Homebrew Race -- Is this +1 ECL?

[Mordane76]

IMHO, the flavor text shows that a bonus to innuendo and bluff would not be out of order. It just fits with the character.

Also, a bonus to disguise when emulating human children may go over well.

That wasn't something I originally considered... and it may actually be in keeping with the flair the girl I have playing a Quith right now has taken; her first scam involved imitating a human child at school, and using her assumed innocence to get food, shelter, and to allow her to rob the parents of the other children as the school.

 

[Mordane76]

As other said seems to be a subrace of halfling rather than their own race. As such, just alter some of the skill bonuses to fit your flavor. Personally I dont see any reason to make them ECL +1, they arent outsiders, they dont have outrageous stat bonuses, and they arent inherently magical. Seems simple enough to trim them down to ECL +0, just get rid of the extra speed and lowlight, or sub out some of the halflings abilties for low-light.

They would be a halfling subrace if my homebrew world contained halfling, however it doesn't. The only standard races in my homebrew are Humans, Dwarves, and Half-Elves. Elves received subrace splitting and modification, Quith took the place that would be considered "Halfling," Bakarans (unposted) took the place that would be considered "Half-Orc," and then there are several other races that don't necessarily pare off any other "canon" races.

I'm not looking to shave them down; they already have low-light, and dropping the extra speed would make them halflings with extra bells. I know their stat block has many Halfling abilities, and some Kender abilities, and that's fine; but just because something has some/most of the same things as a halfling/kender doesn't mean it has to conform to the Halfling/Kender idea. I realize that giving extras means extra power, and that's why I'd rather scale up than down -- if I scale up to ECL +1, I make the race slightly more attractive, but also at the cost of leveling speed. If I scaled down to ECL +0, then I might as well throw out a few months of work and just use Halflings from the book.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Somehow, I never see Taunt as Bluffing...
You don`t really intent to tell lies to someone when you taunt him - yes, you say things that are not true, but everybody knows this...

Taunts are often culture-based (claiming someones father is a coward would be a very effectice way to taunt a Klingon, but the average Human wouldn`t want to kill or pursue someone else for this...), and knowing how to handle culture-related things fits better for Diplomacy.

Mustrum Ridcully

 

[Plane Sailing]

You could do worse than check out the "taunt" mechanism as described in Neverwinter Nights...

 

[Mordane76]

Where might I find that NWN mechanic?

I think that I like the Taunt mechanic using Bluff because there are pieces of the desired results built into the skill already -- you can use Bluff to draw someone off in combat by feinting, and a Taunt has that as part of its effects. Also, I think the lying idea isn't too far from the truth -- you're trying to get someone to invest his attention in the verbal ichor you're spewing at him, and you can use Bluff to do similar things. All in all, I think the skill is a good pick -- I hijacked the idea and most of the mechanic from Kender, but I think whoever developed the idea for the mechanic had a good idea.

 

[Plane Sailing]

It is described in the NWN rule book.

Basically they split diplomacy into "persuade" and "taunt" skills. You could use an action to make a Taunt attack against an opponent, and your check result had to be opposed by a concentration check on their part to ignore the taunt (fighters etc could get concentration). If they fail their check they get so annoyed that they become reckless and have an AC penalty = the amount they failed their concentration check by (max -6) and a 30% spell failure chance (it doesn't deny them their DEX bonus). the effect lasts for 5 rounds.

Cheers

 

[Mordane76]

I like some of the ideas posited by the NWN mechanic, and this weekend is our last game of the season (most of my players are going away for break after finals, so not enough to play for the next few weeks), so perhaps will discuss the general feeling on this mechanic. I'm still partial to the Bluff mechanic, but I'm not going to let a potentially viable mechanic go to waste without throwing it out to my players/play-testers.