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Dazaras
2012-04-07, 07:47 PM
I'm planning on running a Pathfinder campaign in the near future set in Eberron. In my eyes this requires, at minimum, converting Warforged and the Artificer class. Artificers require minimal conversion, but I thought I would take the opportunity to fix some things I didn't like about the 3.5 Warforged.

In particular, I toned down the construct immunities in exchange for full effects from healing spells. In my experience, either the party finds a way around the healing penalty (usually wands of repair light wounds), in which case the construct immunities are too strong, or they waste tons of resources on it, in which case the construct immunities are not enough. I also had problems with the warforged plating being inferior to normal armor for many builds, especially at higher levels when other characters can replace their armor with adamantine and mithril versions (Warforged have to spend a feat at level 1 to get those, and even then it's kind of restrictive). Rather than get rid of the armor, I played it up and tried to make it generally as good as masterwork armor of the same weight category.

Is it balanced?

Warforged:
• Ability adjustments: +2 constitution, +2 intelligence, -2 charisma.
Warforged are tough and analytical, but are unlikely to be outspoken or have particularly forceful personalities and sometimes come off as aloof or unsociable.
• Size: medium
• Speed: 30 ft
• Composite Plating: +3 armor bonus, no max dex, no check penalty, 15% spell failure, counts as light armor. The warforged is automatically proficient with this armor. This armor can be enchanted, but the warforged must be present the entire time (or enchant himself). The warforged cannot wear other armor or a robe or benefit from any magic item that takes the same body slot.
• Stability: Warforged receive a +2 racial bonus to their Combat Maneuver Defense when resisting a bull rush or trip attempt while standing on the ground.
• Slam: a Warforged deals 1d6 points of lethal damage with an unarmed strike.
• Intuitive Crafter: Craft is always a class skill for warforged. They gain a +2 bonus to a craft skill of their choice.
• Living Construct: Warforged are constructs, but they are very much like living creatures. In place of the normal construct traits, warforged receive the following traits:
o Immune to poison, disease, nausea, exhaustion and sickened conditions.
o Cannot heal naturally, but can repair damage equal to craft check with 8 hours of work.
o Can be affected by spells that target constructs (such as repair spells) in addition to spells that target living creatures (such as cure spells). Note that spells that affect objects still do not affect warforged, but they can affect the warforged plating as if it were armor.
o Not subject to damage caused by the disabled or dying conditions, or bleed effects.
o Does not need to eat, sleep or breathe, but can do so to benefit from magic or consumables such as potions or a heroes’ feast spell.

Racial Feats:
Adamantine Body
Prerequisites: Warforged, 1st level only, Composite Plating ability, Proficiency with heavy armor
Effects: Armor bonus increases to +9 and grants DR 1/adamantine. +1 max dex, -5 check penalty, 35% spell failure. Counts as heavy armor and slows you down as such. DR increases by 1 at level 5 and every 5 levels thereafter (max DR 5/adamantine at level 20).

Improved Damage Reduction
Prerequisites: Warforged , Composite Plating ability
Effects: You gain DR 1/adamantine or improve existing DR by 1. If you have the Adamantine Body feat, this feat can be selected multiple times.

Ironwood Body
Prerequisites: Warforged, 1st level only, Composite Plating ability, Proficiency with medium armor
Effects: Armor bonus increases to +6. +3 max dex, -3 armor check penalty, 25% spell failure. Counts as medium armor. Retain armor bonus when using the Wild Shape ability as if it were armor with the Wild special ability. This plating does not contain metal, and does not interfere with a Druid's spellcasting.

Mithril Body
Prerequisites: Warforged, 1st level only, Composite Plating ability, Proficiency with medium armor
Effects: Armor bonus increases to +6. +5 max dex, no check penalty, 15% spell failure. Still counts as light armor. Armor bonus increases by 1 at 6th level and every 6 levels thereafter (max +9 AC at level 18).

Mithril Fluidity
Prerequisites: Warforged, Mithril Body
Effects: Increase max dex by 2.


Alternative Racial Traits:
Unarmored Body: This warforged was made without armor. He can wear armor and robes like characters of other races. In addition, when not wearing armor he gains a +1 dodge bonus to AC. This ability replaces the warforged Composite Plating ability.

Heavy Plating: This warforged has plating that is thicker than normal. It grants a +4 armor bonus to AC, but has a max dex of +4, a check penalty of -1 and spell failure of 20%. This ability replaces the warforged Composite Plating ability.

Free Spirit: Some warforged benefited more than others from the liberation of their race. Some warforged get a -2 penalty to wisdom instead of a -2 penalty to charisma. These warforged are often obstinate in the face of authority, and refuse to obey any order blindly now that they have a choice in the matter. These warforged are ideally suited to be Paladins, Sorcerers, Oracles or other classes that benefit from the force of personality that warforged usually lack.


