GreatLemur
Explorer
Frankly, I'm amazed that such a completely terrible race elicited such polite criticism. My own first instinct was nothing so gentle.
new race
- Thread starter Scion
- Start date
IcyCool
First Post
smootrk said:
I wasn't trying to adjust his views so much as explain my viewpoint. It does appear that he likes to argue, and that nothing I've said will convince him. But he did ask for feedback, and feedback is what he got. He was just dismissive (abruptly so, in some cases) of feedback he didn't see as helpful. That doesn't mean the feedback wasn't helpful (I found some of it helpful).
Apparently my presence has been requested.
I left here when it became all too clear that people wanted to be hostile and unreasonable. I should've seen it from the first few posts, but I had some hope.
Ahh well.. so much for hope.
Still, I'll try going over it again, perhaps people will be a little more open to discussing the topic at hand instead of attacking.
I will start from the beginning, as it is usually a good place to begin.
Smootrk said that he wouldnt use it in his game, to which I asked if anyone had any suggestions.
He then said to compare it to the gnoll as a good comparison point. So I tried it vs the core first to see if it was decently comparable, and hence a good starting place. It was not, it failed in pretty much every way. There wasnt anything to even base the comparison on other than, 'well, the Kri'Loroth should wind up being better than the gnoll'.
Ok, comparison one done, but not overly helpful for the topic of the Kri'Loroth.
Now, some might say that even though the gnoll turned out very poorly in that comparison that it should still be used as a baseline. To that though I ask a simple question: why?
In my eyes, if something is very substandard to what we believe to be balanced (the basic races) why would everything else need to be equally substandard? I would rather have people make choices based on character concept with everything else being equal instead of having to bite the bullet and take the hit in order to get the interesting twist you are looking for.
Werk then said I was berating someone. Even now I see no berate and no attack other than doing the comparison that was asked and my saying that it wouldnt work in my eyes as a valid comparison.
He then said that +2 to stats is too good (rhetoric unfortunately) and something about evolution, which doesnt have much effect in d&d.
Bront then basically said to scrap the race and start over again. Now, while I can see this being something to be said after going through a lot of iterations and coming to the conclusion that something 'cant' be usefully balanced, but since it was near the beginning before anything else was done it wasnt, and still isnt, a step that I am willing to take just yet.
He also said to make it ECL 3 or 4, but nothing to compare it with. People can believe it needs to start anywhere, but after that comparisons need to be done to see where it fits in. Which is of course what I came here for, to see if people could come up with comparisons I couldnt think of and to give a different view point.
His new race may very well be a good one, but it loses all of the flavor of the other race and doesnt fit the profile that I am going for.
If you wanted to play a hulking brute character with dark skin, fur, and eyes that bore into your soul and someone tells you to instead play a fair skinned pixie who is blind then you would likely tell them the same thing, it doesnt fit the concept I am going for. Same thing here.
I made a comment later to bront about thinking that he didnt have a lot of experience with high LA. Every time I have seen it in play it causes major shifts in the power level of a creature. They tend to be highly unbalanced and disrupt play greatly. Challenges tend to become too swingy, things are either a cake walk or destroy them (this happens over the full course of levels that I have seen).
I made the comment later about the halfdragon being +3. The halfdragon gets some pretty huge beanies in comparison, that +8 to str alone.. wow.. +4 natural armor? mmm.. natural weapons are good as well.
Also, we are sitting in a strange area. I'd have to say that this guy is either LA +0 or LA +1, it depends on which way you round. So, which way does it fall? which way should it fall? Tough call. But, since it does seem to be down to that sort of level if one person calls it one way and the other the other way which is 'wrong'? Depends on how you balance each of the aspects that they have good or bad.
I then made 3 sets of guys, human vs Kri'Loroth. I felt that this showed that at low levels they were fairly even. Better in some ways, worse in others, but overall pretty even. This would mean that a +1 LA would make them much weaker than the others and bring the choice back to having to bite the bullet for a different choice. Shifting around a few abilities might work as well, but no one seemed to want to discuss that, so then we jumped up to 20th level comparisons. I assumed this was because the low level ones seemed ok.
