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Domigorgon
2009-08-24, 03:01 PM
This is a brainstorming thing. Which races other than the core ones would you consider well-suited to the core classes? With, say, up to +4 level adjustment, monsters and outsiders included.

You may also recommend some other combinations with exotic classes; i.e. I find the githzerai well-suited for ninjas, with their Dex and Wis bonuses and appropriate backstory.

I'm sort of bored by humans, dwarves, elves, etc.

Sstoopidtallkid
2009-08-24, 04:29 PM
Kobolds do it better. Also, almost all of the Eberron races are awesome, though the Kalashtar require Psionics.

ColdSepp
2009-08-24, 04:30 PM
Goliaths are a favorite of mine. Races of Stone.

deuxhero
2009-08-24, 04:56 PM
I heard steel dragons make a decent gish.

Gnaeus
2009-08-24, 05:09 PM
Pixies make good rogues and sorcerers.
Marrulurk (Sandstorm) make awesome rogues/assassins/roguelike classes
Ghosts can be good in some caster builds, because they are so hard to kill (ecl +5 tho).
It isn't exactly optimized, but I played a half dragon, half ogre chain tripper that was a blast to play. Half ogre is ok in a lot of trip builds. (Races of Destiny)
Necropolitans are a good choice for wizards and sorcs, especially in point buy games where you can tank your Con. (Libris Mortis)
In those rare games where armor class rules, lizardmen can be fun when combined with any class that gets good hp and wears heavy armor.
Gravetouched Ghoul is also good with many builds. It gets huge stat bonuses and good special abilities for 2 ecl. I had a Sorcerer Monk GTG with Ascetic Mage who walked around with a 40 touch AC. (Libris Mortis)

Stormlock
2009-08-24, 06:23 PM
Air mephlings get a Fly (10', perfect) speed and only +1 LA, which is pretty damned nice. 10 isn't exactly going to get you anywhere in a hurry (unless maybe you're a monk) but simply having the option to fly 10 feet straight up and hover there raining death is a pretty damned nice option for almost any class. Especially if your DM remembers that you can't hover with average maneuverability granted by overland flight or half dragon/fiend wings :smalltongue:

BenTheJester
2009-08-24, 07:45 PM
Thri-Kreen Warblade/Disciple of Dispater wielding 3 kukris and the Tiger Fang Weapon of Legacy.

That's like 10 crits every round. and infinite jump.

Signmaker
2009-08-24, 07:52 PM
I like Thri-Keens item pitchers. Particularly bards. Dragonfire is a beautiful thing.

Ghostwalk Ghosts make amusing Spring Attackers, Sorcerers, Monks, etc. They have an annoying set of rules to compensate for their LA0 template though.

Kobolds are kobolds. You don't diss them, for they will kill you.

woodenbandman
2009-08-24, 07:59 PM
Buomman Bard.

Beat that.

Signmaker
2009-08-24, 08:03 PM
Buomman Bard.

Beat that.

Buomman Truenamer. *inspects cuticles*

The Witch-King
2009-08-24, 10:17 PM
This is a brainstorming thing. Which races other than the core ones would you consider well-suited to the core classes? With, say, up to +4 level adjustment, monsters and outsiders included.

You may also recommend some other combinations with exotic classes; i.e. I find the githzerai well-suited for ninjas, with their Dex and Wis bonuses and appropriate backstory.

I'm sort of bored by humans, dwarves, elves, etc.

Okay--I'm bored with humans, dwarves, elves, etc. too. So I suppose my first thought is: why not be open-minded? Why are you excluding monsters and outsiders? If you're excluding creatures that don't have arms and hands and opposable thumbs--then I'm on the same page with you. I'm not if we're talking about monstrous humanoids. And outsiders? If they aren't too powerful, why not include them too? Unless of course you're concerned about players literally getting banished from the game. Cause, you know--I get that.

My second thought--and I'm not trying to subvert your intent here--is: what races WOULDN'T go well with the core races? I'm asking that as a legitimate question because my first answer to your question was less "what do I think would complement the other races" and much more "hey--what weird races do I like that I haven't seen as PCs before." I guess I'm wondering what the criteria are here--if there was something that excluded a race from being a good race to pair up with other PC races, it might help define what attributes a new PC race should possess.

