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Mr Pants
2007-03-02, 12:39 AM
before we start id like to credit obsidian rose for helping with this project that our insane minds can come up with at 2 in the morning


Spartans

Traits:
+4 Str +2 Con -2 Int
Medium Size
Base Land Speed: 30 Feet*

Powerful Build

Martial Training: a Spartan’s martial training provides him with proficiency with all spears and all shields.

Spear Affinity: a Spartan has exceptional training with spears and can throw any spear with a range increment of 15 feet. Spears can be wielded in one hand without penalty.

Shield Affinity: a Spartan can use a tower shield to grant cover to himself and one ally while still fighting.

Never Run Away: when retreating from an enemy the Spartan's movement speed drops to 10 feet.

Fighting with a Brother: a spartan gains the benefits of superior flanking when flanking with a fellow spartan.

Level Adjustment: 3


Spartan Racial Feats

Fight in the Shade [Spartan] [Fighter]

Prerequisites: Phalanx Fighting, Spartan Race, Endurance, BAB 6

Benefit: When a Spartan receives attacks from over 100 archers while not engaged in melee combat, apply twice his shield modifier as an additional deflection bonus to armor class (stacks with all other bonuses). In addition, the Spartan is not fatigue while fighting under arrows thick enough to blacken the sky.

Eat a Hearty Breakfast [General]

Prerequisites: Endurance, Spartan Race

Benefit: Whenever a Spartan goes into a battle with hopeless odds (DM’s approval), the Spartan gains the Fearful Presence ability of a dragon of equal HD. In addition, the Spartan gains +4 to attack, damage, and rolls to resist bull rush, overrun, trip, disarm, and sunder.

Tonight We Dine in Hell [General]

Prerequisites: Eat a Heart Breakfast

Benefit: The spartan gains 5 additional hit points per hit die, the Spartan can never be brought back from the dead even with true resurrection

Face of Sparta [General] [Fighter]:

Prerequisites: Spartan

Benefit: The Spartan gains a +4 to leadership in regards to followers when dealing with Spartans.

Faceless Spartan [General]

Prerequisites Face of Sparta

Benefit: The Spartan can not be individually targeted by magic. Instead, randomly determine any Spartan as the target of the spell.

crazedloon
2007-03-02, 12:44 AM
Lol awsome (I assume you have read the comic)

Add to the spartan template that they can not have any ability below 12 as that would be imperfection and thus not fit to be a spartan :smallwink:

You also forgot to add craft (wall of bodys) which all spartans gain a +20 bonus on and there is no limit to the hight of such a wall.

Fizban
2007-03-02, 01:04 AM
Been watching a few too many 300 trailers, have we?

I believe the fact that they are spartans is most easily represented by letting them roll stats and have more than one level, like any other PC.

ExHunterEmerald
2007-03-02, 01:51 AM
I made a stab (agh) at this awhile back. Too underpowered. I should try again.

katarl
2007-03-02, 10:35 AM
I assume this isn't meant to be realistic, especially since they actually got badly beaten when they boasted that fighting the persians was nice because of the shade. Also, persians sponsored the spartan war on athens (which they lost), so they're hardly a mortal enemy. Helots are a more likely choice, since their martial culture was just to keep their slaves from revolting.

Oh well.

I assume this doesn't apply to spartan women. That would be difficult to explain.

Lapak
2007-03-02, 11:11 AM
We don't even need a template to deal with this. The big deal about the Spartans was that (due to their conquered servant-neighbors) they could be professional soldiers from birth, while all the foes that they faced had minimal training at best.

In other words, the battle of Thermopylae (and especially the amped-up version of 300) is the answer to 'what happens when PC classes go up against an army?' right down to the killed-by-natural-20s effect when they were eventually surrounded.

Mr Pants
2007-03-02, 04:55 PM
Crazed loon, your suggestions have been noted but im not sure if the minimum of 12 in an ability balances the +20 to wall of bodies.

Speaking of balance is it balanced as it is now?

katarl, its really not supposed to be that realistic. I'm just a spartan fanboy. But the way i remember the pelopennesian (sp?) wars the Spartans kicked the Athenians asses.

btw i forgot to credit obsidian rose for doing most of the work on this

Demented
2007-03-02, 05:53 PM
Eat a Hearty Breakfast [General]

*gag*
Have you heard of the famous Spartan black porridge? Well, maybe it wasn't porridge, but it was black, and it was famous.