At this point I asked icycool to make the build he felt would show the problem. I did this for a couple of reasons: to see if he could come up with something I didnt think of and to show that he actually wanted to discuss it. These were both very important to me, especially given the first few posts which talked about what peoples first impressions were but didnt say anything definative.
It also brought up that I had missed something in the write up, which is good. I got to put it in
At this point nifft came in and basically just made a rant and left. It wasnt even as constructive as other posts had been in the thread. He could've just come in and typed random letters and numbers and it would've been worth just as much. Actually, that might've been worth more overall.
Thanee then said that the 2 racial hd wasnt a disadvantage. Frankly, I read through the post but with that first part I mostly disregarded the rest. Ignoring costs then saying the overall thing needs a huge LA just doesnt fly. It tends to delay iterative attacks and it delays classes special abilities (yes, strangely even noncasters have class abilities that are delayed). Saying that some classes wont be penalized for it just doesnt make sense. Even the fighter would be penalized for it, he has to wait longer to get fighter only feats.
Icycool then posted up a couple of races and said compare, but I am not sure what it was supposed to show. Two 0 hd, LA +0 races compared to the 2hd race. There isnt much to go on there, the 2hd race 'should' be much better. If you compare a race to the same race with 2 levels in a class the second should again be 'much' better.
He then goes through savage species, which is a good starting point. It doesnt take into account hd though, which I feel is one of its biggest failings. Acid test would be next
Snowy seems to say that feats and stats are good while the large size penalties are barely noticible while hd arent a big detriment either. This is a fine opinion, I think that the large penalties are pretty detrimental however. I would just like snowy to show it rather than say it. After all, we could use similar logic and go through each race in the phb and come to the conclusion that they are all overpowered/broken.
We then go to the comparison that icycool made and have these overall differences:
Kri'Loroth vs Human
+20 hp
+1 initiative
-1 Ac (flatfooted)
Maybe lower ac normally as well, 'if' the armor he is wearing has a max dex bonus lower than his actual ac, which is possible. Still though, not really a balancing issue, just a general comment
-1 BAB
-1 to hit
+1/+1.5 damage in melee (possibly +1 damage on ranged)
Low light vision
Psi-ability on metaphysical weapon, inertial armor, and 3 other defensive powers
+1 reflex
+4 will (3 of this are mostly from a multiclassing issue however)
same total number of skill points, 20 from a lesser selection
2 more psionic feats
1 less psychic warrior feat (psionic + fighter)
1 less 'any' feat (as in, any)
3 more pp (although with + items this goes away because of the lower number of psychic warrior levels)
2 less powers known (which could be of any level up to 6th, or, in other words, chosen from any psychic warrior power on the list)
2 less manifestor levels
Or, more concisely: +20 hp, +1 ini, -1 flatfooted ac, -1 BAB, -1 to hit, +1/+1.5 damage, low light vision, psi-ability, +1 reflex, +4 will, 2 more psionic feats and 3 more pp vs 1 more psychic warrior feat, 1 more any feat, 2 more powers known of 6th level, and 2 more manifestor levels.
Depending on what sort of character you want one or the other might be better. I dont see this as being hugely swingy in either direction however.
We then had a comparison with the halfgiant. One comparison to see how he compared with a human and another with the Kri'Loroth. Overall it came down to if you wanted to play a grappler and deal lots of damage per swing then play the halfgiant, for any other type of character however play some other race.
Ahh.. now we come to the lizardfolk. This was after I was already pretty much gone.
Still though, lizardfolk are a strange comparison point. They have abilities that are overpowerd at low level but not as big of a deal later on. I feel that is why they have the LA that they have.
+6 natural armor and 3 natural weapons is 'huge' at low level. Effectively the lizardfolk can pretty easily make any character around their level at low levels need a 20 to hit them. Along with having 3 attacks while other people only have 1.
Bigger numbers tend to be more impressive than more smaller numbers, especially at low levels. This is part of the comparison point. The lizardfolk lose out in most ways, but they have a few huge bonuses which make up for it.
