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2010-08-11, 09:07 PM (ISO 8601)
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[4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
I looked, but I didn't see any discussion of the change to racial stats coming with Essentials. It's been confirmed that races will now get options in their attribute bonuses--for example, dwarves now get Con + Str or Wis.
What do people think? Is this a bad idea? A good one?Last edited by DSCrankshaw; 2010-08-11 at 09:26 PM.
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2010-08-11, 09:25 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attributes (Essentials)
It has come up, you might have missed it because Kurald Galain generally makes the threads for such discussion and he likes to call it 4.4.
As for the attribute options, it makes sense they'd give them to the older races since they're reprinting them anyway. The newer races all have the optional stat boost, so it just brings all the races in line.Last edited by Reverent-One; 2010-08-11 at 09:26 PM.
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2010-08-11, 10:36 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
Its nice to hear Dwarves will make good fighters instead of just decent fighters if you get the right feats.
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2010-08-11, 11:18 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
There'd been speculation about that happening before Essentials were ever announced, just because it went over so well with the new races. So I am not surprised.
Last edited by Swordgleam; 2010-08-11 at 11:19 PM.
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2010-08-12, 12:17 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
Anyone want to speculate on what extra stat options the existing races will get?
Dwarves getting Con+Str (fixed) is confirmed in the preview.
Elves I suspect will get Int+Wis to make them better arcanists as the article promises.
Half-Elves seem likely to get Wis based on the Dragon article a while back. I actually suspect Wis+Cha rather Con+Wis. Cha seems to be their defining stat from a fluff point of view; it'd be strange to see it optional.
Eladrin could use an Int+Con option to make them the best Swordmages, or maybe an Int+Cha option for Feylock.
Shifters already have variant of the stat choice. It's be nice to choose stats and encounter power separately perhaps.
Not sure about the rest.Last edited by Excession; 2010-08-12 at 12:39 AM.
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2010-08-12, 12:23 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
Actually, the preview says it's Con + (Str or Wis).
According to someone who's seen the new Essentials, the other known ones are:
Halfling: Dex + (Cha or Con)
Elf: Dex + (Int or Wis)
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2010-08-12, 12:38 AM (ISO 8601)
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2010-08-12, 12:42 AM (ISO 8601)
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2010-08-12, 12:52 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
Aside from "have fun", i think the key to GMing is putting your players into situations where they need to make a choice that has no perfect outcome available. They will hate you for it, but they will be back at the table session after session.
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2010-08-12, 02:03 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
I think it's a wonderful idea. I know there are some races I really enjoy playing (Deva) and others I'm not so hot on (Dwarf). Yet, sometimes the Dwarf is just the optimal race. By giving more flexibility, it allows players to more often select a race that makes sense for fluff and roleplaying purposes and not just stats.
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2010-08-12, 04:21 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (4.4)
I think it's an okay idea, decent but unimpressive.
I find that some people, particularly on the WOTC forums, vastly overstate the importance of a +1 bonus. I've heard people claim a rogue in unplayable with a race that doesn't boost dex. In practice, this matters so little that it's barely even noticeable. Sure, you don't want a rogue with 10 dex because you'll end up missing a lot. But it's very viable to end up with 16, 17, or 18 dex on a race that doesn't boost it.
A useful racial power strikes me as more important than just a +1. So yeah, gnomes make good rogues, and elves make good fighters.Guide to the Magus, the Pathfinder Gish class.
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2010-08-12, 05:26 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (4.4)
Even better? A gnome that gets the option to have the boost to Dex, so they get the good power and stat boost. That's why I like this change.
However, I do think that the +1 is extremely important, as each +1 really adds up. Take a starting 18 vs. 20... then it comes time to choose a weapon. The 18 will have to choose a +3 prof. bonus weapon to try to keep their attack bonus up or risk falling behind even further... which is very frustrating at a table. Yes, the 18 will excel in other areas, but combat tends to be the most important thing in D&D.Thank you Ceika for the wonderful Avatar avatar!
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2010-08-12, 05:50 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (4.4)
Yes, combat is very important in most 4E campaigns.
