Need help choosing/balancing racial traits

[Khaalis]

Hello all. I am working on a race for a homebrew world that is meant to be a Lycanthropic descendant race. Not as powerful as True Lyncthropes, but descended from a line of human/true lycanthrope breeding. However, not as distantly descended as Eberron Shifters.

What I have so far is the following:

Racial Traits:
· +2 Strength, -2 Charisma: Lycans are strong and sinewy but their predatory and aggressive nature makes it difficult for them to blend in with others socially.
· Medium Size: As medium-sized creatures, lycans have no special bonuses or penalties due to their size.
· Lycan base speed is 30 feet.
· Shapechanger Subtype: Lycans are humanoids with the shapechanger subtype. However, due to the unique physiology of their lycnathropic nature, they are immune to the touch of draconic blood and can never assume the dragonblood subtype.
· Low-Light Vision: A lycan can see twice as far as a human in starlight, moonlight, torchlight, and similar conditions of poor illumination. They retain the ability to distinguish color and detail under these conditions.
· Scent (Ex): Lycans have the scent special quality.
· +2 racial bonus on Balance, Climb and Jump, Listen and Move Silently checks: A lycan’s animalistic heritage enhances many of their skills.
· Hybrid Form (Ex): Each lycan has an animal that they are connected to, due to their lycanthropic heritage chosen from: bear, boar, rat, tiger, wolf or wolverine. This choice is made at 1st level and cannot be change. As a standard action, the lycan can assume a humanoid form that takes on the physical aspects of its animal form, such as fur, carnivorous teeth, tail, skeletal structure such as a muzzle, and posture as well as growing in size by roughly a foot, and gaining roughly 100 pounds. However, they remain a medium sized creature, and thus armor and weapons remain useful in hybrid form. A lycan in hybrid form has the following special qualities:
Natural Weapons: A lycan in hybrid form gains two claw attacks and a bite attack as natural weapons. These weapons deal damage based on the hybrid form’s size (considered large with powerful build, thus claw 1d6, bite 1d8). A hybrid may attack with a weapon and a bite, or may attack with all three of its natural weapons. The bite attack of a hybrid is a secondary attack (-5 to hit).
Powerful Build: The physical stature of the lycan’s hybrid lets them function in many ways as if they were one size category larger. Whenever a lycan is subject to a size modifier or special size modifier for an opposed check (such as during grapple checks, bull rush attempts, and trip attempts), the lycan is treated as one size larger if doing so is advantageous to him. A lycan is also considered to be one size larger when determining whether a creature's special attacks based on size (such as improved grab or swallow whole) can affect them. A lycan can also use weapons designed for a creature one size larger without penalty. However, their space and reach remain those of a creature of their actual size. The benefits of this racial trait stack with the effects of powers, abilities, and spells that change the subject's size category.
· Level Adjustment: +1

However, I have been thinking that the class might be better balanced by limiting the Hybrid Form ability to 1+Wis modifier (min 1) times per day with duration of 10 minutes per character level. This prevents the character from simply remaining in Hybrid form 90% of the time. However, then I wonder if limiting the class's true feature to X/day, that I should in exchange, remove the Level Adjustment.

Does anyone have any thoughts or suggestions?

Thanks.

 

[smootrk]

Where are any drawbacks other than a -2 on Charisma (which is also a likely dump stat for the kinds of classes that a race like this would take)?

Powerful Build, strength bonus, natural weapons, scent, low-light - all play into warrior classes quite well.

The only ideas I have currently for balancing what you have already is to add silver weapon vulnerability, inability to wear armor in hybrid form & damage from any armor (and destroying the armor straps) if a change is forced while wearing armor. Possibly a form of mild insanity or mental state change during certain moon phases - maybe something as simple as Wis penalties depending on how full the moon is, but this would be useless unless DM monitors the phases of the moon(s) strictly.

Even with these suggested balancing points, I would still say +1 LA minimum.

 

[Khaalis]

Where are any drawbacks other than a -2 on Charisma (which is also a likely dump stat for the kinds of classes that a race like this would take)?

Powerful Build, strength bonus, natural weapons, scent, low-light - all play into warrior classes quite well.