The lizardfolk has the same +2 str without the -1 to attack from being large. He has a +6 natural armor vs the Kri'Loroths -1 from size. So, just starting out, the lizardfolk hits more often and has an AC 7 points higher. 7! Along with 3 natural attacks.
This means that while other races are swinging once in a round (we'll go for big damage, 2d6+1.5 str) these guys are getting 3 swings for d4 each (str, str, half str). Say 18 strength, that gives the first guy 2d6+6, pretty nice! The Lizard fold however has d4+4, d4+4, d4+2. 3 different swings, so much more likely to get at least one hit each round, along with both d4+4 having the same chance to hit as the 2d6+6 (avg of d4+4 is 6.5, avg of 2d6+6 is 13, so the lizardfolk is way ahead on damage, especially if the 2h guy has 16 str vs the lizardfolks 18 str).
So, for low levels at least, the lizardfolk tends to be incredibly good. Tons of AC (at a point when to hit bonuses are still fairly low) and lots of attacks (3x as many as most other characters, dealing more damage overall than the 2h fighter, let alone any of the others).
That is why I feel that the lizardfolk have the extra LA, they have things that can be overpowering at low levels. The Kri'Loroth doesnt have anything like that.
apparently the name has people upset though, so lets just call 'weak build' 'wiry build'. That would put a better light on it I guess, but thought that the name going the other way would allow people to understand better what it does.
Wiry build it is though.
I am about all typed out for now though. If people are willing to discuss and explain I'll stick around, if they want to jump to conclusions and give no responses I can use (or anyone else for that matter, saying you feel it is over/under powered I dont know what that means, or what you are comparing it to) then I'll be happy to discuss.
Note, just because we can disucuss it does not mean that we will agree.
Much like the poster who suggested converting everything to feats there are some things that I feel arent useful for comparisons. Going further with this, there are so many feats that are of differing power levels that if you had 10 people who all tried to do it the same way they can easily come up with 10 different feat totals, depending on which they use. If you have a +1 BAB how many feats is that worth? 1? 2? what about a +1 attack bonus from str? 1? 2? +1 attack bonus from some other source? 1? 2? Generally I feel that the BAB is by far the strongest, does that make it twice as strong? There are no feat equivalents, there are no fractions, there is no consistancy in feat power, feats only cover a small fraction of what is needed, etc etc.. So, I dont feel that it can help much in this case without a major overhaul.
Whatever works though guys. Try to keep the personal attacks out of the thread if you will.
I left here when it became all too clear that people wanted to be hostile and unreasonable. I should've seen it from the first few posts, but I had some hope.
Ahh well.. so much for hope.
Still, I'll try going over it again, perhaps people will be a little more open to discussing the topic at hand instead of attacking.
I will start from the beginning, as it is usually a good place to begin.
Smootrk said that he wouldnt use it in his game, to which I asked if anyone had any suggestions.
He then said to compare it to the gnoll as a good comparison point. So I tried it vs the core first to see if it was decently comparable, and hence a good starting place. It was not, it failed in pretty much every way. There wasnt anything to even base the comparison on other than, 'well, the Kri'Loroth should wind up being better than the gnoll'.
Ok, comparison one done, but not overly helpful for the topic of the Kri'Loroth.
Now, some might say that even though the gnoll turned out very poorly in that comparison that it should still be used as a baseline. To that though I ask a simple question: why?
In my eyes, if something is very substandard to what we believe to be balanced (the basic races) why would everything else need to be equally substandard? I would rather have people make choices based on character concept with everything else being equal instead of having to bite the bullet and take the hit in order to get the interesting twist you are looking for.
Werk then said I was berating someone. Even now I see no berate and no attack other than doing the comparison that was asked and my saying that it wouldnt work in my eyes as a valid comparison.
He then said that +2 to stats is too good (rhetoric unfortunately) and something about evolution, which doesnt have much effect in d&d.
