Race Balance

[Dax Doomslayer]

Hi Folks,
With all the debate over balance and such , I was wondering what people would do to 'balance' the Core races to the Dwarf level of power? Not major power ups but some tweaks to make them more 'balanced'. I figured I start it with the following (but I'm just kind of brainstorming and throwing things out there):


Humans: Leave as is.
Elf: +4 to Spot; Listen and Search and/or x2 Low-light Vision
Gnome: ?
Half-Elf: +2 Spot; Listen & Search; (they probably should get something else)
Half-Orc: add the scent ability; (they probably should get something else)
Halflings: ?

I was just curious to see what people thought. Thanks!

 

[The_Gneech]

For half-orcs, I'd say just lose the -2 Int. Full-blooded orcs don't have scent, so it seems a little weird to give it to half-orcs. I know that the -2 Int is supposed to combine with the -2 Cha to offset the +2 Str, but then the half-orc gets shafted in abilities as well. So I say give them a slight edge on statistics and leave the abilities alone.

Half-elves, I dunno. Maybe just Alertness as a bonus feat? Nothing too big tho, they're not that weak.

The rest of the non-dwarf races are okay as they are; personally I think it would be better to take away some of the dwarves' ridiculous bag-o'-goodies than to try to buff up the rest of the races to match.

-The Gneech

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Scent is actually a suggested power-up for gnomes in, I think, the 3.0 DMG. I think Scent is probably TOO good as a freebie, but it certainly could be a racial feat.

 

[Dragonbait]

Scent is actually a suggested power-up for gnomes in, I think, the 3.0 DMG. I think Scent is probably TOO good as a freebie, but it certainly could be a racial feat.

But the limited scent ability could work... Of course, you need to get the Dragon magazine compendium and look under the Lupin racial traits for what it does.

 

[delericho]

For half-orcs, I'd say just lose the -2 Int.

This has the curious effect of making Half-orcs very good Paladins, which strikes me as a little odd.

personally I think it would be better to take away some of the dwarves' ridiculous bag-o'-goodies than to try to buff up the rest of the races to match.

I agree with this. What I would do:

Dwarves: Remove the Charisma penalty, the bonus to hit goblinoids and orcs, and the weapon familiarity.

Add a -2 penalty to Dex, and a +2 bonus on Open Locks and Disable Device rolls.

Humans: Leave as-is.

Elves: Replace the automatic proficiencies with Weapon Familiarity - elves consider those bows and swords to be Simple not Martial weapons.

Gnomes: Remove the Str penalty, replace with a -2 Wis penalty.

Halflings: Remove the Dex bonus and the Str penalty.

Half-elves: Not sure. They need some sort of boost. I would probably give them either a bonus feat or the weapon familiarity of elves.

Half-orcs: Again, they need some sort of boost, but I'm not sure quite what. Lesser scent seems a good idea. Maybe a +2 bonus on Intimidate checks, and a +2 racial bonus on Fortitude saves against poison and disease.

 

[Dragonbait]

Halflings: Remove the Dex bonus and the Str penalty.

Qua? A 3-foot tall halfling with an 18 strength?

 

[delericho]

Qua? A 3-foot tall halfling with an 18 strength?

Yeah, it's a strange effect of that suggestion. However, is it really so much stranger than a 3 foot halfling with a 16 strength? (Plus, of course, an 8th level halfling can already get that 18 strength, and that's discounting the effect of magic.)

But the reason I suggest the change is for game balance, rather than realism, reasons. At present, gnomes and halflings suffer a penalty to damage because they have to use Small weapons. They suffer a reduction in their carrying capacity. They suffer reductions on the distance they can Jump. And then they suffer all those things _again_ because of the Str penalty. The net effect is that Small Fighters are nerfed so badly as to be almost unplayable IMO.

To fix this, either the rules for weapon sizes, carrying capacity and Jump need to be changed (where all of these make sense) or the penalty needs eliminated. The latter is simpler, so that's what I advocate, despite that one odd case arising from it.

YMMV, of course. And, you might not consider the 'problem' I'm addressing to actually exist, in which no 'fix' is appropriate.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Personally, I'd go with rolling back the weapon size rules to 3.0 -- a little less realistic, but a lot more fun when one doesn't have to monitor what size a shortsword someone's using and it enables shorties to be viable non-spellcasters -- but delericho's argument makes sense.

 

[der_kluge]

In a quantitative analysis that I worked up a couple of years ago, I found that all the races were more or less balanced - except Dwarves were way overpowered, and half-orcs are ridiculously weak.

 

[Dax Doomslayer]

Hmmm some interesting thoughts there Delericho especially the modifications on the stats for Dwarves. It would seem the -2 dexterity would actually be a better fit for the Dwarf. After all they are medium sized and only move 20' which would kind of support your theory as movement and dexterity are sort of related. However, I think really the Dwarf and Human have the most compelling 'mechanics' to play. I think an Extra Bonus feat and extra skill points make the Human pretty balanced with regards to the Dwarf. Thus I'd want to probably enhance the other races rather to the Dwarf's level than 'ratchet' the Dwarf down. I appreciate the ideas as it makes things interesting as to what others think could be done to make things more 'even'.