Favored Class Bonuses:
Artificer: +1 bonus on UMD checks for items with which you have the appropriate item creation feat.
Barbarian: +1/6 to the barbarian’s Damage Reduction
Fighter: +1 on all the checks the Endurance feat gives you a bonus on. If you pick this option four times, you count as having the Endurance feat for the purposes of meeting prerequisites.
Monk: +1/2 to the monk’s CMD when resisting bull rush and trip attempts and +1/2 to the number of stunning attacks he can attempt per day.
Paladin: +1 to paladin’s energy resistance to one kind of energy (max +10). Stacks with any other resistance

grarrrg
2012-04-07, 08:58 PM
Seems a little on the strong side.

(in no particular order)
Automatic choice if going Barbarian.

I know that most PF player races have a net +2 to stats, this looks like one of those cases where a net +0 stats (or even a -2) would be appropriate.

There is little in the way of 'downside' to balance out all the bonuses/Immunities. No Natural Healing balances out with the Craft Check. Leaving the only penalty having to spend a feat if you want to change your armor (and the -2 Cha, but Cha is the ever popular DUMP STAT).


There is a 3rd party Artificer (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/3rd-party-classes/adamant-entertainment/artificer) for Pathfinder, between that and the 3.5 Artificer you have a good baseline.

Dazaras
2012-04-08, 10:48 AM
What makes it an automatic choice for a Barbarian? Is the barbarian favored class bonus that strong?

I've been balancing it against a Dwarf, which seems like the obvious comparison point. A Warforged fighter or barbarian would generally have higher AC plus the immunities, compared to a Dwarf's bonus to saves and darkvision plus miscellaneous bonuses. Warforged are also a faster when not wearing medium or heavy armor.

TekHed
2012-04-19, 01:37 AM
It's automatic for Barbarian because Warforged are immune to being fatigued after a rage....but that is true in normal 3.5 anyway so I don't see it as a problem. On the other hand your version here is more powerful than the regular 3.5 version.

Person_Man
2012-04-19, 08:21 AM
I would say that this race is slightly stronger then the RAW Warforged, and that the RAW Warforged is itself an extremely strong race. You get:

Con and Int bonus, with the penalty to the most dump-able stat.
+1 attack (Slam) when you make a full attack action. Power Attack applies.
Immune to 7 conditions (poison, disease, nausea, exhaustion sickened, starvation, inhaled effects). Each one of these is basically equivalent to a low-mid level class ability or a Feat.
Will never be ambushed while sleeping.
Strong alternate Favored Class abilities.
Couple of minor CMD and Skill bonuses.


Now, I don't particularly have a problem with very strong or weak homebrew. But if I was your DM, I would want the other players to have access to equally strong races.

Cieyrin
2012-04-20, 11:43 AM
Minor nitpick on my part but why was the armor bonus and arcane spell failure increased on standard Warforged Plating? Only medium and heavy armor increased their armor bonus between 3.5 and PF and since it's considered light armor, I see no reason they needed it. You also force any arcane caster to take Unarmored Body if they can't normally cast in Light Armor with that 15% spell failure. 5% is overcomeable with Arcane Armor Training but can be equated as rolling a nat 1 on d20 rolls, which is not a bygone conclusion for a Warforged Wizard to not chance for free armor.

Leaving it as the original also adds value to the Heavy Plating ART, which I would perhaps strengthen to being equivalent to Scalemail, with all the perks and negatives that entails.

To bring them more in line with other races, I'd make all Warforged Free-Spirited, I.E. +2 Con, +2 Int, -2 Wis, which gives them a severe weakness and also doesn't hamper being an Artificer. I'd probably bring the half-healing thing back, as while it's a chore, it's extra cost to deal with for deciding to play a robot in a fantasypunk game.

7RED7
2012-04-20, 01:56 PM
@Person_man: I don't believe that provides the Warforged with an additional Slam attack. The wording uses Slam as the name for the ability, but simply has the benefit of dealing 1d6 lethal damage when you make an unarmed strike. Unless that is Dazaras' intent, in which case it might benefit from some rewording. As written you'd have to make the unarmed strike as your attack to gain the benefit. It is not clear as to whether or not the 1d6 lethal is in addition to the non-lethal damage, or if it simply replaces the standard damage die and type with '1d6 lethal'.

Meh, on being overpowered. Your buddy is just going to play a pretty standard (better) human wizard anyway.

silphael
2012-04-20, 02:57 PM
The free spirit variant race feels more like a +2 wis, maybe without the +2 int. Your description seems like they have a strong will and a strong sense of introspection. If you want to keep the cha bonus, maybe add that they automatically profit from the strength of personnality feat.

Dazaras
2012-04-24, 06:53 PM
@TekHed: Immunity to fatigue was the first thing I threw out since it's so clearly broken for a pathfinder barbarian. This is why I am confused as to why they're an automatic choice for a barbarian.

