Not-So-Powerful Build? New Race question

[UltimaGabe]

Hey, everyone. I was wondering about something- what exactly would be the repurcussions of giving a small-sized race the Powerful Build ability? (That is, the ability to make them count as medium-sized creatures for purposes of weapon sizes, bull rush, grapple, whatever.) All races that I know of that have it are Medium-sized already (and thus count as Large), and they all have a +1 level adjustment (the only ones offhand are the Goliath, Half-Ogre, and Half-Giant). What about a small-sized character, whose only advantage over a human would be a +1 to attacks and AC (as opposed to a +4 to bull rush attempts, +4 to grapple checks, increased damage, and so on)? Would it still incur a +1 LA? What about just allowing it to wield medium-sized weapons at no penalty, without all of the other bonuses? What would the repurcussions of that be?

Basically, I'm trying to find a way to re-create Frog from Chrono Trigger (basically a knight's sidekick that gets transformed into a frog, but becomes a knight himself in order to avenge his friend's death or something). He's a smallish frog-man, around two or three feet tall, but he could still wield the sword originally owned by the knight before him- who was medium-sized. Anyway, anybody got any thoughts?

 

[Felnar]

there's the monkey grip feat in Complete Warrior
or he could use it two handed

sorry, i dont know much about level adjustments

 

[Spatzimaus]

Well, think of it the other way: if he's treated as a Medium creature for the purposes of weapon sizes, bull rush, grapple, etc., then try and balance it as a Medium creature who has a +1 size bonus to attack rolls and AC, a bonus to skills like Hide, whose land speed is a bit lower than normal, and whose armor weighs a bit less than normal. While it's a bit of a boost, it's not nearly enough to justify a LA+1. Those pseudoLarge races have unbalanced stats (especially +STR) to help explain the LA, so as long as you don't push it too much you'd be fine.

But as to the Chrono Trigger reference, I never got the impression that Frog was that much smaller than the others. Just make him medium-sized and say that he's on the small end of the range.

 

[Drowbane]

But as to the Chrono Trigger reference, I never got the impression that Frog was that much smaller than the others. Just make him medium-sized and say that he's on the small end of the range.

Yeah, Frog never struck me as "small".

 

[Ferrix]

There's a Fey (redcap) who is small with the powerful build feature, although it's not a standard race.

I'd imagine that you could get a LA +0 small race with powerful build that would be balanced with, say the dwarf pretty easily.

 

[Kisanji Arael]

Well, Frog always used the Masamune 2-handed anyway, and I just assumed that it was a bastard sword. Give him the ability to jump up a little and then swing his sword downward.

Really, unless you plan on him using a great sword, you should be fine.

 

[Aust Diamondew]

If you had a small race with powerful build it'd be a medium size character but it'd get:

+4 Hide
+1 Attack
+1 AC
20ft speed
Armor weighs half as much
alot of gear weighs 1/4 as much

I'd say that if you didn't give the race too many other good abilities that LA +0 would be fine.

 

[UltimaGabe]

If you had a small race with powerful build it'd be a medium size character but it'd get:

+4 Hide
+1 Attack
+1 AC
20ft speed
Armor weighs half as much
alot of gear weighs 1/4 as much

I'd say that if you didn't give the race too many other good abilities that LA +0 would be fine.

That's pretty much all I had in mind. I was considering giving this race a Charisma penalty- since I wasn't sure about the Powerful Build thing I was gonna make it a -4, but on second thought, a -2 would be better- is there anything that might make a good offset for that? (Would a +2 strength be too much?) If not, I could always just leave the stat adjustments as they are.

 

[Mr. Moutain]

On the other hand, you could base it off of a 3.5 Halfling, remove most of their bonuses, Convert other ones, such as Hide. Give them the ability to wield weapons as medium size, and go from there. Also, I would like to see the finished product.

 

[Nifft]

Here's an initial take on a small Froggy race which uses normal-sized weapons:

[h2]Froggy[/h2] Small Humanoid (Amphibian)
Strength -2
Movement: 20 ft., swim 20 ft.
Small: +4 to Hide, +1 to AC and attack rolls
Powerful Build: Froggies are treated as Medium or Small, whichever would be more favorable, when computing penalties for wielding weapons.
Amphibious: Froggies can breathe in or out of water.
Skills: Froggies gain a +4 racial bonus on Jump and Swim checks. A froggy can always take 10 on Swim checks.

Cheers, -- N