An alternative view: Simple subraces.

Spartan
These traits are in addition to human traits, except where noted.
+2 Con
- May not have a physical ability score lower than 10, before racial adjustments.
- Gain Toughness as a bonus feat. This trait replaces the human bonus feat.
- +2 to all non-craft skill checks on a ship. This trait replaces the human bonus skillpoints.
Favored Class: Monk. This replaces the human favored class.

Athenian
These traits are in addition to human traits, except where noted.
- May make an aid another check as a swift action if the recipient is Athenian, or a move action if the recipient is not.
- 2 extra skill points at 1st level and 1 extra skill point every other level. This trait replaces the human bonus skillpoints.
Favored Class: Fighter. This replaces the human favored class.

Cybren
2007-03-02, 06:00 PM
Crazed loon, your suggestions have been noted but im not sure if the minimum of 12 in an ability balances the +20 to wall of bodies.

Speaking of balance is it balanced as it is now?

katarl, its really not supposed to be that realistic. I'm just a spartan fanboy. But the way i remember the pelopennesian (sp?) wars the Spartans kicked the Athenians asses.

btw i forgot to credit obsidian rose for doing most of the work on this
Yeah and then the spartans got destroyed by thebes. And then the spartans war mongering bit them in the ass as the weakened southern greek city states were conquered by Macedonia and a unified greek nation was created for the first time.

Monseigneur
2007-03-02, 06:02 PM
Funny thing...I am DMing a campaign right now based on history and mythology, and made some simple base races (Yes, I know they don't reflect all of the traits, but I needed something simple.) one of them being Spartan.

Spartan
+2 Con
-2 Int
-2 Cha
Gets free Endurance (As the feat) at first level.
Favored class:Fighter
Languages:Latin, Greek
Bonus languages:Tartarian, Aesir, Olympian

The -2 Int and Cha exist to balance the Con bonus. Half-orc clone, I know, but it works. I might post the entire database I thought up (Includes gods, races, and languages.).

K2
2007-03-02, 09:17 PM
spartans, Tonight We Dine In Hell!

Mr Pants
2007-03-04, 12:18 AM
edited version is up. A lot was removed. Tell me if you think its balanced now

elliott20
2007-03-05, 02:33 PM
a lot of these abilities you have here I feel would be more suitable by just giving them the proper classes.

As a race? they come across as a little pigeon holed. The never run away ability seems a little silly to me. For one, what constitutes as a retreat? A tactical withdrawal to draw the enemy into a snare is not an act of cowardice but an act of tactical maneuvering. Placing a penalty like this means that they are simply that much less capable of performing such tactics.

The Spartans are ferocious warriors yes, but their strength also lies in their use of tactics. As such, I imagined that movement would be of paramount importance to them.

Closet_Skeleton
2007-03-05, 03:00 PM
I assume this doesn't apply to spartan women. That would be difficult to explain.

Why? Spartan women were subject to the same eugenics and athletics training even if they didn't take part in the army.

Mr Pants
2007-03-05, 10:27 PM
a lot of these abilities you have here I feel would be more suitable by just giving them the proper classes.

As a race? they come across as a little pigeon holed. The never run away ability seems a little silly to me. For one, what constitutes as a retreat? A tactical withdrawal to draw the enemy into a snare is not an act of cowardice but an act of tactical maneuvering. Placing a penalty like this means that they are simply that much less capable of performing such tactics.

The Spartans are ferocious warriors yes, but their strength also lies in their use of tactics. As such, I imagined that movement would be of paramount importance to them.

to me a retreat means running away because you are scared like a pansy. something a spartan would never do imo. what constitutes as a retreat however would most likely fall to the decision of the dm whether it is tactical or just running away

Demented
2007-03-05, 11:02 PM
It's not called retreat, it's called flank-side reinforcement!

elliott20
2007-03-06, 01:57 PM
It's not called retreat, it's called flank-side reinforcement!
hehe, cheeky grebster :smallbiggrin:

well, Mr. Pants, while I agree with you that Spartan morals would look down upon cowardice, you can't always equate refusing to engage as a sign of cowardice. Like I said, tactical retreat is entirely a valid tactic, one that was probably utilized very frequently in the 300 Spartans last stand.