Bront then basically said to scrap the race and start over again. Now, while I can see this being something to be said after going through a lot of iterations and coming to the conclusion that something 'cant' be usefully balanced, but since it was near the beginning before anything else was done it wasnt, and still isnt, a step that I am willing to take just yet.
He also said to make it ECL 3 or 4, but nothing to compare it with. People can believe it needs to start anywhere, but after that comparisons need to be done to see where it fits in. Which is of course what I came here for, to see if people could come up with comparisons I couldnt think of and to give a different view point.
His new race may very well be a good one, but it loses all of the flavor of the other race and doesnt fit the profile that I am going for.
If you wanted to play a hulking brute character with dark skin, fur, and eyes that bore into your soul and someone tells you to instead play a fair skinned pixie who is blind then you would likely tell them the same thing, it doesnt fit the concept I am going for. Same thing here.
I made a comment later to bront about thinking that he didnt have a lot of experience with high LA. Every time I have seen it in play it causes major shifts in the power level of a creature. They tend to be highly unbalanced and disrupt play greatly. Challenges tend to become too swingy, things are either a cake walk or destroy them (this happens over the full course of levels that I have seen).
I made the comment later about the halfdragon being +3. The halfdragon gets some pretty huge beanies in comparison, that +8 to str alone.. wow.. +4 natural armor? mmm.. natural weapons are good as well.
Also, we are sitting in a strange area. I'd have to say that this guy is either LA +0 or LA +1, it depends on which way you round. So, which way does it fall? which way should it fall? Tough call. But, since it does seem to be down to that sort of level if one person calls it one way and the other the other way which is 'wrong'? Depends on how you balance each of the aspects that they have good or bad.
I then made 3 sets of guys, human vs Kri'Loroth. I felt that this showed that at low levels they were fairly even. Better in some ways, worse in others, but overall pretty even. This would mean that a +1 LA would make them much weaker than the others and bring the choice back to having to bite the bullet for a different choice. Shifting around a few abilities might work as well, but no one seemed to want to discuss that, so then we jumped up to 20th level comparisons. I assumed this was because the low level ones seemed ok.
At this point I asked icycool to make the build he felt would show the problem. I did this for a couple of reasons: to see if he could come up with something I didnt think of and to show that he actually wanted to discuss it. These were both very important to me, especially given the first few posts which talked about what peoples first impressions were but didnt say anything definative.
It also brought up that I had missed something in the write up, which is good. I got to put it in
At this point nifft came in and basically just made a rant and left. It wasnt even as constructive as other posts had been in the thread. He could've just come in and typed random letters and numbers and it would've been worth just as much. Actually, that might've been worth more overall.
Thanee then said that the 2 racial hd wasnt a disadvantage. Frankly, I read through the post but with that first part I mostly disregarded the rest. Ignoring costs then saying the overall thing needs a huge LA just doesnt fly. It tends to delay iterative attacks and it delays classes special abilities (yes, strangely even noncasters have class abilities that are delayed). Saying that some classes wont be penalized for it just doesnt make sense. Even the fighter would be penalized for it, he has to wait longer to get fighter only feats.
Icycool then posted up a couple of races and said compare, but I am not sure what it was supposed to show. Two 0 hd, LA +0 races compared to the 2hd race. There isnt much to go on there, the 2hd race 'should' be much better. If you compare a race to the same race with 2 levels in a class the second should again be 'much' better.
He then goes through savage species, which is a good starting point. It doesnt take into account hd though, which I feel is one of its biggest failings. Acid test would be next
Snowy seems to say that feats and stats are good while the large size penalties are barely noticible while hd arent a big detriment either. This is a fine opinion, I think that the large penalties are pretty detrimental however. I would just like snowy to show it rather than say it. After all, we could use similar logic and go through each race in the phb and come to the conclusion that they are all overpowered/broken.
