OK so level adjustment +2 or more is really a bad deal!

[Wrathamon]

The Saint Templete is WAY overpowered for +2 LA imo.

I think +1 LA classes work out fine they dont seem underpowered at all, you hardly miss the level and they normally get some niffy bonuses.

I think +2 and up you may see some problems, specially early on when you have no hitpoints but around 6 to 12 they are fine and then I think they may start to feel the effects.. but that really is only casting classes because they lose out on spell levels.

Basically, LA favors the fighter types.

 

[Carnifex]

Now THAT is the reason why LA was written in. Some people, people who may GM, don't seem to be capable of not having a +3 shield there in the first place. Or perhaps can't concieve of there being LESS treasure.

Or to say, to me the GM giving out treasure makes lots of sense in game, and having the half celestial being able to manifest such a thing seems like a poor idea.

So it would play more like this:

"Wow. there are no +3 Shields. It's as if there's something out there making my pay for my abilities. But hey, I'm higher level than you are!"

So in other words, the entire party is punished by the reduction in treasure to make up for the increased power of one character. But wait! That means that the LA race character's bonuses are worth more, as the other characters lack the magical gear that would bring them into line with their more potent ally.

 

[JoeGKushner]

Hit Dice and their lack of, was one of my biggest problems with Bastards & Bloodlines.

To be honest, I hate most of the ECL/LA things. They break D&D. I think that the racial paragons, as done in Unearthed Arcana and Arcaan Evolved/Unearthed, are the way to go. Monsters should be made the same way characters are with hit dice and skill points at every level.

 

[Gez]

Book of Exalted Deeds page 29:

"...the character sacrifices her next two levels of advancement to 'catch up' with the (artificially low) level adjustment of the template..."

Exalted feats are similar: they're overpowered, but that's partly because they're meant as rewards -- they're balanced by smaller rewards in other domains (i.e., instead of gathering a total of 15 000 gp worth of loot at the end of the adventure, you'll find just 5 000, for example, but you'll get rewarded with the possibility of taking an exalted feat).

In order to become a saint, you have to make several sacrifices, during role-play (giving your wealth to people, for example), and your character's reduced assets in gear and in tactical advantage (can't fight the ruthlessly efficient way) balances out the template.

 

[nothing to see here]

I'm sorry if my post digresses into a rules discussion. Like many of the so-called 'holes' in d20 rules, LA ad ECL are well intended and, mainly, quite elegant...the designers just could not anticipate eveyr potential possiblity created by the rules modular nature.

Level Adjustment is a well intended mechanic -- yet there are three big problems.

1) Scaling: What a 'static' level adjustment means varies greatly according to level. a +2 LA at 4nd level is a much different penalty than a +2 LA at 18th level.

2) Racial HD dependency: I haven't seen this discussed much, but base HD for creatures seems to be assigned pretty arbitrarily...outside of the 'approrpirate HD by size' guideliens in the MM there's nothing on this. If you're base race has enough HD, you can stomach a decent LA...if it's lower, you can't. This means that physically weak magical races (such as fey) with relatively low HD but high LA, are put at a mechanical disadvantage

3) Class dependency: An Ogre with 2 levels of fighter is much more powerful than an ogre with two levels of bard. Seems pretty intuitive that playing against type would create less mechanical advantages (like the old Dwarven sorcerer), except that LA's are designed assuming optimal class selection, and seem to almost compound exponentially with each non-optimal class chosen. This is an example of rules that are modular on paper -- but acting as a straitjacket in spirit.

Anyhow...Our group had a couple of small rule tweaks to reduce the impact of Level Adjustment, that seemed to work quite well. I'm sure there are plenty others out there.

However that's probably a discussion for the House Rules section. Maybe I'll start such a thread.

 

[ARandomGod]

So in other words, the entire party is punished by the reduction in treasure to make up for the increased power of one character. But wait! That means that the LA race character's bonuses are worth more, as the other characters lack the magical gear that would bring them into line with their more potent ally.

Yes. But in equal proportion to the entire party being rewarded by the increase of virtual magical items created by the influx of the one character with said virtual abilities.

They would be worth more, if you docked the items given out disproportionately. And, once again, this very statement is why they attempted to do something that's easier to enumerate. Some people can't grasp handing out treasure in proportions.

As I've shown above, I think a lot of the time, the bonus you've gotten scales upwards to compete favourably with the penalty you accepted anyway (unless you're a caster). Personally I think LA buyoff is a pretty terrible idea most of the time.

It depends a lot on how far up you're planning on going. A +1 buyoff is usually worth it. You'll make up that 3k pretty fast gaining XP for the lower level that you are, versus being docked for the higher level that you were. Of course, you're right with casters. LA hurts them bad in almost every circumstance. It'd be very hard to find one that's actually worth it. Take the Lich for example. An NPC Lich is more powerful than the base caster. But a PC Lich is much less powerful than he would be if he didn't take that +4 ECL.

Depending, of course, on how you DO it. IF you instantly gain those four levels when you Lich yourself up that's a different story.

So actually, with my buyoffs I do it a little easier than the Monty version. The first is the same, but for a +2 ECL I let one get bought of as if it were ECL 1 (at fourth level) and the second be bought off at level 7. Instead of waiting till seven to let the first of the two be bought off. That lowers the cost... and by making the XP penalty be "unseen" or payed along the way, it tends to be pretty similiar to the character making equivelant magic items. At least I've been able to balance it like that so far. In general, however, I just don't let ECL races play without special dispensation.

 

[ARandomGod]

Hit Dice and their lack of, was one of my biggest problems with Bastards & Bloodlines.

To be honest, I hate most of the ECL/LA things. They break D&D. I think that the racial paragons, as done in Unearthed Arcana and Arcaan Evolved/Unearthed, are the way to go. Monsters should be made the same way characters are with hit dice and skill points at every level.