Also, sometimes fighting to stand one particular piece of ground just might not be worth the trouble over retreating to a more strategic position where a counter attack can be launched. Spartans are supposed to be competent warriors, not blind fools with hormonal imbalance.

But also, just because they look down upon fleeing from battle in a cowardly manner, doesn't mean that they CAN'T do it, or that they would be less capable of doing so.

Paladins look down upon corruption but it doesn't mean they are in the least bit incapable of it.

If you want to make it a rule in some mechanical fashion, I think some kind of behaviorial rule of conduct that relates to one of their bonuses would be more appropriate.

i.e. a spartan who is seen fleeing from battle in a cowardly fashion will hence forth receive a -4 circumstantial penalty to all his charisma based skill checks when dealing with other Spartans who know of his cowardice.

This rule would be more in line with what you're thinking about, I believe.

Mr Pants
2007-03-06, 05:47 PM
i see what you're saying and i think i might change it to something where they need a will save to retreat otherwise their speed drops bc they are hesitant about staying to fight, probably something like dc 12 or 15

Tommer_man
2007-03-08, 01:10 AM
I would suggest just not making it a template or a race. The problem with having it a template lays in that your just adding abilities and exchanging it for lvl adjustment. Well theres not much point unless it's something worth adding (such as the umbreal creature temple makes what ever you add to it a different and more interesting monster).

Honestly, the average commoner doesn't know how to weild martial weapons. The commoner misses out on alot of things that pc's enjoy. So why make something that trumps PC's when you could just level the playing field?

Commoners represent a normal mundane backround and upbringing, Spartans have far from that. They're trained for battle from birth, only the strong survive. So why would that kind of society have commoners? They didn't, so change the average citizens career to warrior, and give the warrior acess to some skills that a commoner has. That reflects history the best, because in truth when spartans were attacked or at war, EVERY hand was available. The men women, barely anyone would stay behind hen battle was afoot.

So when you get the generic D&D town underseige, only 15% or so of the populace can defend it. Now that you make it a spartan town, 85% of the townsfolk can fight. Women too, but they are diliberatly taught to be reserves so they only come in when the men fail or need help.

Now your thinking, what good is that? Thats not cool or edgy! Well wrongo friend, because if we step back and look at the world on a nation scale, the spartans will be-able to fight and readily defend over 5 times more then a D&D nation. Pretty badass, maybe not as cool when your an adventurer but if your a DM it gives you a good handle over Players. No more picking fights with the helpless or losers because the average citizen can, and will fight. Like-wize they should be higher level on average because of their advanced fighting scheme (fighting earns more exp per year then just common work, just ask the average who levels up to 20 after a year of gaming).

Harkone
2007-03-08, 01:28 AM
Been watching a few too many 300 trailers, have we?

I believe the fact that they are spartans is most easily represented by letting them roll stats and have more than one level, like any other PC.

I agree; this makes more sense than a separate race.


We don't even need a template to deal with this. The big deal about the Spartans was that (due to their conquered servant-neighbors) they could be professional soldiers from birth, while all the foes that they faced had minimal training at best.

In other words, the battle of Thermopylae (and especially the amped-up version of 300) is the answer to 'what happens when PC classes go up against an army?' right down to the killed-by-natural-20s effect when they were eventually surrounded.

Exactly.


a lot of these abilities you have here I feel would be more suitable by just giving them the proper classes.

As a race? they come across as a little pigeon holed. The never run away ability seems a little silly to me. For one, what constitutes as a retreat? A tactical withdrawal to draw the enemy into a snare is not an act of cowardice but an act of tactical maneuvering. Placing a penalty like this means that they are simply that much less capable of performing such tactics.


I would suggest just not making it a template or a race. The problem with having it a template lays in that your just adding abilities and exchanging it for lvl adjustment. Well theres not much point unless it's something worth adding (such as the umbreal creature temple makes what ever you add to it a different and more interesting monster).

Honestly, the average commoner doesn't know how to weild martial weapons. The commoner misses out on alot of things that pc's enjoy. So why make something that trumps PC's when you could just level the playing field?

Commoners represent a normal mundane backround and upbringing, Spartans have far from that. They're trained for battle from birth, only the strong survive. So why would that kind of society have commoners? They didn't, so change the average citizens career to warrior, and give the warrior acess to some skills that a commoner has. That reflects history the best, because in truth when spartans were attacked or at war, EVERY hand was available. The men women, barely anyone would stay behind hen battle was afoot.

