Most humanoid races, apart from humans who form the baseline, have Keen Senses giving them boni to Perception checks when relating to two senses. Halflings, however, have a +2 bonus only to sound-based Perception checks and Half-Orcs don’t have the Keen Senses ability at all.
I would suggest giving the Halflings another +2 bonus to taste-based Perception checks, because it fills the flavor of the Halfling, maintains consistency of the Keen Senses ability of giving a +2 bonus to two senses and does not make a big difference in terms of power-level, as taste-based Perception checks are liable to be made very seldom indeed.
Half-Orcs also deserve the Keen Senses ability. Half-Orcs are not exactly overpowered, and flavor-wise, the best explanation for their somewhat dubious +2 to Wisdom (though Wisdom is still the most appropriate mental score to give them a bonus to, because the others don’t fit at all) is their ability to sense things around them. I would imagine it would befit Half-Orcs to have a particularly good sense of smell and hearing, thus their Keen Senses could give them a +2 bonus to both sound-based and smell-based Perception checks.
Agreed.
Half-Orcs have pointy ears that seem good for hearing, and Smell would be a perfect fit as well.
One more Halfing bonus, I don't really care one way or the other...
One more Halfing bonus, I don't really care one way or the other...
Taste, of course! Why do you think they eat so many meals every day!
Agreed.
Half-Orcs have pointy ears that seem good for hearing, and Smell would be a perfect fit as well.One more Halfing bonus, I don't really care one way or the other...
As to the Halfling bonus, it is mostly for the sake of consistency of the Keen Senses ability, which grants two bonuses in every other case. Luckily, Taste-based Perception bonus is pretty incosequential and fits the flavor of the Halfling.
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You know I had not really even considered those ideas, but that is a a fantastic idea. The halfling taste bonus just makes sense. It makes it consistent, and could be fun. I can definitely see halfling rogues using taste to test poisons :) lol
And Half Orcs really make sense to have smell and hearing. When the Monsters of Pathfinder comes out the Orcs should have that as well. It makes them seem more bestial. The power boost is minimal and really adds more flavor than crunch.
I must confess, my "taste" suggestion was a little biased by my infamous halfling commoner PC, who is a master baker. Glad there's some consensus.
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Halflings had a +2 to Listen under 3.5, which translates as a +2 bonus to sound-based Perception checks. That being said, I can see a +2 taste-based Perception bonus as entirely appropriate, as well as the bonus to smell-based checks for Half-Orcs. Don't know about the Half-Orcs and good hearing, though.
I have to admit, I HATE having to keep track of different senses separately; it defeats the whole purpose of consolidating Perception into one skill. If Listen and Spot and Taste are all treated as separate skills, then just separate them and give everyone more skill points.
As a houserule, I give races with at least 2 senses with bonuses a flat +2 to Perception rolls. Then I don't have to treat it as six different skills.
I agree 97%. I don't think consistency is a particularly good reason to give Halfings +2 to taste, but it does make sense for them to have it. And the half-orc has had that coming for a long long time.
I have to admit, I HATE having to keep track of different senses separately; it defeats the whole purpose of consolidating Perception into one skill. If Listen and Spot and Taste are all treated as separate skills, then just separate them and give everyone more skill points.
I actually feel exactly the opposite. I really like the idea of consolidating skills that would almost always be taken together anyway (seriously, why would an adventurer train themselves to hear really well but not see really well?) and them giving advantages to some uses of those skills based on special circumstances.
Speaking of which, it might be nice to have a Skill Focus-type feat that lets you add +4 to one use of a skill which advances to +8 at 10th level, so if you wanted to have particularly good eyes but more average ears, you could do that, but the average adventurer isn't stuck spending twice as many skill points.
For me, the test lies not in whether the change is equivalent to the other races, nor whether it's useful or whatever...
The fact is, when the half orc in the party is most likely to start sniffling and asks "do you smell something?" that just feels right.
Mmm, same sort of thing,
I can see a Half-Orc Barbarian twitching and swivelling his pointy 'lupine' ears around as he catches fragments of suspicious sounds moving around in the trees above.
The fact is, when the half orc in the party is most likely to start sniffling and asks "do you smell something?" that just feels right.
Fruitcake? Is it fruitcake? Please let it be fruitcake. You can use it as a d8/x3 throwing weapon, you know.
Well an adventurer who just happens to be color blind, or perhaps near sighted or has astigmatism or lost an eye in a fight just might be able to hear just fine...
