PDA

View Full Version : What would the Level Adjustment be for this race?



unseenmage
2013-11-13, 12:17 PM
Say I have a 1 HD race of Humanoids being magically created but their stats are too high for +0 LA but they get exactly zero useful racial traits. In fact they get quite penalized compared to other base races. (Think of it kinda like Dragonborn, only it's not a modified creature, it's a brand new one.)

What would their Level Adjustment be?

Esgic

Esgic Template Race
Each new Esgic is brought into the world from the mysterious ritual chambers beneath their city fully formed.
They are actually created as Effigies (CAr), imbued with holy power as Sacred Guardians (DL:BoK), and finally given new life as flesh and blood creatures with Incarnate construct (SS).
Sometimes the infusion of divine energy remains after their final transformation in the form of the Celestial Bloodline (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/races/bloodlines.htm).
Esgic who are dissatisfied with their form often partake of the ritual to become Dragonborn or Spellscale (RotD) so Esgic communities often have a dragonkin district.
Esgic infancy is mental only and lasts for about one year on average.

Personality: Often quiet and composed Esgic sometimes act as though they have forever to accomplish a task. Other than that their personalities tend toward that of the base creatures racial predilections.

Physical Description: New Esgic always resemble an actual person in the world only with odd, gear shaped, fleshy or boney protrusions or growths around their joints and muscles. Esgic often have skin and features which are metallic in color and texture. Most are coppery.

Alignment: Usually neutral.

Lands: Esgic communities are always started from next to nothing in areas where their grand Council deems it safe to construct their underground creation chambers. If one of their communities is threatened the Council takes steps to ensure that the creation chambers are utterly destroyed or safeguarded to keep the secrets of Esgic creation (and potential subjugation) out of enemy hands.

Religion: In Faerun Gond is the god the Esgic worship primarily. Though many tend towards the worship of whatever god their base creature worshipped.

Language: Esgic speak only the language of the base creature and have no bonus languages.

==Player Characters== Abilities: All Esgic have the ability score adjustments of +8 Str, +2 Dex, +0 Con, +0 Int, +4 Wis, and -6 Cha.
Type: Medium and smaller Esgic are Humanoids while large and larger Esgic are Giants.
Size: Esgic share the same size as the base creature.
Speed: Small and smaller Esgic have a speed of 20 feet. Medium Esgic have a speed of 30 feet, while Large and larger Esgic have a speed of 40 feet.
Racial abilities: A Esgic can be modeled after corporeal aberration, animal, dragon, giant, humanoid, magical beast, monstrous humanoid, or vermin of one HD and up to a +2 Level Adjustment. Their HD changes according to their new type (and is replaced if they acquire class levels) and their Level Adjustment is replaced as listed below.
Racial abilities: Medium size and smaller Esgic retain up to +3 Natural Armor. Large and larger Esgic retain up to +9 Natural Armor.
Racial abilities: A new Esgic loses all Special Qualities and Special Attacks of the base race. This also means they will lose all racial traits, weapon familiarity, and preferred classes of the base creature.
Racial abilities: Esgic have no skill points or feats unless they gain class levels.
Automatic languages: Esgic speak one language of the base creature.
Bonus Languages: None, Esgic have no bonus languages.
Favored Class: The preferred class of Esgics is Fighter.
Aging: The starting age for an Esgic is the adult age for the base creature, otherwise they age normally.
Level Adjustment: ???


Edit: I had fun taking the simple application of templates and tacking some racial fluff onto it. the process even revealed some angles of how this "race" would fit into a gameworld that I hadn't considered.

I am not looking for critique as this is not my own creation. I am simply asking the board which I thought was most familiar with the guidelines involved what they thought the Level Adjustment should be.

I apologize if this post is somehow inappropriate or offends someone's sense of 'good homebrew'. It wasn't supposed to.

Grod_The_Giant
2013-11-13, 12:40 PM
The abilities section is... really weird. Why are you setting ability scores directly?

unseenmage
2013-11-13, 12:44 PM
The abilities section is... really weird. Why are you setting ability scores directly?

Because that's what happens when the template the "race" is based on gets applied.

Just to Browse
2013-11-13, 03:15 PM
It's impossible to have a charisma modifier of -6. That implies a charisma score of -1 or -2.
This isn't really homebrew, just multiple applications of stacked templates.
This "template" is basically an excuse to powergame strength/dex bonus and dump all other stats. Bad by design.
Because you're homebrewing, you might as well just write a good template instead of piecing together borked ones.
The Esgic template would benefit a lot more from the Elan treatment--say they're members of other races and give them some looks, but make them functionally identical so people don't just use this template to powergame as hard as possible.

unseenmage
2013-11-13, 03:33 PM
It's impossible to have a charisma modifier of -6. That implies a charisma score of -1 or -2.
Good catch, and thank you. I'd mistyped due to wording it poorly. It has been corrected.

