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So I was reading Lord of the Rings and Tolkien likes to bring up that elves are wise and dwarves are crafty. So how do people feel about switching the mental bonuses, giving +2 Int to dwarves and +2 wisdom to elves.
I see this encouraging dwarf wizards and magi, Wizard is a good crafting class so that fits.
It would encourage elven druids which seems to fit.
What do other people think about this? Are there other racial stat bonuses that could/should be moved around?
Personally, I think it's great. Your dwarves and elves will be a bit different than the Gygaxian. I don't really have anything further to say just yet, other than I like it.
I think everyone benefits from this sort of thing. I made a thread on something similar once. Its the threads one year anniversary too!
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So I decided to rebuild the core races that I use in my world. Do they look balanced? I fear I made orcs too good but that is partially balanced by the fact that no one likes orcs in game.
Dwergar
Dwegar, called dwarves by insensitive people, are a stout folk who live in the mountains enjoy mining, drinking, hitting things with axes et cetera. I really have not changed dwarven culture at all I just changed the name
Racial Traits
(0 RP) +2 Constitution, +2 Intelligence, –2 Charisma: Dwergar are both tough and wise, but also a bit gruff.
(0 RP) Medium: Dwergar are Medium creatures and receive no bonuses or penalties due to their size.
(-1 RP)Slow and Steady: Dwergar have a base speed of 20 feet, but their speed is never modified by armor or encumbrance.
(2 RP) Darkvision: Dvergar can see in the dark, darkvision 60ft. (only race with darkvision)
(1 RP) Low-Light Vision: Dvergar can see twice as far as humans in conditions of dim light.
(4 RP) Duergar Immunities: Members of this race are immune to paralysis, phantasms, and poison. They also gain a +2 racial bonus on saving throws against spells and spell-like abilities. This poison immunity means that while dwergar do get drunk they never get alcohol poisoning, never vomit, and never have hangovers. This makes partying with the Dwergar rather exhausting.
(0 RP) Languages: Dwergar begin play speaking Common and Dwergar. Dwergar with high Intelligence scores can choose from the following: Human, Orcish, Elven, Giant or Terran
(1 RP) Craftsman: Dwergar are known for their superior craftsmanship when it comes to metallurgy and stonework. Dvergar receive a +2 racial bonus on all Craft or Profession checks related to metal or stone.
(1 RP) Stability: Dwergar gain a +4 racial bonus to their Combat Maneuver Defense when resisting a bull rush or trip attempt while standing on the ground
(2 RP) Weapon Familiarity: Dvergar are proficient with battleaxes, heavy picks, and warhammers and treat the waraxe, direpick, and greathammer as martial weapons not exotic (strength requirements for proficient wielding remain).
Elves
In my campaign world elves have the oldest civilization which bears some remarkable similarities to some real world asian cultures. Elves have a very regimented societal structure based partially on the confucian ideal of filial piety with a hefty amount of Gerontocracy (age based hierarchy) thrown in to take advantage of their long life span (~500 yrs). The monk is primarily and elven class, I also made some changes to the monk class which should allow martial characters to take a monk dip to add some martial artist flavor to their characters.
Racial Traits
(0 RP) +2 Dexterity, +2 Wisdom, –2 Constitution: Elves are nimble and wise, but their form is frail.
(0 RP) Medium: Elves are Medium creatures and receive no bonuses or penalties due to their size.
(1 RP) Fast Speed: Elves have a base speed of 40 feet, yah there fast.
(1 RP) Low-Light Vision: Elves can see twice as far as humans in conditions of dim light.
(2 RP) Keen Senses: Elves receive a +2 racial bonus on Perception checks.
(2 RP) Nimble: Elves are incredibly nimble this gives them +2 racial bonus on all acrobatics.
(2 RP) Musical: Elven culture is very musical all elves gain a +2 racial bonus to any musical perform check and additionally perform is always considered a class skill for elves.
(2 RP) Weapon Familiarity: Elves are proficient with longbows (including composite longbows), shortbows (including composite shortbows), longswords, and shortwsords. Additionally the katana and wakisashi are treated as martial weapons not exotic weapons.
(0 RP) Languages: Elves begin play speaking Common and Elven. Elves with high Intelligence scores can choose from the following: Human, Dvergar, Orcsih, Sylvan, or Draconic.
Human Racial Traits
Humans are pretty boring very human, I gave them their own language distinct from common (which is a pidgin language) and the lucky racial trait to get them up to 10 RP.
(0 RP) +2 to One Ability Score: Human have a widely varied nature.
(0 RP) Medium: Humans are Medium creatures and have no bonuses or penalties due to their size.
(0 RP)Normal Speed: Humans have a base speed of 30 feet.
(4 RP) Bonus Feat: Humans select one extra feat at 1st level.
(4 RP) Skilled: Humans gain an additional skill rank at first level and one additional rank whenever they gain a level.
(2 RP) Lucky: Humans are naturally lucky or at least it seems so compared to other races they get a +1 racial bonus on all saving throws.
