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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lord Zardoz" data-source="post: 4044111" data-attributes="member: 704">It really depends on two things.  What level are you starting the game out at and how prone are your players to optimizing their builds?  For someone prone to optimizing their characters and when using a point buy, +4 Str is huge.  Consider it the same as having a human Barbarian in a perpetual rage, since that is what it works out to.  At the lower levels, say up to level 6 or 7, a fighter with a huge strength output will be very dominant.  Consider this:Elite Array:  15,14,13,13,10,10A Barbarian laying those stats out would probably leave them mostly alone, perhaps dropping the 14 on Con instead of Dex.  Either way, using a Great Axe, a 1st level human Barbarian would look like this, ignoring feats:15 Str Human Barbarian:Normal:  GreatAxe, +3 Atk, 1d12+3;  Raged:  GreatAxe +5 Atk, 1d12+619 Str Orc Barbarian:Normal:  GreatAxe, +5 Atk, 1d12+6;  Raged:  GreatAxe +7 Atk, 1d12+9If your player uses a point buy and kicks Str up to 18 to start, the Human Barbarian would start at the same damage output as the Elite Array Orc.18 Str Human Barbarian:Normal:  GreatAxe +5 Atk, 1d12+6;  Raged:  GreatAxe +7 Atk, 1d12+922 Str Orc Barbarian:Normal:  GreatAxe +7 Atk, 1d12+9;  Raged:  GreatAxe +9 Atk, 1d12+12The signifigance?  The PHB more or less assumes that your players are created with the Elite array layout.  And while a 22 Str Orc Barbarian will have unimpressive stats for the rest, the damage output ends up well beyond the bounds expected by the rules. - At +7 to hit to start, our Barbarian friend is unlikely to miss anything not wearing Heavy Armour.  Raged, he is going to hit things he should have no business hitting. - At +9 damage, the Orc is going to be one shotting anything with 1 HD or less, and is probably going to kill most 3 HD monster in one shot unless he rolls low.  At +12 damage when raged, 3 HD is an easy kill.  Once he obtains cleave, he can drop bugbears reasonably frequently. - The maxed out Orc has a damage edge of 6 points on an Elite Array human, and nearly twice the attack bonus when raged.  Non Fighter types may be in the same ballpark if customized.  Spell casters wont catch up for quite a bit longer.  This has one of two results.  You can try to account for the presence of this character, by upping the difficulties of the opposed encounters.  This will in turn result in probable TPK's, because if you do mange to drop the Barbarian, the surviving members of the party are probably unable to handle the encounter.  The alternative is to try to ignore the presence of the character.  This will result in the Orc dominating combat encounters until about 6th or 7th level, which is about when you will start throwing monsters at the players that cannot be taken down in 1 or 2 shots by the Orc, and when the spell casters start to fully hit their stride.  Even then, the character will be unusually dominant.Maxed out Half Orcs are also surprisingly dominant, but the difference is about 3 points of damage and 1 point of attack, which works out to be just enough to make 2 HD opponents a bit more viable, and is in turn only 1 point of damage and to hit better than a human with similar base stats.  If you keep the Orc's Dazzled penalty in daylight, the Orc is nearly identical in damage output to a Half-Orc, unless you spend a great deal of time in dungeon type environments.Anyway, if your starting out at a higher level, you might be able to justify it.END COMMUNICATION</blockquote>

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