rosethorn Nov 12, 2012 9:48:56	The Ogre Ogre characters possess the following racial traits. +10 Strength, -2 Dexterity, +4 Constitution, -4 Intelligence, -4 Charisma. Large size. -1 penalty to Armor Class, -1 penalty on attack rolls, -4 penalty on Hide checks, +4 bonus on grapple checks, lifting and carrying limits double those of Medium characters. Space/Reach: 10 feet/10 feet. An ogre’s base land speed is 40 feet. Darkvision out to 60 feet. Racial Hit Dice: An ogre begins with four levels of giant, which provide 4d8 Hit Dice, a base attack bonus of +3, and base saving throw bonuses of Fort +4, Ref +1, and Will +1. Racial Skills: An ogre’s giant levels give it skill points equal to 7 × (2 + Int modifier, minimum 1). Its class skills are Climb, Listen, and Spot. Racial Feats: An ogre’s giant levels give it two feats. Weapon and Armor Proficiency: An ogre is automatically proficient with simple weapons, martial weapons, light and medium armor, and shields. +5 natural armor bonus. Automatic Languages: Common, Giant. Bonus Languages: Dwarven, Orc, Goblin, Terran. Favored Class: Barbarian. Level adjustment +2.
#13 Balthanon Nov 21, 2012 11:08:54	One thing I've done in my campaigns (or planned to do anyway, I've only used it in place of LA buyoff so far) is use bloodline levels as a ".5" LA of sorts. i.e. in the case of a hobgoblin, you might be ECL 2 with one class level and one bloodline level. It doesn't give you an actual bloodline with the abilities, you just use the mechanics described in bloodlines (i.e. it contributes to things like caster level, boosts your maximum skill points, etc...). Might be useful for you here if you're trying to increase the spread for your assessments. They're much more useful than LA, but you're still sacrificing hit points, skill points, saves, and making yourself more vulnerable to hit die based spells and attacks. Gives you a little bit more flexibility.

Post/Author/DateTime

Post

Andarious-Rosethorn

Oct 30, 2012 15:00:29

So recently I decided to look over some of the monsters in the MM that are available for players to use. I've always considered most LA races to be underpowered compared to a moderately optimized character of the same effective character level with no LA. So I got to thinking about what specifically one could grade LA on, as it appears to in most cases be strictly arbitrary, and not even balanced from one equivilent LA race to another.

Grading aught to be done on a scale for these comparing a few traits. Conservatievly, we'll look at the highest trait to base the modified LA on.

Most powerful abilities: What level would a non-LA character need to be to get access to spellcasting, SLA's or other traits of the creature?

Hit points: Compare to the class that would best represent the monsters abilities, what level character with a base Con of 10 would have the same HP? (Consider HD the minimum number here even if the HP could be achieived on fewer HD by a like-flavored class). Remove all HP from Con before doing this (so we're not double dipping with ability score mods below).

Saves and BAB: What level would a non-LA character need to have the same base saves and BAB, while maintaining the HP and special abilities of the race?

Modify for the following
Utility: Additional SLA's and spellcasting, or other features that are less noteworthy than the most powerful abilities, but still not completely neglible. This may provide +1 or +2 to ECL if significant.
Size: Being bigger than Medium or smaller than Small requires some kind of evaluation. +1 per size category above or below may be appropriate depending on synergy with the general flavor of the race (being Large is not generally good for a spellcaster or rogue, but is for a fighter type).
Defensive abilities and immunities: Significant resistance or immunity to effects can easily be worth +1 or more ECL.
Exceptional ability modifiers: +1 for a net bonus of +2 or +4, +2 for +6 up to +10, +3 for +12 to + 18, and +4 for +20 or more net. (Arbitrarily scaled for now).

Am I missing anything major here? Anyone have input before I start analyzing a race?

frost.fire

Oct 30, 2012 15:33:55

What about ability modifiers?

Andarious-Rosethorn

Oct 30, 2012 15:57:45

Noted. Was thinking about that after the fact. Knew I'd missed something.

frost.fire

Oct 30, 2012 16:02:24

Poor hobgoblins so sub par, so expensive

Andarious-Rosethorn

Oct 30, 2012 16:18:26

Yeah. They get the same LA as a Goliath, it's kinda weak. The problem is the sensitivity of the scale. If the levels were a larger spread than 20 it would be easier to evaluate them differently. I'm still willing to move things around a bit on this system, just trying to get the bones of it first. Any requests for races to adjust?