There are three things to realize:
(1) there are multiple ways to get +1 bonuses;
(2) while getting none of them is a bad idea, getting all of them isn't necessary;
(3) each of those comes at an opportunity cost; what are you giving up for this, and is it worth it?
Suppose you're making a fighter...
- You can be an eladrin. That means you're giving up a +1 (because your race doesn't have a strength bonus) in exchange for teleportation. That strikes me as a fair trade.
- You can decide to use a longspear. You're giving up a +1 in exchange for reach. Also a fair trade.
- You can wield a khopesh. Now you're giving up a +1 in exchange for brutal-1. If you do the math, that's not such a good idea, really.
- You can lower your strength to boost charisma: you trade +1 to hit for a +1 on diplomacy. As you're likely going to make many more attack rolls than diplomacy checks, this is not such a good trade-off either.
- You can take weapon ex at level 1, or you can take another feat. There are some good trade-offs; you'll probably pick up weapon ex eventually, but it needn't be at level 1.
A fighter can have +10 to-hit at level 1 if he wants to. Lowering this in exchange for a cool ability is a good idea; lowering this in exchange for a small bonus to some skills or defenses is not such a good idea, mechanically speaking.Guide to the Magus, the Pathfinder Gish class.
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2010-08-12, 08:38 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
RE: The importance of that +5 bonus. Heh. Our gaming group is talking about playing against this trope next time we remake characters. What we were talking about was that you couldn't play a race/class combination that could start with a 20 in its primary stat (we haven't decided what this would mean for a human) or easily start with an 18 in both key stats. I'm not sure *how* seriously it's being taken but it has come up more than once.
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2010-08-12, 08:56 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
Guide to the Magus, the Pathfinder Gish class.
"I would really like to see a game made by Obryn, Kurald Galain, and Knaight from these forums. I'm not joking one bit. I would buy the hell out of that." -- ChubbyRain
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2010-08-12, 09:51 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
A fine HR if people are routinely taking double 18's or single 20's in your game. So far, my players have preferred building around different criteria (racial powers, feat choices, Rule of Cool) so I haven't seen much stagnation.
Anyhoo, the more I hear about the flexible racial modifiers, the more I like them. The Eladrin choice (+Int, +Dex/Cha) seems quite appropriate as well - although I suspect there will be very few Int/Dex Eladrin in 4.4Lead Designer for Oracle Hunter GamesToday a Blog, Tomorrow a Business!
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Elflad
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2010-08-12, 10:31 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
{Scrubbed}
Last edited by Roland St. Jude; 2010-08-12 at 11:21 AM.
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2010-08-12, 11:05 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
Last edited by Roland St. Jude; 2010-08-12 at 12:20 PM.
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Elflad
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2010-08-12, 11:47 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
Ooh, I hadn't thought of that. Thanks, I'll be stealing it. *Yoink*
And I'll reiterate why I think 4.4 is poor terminology, which is because traditionally numerical changes in naming for D&D have been used for different, incompatible editions, see 3.0, 3.5, and Pathfinder (3.75). DDE, however, is within the same edition and compatible with the books before it.Thanks to Elrond for the Vash avatar.
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2010-08-12, 12:00 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
3.0 and 3.5 (and 3.5 and PF) are mostly inter-compatible, though, or at least reverse-engineerable from one to the other. There are a few exceptions, but a good majority of 3.0 material can be imported into 3.5 games without significant modifications. Your point stands better for the X.0 numbering (2E versus 3E, or 3E vs. 4E) - those are fundamentally incompatible rulesets.
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2010-08-12, 12:08 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
Last edited by Reverent-One; 2010-08-12 at 12:08 PM.
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2010-08-12, 12:52 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
The comparison isn't between full compatibility and partial compatibility, but compatibility at all and incompatibility, as you originally argued. A 3.0 class can be used in 3.5 with minimal alteration (Saving throw progressions or class skills would be the likely victims), and it would be almost as simple to reverse-engineer 3.5 material into a 3.0 format. You could even have them exist side-by-side, such as a "Packmaster" 3.0 druid with a large number of weak animal companions and a "Beastmaster" 3.5 druid with a single improving companion. Similarly, as far as I understand, it'd be perfectly workable to include a 4E Rogue and a 4.4/Essentials Thief in the same party, though their roles overlap.