I do wonder if there's a difference between setting an ability score at a number and setting a modifier based on what that ability score would have been set to.


This isn't really homebrew, just multiple applications of stacked templates.
The Level Adjustment for this creature by definition has to be Homebrewed and this seemed like the appropriate place to ask about such a thing. This is the board where Homebrewed Level Adjustments are discussed, isn't it?


This "template" is basically an excuse to powergame strength/dex bonus and dump all other stats. Bad by design.
Because you're homebrewing, you might as well just write a good template instead of piecing together borked ones.
Or it's possible that my DM and I enjoy having fun and decided to see what a certain set of in-game actions and circumstances would do to our gameworld.
And that I came to this board for it's expertise and received insult instead.


The Esgic template would benefit a lot more from the Elan treatment--say they're members of other races and give them some looks, but make them functionally identical so people don't just use this template to powergame as hard as possible.

Thank you for the constructive suggestion. I will look at the Elan for inspiration.

Grod_The_Giant
2013-11-13, 03:36 PM
I do wonder if there's a difference between setting an ability score at a number and setting a modifier based on what that ability score would have been set to.
Set the ability score, not the modifier-- to the best of my knowledge, nothing else in the game alters modifiers directly. You'll sidestep a lot of confusion and arguments that way. ("OK, so I rolled a 14 for Con, which makes my modifier... 0? What if I get bear's endurance cast on me?")

I'd still recommend ability score modifiers for a playable race, mind you.

Just to Browse
2013-11-13, 03:48 PM
The Level Adjustment for this creature by definition has to be Homebrewed and this seemed like the appropriate place to ask about such a thing. This is the board where Homebrewed Level Adjustments are discussed, isn't it?Yes, but since you're on a homebrew board, there's no need to jump through hoops of non-functional templates (including Savage Species and setting-specific stuff). You can just write a race and have it be balanced.


Or it's possible that my DM and I enjoy having fun and decided to see what a certain set of in-game actions and circumstances would do to our gameworld.
And that I came to this board for it's expertise and received insult instead.Right, but if you write a template that is horrible for PCs, then I reserve the right to tell you it is horrible for PCs before evaluating its level adjustment. This template is not good for the game, because it encourages obscene stat minmaxing, locks players into the dumb brute role (incapable of communicating), and grants nothing but numbers for creatures that will probably have many hit dice.

So just the way people say "rewrite it" when a bad fighter fix comes up, I'm saying "rewrite it" when you show me this template. If you are offended when someone says your work is low quality, you shouldn't ask for public critique.

unseenmage
2013-11-13, 03:59 PM
Yes, but since you're on a homebrew board, there's no need to jump through hoops of non-functional templates (including Savage Species and setting-specific stuff). You can just write a race and have it be balanced.

Right, but if you write a template that is horrible for PCs, then I reserve the right to tell you it is horrible for PCs before evaluating its level adjustment. This template is not good for the game, because it encourages obscene stat minmaxing, locks players into the dumb brute role (incapable of communicating), and grants nothing but numbers for creatures that will probably have many hit dice.

So just the way people say "rewrite it" when a bad fighter fix comes up, I'm saying "rewrite it" when you show me this template. If you are offended when someone says your work is low quality, you shouldn't ask for public critique.

But you didn't say 'rewrite it' you just said 'bad'. Part of constructive criticism is seeing to it that your message is digestible by your audience. That's the 'constructive' part. Otherwise every time someone railed at something they did not like then change would be automatic.

Your correctness and the validity of your position is no excuse for rude or lazy evaluation. And I never asked for public critique, I very specifically asked for assistance with a specific problem in a place i thought such assistance could be found. You assumed I wanted public critique because this is the place where you provide such, apparently regardless of whether it is requested.

In fact, I explained that i was applying templates to get the resultant "race" just so such an assumption wouldn't occur. I will be sure to state more explicitly next time the purpose of my post. My apologies for such assumptions of my own which have contributed to our misunderstanding each other's positions. My bad.

Djinn_in_Tonic
2013-11-13, 04:40 PM
I'll give more critique when I'm not at work, but the LA for this is, sadly, impossible to calculate. It's a straight buff to some things, a staggering nerf to others, and its mechanics play havoc with the racial and LA systems, as well as with stat generation, feats, skills, and a number of important mechanics.