Right now I'm thinking of the three Yaun-ti races, Ogre, Minotaur and Mind Flayer. The tough ones are actually likely to be the templates.

frost.fire

Oct 30, 2012 16:24:40

I think those would be the major races people wants perhaps looking at centaur/ogre too? Since they are a fantasy cornorstone

Caker

Oct 30, 2012 16:27:46

Needs more pixie.

Andarious-Rosethorn

Oct 30, 2012 16:51:07

Pixie's a good one, I'll work with we'll say that and Ogre off the top.

StevenO

Oct 30, 2012 18:07:10

I know one thing to consider when evaluating a creature's LA is the racial HD it may bring with it. If you give me two creatures that are otherwise identical but one has lets say six HD of Humanoid and the other six HD of Outsider or Dragon you'd better believe I'd assign the second character more LA despite having the same adjustments.

#10

Andarious-Rosethorn

Oct 30, 2012 20:48:21

Yes, that comes into play from other factors though that are already considered. Saves, BAB, special defenses, that sort of thing. I have not listed skills and probably aught to, although it's likely not going to be a big deal.

#11

Andarious-Rosethorn

Oct 30, 2012 21:01:51

The Pixie

Pixie characters possess the following racial traits.

-4 Strength, +8 Dexterity, +6 Intelligence, +4 Wisdom, +6 Charisma.

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 limits ¾ those of Medium characters.

A pixie’s base land speed is 20 feet. It also has a fly speed of 60 feet (good).

Low-light vision.

Skills: Pixies have a +2 racial bonus on Listen, Search, and Spot checks.

Racial Feats: A pixie receives Dodge and Weapon Finesse as bonus feats.

+1 natural armor bonus.

Special Attacks (see above): Spell-like abilities.

Special Qualities (see above): Damage reduction 10/cold iron, greater invisibility, spell resistance equal to 15 + class levels.

Automatic Languages: Common, Sylvan. Bonus Languages: Elven, Gnome, Halfling.

Favored Class: Sorcerer.

Level adjustment +4 (+6 if the pixie can use irresistible dance).

#12

Andarious-Rosethorn

Nov 12, 2012 9:48:56

The Ogre

Ogre characters possess the following racial traits.

+10 Strength, -2 Dexterity, +4 Constitution, -4 Intelligence, -4 Charisma.

Large size. -1 penalty to Armor Class, -1 penalty on attack rolls, -4 penalty on Hide checks, +4 bonus on grapple checks, lifting and carrying limits double those of Medium characters.

Space/Reach: 10 feet/10 feet.

An ogre’s base land speed is 40 feet.

Darkvision out to 60 feet.

Racial Hit Dice: An ogre begins with four levels of giant, which provide 4d8 Hit Dice, a base attack bonus of +3, and base saving throw bonuses of Fort +4, Ref +1, and Will +1.

Racial Skills: An ogre’s giant levels give it skill points equal to 7 × (2 + Int modifier, minimum 1). Its class skills are Climb, Listen, and Spot.

Racial Feats: An ogre’s giant levels give it two feats.

Weapon and Armor Proficiency: An ogre is automatically proficient with simple weapons, martial weapons, light and medium armor, and shields.

+5 natural armor bonus.

Automatic Languages: Common, Giant. Bonus Languages: Dwarven, Orc, Goblin, Terran.

Favored Class: Barbarian.

Level adjustment +2.

#13

Balthanon

Nov 21, 2012 11:08:54

One thing I've done in my campaigns (or planned to do anyway, I've only used it in place of LA buyoff so far) is use bloodline levels as a ".5" LA of sorts. i.e. in the case of a hobgoblin, you might be ECL 2 with one class level and one bloodline level. It doesn't give you an actual bloodline with the abilities, you just use the mechanics described in bloodlines (i.e. it contributes to things like caster level, boosts your maximum skill points, etc...).

Might be useful for you here if you're trying to increase the spread for your assessments. They're much more useful than LA, but you're still sacrificing hit points, skill points, saves, and making yourself more vulnerable to hit die based spells and attacks. Gives you a little bit more flexibility.