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## Poll: What's in a Race?

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Username17
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### Poll: What's in a Race?

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Post by Username17 » Mon Jan 12, 2004 5:33 am

I am writing up races for the Final Fantasy d20 stuff.
Here's the question: How big of a difference is a race supposed to make, in everyone's opinion? There are many different guidelines available in previously published D&D works:
High End: Elf and Dwarf. These races are essentially a class level in every sense except actually giving a hit die. Let's face it, if a level came with +2 to all saves, stone cunning, +4 AC against Giants, +1 to-hit a couple of favored enemies, +4 stability bonus against trips, the ability to run in heavy armor, darkvision, a bonus language, and an exotic weapon proficiency - you'd be pretty happy, right? Even if it didn't come with a BAB....
2nd Place: Gnome and Hobbit. These races give about half a class level in perks - but again don't provide a hit die. A pile of bonuses to a variety of skills, checks, and saves. Also a couple of unique powers that are not readily duplicable by any class (which collectively aren't that good, but there they are).
3rd place: Humans. They get some skill ranks and a feat.
Bare Advantage: Half Elves. They get a small collection of personalized skill bonuses.
Even Steven: Half Orcs. Everything the Half Orc gets is payed for by a penalty - they actually have a zero-sum existence that simply moves points around.
Disadvantage: Genasi. They don't really et anything, and they pay a level - for a grand total of getting kicked in the balls.
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So here's the question: where do people want the power balance point to be? The game could be written so that all the races are kind of like the Genasi - all the races are inherently disadvantageous, and you simply get to pick how and where you get kicked. The game could also be written so that each of the races is equivalent to taking a class level - like the Elf or Dwarf in the PHB.
It doesn't really matter - the question is really one of how much power people want to get out of their racial choice. The bigger the bonuses or penalties the races give, the more of a character defining and important choice the race choice is - the smaller the absolute value of those abilities is - the less important that choice is.
So are people more annoyed when you can make the "wrong" choice for race, or by racial choice being an afterthought?
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fbmf
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### Re: Poll: What's in a Race?

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Post by fbmf » Mon Jan 12, 2004 2:02 pm

The half level gnome/halfling is how I would do it.
How do elves/dwarves get a +2 to all saves. Am I missing something?
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Count Arioch the 28th
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### Re: Poll: What's in a Race?

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Post by Count Arioch the 28th » Mon Jan 12, 2004 4:34 pm

Dwarves get +2 to all saves versus magic. Since mos of the saving throws will be against magic spells, for all intents and purposes, you get +2 to all saves. except for disease, and reflex saves to avoid non-magical traps. (And poison gets the +2 save against poison. Magic poison gets +4, since they are unnamed bonuses, if I recall correctly.)
And I would do it elf/dwarf style myself, if I was going to re-do the races, or make new races. I might fiddle with Monte Cook's racial level idea as well.
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fbmf
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### Re: Poll: What's in a Race?

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Post by fbmf » Mon Jan 12, 2004 6:00 pm

Got it. Thanks, Count.
Game On,
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Joy_Division
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### Re: Poll: What's in a Race?

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Post by Joy_Division » Mon Jan 12, 2004 7:10 pm

I usually prefer to play races at the gnome power level. As long as none of the race's greatest benefits are specific to a certain class. Then each race sort of has something to bring to each class.
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Jack_Lurch
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### Re: Poll: What's in a Race?

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Post by Jack_Lurch » Tue Jan 13, 2004 4:25 pm

I'm also of the gnome/halfling school of thought, though I admit that most of my characters lately have been human. Not that that has anything to do with anything.
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Essence
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### Re: Poll: What's in a Race?

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Post by Essence » Sat Jan 17, 2004 8:28 am

Personally, I think humans, elves, and dwarves are on par with each other, and that all races need to be brought up to their level. Humans don't seem like much out of context, but their racial profile allows them to qualify for an assload of PrCs before anyone else can, and that's no small advantage.
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Username17
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### Re: Poll: What's in a Race?

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Post by Username17 » Sun Jan 18, 2004 7:23 am

Well, that's predicated on the concepts that:
* Prestige Classes are fundamentally superior to taking other classes.
* Prestige Classes are better when they must be "paid for" with feats.
These are disasterous game balance decisions which if implemented pretty much screw any chance of anything being balanced. For that to be implemented, feats would have to be set up to be unbalanced, as would classes.
So I can't really consider that to be a valid game balance POV. In theory, feats are supposed to be balanced. In theory, classes are supposed to be balanced. and that means that getting one extra feat is by definition not supposed to "pay for" a class that in turn would be sufficiently superior to whatever else you would have access to to set you ahead to the point of making up for not having a dwarf's worth of bling in your shorts.
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Josh_Kablack
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### Re: Poll: What's in a Race?

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Post by Josh_Kablack » Sun Jan 18, 2004 8:16 pm

I tend to side towards the elf/dwarf side - make the races meaningful and distinct from each other in mechanical ways.
Of course, I could also see the Genasi approach (pay a level for +2 to save against spells that don't exist) working for settings where race was defined more by flavor than by mechanics.
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Lago_AM3P
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### Re: Poll: What's in a Race?