We then go to the comparison that icycool made and have these overall differences:
Kri'Loroth vs Human
+20 hp
+1 initiative
-1 Ac (flatfooted)
Maybe lower ac normally as well, 'if' the armor he is wearing has a max dex bonus lower than his actual ac, which is possible. Still though, not really a balancing issue, just a general comment
-1 BAB
-1 to hit
+1/+1.5 damage in melee (possibly +1 damage on ranged)
Low light vision
Psi-ability on metaphysical weapon, inertial armor, and 3 other defensive powers
+1 reflex
+4 will (3 of this are mostly from a multiclassing issue however)
same total number of skill points, 20 from a lesser selection
2 more psionic feats
1 less psychic warrior feat (psionic + fighter)
1 less 'any' feat (as in, any)
3 more pp (although with + items this goes away because of the lower number of psychic warrior levels)
2 less powers known (which could be of any level up to 6th, or, in other words, chosen from any psychic warrior power on the list)
2 less manifestor levels
Or, more concisely: +20 hp, +1 ini, -1 flatfooted ac, -1 BAB, -1 to hit, +1/+1.5 damage, low light vision, psi-ability, +1 reflex, +4 will, 2 more psionic feats and 3 more pp vs 1 more psychic warrior feat, 1 more any feat, 2 more powers known of 6th level, and 2 more manifestor levels.
Depending on what sort of character you want one or the other might be better. I dont see this as being hugely swingy in either direction however.
We then had a comparison with the halfgiant. One comparison to see how he compared with a human and another with the Kri'Loroth. Overall it came down to if you wanted to play a grappler and deal lots of damage per swing then play the halfgiant, for any other type of character however play some other race.
Ahh.. now we come to the lizardfolk. This was after I was already pretty much gone.
Still though, lizardfolk are a strange comparison point. They have abilities that are overpowerd at low level but not as big of a deal later on. I feel that is why they have the LA that they have.
+6 natural armor and 3 natural weapons is 'huge' at low level. Effectively the lizardfolk can pretty easily make any character around their level at low levels need a 20 to hit them. Along with having 3 attacks while other people only have 1.
Bigger numbers tend to be more impressive than more smaller numbers, especially at low levels. This is part of the comparison point. The lizardfolk lose out in most ways, but they have a few huge bonuses which make up for it.
The lizardfolk has the same +2 str without the -1 to attack from being large. He has a +6 natural armor vs the Kri'Loroths -1 from size. So, just starting out, the lizardfolk hits more often and has an AC 7 points higher. 7! Along with 3 natural attacks.
This means that while other races are swinging once in a round (we'll go for big damage, 2d6+1.5 str) these guys are getting 3 swings for d4 each (str, str, half str). Say 18 strength, that gives the first guy 2d6+6, pretty nice! The Lizard fold however has d4+4, d4+4, d4+2. 3 different swings, so much more likely to get at least one hit each round, along with both d4+4 having the same chance to hit as the 2d6+6 (avg of d4+4 is 6.5, avg of 2d6+6 is 13, so the lizardfolk is way ahead on damage, especially if the 2h guy has 16 str vs the lizardfolks 18 str).
So, for low levels at least, the lizardfolk tends to be incredibly good. Tons of AC (at a point when to hit bonuses are still fairly low) and lots of attacks (3x as many as most other characters, dealing more damage overall than the 2h fighter, let alone any of the others).
That is why I feel that the lizardfolk have the extra LA, they have things that can be overpowering at low levels. The Kri'Loroth doesnt have anything like that.
apparently the name has people upset though, so lets just call 'weak build' 'wiry build'. That would put a better light on it I guess, but thought that the name going the other way would allow people to understand better what it does.
Wiry build it is though.
I am about all typed out for now though. If people are willing to discuss and explain I'll stick around, if they want to jump to conclusions and give no responses I can use (or anyone else for that matter, saying you feel it is over/under powered I dont know what that means, or what you are comparing it to) then I'll be happy to discuss.
Note, just because we can disucuss it does not mean that we will agree.