Their material uses the same core ruleset, so they can share a numerical identifier designation. This is the meaning of the 3.0/3.5 labelings - two sets of rules that are, while different, sufficiently similar to work alongside each other or replace each other interchangably. 4E classes/powers can be used in 4.4 without problem, and anyone wishing to run a 4E 'classic' game with 4.4 classes shouldn't have more than superficial problems.
You could not do this with truly imcompatible rulesets, such as a 2E Thief and a 3E Rogue. They cannot exist side-by-side without massive, significant modifications, so a simple ".x" divider is insufficient to label them.Last edited by The Glyphstone; 2010-08-12 at 12:53 PM.
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2010-08-12, 01:08 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
I originally argued that they were incompatiable, with no specification of how incompatible. And since if two things are only partially compatible, then they are also partially incompatible, my statement is still correct.
While you can use 3.0 and 3.5 material side by side, doing so is houseruling, not RAW. For example, if you're playing a 3.5 game as a wizard, you can't simply take the 3.0 version of the Fly spell. Because, as you said, 3.0 and 3.5 material is different, while this is not the case between "4.0" and "4.4" material anymore than 3.5 material is different from other 3.5 material. You are also correct that "anyone wishing to run a 4E 'classic' game with 4.4 classes shouldn't have more than superficial problems", because they will have no problems at all.Thanks to Elrond for the Vash avatar.
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2010-08-12, 01:20 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
Maybe the druid was a bad example then, because it's been updated/replaced, as the fly spell has. But it's not houseruling to use 3.0 material that hasn't been updated (the Knock-down feat comes to mind, out of the SRD, or the Lasher PrC for someone who likes whip-fighters), because of that specific clause in the 3.5 books (quoted earlier) that declares them to be backward-forward compatible.
Mind you, I can't stand 4E, and I doubt this 'update' will be any better no matter what it's called. But I can see calling it 4.4 as valid of terminology as any other given name for it, greatly for the reasons given - it doesn't invalidate any old material the way 3.5 did for 3.0, but does fundamentally alter the course and design philosophy of its own material and likely anything printed afterwards.NOW COMPLETE: Let's Play Starcraft II Trilogy:
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2010-08-12, 01:29 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
Except that the fact that some 3.0 material can't be used without houseruling means that said 3.0 material is incompatible with the 3.5 material. Does that make 3.0 and 3.5 as incompatiable as 2nd and 3rd edtion? No, but there still is some incompatibility. Without which incompatibilty, we wouldn't need the 3.0 and 3.5 monikers. And so we arrive at my point, as "4.0" and "4.4" has no such incompatibily.
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2010-08-12, 01:59 PM (ISO 8601)
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2010-08-12, 02:03 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
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2010-08-12, 02:46 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
I've seen it shorthanded as 4EE as well.
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2010-08-12, 03:20 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
Meme battle is on!
However, you have to compete with DichlorodiphenylDichloroEthylene, Dynamic Data Exchange, a certain Norwegian rockband, and more importantly D&D Encounters.
This is why WOTC should really have called it D&D Fundamentals, or D&D Generics, or D&D Masterwork; that way everybody could simply use 4F, 4G or 4M instead.Guide to the Magus, the Pathfinder Gish class.
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2010-08-12, 03:28 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: [4e] New racial attribute bonuses (Essentials)
Well, as long as it's not confusing within the RPG context, it's a good label. Admittedly, I don't know how popular D&D Encounters are (I always felt they were kind of silly) so if it gets discontinued, I'm totally asserting DDE as the chosen short-form.
In the alternative, we could go DD-ES, but 4.4 really is just a much more convenient form. 4F, of course, is very similar to "4-F," a classification used by the US military for someone sufficiently "defective" to be free of conscription.Lead Designer for Oracle Hunter GamesToday a Blog, Tomorrow a Business!
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