I'd suggest taking another look at this and asking yourself WHY this race is allowed to break not one, not two, but MANY constant and fundamental rules of D&D. Then see if you can accomplish something similar WITHOUT breaking those rules. Remember: a major tenant of homebrew is to NOT change the core mechanics unless that change is A: part of a greater revision applied to everything or B: fundamentally necessary for your creation to function.

unseenmage
2013-11-13, 04:55 PM
I'll give more critique when I'm not at work, but the LA for this is, sadly, impossible to calculate. It's a straight buff to some things, a staggering nerf to others, and its mechanics play havoc with the racial and LA systems, as well as with stat generation, feats, skills, and a number of important mechanics.

I'd suggest taking another look at this and asking yourself WHY this race is allowed to break not one, not two, but MANY constant and fundamental rules of D&D. Then see if you can accomplish something similar WITHOUT breaking those rules. Remember: a major tenant of homebrew is to NOT change the core mechanics unless that change is A: part of a greater revision applied to everything or B: fundamentally necessary for your creation to function.

I just had to send my DM a link to this thread after reading this. Just because the idea that he and I are powergaming (according to Just to Browse), fundamental rule breaking monsters made me laugh that much/hard. Monsters I tell you.

And we're planning to do the impossible and use not one but three of these creatures as PCs. I'm not sure what that makes us. Cursed somehow, I'm sure. And the second and third one are even more template stacked than the first. (Plot-wise that's part of why their creator stopped making them but that's neither here nor there.)

Just to Browse
2013-11-13, 05:21 PM
But you didn't say 'rewrite it' you just said 'bad'. Part of constructive criticism is seeing to it that your message is digestible by your audience. That's the 'constructive' part. Otherwise every time someone railed at something they did not like then change would be automatic.

False.


Because you're homebrewing, you might as well just write a good template instead of piecing together borked ones.


Your correctness and the validity of your position is no excuse for rude or lazy evaluation. And I never asked for public critique, I very specifically asked for assistance with a specific problem in a place i thought such assistance could be found. You assumed I wanted public critique because this is the place where you provide such, apparently regardless of whether it is requested.If your template is broken, then it cannot be balanced with level adjustment. Thus by saying your template is broken, I am saying you cannot use level adjustment. 95% of interactions I've had don't require me to spell this out, and by no means is it "rude" or "lazy" to tell you your product is not balanceable if you are asking us to balance it.

But seriously, there's no way to balance a template that makes your highest stat Strength with a +8 bonus while forcing you to have 1 Charisma. It's playable the way Ixitxachitl is playable, but that level of glass cannon is not within appropriate balance boundaries.

Djinn_in_Tonic
2013-11-13, 06:43 PM
...fundamental rule breaking monsters made me laugh that much/hard. Monsters I tell you.

Please do not put words in my mouth. I'm not (and never was) being antagonistic towards you or your creation, and I would appreciate you not assuming the worst of me and my perception of you and your gaming group.

Moving on...you asked us to estimate a Level Adjustment. This is not possible, as your creation breaks many of the constant rules that the Level Adjustment system is based upon, meaning that it gives vastly different results when applied to different base creatures. We can't judge that sort of variance with any degree of accuracy.

It's usable in a game, certainly. I don't recall telling you that it wasn't. If you want to run it, so be it. Just be aware that it is not a balanced creation, or one that I would consider particularly healthy for the system.

What I did suggest was a recommendation, coming from almost 10 years experience with homebrew design in 3.5e and other systems. It's good advice for homebrewing, especially if you plan on sharing that homebrew with others for their input, thoughts, critique, or even their use.

If you don't want that, that's fine. That said, it is generally assumed by the GiantitP community that things posted to the Homebrew Forum are looking for input/comments/suggestions/critique unless it is specifically stated otherwise. Additionally, if for some reason a request (such as LA calculation in this case) cannot be accurately accomplished due to the design in question, people will tell you that, and often suggest fixes/alterations.

When you say you want an LA, we assume that means you're trying to balance the creation to some existing point of reference. It's clear now that that is not what you want to accomplish. Again, that's fine. But it also means that we cannot provide you a Level Adjustment estimation, due to everything we've said previously.

unseenmage
2013-11-13, 07:06 PM
Please do not put words in my mouth.

You asked us to estimate a Level Adjustment. Which is not possible, as your creation breaks many of the constant rules that the Level Adjustment system is based upon, meaning that it gives vastly different results when applied to different base creatures.