Those are genetic defects, not a lack of training, and modeling them would require a Flaw system that D&D doesn't (but perhaps should) have. If anything, a colorblind adventurer would especially want to train their visual acuity so as to not be at a potentially deadly disadvantage.
Indeed - the flavor of an ability is just as crucial as its gameplay effects.
Halflings having a bonus to taste? That seems reasonable. The same applies to Half-Orcs having a bonus to smell and taste.
Agreed.
Half-Orcs have pointy ears that seem good for hearing, and Smell would be a perfect fit as well.
Agreee, fits the bestial aspect of them.
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I'm sorry to join this party late - but I wanted to express the silliness IMO of this consideration:
Personally I think the Percpetion skill being broken down into so many senses seems ridiculously silly. I know it carries with it a modicum of verisimilitude - but when you get down to the facts, Spot and Listen were two different skills that were combined for a number of reasons including the sheer simplicity of it.
If we now have to keep track of four or five different sets of circumstances and modifiers, it completely defeats the efforts taken to simplify the system.
Do I think that it makes sense to have different aspects of the skill? Sure. But personally trading in the realism for the purpose of simplicity just makes sense quite often; the hit point system is perfect example of this; and to simply recomplicate a system that was recently simplified seems backwards to me.
Why not just keep spot and listen seperate and add the others? I dont want to have to keep track of so many different situation and circumstantial bonuses for all my creatures, and being sure that the players are keeping it all straight too.
I say give a bonus to races that deserve a bonus - and just make perception and overall perception. Is it perfect? no. Does it make pragmatic sense. Absolutely.
Robert
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Well an adventurer who just happens to be color blind, or perhaps near sighted or has astigmatism or lost an eye in a fight just might be able to hear just fine...Those are genetic defects, not a lack of training, and modeling them would require a Flaw system that D&D doesn't (but perhaps should) have. If anything, a colorblind adventurer would especially want to train their visual acuity so as to not be at a potentially deadly disadvantage.
You are right D&D does not deal with genetics... but these are not actually genetics per se. And since D&D does not really deal with this concept, these ideas still explain why an adventurer would not be equal in all senses.
You can train all you want... but if ya got one eye you will never see as well as someone with two. If you are near sighted, then unless you are wearing glasses you will never see as well as an adventurer with 20/20 vision. If you bleed from one ear all the time cause the ear drum was ruptured when the dragon slapped ya up side the head, then you just are not going to hear as well. That has nothing to do with genetics...
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I'm sorry to join this party late - but I wanted to express the silliness IMO of this consideration:
Personally I think the Percpetion skill being broken down into so many senses seems ridiculously silly. I know it carries with it a modicum of verisimilitude - but when you get down to the facts, Spot and Listen were two different skills that were combined for a number of reasons including the sheer simplicity of it.
If we now have to keep track of four or five different sets of circumstances and modifiers, it completely defeats the efforts taken to simplify the system.
Do I think that it makes sense to have different aspects of the skill? Sure. But personally trading in the realism for the purpose of simplicity just makes sense quite often; the hit point system is perfect example of this; and to simply recomplicate a system that was recently simplified seems backwards to me.
Why not just keep spot and listen seperate and add the others? I dont want to have to keep track of so many different situation and circumstantial bonuses for all my creatures, and being sure that the players are keeping it all straight too.
I say give a bonus to races that deserve a bonus - and just make perception and overall perception. Is it perfect? no. Does it make pragmatic sense. Absolutely.
Robert
I agree 100% No matter what they do in the final version in MY games all fifty perception subskills will be just one Perception check.
You are right D&D does not deal with genetics... but these are not actually genetics per se. And since D&D does not really deal with this concept, these ideas still explain why an adventurer would not be equal in all senses.
You can train all you want... but if ya got one eye you will never see as well as someone with two. If you are near sighted, then unless you are wearing glasses you will never see as well as an adventurer with 20/20 vision. If you bleed from one ear all the time cause the ear drum was ruptured when the dragon slapped ya up side the head, then you just are not going to hear as well. That has nothing to do with genetics...
That still has nothing to do with the training side of it. If you burst an ear drum, that's a circumstance penalty, not a reduction in your maximum number of skill ranks.
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I like these keen senses bonuses, and I don't find them any harder to apply than any other circumstance bonus, like Dwarves' bonus against poison etc. I think they add a little bit of colour to the game at minimal cost.
The Rambling Scribe
But that bonus to poison is always stagnant.
