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D&D 5E So,whats up with those half orcs?
- Thread starter GameOgre
- Start date
abirdcall
(she/her)
I am not really seeing those abilities going well with barbarian (or even really being that good).
Barbarians are all about having tons of health and taking little damage. Staying at 1hp then isn't that great. It's not likely to prevent much damage. It's also situational. Great against an enemy that has 1 big attack. More often though dangerous enemies will have 3 small attacks.
Doing an extra d12 damage every 10 attacks or so is better than nothing of course but also not that great. In order to do so you need to forgo the better 2d6 damage of a greatsword (or just get an extra d6). The extra damage may be wasted too because you are already critting so unless it is a huge monster it is probably already dead.
This sounds like group think to me. They're not bad of course, but other races also have nifty abilities. Just wait until your wizards discover mountain dwarfs. Or if you want to talk about a good ability, how about rerolling all 1s. Halflings get that. And so on.
If it really is a problem keep in mind that half orcs are an optional "uncommon" race.
Barbarians are all about having tons of health and taking little damage. Staying at 1hp then isn't that great. It's not likely to prevent much damage. It's also situational. Great against an enemy that has 1 big attack. More often though dangerous enemies will have 3 small attacks.
Doing an extra d12 damage every 10 attacks or so is better than nothing of course but also not that great. In order to do so you need to forgo the better 2d6 damage of a greatsword (or just get an extra d6). The extra damage may be wasted too because you are already critting so unless it is a huge monster it is probably already dead.
This sounds like group think to me. They're not bad of course, but other races also have nifty abilities. Just wait until your wizards discover mountain dwarfs. Or if you want to talk about a good ability, how about rerolling all 1s. Halflings get that. And so on.
If it really is a problem keep in mind that half orcs are an optional "uncommon" race.
neobolts
Explorer
Elf, Half-Elf, Human, Dwarf, Tiefling
That said, these particular players are playing towards backstory and concept more than optimization.
5e is challenging my expectations regarding this. Changes to OA and less marking/controller emphasis is making the rear row a lot less safe than it has been in recent editions.
Sacrosanct
Legend
Now that I think about it, I don't think I've seen on half orc as a PC. We've had:
couple halfings
couple dragonborn
LOTS of humans
half elf
couple tieflings
dwarf
half elf
couple halfings
couple dragonborn
LOTS of humans
half elf
couple tieflings
dwarf
half elf
S
Sunseeker
Guest
Our group is mostly elves. 4 elves and 1 human. We had a dwarf, he died, now he's a human. We had another human, he died, now we have another elf, we had a tiefling, she died, now she's a elf. Noones touched half-orcs.
Jefe Bergenstein
Legend
I think this is important. Tables circulate ideas among themselves and develop a culture. Plus DM's have different styles, and some races tend to fare better than others depending on which pillar is favored. I'm also playing a half elf. The cha boost and 2 +1's AND extra skills is totally awesome for our less combat centric game.
We have one thread indicating everyone wants to play alt human for the feat, another where halfings are rampant because of Lucky, Half-Orcs here, another where elves are the favored race. I think I've seen every race but gnomes pointed out as "the best". To me, that says WOTC did a great job of balancing them!
Vymair
First Post
Haven't seen this issue at all at our table. We are on the verge of starting our 4th group and we've had 1 half-orc. So far, all races have been available in all games, so there's no biases.
For us, it's been the feat from humans that has attracted the most interest.
Human - 14 (barbarian, bard, cleric, druid, fighterx2, monk, paladin, ranger/rogue, sorceror, warlockx2, wizard, wizard/ranger)
Elf - 3 (cleric, monk, wizard)
Dwarf - 2 (fighterx2)
Half-Elf - 2 (druid, paladin)
Half-Orc - 1 (barbarian)
Halfling - 1 (bard)
Dragonborn - 1 (cleric)
Custom Race - 1 (rogue)
For us, it's been the feat from humans that has attracted the most interest.