It's usable in a game, certainly. I don't recall telling you that it wasn't. If you want to run it, so be it.

What I did suggest was a recommendation, coming from almost 10 years experience with homebrew design in 3.5e and other systems. It's good advice for homebrewing, especially if you plan on sharing that homebrew with others for their input, thoughts, critique, or even their use.

If you don't want that, that's fine. That said, it is generally assumed by the GiantitP community that things posted to the Homebrew Forum are looking for input/comments/suggestions/critique unless it is specifically stated otherwise. Additionally, if for some reason a request (such as LA calculation in this case) cannot be accurately accomplished due to the design in question, people will tell you that, and often suggest fixes/alterations.

When you say you want an LA, we assume that means you're trying to balance the creation to some existing point of reference. It's clear now that that is not what you want to accomplish. Again, that's fine. But it also means that we cannot provide you a Level Adjustment estimation, due to everything we've said previously.

Not putting words in your mouth. Guess I should have colored that blue for humor/sarcasm. i was just poking fun at the "impossible" and "fundamental rules" comments.

I had no idea you folk would take this thread so personally. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad there's a community of Homebrewers out there willing and able to call out poor design choices. Good for you. It takes a special kind of bravery to tell others one's opinion without backpedaling.
But wow guys, it's just a game in which "balance" and "good design" are just popular ideas. Some of us even enjoy poor design and gross imbalance on occasion. Everyone's fun is different, after all.

I too have many a year of homebrew experience. Heck I look forward to seeing what marks my children will leave on my 'brewed world. If I am any example, old gamer does not equal better gamer. That is to say just because the two of us have been at this for a long time doesn't make us better at it or more right, just older.

One thing I don't get though is how the RAW application of three templates breaks the rules of D&D.
Yes I left the target creature space empty but I did restrict it to only affecting creatures that the templates would make all the same ECL anyway.

Perhaps refluffing the results of several templates as a race instead of a single creature was too much? I dunno. The only hand I had in this was that I did what the templates told me to. Must have been too much to ask to desire a Level Adjust estimate (because that's all it could be, an estimate, they're not set in stone) at the end of the process rather than the beginning or the middle.

Perhaps a change of approach, if there were an appropriate level adjustment for the Effigy and Sacred Guardian templates then we could just follow all the proper procedures in their correct order. Would that help?

But then we'd have to homebrew (no scratch that) adjudicate ourselves a Level Adjustment for those two templates. But I bet that would be impossible.

Kidding aside, why can't the Savage Species: Estimating Level Adjustments redirect to DMG: Ability Score Equivalencies process be applied here? Do the ability score changes just need rewritten as 'plus modifier' or 'minus modifier' instead of 'becomes'?

Djinn_in_Tonic
2013-11-13, 07:20 PM
One thing I don't get though is how the RAW application of three templates breaks the rules of D&D.

It's not the application of three templates. That's fine. Heck, according to RAW you can be a Half-Dragon/Half-Celestial/Half-Ogre...with extra sprinkles and bacon on the side.

The place where your creation breaks the core rules is as follows:

Con becomes 10, Int becomes 10, Wis becomes 15, and Cha becomes 1


This makes calculating LA impossible, because this not only varies hugely based on the starting race (a race with +4 Con and +6 Charisma gets vastly different bonuses than a race that starts with +4 Strength, -2 Con and -4 Charisma). It also messes with stat generation, as poor stats are immediately nullified. If you roll 18/16/14/9/3/4, you can just shunt the 4 lowest scores into Con, Int, Wis, and Cha, as those scores are pre-selected for you as a result of the template. In effect, you only need to worry about 2 of your 6 ability scores, which skews balance majorly.

A Esgic can be modeled after any race or creature of one HD and up to a +2 Level Adjustment.

Do you retain the HD of the creature? Do you retain the Level Adjustment? If so, how much of each? What's the distinction between, say, a Drow (where a lot of power is in the abilities) vs. a creature where most of the power is in the statistics (like a Half-Orge)? One becomes MUCH stronger than the other...but what happens to the Level Adjustment?

Those are the big two.

Yes I left the target creature space empty but I did restrict it to only affecting creatures that the templates would make all the same ECL anyway.

I'm assuming it can only be applied to Humanoid and/or Giant creatures? 'cause taking, say, a Fire Elemental as the base creature and making it a humanoid seems...unintended.


Perhaps refluffing the results of several templates as a race instead of a single creature was too much?

I would say so, yes. Templates are...well...best served as templates applied to a base race.


