I've always felt the Barbarian's Trap Sense ability seemed a bit tacked on and didn't feel very barbaric to me. I was looking through the Unearthed Arcana's different totems for Barbarians and at some of the alternate class features in the "Races of" books, and thought it might be fun to come up with some alternatives to Trap Sense.
Irongut Barbarian: +1 to Fortitude saves vs. poison and disease every 3 levels.
Strongheart Barbarian: +1 vs. fear effects every 3 levels.
Determined Barbarian: +1 vs. charms and compulsions every 3 levels.
Hunter Barbarian: +1 to Survival checks to track every 3 levels.
Aware Barbarian: +1 dodge bonus to AC vs Attacks of Opportunity and to avoid confirming a critical hit.
Steady Barbarian: +1 to CMD every 3 levels.
Dodgy Barbarian: +1 dodge bonus to touch AC every 3 levels.
Have you seen my barbarian rebuild yet? Just scrap it and never look back I say ... ;-)
one thing you could also do is give them an intimation bonus of one every 3 levels.
I like the cold resistance bit. I can also see other alternate builds giving fire resistance, or maybe bonuses to Con checks for holding your breath or surviving extreme weather, etc. etc.
I'm not sure an Intimidate bonus fits the general flavor of a defense of some kind.
I think it should be a minor bonus that is somewhat situational.
Personally, I always thought the only problem with trap sense was the same problem with their DR, it didn't do enough to be significant. So I always contemplated dropping trap sense for more DR.
However these are interesting ideas.
Personally, I always thought the only problem with trap sense was the same problem with their DR, it didn't do enough to be significant. So I always contemplated dropping trap sense for more DR.
However these are interesting ideas.
Yeah, I think the designers were a little wary of giving out DR/- to a player character class initially, so they only gave out a tiny little bit to see what would happen. In later products, they gave it out a lot earlier (DR 1/- at 3rd level to Tough Heroes in d20 Modern, DR 1/cold iron at 4th level to Warlocks in Complete Arcane).
My games use very little traps and we don't really care about them and feel the barbarian is a little weak so to add to his "incredible resilience/toughness' theme, we just replaced it by the more powerful energy resistance (each +1 beign a point of resistance), and called it Elemental body +1 (+2, etc, up to +6)
My games use very little traps and we don't really care about them and feel the barbarian is a little weak so to add to his "incredible resilience/toughness' theme, we just replaced it by the more powerful energy resistance (each +1 beign a point of resistance), and called it Elemental body +1 (+2, etc, up to +6)
Like, +1 on saves vs. acid, cold, electricity, fire, and sonic?
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Personally, I always thought the only problem with trap sense was the same problem with their DR, it didn't do enough to be significant. So I always contemplated dropping trap sense for more DR.
However these are interesting ideas.
How is the DR not significant? Considering how many attacks they receive, it saves a lot of damage over the course of a gaming session.
How is the DR not significant? Considering how many attacks they receive, it saves a lot of damage over the course of a gaming session.Personally, I always thought the only problem with trap sense was the same problem with their DR, it didn't do enough to be significant. So I always contemplated dropping trap sense for more DR.
However these are interesting ideas.
I just ran a 12th level session, and one PC (Fighter 4/Rogue 4/Teflon Shadowlord 4) was able to jump or teleport an opponent and cause upwards of 150 points of damage with a single hit--more with power attack, so DR 5/- can seem insignificant at times.
Maybe a once per rage ability to multiply your DR by 5 or 10 for 1 round or against 1 attack as a immediate action would be cool. "Shrug it off" or something like that. Maybe as a 12th level ability.
My games use very little traps and we don't really care about them and feel the barbarian is a little weak so to add to his "incredible resilience/toughness' theme, we just replaced it by the more powerful energy resistance (each +1 beign a point of resistance), and called it Elemental body +1 (+2, etc, up to +6)Like, +1 on saves vs. acid, cold, electricity, fire, and sonic?
Nope, it means every round you can substract up to the designated amount from the total energy damage received (and not from every hit). It's true I kinda butchered the explanation.
Instead of trap sense+1, the barbarian gets
Cold resistance 1, Fire resistance 1, etc
Meaning every round he will substract said amount from the damage received in the round (and NOT per hit).
I just ran a 12th level session, and one PC (Fighter 4/Rogue 4/Teflon Shadowlord 4) was able to jump or teleport an opponent and cause upwards of 150 points of damage with a single hit--more with power attack, so DR 5/- can seem insignificant at times.
