Should this Orc & Hobgoblin hybrid be +0 or +1 LA?

[Gustaff]

I've been thinking on creating a very specific NPC for the E6 game I'm running. This NPC would be a male barbarian, a hybrid between an Orc and a Hobgoblin, perhaps with advanced age. There are no official rules for a Half-Hobgoblin race, though there are several homebrews, and that mixes Hobgoblin and Human blood - not exactly what I'm looking for. I came up with this, and would like feedback on its balance. My idea is to end up with something that has a +0 level adjustment. Take a look:

Orc-Hobgoblin Hybrid

- +2 Strength, +2 Constitution, -2 Intelligence, -2 Wisdom -2 Charisma
- Humanoid (Goblinoid)
- Medium size
- Half-hobgoblin base land speed is 30 feet
- Darkvision out to 60 feet
- +2 racial bonus on Move Silently checks
- Hybrid Blood: for all purposes related to race, the character is considered a hobgoblin and a orc
- Automatic Languages: Common and Goblin. Bonus Languages: Draconic, Dwarven, Infernal, Giant, Orc.
- Favored Class: Fighter.
- Level Adjustment: +0

When you look at it, it is basically a half-orc with +2 Move Silently (Half of the bonus that hobgoblins get) and +2 Cons/-2 Wisdom. Is this too far beyond a LA +0 race? I'm not comfortable with all the negative mental status modifiers, though having only -2 Wis/-2 Char would render it too powerful. I could add something like having a penalty to Charisma skills whenever dealing with Hobgoblins and Orcs due to prejudice. Is this balanced at +0 or +1, and what would I need to change to make it a solid +0 LA?

[Necroticplague]

Meh. Hobgoblins aren't worth the LA, this hybrid is LA0 material. Can't think of enough hobgoblin-focused material to make its hybrid trait worth much. It's better than Half-orc, but that's the fault of half-orcs for being freaking terrible.

[OldTrees1]

When you look at it, it is basically a half-orc with +2 Move Silently (Half of the bonus that hobgoblins get) and +2 Cons/-2 Wisdom. Is this too far beyond a LA +0 race?

What does the Nth level of Barbarian give you? +1 BAB, d12+Con mod hp, +4+Int to skills, roughly +1 to a save, and some class feature or other.

+2 Con/-2 Wis < d12+Con mod hp +1 to a save
+2 to a skill < +4+Int mod to skills

So clearly these additions are not worthy of losing a Barbarian level. Thus, at the optimization level that uses Barbarian, this Orc-Hob Hybrid is still merely LA +0.

[nyjastul69]

I don't see anything that would make this a +1 LA.

[Psyren]

what would I need to change to make it a solid +0 LA?

Run it in Pathfinder :smalltongue:

[ZamielVanWeber]

As it is it is a fairly weak +0. It compares unfavorably to Water Orcs overall. -2 net stat total with both Wis (saves) and Int (skill points) really needs a good pan to justify.

[Chronos]

The fact that this is better than half-orc reflects more on half-orc than on this race. It's on the low end of LA 0, but decent enough to not be completely laughable. It'd probably still be fine with penalties to only two of the mental stats.

As a rough rule of thumb, you get LA from being smaller than Small or larger than Medium, from having positive net ability modifiers, from having +4 to any one ability with net balanced modifiers, or from having +6 to any one ability (or for having high-powered special abilities, but you don't really have any special abilities there). You're medium, your stats are balanced, and none of them are higher than +2. It's kind of nice that your ability modifiers are separated by physical/mental (the characters who care most about Str and Con care less about mental scores), but that just means that the race has a niche (everyone's got to be the best at something).

[Necroticplague]

For comparison, look at the core non-half-breed races. All of them have +0 net stats and one or two useful abilities, and one or two minor ones (though dwarves trade in a useful ability for a couple extra minor ones). This hybrid has -2 net stats, one useful ability (darkvision), and two very minor abilities (+2 move silently,hybrid blood). Chopping off one of the -2 would merely make a bit below average. To make it a middle-of-the-road +0, I'd then give it +2 to another skill (or another +2 to move silently).

[Thurbane]

Definitely LA +0.

It's nowhere near as good as Human, Strongheart Halfling, Lesser Aasimar or Anthropomorphic Bat (although I blame FR and/or 3.0 for 75% of those :smalltongue:).

[Inevitability]

LA +0.

