Playable Gith

[Nagalipton]

So I'm working on a setting for my players that will be far more playable-monster-race friendly than most. I'll spare the details on the setting itself for now, but I'd like some critique help if my fellow playground dwellers would be so kind. As the title suggests I have the Githyanki/zerai as a playable race, and have finished the rough draft of their player race entry. Too much? Too little? Just right? Thanks in advance for any words one way or another: (Note: Flavor Text is subject to editing as needed/wanted.)

Desc:

Originally a race called the Forerunners enslaved by Mind Flayers, these gaunt creatures managed to escape under the banner of their namesake hero, a woman named Gith. Her warlike behavoir was however challenged by a man named Zerthimon who said war was just another form of slavery. In fighting led to most Githyanki (in their toungue, followers of Gith) and Githzerai to hate each other.

Traits:

ABILITY SCORE INCREASE: +1 Dex
SIZE: Medium
SPEED: 30ft
LANGUAGES: Common, Gith.
INATE PSIONICS:
At will: Mage Hand (hand is invisible)
3/day: Jump

Subraces:

GITHYANKI

ABILITY SCORE INCREASE: +1 Str
WAYS OF WAR: Gain proficiency with Long Swords, Great Swords,
light and medium armor.
IMPROVED PSIONICS: Starting at level 3, gain the following:
(Githyanki Psionics are based on Intelligence, both for spell
save DC and spell attack bonuses.)
3/day: Misty Step
3/day: Non Detection (self only)
3/day: Tongues
GREATER PSIONICS: Starting at level 8, gain the following:
1/day: Plane Shift
1/day: Telekinesis
SILVER SWORD: At level 8 a Githyanki may become a Knight by
creating one of the famed Silver Swords of the Githyanki.
This may be done only once in a Githyanki's life unless the
original blade is truly destroyed. Neither the creation, nor
the destruction of a blade should be taken lightly since the
blades are a reflection of the creator's very soul.
The ritual takes one day to complete, and during the
following day the Githyanki in question cannot perform
any of their inate psionics due to the mental strain of
the ritual.

Silver Sword (+3 Greatsword)
DMG: 2d6(+3) slashing as well as 3d6 psychic damage.
On a crit against an astral body, you may chose to sever the
silvery cord rather than dealing damage.

GITHZERAI

ABILITY SCORE INCREASE: +1 Wis
PSYCHIC DEFENSE: When unarmored and without a shield, add your wisdom
to your armor class.
MONISTIC TRAINING: Unarmed strikes now deal 1d8 psychic damage.
At 4th level the psychic damage increases to 2d8.
IMPROVED PSIONICS: Starting at level 3, gain the following:
(Githzerai Psionics are based on Wisdom, both for spell
save DC and spell attack bonuses.)
3/day: Feather Fall
3/day: See Invisibility.
3/day: Shield
DISCLIPLINE OF THE ZERTH: At level 8 a Githzerai reaches a proficiency
with their psychic powers powerful enough to be considered
a zerth, a teacher of the ways of Zerthimon. Taking up
this pristigeous mantle can open many doors in Githzerai
society, though failure to uphold one's zerthdom can cause
the Githzerai in question to become something of an outcast.
Regardless of wether the Githzerai in question becomes
a zerth, they do gain the following benefits upon reaching
level 8:
MONISTIC MASTERY: The psychic damage from unarmed attacks
increases to 3d8.
GREATER PSIONICS:
1/day: Plane Shift
1/day: Phantasmal Killer

[brainface]

I'm gonner go with too much. (!)


Traits:

ABILITY SCORE INCREASE: +1 Dex
SIZE: Medium
SPEED: 30ft
LANGUAGES: Common, Gith.
INATE PSIONICS:
At will: Mage Hand (hand is invisible)
3/day: Jump

You got a lot of spells listed 3/day. I'd tone this down a lot. I'd also suggest just a straight out athletics bonus or bonus to jump distances.



Subraces:

GITHYANKI

ABILITY SCORE INCREASE: +1 Str
WAYS OF WAR: Gain proficiency with Long Swords, Great Swords,
light and medium armor.

Warblegarble that's a lot of good weapon proficiencies. I suppose dwarf gives something close to this though, and they are kind of the everyone's a warrior race. Greatsword may be the only questionable outlier.



IMPROVED PSIONICS: Starting at level 3, gain the following:
(Githyanki Psionics are based on Intelligence, both for spell
save DC and spell attack bonuses.)
3/day: Misty Step
3/day: Non Detection (self only)
3/day: Tongues
GREATER PSIONICS: Starting at level 8, gain the following:
1/day: Plane Shift
1/day: Telekinesis

I'm going to be super critical here:
Why tongues 3/day and not say, just racial telepathy?
What purpose does nondetection 3/day serve? Why not just make them undetectable to divinations (they have 24 hours on the spell.)
I wouldn't give out high levels spells based on a pcs race, regardless of previous lore.
And again--most racial spellcasting in the PHB is 1/day at a certain spell level. I'd cut out every spell except "Misty step 1/day," personally? I don't think always on nondetection or racial telepathy would be broken either--the 3/day for a niche ability or long duration spell is just tremendously clunky in my mind.


SILVER SWORD: At level 8 a Githyanki may become a Knight by
creating one of the famed Silver Swords of the Githyanki.
This may be done only once in a Githyanki's life unless the
original blade is truly destroyed. Neither the creation, nor
the destruction of a blade should be taken lightly since the
blades are a reflection of the creator's very soul.
The ritual takes one day to complete, and during the
following day the Githyanki in question cannot perform
any of their inate psionics due to the mental strain of
the ritual.

