Speed for 5e Centuar Race: 40 or 50 feet?

[HopelessGM]

So I'm planning on starting a Greek mythology campaign, and I'm working on gathering races that would fit such a setting. Mostly I'm just re-skinning pre-existing races, ex. Wood Elves as Satyrs and Dragonborn as Spartoi, or else just finding other people's homebrew if existing classes don't fit.

I have been rather dissatisfied with homebrew designs for Centuars as a race, so I've decided to make my own that fits my thoughts on what should draw players to this race. The one thing I'm really stuck on, prompting the title of this thread, is what to set the base speed of Centuars to. I've seen most people with some exception set speed to 40 ft, but looking at the Monster Manual I see that Centuars have a speed of 50 ft, and war horses and riding horses have a speed of 60 ft. Now, a natural player speed of 60 ft seems ridiculous to me, but I'm not completely unsold on the idea of 50 ft.

On one hand, I feel like 50 speed gives possibly too much of an advantage over other players, especially depending on whatever I plan to make the stat score increase. On the other hand, I feel like the major gimmick of playing a literal horse person would be having high enough speed that you don't need to worry about having a mount and because the centuar race would be effectively "large" (in the way the Goliath class is "large" while still being a medium creature), it's speed as a quadrapedal creature should outperform that of a bipedal large creature like cyclops. On the other OTHER hand, the draft horse has 40 ft speed, and the Goliath doesn't get a speed bonus despite it's effectively large build.

So what are your thoughts? Is 50 ft speed too unbalanced, or does 40 ft speed undermine the concept of the race too much?

[Flashy]

It depends what other features you give them. If they're picking up a normal +2/+1 split on their ability scores, a couple moderate to minor features, and 50' speed then it's probably fine. If it's speed increase AND other substantial features then it might turn out to be too much.

[HopelessGM]

It depends what other features you give them. If they're picking up a normal +2/+1 split on their ability scores, a couple moderate to minor features, and 50' speed then it's probably fine. If it's speed increase AND other substantial features then it might turn out to be too much.

Other than speed, I'm planning on having better carrying capacity, the ability for other players to ride a centuar player as an independent mount, and a requirement to use barding instead of regular armor, as well as maybe hooves as a natural weapon.

[BobMacBobson]

Would the speed stack with class speed buffs? ie if you go with 50ft, a barbarian centaur would move 60ft (which is still manegable, Fly is a 3rd level spell and gives you 60ft flying); but a high level monk would go 80ft, or 160ft if they dash. That seems a bit much, maybe. (Though, to be fair, the difference between going 80ft and 70ft a turn might not matter that much).

[Ninja_Prawn]

Other than speed, I'm planning on having better carrying capacity, the ability for other players to ride a centuar player as an independent mount, and a requirement to use barding instead of regular armor, as well as maybe hooves as a natural weapon.

Offhand, let's sketch out some points...

ASIs: 3
Powerful Build: 0.5
Large size: 0.5?
Increased armour costs: -0.5
50ft speed: 2
1d6 Natural Weapon: 1

Total: 6.5ish

That seems like it would be okay; there's probably room for a third language if you're thinking Common/Elvish/Sylvan. The biggest problem is not the speed, but the size. Dealing with the Large size and all the attendant issues is a minefield that I've seen a lot of people struggle with. I've yet to see anyone handle it well.

[Edge]

That seems like it would be okay; there's probably room for a third language if you're thinking Common/Elvish/Sylvan. The biggest problem is not the speed, but the size. Dealing with the Large size and all the attendant issues is a minefield that I've seen a lot of people struggle with. I've yet to see anyone handle it well.

Random spitballing: whilst centaurs might be Large-sized overall, their humanoid portion isn't usually any larger than the waist-up of an actual human. Maybe the best solution would be to have them be Large-sized (for space and such), but only have the reach and weapon-wielding capabilities of a Medium creature?

[GalacticAxekick]

Random spitballing: whilst centaurs might be Large-sized overall, their humanoid portion isn't usually any larger than the waist-up of an actual human. Maybe the best solution would be to have them be Large-sized (for space and such), but only have the reach and weapon-wielding capabilities of a Medium creature?

5e doesn't base reach or weapon-wielding on size, if I recall. Large creatures like ogres sometime double the size of their weapon dice (2d8+Str instead of 1d8+Str, for instance), but there's no rule that large wielders or large weapons must do this: that's just how the specific creature works.

A player race being large just means that they occupy more space, that they are more difficult to grapple, and I think that they can carry a heavier load.

[Edge]

5e doesn't base reach or weapon-wielding on size, if I recall. Large creatures like ogres sometime double the size of their weapon dice (2d8+Str instead of 1d8+Str, for instance), but there's no rule that large wielders or large weapons must do this: that's just how the specific creature works.

A player race being large just means that they occupy more space, that they are more difficult to grapple, and I think that they can carry a heavier load.

The general assumption for monsters that wield weapons is they get extra dice of damage with weapons appropriately sized for them:

If a monster wields a manufactured weapon, it deals damage appropriate to the weapon. For example, a greataxe in the hands of a Medium monster deals 1d12 slashing damage plus the monster's Strength modifier, as is normal for that weapon.

Big monsters typically wield oversized weapons that deal extra dice of damage on a hit. Double the weapon dice if the creature is Large, triple the weapon dice if it's Huge, and quadruple the weapon dice if it's Gargantuan. For example, a Huge giant wielding an appropriately sized greataxe deals 3d12 slashing damage (plus its Strength bonus), instead of the normal 1d12.

Player characters rendered Large (such as by enlarge person usually get +1d4 damage on all weapon attacks. I don't think it's unreasonable to include a trait or clause to specify that a Large centaur PC wouldn't gain either one of these benefits.

[HopelessGM]

Offhand, let's sketch out some points...

ASIs: 3
Powerful Build: 0.5
Large size: 0.5?
Increased armour costs: -0.5
50ft speed: 2
1d6 Natural Weapon: 1

Total: 6.5ish

That seems like it would be okay; there's probably room for a third language if you're thinking Common/Elvish/Sylvan. The biggest problem is not the speed, but the size. Dealing with the Large size and all the attendant issues is a minefield that I've seen a lot of people struggle with. I've yet to see anyone handle it well.

In terms of dealing with the large typing, I would just call it a medium creature but give it traits advertising it as a large creature, such as increased carrying capacity and being considered large in the case of grapples and the like, as is done with the Goliath in the Elemental Evil supplement.

Thanks a ton for summing up the reasonability of the traits, by the way. That's especially helpful to me for the sake of balancing.