What if the dwarf's bonus was:
"The dwarf is a hardy individual and resistant to most poisons and toxins and usually receives a bonus to their saving throws against it. Against poisons from spiders, however the dwarf is not so lucky and receives no bonus. All other poisons that are injected, the dwarf gains a +2 to their save; unless the poison is a mentally incapacitating one, then he receives only a +1. If the poison comes from a magical source, he receives a +3 bonus. Poisons that are swallowed, the dwarf actually receives a +4 bonus due to their propensity for eating foods and drink that would bowl over most other people. Dwarves receives a +3 bonus to poisons that they breathe, due to their dimished olfactory department. All poisons not listed above would receive a +2 bonus to the save unless the poison comes from a plant, in which case it's a +3; unless the plant is from a tropical region, in which case, the bonus is +4."
Robert
I like these keen senses bonuses, and I don't find them any harder to apply than any other circumstance bonus, like Dwarves' bonus against poison etc. I think they add a little bit of colour to the game at minimal cost.
The Rambling Scribe
But that bonus to poison is always stagnant.
What if the dwarf's bonus was:
"The dwarf is a hardy individual and resistant to most poisons and toxins and usually receives a bonus to their saving throws against it. Against poisons from spiders, however the dwarf is not so lucky and receives no bonus. All other poisons that are injected, the dwarf gains a +2 to their save; unless the poison is a mentally incapacitating one, then he receives only a +1. If the poison comes from a magical source, he receives a +3 bonus. Poisons that are swallowed, the dwarf actually receives a +4 bonus due to their propensity for eating foods and drink that would bowl over most other people. Dwarves receives a +3 bonus to poisons that they breathe, due to their dimished olfactory department. All poisons not listed above would receive a +2 bonus to the save unless the poison comes from a plant, in which case it's a +3; unless the plant is from a tropical region, in which case, the bonus is +4."
Robert
Wow - hyperbole much?
I'll admit I've never DM'd, and I can see how it could get complicated to keep track of all the NPC bonuses. But as a player, when the GM asks for a fort save, I *always* as "is it poison?" (with a very hopeful grin!) and if it were only against tropical plants, I would ask for clarification there too. :-)
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Wow - hyperbole much?
He's my best friend.
I'll admit I've never DM'd, and I can see how it could get complicated to keep track of all the NPC bonuses. But as a player, when the GM asks for a fort save, I *always* ask "is it poison?" (with a very hopeful grin!) and if it were only against tropical plants, I would ask for clarification there too. :-)
That being said - I'm not sure if its fair to call my post hyperbole - considering the skill in question takes up a full page and a half of test to remember and apply.
Giving each race various bonuses to each type of sese, is not much different than applying situationally different saving throw bonuses against something as simple as poison - as I described. Sure it can be justified and may be more realistic that certain poisons may be easier to resist than others - but is it really pragmatic to take something so simple and complicate it so?
You may have seen my response as hyperbole - and perhaps it was a bit - but I found the suggestion that likens a simple bonus to poison to the various senses bonuses throughout the book to be an unfair comparison by nature - which is what I was trying to illustrate.
Is the senses bonuses a game-breaker? No. Will the game still be enjoyable? Absolutely, and I'll still love to play - but my opinions of this issue is that its going in the wrong direction - ESPECIALLY when you consider that the two skills (spot, listen) were combined to make things simpler - and now they're more complicated than they were to begin with.
Robert
That being said - I'm not sure if its fair to call my post hyperbole - considering the skill in question takes up a full page and a half of test to remember and apply.
I'm sorry, I don't quite understand what you mean?
Giving each race various bonuses to each type of sese, is not much different than applying situationally different saving throw bonuses against something as simple as poison - as I described. Sure it can be justified and may be more realistic that certain poisons may be easier to resist than others - but is it really pragmatic to take something so simple and complicate it so?
You may have seen my response as hyperbole - and perhaps it was a bit - but I found the suggestion that likens a simple bonus to poison to the various senses bonuses throughout the book to be an unfair comparison by nature - which is what I was trying to illustrate.
My apologies, I must have missed that you were referencing someone else's comparison - I'm sorry! That'll teach me to pay better attention to ALL the comments in a thread! ~grin~
I guess, what really stuck out to me, is that it just doesn't seem as hugely complicated as you feel it is. I agree that it's a little illogical to consolidate things and then split them out again... but it just makes *sense* to me that the halfling is the one most likely to taste the poison in the wine, while the half-orc is the one most likely to smell fire burning that-a-way. ~shrug~
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That being said - I'm not sure if its fair to call my post hyperbole - considering the skill in question takes up a full page and a half of test to remember and apply.I'm sorry, I don't quite understand what you mean?
