3.X Race Balance

[DenizenKane]

What should the power level of a race in DnD be?

How much is too much? How many abilities should a race have?

Is it okay to have level 1 thri-kreens running around with 4 attacks at level 1?

Is it okay to have things with wings that can fly at first level?

Should a race modify stats? Should you pick your stat bonuses? Should there even be one at that point?

How many races do you need to cover most of what people want? Should there be a racesplosion or a few races?

Should humans really just be a feat and skill points?

If you were designing your perfect race package for a 3.X variant what would you want it to look like?

[Foxwarrior]

Well, in Lord of the Rings, a major inspiration for D&D, almost all of a character's powers come from race: hobbits primarily have hobbit powers, elves rely on elf powers, and wizards use wizard powers.

Generally speaking, all races with equal cost should have equal value.

In my game which is a bit like a 3.X variant, not all races have equal cost, humans are very neutral statistically (like, not even a feat or skill points), and the stat bonuses for race are generally possible to copy by being a human with the right character building choices. Races run the gamut from rubber forehead ones like Deathtouched and Puny Horses to actually exotic things like Forbidding Tomes and Swarms.

Being able to fly at first level has to be on the table because you could always play a murder of crows instead at that level.

[Chamomile]

If you want your races to be more interesting than the standard human, elf, dwarf, halfling, and orc, you need a way to exchange some of your class or equipment powers (or some other power source, if you're playing a game that has those - but in D&D you are usually a level Y [race] [class] with [swag] and that's it) in order to be a more powerful race. Depending on how you do that, you might also be able to make a likewise undercosted race that lets you get more class or equipment power.

[erik]

• What should the power level of a race in DnD be?
Enough to provide at least one interesting thing to do either in or out of combat. Probably 2 interesting things is the minimum.

• How much is too much? How many abilities should a race have?
For a starting ECL 0 race? More than 6 is probably too many. You start forgetting them or they are insignificant crap.

• Is it okay to have level 1 thri-kreens running around with 4 attacks at level 1?
Probably. It's a cute perk early on and loses its potency later in life. It does synergize quite well with things like sneak attack, but that advantage wanes over time.

• Is it okay to have things with wings that can fly at first level?
Sometimes. Wings solves a lot of problems/provides perfect defense vs a bunch of monsters. But that's probably fine.

• Should a race modify stats? Should you pick your stat bonuses? Should there even be one at that point?
In D&D it is kind of unavoidable. Some races just make sense to have some stats be better. If halflings are as strong as ogres then we've done fucked up.

• How many races do you need to cover most of what people want? Should there be a racesplosion or a few races?
A bunch, but we can probably do without all the fucking subraces. I'd rather include a dozen extra races than a half-dozen subraces of elves, gnomes, halflings, dwarves each.

• Should humans really just be a feat and skill points?
Unless you swap em for something else. You really need *something*. Luck reroll stuff like from Heroes of Destiny (?) might be a suitable exchange. Or a bonus background.

• If you were designing your perfect race package for a 3.X variant what would you want it to look like?
I don't understand the question, specifically 'perfect race package'. Like "how would I redo all the basic races?" or "This be the best race?" or "Use this formula for creating races?"

[angelfromanotherpin]

Should humans really just be a feat and skill points?

This is the result of so many races being describable as 'humans, but...'
In a from-scratch setting, you could definitely do humans as more distinctive. Frank had a take that was based more in anthropology than in nebulous fantasy tropes.

[OgreBattle]

I don't like D&D races, I'd prefer they be just different shapes and sizes of humans like in One Piece or Zelda. Short bearded miner humans, slender forest humans with fey blood, savage muscly viking humans, etc. like One Piece

Playing as a different species should be more noticeably different, like being a bug person, lizard person, robot person, centaur, and so on like Shining Force

Decide what components make up a player character in your game and you can decide how much species/race takes up. Like is being a fey blooded being worth 1 feat or 1 class level or whatever it is your game uses.

