Level Adjustment Alternative

[Sekhmet]

[MENTION=19675]Dannyalcatraz[/MENTION] Those numbers are reflected in your stat roll/point buy, but the fact that all minotaur gain +8 strength remains. One might roll a 12 (for a 20), one might roll an 18 (for a 26).

I really dislike the idea of taking what is one of the fundamental rules of the game (creature/race stat blocks) and allowing for bastardized versions to exist. Once you start getting into that, should the DM start making rolls to see if your parents were only 1/3 Minotaur, and therefor limiting your potential dramatically without your knowledge? If they were weak or sickly, or didn't reach their own potential, that is going to reflect in your own character.
More specifically to address your argument "I am human, but I could make myself better", I absolutely agree. However, all that extra training does not make you more human than anyone else, where allocating EXP to level up a race does just that - makes you more of that race.
It really is best to not go down that road, and to consider the drawbacks of choosing a race when considering your desire and it's bonuses. If you want to play a minotaur, you'll choose a minotaur whether or not it has an upfront 2 LA, 2 LA that you buy off by level 4, an exp penalty spread across 20 levels, or whatever other limitation/rule you're going to put on it.

[MENTION=6678119]Jackinthegreen[/MENTION] No, but people don't generally start their humans off as children either.
I've played a few "children" games before, and they're fun. Starting off with 3's in every stat and acquiring points for actions is a great way to do it.
However, if your Ogre is starting off as a child, he's still going to have his racial bonuses, because he is naturally that much stronger than a human.

You'll notice that even the youngest age category dragons have racial HD. Golds have 8HD right out of the egg.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

In addition, there ARE different power levels of creatures like vampires in the legends themselves. The stats in the MMs are just typical exemplars.. Statistical averages.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Those numbers are reflected in your stat roll/point buy, but the fact that all minotaur gain +8 strength remains. One might roll a 12 (for a 20), one might roll an 18 (for a 26).

Yes...but again, that is a typical member of the race, not neccessarily all.

Look at elves. They receive a bonus to using certain weapons, but it is explicitly because they PHB says they spend longer than other races practicing those weapons. We largely ignore that, but there is no reason why they all have to do that. An elf who grew up among barbarian dwarves may well have a similar bonus to axes & hammers instead of long swords & rapiers.

And yes, even young gold dragons start off with racial HD...because they're large reptilians. That would serve as the baseline for the racial class. If, over time, they live a typical Draconic life, they'll acquire typical Draconic stats. If they live a different life, however, ___________.

Racial classes let DMs & players fill in that blank while allowing for more variety in PCs without balance becoming an issue.

Over to the Minotaur- he'd start off with a bonus to strength (+2? +4?), and other attributes...say, a 1d6 gore and 30' darkvision. He takes a level of Fighter. At 2nd level, the player decides to take another level of Fighter. Then at 3rd, he takes another level of Minotaur, gaining more BAB, bonuses to saves, another racial HD, and +2 Str as a racial bonus. Perhaps his horns grow and he gets an additional d6 to his gore, and gets Power Attack, even if he did not qualify for it. He then starts taking Battle Sorcerer levels...

Over the course of the PCs life, he takes no more Minotaur levels. His people call him "Tiny" in endearment, or "the Withered" as an insult...but because of his mixing of arcane and martial prowess, he still becomes a leader.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Something I have considered but never planned out in detail:

LA works as it has except that LA benefits are assigned XP values as well--this works on each benefit separately and in general would be 1/5 the gp cost of buying a non-slot item that did the same thing. (Note that some things like stat bonuses would be worth more than this due to the fact that racial bonuses are a different bonus type and thus stack.)

Sort these from cheapest to most expensive. As your LA costs you XP on level-up the XP is used to buy off the powers on the list. As powers are bought off you refigure the LA based on what powers are not yet bought off.

Eventually all the powers will be bought off and you'll be left with LA0 character who simply has less XP than he earned.

The big problem I see with the current LA & buyoff system is that the system must err on the side of underpowered if it can't be perfect. This doesn't coexist very well with the fact that the value of things changes as your character advances. LA buyoff is a very blunt way of addressing this that comes nowhere near being one size fits all.

 

[IllithidFan]

AHHHHHH I just wrote an extremely long post that took almost an hour, complete with a detailed story about a gnoll wizard PC and a goblin general named Gobble D'Gook, and it got deleted before I could post it! FML, I really am new to this...

I'll write it out again in a while when I'm over it. Stay tuned.

P.S. - Sorry for posting this as it is completely irrelevant to the topic being discussed - especially considering I started the thread - and I'm sure no one really cares to hear my stupid sob story, but I'm so damned mad!

 

[Sword of Spirit]

Has anyone other than me simply tried altering the values of LA and using the system as is?

 

[Greenfield]

Treating "monster levels" as hit dice works, sort of.

Acquired templates could reasonably be taken as class levels, so a person who becomes a Werewolf would spend some time learning about their new nature. That would make sense.

But true races with LA above and beyond their hit dice are another matter. Converting the "Character adjustment" portion of the description into hit dice does a few things.

Primarily, it adds to their actual hit points as a starting character, as well as skills and feats and everything else. Possibly even affecting stat bumps, either giving them "early", or subsuming them into the character at creation time.

The solutions proposed are interesting, but problematic.

First, a higher level character already suffers an EXP penalty. They get less Exp from a given encounter than their lower level counterparts. It's spelled out in the Experience table in the DMG.

And it should be that way. Consider the 1st level party that has a WereBear with them. He's a 10th level character (6 dice of Were Bear, +3 character adjustment, plus his initial class level). The Orc war party that's a tough fight for these intrepid adventurers will be worth exactly zero Exp for him. He's 10th, they're something under 1st, way way off the bottom of the Exp chart for him.

