What's the big deal with large PCs?

[Pentius]

The problem with squeezing and more attackers is that they sound like great disadvantages, but really aren't. Take passages, first. Maybe you play with dungeon tiles and use a lot of small areas(note that 2x2 passageways are pretty much cool for a large defender). Now the clever use of terrain is a balancing factor. How many DMs honestly think of it that way? I am willing to bet not even all of us here do, and we are a self selected group of people who spend a lot of time thinking about D&D. Secondly, for the multiple attackers. There's no functional difference between having 8 attackers and 12(unless they're all minions). You're kinda screwed either way.

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

Until recently, one of my players has been playing a centaur fighter. What we found is that Large size in and of itself isn't a big deal. Martin the centaur was a great defender, and made me grind my teeth at times, but that had more to do with Combat Superiority than being Large.

(While Martin was Large, his torso was human sized, so he used Medium weapons.)

Being Large certainly is an advantage, but no more so than say...second winding as a minor action. I think a lot of gamers look at the difference in size between a Medium space and a Large space -- a multiple of four! -- and think "Whoa, close bursts are gonna get that much bigger!" But in reality, it hardly makes a difference because distance is more important than number of squares. In other words, it doesn't really matter that a close burst 5 from a centaur covers 20 extra squares, unless all those squares are filled with enemies. In 99% of encounters, distance from your targets is more important -- which means that Large creatures have an advantage of just 1 square.

 

[Riastlin]

In other words, it doesn't really matter that a close burst 5 from a centaur covers 20 extra squares, unless all those squares are filled with enemies. In 99% of encounters, distance from your targets is more important -- which means that Large creatures have an advantage of just 1 square.

Yes and no. As a practical matter, I agree that a large PC with Close Burst 1 will not often actually get to target 12 enemies (the max after you account for the PC) anymore than a medium PC is likely to target 8 enemies with his Close Burst 1. The point though is that with large PCs, there would be that many fewer places for the enemies to "hide" from the bursts. This of course would be more of an issue with indoor encounters than outdoor since interior locations naturally tend to be smaller and have harder boundary lines.

That being said, I think you can make it work but you need to be careful. For instance, I think you need to be real careful with weapons. Frankly, from a realism standpoint, I think it might make sense that a 9 foot tall ogre could wield a fullblade one-handed, thus also allowing him to wield a heavy shield at the same time, or making the fullblade versatile, etc. Now personally, although that makes a certain amount of sense from a realism standpoint, I do think that would tend to over power large PCs a bit, but those are issues that can be worked out if need be.

As for squeezing, I personally, don't think it would be an issue. I rarely have 5 foot wide spaces in my encounters (though it does happen occasionally). If anything, the large size becomes a benefit as now even a 10 foot wide opening can be fully blocked by the defender while his allies stand behind him with cover and firing without penalty at the monsters.

At the end of the day though, if it works for your group, go for it!

 

[Dice4Hire]

The problem with weapons and damage is one to think about, but if the PC could only use two handed weapons one handed, I cannot see it as being overpowered. Upping dice is the usual problem.

As for bursts, I do not see that as a huge problem either.

Now as threatening reach is pretty much out of the game, that problem is also solved. Reach is not a huge deal, nice, but not an automatic game winner. Yes, attacking further away with a polearm would b pretty nice.

As for moving, this is the area I would find the most annoying. I know, as a DM, that moving large creatures is sometimes hard, and that large PC is taking up a lot of floor space, especially in corridors and the like. It could be annoying, but not a lot more than that.

All that said, I wold not want WOTC to intro large races. The game works fine without them. Mainly as I would see players who go for large characters trying desperately to work out rule advantages for themselves, and such things annoy me to no end.

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

I don't think there is anything wrong with large races..what is wrong is upping dice due to weilding a 'large' weapon... which leads to the 3e monkey-grip, enlarged Goliath problem. {A medium critter weilding a huge weapon for tons of damage..}

I would like to see the return of the Ogre.

Perhaps a good balancing deal would to say that large {or bigger} creature can be flanked when two or more opponents threaten 2 or more sides..showing their difficulty in shifting around as quickly.
And have bursts work like mounted critter rules

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[Saeviomagy]

Would it be fun, as a player of, say, a fighter with no ranged weapon, to continually fight creatures with 15' threatening reach and the ability to hit with their basic attack almost every time and prone with it?

No.

And that's basically what you need to protect against when you let a PC become large. Every melee creature who doesn't have an effective ranged attack suddenly becomes fodder to the large greatspear-wielding PC.

Hell, this time around game designers haven't even managed to avoid the scenario with medium PCs.

