ECL Races, EVER worth it?

[Rel]

I am firmly of the opinon that "racial persecution" should never translate directly into a mechanical advantage. The same goes for most role-playing related disadvantages.

I tend to agree with you in general. That's why I noted that fact in the first paragraph of the post that got this portion of the debate rolling.

What I was sort of wondering is how GM's approached the situation. Do they (as I'm currently doing with my Eberron campaign) attach no social stigma to being from a monstrous race? Or do they make a big deal out of the fact that everybody stops and stares at the PC as he walks through town and go out of their way to make him unwelcome and descriminate against him whenever possible (even if they don't outright attack the PC)?

It seems to me that one way encourages playing non-standard races and the other does not, all mechanical considerations aside. I would posit that, at the low end of the power scale at least, the roleplaying disincentives to playing such a race could weigh as heavily as LA considerations.

 

[Mokona]

On A Slightly Different Note

The biggest problem with ECL, IMO, is that it assumes levels are generally linear.

I started a related, but off topic, discussion here: http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=141448

 

[Selvarin]

Which is, as Sean said, sort of the point.

My eyeballin' gut feeling is that ECL races will be unviable for general play until that ECL accounts for only 1/4 or less of the PC's total Character Level. Even then, only specific races will be viable (those with Monstrous Humanoid and Outsider dice or no dice) and only as a non-caster.

I would suggest that maybe ECLed races should start with Negative Levels equal to their ECL, and lose them on stat increase levels (I.E. Bugbear would have 4 negative levels ... at 4th, 8th, 12th, and 16th he'd lose a negative level "for free" until his ECL was gone) but Negative Levels hit spellcasting and HP, which is specifically what I WOULDN'T want to hit.

The problem with ECL is that you lose class levels, and those are too important to pass up, no matter what kind of sweet power you get.

This is one reason I don't play Eberron, mind you. There's almost no reason not to play a warforged. I know WHY they made them +0 ECL, but the only reason to go anything else is if you've got a specific feat-centric build in mind and go human.

--fje

That's something closer to what I'd want to do in most cases, including certain templates. I'm not a fan of going through monster levels before getting to take class levels.

 

[Victim]

One problem with many monstrous races is that not all HD are created equal. Dragon HD are better than Fey HD. And the mechanic where ECL = HD + LA is stupid; the only classes that don't get abilities with their HD are NPC classes (which have a CR penalty compared to normal ones). It's like saying that a level 10 human cleric is ECL 16: 10 HD from cleric levels and then another 6 Level Adjustment from his spell abilities, turning, and domains. Some of the abilities that are included in a creature's LA should be considered attached to its HD, depending on their type (dragon and outsider HD don't cover as many abilities).

 

[Serathin]

First, I should note that EL is supposed to measure something OTHER than combat ability - total character effectiveness. For example, having a phylactery does not make a lich more effective in combat, but it is definitely worth EL.

Second, as noted earlier, monster HD are unequal, and this has been expressed in 3.5 rules for increasing CR as HD increases.

In particular, dragon and outsiders are solid.

If there were a character class that gave NOTHING but:

3 good saves, full BAB, d12 HP, and 6 skill points (or d8 HP and 8 skill points for outsiders, and decent skill access), it'd be worth taking 1 or 2 levels of even without any special abilities.

Second, it's not always true that EL is not worth it. Generally, and special abilities like spell likes or supernatural abilities that do NOT SCALE BY LEVEL, make an LA race not worth it. LA deriving from spell like abilities, or flat-DC effects, or effects with DCs that increase by HD but not by class levels also, generally become worthless. Abilities that do scale MAY be worth it.

The biggest notable issue in LA is that it hurts spellcasting classes far more than non-casters, like fighters and rogues. A well designed fighter/rogue (or fighter-rogue) can benefit from the LA class if the abilities mesh well. For example, a pixie rogue/sniper...

The other issue is that most of the comparisons I've seen pit low level LA creatures against low-mid level characters. However, this does not take into account the fact that the base classes are heavily front loaded. Thus, fighter/rogues with LA don't really come into their own until they have at least 4 to 8 class levels.

Finally, LA derived from stat increases and other stackable bonuses can be worth it - but it depends how much. At high levels, half dragon can be decent. +8 STR, +2 Con, Int, Cha, +4 natural armor, possible winged flight... For 3 LA, is probably fair. (Note that I'm completely ignoring the breath weapon, which is worthless beyond level 5). Half dragon, as a template, also lets you keep the base race bonuses, like human. Classes like Aasimar are NOT worth it, however. They receive 4 stat points for one level and lose base race bonuses... In our game, we made aasimar a template (so you get the human bonuses AND the aasimar bonuses for 1 LA), and it's still questionable whether it's worth it. (For that matter, anyone who thinks the elf bonuses are even vaguely comparable to the human bonuses has serious issues...)

