ECL of Planetouched races too High?

[Chun-tzu]

Fly 90' with perfect manuverability?
I would guess not, though I don't have the book. It's the really high movement rate of fly that really impacts my game, I've noticed.

You gain the ability to fly at your land speed, average maneuverability. Not as good as the spell, but more often than not, it's the ability to fly that's more important than speed. Flight keeps you out of range of melee combat, which is great for spellcasters and archers.

I'll suggest again that the ability to do something for 50 minutes is pretty much the same as being able to do it all day for the purposes of impact on game balance.

Not for all games. A 6th level Wizard can do it once a day, maybe twice (but not likely, as he'd probably prep a different spell for other slots). So, IF your game has only one combat per day, no problem. If there's more combat, the Outsider can still do it. The Outsider can also use his wings for travel, which is much more limited when you can only do it for 50 minutes.

While fly will get you past a lot of problems and open a lot of tactic capabilities, it isn't a game breaker. Hmm... how much does an item with fly cost in comparison with an 6th level characters standard equipment?

Wings of Flying cost 22 000 gp. A 6th level character should have about 13 000 gp worth of treasure. In other words, he can't afford Wings of Flying for several more levels.

An Avariel or Aarakocra pays a +2 ECL for those wings. An Outsider that gets them for the cost of a feat is getting off easy. However, paying +1 ECL and a feat... that's better.

 

[kreynolds]

A positive enhancement bonus effectively hurting your spellcasting ability for one.

But it doesn't hurt your spellcasting ability. The ability score being low is the point. You want it low. They draw power from their anger, their inner fire, if you will.

That is what I meant by elegance, your mechansim,(please send $3.99 to teach satori01 to spell...), is at odds with the rest of the system.

You still have yet to illustrate how so many class abilities are _not_ at odds with the rest of the system. But, to point you in the right direction, why don't you start with the Improved Unarmed Strike feat. It is in fact at odds with the rest of the system. It changes the rules and gives you one more rule that you have to remember, further complicating and already complex set of rules. This is no different.

Intimidate is not the best supporting arguement...

It's a perfect argument. It's inherently flawed. The best the designers can come up with is using your Strength as the ability for Intimidate if your Charisma is low.

...as using a suboptimal rule set...

Don't blame me for Intimidate being suboptimal. I didn't design it. But thank you for acknowledging that its suboptimal.

...to support another proppsed rule set...

One that isn't suboptimal, at least not in my book.

...is like using Stalinist Russia to support a human rights record.

Did you know the head guy at the UN for WoMD was going to be Sadam? Oh, and there's also the guy under investigation for war crimes being the head of the very same group at the UN as well. Funny how the world works, isn't it?

Anyways, I guess I missed your point.

 

[Malacoda]

But it doesn't hurt your spellcasting ability. The ability score being low is the point. You want it low. They draw power from their anger, their inner fire, if you will.

That's just it. A low Charisma tells us that the character does not have the ability to draw on their anger. They don't have much of an inner fire. The lower the Charisma, the worse it gets. They may be full of anger, but it just makes they unlikable. That is part of what Charisma is all about.

Don't blame me for Intimidate being suboptimal.

The comparison to Intimidate seems off to me, because the skill has a glaring problem: size and other visual components can easily overcome lack of personal presence. An ogre with a bloody huge greatsword is going to be intimidating to most common people, even if he doesn't have the personal forcefulness to push it all further.

But, just because someone is filled with anger and "fire" doesn't mean he should be a better spellcaster. Charisma just doesn't work that way. I don't see the correlation between the two.

Seems to me the easiest way to acheive what you want is to give fire genasi a bonus to Charisma but penalties to social skills such as Diplomacy and Bluff (though certainly not Intimidate).

 

[satori01]

Lol, man I was not really taking your suggestion seriously, and frankly still cant, no offense meant.

Charisma to my mind in 3e refers to strength of personality and the power of a person's animus. The higher the number the more powerful the personality, the lower the number the weaker the personality with 0 charisma meaning a vegatable, an inanimate object.

Angry people can be portrayed with high cha scores, everyone knows someone who is able to say things and get away with them. Han Solo is a disagreable rogue that still has a way with people. He sucks at inital impressions but he wins people over with time. I think Kreynolds you might be thinking of charisma as behavior not as strength of spirit.

Turning a negative into a positive benift is going against a central logical tenet of 3e which is the idea of positive good, negative bad for all its various systems,(spellcasting, attributes, skill bonuses etc) as opposed to older D&D systems.

Class abilities are not really germaine to the conversation, they work within the confines of the rules. Your proposal for one race to use a negative modifer to their cha based spell casting abilites and the equailvent positive modifier has more akin with undead and the lack of a con score.

It seems counter intuitive to me to have a single race become more powerful and better spell casters the closer they get to being a vegatable, and that is what ultimately is at stake by having negative modifers in cha equate toa positive. The 3 cha fire gensai sorc is more powerful than the 10 gensai sorc. How would the 3 cha fire gensai sorc buff err I mean curse himself? What if he or she finds a standard magic item that adds pluses not minuses? Would you allow that character to go into negative charisma?
That is what I meant by it being lacking elegance, your solution raises more problems than other solutions that could be tried.

Is it unworkable? Hey it's your game, I wouldnt do it like that, but you like it so go for it, If I am ever in Texas and had the pleasure to play in your game, well your court your rules.

Again though I do think there is a difference from behavior and stat modifiers and high charisma. If you go and moon the queen, I dont care how cute your ass is, or how high your charisma modifier is, your behavior is going to be taken poorly. A higher charisma character will have greater success than a lower charisma character in getting others to listen to and accept his reasons.

