Hit Die tied to race, not class?

[wolfen]

I'm sure this has been brought up before, but is there a good reason that race is not influential on HD?

By default the Monster Manual employs this logic. I mean, let's theorize I chose to be a dragon PC. A mage, even. Now suppose there's a Halfling Wizard in my party. Do I have 4 HP on lvl 1? We both gettin' a d4 on level 2? C'mon. Not a chance. Comparisons between a Gnome and a Half-Orc are not as extreme, but there should be a difference. Bigger size = longer cooking time. There's simply more humanoid to kill!

Why not have a base # of hit points for each race as it levels up? Then you could simply apply a class bonus or penalty.

I understand they don't want to create a system that pigeonholes a race to a class. And they don't want to mass-produce Half-Orc Battlemages with a zillion hit points. But different racial ability mods could address those concerns, along with restrictions and bonuses tied specifically to different race/class combinations.

I dunno...where does this path of thought lead?


wolfen

 

[Ace32]

Racial ability scores already affect HD - a higher constitution means you are getting more 'bang for your buck'. I think that's enough influence, but in some cases I guess you could do the half-dragon way - raise the HD by 1 for members of a particular race. I wouldn't do it, but YMMV.

 

[wolfen]

Consider this:

Average Half-Orc with Con 10.
Average Gnome with a Con 12.

The Half-Orc is avg sized: 5' 7" and 175lbs. He becomes a Sorceror. At first level, he has 4 HP.

The Gnome is avg height: 3' 5" and 45lbs. He becomes a fighter. At first level, he has 11 HP.

The Gnome will consistently have more than twice the hit points while weighing just about 1/4 of what the Half-Orc weighs.

I submit to you that this makes no sense. If you look at the typical PC races in the monster manual, they are much closer in HP (4 vs 5) than the current class-dependent system produces for most PC's.

Instead you could say the avg Half-Orc above will gain 5 HP per level regardless of class, and that being a sorceror incurs a -2 Con penalty. Sorc's don't get much exercise. 1st Level Half-Orc sorceror gets 4 HP, and 4 every level thereafter (Base 5, -2 Sorceror Con)

The above gnome could get 4 HP per level (Base 3, +2 Racial Con bonus) regardless of class, and Fighters get a +2 Con. 1st level Gnome fighter gets 5 HP. (Base 3, +2 Racial Con, +2 Fighter Con).

Yes, the gnome's getting more HP, now, but it's not ridiculous anymore. And there's logic to how it got there. The Half Orc starts out bigger, but loses Con because he didn't play sports with all the other kids. The gnome starts out significantly smaller, but his racial hardiness and active lifestyle bump him up.

When you make this change, it then becomes clear that current armor bonuses to AC (a key class differentiator) are probably not high enough.


wolfen

 

[Nifft]

IMC, PCs start out with Racial HP that do not change as they level up.

Half-Orc, Aasimar, Tiefling: 10 hp
Human, Dwarf, Half-Elf: 8 hp
Elf: 6 hp
Halfling: 4 hp
Gnome: 2 hp <-- NOTE: house-ruled Tiny-sized Gnome

Thus, a 1st level Human Wizard is likely to be tougher than a 1st level Halfling Fighter. As they level up, the Class-ness will outshine the Race-ness, and the Fighter will be tougher than the Wizard.

-- Nifft

 

[Grazzt]

I have thought about trying something like allowing hit point advancement by race rather than class. It does make more sense and the MM does follow that logic. (And if you wanna argue that if a d6 monster takes class in fighter he gets d10..that's true...but all his "monster levels" still count and he has "extra" d6s )

However, if you base it on size of race, heartiness, etc... I figure it breaks down similar to what Nifft posted for the playable (read PHB) races:

Human, half-elf, half-orc: 1d8

Elf, halfling, gnome: 1d6

Dwarf: 1d10

But- by default all the PHB races are considered humanoids. Therefore, according to the MM rules, they all should have 1d8 for hit points.

 

[Staffan]

Remember that class-based hit points don't really reflect actual physical resistance to injury - it's more a matter of defensive skill and stuff. That's why fighters get more hp than wizards.