Half-Ogre Level Adjustment

[werk]

As an aside, I would encourage house ruling reach weapons to be "five feet farther than normal reach" instead of "double reach."

It makes enlarged half-ogres with reach weapons and the like a lot more manageable.

How did you read the post I deleted a minute ago?

Large half ogre, check.
Reach weapon, combat reflexes, check.
One level dip for enlarge, check.

 

[Seeten]

OH, you mean preferred by the DM...

I read that totally wrong I guess.

Did I miss where the OP said what level he's playing at? Everyone keeps saying low level, but I didn't see that.

I'm assuming player perspective, decent level.

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OK, so one of my players wants to play a half-ogre fighter, starting at 4th level. Races of Destiny says the half-ogre has a level adjustment of +2.

OK, as I understand it, you add level adjustment to the creature's HD and class levels, and that's what level the creature is. Fine. But I can't find anything in Races of Destiny (or any of the Monster Manuals) on what a half-ogre's starting Hit Dice is.

So does the character start with 2 fighter levels and nothing else? No extra Hit Dice? Or does he get two HD for the 2 levels of half-ogre?

If ever something needed a streamlining for 4e, this system is it.

Relevant text boldness for ease on eyes.

 

[frankthedm]

How did you read the post I deleted a minute ago?

Large half ogre, check.
Reach weapon, combat reflexes, check.
One level dip for enlarge, check.

Half ogres are giant type, enlarge person fails to work on them.

 

[Kafkonia]

I played a half-ogre fighter 4 in my friend's homebrewed adventure, and while it kind of hurt that I was the only frontline fighter and lacking in HD, I survived til the end (when a Prismatic Spray turned me to stone.) The reach is great, but it's not *as* great when you're constantly fighting baddies with equal or greater reach. :\ It was also my first melee build, so I probably could have picked better feats than what I did (the Huge weapon Monkey Grip gave me wasn't all it was cracked up to be, for instance. )

 

[ThirdWizard]

Half ogres are giant type, enlarge person fails to work on them.

As a totally irrelevant aside, the wizard in the party claims that he cannot cast enlarge person on the half-ogre (one of his favorite spells to cast on the bugbear fighter) because the half-ogre has no soul (ie "He's a soulless monster").

As a second aside, luckily, the half-ogre is a cleric, so no session goes by without him casting righteous might to become Huge sized, which gives him 4d6+16 damage per attack before divine favor and rage (with 15' reach).

Yet a couple of arrows will easily breach their terrible AC, and a couple of arrows with decent rolls can drop a half-ogre at this level.

They get an overall +2 to AC, though. Where is the terrible AC coming from?

 

[Seeten]

The terrible AC comes from the fact that at low levels, they likely cant afford specially made armor, considering their size precludes normal armor.

 

[frankthedm]

The terrible AC comes from the fact that at low levels, they likely cant afford specially made armor, considering their size precludes normal armor.

Chain shirt ain't that costly.

Full plate onthe other hand... ouch.

 

[The Grackle]

Half ogres are a pretty great race, and being large is totally worth the +2LA. (Though maybe not at ECL4.) I wish there were more options for being large-large and not fake-large like a goliath.

 

[pallandrome]

Just start getting wary if he's looking to pick up monkey grip and/or proficiency with a spiked chain. Personally, I made a Half-Ogre Battle Sorcerer/Dragon Disciple that, truth be told, should probably never have been allowed to see the light of day. There was just something about a Huge creature with a reach weapon and 40+ strength that was just silly...

 

[Seeten]

We had a half-dragon/half-giant that monkey gripped a huge spiked chain with large and in charge and the 10 level strength boosting prc that lets you swing at squares instead of people. He was gross, but the same campaign had a lich necromancer(mine) a feral tiefling grappler, and a half-fey archer. We killed the BBEG+minions in the first round, and they were all uber twinked also.

Of course, that game, from the get go, was a planned exercise to break D&D. It kinda worked, and was great fun.