Shabak - An Ethnic Minority in Power. Racial Mechanical Input please.

[PotatoNinja]

I would like to request information Regarding the potential LA associated with a race of humanoids who gain the following traits. There is no fluff for this, because i don't want to type up all my hand written notes. But, if there's enough interest in this ethnic minority, i'll post fluff.

Shabak can reroll any one dice roll 1/day
Shabak Gain a +1 to all saves

The above two i'm not exactly to worried about, both are pretty minor things, i would put them at +0 personally. WHat i'm really here for is, this stuff below.

Shabak can pick any two clerical domains of the following list and use them as if their CL was their hit die:

Fate
Luck
Meditation
Nobility
Time

These are the core domains, i plan to add several lesser domains to add versatility and flavor.

[jojolagger]

Shabak can pick any two clerical domains of the following list and use them as if their CL was their hit die:

Use them how? Just domain Powers?The spells 1/day? At will? That really is what will make the difference.

[PotatoNinja]

Ah, you're completely right, thank you for pointing out my oversight.


They will get thedomain powers, and the spells listed.

They will become 1/day SLA for the characters, obtained at the same level a cleric would normally obtain that specific level of spells. They're not intended to become at will abilities :smallredface:

[jojolagger]

Ah, you're completely right, thank you for pointing out my oversight.


They will get thedomain powers, and the spells listed.

They will become 1/day SLA for the characters, obtained at the same level a cleric would normally obtain that specific level of spells. They're not intended to become at will abilities :smallredface:

In that case, I'd say to give them a bit more bonuses and make them +4. So they can't get Miracle as a SLA, negating the xp cost and getting 25000 gp worth of savings daily. The stuff they have now might put them at about +2, but free miracles are bad.

[PotatoNinja]

What kind of bonuses would you sggest to use to make it a solid 4? I'm interested in input and ideas :)

[Morph Bark]

Could you give at least a summary of the fluff? It's otherwise hard to see the connection between fluff and crunch (which make for the best homebrew) and see why it is "an ethnic minority in power".

I'm not even sure what you mean by that. :smallconfused:

[PotatoNinja]

Ahhhhh, the part i loath to post, only because it's rather large, and i havn't hammered out all the finer details. I'll post as brief a summary i can to give the best view of these people possible.

Many centuries ago (Around 1,500 years in game) the great Rizymore Empire was allied with a coalition of Dwarves, Halflings, and a myriad of other races in opposition to a ruling elite of Elves. Said Elves used magic to enslaves most of the other races on a wide scale. Rizymore, a vast and far flung Human Empire, was the last kingdom not under the heel of the elves, and was a bastion for hope and prosperity against oppression and control. In secret, they produced the first psions. Before the tide of the war could be swayed, the first Psion, a man named Azgar, saught revenge on the Rizymore empire for the hell he endured becoming a psion, the process was not easy, and he was forced to slaughter his own family to satisfy his handlers. In his fury, he decimated the world, and stole all magic from it, placing it in another dimension and leveling large pieces the continent Rizymore was apart of in a massive explosion of raw power.

The Shabak are a sort of genetic defect that showed up several hundred years after the explosion, in a time when society was rebuilding itself and looked to regain the knowledge of the lost empire. Geographically, the Shabak were a group of Nomads who lived just on the fringe zone of destruction wraught by the explosion of Rizymore. They could be called the first survivors, and the fact that they survived should not allude to an easy survival.

Over time, some time, perhaps another few centuaries, after the first abnormalities showed up, The Shabak began to show these defect in all babies born, and it gave them a stronger sense of identity.

The defects are the domains, small granted powers. In terms of modern day equivalents to cultural cohesion, i modeled them heavily off the Muslim world around the time of the Umayyad Caliphate and beyond. They are all ethnically similar, all share a common heritage, and all consider themselves nobility because of their genetic inheritance.

THey also share common religious beliefs, and the main theme of their existence has been(in the early days) as diviners of the future. While kingdoms came and went, the Shabak were used by those in power, in a world with almost no magic, to gain the upper hand. The worship of Azgar was to a false deity, as he is not a deity, just a powerful figure in history, but they justified their power as such.

Over time, the ideas and themes of Nobility, Fate, Luck, Time, and meditation became central tenets of faith, and their numbers began to grow at a rapid pace. They increasingly were able to find themselves in positions of power thanks to their inherent abilities.

In Yulova, a country of slavery and harsh Hobbsian lives, the Shabak favor Nobility and fate. Across the mighty Shijirikal River to the south east, in the country of Ardino, the Shabak prefer the domains of Luck and Time. These spring primarily from religious ideological differences.

While the Shabak are one people, they do not always see eye to eye. They never have managed to obtain positions of a kingship because of these divisions over the course of 600 some years, there never was the cohesion necessary to form a Shabak Caliphate to speak of, not that they haven' tried.

Most SHabak (the majority of them infact) are at least minor Nobility in Yulova and Ardino. The populations of both countries though, dwarfs the actual numbers of Shabak and limits their ability to band together over a large distance,. In this respect they resemble Kurds. Despite this inability to band together, they do have many people in key positions that can influence very heavily politics in the regions. When a commoner hears Shabak, they know these people wield power inherently from within, but also from a social position.

Edited. Magic has since come back, but it's only a trickle, and it's only been 8 months. I plan to keep it at mid level magic in this area. Most people are still adjusting to magic, and using it is some what dangerous.

[Anton Spohn]

Depends on the power level of your campaign. If there's a good chance that your characters will die in every fight i think that +1 is fine. +1 would also be fine if every major monster/emeny possess magic of similar stature for the appropriate chellenge rating.

In any other if you remove the possibility of Wish/Miracle or restrict their use then it would be most likely +2 or +3. Most Races don't have scaling powers of this magnitude. It makes them much more powerful than many races and it depends on how rare they are.

In a campaign where magic is rare it puts them among Archamges and Highpriests at highlevels. I would suggest in this setting a +4 LA.

[PotatoNinja]

I think i might caveat the WIsh/Miracles to require the same EXP Cost and penalties as the spell being cast. The world is heading towards a moderate Magic world with only mid levels of optimization allowed. Because of the mid level optimization expected by players, it does downplay a little of the power creep i feel.

I'm thinking of pegging it at a +2 for now. Although, more input is always welcome.