Floating Ability Bonuses

[Tequila Sunrise]

Someone came came up with this idea, and I like it--players assign their racial bonuses to whichever two abilities they want. It makes interesting and unusual character concepts more appealing, but I'm unsure of how to handle humans. I'm thinking of one of these rules for human characters:

1. Humans can trade one racial ability to get a second +2 bonus.
2. Humans automatically get a second +2 bonus.

Which is most balanced? Does either one scream 'HUMANZ RULE!' or 'HUMANZ SUCK!'?

TS

 

[scarik]

I like giving everyone any two +2s they want.

The races are more or less balanced otherwise, it opens up more class options rather than making any race more potent. For me the racial powers generally are the coolest part of the race more so than their stat mods.

 

[jSpengler]

This is a great idea! I think I'll use a variant of this when I run my 4E game. I'm going to allow each player to float a single +2 bonus that their race would normally give. This would allow a dwarven fighter, for example, to get +2 strength instead of a +2 wisdom, as long as his +2 constitution bonus remains. I think that retains the flavor of each race while not restricting players. I'm just not completely ok with moving both bonuses. Personally, allowing a dwarf rogue with a +2 dexterity and +2 charisma really impedes the fun racial flavor of D&D.

I don't think that anything needs to be done with the humans, honestly. This house rule is about increasing flexibility and allowing for more interesting PC builds. The humans are already interesting enough, and I don't think that allowing a single +2 to float would create the need for additional balancing.

 

[ranger9]

I was the guy who proposed this, with greater restrictions (that is, not just any +2/+2 combo, but with some restrictions by race).

The post is here:

http://www.enworld.org/forum/4e-fan...ter-choice-ability-modifiers.html#post4560822

The preamble is long as I attempt to justify my proposals, but skip down to the actual proposals for a quick read.

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

I was the guy who proposed this, with greater restrictions (that is, not just any +2/+2 combo, but with some restrictions by race).

Kudos for the idea, man! I do agree with Scarik's comment though; I like simple house rules. My current version of this rule is:

"You can assign your racial bonuses to any two abilities you want. Humans get an additional +2 bonus. Additionally, humans can double-up one of their other racial traits."

I got an overwhelming and unanimous response to this topic over at Giant in the Playground, saying that this house rule makes humans suck. They came up with some pretty outrageous counterbalances to make humans comparable to other races again, but I am prone to agree that humans do become rather lackluster once everyone else has floating bonuses too.

This is a great idea! I think I'll use a variant of this when I run my 4E game. I'm going to allow each player to float a single +2 bonus that their race would normally give. This would allow a dwarven fighter, for example, to get +2 strength instead of a +2 wisdom, as long as his +2 constitution bonus remains. I think that retains the flavor of each race while not restricting players. I'm just not completely ok with moving both bonuses. Personally, allowing a dwarf rogue with a +2 dexterity and +2 charisma really impedes the fun racial flavor of D&D.

I like this too. I think I'll include this in my Tome of House Rules as a house-rule lite rendition.

TS

 

[ranger9]

Not to be all pride-of-authorship and all, but I don't see how giving races a list of possible modifiers to chose from is overly complicated.

For halflings, they can pick anything but STR and CON. (Same with elves, actually, which is a bit unsatisfying, making them so similar to halflings in that regard... ) I don't see that as "complicated."

It opens up a lot of character options while retaining the basics of the current bonus system, disallowing certain options but permitting most everything else.

Without restrictions Halflings could have 20 STR. Not really what you think of when you think Halflings.

The only complicated part is the introduction of the Dwarven magical resistance, which I just snuck in because I wanted Dwarves to be capable of 20 INT genius (making them great warlords, which should be a real Dwarven schtick; they have a very militant society, after all), but also didn't want them to be the ideal spellcasters, competing with elves as far as wizardry. That just runs too hard against what most people imagine dwarves and elves to be.

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

Not to be all pride-of-authorship and all, but I don't see how giving races a list of possible modifiers to chose from is overly complicated.

It's not complicated in calculus kind of way; it is complicated in a "I want to turn on the TV but I just ate Thanksgiving dinner and I'm too lazy...so I'll just wait until someone else does it" way. In other words, it's complicated in the lazy player kind of way. Maybe you've been blessed with unusually house rule-attentive players, in which case I am VERY jealous. But as I said, my experience with players is that house rules have to be kept inanely simple and short to prevent most players from saying "meh, whatever."

Without restrictions Halflings could have 20 STR. Not really what you think of when you think Halflings.

No, it isn't. But that's what makes it such a great opportunity for a unique character!

TS

 

[Exen Trik]

Rather than restricting where the ability bonus can go, it may be better to only allow one of the two racial mods to be floated, but the player chooses which. That way they retain some aspect of their races natural aptitudes, while still being outside the norm either physically or mentally.

Of course, the human has no restrictions on where it's two bonuses go.