The only ideas I have currently for balancing what you have already is to add silver weapon vulnerability, inability to wear armor in hybrid form & damage from any armor (and destroying the armor straps) if a change is forced while wearing armor. Possibly a form of mild insanity or mental state change during certain moon phases - maybe something as simple as Wis penalties depending on how full the moon is, but this would be useless unless DM monitors the phases of the moon(s) strictly.

Even with these suggested balancing points, I would still say +1 LA minimum.

As points of comparison:

Shifter:
* Net: +2 physical stat, -4 mental stats
* Humanoid Type
* Medium Size
* Shifting (another +2 to physical stat)
* Low-Light
* Skill Bonuses
LA+0

Half-Giant:
* Net: +2 physical stats
* Giant Type
* Medium Size
* Powerful Build
* Low-Light
* +2 save vs fire
* Naturally Psionic (bonus Power Points)
* Psionic-like Ability
LA+1

Half-Ogre: (Races od Destiny)
* Net: +6 physical stats, -4 menta1 stats
* Giant Type
* Large Size
* Darkvision
* Natural Armor
LA+2


Using these as bases, the Lycan is best balanced and comapred to the half-giant.

Lycan:
* Net +2 physical stats; -2 mental stats
(better than Half-Giant's +2 net physical gain, suffering an actual penalty and NOT gaining the hight of the half-giant +4 STR. THis also stays in the realm of the bonuses gained by other races such as the Dwarf.)

* Humanoid/Shapechanger Type/Subtype
(Less advantage than Giant type. Thus, trade out Giant type for Scent switching immunity vs humanoid affecting spells and affects / for resistance (not even immunity) vs illusions)

* Medium Size
(same as half-giant - no advantages or disadvantages)

* Low-Light
(Less powerful than he half-giant's Darkvision)

* +2 to certian skills
(Less advantagious than a half-giant's +2 save vs fire [the most common energy type])

* Powerful Build
(Same as a half-giant; I was considering making it uses per day rather than permanent. This would make it sub-optimal when compared to the half-giant.)

* Natural Weapons
(I'd think equal to the combined half-giant's Naturally Psionic & Psionic-like Ability)


Thoughts?

 

[Nel]

· +2 Strength, -2 Charisma: Lycans are strong and sinewy but their predatory and aggressive nature makes it difficult for them to blend in with others socially.

Not as broken in itself as some could think, it enhances melee class power but make this race especially unsuited for sorcerers (and can be a problem for pallies, bards and clerics).
But it lacks diversity considering what could be done (see below).

· Medium Size: As medium-sized creatures, lycans have no special bonuses or penalties due to their size.
· Lycan base speed is 30 feet.

Nothing fancy here, even if I would have given a little boost in speed while in hybrid shape.

· Shapechanger Subtype: Lycans are humanoids with the shapechanger subtype. However, due to the unique physiology of their lycnathropic nature, they are immune to the touch of draconic blood and can never assume the dragonblood subtype.

Why the thing with draconic blood ?
Campaign flavored trick ?

· Low-Light Vision: A lycan can see twice as far as a human in starlight, moonlight, torchlight, and similar conditions of poor illumination. They retain the ability to distinguish color and detail under these conditions.
· Scent (Ex): Lycans have the scent special quality.

Makes sense, even if I would enhance these capacities when in hybrid form or make them less pronounced in human form.

· +2 racial bonus on Balance, Climb and Jump, Listen and Move Silently checks: A lycan’s animalistic heritage enhances many of their skills.

Too many skills, animals' abilities aren't usualy that broad (even if Balance, Climb, Jump and Move Silently bonus seem perfect for a weretiger here).
For most of them you should concentrate on 2 or 3 skills at a time even if it means giving them higher bonus.
And you can do some nice mix by having different races (see below).

· Hybrid Form (Ex): Each lycan has an animal that they are connected to, due to their lycanthropic heritage chosen from: bear, boar, rat, tiger, wolf or wolverine. This choice is made at 1st level and cannot be change. As a standard action, the lycan can assume a humanoid form that takes on the physical aspects of its animal form, such as fur, carnivorous teeth, tail, skeletal structure such as a muzzle, and posture as well as growing in size by roughly a foot, and gaining roughly 100 pounds.

