What's the big deal with large PCs?

[Will Doyle]

If you want rules for Large PCs... then just create rules for Large PCs. No big deal. And don't give a crap that WotC hasn't made their own rules for it available, because they aren't necessary for what you want to do.

Who said anything about wanting WotC to make these rules?

EDIT: To clarify, the purpose of this thread, for me, was to scope out what people felt about it. Just for my own games.

 

[mneme]

Really, I'm not really seeing huge issues. Understandably large characters may not be to everybody's taste (much like tiny characters), but I don't think they'd be intrinsically broken.

I don't think there are -insurmountable- issues, particularly in a home game. But I do think there are significant issues that one needs to take into account to be fair to other players.

Larger footprint
For: Easier to block enemy movement, more likely to trigger OA against enemies, burst attacks made a lot larger
Against: Easier to get slowed down by difficult terrain, more available spaces for enemies to attack from, less room for allies to manoeuvre.

Seems fairly balanced, apart from the bursts. Use mounted rules, and it works, in my opinion.

I wouldn't use mounted rules, actually. Let the large character get the benefit; it's mostly balanced, particularly if you consider it one of their racial features.

Note that also in here is (separate from reach) the ability to hit creatures 10 feet off the ground). The vertical height is certainly an advantage, but again, almost balanced by limited maneuvering ability.

Larger weapons
For: Deal +1 die-step for most weapons e.g. 1d8>1d10
Against: Difficulty obtaining large weapons.
Now that's a flat bonus. But really, all it equates to (very roughly) is a +2 melee damage bonus, right? Doesn't sound so huge to me.

It's huge. It's not +2 damage with melee, it's +1 damage--but that's at least +1 damage per die, and +2 on a crit. So the paladin with a +4W daily starts dealing out +4 damage on that daily at first level, and the ranger is dealing out an extra two damage (at least) per turn. unbalancing that PC WRT other PCs. Worse, the brutal rules break when you start messing with weapon dice; while most weapons go up by 1 damage, for instance, an Executioner's Axe goes from brutal 2 1d12 (average of 7.5 damage) to brutal 2 2d6 (average of 9)--so a paladin with an EA starts doing an extra 6 damage on her 4W daily, which certainly makes a difference.

I'd want to balance this out with something similarly large. Probably -1 to AC.

Obviously, the Centaur doesn't suffer from this, which was why it was a fantastic idea.

Reach
For: Hit enemies from 1 square further away. However, no threatening reach.
Against: Nothing really.

I think reach is a pretty big deal, even without threatening reach.

However, not all large creatures have reach - and I don't think it would be breaking things too much to say that large races that traditionally have it don't when made into player races (such as an ogre).

Easiest approach is just not to give reach, yeah. Certainly not threatening reach -- or at least if you want threatening reach, you want to be -really- careful (and at that point you're talking tentacular; mostly if it doesn't have tentacles, it doesn't have threatening reach). Reach is a big deal, of course, but it's easy to overrate, given that it's easy enough to get via magic items and that more monsters have it as things grow larger, plus that reach weapons don't necessarily do -that- much more damage than non-reach weapons. Not worth that much thought, though.

 

[Infiniti2000]

Just don't increase damage dice. It never worked well in the previous editions and it won't suddenly work well in any other edition. Changing dice is a terrible idea. If you think that the impact is simply an average +1, then just give Large creatures +1 damage. Period. Balanced across all weapon types and doesn't force a Large creature to always pick the same weapon.

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

I agree with not changing the die type, and a flat + to damage would work

As a player, I would like to get reach, but would be okay with gaining that as part of a paragon path... 'Giant-Kin' or some such.

I would like to see WoTC come out with this officially, if only because my games tend to require DDI built characters.. and if the virtual table ever gets out of beta....

 

[MarkB]

Many apologies if we've been here before, but what's really so wrong about having large PC races?

Understandably they have a larger footprint on the grid, making them more likely to make opportunity attacks, and making defender auras/burst attacks all that much better.

But isn't this offset somewhat by having to squeeze so much (as a DM, my large monsters certainly suffer), and by having 12 potential attackers as opposed to 8?

I don't think balance is the major issue with Large creatures so much as the complications they introduce.

Everything you've listed here are complications, so far from compensating for each other, they reinforce each other and create greater issues.

I've played a couple of games where a PC had a giant-ant mount which he would bring with him into dungeons, and the number of issues that ant created for us made it far more an annoyance than a fun, useful companion, especially during combat. A large PC would have all the same issues, plus a few others.

 

[Stalker0]

I would say that balancing a large race should be a lot easier in 4e than in 3e. In 3e, you get so many bonuses to being large (bonuses to bull rush, trip, grapple, disarm, sunder) along with the increased damage its just hard to balance.

Since a lot of those are not advantages in 4e, a couple of penalties could balance out a large race in my book.

 

[Infiniti2000]

Since a lot of those are not advantages in 4e, a couple of penalties could balance out a large race in my book.

The problem with this is that depending on the benefits optimizers will not care about penalties. Think of vertical optimization. "Balance" only works if you are thinking about balance. There will, however, be a lot of people out there who build their characters one-dimensionally, and those are the ones that concern me.

 

[Stalker0]

The problem with this is that depending on the benefits optimizers will not care about penalties. Think of vertical optimization. "Balance" only works if you are thinking about balance. There will, however, be a lot of people out there who build their characters one-dimensionally, and those are the ones that concern me.

Well that's a factor in any bonus you grant.

Right now, the main benefit to being large is the reach (which while nice isn't that great without threatening reach) and on again hitting more creatures with close bursts.

These are nice, but no more than rerolling your attack rolls, teleporting, getting a +4 to one attack or a save, healing surge as a minor action, etc.

 

[Mirtek]

Yeah, bursts to blasts is probably a bit naff. But configuring bursts from a chosen origin square within the creature's footprint has an actual precedent in the mounted combat rules - so I don't see that as a huge problem at all.

Well, except that they would now hurt themselves with their own target creatures bursts

 

[Infiniti2000]

Right now, the main benefit to being large is the reach (which while nice isn't that great without threatening reach) and on again hitting more creatures with close bursts.

To be accurate, this isn't true. There are no official Large PC races, so you can't comment on the "main benefit" because there are none. If you read the posts above, however, you'll see other options that I think support what I said. Namely, using "next step" dice. That's an example, and I'm sure there are others that would contribute solely to vertical optimization. PCs would surely want threatening reach, wouldn't they? +4 to strength instead of only +2?