[erik]

I feel I should clarify I’m just working on the pretense that races are in 3.x and mostly hewing to that format.

I totally agree with ogre that a much more enjoyable solution is a massive overhaul wherein human like races are pretty much just humans. And other races are much more different. If you have elves make them plant people. If you want dwarves make them stone lizards. Halflings can be monkey people with tails. Orcs are actually fungus men who need dead tree people to propagate. Etc. that’s pretty much what I did for my stalled heartbreaker years ago. That and no attribute modifiers. Just tags for stuff like hulking strength, aquatic, hide in plain sight, flight, multiple appendages, etc.

[Mask_De_H]

I never really hewed to the "other races must be super different" thing, since they all need to be sapient bipedal humanoids (or able to manipulate things as a sapient bipedal humanoid can) anyway. Feels like extra makeup on a rubber forehead alien to me.

[Almaz]

I never really hewed to the "other races must be super different" thing, since they all need to be sapient bipedal humanoids (or able to manipulate things as a sapient bipedal humanoid can) anyway. Feels like extra makeup on a rubber forehead alien to me.

Why?

Sapient, sure, but that doesn't even mean they have to have a particularly human intelligence. Not saying that it would necessarily be a good role-playing opportunity but we regularly ask DMs to model beings with somewhat alien desires or ways of thinking. And they need one limb, but there's no reason they have to be bipedal, although it might create extra work in the rules to think through the implications of having a person with more limbs.

What I'm saying is that an uplifted octopus is a perfectly viable character.

[brized]

Eclipse Phase had seemingly more varied race/body options:

Anyone have experience with that?

[Bihlbo]

Races are 100% setting material. Which races your game has should be determined solely by the setting. My preference is for D&D to not have a built-in setting, and to treat races as an optional rule you can use if your setting demands it. Every character starts with a feat and X hit points, unless you're using the optional race rules, then characters start with what the race gets.

But I do like that your race is basically your starting package. I played one game where everyone starts with something very similar to a racial level with hit points and everything, then advanced as a class to be considered a fully level 1 "adventurer". I thought that worked very well, and it allowed lowbie characters to have enough hit points to survive a housecat attack, and set them apart from dirt farmers.

The actual power level of your racial bits is also setting information. In Fantasy Flight's Midnight setting for instance, an Erenlander gets more than a human does in 3.5, along with an "heroic path" ability that's comparable to a class ability, before ever selecting a class. But everything else in the world is so stacked against you that in this setting you need to start at a high power level. Midnight's system would be just stupid in something like Eberron where it's assumed that you can have a weapon without being arrested, and you can eventually trick yourself out with magic items.

But if D&D absolutely MUST have Tolkein's folk boiled in, along with whatever anthropomorphic that's most popular with the damn furries, I'd say keep it really simple and let race have more to do with role-playing choices than stats. I don't want everyone who plays a warlock to think, "Dragonborn is the best choice, and here's a list of no-go races." Each race should have something they can contribute to each build. Unfortunately I think that means no ability score modifiers, because as much as I agree with "if the halfling is stronger than the ogre, you messed up" is true, "You're an idiot if you don't pick a race that boosts your primary ability score" is true in 3.5 as well.

[Mask_De_H]

I never really hewed to the "other races must be super different" thing, since they all need to be sapient bipedal humanoids (or able to manipulate things as a sapient bipedal humanoid can) anyway. Feels like extra makeup on a rubber forehead alien to me.

Why?

Sapient, sure, but that doesn't even mean they have to have a particularly human intelligence. Not saying that it would necessarily be a good role-playing opportunity but we regularly ask DMs to model beings with somewhat alien desires or ways of thinking. And they need one limb, but there's no reason they have to be bipedal, although it might create extra work in the rules to think through the implications of having a person with more limbs.

What I'm saying is that an uplifted octopus is a perfectly viable character.

