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tcg_researcher]I'd PEACH this, but it really should have its own thread.

I agree. Discussing design philosophies or individual mechanics is one thing, but critiquing entire races is not really what this thread is for.

@Goldgrae - That said, I'd hate to have you come here asking for advice only to be met with "Get outta of my thread." So I will comment briefly on your races. For the most part, I only have problems with their encounter abilities.

Tail Slash - It's damage is a bit higher than what I would prefer to see on a racial AoE (I prefer to use the Dragonborn's damage progression as the cap), but more importantly, my issue is with the attack stat. Being only strength based makes this power very useless to any class or build that doesn't focus in strength. And that's a lot of them. Allowing the choice of additional stats would fix that (I suggest dex and con).

Retaliatory Bite - Daze bad. No daze good. Also, the target line should unambiguously specify a specific target. Finally, what do you mean by "yielding combat advantage."

Gut Spit - Does crazy good damage. Remember that ongoing damage hits at the beginning of your turn, but you don't get to save until the end. So even at heroic, a foe is taking 1d8+con+5 points on a hit guaranteed, and will likely take more. I suggest either removing the ongoing damage completely or moving it to a paragon-tier feat (sans the scaling). I did the same with one of my homebrew races, where a non-scaling Ongoing 6 damage about equaled the average damage output of the Dragonborn's Enlarge Breath feat.

I do suggest, however, that you create your own thread. That way, your race will get the attention that it deserves from a larger audience of potential reviewers.

I'd PEACH this, but it really should have its own thread.[/quote]
I agree. Discussing design philosophies or individual mechanics is one thing, but critiquing entire races is not really what this thread is for.

@Goldgrae - That said, I'd hate to have you come here asking for advice only to be met with "Get outta of my thread." So I will comment briefly on your races. For the most part, I only have problems with their encounter abilities.

Tail Slash - It's damage is a bit higher than what I would prefer to see on a racial AoE (I prefer to use the Dragonborn's damage progression as the cap), but more importantly, my issue is with the attack stat. Being only strength based makes this power very useless to any class or build that doesn't focus in strength. And that's a lot of them. Allowing the choice of additional stats would fix that (I suggest dex and con).

Retaliatory Bite - Daze bad. No daze good. Also, the target line should unambiguously specify a specific target. Finally, what do you mean by "yielding combat advantage."

Gut Spit - Does crazy good damage. Remember that ongoing damage hits at the beginning of your turn, but you don't get to save until the end. So even at heroic, a foe is taking 1d8+con+5 points on a hit guaranteed, and will likely take more. I suggest either removing the ongoing damage completely or moving it to a paragon-tier feat (sans the scaling). I did the same with one of my homebrew races, where a non-scaling Ongoing 6 damage about equaled the average damage output of the Dragonborn's Enlarge Breath feat.

I do suggest, however, that you create your own thread. That way, your race will get the attention that it deserves from a larger audience of potential reviewers.

Vebrandsson]To focus on the guide itself, I would just like to state (because no one else has) that WotC gave the Gnolls Abyssal language as one of their racial languages. [/QUOTE[
I hadn't realized that. Thanks for pointing that out.

To focus on the guide itself, I would just like to state (because no one else has) that WotC gave the Gnolls Abyssal language as one of their racial languages. [/QUOTE[
I hadn't realized that. Thanks for pointing that out.

Vebrandsson]And to be honest I have yet to figure out what reason PC's can't learn one of these languages at lvl 1 (however at lvl 2 its just fine, in fact I had a player retrain his linguist feat at level 2 and pick up both languages, simply to prove he could).

Besides for flavor reasons, my assumption is that WotC and wants to keep those languages restricted so they can serve as a resource tax for prerequisites in feature material. I just got my EPG today, and the Sivis Truenamer path actually has Supernal as a prerequisite, and we might see more of the same in Divine Power.

And to be honest I have yet to figure out what reason PC's can't learn one of these languages at lvl 1 (however at lvl 2 its just fine, in fact I had a player retrain his linguist feat at level 2 and pick up both languages, simply to prove he could).[/quote]
Besides for flavor reasons, my assumption is that WotC and wants to keep those languages restricted so they can serve as a resource tax for prerequisites in feature material. I just got my EPG today, and the Sivis Truenamer path actually has Supernal as a prerequisite, and we might see more of the same in Divine Power.

Vebrandsson]Also to bring something up from the EPG. The doppelgangers from that book get the following for racial stat bonuses: Dexterity or Intelligence +2, Charisma +2. Personally I question the wisdom of this on the part of WotC, and do not myself plan to use this, however if someone wanted to, anyone have suggestions on reconciling the balance of it?

From a purely mechanical point of view, I don't think there are any balance apparent balance problems. While the ability to choice between Dex or Int does make them more versatile than most races, at the end of the day, that choice doesn't make them any more or less powerful.

I would even go so far to say that in most cases, allowing any race to have any combination of racial bonuses would not affect overall balance. It would make races less focus and trample all over the poor humans who would need some form of compensation, but overall most races would not much more powerful for it, I think.

Regardless, I think the trend with the Doppelgangers is going to remain the exception and not the norm. Doppelgangers are suppose to be known for versatility (and even get a paragon path dedicated to that concept), so the idea was not implemented entirely arbitrarily. As far as ability scores go, they're still not as versatile as wrote:

Also to bring something up from the EPG. The doppelgangers from that book get the following for racial stat bonuses: Dexterity or Intelligence +2, Charisma +2. Personally I question the wisdom of this on the part of WotC, and do not myself plan to use this, however if someone wanted to, anyone have suggestions on reconciling the balance of it?[/quote]
From a purely mechanical point of view, I don't think there are any balance apparent balance problems. While the ability to choice between Dex or Int does make them more versatile than most races, at the end of the day, that choice doesn't make them any more or less powerful.

I would even go so far to say that in most cases, allowing any race to have any combination of racial bonuses would not affect overall balance. It would make races less focus and trample all over the poor humans who would need some form of compensation, but overall most races would not much more powerful for it, I think.

Regardless, I think the trend with the Doppelgangers is going to remain the exception and not the norm. Doppelgangers are suppose to be known for versatility (and even get a paragon path dedicated to that concept), so the idea was not implemented entirely arbitrarily. As far as ability scores go, they're still not as versatile as humans.