Excerpt: Racial Benefits

[Derren]

Also there comes a drawback of enlarging an AoE: The threat of catching your party in it. That was one of the most frustrating things for me, playing the 4e wizard in a demo: Many times, my party were adjacent to the enemy, so any effect that radiated outwards to adjacent foes (Acid Arrow, Force Orb, Scorching Burst) wasn't usable.

The Dragonborn can still use the smaller AOE breath.

 

[Rechan]

But the Dragon Breath feat is an encounter power, I believe, as compared to a continuous power. We also don't know how much damage the Dragonborn Dragon Breath does, so even if it's spread over a wide area it may not be that effective.

The paragon-tier feat for Dragonborn ups their breathweapon to d10s.

So it's gotta be smaller than d10.

 

[Andor]

P.S. Jeez, I hate the idea of dragonborn as a core race. Talk about killing sense of wonder.

Nah. Wonder is all in perspective. Imagine a party made up of all dragonborn from some isolated tribe. At the edge of their range they meet an old hermit who warns them of what lies beyond their lands:

Hermit: "Beyond the waterfall of broken barrels the is a path that takes one outside our valley. Some say that at the end of that path the are a smooth skin pink people who are (brace yourselves) naturally exothermic!
Party: *gasp*

 

[el-remmen]

Why does it kill your sense of wonder, exactly? Personally, I don't find Dragonborn any more remarkable than Eladrin who can teleport short distances on a daily basis.

Ha! Don't like Eladrin or Teiflings either!

Obviously, it is just personal taste, but there is a line of look/ability/origin beyond which, to me, are the great bizarre mysteries and threats of the world which are better off as the things characters run across and discover about than as something they have access (except perhaps as optional supplemental rules)

 

[Ulthwithian]

Well, at least they give the Dragonborn the option. Otherwise, the utility of a Blast 5 vs. Blast 3 could really be up in the air. (Unless there's no friendly fire here....)

Another interesting feat is the +2 dmg when bloodied. That can be anything from nigh-worthless (Dragonborn Rogue) to very good (Dragonborn Fighter).

I have a feeling that we haven't seen some of the 'good' racial feat options for some of the races yet.

 

[Rechan]

Obviously, it is just personal taste, but there is a line of look/ability/origin beyond which, to me, are the great bizarre mysteries and threats of the world which are better off as the things characters run across and discover about than as something they have access (except perhaps as optional supplemental rules)

It must be personal taste. Because I would much rather play in a world with no humans/dwarves/elves/halflings/gnomes, that's JUST dragonborn/tieflings/tri-keen/warforged/shifters/anthropomorphic somethingorother.

I'd rather be something entirely divorced from humanity and its demi-human derivatives. Because that, to me, is fantasy.

 

[TerraDave]

On the Quantity of Feats: A 10th level charecter will have 6 feats. So, e.g., if a charecter feels compelled to use two on racial feats and two on multiclassing, two would remain (vs. the 3 that a 10th level 3E charecter would have). Given that some things feats use to do will be covered by powers and (at higher levels) rituals, this does not seem so bad.

On the quality of feats: The feats we have seen may not be as good as the best 3E feats, they are better then many of the feats that are actually in the books, and that your PC never bothered to take.

On these feats: Not a bad approach. I was intrigued when they said race would matter over 10 levels...and clearly they decided to punt. But, given that this is not all of them, and that their are racial abilities in addition to these (and there are), it looks good.

 

[Derren]

(vs. the 3 that a 10th level 3E charecter would have).

4.
1st, 3rd, 6th, 9th level.

 

[Jer]

Unrelated question:

This article game me the impression darkvision is gone. . . Has this been mentioned before?

It's been mentioned before that darkvision for PCs is gone. I believe it was mentioned in one of the podcasts that low-light vision was going to be the default for PC races. I believe that there was some indication that monsters might still have darkvision, but it would be more rare. Quite a few of the RPG stats from the Dungeons of Dread miniature set that Wizards has for download have "darkvision" listed in their "Senses" line (Death Knight, Young Red Dragon, Beholder, Oni, Vampire Spawn, etc.) so I'm thinking it's still in the game unless there was some last-minute change.

 

[Mort_Q]

RE: Darkvision

Seeing as Dragonborn can buy low-light vision via a fear, perhaps Dwarves can buy darkvision via a feat?