So when you get the generic D&D town underseige, only 15% or so of the populace can defend it. Now that you make it a spartan town, 85% of the townsfolk can fight. Women too, but they are diliberatly taught to be reserves so they only come in when the men fail or need help.

Now your thinking, what good is that? Thats not cool or edgy! Well wrongo friend, because if we step back and look at the world on a nation scale, the spartans will be-able to fight and readily defend over 5 times more then a D&D nation. Pretty badass, maybe not as cool when your an adventurer but if your a DM it gives you a good handle over Players. No more picking fights with the helpless or losers because the average citizen can, and will fight. Like-wize they should be higher level on average because of their advanced fighting scheme (fighting earns more exp per year then just common work, just ask the average who levels up to 20 after a year of gaming).

And all that sounds right too.

Maybe it would be better to make "Spartan Heroes" (or something like that) some kind of prestige class.

elliott20
2007-03-08, 11:19 AM
Maybe it would be better to make "Spartan Heroes" (or something like that) some kind of prestige class.
Hell, even that feels a tad redundant. If we look into CW, you can probably find more than a couple inspiring war leader PrCs that he can use for that role.

MaxKaladin
2007-03-08, 12:31 PM
Commoners represent a normal mundane backround and upbringing, Spartans have far from that. They're trained for battle from birth, only the strong survive. So why would that kind of society have commoners? Because someone needs to do all the mundane tasks that you can't do when you spend your entire life preparing for war. Spartan society had quite a large number of people who D&D would call "commoners" or "experts". They were the people who worked the fields, tended livestock and made goods for the Spartan elite. The people people are generally talking about when they speak of the Spartans were a minority. They were simply the most famous part of Spartan society, not the bulk of it.

katarl
2007-03-08, 02:29 PM
Originally Posted by katarl
I assume this doesn't apply to spartan women. That would be difficult to explain.

Why? Spartan women were subject to the same eugenics and athletics training even if they didn't take part in the army.

Yes, i know, healthy, strong women make for healthy strong new recruits! But they certainly don't get phalanx fighting.


katarl, its really not supposed to be that realistic. I'm just a spartan fanboy.

Hey you said it, not me! I have a friend who was obsessed about spartans, so I called him an ignorant fanboy and always argued that spartans were amoral thuggish rapists, but I have my own fanboydom for knights, who were just as bad, so i can't really talk.


But the way i remember the pelopennesian (sp?) wars the Spartans kicked the Athenians asses

Makes you think why such hard warriors who trained all their lives had such trouble getting past athenian walls. In the end though, the athenians won the moral victory though, it was their culture, not the spartans that changed europe. They even invented lasers, so they're okay in my books.

Dervag
2007-03-08, 05:13 PM
I assume this isn't meant to be realistic, especially since they actually got badly beaten when they boasted that fighting the persians was nice because of the shade.Yes, but they only got beaten when they were totally outflanked (half the Persian army had snuck around behind them on a goat trail through the hills), and outnumbered something like 20-200 to one.


Also, persians sponsored the spartan war on athens (which they lost), so they're hardly a mortal enemy.Frankly, to the Spartans, everyone was a mortal enemy. They were equal-opportunity attackers, willing to assault, besiege, and butcher pretty much anyone.


Helots are a more likely choice, since their martial culture was just to keep their slaves from revolting.And to capture more slaves. And just for the sake of being really really martial.


Yeah and then the spartans got destroyed by thebes.Yeth. The Thacred Band of Thebeth got behind them, and then it wath all over [limp-wristed handwave]


They even invented lasers, so they're okay in my books.Nonono. It was the Sicilians who invented lasers!

Matthew
2007-03-08, 05:31 PM
Why are we discussing the historical and mythological Spartans? I thought this was inspired by the Comic Book turned Film?

Tommer_man
2007-03-08, 05:54 PM
Because someone needs to do all the mundane tasks that you can't do when you spend your entire life preparing for war. Spartan society had quite a large number of people who D&D would call "commoners" or "experts". They were the people who worked the fields, tended livestock and made goods for the Spartan elite. The people people are generally talking about when they speak of the Spartans were a minority. They were simply the most famous part of Spartan society, not the bulk of it.