Highly doubtful that shapeshifters from different species will have the same stats, if you take each kind of lycan (bear, boar, rat, tiger, wolf and wolverine) and make it different from the others with various ability scores and skills then the fun they will bring to you will be increased tenfold.

However, they remain a medium sized creature, and thus armor and weapons remain useful in hybrid form. A lycan in hybrid form has the following special qualities:
Natural Weapons: A lycan in hybrid form gains two claw attacks and a bite attack as natural weapons. These weapons deal damage based on the hybrid form’s size (considered large with powerful build, thus claw 1d6, bite 1d8). A hybrid may attack with a weapon and a bite, or may attack with all three of its natural weapons. The bite attack of a hybrid is a secondary attack (-5 to hit).

This kind of things should also be based upon their animal "totem", a weretiger will certainly use it's claws first (as do tigers) but a werewolf should use its bite first (as do wolves).
And the bite/claw damage could be different from one race to another too, tigers are supposed to have sharper claws than boards' ones.

Powerful Build: The physical stature of the lycan’s hybrid lets them function in many ways as if they were one size category larger. Whenever a lycan is subject to a size modifier or special size modifier for an opposed check (such as during grapple checks, bull rush attempts, and trip attempts), the lycan is treated as one size larger if doing so is advantageous to him. A lycan is also considered to be one size larger when determining whether a creature's special attacks based on size (such as improved grab or swallow whole) can affect them. A lycan can also use weapons designed for a creature one size larger without penalty. However, their space and reach remain those of a creature of their actual size. The benefits of this racial trait stack with the effects of powers, abilities, and spells that change the subject's size category.

Bad thing, shapeshifter with animalistic traits are supposed to become more "feral", they shouldn't be able to make more damage through crafted weapons, it's simply not in the spirit.
And the bonus in grapple, bull rush and so on could be a good idea (without the need to make it a size bonus) as they are natural attacks, but still by being more specialized for each type of animal (grapple for a werebear, bull rush for a wereboar, etc).

· Level Adjustment: +1

No.
Giving a character the ability to wield a Greatsword in a hand, a Bastard Sword in the other and make use of a bite attack to top it off seems pretty...violent to me.
Add to this a +2 Str bonus, low-light vision, scent, good natural attacks if he is disarmed and +10 skill bonus points and you obtain something that is at the very least +2.

 

[Khaalis]

Not as broken in itself as some could think, it enhances melee class power but make this race especially unsuited for sorcerers (and can be a problem for pallies, bards and clerics).

True, and it is meant to be a melee race, just as are dwarves, half-ogres, half-giants, half-orcs, etc. They are not banned from being something else but they have advantages to being a melee class. However, they could make a hell of a battle cleric or nasty druid if you use UA options as well.

• Medium Size: As medium-sized creatures, lycans have no special bonuses or penalties due to their size.
• Lycan base speed is 30 feet.

Nothing fancy here, even if I would have given a little boost in speed while in hybrid shape.

I am trying to keep the race to a minimum of LA adjustment firstly, and secondly, being a race prime for melee, I didn’t want to add a speed boost that could be so easily abused with the barbarian speed boost.

Why the thing with draconic blood? Campaign flavored trick?

Yes, the campaign world being developed has a strong draconic flavor and a large number of “dragonblood” subtype options. I thought it would be a bit much to allow this race to acquire the dragonblood subtype on type of everything else, or god forbid be mixed with half-dragon. I am not 100% set in stone on this, and would be open to arguments as to why it should be allowed. However, in trying to make the race as unbroken as possible while keeping the core ideal, I figured that adding dragonblood could just be too abusive.

• Low-Light Vision: A lycan can see twice as far as a human in starlight, moonlight, torchlight, and similar conditions of poor illumination. They retain the ability to distinguish color and detail under these conditions.
• Scent (Ex): Lycans have the scent special quality.

Makes sense, even if I would enhance these capacities when in hybrid form or make them less pronounced in human form.

