Penalties and Being Small: Those who don't mind.

I understand that Small creatures have the space and reach of Mediums so that Sam and Frodo aren't outright gimped in melee. But from an internally-consistent and a realistic PoV, it's absurd that they all seem to have chimpanzee arms. It makes those Small penalties mere tokens, lip-service to realism, in a game that has never been overly concerned with realism. 3.x and 4e effectively have one PC size category: Smedium.

Melee reach and space have never been about the size of your arms, though.

(Even in 1e, it was about the length of your weapons, anyway.)
 

log in or register to remove this ad


I always felt the defense bonus for being small was worth the trade-off in penalties. I've thoroughly enjoyed playing small characters in both 2E and 3E (Thistleskin Kapplekourt, Gnome Beastrider* Extaordinaire at your service!):D




*with his faithful Cooshee Dog!:cool:
 

Melee reach and space have never been about the size of your arms, though.
How do you figure? TSR doesn't have space or reach, while WotC has set up these almost-consistent space/reach charts based on size. It's just that the Small category breaks the pattern.

Weapons aside, I'm sure you'll agree that if you're twice as tall as I am, I'm going to take up noticeably less space and suffer a rather painful disadvantage in a fist fight due to my short reach. Unless maybe I have freakishly long chimpanzee arms.
 

3e and 4e weapon sizes both work better than 3.5, IMO.

For example, it's kind of silly that with a small longbow you can shoot just as far with a medium one but they deal different damage.
 

Remove ads

Top