Choices not pigeonholes (racial stat bonii)

[DanmarLOK]

I'm about to institute a house rule for a new 4e campaign. It's just really been grating on me to hear players going, "I'm going to be a wizard." and others going "Okay, if you want the bonus intelligence you have to pick Eladrin or Tiefling?" because those are the two races with +2 int.

Want to be the strongest fighter you can be? Dragonborn is your option.

(this all presumes that human with the single +2 to any stat isn't wanted and that monster races or non-released races aren't an option or desired).

So after little thought I'm going to institute the following rule on racial increases:

Character House Rule #2: Racial Stat Increases have been changed. Each race except for human now gets +2 to any stat of their choice and +1 to any of the race's existing dominate stats.
Example: Dragonborn Wizard with +2 int and +1 str OR cha. Dwarvish Rogue with +2 dex and +1 con OR wisdom.
​

The game should be about choices, not pigeonholes. And those racial bonuses smell strongly of pigeon poop to me.

As a caveat let me state my group has no min/maxers, no char-op's, no twinks. But it is a minor irritation to most of them that numerically a halfling wizard can never be as good as a eladrin wizard. I think the above rule helps that to some extent. They all have professed that it sounds good on paper and we'll have to see how it plays out.

Just thought I'd see what others have to say about it. And we've all been playing a very long time, most from 1st edition onwards although we did pretty much give 3.5 a complete miss after our time with 3.0.

 

[Dinkeldog]

I'd avoid odd bonuses--they're too prone to abuse of one sort or another.

There's also not much of a difference between an eladrin wizard and a halfling wizard--+1 to hit (for a 5% advantage to the eladrin on the d20 rolls).

My other warning about everyone choosing +2 to assign to the ability of their choice is the possibility of stepping on human toes.

 

[DanmarLOK]

Hmm the fact that it's being dropped from 2 to 1 I would think would lead to a loss rather than an possible abuse? I'm certainly willing to concede though that in later iterations at least that a +1 can be as strong as a +2 at any given bonus time. But it can also be worthless, i.e. taking a 10 to 11 or 14 to 15 etc. since it's only really the modifier the stat gives you that matters. (which is a primary reason True20 did away with stats and just made them flat out mods)

It definitely does impact the humans and that's my only real concern. In practice this means that all races but human get an extra +1 to a limited selection of attributes. On the right attribute that is 5% more, on the wrong one it's worthless.

A little out of balance is fine, I have primarily roleplayers and it's not so much that halfling wizards can't be as strong as certain other racial wizards it's the glass ceilings that are arbitrarily created as a result.

Essentially we want race to not matter much at all in terms of numbers as to which you choose but rather the flavor of the race in the form of abilities and powers etc.

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

I'm using a similar house rule for my upcoming Dying Earth campaign: players can assign their two +2s to whichever two stats they want. Humans get a second +2 and can "double up" one of their racial traits.

TS, clearing out the pooh

 

[77IM]

I, too, have a similar rule:

• All PCs get a +2 Heroic Bonus to any one ability score.
• It doesn't stack with your racial ability score bonuses, so put it in some other score (like, the one you use to attack people).
• You only get 20 points for buying ability scores instead of 22.

So a dragonborn wizard would get a +2 racial bonus to Strength and Charisma, and a +2 Heroic bonus to Intelligence. So it's easier for him to get that 18 Intelligence instead of juts a 16. But, he only has 20 points to buy abilities instead of 22, so his secondary scores might not be as impressive as the guy using standard point buy and settling for a 16 Int.

Overall this results in a very slight power boost, but it's not unbalancing (except possibly for feats like Dwarven Weapon Training, which is arguably balanced by the dwarf's lack of a Strength bonus).

-- 77IM