Human - 14 (barbarian, bard, cleric, druid, fighterx2, monk, paladin, ranger/rogue, sorceror, warlockx2, wizard, wizard/ranger)
Elf - 3 (cleric, monk, wizard)
Dwarf - 2 (fighterx2)
Half-Elf - 2 (druid, paladin)
Half-Orc - 1 (barbarian)
Halfling - 1 (bard)
Dragonborn - 1 (cleric)
Custom Race - 1 (rogue)
Last edited:
abirdcall
(she/her)
Savage Attack:
Let's say for the sake of argument that you always reckless attack so you always have advantage on your attacks (Let's discount the times you have disadvantage which cancels it out). Barring a champion/barbarian multiclass that is about as good as you will get.
So you crit 1 in 10 attacks.
Let's say you have 2 choices in weapon, 1d12 or 2d6.
With 1d12 you get an extra 6.5 damage when you crit. so 6.5/10 or an extra .65 dmg per attack. You are giving up .5 dmg per hit taking 1d12 over 2d6 in order to get an extra 3 dmg on crit.
If you use 2d6 then you are getting an extra .35 dmg per attack.
This is only when you crit though and some of that dmg will be wasted as you will have already defeated the creature you are attacking so it will be somewhat less than that.
I think getting intimidation as a class skill is more powerful.
Let's say for the sake of argument that you always reckless attack so you always have advantage on your attacks (Let's discount the times you have disadvantage which cancels it out). Barring a champion/barbarian multiclass that is about as good as you will get.
So you crit 1 in 10 attacks.
Let's say you have 2 choices in weapon, 1d12 or 2d6.
With 1d12 you get an extra 6.5 damage when you crit. so 6.5/10 or an extra .65 dmg per attack. You are giving up .5 dmg per hit taking 1d12 over 2d6 in order to get an extra 3 dmg on crit.
If you use 2d6 then you are getting an extra .35 dmg per attack.
This is only when you crit though and some of that dmg will be wasted as you will have already defeated the creature you are attacking so it will be somewhat less than that.
I think getting intimidation as a class skill is more powerful.
Our group is currently:
Half-Orc Ranger
Dragonborn Paladin
Dragonborn Sorcerer
Halfling Monk
I've found that the halfling shines quite a bit with the 'lucky' racial trait. Re-rolling 1's is awesome. Also the advantage versus poison and fear for the stout sub-race is great. I do not think that half-orcs are necessarily a "go to" race, but they are quite nice. I certainly don't think they are overpowered, though I could see how with your group it would be a perception. I generally put limits on my players on what races occur with what frequency based on my campaign world. There tend to be a lot of humans, elves, dwarfs, and halflings. Half-orcs, tieflings, and dragonborn are a bit more rare. You might consider implementing a percentage roll at character creation which limits what races are chosen if you think they are a bit too much.
% roll:
01-65 = Humans, elves (excluding drow), and dwarfs
66-80 = add in gnomes and halflings
85-99 = add in tieflings, dragonborn, and half-orcs
100% = add drow
Just a thought.
Half-Orc Ranger
Dragonborn Paladin
Dragonborn Sorcerer
Halfling Monk
I've found that the halfling shines quite a bit with the 'lucky' racial trait. Re-rolling 1's is awesome. Also the advantage versus poison and fear for the stout sub-race is great. I do not think that half-orcs are necessarily a "go to" race, but they are quite nice. I certainly don't think they are overpowered, though I could see how with your group it would be a perception. I generally put limits on my players on what races occur with what frequency based on my campaign world. There tend to be a lot of humans, elves, dwarfs, and halflings. Half-orcs, tieflings, and dragonborn are a bit more rare. You might consider implementing a percentage roll at character creation which limits what races are chosen if you think they are a bit too much.
% roll:
01-65 = Humans, elves (excluding drow), and dwarfs
66-80 = add in gnomes and halflings
85-99 = add in tieflings, dragonborn, and half-orcs
100% = add drow
Just a thought.
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