(0 RP)Languages: Humans begin play speaking Common and Human. Humans with high Intelligence scores can choose (Dvergar, Elven, Orcish, aquan and celestial)
Orcish Racial Traits
I eliminated half-races in my world (which makes for some interesting social dynamics between elves and humans since they are close enough to find each other attractive but incapable of conceiving children together) and I used to run orcs with the same stats as vanilla half-orcs. I decided to change them around with the motivation of why do you never see any female orcs? well I answered that by saying that they have a matriarchal society, sexual dimorphism, and an extremely skewed birth rate (1 female to 5 male). Male orcs are brutish warriors similar to classic orcs. Female orcs are almost mostly sorcorreces or clerics and are called war-mothers, leaders of the orcish hordes.
While I really like the orcish society I created I think I may have min/maxed the orcs too much for balance.
(0 RP) Medium: Orcs are Medium creatures and have no bonuses or penalties due to their size.
(0 RP) Normal Speed: Orcs have a base speed of 30 feet.
(1 RP) Low-Light Vision: Orcs can see twice as far as humans or dwarves in low-light or starlight
MALE
(1 RP)+2 Str, +2 Con, -2 Int: Orcs are strong and tough but generally lack the discipline for more civilized learning
(2 RP)Intimidating: Orcs receive a +2 racial bonus on Intimidate checks due to their fearsome nature.
(4 RP) Ferocity: Orcs can remain conscious and continue fighting even if their hit point totals fall below 0. Orcs are still staggered at 0 hit points or lower and lose 1 hit point each round as normal.
(2 RP) Natural Armor: Male orcs have tough hids they gain a +1 Natural Armor bonus to their armor class.
(0 RP) Languages: Orcs begin play speaking Common and Orc. Half-orcs with high Intelligence scores can choose from the following: human, dvergar, elven, Sylvan, and infernal)
FEMALE
(2RP) +2 Cha, +2 Int: Born to lead the hordes as war-mothers female orcs are both charismatic and intelligent though they lack the brutal strength or toughness of their male kin.
(3 RP) Silver Tonged: Orcs receive a +2 racial bonus on Bluff and Diplomacy checks
(3 RP) Magic Aptitude: Female orcs gain +2 on caster level checks to overcome spell resistance, +2 to concentration checks for casting defensively
(1 RP) Fearless: Growing up amongst the intimidating orcs have made female orcs particularly difficult to frighten they gain a +2 bonus on all saves against fear effects and the DC to intimidate them is increased by 2.
(0 RP) Languages: Orcs begin play speaking Common and Orc. Half-orcs with high Intelligence scores can choose from the following: human, dvergar, elven, undercommon, and infernal
I gave my humans eternal hope instead of lucky, if I remember right. Your races seem perfectly fine to me. While your orcs do lean toward a particular niche, there's nothing wrong with that. I really like how you removed Orc females as victims and made them different from males and even put them in leadership roles.
My only issue is with your dwarves: you spell their name multiple different ways throughout the text.=)
I have always been in favor of supplemental materials that expand the main races like elves, dwarves, halflings, and gnomes to have variants that allow for bonuses to all the different mental stats.
I like that there could be Charismatic elves, Wise elves, Intelligent Gnomes, Wise Halflings, Intelligent dwarves, etc.
I would love to see paizo do some more "Blood of" expansions that open up these options.
The Int/Wis switch between Elves and Dwarves makes a reasonable amount of sense; I've always preferred Elves as unstudied casters and the Druid class suits them well. The Wis bonus for elves makes huge sense.
I'm not so sure about Int for Dwarves; I'd rather keep their Int unbonused - maybe keeping Wis, not sure - and give a Racial Trait bonus on Crafting (maybe the Skill Focus feat for any crafting skill).
Thinking about it some more, I'd be tempted to go with
Elves:
+2 Dex, +2 Wis, -2 Con
Dwarves:
+4 Con, -2 Chr (and the feat Skill Focus: Craft)
Is complete immunity to poisons for the whole race too strong? (I guess it depends on how widespread poisons are in the campaign).
I kinda like your idea of adapting the Monk into being a mostly Elven class. (I'm sketching up a world where Monks are a mostly Hobgoblin class; the Hobgoblins have an uneasy peace with the human/halfling nations, and it's possible for Humans and Halflings to study as monks with a Hobgoblin master. Dwarves are only known in the civilised worlds as a slave race).
I also like the 40 ft base speed for Elves, though given they're meant to be 'form is frail', I think I'd still reduce that to 20 ft when encumbered/armoured.
Languages IMHO are better applied as regions rather than species.
Your female orcs are a nice twist. (If you want them to be sorceresses or clerics though, you might want to go with bonuses to Chr and Wis instead of Chr and Int).
I also like the 40 ft base speed for Elves, though given they're meant to be 'form is frail', I think I'd still reduce that to 20 ft when encumbered/armoured.
I really like this and am defiantly going to use it. Thank you.
I really like this and am going to use it. Thank you.
I really like this, but I wonder if you meant "definitely". Either word works, but yours made me smile.