Silver Sword (+3 Greatsword)
DMG: 2d6(+3) slashing as well as 3d6 psychic damage.
On a crit against an astral body, you may chose to sever the
silvery cord rather than dealing damage.

This is crazy insane good. I'd remove it and the Gith player finds/makes a silver sword in exactly the same way any other player makes/finds a magic weapon.


GITHZERAI

ABILITY SCORE INCREASE: +1 Wis
PSYCHIC DEFENSE: When unarmored and without a shield, add your wisdom
to your armor class.

I like this! Steps on monks toes a bit, but most high wisdom classes have access to good armor anyway, so I don't think it's very powerful, just neat.


MONISTIC TRAINING: Unarmed strikes now deal 1d8 psychic damage.
At 4th level the psychic damage increases to 2d8.

An... additional 1d8 or...
My first reaction is to call shenanigans here, but it might not actually be that potent--it's kind of in cantrip range if a character doesn't have extra attack.
If they do it's gonner be bonkers.
The increase should probably be at 5th level, which is when everyone gets a large power upgrade (extra attacks, fireball, cantrip damage, etc)


IMPROVED PSIONICS: Starting at level 3, gain the following:
(Githzerai Psionics are based on Wisdom, both for spell
save DC and spell attack bonuses.)
3/day: Feather Fall
3/day: See Invisibility.
3/day: Shield

Too many, too often. Trim it down to a couple of important ones once a day?



DISCLIPLINE OF THE ZERTH: At level 8 a Githzerai reaches a proficiency
with their psychic powers powerful enough to be considered
a zerth, a teacher of the ways of Zerthimon. Taking up
this pristigeous mantle can open many doors in Githzerai
society, though failure to uphold one's zerthdom can cause
the Githzerai in question to become something of an outcast.
Regardless of wether the Githzerai in question becomes
a zerth, they do gain the following benefits upon reaching
level 8:
MONISTIC MASTERY: The psychic damage from unarmed attacks
increases to 3d8.

Kind of bonkerish. It's scaling like a cantrip, faster than a cantrip, and does bonkers things with extra attack or flurry of blows. (I'd suggest using the mystic's cantripy mind thrust/whatever the other one is from the unearthed arcana article, but i suspect part of the goal here is punching things in the face. Maybe a rethemed greenflame blade/booming blade cantrip githzerai have access too, with the damage changed to psychic?)


GREATER PSIONICS:
1/day: Plane Shift
1/day: Phantasmal Killer
Again, I wouldn't give out either of these. Previous editions would coupled with a high LA or 2e just being 2e.

In summary, I think you're trying to put way too much power and fiddly bits into the race that the player should be getting from class choice instead.

[brainface]

An addendum:
Level scaling--the levels pcs gain additional damage are generally 5th, 11th, and 17th at least for cantrips. Fighters get an extra attack, mages get another tier of spells and so on. When you have an ability gain an additional dice of damage, it should generally happen at these levels. (This is also why I'm disliking monastic training--it takes monk damage from 1d8 to 2d8 at 4th level, doubling their damage. Then at 5th level, they get an extra attack, doubling their damage again. So the Barbarian hits level 5 and is doing about twice the damage they used to, and the monk is doing about four times as much (then the gith monk hits level 8 and things get even crazier.)

Also, for reference, the mystic: https://dnd.wizards.com/articles/features/psionics-and-mystic-%E2%80%93-take-two You may one to steal some of the talents/abilities from here. Thought spear was the talent/cantrip I was trying to think of.

[Ninja_Prawn]

We do have a homebrew subforum, you know. The compendium (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=20541848&postcount=3) has two attempts at Gith already; you may want to take a look at them.

As for my review, well. This is the most ludicrously overpowered race I've ever seen. What in the Planes are you thinking with all that innate casting?

And Silver Sword / Discipline of the Zerth should be racial feats for sure.

[Nagalipton]

Thank you for the quick replies everyone. It's been a bit since I've homebrewed anything and I'm a little rusty. Good thoughts all around and thanks for pointing out the sub forum; I actually didn't know it was a thing.

When I first started with these guys I hit the monster manual first and tried to make what's in there true for PCs as well. It hadn't occured to me that most of what makes Gith as we know them is class based not race based. I'll read over the examples in the forums but will probably give them race specific sub classes or something.

[Thrudd]

I want to second everything everyone has said so far. What is depicted in the monster manual should be seen as the warrior versions of these creatures that are a serious threat to higher level PC's. They are not what every Githyanki and Githzerai are or should start out as.

Traditionally, both races possess psionics (which hasn't been officially introduced into 5e yet). Githyanki knights tend to be high level fighter/magic-users. Githzerai have a monastic tradition, which means their special warriors are high level monks. If you are starting the game at level 15 or something, then the Gith PC's should be comparable in power to the MM entries. Otherwise, they should be races with minor affinity for psionic abilities, which you will need to homebrew carefully to make sure they are not any more powerful than a single cantrip that some other races get as an racial ability.

If you want to ensure the PC's preserve these archetypes, then restrict the class choices available for each race. Or introduce a "favored class" mechanic into the game to encourage them choosing specific classes that restricts multiclassing except with those specific classes. Maybe there are feats only allowed to Githyanki fighter/wizards, and Githzerai monks, that will encourage those being chosen.

[Naanomi]

I'd make the base Gith Race +2 Dex; then make the subraces (yanki +1 Int; zerai +1 Wis) to encourage classes that use those stats