Yeah, DR has the same problems as blasts: It's only good against weak enemies. It has its uses, when you're storming up a mountain to take on the general of a hill giant army, getting DR 5/- against the ogre warriors' 2d6 longbows can be huge.
However, I think DR x/- should be broader. I'll let the barbarian get it against any effects that aren't force effects, effectively granting him fire/cold/acid and so on resistance equal to his DR. It's still a pretty measly amount, but could do some good against Scorching Ray.
I think energy resistance 5 vs a single energy type at 3rd, 6th, 9th, etc., upto 30 at 18th level, wouldn't be unbalancing.
Danger Sense : +1 bonus to Initiative and Reflexes every 3 levels.
Feral Senses : +1 bonus to Perception every 3 levels.
Feral Defense : +1 bonus to AC and Reflexes every 3 levels.
Danger Sense : +1 bonus to Initiative and Reflexes every 3 levels.
Feral Senses : +1 bonus to Perception every 3 levels.
Feral Defense : +1 bonus to AC and Reflexes every 3 levels.
Maybe +1 to Perception checks to avoid being surprised and Initiative, but some of your other ones are a bit powerful, as they are "always on."
Irongut Barbarian: +1 to Fortitude saves vs. poison and disease every 3 levels.
A good incremental situation bonus, in theme with the class.
Strongheart Barbarian: +1 vs. fear effects every 3 levels.
A good incremental situation bonus, in theme with the class.
Determined Barbarian: +1 vs. charms and compulsions every 3 levels.
I don't really feel that this is in theme with the class, and if anything was added in as a defense against one of the barbarian's weaknesses.
Hunter Barbarian: +1 to Survival checks to track every 3 levels.
Not a bad skill bonus. I don't necessarily think of barbarians as composed trackers, but they do have sort of an "ultimate survivalist" theme, so I think this works. The progress is less than the ranger's track bonus which I think is good too.
Aware Barbarian: +1 dodge bonus to AC vs Attacks of Opportunity and to avoid confirming a critical hit.
I think these bonuses combined are a bit too good. I would either scrap this bonus, or just give them the AoO bonus which would be consistent with their Uncanny Dodge ability.
Steady Barbarian: +1 to CMD every 3 levels.
Its likely inevitable that barbarians at some time are going to drop the gloves and grapple. I always felt that a grapple aspect was missing from them, and with fewer feats to choose from than Fighters, its often a hard decision whether to pick up any of the feats that help them with CMB and CMD. I would like to see this ability to add +1 to both CMD and CMB, but that would be too good.
Dodgy Barbarian: +1 dodge bonus to touch AC every 3 levels.
I think this would also be against the theme of the barbarian. They typically want to get close and skirmish. I don't really see them as being adept at specifically avoiding touch attacks.
Overall, I think most are some really good options. Trap Sense definately should have been dropped from the class, as it doesn't really fit the theme well, and my experience with player's playing characters with trap sense, is that usually they forget to add in the bonus the few times that it could be used.
Or just +1 vs spells, this is out of the complete mage (or arcane, i forget which). it's what i take, most of the time, for my rogues too.
On Determined Barbarian, I think it could fit with the class's theme. They get a bonus on Will saves while raging, after all.
The reason they get the bonus while raging, is because they are caught up in such a focused, savage fury, that such mind effects are harder to affect them with. If this bonus was only available while the barbarian was raging, then it would be in theme -- otherwise it's just a cheezy attempt to take away one of the designed weaknesses of the class.
On Determined Barbarian, I think it could fit with the class's theme. They get a bonus on Will saves while raging, after all.The reason they get the bonus while raging, is because they are caught up in such a focused, savage fury, that such mind effects are harder to affect them with. If this bonus was only available while the barbarian was raging, then it would be in theme -- otherwise it's just a cheezy attempt to take away one of the designed weaknesses of the class.
Thanks for all the great comments!!! My intention was to replace one situational defensive ability with another situational defensive ability. If barbarians in your games are constantly making Will Saves against charms and compulsions, then the Determined option is too powerful. Ideally, the options provided should NOT be a no-brainer. The options should provide a difficult choice for the player; ideally, different players of barbarians will make different decisions and some differentiation can be made between Barbarians A and B. The various rage powers also help make different barbarians, um, different. Which is cool.