Half-Human Races

[Viktyr Gehrig]

Alright. One thread that keeps popping up around here is how underpowered/useless/boring the Half-Elf and Half-Orc are-- to the point that when someone starts complaining about one, someone else uses the other as an example of how it could be worse.

Most of the solutions to this problem seem to revolve around giving one or both races one of the Human's bonus features-- usually the skill point.

So, I got to thinking... if people think it's alright to give the Human's extra skill point to the half-human races, why not make the hybrid heritage a Human-only 1st level feat?

I've got versions for the Elf, Dwarf, Orc, and Hobgoblin. These feats all have the prerequisites of "Race: Human" and "Special: May only be taken at 1st level." In addition to the listed benefits, they bestow the appropriate racial subtype to the character who takes them.

They're also based on my House Ruled versions of the full-blooded races, so some of the ability modifiers or racial special abilities might not make sense. I'm pretty sure they all make sense, flavor-wise, so my main concern here is balance-- and whether or not this was a good idea in the first place.

Elf-Blooded

• +2 Charisma, -2 Constitution.
• Low-Light Vision.
• +1 racial bonus to Listen, Spot, and Search checks.
• +1 racial bonus to saving throws against enchantment spells or effects.

Dwarf-Blooded

• +2 Constitution, -2 Charisma.
• Darkvision 60 feet.
• Stability +2.
• +1 racial bonus on saving throws against spells and spell-like effects.

Orc-Blooded

• +2 Strength, -2 Intelligence, -2 Charisma.
• Low-Light Vision.
• +1 racial bonus to Fortitude saves against Poison and Disease.
• +2 racial bonus to Survival and Intimidate checks.

Goblin-Blooded

• +2 Dexterity, -2 Wisdom.
• +1 racial bonus to saves against fear and charm effects.
• Darkvision 60 feet.
• +2 racial bonus to Move Silently checks.

edit: Adjusted some values for balance purposes.

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

Interesting idea...

To add on, there was a thread somewheres suggesting variant Builds, ala 'Powerful Build' which could go hand in hand with this. Half-Goblins would gain 'Stunted Build', Half-Elfs ..'Frail build', etc..

Anyone remember where that went?

Another thing to add would be regional background (not feats ), that would provide the character with favored class and possible a weapon proficency or additional skill points in a certain skill.

That way you can have a half-elf raised in a barbaric area, gaining favored class of Barabarian and a +2 to Survival checks.
Or something like that.

Oh.. and all the 'blooded' feats would have the line "Character is affected as if a member of the [insert race here] race by spells and other effects."

 

[Spatzimaus]

I like the concept, but I just look at it differently, I guess. Yes, the PHB Half-Elf and Half-Orc are a bit bland, but I blame that on the fact that the designers wanted them to always fall halfway between. And really, the "pure" races simply aren't diverse enough for that to work. So, we get a Half-Elf that's just like a Human or just like an Elf, depending on which ability you're looking at; this doesn't give much motivation to play one, because most people either want neat abilties and stat mods (in which case you'd go pure Elf) or they want the feat and skill points of the Human.

If you really want to make this work, then, I only see two good options:
1> Add more unique abilities to the mixed races, even if they're not very powerful. For instance, the Half-Orcs in my last 3E campaign were the ideal trackers; they can take "Minor Scent" as a Feat, and later can take the full Scent. They have both low-light vision and darkvision. And their favored class went to Ranger, but that's more of a style thing. Then, we added a custom Half-Ogre for the more brute-force types (somewhat similar to the Half-Giant from the new PsiHB, but a bit more brute-force, and ECL 0).
We also explained this by adding a new ability to Humans, called "Thin Blood". Basically, the reason that Humans can crossbreed with practically anything is that human blood is "recessive" with regard to magic; with any other combination there'd be an internal incompatibility. On the bright side, this means that magic can't be purely anti-Human (no Humanbane weapons) because there's nothing magical to identify as "enemy". On the downside, we added more enchantments specific to each other race, to make those Elf Blood and Dwarf Blood abilities worthwhile. But, this meant that we didn't have to worry about making rules for Elf/Dwarf crossbreeds.

2> Make the pure races more distinct. For Elves, what if their stats were (+2 DEX, +2 CHA, -2 CON, -2 STR)? Then the Half-Elves could be the old (+2 DEX, -2 CON), making them distinct from both extremes.
This is actually close to what we did in the homebrew I play now. Our pure races are VERY different, so that we can have a wider assortment of half-breeds. In fact, most players seemed to gravitate to these, probably since most people tend to shy away from giving their character too many penalties, regardless of the number of offsetting bonuses.

 

[Angel Tarragon]

What about magic items? Would say a dwarf blooded gnome be able to use gnomish and dwarven magical items?

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

2> Make the pure races more distinct. For Elves, what if their stats were (+2 DEX, +2 CHA, -2 CON, -2 STR)? Then the Half-Elves could be the old (+2 DEX, -2 CON), making them distinct from both extremes.

*whistles* I was already doing this. My original Half-Elf was +2 Cha -2 Con, until someone suggested I switch it back.

Got Dwarves at -2 Dex +4 Con -2 Cha, Goblins as +2 Dex +2 Con -2 Wis -2 Cha, and Orcs are as-written.

I use your "thin blood" explanation for Human interbreeding, since most halfbreeds are Human-- and I went one further-- any half-template applied to a Human costs one fewer LA, but you lose the Human's racial traits. It never occurred to me to prevent humanbane weapons, but I like it-- I may have to consider this.

 

[Spatzimaus]

It never occurred to me to prevent humanbane weapons, but I like it-- I may have to consider this.

It's a nice little change. Not a huge game impact, but it adds a bit of flavor to a pretty bland race. Actually, we took it a bit further than that in our campaign, to keep things interesting.

First, we added a weapon/armor ability called "Blooded"; +0 cost, requires bestow curse. Basically, you forge the weapon/armor in the blood of up to three Enemy races (same categories as Bane), as well as a bit of your own. If a member of your race wields the item, there's no penalty. If someone outside your race but not a racial enemy (i.e., a "neutral") wears or wields it, they get 2 temporary negative levels as long as they wield it. If one of the races chosen as Enemies is even in the same 5'x5' square for more than a round, though, they get 4 temporary levels and lose 1 HP per round until they can move away.

Because of their Thin Blood ability, Humans can't be affected in either direction, and are always treated as "neutral", meaning they get 2 negative levels.
(Yes, it's +0 cost, since it doesn't actually help you much. Plus, the market price shouldn't be affected, although few merchants would ever carry these sorts of things. They're not evil or anything, just difficult to sell.)

Then, we added a few weapon and armor enhancements that have Blooded as a prerequisite, each giving extra bonuses against the Enemy races. So, there were a whole slew of race-specific magic items out there, which Humans couldn't be part of, but which they also couldn't be penalized for. If you wanted any sort of bonus against Humans, your only real option was Ranger Favored Enemy.

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

Unless Humans take one of the Blooded feats, they gain a +2 racial bonus on Use FX Device checks to emulate another race.

I've taken your advice, since I think this is really cool.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Here's my solution: http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=141007.


RC