My third thought is--if you REALLY want to shake things up--turn the elves, dwarves, gnomes and halflings into monsters. Make the elves aloof forest-dwelling xenophobes who don't tolerate trespassing into their woods. Make the dwarves greedy gold-miners who love powerful magic items and lust for tall women. Turn the gnomes into resentful warlocks who've turned to evil magics because they're afraid of physical confrontations with creatures two and three times their size. And just pitch the halflings into a black hole--cause I can't do anything with that. I mean, you could make them vicious pygmies but that always just struck me as silly. Well, okay--you could turn their tropes on their head--replace them with a race of seven or eight foot tall guys with the same culture. A bunch of heavily muscled eight foot tall humanoids (who aren't too bright) who love nothing more than drinking and dancing and having a good time--and people are forever bothering them to become bodyguards and mercenaries just because they're huge. And if you wind up on the outs with the rest of the community and have to leave the village and take one of those bodyguard/mercenary jobs--it may be against your peaceful nature--but an eight full tall cyclops still has to eat, right?

HCL
2009-08-24, 10:33 PM
I would definitely consider the Raptoran (Races of the Wild) to be a tier 1 race. Flight is good for EVERYONE. Melee characters can enjoy making double damage on flying charges with a piercing weapon (*cough* spiked chain *cough*). Arcane casters can skip those fly spells and spend their spell slots and actions summoning air elementals and pwning people with Thunderclap at +1 caster level. Divine casters (consider the divine bard variant) can go into Skypledged and get (limited) spontaneous access to all of the druid and cleric. Definitely my new favorite race.

Wings of Peace
2009-08-24, 10:34 PM
Kenku especially mixed with Binder or Totemist for natural attacking insanity would be fun and cheap at +0 LA

Domigorgon
2009-08-25, 08:45 AM
@Witchking: I did say INCLUDE outsiders and monsters, not EXCLUDE. You misread.

Also, I am not the Dungeon Master here to change the races, I just want to try out legitimate new combinations with existing possibilities.

You also seem to have a typo there, "what races WOULDN'T go well with the core races", you must mean CLASSES. And, well, isn't it obvious? A race with a penalty on Charisma wouldn't do much good as a bard, now would it.

kamikasei
2009-08-25, 08:57 AM
Elans and Changelings all the way.

Cieyrin
2009-08-25, 11:07 AM
A race with a penalty on Charisma wouldn't do much good as a bard, now would it.

I don't know, I find Minotaur Bards amusing, personally.

For my choices of races, I like Orogs for gish builds or just kicking ass, Shadar-kai are fun for a dash of stealth in whatever and I <3 Thri-Kreen. Red Caps have interesting advancement rules to exploit, if you can get over advancing as a fey to smash things up something fierce (gotta love a small race with Powerful Build :smallbiggrin:) and the Urdunir are the one race no one will ever let me play.:smallfrown:

Sstoopidtallkid
2009-08-25, 04:26 PM
I have often tossed around the idea of a Bard with 3 Cha, focusing on the songs rather than casting. Could work well, but no sane group would allow it.

Domigorgon
2009-08-25, 05:18 PM
Well, naturally, if it were a Discworld campaign, I might be tempted to play a 120-year-old human barbarian with a STR 6 and no teeth.

But I'm not. And I like my characters to be believable.

Cieyrin
2009-08-25, 08:26 PM
Well, naturally, if it were a Discworld campaign, I might be tempted to play a 120-year-old human barbarian with a STR 6 and no teeth.

But I'm not. And I like my characters to be believable.

I've clearly read little, if any at all, Discworld, but what is your barbarian doing trying to bite people? You grab the biggest weapon you can find and introduce people to the sharp end. Simple.

Sure, he rages to get his strength to get positive bonuses (I hope he's high enough level by that age to get at least Greater Rage, otherwise he would probably be better off retiring and beating on the other retired characters in the retirement community) and if he's got Mighty Rage, he can actually use Power Attack that he used in his more spry days.

Domigorgon
2009-08-26, 06:27 AM
It was a reference to an actual character, Cohen the Barbarian. :)

Irreverent Fool
2009-08-26, 06:38 AM
It was a reference to an actual character, Cohen the Barbarian. :)

6 STR? Are you suggesting that his din-chewers gave an enhancement bonus to strength?

obnoxious
sig

Thajocoth
2009-08-26, 07:12 AM
Xvart. They're small and blue. They're from Dragon 339... The place I originally found them listed them as -2 LA, but looking up the actual Dragon mag to write this post, they're 0 LA...

Errant_Polearm
2009-08-26, 09:38 AM
Elans and Changelings all the way.

Yes. Especially if you can get the Phrenic template (though it takes a little rule-bending with Elans, since they're already psionic). I'm not sure it could be called strong, but it can be effective and it's a whole lotta fun.

kamikasei
2009-08-26, 09:44 AM
Yes. Especially if you can get the Phrenic template (though it takes a little rule-bending with Elans, since they're already psionic). I'm not sure it could be called strong, but it can be effective and it's a whole lotta fun.