Much like the poster who suggested converting everything to feats there are some things that I feel arent useful for comparisons. Going further with this, there are so many feats that are of differing power levels that if you had 10 people who all tried to do it the same way they can easily come up with 10 different feat totals, depending on which they use. If you have a +1 BAB how many feats is that worth? 1? 2? what about a +1 attack bonus from str? 1? 2? +1 attack bonus from some other source? 1? 2? Generally I feel that the BAB is by far the strongest, does that make it twice as strong? There are no feat equivalents, there are no fractions, there is no consistancy in feat power, feats only cover a small fraction of what is needed, etc etc.. So, I dont feel that it can help much in this case without a major overhaul.
Whatever works though guys. Try to keep the personal attacks out of the thread if you will.
IcyCool
First Post
Scion,
You know, you keep wanting to use those Racial Hit Dice as a balancing factor, but you seem to be ignoring the fact that they give you the following:
+2d8 + 2xCon mod hit points
+2 HD for purposes of resisting spells
+3 Will save
+1 BAB
10 + (5*Int mod) in skill points
What exactly is this "penalty" balancing?
Oddly enough, if you ditched the Racial Hit Dice and all the stat bonuses, you'd have a +0 LA race in my opinion.
After running through the comparisons I put up, it is my opinion that the Kri'Loroth should be 2HD +1 LA. At 2 Racial Hit Dice, it is too strong. I have shown you my reasons, and you simply do not agree. I simply cannot see how you think that the laundry list of advantages the Kri'Loroth has (Psi ability is 4 other defensive powers, and you didn't list the stat bonuses either) is not better than an "equivalent" (ECL-wise) human, or elf, etc. As you either do not understand or agree with my argument, nothing else I have to say will be of any use to you.
Good luck with your race, and I hope you find a way to balance it to your satisfaction.
You know, you keep wanting to use those Racial Hit Dice as a balancing factor, but you seem to be ignoring the fact that they give you the following:
+2d8 + 2xCon mod hit points
+2 HD for purposes of resisting spells
+3 Will save
+1 BAB
10 + (5*Int mod) in skill points
What exactly is this "penalty" balancing?
Oddly enough, if you ditched the Racial Hit Dice and all the stat bonuses, you'd have a +0 LA race in my opinion.
After running through the comparisons I put up, it is my opinion that the Kri'Loroth should be 2HD +1 LA. At 2 Racial Hit Dice, it is too strong. I have shown you my reasons, and you simply do not agree. I simply cannot see how you think that the laundry list of advantages the Kri'Loroth has (Psi ability is 4 other defensive powers, and you didn't list the stat bonuses either) is not better than an "equivalent" (ECL-wise) human, or elf, etc. As you either do not understand or agree with my argument, nothing else I have to say will be of any use to you.
Good luck with your race, and I hope you find a way to balance it to your satisfaction.
Henry
Autoexreginated
First of all, for everyone concerned: Let's please eliminate snarky comments and insults.
Second, if someone requests help, and does not express themselves in a manner you find civil, it's best to simply not respond back. In some cases, putting someone on an ignore list is better than picking a fight. Scion is looking for an involved critique-post-and-rebuttal of his work in this thread. If you have decided it's not what you're interested in participating in, it's best to not post in it.
Thanks, all.
Second, if someone requests help, and does not express themselves in a manner you find civil, it's best to simply not respond back. In some cases, putting someone on an ignore list is better than picking a fight. Scion is looking for an involved critique-post-and-rebuttal of his work in this thread. If you have decided it's not what you're interested in participating in, it's best to not post in it.
Thanks, all.
Bront
The man with the probe
Bront said:
You seemed to miss the fighter example I gave. I think it's still valid. And I disagree with your assessment that your race is not balanced well against the lizardfolk (I stated line for line what I though was and wasn't balanced in that assessment, you simply point out what you think is more powerful about the lizard folk, and ignored what was more powerful about your race). Honestly, if it was a choice between the lizardfolk and your race at +1 LA and +2 Racial HD, I'd take your race 90% of the time. For just about any class.
I agree with Icycool. Racial HD are not a good balancing factor in small numbers, because there is no huge disadvantage, and the disadvantage is best described when compairing straight class builds. For extreme multi-class builds, it's almost negligable (And could be an advantage in some cases). This race needs some sort of LA.