If they can use stairs (or bypass them) and manipulate tools built for bipeds with opposable thumbs, fine. It pushes hard on the "I wanna be a spaceman in fantasy Sengoku Japan" uniqueness through contrariness button in my head, but if they can work with the world, fuck it.

[Almaz]

Oh, I see.

I always interpret D&D as intended to be primarily Weird Fiction rather than "medieval fantasy" unless overly specified otherwise because there are in fact spacemen in our fantasy "Oriental Adventures" (e.g. illithids in the Underdark), so just embracing "sure, you can play a squid now" feels natural to me rather than unnatural.

[Aryxbez]

1.)How much is too much? How many abilities should a race have?

2.) Is it okay to have level 1 thri-kreens running around with 4 attacks at level 1?

3.) Is it okay to have things with wings that can fly at first level?

4.) Should a race modify stats? Should you pick your stat bonuses? Should there even be one at that point?

5.) How many races do you need to cover most of what people want? Should there be a racesplosion or a few races?

6.) Should humans really just be a feat and skill points?

7.) If you were designing your perfect race package for a 3.X variant what would you want it to look like?

1.) 2-3 abilities I would guess, mostly Low level Utility spell equivalents, or spells that are minor despite their level.

2.) Maybe not out of the gate, similar with a Large 1st lv race, find some way to kinda limit it in the beginning but quickly advance to where it can. Ogre could be a level minimum, Multi-arms can be mostly utility in nature till they've "trained" it well enough to use it for multi-atks efficient enough (alternatively, they do have 4 attacks but at such high penalties it's discouraged to do so, but I'd rather avoid the trap option)

3.) Like the above basically, Flight itself specifically has been solved awhile back with the notion that it should scale with level. At first you glide, or maybe you can fly but takes up your action to do so, later on when it's level appropriate you can just fly.

4.) I don't think races should have stats at all, but if it's expected, then just have PC's pick their stats. At worst, you can note "typical stats" for X Race (So +2/-2 situation, Dwarves typically strong/sturdy so Str or Con, and then Dex or Cha for their slow/gruffness).

5.) Let's see, I feel like you want "build a furry beastmen that has 3 or so archtypes small/med/big" so can have your flavors of Beastmen (I know Frank Trollman said this wouldn't be enough, but it is a conversation I've been wanting to find again and partake in it) and that could cover Lizardman, catfolk, Minotaur. Then you also want your Midget Race or two (Goblin, Dwarf?), Human that maybe also lets you choose to be Half Demon/Fey/Angel/Dragonborn/etc, Elf (If need be, like furry simulator has some minor options to build your flavor of the elf rainbow), Smashy-race like Orc or half-giant, Centaur, Biiiiiiiiiiird MAN! (unless furry simulator got this race), Bugman, Golem, and....I think that about covers it?

6.) Maybe in a way, A special feat you can spend on special racial trait as I mentioned in #5 to become different sub-type/half-breed, or just on something else, maybe get both a racial feat and bonus feat, and the former ye can spend on some kind of "heroic-surge" for human persistence if ye don't want to be some flavor of phlebtonium.

7.) It would give a +2 to stat of choice, maybe +2/+2, You get a racial feat, 2-3 skill bonuses, and ideally a couple minor abilities, and racial feat might cover this in part. Ideally wouldn't matter what race you chose, and all would feel a little bit different.


Otherwise, I like what OgreBattle was saying, and I can agree with almaz on D&D = Weird Fiction. Most Fantasy settings after awhile seem to get into sci-fi anyway, so there's nothing wrong with slamming down aliens.

[OgreBattle]

It pushes hard on the "I wanna be a spaceman in fantasy Sengoku Japan" uniqueness through contrariness button in my head, but if they can work with the world, fuck it.

Check out Tenra War, it's a parallel universe to Tenra Bansho Zero where there's a continent of super science Americans that war with the magitech Buddhists.