The solution probably isn't to ban large PCs, it's to make sure that knocking someone off their feet is usually costlier than them having to stand up again.

 

[MrBeens]

Would it be fun, as a player of, say, a fighter with no ranged weapon, to continually fight creatures with 15' threatening reach and the ability to hit with their basic attack almost every time and prone with it?

No.

And that's basically what you need to protect against when you let a PC become large. Every melee creature who doesn't have an effective ranged attack suddenly becomes fodder to the large greatspear-wielding PC.

Hell, this time around game designers haven't even managed to avoid the scenario with medium PCs.

The solution probably isn't to ban large PCs, it's to make sure that knocking someone off their feet is usually costlier than them having to stand up again.

The reach range on large weapons stays the same doesn't it? It's just the damage dice that goes up (and as everyone has said this in of it's self causes problems - see bugbears and minotaurs?).
For large weapons I'd say just make things that are 2 handed have the versatile property instead. The large character gets to have a slight increase in versatility or damage without breaking the underlaying weapon damage assumptions.

 

[Will Doyle]

Really, I'm not really seeing huge issues. Understandably large characters may not be to everybody's taste (much like tiny characters), but I don't think they'd be intrinsically broken.

A quick "for" and "against":

Larger footprint
For: Easier to block enemy movement, more likely to trigger OA against enemies, burst attacks made a lot larger
Against: Easier to get slowed down by difficult terrain, more available spaces for enemies to attack from, less room for allies to manoeuvre.

Seems fairly balanced, apart from the bursts. Use mounted rules, and it works, in my opinion.

Larger weapons
For: Deal +1 die-step for most weapons e.g. 1d8>1d10
Against: Difficulty obtaining large weapons.

Now that's a flat bonus. But really, all it equates to (very roughly) is a +2 melee damage bonus, right? Doesn't sound so huge to me.

Reach
For: Hit enemies from 1 square further away. However, no threatening reach.
Against: Nothing really.

I think reach is a pretty big deal, even without threatening reach.

However, not all large creatures have reach - and I don't think it would be breaking things too much to say that large races that traditionally have it don't when made into player races (such as an ogre).

 

[Will Doyle]

And just for the hell of it, here's an quick stab at the Ogre (using the flanking balancer proposed by Primitive Screwhead, above)

BEING LARGE
Large characters follow most of the same rules as Medium ones, with the following exceptions:

Space: Whenever a large character uses an effect that has an origin square (such as a melee, a ranged, a close, or an area power), the player chooses where that square is located in the character’s space, and the effect uses that origin square. Powers cannot accidentally effect the user (for example, bursts that target "all creatures")
Weapons: Large characters use weapons that are specially sized for them. When using large weapons, increase the damage die by one size (PHB 220). Large characters can use two-handed weapons intended for creatures of Medium size and treat them as one-handed weapons. A Large character cannot use a Medium-sized one-handed weapon at all; its hand is too large to effectively hold the weapon’s grip.

OGRE
Brawny meatheads, stubborn as stone.
RACIAL TRAITS
Average Height: 9'2'' - 10'
Average Weight: 620-800

Ability Scores: +2 Constitution, +2 Strength or Wisdom
Size: Large
Speed: 6
Vision: Normal

Languages: Common, Giant
Skill Bonuses: +2 Endurance, +2 Intimidate
Angry Smash: You gain the angry smash power.
Lumbering: You count as flanked when two or more enemies are adjacent to at least two of your sides.
Iron Grip: You gain a +2 bonus to Reflex and Fortitude against attempts to escape your grab.

ANGRY SMASH Ogre Racial Power
Stoopid yoomans gunna get smushed good!
Encounter
Free Action Personal
Trigger: You make a melee attack.
Effect: Roll twice for the attack and use the highest result. If you hit, you knock your enemy prone.

 

[DEFCON 1]

This is a perfect example of a set of house rules that any DM who desires it can probably add into their game with a minimum of fuss (as Tequila Sunrise did with his centaur). There are probably easy additions that make things better and worse for a Large PC that won't throw balance out of whack.

But that being said... there's currently no reason why the D&D 4E game itself needs to add in rules for Large PCs. It currently isn't necessary, so there's no reason to jump down that rabbit hole on an official level. Especially considering that if they did... there would thousands upon thousands of players who would dismantle those rules and put them back together, discovering and creating many more game issues than even Design & Development (or your own home game with your own house rules) could have sussed out.

If you want rules for Large PCs... then just create rules for Large PCs. No big deal. And don't give a crap that WotC hasn't made their own rules for it available, because they aren't necessary for what you want to do.