 

[Madfox]

First of all I want to adress the discussion on flight. Personally, I find the ECL for Avoriels just for being able to fly way over the top. Flight is good and probably too good at low levels, but once you start approaching 6th level opponents will actually be ready to face flying opponents. The dowside of wings is also that they do not have perfect or good flight manouvrability. This means that they have to move each round or fall to the ground. Hence this flying nemesis cannot make a full-round attack, which at higher levels does hurt.

Anyway, adjusting the ECL for flight -just as for any other movement ability like swim and climb- is highly campaign specific. For example, I am currently running an Underdark campaign with many small corridors and the like. Battles rarely take place in areas with enough space for a natural flyer to manoeuvre. Sometimes it would make it easier to cross a chasm, but at other places wings would not help because a straight vertical ascend or descend is needed (which again needs perfect manouvrability). Of course, the fighter with his boots of flying and the wizard can use it often enough, but that gives a perfect manoeuvrability. Last session the player learned that having a speed of 90 ft can also be a hindrance when he was dominated and ordered to fly away and wait at the back.

Returning to the genasi's, I never gave much thought about the fire, water and air genasi except that I agree that they are too weak at ECL +1. I don't agree that thieflings and aasimar are to weak for ECL +1, but that might be because in my campaign the circumstances favoured their resistances rather well. They also used their darkvision to great effect. Also never underestimate the benefits of being an outsider. Being immune to hold person, dominate person and charm person can be a huge benefit now and then

Now, I did have an earth genesi in a dwarf orientated campaign. I switched the -2 wisdom to -2 dex, since I always envision earth as being ponderous and carefull. I also gave them the stonecunning ability of dwarves. While still relative weak for an +1 ECL class, it did make that particular PC not too bad. In the end I do get the impression the designers chose slightly too high ECLs on purpose to get people to select core races in preference to weird races and to leave those open for role-players only. That though might just be me

 

[Staffan]

In the end I do get the impression the designers chose slightly too high ECLs on purpose to get people to select core races in preference to weird races and to leave those open for role-players only. That though might just be me

They've basically said as much, though more along the lines of "erring on the side of high ECL" rather than "artificially inflating ECL".

 

[kreynolds]

That's just it. A low Charisma tells us that the character does not have the ability to draw on their anger. They don't have much of an inner fire.

I disagree, but only to a point. Among other things, Charisma represents "force of personality, persuasiveness, personal magnetism, ability to lead, and physical attractiveness". It represents "actual personal strength". An individual with a lot of anger does not need to be persuasive, does not need to have a magnetic personality, the ability to lead, and they don't need to be physically attractive. I think a person can draw power from their anger without having the four previously mentioned characteristics, but when you take "actual personal strength" into account, I understand what you're saying.

With that said, however, there are most certainly exceptions. Many special abilities are based on Constitution. What is constitution? "Health and stamina". The tougher you are, the more powerful your special abilities. So, your power comes from your toughness. But what about undead? They have no Constitution at all. They're not tough, so what about their abilities? Where are they drawing their power from? Charisma. It's an exception to the rule. What I am suggesting is simply an exception to the rule, one that is not any further outside the norm than undead. Arguably, less so, at least it is from my perspective.

I respect that you don't like it though. I just don't see it going any further beyond the boundaries than other exceptions, is all.

 

[kreynolds]

They've basically said as much, though more along the lines of "erring on the side of high ECL" rather than "artificially inflating ECL".

Yup. My problem is that I just don't see a difference between the two. I do understand what they were going for and what their goal in mind was, I just think how they handled it was unnecessary.

 

[drnuncheon]

I respect that you don't like it though. I just don't see it going any further beyond the boundaries than other exceptions, is all.

"I think I'll play a fire genasi. Hey, do I have to drop the lowest die on this roll?"

"Point buy? Sweet. Can we get points back for going below 8?"

"Hey Bob, I want to drive my save DCs up...cast bestow curse on me!"

And of course, there's the problem that the regular sorcerer can go up to Charisma whatever, while the fire genasi is limited to a 1...which means that you haven't really fixed the problem, just delayed it.

Bad idea, that's all there is to it. Heck, the designers (the ones who made all those other exceptions that you talk about) decided it was a bad idea having stat maximums as prereqs for feats (eg "Too Ugly to Die").

I think you'd be better off with a mechanism something like 'Cha is counted as X higher for spells with the fire descriptor'.

J

 

[Pax]

I disagree, but only to a point. Among other things, Charisma represents "force of personality, persuasiveness, personal magnetism, ability to lead, and physical attractiveness". It represents "actual personal strength". An individual with a lot of anger does not need to be persuasive, does not need to have a magnetic personality, the ability to lead, and they don't need to be physically attractive. I think a person can draw power from their anger without having the four previously mentioned characteristics, but when you take "actual personal strength" into account, I understand what you're saying.

Ghouls have a 16 racial average for Charisma.

I highly doubt they are at all persuasive, nor display any personal magnetism, and definitely not physical attractiveness (unless you're into necrophilia, I guess). Ability to lead is possible.

However, above all else, I view charisma as a measure of PRESENCE. Likeable or detestable, do you project great PRESENCE when you enter a room? Do people take note of your passing?

Or do you have to yell "hey, I'm TALKIN' here!" to get people to realise you're even there?

IMO, that's the difference between high and low Charisma. Even WOTC doesn't seem to treat it consistently, though.