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3 months ago ::
Mar 15, 2013 - 7:52AM
#41
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Date Joined:
Jun 14, 2006
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I meant the racial weapon training, I'm a jungle dwarf, I grew up bouncing from tree to tree wielding a blowgun, a tiger gut garrote, and a club. Why would taking a level of fighter give me a damage bonus with axes and hammers?
There are no Jungle Dwarves; maybe you're thinking of pigmies.
Seriously though, if you make a new race (or sub-race) that doesn't fit with the traditional racial traits, note it in their write-up and add/remove what is necessary for your vision.
The initial release material cannot cover everthing.
Forgotten Realms has jungle dwarves.
The point being that it makes little sense to give your races culutural traits like favored weapons- knowing full well that their culture will change (often drastically) between gameworlds. Not even WOTC's own published settings really have their elves favoring similar weapons.
Stuff that's inherited or a matter of anatomy- patience, sharp senses, nimbleness, and (relatively) long life- are traits that pretty much all elves tend to share. Give us more stuff that reflects this and less bonuses to specific weapons groups.
Save that for backgrounds, regional/cultural bonuses, feats, and other options.
There must be a baseline; tradition is that baseline. Everything else is an addition/expansion to that baseline. The initial release has to be based in that baseline, so that everything else can be properly added/expanded to it.
Seems like I can't post on the forums with my phone. Needed to get to a computer...
The baseline doesn't have to include a mechanical incentive towards using certain weapons in the race's stat line. Orcs don't usually get a bonus to useing axes, but everyone knows they love them. Dwarves don't need a mechanical bonus to hammers in their stats. Elves don't need a bonus to using bows.
You can give a baseline culture. Just make it fluff, though. Not crunch that's stuck in the race's statline and requires houseruling if you ever want to do anything more than mining dwarves or woodsman elves.
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3 months ago ::
Mar 15, 2013 - 8:05AM
#42
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Date Joined:
Nov 21, 2012
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The baseline must also be appealing and exciting, the faux tolkein retreads just don't cut it on their own anymore.
Also enough with the bonus skills and stuff. Give humans real gorram features for once. My favorites include the encounter power to help as a minor action, the ability to re-roll 1s on attack rolls.
I play humans specifically to have no features, to just be the baseline race and let my other choices determine my character, and I don't believe I'm the only one. Please, no special features for humans.
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3 months ago ::
Mar 15, 2013 - 8:12AM
#43
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Date Joined:
Oct 26, 2004
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It's increasingly clear to me that what we need to do is have racial abilities picked from small thematic lists.
That way I can have my cool teleporting elves and you can have your lame searches for secret doors elves, I can have my cool humans with actual features and game world identity, and you can have your "baseline" humans.
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3 months ago ::
Mar 15, 2013 - 8:19AM
#44
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It's increasingly clear to me that what we need to do is have racial abilities picked from small thematic lists.
That way I can have my cool teleporting elves and you can have your lame searches for secret doors elves, I can have my cool humans with actual features and game world identity, and you can have your "baseline" humans.
That's a lot like how PF does it.
Another potentially cool option might be a "Dwarven Paragon" specialty that requires you to be a Dwarf and then gives you abilities that build off of your existing racial abilities and new Dwarven talents and the like.
Dwarves invented beer so they could toast to their axes. Dwarves invented axes to kill people and take their beer.
Swanmay Syndrome: Despite the percentages given in the Monster Manual, in reality 100% of groups of swans contain a Swanmay, because otherwise the DM would not have put any swans in the game.
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3 months ago ::
Mar 15, 2013 - 8:22AM
#45
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Date Joined:
Nov 21, 2012
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It's increasingly clear to me that what we need to do is have racial abilities picked from small thematic lists.
That way I can have my cool teleporting elves and you can have your lame searches for secret doors elves, I can have my cool humans with actual features and game world identity, and you can have your "baseline" humans.
That's a lot like how PF does it.
Another potentially cool option might be a "Dwarven Paragon" specialty that requires you to be a Dwarf and then gives you abilities that build off of your existing racial abilities and new Dwarven talents and the like.
I'd prefer that, having to spend feats to get teleporting elves. Then there is a tradeoff and one character is not blatantly better than another.
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3 months ago ::
Mar 15, 2013 - 8:30AM
#46
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Date Joined:
Oct 26, 2004
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Well if all that old garbage is so cool then why not set it equal to the new hotness?
Why not have races be dynamic and influential as a default why must boring be the baseline?
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3 months ago ::
Mar 15, 2013 - 8:34AM
#47
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I prefer how Iron Heroes does it. It is assumed that every character is human. Every character gets a certain number of traits which are quite similar to the racial features. They can represent mental or cultural characteristics, physical training or build, and even regional characteristics.
So perhaps something of a hybrid of the two philosophies? Physical characteristics, characteristics that are abilities solidly linked to the anatomy of the race, whether magical or mundane, get lumped in with races and subraces. Cultural and training things, armor proficiencies, weapon proficiencies, ambition or fortitude or the like, get pulled out as traits that can be selected at level one. Each subrace can have a suggested set of them, but now they have to be reasonably balanced because they're a slightly separate component that can be interchanged.
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3 months ago ::
Mar 15, 2013 - 8:44AM
#48
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Date Joined:
Nov 21, 2012
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Well if all that old garbage is so cool then why not set it equal to the new hotness?
Why not have races be dynamic and influential as a default why must boring be the baseline?
That old garbage is what makes many of us enjoy the races and plenty of players think what we have now is dynamic and influential and aren't bored by it at all. We have classes to get all those "cool" features from, and feats too, both things that represent what a character learns and practices. Races are just what they are born with and the basic skills their culture would teach them, and I do not accept that that would include teleportation.
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3 months ago ::
Mar 15, 2013 - 8:59AM
#49
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Date Joined:
Oct 26, 2004
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And yet it still holds together better from that perspective than +damage with longswords.
What I'm saying is that the basic options should allow for a dynamic active version of the race, and that playing the modern version shouldn't cost a bunch of extra feats, especially since we only seem to get a handful these days.
Just hand out a few extra bits to the boring versions if you think there's a power issue. For example Searches for doors probably ins't on par with fey step, so give the search package another little boost, maybe it comes with walks on snow, or ears out my shoulders.
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3 months ago ::
Mar 15, 2013 - 12:08PM
#50
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Date Joined:
Aug 28, 2005
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There must be a baseline
It's possible, though, to have a baseline that is more broadly applicable. In fact, it isn't even that hard. There's no reason to make the baseline so limited in scope.
(A) Races are just what they are born with (B) and the basic skills their culture would teach them.
A is correct. B is not. B is the problem. B is what makes races to limited in scope. B is what prevents races from being broadly applicable. B is what necessitates hundreds of subraces for every race. No, race is A and only A, what are biological or otherwise innate features. Adding B to a race's default mechanics is always a mistake, and B includes weapon proficiencies or affinities. It simply makes no narrative or thematic sense for those to be mandatory features for all members of a race.
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