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Post by Lago_AM3P » Mon Jan 26, 2004 9:41 pm

I know this is an unpopular idea, but, let's be honest with the game realities.
People are not going to like non-human races being blatantly superior to human ones. Right now, humans are second-best to almost everything unless you're into heavy amounts of cheese or min-max, but if the dwarf/elf bling continues to extend across all of the races, it's going to cause resentment IMHO.
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Username17
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### Re: Poll: What's in a Race?

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Post by Username17 » Mon Jan 26, 2004 10:29 pm

The concept is that the Humans are supposed to be put in line with all the other races in terms of bling. So whatever balance point you choose, humans will be placed in the same place on it as everyone else.
The concept that humans have to get a bonus skill point every level and a bonus feat is absurd - it never worked like that before and there's no special reason why it has to work like that in the future. Here's how Humans stacked up in previous incarnations of the rules:
2nd Edition AD&D: No special abilities, no ability mods, no bonus skills or languages, nothing. What you got for being human was access to a special kind of multiclassing called "Dual Classing" where you took your levels sequentially instead of simultaneously, and in exchange you got to min/max your XP points on your classes and also bypassed the multiclassing rules regarding fractional hit dice (a dual classed Fighter/Wizard would have d10s for all his hit dice instead of half a d10 and half a d4). The drawback here was that you needed attrociously high stats to pull this off.
AD&D: No special abilities, no ability mods, no bonus skills or languages, nothing. What you got was an exemption from "level limits" (a harsh restriction that made no sense and was almost never used by any DM in any game), and the ability to take any class (other races were restricted to taking only a small number of classes each). What's the big deal? Well, back then there were super secret bonus classes that did not show up on any racial class list. That means that if your stats were good enough - you could play a "Paladin" or a "Cavalier" - which was just like being a Fighter except that you got huge bonuses (like a constantly on Magic Circle Against Evil or Stat Raises).
D&D, later printing (2nd edition D&D): Again with the no special bonuses, but other races were themselves character classes. That's right, being an "Elf" was a Fighter/Mage type class in its own right.
D&D, early (1st edition D&D): You had to be human, so the fact that you didn't get anything for it was unsurprising.
So historically, the "bonuses" for choosing "Human" as your race have been drastically different over time - changing more between editions than even to-hit numbers, spell levels (there was a time when 6th level spells were the top and 1st level spells were the bottom), or the Bard (which was a PrC based on the Druid in AD&D).
So the current conception of "Human" as giving you a smaller absolute bonus with the advantage of being customizable is new to 3rd edition. In AD&D and 2nd Edition AD&D, for example, Human was a required race if you wanted to take full advantage of a character who had rolled very high stat rolls in multiple places.
I have no problem with making all races slightly customizable, and giving humans some stuff that they are just generally good at when contrasted with other races. There's no particular reason for humans to have to be a blank slate - and sometimes people want to play "Arctic Dwarves" or "Tunnel Hobbits", so there should be some unspent bonuses in the generic race that can be applied to cultural or subrace bonuses. Otherwise we have to pretend that the subteranean template is zero-sum, and that's absurd.
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Desdan_Mervolam
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### Re: Poll: What's in a Race?

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Post by Desdan_Mervolam » Tue Jan 27, 2004 1:49 am

As far as the standard PHB races go, I think humans are probably just about as good as the non-crappy races. I mean, I suppose I can agree that elves and dwarves come out a little ahead practically(They certainly do numerically), I've just not seen elven and dwarven bling come into play during the actual game sessions. (The only time I can really say being a dwarf made a difference in a character's abilities was during the first D&D session I ran, which included a dwarf with a maxed-out Intelligence, but also a high strength and a 18 con. Then only mage I've ever seen who could wade into combat and not get pimpslapped for it.). I mean, let's face it, unless you're a rogue(And even then), skill points are precious. The biggest complaint I hear in my gaming group is "Why isn't (Skill X) in-class for (class Y)", and nipping closely at it's heels is "I need more skill points". Also, no matter what you play, feats are a premium. Have you ever heard anyone ever say "Awww, geez. I gotta fill ANOTHER feat slot?"? Of course not, and the new feats coming out with every splatbook just makes feats more precious.
No, when humans become obsolete is when you start looking at non-core subraces. If you introduce a race with a +2 to intelligence, you've just instructed most if not all of the players in your party to choose this race when they want a wizard.
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Essence
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### Re: Poll: What's in a Race?

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Post by Essence » Fri Jan 30, 2004 4:35 am

> Desdan Mervolam wrote:Have you ever heard anyone ever say "Awww, geez. I gotta fill ANOTHER feat slot?"?

Actually, I have. Twice. Once was Maj, and once was Giant in the Playground, IIRC, though it might have been the third player in that game.
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Maj
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### Re: Poll: What's in a Race?

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Post by Maj » Fri Jan 30, 2004 6:58 am

I can also say that finally I am no longer saying that I need more skill points. I have too many. But I digress...
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