D&D 5E Homebrewing a PC race: Gorgons

[Quickleaf]

I'm really grateful to everyone for their help in trying to balance this out. But, I figured I Should ask the Key Question: can Gorgons get away with keeping the "eyebeams as a subracial trait" idea?

I get where you're coming from when you say that they can't have secondary effects like Paralysis, etc. Even if that poster was mistaken in how often the trait is available. But, these gorgons have being a chaotic, physically/spiritually unstable race written into their fluff. Can the game mechanics support there being gorgons who poison, freeze or incinerate with their gaze?

Absolutely! I think you're on the right track with effects kicking in when you reduce a creature to 0 hit points.

Before, it seemed like you were balancing its gaze attack under the assumption that the extra targets caught in a Dragonborn's breath would roughly equal the conditions imposed by the Gorgon's gaze. As [MENTION=88539]LowKey[/MENTION] eloquently points out, that just isn't the case.

Getting back to that "when you reduce the target to 0 hp" bit, you'll notice that has vastly different implications if being used against a PC vs. being used against a monster. PCs often are being healed up from 0 hp and getting back on their feet, so it is particularly nasty for them. Monsters, on the other hand, rarely do this (regeneration and monsters with healing spells being notable exceptions).

Now, if elsewhere in your homebrew, you were making a bunch of monsters that have ways to come back up from 0 hp, then I'd say your gaze attack could just drop the conditions & keep the "when you reduce the target to 0 hp" bit, and it would be good. However, if that's not the case, I'd suggest tweaking it to be more relevant to how monsters often appear in the game: groups of bad guys that go down hard and fast.

So, you might do something like: "when you reduce the target to 0 hp, another enemy of your choice within 30 feet of it suffers cold/fire/poison damage."

Not saying that gets the feel you want, just trying to illustrate my point.

An alternative would be placing a "death clock" on the monster affected by the gaze attack, something where nothing bad happens immediately, but on a failed save it suffers ongoing damage, and while suffering ongoing damage (ended on a repeated save), if any attack reduces it to X hit points (e.g. 10 hp) while suffering this ongoing damage, the monster is petrified. Alternately you could replace the damage entirely with a slow effect.

 

[QuietBrowser]

[MENTION=6799753]lowkey13[/MENTION]: I'm not saying you don't have a valid point in that the old race was overpowered, because I aggreed with the others who made the same commentary. I just can't get over the fact that you actually cite both the Gith (a UA creation, when UA is notoriously unreliable in its balancing) and the Dragonborn (widely regarded as the weakest and most uninteresting race in basic 5e).

Anyway, to all my interested assistants, stepping aside from feats for a moment, I figured it was time to try and take a fresh shot at the Gorgon's core stats. Tell me, how does this look? I'd still like to give the race some options in what its gazes can do, but let's leave that aside for the moment.

...In fact, let's actually leave the gaze attack aside completely for the moment. First, let's look at the true "core" of the race...

Gorgon, mk 2:
Ability Score Modifiers: +2 Charisma, +1 Constitution
Size: Medium
Speed: 30 feet
Vision: Darkvision 60 feet
Venom-Kissed: You have Resistance to Poison damage and Advantage on saving throws against Poison and Disease.
Writhing Mane: Your head is adorned with myriad prehensile, serpentine tails in lieu of hair, which can accomplish any task that a pair of hands could functionally do. It does not grant you either extra attacks or extra actions per turn. It does grant you Advantage on Grappling checks made to grapple another being.
Evil Eyes: Spells that you cast that make a Spell Attack roll at Range or that force a Saving Throw at Range can be cast as a Gaze Attack. When you do so, you count as your own Arcane or Divine Focus, and you don't need to use Verbal or Somatic components. However, range is reduced to 30' and the target must meet your gaze to be affected; if the spell could normally affect multiple targets, all targets must meet your gaze. If there is a mirrored surface in your line of sight and within 30' when you use the power, you are affected by your own gaze.

Incidentally, I like the idea of a gorgon spellcaster being able to cast spells through their gaze, but I would understand perfectly if that's an ability that needs to be shuffled off to a feat, because it is kind of a gimmick and may be too strong for a basic racial trait.

Now, let's talk Gaze Attacks. Are there any complaints about this basic mechanic outline below? I will put forth a reminder that the Dragonborn's Breath Weapon does the amount of damage and hits multiple targets (5ft by 30ft line or 15ft cone, depending on breed) and does not have the specific requirements to actually affect someone.

In fact... maybe I should cut out the "you must meet their eyes" aspect entirely? We're all familiar with the "gaze attack via rays" mechanic, we see it often enough in media...