Well I wanted the race to have “something” while in humanoid form. I didn’t want their only schtick to be in hybrid form. Low-Light vision is ok, but nothing special. I wanted to avoid Darkvision due to its being more powerful than low-light vision. Scent also gives the race at least one nice ability while in humanoid form and I kept this aspect direct from lycanthropes who gain it in any form as well.

• +2 racial bonus on Balance, Climb and Jump, Listen and Move Silently checks: A lycan’s animalistic heritage enhances many of their skills.

Too many skills, animals' abilities aren't usualy that broad (even if Balance, Climb, Jump and Move Silently bonus seem perfect for a weretiger here). For most of them you should concentrate on 2 or 3 skills at a time even if it means giving them higher bonus. And you can do some nice mix by having different races (see below).

I can see this. Using the Shifter as an example, they gain +2 to 3 skills. I can make it so that each affinity gets slightly different skills, giving the class one mechanical difference from affinity to affinity rather than going pure genericized.

Highly doubtful that shapeshifters from different species will have the same stats, if you take each kind of lycan (bear, boar, rat, tiger, wolf and wolverine) and make it different from the others with various ability scores and skills then the fun they will bring to you will be increased tenfold.

I can see the argument to this. However, while I agree on skills, I can’t agree on ability scores. The key problem with Lycanthropes is that they are NOT balanced from one species to another. One of the core reasons is that the ability scores are not balanced from one to another. I wanted the race to have a set racial ability score adjustment. They are similar in almost all respects from one to another, they just “look” different in hybrid form – showing their personal affinity. I didn’t want to get into big racial differences between wolf-lycans and bear-lycans for example, each with its own culture and subculture. They are all one race. The skills though, do add a mechanical flare to the flavor of the different affinities without getting into the broken aspect of inequality due to ability scores.

This kind of things should also be based upon their animal "totem", a weretiger will certainly use it's claws first (as do tigers) but a werewolf should use its bite first (as do wolves). And the bite/claw damage could be different from one race to another too, tigers are supposed to have sharper claws than boards' ones.

Again, see my argument above. For a lycanthrope or something taking a true animal form this makes perfect sense. However, the feel I am going for is a more unified, or dare I say genericized, race. Remember that these are a descendent race of lycanthrope-human breeding, similar in idea to Shifters in Eberron but not as distantly related. Yes they take on the appearance of different animals, but the racial traits of the Lycan are the same for all of them. If necessary I can remove reference to say Boar who doesn’t fit the same physical characteristics as the others (i.e.: claws).

Bad thing, shapeshifter with animalistic traits are supposed to become more "feral", they shouldn't be able to make more damage through crafted weapons, it's simply not in the spirit.

Yet even in the MM, most of the example lycanthropes show stats with a hybrid using a weapon.

And the bonus in grapple, bull rush and so on could be a good idea (without the need to make it a size bonus) as they are natural attacks, but still by being more specialized for each type of animal (grapple for a werebear, bull rush for a wereboar, etc).

The point of powerful build is to gain only some of the advantages to being Size Large without actually giving all of the advantages. As for specific to an animal, see above.

Giving a character the ability to wield a Greatsword in a hand, a Bastard Sword in the other and make use of a bite attack to top it off seems pretty...violent to me.

This still isn’t possible without extra feats. A Greatsword is still a 2-handed weapon. Bastard sword still requires a feat to be wielded 1-handed. By saying “A lycan can also use weapons designed for a creature one size larger without penalty.” This means they could wield a Large Longsword in one hand rather than a Medium Longsword (thus doing 2d6 damage instead of 1d8). So even a decent TWF Lycan would be using a Longsword and Shortsword but doing 2d6+1d8 instead of 1d8+1d6.

Add to this a +2 Str bonus, low-light vision, scent, good natural attacks if he is disarmed and +10 skill bonus points and you obtain something that is at the very least +2.

The skills will be reduced to the same as they are for the shifter. This brings it more in line to trade out in the equation for the half-giants +2 to saves vs. fire. Overall, after the discussion and doing the comparison line by line with the half-giant, I do think a +1 LA is appropriate, especially if I limit the shapechange to X/day.

Thanks for the input.