I meant to say "page and a half of text" not test. My point is - calling my response hyperbole is perhaps accurate - but since the skill takes up so much space just to describe all the nuances, and having to remember all the various potential circumstances and modifiers, making hyperbolic comments is IMO no less verbose than the skill as written to begin with.
Giving each race various bonuses to each type of sese, is not much different than applying situationally different saving throw bonuses against something as simple as poison - as I described. Sure it can be justified and may be more realistic that certain poisons may be easier to resist than others - but is it really pragmatic to take something so simple and complicate it so?
You may have seen my response as hyperbole - and perhaps it was a bit - but I found the suggestion that likens a simple bonus to poison to the various senses bonuses throughout the book to be an unfair comparison by nature - which is what I was trying to illustrate.
My apologies, I must have missed that you were referencing someone else's comparison - I'm sorry! That'll teach me to pay better attention to ALL the comments in a thread! ~grin~I guess, what really stuck out to me, is that it just doesn't seem as hugely complicated as you feel it is. I agree that it's a little illogical to consolidate things and then split them out again... but it just makes *sense* to me that the halfling is the one most likely to taste the poison in the wine, while the half-orc is the one most likely to smell fire burning that-a-way. ~shrug~
Again - I'm not arguing that it makes sense to have one be better at one or the other - I'm arguing the fact that it doesn't seem worth the hassle of having such nuances and complications.
What makes sense is not always the most effective mechanic in the game.
Hit Points by far don't "make sense" but have been a staplepoint of the hobby throughout - and the pragmatism and easy of use to simply implement them as wounds for tracking overrides the needs to be realistic and make sense.
Robert
...Amazing this thread is still going :-) But, I was curious, doesn't everybody just play with their Skill list like this:
with a simple sub-skill denoting the modifier for a specific usage...?
as my example shows, there's plenty of situations where this applies, like the Class bonuses to specific aspects (Handle Animal, above, or Favored Enemies for Rangers), or other Racial Traits, like Stonesense for Dwarves... There's so many of these other "special" Skill Bonuses, that using them shouldn't seem like a problem...? I even usually list "alternate" Stat modifiers if they're common for the character, like from Rage.
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...Amazing this thread is still going :-) But, I was curious, doesn't everybody just play with their Skill list like this:
with a simple sub-skill denoting the modifier for a specific usage...?
as my example shows, there's plenty of situations where this applies, like the Class bonuses to specific aspects (Handle Animal, above, or Favored Enemies for Rangers), or other Racial Traits, like Stonesense for Dwarves... There's so many of these other "special" Skill Bonuses, that using them shouldn't seem like a problem...? I even usually list "alternate" Stat modifiers if they're common for the character, like from Rage.
Having space on the character sheet for sub-skills would rock my world. I usually have to squeeze them into parentheses, but yes, I try to list them.
And I think the OP's suggestion is characterful and balanced. Give the Half-Orc some love!
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I can just picture halflings licking things they encounter in a dungeon.
*sluuurp!* "Yup, that's a dragon!"
The halfling rogue in our party already does this. he's also managed to work into his background a way to identify things based on taste. mostly poisons and spices, but all the way up to certain kinds of paint. Fun character. Saved a king's life once by tasting his soup by mistake. new cook didn't know king was allergic to Cumin. and the black widow venom was probly a mistake...
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I'm not sure if spider venom is poisonous when ingested; it's an injury poison. You can eat scorpions, tail and all, without being poisoned because your body can digest the venom like any other protien. If you have a cut or the stinger pierces your throat, you're in trouble though. :O
Still, the cumin would probably have been enough. :)
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I'm not sure if spider venom is poisonous when ingested; it's an injury poison. You can eat scorpions, tail and all, without being poisoned because your body can digest the venom like any other protien. If you have a cut or the stinger pierces your throat, you're in trouble though. :O
Still, the cumin would probably have been enough. :)
huh. you learn something new everyday, eh? but the naming was probly due to my not being able to come up weith anything more exotic. otherwise, all poisons would suddenly become "generic contact poison C", or something of the like.
It's probably academic, but taste and smell are practically the same sense. It's not very logical to grant a bonus to one sense and not to the other. (Likewise, anosmia, which is an inability to smell, renders taste very difficult to experience.)