@Person_Man: All races were improved from 3.5 to pathfinder, some more than others. I think the ability score bonuses are in line with the other races, particularly Dwarves (who I mentioned I've been balancing against). They don't get an extra attack on a full attack, they just deal more damage with unarmed strikes.
As for the immunities, yes I think they may be a bit strong but I already cut all the ones I could envision warforged without. The only ones that come up frequently in my experience are poison, nausea and sickened. I didn't say this explicitly, but I imagine warforged would be susceptible to some effects that other races are not, such as the rusting grasp spell. I think this balances them out well enough that I wouldn't pick them over some other race I wanted for flavor reasons, which is good enough for me.
Favored class abilities are something I could mess around with, do you have any suggestions?

@Cieyrin: As I said above, one of my main goals in updating the warforged was to fix the fact that their plating was inherently inferior to regular armor for some builds. +2 armor bonus to AC is NOT a fair trade for the ability to wear regular armor. I think a +3 armor bonus to AC is good enough. As for the spell failure, I was unfamiliar with the Arcane Armor Training feat, and I think I'll lower the spell failure back to 10%. I had increased it so the armor would be comparable to masterwork studded leather, but I don't think it's that important. Thanks.
I really, really don't want to bring the half-healing effect back. I don't want a drawback that is mostly a drawback because of the hassle it imposes on the player rather than the mechanics themselves. I'll reconsider the wisdom penalty, I had a reason for the charisma penalty but I've forgotten what it was.

@7RED7: I follow the gaming philosophy that the only real imbalance is the imbalance that prevents people from having fun. That said, I'd like to make my warforged as close to the other races as possible, to prevent temptation to pick them for mechanical reasons over a race someone might otherwise want for flavor reasons.

@silphael: I don't really understand what you're saying. Are you saying the flavor text sounds wrong? I could not find the Strength of Personality feat in pathfinder, are you sure that's what you meant?

Cieyrin
2012-04-24, 07:54 PM
I think Force of Personality was meant, which is from 3.5's Complete Adventurer, which applies Charisma to mind-affecting Will saves.

toapat
2012-04-24, 08:08 PM
WF, while not having an Int penalty in 3.5, were not supposed to be well versed in anything other then war and self maintenance.

Warforged are very, very minimally made of metal. Most of their body is made of Rope and Wood, with a few gems on their inner structure and copper wire acting as nerves, while mithral doesnt rust (at least in a way that is detrimental to the integrity of the material). Only adamantine Plating should grant vulnerability to metal effecting spells, considering that Adamantine plating replaces the normally carved wood skeleton with an iron one to support the heavy armored plating.

asto the problem with WF armor: Why not just give them a feat slot for it, and make it required to take one of the 4 armors.

Dazaras
2012-04-24, 11:38 PM
WF, while not having an Int penalty in 3.5, were not supposed to be well versed in anything other then war and self maintenance.

Warforged are very, very minimally made of metal. Most of their body is made of Rope and Wood, with a few gems on their inner structure and copper wire acting as nerves, while mithral doesnt rust (at least in a way that is detrimental to the integrity of the material). Only adamantine Plating should grant vulnerability to metal effecting spells, considering that Adamantine plating replaces the normally carved wood skeleton with an iron one to support the heavy armored plating.

asto the problem with WF armor: Why not just give them a feat slot for it, and make it required to take one of the 4 armors.

I'm not really sure where you're getting any of that from. Warforged are unsociable and indecisive, but they excel at strategy, tactics and improvisation, especially on the battlefield. According to the campaign guide, warforged are made of obsidian, iron, stone, darkwood, silver, and "fibrous bundles" of nondescript material. Nowhere that I found does it go into more detail than that, including specifying what proportion of the warforged is metal nor gems of any kind. Thanks for your input, but I'm really looking for balance concerns rather than flavor text anyway.

Why would I give them a free feat and then require that it is one of the armors rather than just giving them whatever armor they want? Moreover, since the consensus seems to be that they're an above average race already, what would they have to give up in place of it? I'm fairly happy with the way I've set up the armor plating, and I don't think I'll be doing any major changes to them. Minor re-balancing is all I think is necessary.

McSmack
2012-07-12, 01:45 AM
Happened to stumble on this thread while looking up warforged homebrew designs. Good stuff!

When I updated warforged for my Eberron PF game, I changed the nature of the composite plating. Now it's more like armor that is riveted to the warforged body. It can be changed out, but takes time and money to do so. Armor, even magical armor can be converted (for a fee) to composite plating. Starting warforged get to choose what kind of plating they have (aka what type of armor it counts as). They can also choose any of the warforged armor feats if they choose, but it is understood that they are unable to sell the plating for the special material value (the special materials are alchemically maintained and degrade once removed from the warforged.

Warforged get +2 to one physical ability score and -2 to one mental ability score, player's choice. Warforged creation was not an exact science, and so each individual is slightly unique in construction.