That would be a different good way to go.

Exalted feats are similar: they're overpowered, but that's partly because they're meant as rewards -- they're balanced by smaller rewards in other domains (i.e., instead of gathering a total of 15 000 gp worth of loot at the end of the adventure, you'll find just 5 000, for example, but you'll get rewarded with the possibility of taking an exalted feat).

In order to become a saint, you have to make several sacrifices, during role-play (giving your wealth to people, for example), and your character's reduced assets in gear and in tactical advantage (can't fight the ruthlessly efficient way) balances out the template.

That's the kind of thing I was talking about when I said I think LA could be better handled by adjusting the treasure level to compensate for the abilities granted instead of adjusting "level"

 

[Andre La Roche]

Level Adjustment is a well intended mechanic -- yet there are three big problems.

SNIP

I think the first two problems you listed (scaling meaning of an LA and hit die dependency) really tie in together in that the reason a +2 LA among 3rd level characters is different than same said LA amongst 20th level characters is due to the fact that the hit points provided by those two levels make a crucial difference that often really isn't helped out by the racial hit dice.

I've solved this issue in my own campaign by creating a feat called "Girded by Power" that's loosely based on the "Psionic Body" feat. It's only prerequisite is that the character have an LA +1 or higher. The benefit is that for each point of LA the character has, he gains 2 hit points. This can make a world of difference at lower levels, bringing the characters up just enough so that they're not mopped around the floor, and is so slight at higher levels that the average 2-8 hit points that most LA creatures gain by this doesn't make enough of a difference one way or another.

Basically, LA takes into account the strengths of the creatures, "evening" them out with the strengths of regular characters while deemphasizing the disparity of weaknesses. I figure that this feat evens the playing field just enough so that LA races aren't as glass-jawed as they could be, but they're still not quite as hearty as regular classed characters

Admittedly I don't find the part about certain classes gaining more benefits than others to be very problematic anymore than I take issue with your example of the dwarven sorcerer. The things that make such races so powerful make them less of a "blank slate" than most PC races. That said, for the issue of spellcasters you could always use the "magic rating" rules from Unearthed Arcana, essentially stating that LA for monsters who have innate spellcaster levels fall under the type B column, and those with only supernatural or spell-like abilities in the type C column. The problem with this approach is that you'd conceivably have spellcasting monsters whose caster level is 2 apart, when the only difference is that one is a PC. If you're cool with that, go for it.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

1) Scaling: What a 'static' level adjustment means varies greatly according to level. a +2 LA at 4nd level is a much different penalty than a +2 LA at 18th level.

Another problem is that a +2 LA for special abilities is worthless at 18th level but quite nice at 4th, while a +2 LA for a high Constitution is worth a lot at 18th level but is merely average at 4th.

2) Racial HD dependency: I haven't seen this discussed much, but base HD for creatures seems to be assigned pretty arbitrarily...outside of the 'approrpirate HD by size' guideliens in the MM there's nothing on this. If you're base race has enough HD, you can stomach a decent LA...if it's lower, you can't. This means that physically weak magical races (such as fey) with relatively low HD but high LA, are put at a mechanical disadvantage.

I couldn't disagree more. Unless you're talking a dragon or an outsider, every racial hit dice is essentially between 1/4 and 3/4's of a level adjustment in and of itself. Say hello to your rogue with a wizard's BAB and lack of level-based abilities (Fey) or your cleric without spellcasting, armor proficiency or two good saves (Humanoid and Giant). Monstrous Humanoid and Magical Beast are tolerable, and Construct because of the size bonus to hp, but overall racial hit dice are terrible burden on a PC.

Give me the same special abilities packaged in a 3 HD humanoid and no LA or a humanoid with no racial hit dice and +2 LA and I'll take the latter every time - I'll be behind two hit dice, but I'll get class abilities which are actually useful with the hit dice I do have. That's why Giants, for example, are just awful - their hit dice are terrible, they have a lot of them, and they're "balanced" under the assumption that their LA shouldn't reflect how awful every Giant hit dice is.

3) Class dependency: An Ogre with 2 levels of fighter is much more powerful than an ogre with two levels of bard. Seems pretty intuitive that playing against type would create less mechanical advantages (like the old Dwarven sorcerer), except that LA's are designed assuming optimal class selection, and seem to almost compound exponentially with each non-optimal class chosen. This is an example of rules that are modular on paper -- but acting as a straitjacket in spirit.

Yep. Although Dwarf sorcerer isn't a terrible choice; you take a power hit to gain much better defensive abilities, addressing the class's number one weakness. Especially at low levels. Half-Orc sorcerer would be a better example of a totally suboptimal choice, though not unplayable.

Most LA races, on the other hand, are very close to unplayable as non-warriors. Experts have lower max skill ranks and primary spellcasters are completely crippled.

I always find it interesting when players hunt down the handful of good LAs (like minotaur, half-dragon, half-ogre, pixie, aurak draconian, or sharn (the last immensely munchy)), play them in their favored classes, and assume they're good to go. I can play a reasonably effective dwarf sorcerer and a quite nasty halfing barbarian; I can't play an ogre cleric (not even a wizard!) and expect to be terribly helpful to the party. I can't play a hill giant and be even as good at fighting as a human fighter, much less a playable rogue or spellcaster.

Any time a character can't even get XP for a mirror-match because of his level adjustment (almost all giants, for example), something's seriously wrong.

 

[Psion]

Book of Exalted Deeds page 29:

"...the character sacrifices her next two levels of advancement to 'catch up' with the (artificially low) level adjustment of the template..."

Which just contributes to my general impression of the book. Which is to say, not good.