Actually, the whole giving the warrior class extra skills covers the minial tasks. And to counter with the whole spartan warriors were the only ones who were famous? Wanna know why a cultures warriors were famous? Because this culture was ALL warrior. Seriously go find a history text book, these guys were trained to kill from birth. ALL of them, and yeah they had slaves but don't think that the slaves made up the commoner role. Statisticly speaking there would be alot more commoners Per D&D town then slaves in a Spartan town, so yeah they would fill the commoner role. Unfortunetly though, through random town generators we can determine how many slaves there would be.

So the whole turn commoners into warriors still works, because to run a stable society they just rely on the small slave task force. And if we really want to get into this, you CAN run a society on slave workers. I think most civilisations prove this.

Matthew
2007-03-08, 06:20 PM
Maybe, but that's not how Spartan society necessarily worked from period to period. They relied on the Helots for produce and they used them in war as Light Foot as well. In any case, it doesn't make any difference, because these Spartans are not the historical ones. If we want to discuss a historical Spartan Class we should probably start a new thread.

ExHunterEmerald
2007-03-08, 06:25 PM
Yes, i know, healthy, strong women make for healthy strong new recruits! But they certainly don't get phalanx fighting.
It's a game where people can sling fireballs. A little equal-opportunity asskicking never hurt anybody. 'cept the monsters.



Hey you said it, not me! I have a friend who was obsessed about spartans, so I called him an ignorant fanboy and always argued that spartans were amoral thuggish rapists, but I have my own fanboydom for knights, who were just as bad, so i can't really talk.

To be fair, not every history buff decided he liked spartans after finding out what the Master Chief got his name from. I always had an interest, and it's lately resurged since I'm reading the Iliad and the Odyssey. You can admire and admonish the same thing's various traits.

MaxKaladin
2007-03-09, 01:08 PM
Actually, the whole giving the warrior class extra skills covers the minial tasks. And to counter with the whole spartan warriors were the only ones who were famous? Wanna know why a cultures warriors were famous? Because this culture was ALL warrior. Seriously go find a history text book, these guys were trained to kill from birth. ALL of them, and yeah they had slaves but don't think that the slaves made up the commoner role. Statisticly speaking there would be alot more commoners Per D&D town then slaves in a Spartan town, so yeah they would fill the commoner role. Unfortunetly though, through random town generators we can determine how many slaves there would be.

So the whole turn commoners into warriors still works, because to run a stable society they just rely on the small slave task force. And if we really want to get into this, you CAN run a society on slave workers. I think most civilisations prove this.Yes, the Spartans are famous for their rigorous military training system and the fact that every Spartan boy was subject to it (if they weren't murdered by their society shortly after birth, of course). What is often not mentioned is that it was really only every Spartan CITIZEN (called Spartiate) boy who was subject to this training. One of the reasons for the decline of Sparta is that the citizen population kept declining for various reasons and they eventually just didn't have enough of their famous soldiers.

Spartan society had a large non-citizen population who were more numerous than the citizens. Almost all of this population lived in the countryside rather than the city of Sparta itself, but their labor was vital to the Spartan state. The Spartan citizens themselves were far too busy with their military training to do things like raise food or forge weapons or armor. In fact, many of these tasks were actually forbidden to the citizen. It was the non-citizen population that did these tasks. Without them, the famed Spartan military system would not have been possible. It is true that the Spartans kept relatively few actual slaves, but much of the non-citizen population were helots who were a lot like medieval serfs but without any rights.

In D&D terms, the actual city of Sparta would have been almost completely composed of fighters and warriors while the Spartan countryside would have had many villages almost completely composed of commoners and experts.

I suppose it is possible to preserve the argument that every Spartan was subject to military training by claiming the non-citizens were not Spartans because they were almost exclusively the descendants of conquered peoples and because almost none lived in the city of Sparta itself even if they lived in the state of Sparta. Even if you do so, I don't think you can ignore the vital part the non-citizens played in the Spartan "system".

BobGhengisKhan
2007-03-10, 05:10 PM
Yes, i know, healthy, strong women make for healthy strong new recruits! But they certainly don't get phalanx fighting.

They would fight if they had to. In one famous incident, they held off Phyrrus (yes, that Phyrrus) when he attacked Sparta while the main army was away.