User talk:T.G. Oskar/Core Races, Retooled (3.5 Race)

About the race retooling

The idea behind doing this essentially insane retooling of each race is to make them stand out. Humans will be the less that stand out, getting only a minor boost. This is intentional.

Another thing is that I'm trying to get away from level adjustment. If a race DOES have level adjustment, it'll be not only have an explanation as to why, but also have something that merits having a constant XP penalty. All races should have something that scales with level, or otherwise there's no importance to choosing a race other that what you might get from feats (and that essentially implies you need to compete with other, much more useful, feats in order to make your race choice actually count).

Finally: Ethnics. The use of the term isn't exactly the best, but it definitely describes the variants to each race. Some ethnics are so different, they may count as an entirely different class, but they're placed there because of the clear similarities between the "vanilla" version of the race and the variant.

Dwarves

The biggest change, of course, is making dwarves constructs (and living constructs, to boot!). This would make dwarves a "core", non-metallic living construct. One great thing that Eberron got right was the creation of the warforged (and thus, the living construct subtype) as it allowed to play constructs without having the DM suffer. The idea, thus, was to balance the dwarves against the warforged, the "main" form of living construct, but make them stand out.

Another thing is that I wanted Dwarves to be silicon-based creatures rather than carbon-based. Silicon-based creatures, of course, cannot exist in a world guided by physics...but it CAN and SHOULD exist in D&D. Creating a silicon-based organism from scratch would be decent (and some do, like the galeb duhr), but nothing would make more sense than to take a "race of stone" like the dwarf and make it silicon-based in order to explain its weird fetish for metal, stone and living underground (and other stuff, like ale). Essentially, and to put it succintly, dwarves are a "localized hive-mind based on brewer's yeast that lives within a statue". This would make dwarves "younger" than humans in the idea that they wouldn't take a humanoid form otherwise, but they can live much, much longer lives because of how they're made.

Ethnics

Deep dwarves are to dwarves what...well, deep gnomes are to gnomes. Or High Elves are to elves. They live in the deep and thus are quite different. They're somewhat sturdier but slower.

Black dwarves are a direct reference to Nordic dwarves, up to their skill at forging (and the ability to create cursed items, as well). Nordic dwarves are unlike the Tolkien basis for the dwarf, and behave much more like fey, so they're fey and not living constructs (and have the Earth subtype to represent their ties with the mountain).

Vulcan dwarves are a volcanic variant, probably made out of fluorosilicates or sulphur-silicon compounds. The abilities they get MAY merit a level adjustment, but I'd prefer someone with a more clinical eye judge that out. Fire is easily resisted, and vulnerability to cold HURTS.

Dune dwarves are a natural result of what happens because of erosion; if dwarves are like mountains, dune dwarves are what happens to a mountain when erosion kicks in. They're also a much, MUCH better version of the desert dwarf variant race, because you get very little out of desert dwarves (or any desert race, actually).

Elves

The theme with elves is "fey/fae as a reflection of Material Plane nature" coupled with "no different from humans". Elves have some minor plant and animal traits, but for the most part they are remarkably human in terms of culture. They are an innately fae race, much like they should have been right from the beginning, because an arbitrary distinction of humanoids may make sense (somewhat) mechanically but not sense to the race itself (and, besides, Charm Person only affects "humanoids", which leaves giants out of the way and does not really makes a proper distinction; a fae could easily be treated as a "person" whereas another wouldn't. The plant traits, despite being very slight, are meant to emphasize the distinction between elves and humans, making them closer to nature than humans would.

The iron vulnerability is an explanation as to why elves use so much mithral and prefer wood. As a rule of thumb, elves have most of the druid's restrictions on armor, except their restriction is less "you lose stuff" and more "you get hurt while wearing it, but not THAT much..." Sure, being sickened can be a real hassle, but for a spellcaster it's essentially a non-issue at higher levels.

Ethnics

Most of the old sub-races are essentially passed in with some changes.

High Elves are Gray Elves that really kick some booty. The claws are a deeper reflection of their animal side, one they simply ignore (however, they are NEVER unarmed...) They get damage reduction to reflect their sturdiness, and they get a good deal of Druid spells as spell-like abilities to show their innate magical potential. They're also far more intelligent than their vanilla elf kindred (and the Gray Elf at that). In exchange, the high elf suffers a pretty violent aversion to iron, far more than their kindred. Even then, they merit one of the few bits of level adjustment, if only because they keep getting stuff at higher levels that merits it. IMO, Level Adjustment is only justified if you have something that augments with your character levels, because otherwise it becomes a non-issue as levels pass. Githyanki and githzerai are perfect examples of when level adjustment must be made, as they get abilities that ALWAYS keep progressing as you gain levels.

Blood Elves are new, and they are NOTHING like WoW blood elves. They are, essentially, elves with blood poisoning, but which they've been handling enough to exist. They'll be frail than most other elves, but when they overcome their innate iron vulnerability, they're essentially super-charged with vitality.

Wood Elves are just like the old wood elves, with some hints of wild elf alongside them. They make great Rangers and Druids, and also wonderful Psychic Warriors (good Dex and Wis, plus innate claws that can be buffed with psionics). Their score penalty is toward a dump score for all three, so it's more of a boon.

Dark Elves are NOT like the Drow, but really an "evil elf" thing. Thus, they're remarkably similar.

Drow, on the other hand, got some serious revisions. The biggest one is the schism between the drow. Personally, I LOATHE Lolth and her kindred, because they're sissies led by b****es, whose most famous exemplar not only rebelled against them, but also has inspired the dread of unoriginality. Thus, it was a breath of fresh air to hear about Eberron's version of the drow, who revere a scorpion and are geared towards ruthless survivalists much like the scorpion does. When making their revision, I decided to make scorpion drow an off-shoot that splintered from those who follow Lolth and decided to strike on their own. As you may see, while they lost their spell resistance (MWAHAHAHA!!!), they get some seriously GOOD SLAs (particularly scorpion drow with their Hold Person), and sensible adjustments to their scores (spiders are not very agile, but quite strong; scorpion on the other hand are pretty swift and dextrous). Spider drow and scorpion drow are distinct to the elf, but also pretty distinct to each other so as to be treated differently.

Finally, half-elves are improved towards being better skill-monkeys and social faces. They get a much, much more limited form of bonus feat, but they keep their human parent's extra skill points intact (considering they get bonus Int, that means they get even MORE skill points!), which should truly elevate them to "considerable". They're better Beguilers and Illusionists (and Bards!!) than anything else, until they draw the greatsword and hack away.