Why? Because they don't represent any challenge for him. His attack bonus is higher than their AC (+13 Melee, for an average, vs an AC of 14.) He only misses on a 1, and his minimum damage kills the Orc (and probably half his family).

While the Were Bear is the extreme example, he illustrates the point clearly.

There is no way to include a full Lycanthrope with a party of typical 1st level Humanoids and have it balance.

The only way to make it work as a class that can be advanced would be to have him come in as a child, with all the stat bumps tuned back and no real hit dice yet.

And the idea that he could then decide whether to take class levels or Bear levels would presume that he can somehow decide whether or not to get any older.

Now call those Bear dice true Levels or not, call the +3 ECL Levels or something else, the reality is that he'll never attain 20 Fighter levels without going Epic. He'll be effectively Epic by the time he's taken 12, in that he'll be a match in melee for a 20th level fighter.

The typical Were Bear from the SRD will have advanced Strength from 29 to 32, not counting any items he's acquired, so his effective attack bonus will be +27, before any magic weapon adjustments, stat boost item adjustments, or feat adjustments get counted. He'll get as many attacks (At BAB +16, +11, +6, and +1) as the Fighter. He won't have had as many Feat choices to make (Fighter will have 4 more), but he'll have Power Attack, Multi-Attack, Run, Track, Endurance and Iron Will as racial bonuses, so he's actually up by 2. He'll also have a +11 damage bonus. He'll have fewer hit dice, but with an extra 4 hit points per dice because of the racial CON bump he'll more than make up the difference. The only place he's weaker is on Saves, and even there it isn't by much.

So, comparing apples to apples, that particular ECL adjustment is well deserved. It is, if anything, understated.

So, to call that one anything but what it is would require you to completely rewrite the Were Bear template. Make it less Bear and more Human.

The same is probably true of any other ECl adjusted race, and making them more Human kind of defeats the purpose of having non-human races.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

And the idea that he could then decide whether to take class levels or Bear levels would presume that he can somehow decide whether or not to get any older.

...or that the curse of lycanthropy did not affect him as it did others: natural immunity; another curse or blessing is upon him; etc.

...or that some outside force is keeping the curse from fully affecting him: diet; his god, etc.

...or that (some) lycanthropes in that campaign world vary in the potency the curse they pass along: the creature that bit him is dying, weakening the curse; the curse can be trsnsmitted only so many times within a given time period, like a venom, and he didn't get a full dose; curse transmission is voluntary; the lycanthropy is weakening in general within the campaign world itself; etc.

...or...

 

[Greenfield]

Or you could notice that I was talking about a natural Were Bear, not an Afflicted one. (Admitted, I didn't highlight the difference, but I did make a distinction between that an an acquired template.)

And even then, your solution is to re-write the Were Bear template, to make it less Bear and more Human.

But I could raise the same type of argument for a Half-Dragon as well. It's only an ECL +3, so the difference isn't as pronounced, but the same factors apply.

Add a 1st level Half Dragon fighter to a 1st level party. He's effectively 4th level. We'll presume that he's half Red, or Gold, or White, or Silver, or Green.

They face that same Orc war band. He breathes, once, and the entire war band is dead.

How much Exp should he get for killing them all before they could blink?

He'll get farther as a Fighter before he goes Epic, of course. 17 levels, in fact. He'll hit better than his 20th level counterpart (BAB 17 plus an extra 4 for his +8 Strength bonus.) His hit points will be 17 higher than a 17th level fighter would be because of the CON boost. At an average of 5.5 per D10 roll, that equates to a shade more than the 3D10 he's missing for hit points. His AC will be higher because of both Dex and Natural Armor.

He doesn't get all the racial feats that the Were Bear does, but then he's only two Feats behind. I'll balance that against a total immunity to one energy type and call it even. Toss in the Breath Weapon if you think he's still light.

Then add what is effectively Improved Unarmed Strike, because of his natural weapons, and he's clearly ahead.

He'll be ahead by a few skill points as well, because of the Int bump, stretched over 17 levels (20 skill points more than typical 17th level, vs 9 extra points for the 20th level Fighter).

He'll be a bit light on Saves (Same on Reflex, light 1 on Fort and Will).

Looking at the other end of the career scale, there's no way to include him in a 1st level party when he has 1 class level, and call it balanced. He's better matched to the 4th level party.

He's light on Hit Points compared to a 4th level Fighter counterpart, but higher in AC, attack bonus and melee damage. He's light on Skills and Feats, but he'll make that up in time.

Over all I'd call that a good call on the ECL.

But casting all the numbers aside, the biggest complaint I seem to see is that somebody can't run their Half-Dragon/Half Orc with the 28 Strength as a starting, 1st level character, in a 1st level campaign, and they don't understand why that's unbalanced.

I say that the fault is not in our stars, but within ourselves.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Personally, I ran a Minotaur Ftr/Mage in 2Ed alongside a first level party: Extremely strong, size L...and thus, took damage like a size L creature. He was a blast,and was not out of line with the rest of the party.

3Ed boosted the damage output of large, strong creatures, but didn't give them much in the way of corresponding disadvantages. Ditto other critters- Githzerai, Drow...

Hence 3.X's use of things like LA, Templates, and Racial Classes.

As for the were werebear, it doesn't matter natural or not: consider the MM stats as the average representative of the type, and "were" is only half of the story. Black, Brown, Kodiak, Panda? And just like other creatures of the world, somew sill be smaller or larger. (That's one of the reasons I still roll every last HD for my critters that matter.)