Never mind strength, though neither are weak. They're just cool. (Though any player at my table trying to take phrenic with their class levels counting as hit die for the template's purposes would be angling for an XPH upside the head. And since I use the SRD for my psionics, in practice that means I bean them with my laptop. Not pretty.)

wadledo
2009-08-26, 10:08 AM
Never mind strength, though neither are weak. They're just cool. (Though any player at my table trying to take phrenic with their class levels counting as hit die for the template's purposes would be angling for an XPH upside the head. And since I use the SRD for my psionics, in practice that means I bean them with my laptop. Not pretty.)

I can only assume your referring to the PR and Psi-like abilities?
Because class levels are HD when referring to template abilities like that.
Because otherwise it isn't worth it for +2 LA.

kamikasei
2009-08-26, 10:37 AM
I'm referring to the template as a whole. I would only apply it to racial hit die. Given the comment in the entry, that seems a reasonable interpretation of its intent.

It's not that I think it's too grossly overpowered - it's just pretty clearly supposed to be for monsters, not characters advancing by class.

wadledo
2009-08-26, 10:41 AM
.....So half-Fiends and half-celestials don't get their spell-like abilities?:smallconfused:

Kroy
2009-08-26, 10:48 AM
Goliathe, Raptorans, Kobolds, and PlaneTouched (Aasmir Gensai and Tieflings)

kamikasei
2009-08-26, 10:48 AM
Since my objection to the use of Phrenic for an otherwise normal character is that it's specifically supposed to be for monsters rather than for characters who progress by character class, and since Half-Fiend and so on do not have that problem, I do in fact let them use their class levels for their HD calculations. Again, it's not a matter simply of power or of strict RAW, but of what I see as the fairly clear intent of the template. No one should be a Phrenic <Class>, they should be a <Class>/Psion.

wadledo
2009-08-26, 10:51 AM
So it's a fluff thing.

kamikasei
2009-08-26, 10:54 AM
No, it's an intent of the rules thing. It's also partly a power thing, as Phrenic is quite cheap if you're getting all those abilities on top of class, rather than racial, hit die.

wadledo
2009-08-26, 10:59 AM
But then wouldn't the intent of the rules for Half-fiend/celestial be that it's only works with racial HD?:smallconfused:

kamikasei
2009-08-26, 11:13 AM
No, as I've already explained.


Monsters who naturally possess psionic ability are not found as phrenic creatures. Phrenic creatures are freaks among their kind, otherwise normal creatures whose minds are more powerful than those of their fellows. Similarly, creatures who advance by character class are usually not phrenic creatures—they simply take levels in a psionic class to hone their mental powers.

To me, this seems a clear statement that the intent of the template is to boost monsters, not characters. Though LA is provided, it seems reasonable to me that if a character wants to gain the hit-die related benefits of the template, they should do so only for the hit die that actually make them monstrous. I do not claim that this is RAW.

Half-Fiend and so on contain no such statements.

wadledo
2009-08-26, 11:26 AM
So it's a fluff thing.
Seeing as it says usually.........

kamikasei
2009-08-26, 11:30 AM
Since this has long since ceased to have any relevance to the thread, yes, by all means chalk it up as "a fluff thing" and let's just drop the whole pointless issue.

wadledo
2009-08-26, 11:37 AM
No issue is pointless!:smalltongue:

But yes, your particular house rules don't have anything to do with the thread, sorry.

Neraph Swift Hunter build.
An outsider with +2 NA, a few random skill bonuses, and a cool first attack feature (no dex to AC on the first charge or thrown attack per enemy in an encounter).

arguskos
2009-08-26, 11:41 AM
No issue is pointless!:smalltongue:

But yes, your particular house rules don't have anything to do with the thread, sorry.

Neraph Swift Hunter build.
An outsider with +2 NA, a few random skill bonuses, and a cool first attack feature (no dex to AC on the first charge or thrown attack per enemy in an encounter).
Neraph are frikkin' AWESOME. I approve of this idea. I actually played a Neraph Monk/Fist of Zuoken once. He had spent much of his life in a githzerai monastery, and so trained in their styles. He was hilariously fun, especially when we actually journeyed to Limbo, and he got to fight in his native subjective gravity. That was awesome, because he'd flurry as he flew past people and stuff. *sigh* Neraphs are so much fun.

Zaq
2009-08-26, 03:23 PM
Buomman Truenamer. *inspects cuticles*

My Truenamer speaks Buomman. Does that count?

Signmaker
2009-08-26, 06:43 PM
My Truenamer speaks Buomman. Does that count?

I suppose, but he wouldn't have many people to talk to.