Gaze Attack: As a bonus action, you can unleash a gaze attack on a single creature within 30 feet that you can see and which can see your eyes. The targeted creature must make a Constitution saving throw, with a DC of 8 + your Charisma modifier + your Proficiency bonus. On a failed save, the target takes 2d6 damage and suffers an after-effect. On a successful save, the victim only takes half-damage. The damage inflicted by a failed save increases by +1d6 at levels 6 (3d6), 11 (4d6) and 16 (5d6). Once you have used your Gaze Attack, you must complete a short rest before you can use it again.

Anyway! If this above is a solid outline for the basic underlying mechanics of how Gaze Attacks work, let's talk turkey on how it can be a variable trait.

We're all united on the idea that actual Condition imposing is too strong, even for a 1/encounter power that only inflicts the effect for 1 turn. That's fine. But what about the "cosmetic mangling of a corpse" effect? Quickleaf seems to be expressing the opinion that this is functionally aflavor ribbon, and so a harmless addendum?

More importantly, my big questions are:
1 - What kinds of damage can the gaze attack inflict? "Stoning" is out, but Necrotic, Fire, Frost, Poison (basilisk and medusas in 4e both had variants who had poisonous gaze attacks), and Psychic all seem viable, yes?
2 - Should I consider going full subrace with the different gaze-breeds? Or is the core race too full of feats as-is to allow for that?

 

[cbwjm]

I like this idea for a race, I've had brief thoughts about them before when browsing through the Theros block but didn't come up with anything.

A couple of queries, why the advantage on saving throws against disease in venom touched? To me it just seems like a weird bonus. The poison resistance and save bonus I can understand, it's just disease that I do not. I also liked the additional little one turn effects each of the different gaze attacks had, I think they were quite flavourful. Maybe this ability should be an action instead of a bonus action but that would be something to playtest with your group.

Evil Eyes might be better as a caster feat.

I'm not sure if you've updated your feats, but I think some of them need to be boosted a little to make them worthwhile. The flight one I think needs to be boosted to at least 30 feet and restricting it to light armour/load as you suggested earlier might make it worthwhile. Some of your other feats I think might just need to be a half feat with a stat bonus.

In answer to your big questions;

1. Any damage type could be used (well, maybe not thunder).
2. I don't think you need to go full subrace, take the dragonborn for instance. Rather than subraces they have breeds which define certain racial abilities rather than have a full subrace.

 

[QuietBrowser]

I like this idea for a race, I've had brief thoughts about them before when browsing through the Theros block but didn't come up with anything.

A couple of queries, why the advantage on saving throws against disease in venom touched? To me it just seems like a weird bonus. The poison resistance and save bonus I can understand, it's just disease that I do not. I also liked the additional little one turn effects each of the different gaze attacks had, I think they were quite flavourful. Maybe this ability should be an action instead of a bonus action but that would be something to playtest with your group.

Evil Eyes might be better as a caster feat.

I'm not sure if you've updated your feats, but I think some of them need to be boosted a little to make them worthwhile. The flight one I think needs to be boosted to at least 30 feet and restricting it to light armour/load as you suggested earlier might make it worthwhile. Some of your other feats I think might just need to be a half feat with a stat bonus.

In answer to your big questions;

1. Any damage type could be used (well, maybe not thunder).
2. I don't think you need to go full subrace, take the dragonborn for instance. Rather than subraces they have breeds which define certain racial abilities rather than have a full subrace.

Venom-Kissed grants Disease resistance as well mostly because I figured it was thematic, given the race lives in jungles & swamps. But, I suppose just the poison resistance and the Constitution bonus could work for a race that lives in toxic hell and routinely breeds & controls snakes, spiders, scorpions, centipedes, wasps and other venomous vermin...

Yeah, Gaze Attack is supposed to switch to an Action, I forgot to tweak that in my post.

And none of the feats from the first page have been updated as a result of discussion yet; we've just hit the point of reworking the core race, which needs to be done before I can really go to town on the feats.

 

[QuietBrowser]

I don't like doing this, but does anyone have any further opinions on the remade racial statblock? I really appreciate all that you guys have done to help me after the rocky start that was my first draft, so I really want to try and get this improved...

 

[DeanP]

Well, I still think the gaze attack should be an action and not a bonus action.

 

[Sunseeker]

Well, I still think the gaze attack should be an action and not a bonus action.

I agree with this.

 

[QuietBrowser]

Well, I still think the gaze attack should be an action and not a bonus action.

I agree with this.

I agree with you both, as I said, it was a mistake that I didn't change that in the post proper. Any other thoughts?

 

[QuietBrowser]

So... I really don't like doing this, but I'm desperate: bumping this in hopes of figuring out where to go from here.

 

[DeanP]

I think it's playtest time.