It's Official!

[Sejs]

Goliaths... Goliaths I don't mind. The name is abysmal, but after reading RoS they've grown on me to the point that I'm okay with 'em.

Illumians I don't care for. Much the same can be said for most of the content in RoD, however. The concept had a smidge of potential (okay, they're guys with glowing runes floating around their head...), but that potential didn't get realized (how? why? uh... they were just normal guys who did this ritual, so now they have letters.).


As for the new kids on the block? Well, I'm not a big fan of winged pcs in general, and I'm pretty sure that's not going to change with this latest offering.


But golly if I'm not set should I ever want to play Flash Gordon d20.

 

[ivocaliban]

Great! Let's make crappy new races and devote a third of our new books' content to them.

Make a new race..devote a page or two to them for goodness sake and THEN maybe if they catch on print volumes on them.

While I agree with your overall point, the damage was done with the Goliaths and it certainly wasn't going to change mid-series. Do the new races take up more space than they should, I think the overall response is: absolutely. As it is, we might as well judge the races on their own merit, which admittedly isn't very impressive. I thought the Goliaths were just so-so (mainly being replacements for half-orc bruisers), the Illumians were subpar (mainly being pointless), and the Raptorians somewhat interesting as a race unto themselves (though questionable for PCs).

What I have noticed, however, is that all three races, just like core races, have their supporters and detractors. As many polls here have reported, gnomes and halflings are generally disliked while dwarves and humans are favoured. Overall, I imagine that most people will have at least one new race they might find useful and the others will be throwaways, but that race is going to vary from player to player, DM to DM.

After Races of the Wild is released and folks have had the time to absorb the Raptorans (agreed, it's a silly name), it would be interesting to see a poll on how people feel about the three new races as a whole. Hopefully, the idea of introducing new races in such a forced, page-consuming fashion can be separated from the value of the races themselves, but that may be overly optimistic.

 

[lotuseater]

i like the goliaths, the other two not so much. but i'm a sucker for cool pictures. and pretty lights. oooooh.

 

[Tarril Wolfeye]

Look on the bright side: If so much of Races of the Wild is used by raptorans, there will not be enough space for new elven subraces.

 

[Gez]

But I want to see Tinker Elves, Klepto Elves, and Gully Elves! <insert innocent-looking smiley>

 

[JoeGKushner]

I haven't been impressed with the names, but the mechanics and the ideas have been sound. The Goliath has seen some game use in a friend's campaign and I haven't had the chance to slip the Ilumians in yet but when the players do make that trip to the plane of shadow, they'll be waiting...

 

[Piratecat]

We really like the goliath in KidCthulhu's game, and the raptorans look sound enough. I like the mechanics, and they fit a spot in my world.

 

[Desdichado]

Dont' forget the new races in the XPsiH. Most of them... well, some of them anyway, were pretty cool. And I love the new races from Eberron. Heck, I've got two shifter characters I'm playing currently; one in a ftf game and one in a pbp game.

But I'm pretty ambivalent on the new Races series races. For that matter, I'm pretty ambivalent on those books in general...

 

[Psion]

Whether or not they suck, the name certainly sucks.

 

[Vraille Darkfang]

Ok,

Lots of silly names and an attempt to make ECL+ something into ECL 0 races.

Goliaths: Large creatures are usually ECL +1 (at least). So lets make a race that’s sort of large size, but not really. Then lets name them something so they can be easily killed by any Halfling named David with a sling.

Illumians: I want to like these guys a lot. I read their back story and its very good, mechanically, they're solid. Just.... I mean.... Well...... Can I rent out that neon advertising space you got floating there buddy? I'll be you 5 gold a week to have "Eat at the Flatulent Ogre" orbiting your cranium. The neon halo just really, really makes it hard to like these guys. I mean just look at all the cool artwork in the book, which appears to have been scribbled on by a 3 year old before it went to print. The really needed to try harder to get a better gimmick with these guys.

Raptorans: When I first heard it I thought "Oh know dinosaur people again" Like some sort of semi-feral velociraptor lizard man type race. Then I read the preview and found out, Nope more birdmen. Of course 95% will never fly. In order to avoid the minimum ECL +1 flight normally gives a race, they decide to limit flight until the pc's are of high enough level to have access to Flight magic anyhow (5th level). OF course this means the vast majority of these bird people are flightless as how many NPC's make it to 5th level? (even using NPC classes like Commoner, Warrior, etc). So basically we got a race of mainly Kiwis with the odd PC-type Kestrel. Nice. I think I want my dino-people back.

So my overall impressions of the new races:

1. Names that suck much. Need to work harder at the old Thesaurus WotC.

2. Crunchy is good. These new races are all based on filling crunchy bits of the DnD universe (exactly when did 'DnD' replace 'D&D" anyhow?). Goliaths allow people to play ogres and other large races without the almighty power of 10' reach. Raptorans allow people to play flying races but takes away the flight power until they could uses spells or have access to magic to fly anyway. Illumians take advantage of "Eat at Joe's" neon signs to have a unique list of powers & feat chains (admittedly the fluff and crunch goes together like a fluffenutter & pb sandwich).

3. We all have race books: Hammer & Helm, Quit Elf, Etc; so we need to have a BIGGER reason to buy a new race book. So, put in new "official" race & if it takes off start sticking it in other places (like Eberron).

In the end,
They're not bad enough for me NOT to buy them. At present the only advantage WoTC has for me over other d20 publishers. I buy it because its official & most of those I game with will have it or have access to it.

Later,
Vraille Darkfang