The real problem with LA is that the specific LA values given are often just way off base.

I'm not sure the fact that LA races make poor spellcasters is a bad thing... it does mean that the most magical races (in terms of learned or acquired magic, rather than innate magic) are the ones with lowest hit dice, and that's important for the game genre. It just means that no one will ever actually play a giant=priest (do you know what the LA of the cloud giant priest in the book is?!?!?!)

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hello there Feathercircle!

On the other hand, DON'T use Upper_Krust's CR formulas for this, no matter HOW good they are!

Is this sort of a backhanded compliment?

ECL is not equivalent to CR, even though a character level is supposed to generally be worth a full CR point when you're playing an NPC properly.

Doesn't that sort of defy the purpose of ECL then though? The idea being to try and rate the effective class level of something that is technically not a class level.

Some of the abilities that a monster has may be FAR more useful to them when they have a chance to use them repeatedly as a PC than if they're used in a one-shot encounter.

I have heard these thoughts before, and on the surface they seem valid, but I personally don't think they hold water.

How can a monsters potential CR or ECL change simply as a result of it being present more often? For a start, there is no ability that cannot somehow be duplicated by spell, item or feat anyway.

At-will telepathiy is handy for a monster, but potentially balance-altering when used by a PC. A casting of Wish once a year comes up a lot more often when you're fighting different monsters of that kind in several encounters, but is less of a big deal when your PC will probably use it once in the entire campaign. Flight adds to an encounter's challenge, but allows PCs to bypass many otherwise-challenging encounters entirely. Eyeballing is imperative.

Can someone honestly tell me their campaign was totally derailed because a player could fly at will? The idea sounds unlikely...unless the entire campaign is set on the elemental plane of air and the centrepiece is the aerie of broken bridges over perilous plummets!

Theres nothing mentioned above that couldn't potentially be found within a Prestige Class, wherein I doubt anyone would make a fuss. eg. Dragon Disciple.

 

[Felon]

I have heard these thoughts before, and on the surface they seem valid, but I personally don't think they hold water. How can a monsters potential CR or ECL change simply as a result of it being present more often?

The point is, giving out mind blank at will to a 10 HD, CR 9 monster like the braxat (MMII) that the PC's will fight in a single encounter is not the same thing as handing out mind blank at will to a 9th or 10th-level player character. It's easy to say "at will" when that doesn't really mean anything different than "1/day, or until the PC's kill you, whichever comes first". That definitely holds water.

Can someone honestly tell me their campaign was totally derailed because a player could fly at will? The idea sounds unlikely...unless the entire campaign is set on the elemental plane of air and the centrepiece is the aerie of broken bridges over perilous plummets!

That's quite a straw-man arguement you've got there...an ability doesn't have to totally derail a campaign in order to be deemed problematic or inappropriate.

 

[maggot]

I'm not sure the fact that LA races make poor spellcasters is a bad thing... it does mean that the most magical races (in terms of learned or acquired magic, rather than innate magic) are the ones with lowest hit dice, and that's important for the game genre. It just means that no one will ever actually play a giant=priest

I've always wanted giant wizards and giant priests without them being pathetic. Even as NPCs they are way under the curve. The CR rules at least allow you to give two levels of mage to a giant before you its CR goes up. But if you want to make a 11th level giant mage, he is epic.

Why not allow swapping out hit dice of larger creatures? When a 1HD human becomes a 1st level wizard, he loses that 1HD and gains the wizard level. So why can't an 11HD giant gain 1st level wizard and give up one of his 11HD. Yes, it would make giant wizards actually lose hit points as they gain levels, but I think it would work and is a logical extention.

Why are 1HD creatures so different than 2+HD creatures anyway? At the bare minimium you there seems like there should be some creature that keeps only 1HD when it gains classes. Compare the hobgoblin to the gnoll. There is a big disconnect.

 

[Psion]

FWIW for those who may be grappling with the issue of allowing ECL races, Green Ronin's Advanced GM Manual has one technique. It basically gives all characters one or more free ECLs. You can't use this(these) level(s) to take actual class levels, but if you want to play a race with a lower LA, you can use it to gain bonus feats, stats, or special abilities.

It's pretty slick, the more I think about it.

 

[maggot]

One problem is that everything is supposed to start with 11,11,11,10,10 for ability scores. This means that a monster that should be strong when compared to the PCs has a HUGE strength adjustment.

Yes, I have noticed this before as well. Some monsters like mind flayers are clearly elite, and should have an assumed elite array of 15,14,13,12,10,8. But instead, you end up with mind flayers having +8 Int, and if you give one a character class, oh lordy watch out. Some mind flayer NPC wizards I've stat'd up have ridiculous DCs because of attribute stacking, even though they are lower level wizards due to the CR rules.