Compared to Water Orc, you are less strong, can't swim, lack light sensitivity (which can be easily cancelled out), have a minor skill boost where the water orc has none and lack a few random element-based abilities no one ever uses. Oh, and you're considered a goblinoid hobgoblin from now on, which opens up Stonedeath Assassin, I guess.

I'd still pick Water Orc over this any day, unless I was creating a bizarre niche build.

[Dread_Head]

LA +0.

Compare it to the Neanderthal from Frostburn. The Neanderthal has +2 Str, -2 Dex, +2 Con, -2 Int and a bunch of abilities which are probably at least as good as darkvision and +2 move silently. Neanderthal is generally considered a decent race, it has it's flaws and it obviously suits a certain type of character, but even then it isn't necessarily the best choice, just reasonably good.

So now we need to consider if -2 wis, -2 cha is approximately equivalent to -2 dex. I would say it is at least equivalent is not more penalising. Consider who would take this race, most likely a martial character as the penalties to mental scores dissuade anyone else. Of the martial classes most need a mental stat (ToB, Swashbuckler, Knight etc) and the ones that don't (Fighter, Barbarian) need all the help they can get. So the race is completely fine as is, perhaps even a little too weak. I would still consider it balanced with penalties to only two of the mental scores but it would be getting quite strong by that point.

[GreyBlack]

I've been thinking on creating a very specific NPC for the E6 game I'm running. This NPC would be a male barbarian, a hybrid between an Orc and a Hobgoblin, perhaps with advanced age. There are no official rules for a Half-Hobgoblin race, though there are several homebrews, and that mixes Hobgoblin and Human blood - not exactly what I'm looking for. I came up with this, and would like feedback on its balance. My idea is to end up with something that has a +0 level adjustment. Take a look:

Orc-Hobgoblin Hybrid

- +2 Strength, +2 Constitution, -2 Intelligence, -2 Wisdom -2 Charisma
- Humanoid (Goblinoid)
- Medium size
- Half-hobgoblin base land speed is 30 feet
- Darkvision out to 60 feet
- +2 racial bonus on Move Silently checks
- Hybrid Blood: for all purposes related to race, the character is considered a hobgoblin and a orc
- Automatic Languages: Common and Goblin. Bonus Languages: Draconic, Dwarven, Infernal, Giant, Orc.
- Favored Class: Fighter.
- Level Adjustment: +0

When you look at it, it is basically a half-orc with +2 Move Silently (Half of the bonus that hobgoblins get) and +2 Cons/-2 Wisdom. Is this too far beyond a LA +0 race? I'm not comfortable with all the negative mental status modifiers, though having only -2 Wis/-2 Char would render it too powerful. I could add something like having a penalty to Charisma skills whenever dealing with Hobgoblins and Orcs due to prejudice. Is this balanced at +0 or +1, and what would I need to change to make it a solid +0 LA?

Question: why is common an automatic, instead of Orc? I would switch the two.

[Inevitability]

Question: why is common an automatic, instead of Orc? I would switch the two.

Because with one exception, all player-intended races speak common. Having to invest in Intelligence or skill points just to communicate with your teammates is definitely not fun.

[Thurbane]

Because with one exception, all player-intended races speak common. Having to invest in Intelligence or skill points just to communicate with your teammates is definitely not fun.

We actually had a bit of fun with this in a game a few years back. We had a Deep Dwarf Monk in the party, and he refused to spend skill points on Common. Another party member who spoke Goblin had to constantly translate for him. I never thought of it at the time, but someone should have bought him a Pearl of Speech. :smalltongue:

[Inevitability]

We actually had a bit of fun with this in a game a few years back. We had a Deep Dwarf Monk in the party, and he refused to spend skill points on Common. Another party member who spoke Goblin had to constantly translate for him. I never thought of it at the time, but someone should have bought him a Pearl of Speech. :smalltongue:

Don't Deep Dwarves (Duergar, right?) get common for free?

[DrMotives]

Duergar are the Gray Dwarves. Deep dwarves are a non-evil underdark dwarf, without the psychic power or weird spider-riding culture of Duergar. Basically the Mountain Dwarf subrace, just from deeper down, IIRC.

[Troacctid]

This race looks about on par with or possibly slightly worse than a standard orc, and easily worse than human, halfling, or dwarf. Definitely +0 LA, and you could even buff it up a little.