Perhaps a change of approach, if there were an appropriate level adjustment for the Effigy and Sacred Guardian templates then we could just follow all the proper procedures in their correct order. Would that help?

Yes. Definitely.


But then we'd have to homebrew (no scratch that) adjudicate ourselves a Level Adjustment for those two templates. But I bet that would be impossible.

That would probably be much easier, actually.


Do the ability score changes just need rewritten as 'plus modifier' or 'minus modifier' instead of 'becomes'?

That alone would solve the bulk of the issues with this template/race thing.

unseenmage
2013-11-13, 07:35 PM
Con becomes 10, Int becomes 10, Wis becomes 15, and Cha becomes 1


This makes calculating LA impossible, because this not only varies hugely based on the starting race (a race with +4 Con and +6 Charisma gets vastly different bonuses than a race that starts with +4 Strength, -2 Con and -4 Charisma). It also messes with stat generation, as poor stats are immediately nullified. If you roll 18/16/14/9/3/4, you can just shunt the 4 lowest scores into Con, Int, Wis, and Cha, as those scores are pre-selected for you as a result of the template. In effect, you only need to worry about 2 of your 6 ability scores, which skews balance majorly.

I'm pretty sure that allowing the template stacking to modify the base creatures stats instead of replacing them is powergaming more powerful but if it's that intractable a problem then I'll rewrite them as modifiers instead of replacements.


A Esgic can be modeled after any race or creature of one HD and up to a +2 Level Adjustment.

Do you retain the HD of the creature? Do you retain the Level Adjustment? If so, how much of each? What's the distinction between, say, a Drow (where a lot of power is in the abilities) vs. a creature where most of the power is in the statistics (like a Half-Orge)? One becomes MUCH stronger than the other...but what happens to the Level Adjustment?

This is a miswording on my part. Thank you for pointing it out. My brain had skipped over it like a vinyl record groove because I'd already mentioned the Incarnate Construct template.

With nothing but 1 HD up to +2 LA base creatures they all become +0 LA by pure application of the templates. Which is wrong because of Effigy and Sacred Guardian not having listed LA. Which is also exactly what I was asking about.
I thought the stats alone would be used to generate an appropriate LA as the templating takes away everything else.



Yes I left the target creature space empty but I did restrict it to only affecting creatures that the templates would make all the same ECL anyway.

I'm assuming it can only be applied to Humanoid and/or Giant creatures? 'cause taking, say, a Fire Elemental as the base creature and making it a humanoid seems...unintended.

I did forget that Effigy (the start of the cycle) can only be applied to certain creatures. Will rectify. PS. I have no problem with robotic fire elementals, that sounds pretty cool. But yeah, it was unintended in this instance.


This is helpful Thank you.

Edit: Changes applied.
And if they had to have a Level Adjustment Effigy would have a +1 according to popular opinion and Sacred Guardians would be bloated beyond belief because it is ridiculously strong. Fast healing, super buffed ability scores, and Domain superpowers alone would put it at +6 to +8 at least if I had to guess.

Which doesn't work so much for this creature as all the super powers and half the ability score increases are lost in the end. Which is why I didn't try and do it that way.

DracoDei
2013-11-16, 12:58 PM
The place where your creation breaks the core rules is as follows:

Con becomes 10, Int becomes 10, Wis becomes 15, and Cha becomes 1


This makes calculating LA impossible, because this not only varies hugely based on the starting race (a race with +4 Con and +6 Charisma gets vastly different bonuses than a race that starts with +4 Strength, -2 Con and -4 Charisma). It also messes with stat generation, as poor stats are immediately nullified. If you roll 18/16/14/9/3/4, you can just shunt the 4 lowest scores into Con, Int, Wis, and Cha, as those scores are pre-selected for you as a result of the template. In effect, you only need to worry about 2 of your 6 ability scores, which skews balance majorly.
Actually, this is somewhat easy to fix fairly well, while retaining the fixed values. These solutions are not obvious, but I think it is "obvious in hindsight".

For any method OTHER than point buy:
You select your stats normally.

Then you select either the highest and lowest, the second highest and second lowest, or the middle two values, then assign those to your two scores that actually matter.

For point-buy:
You only buy the two stats that actually change, but get 1/3 (or slightly more?) points to buy them with.

(Alternatively, adjust the PB pool as if you were a human, and bought those 4 stats before proceeding to the others. I know that people have come up with PB rebates for stats lower than 8, and that Cha 1 should give a hefty rebate... actually more than the other stats cost.)

There MAY be some flaw that shows up between the first-approximation theory and a more careful look, but I think it is worth considering.