Nonmagical Dwarf race

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Desdan_Mervolam
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Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by Desdan_Mervolam »

I've been working with a concept for a while now and been utterly unable to come up with anything workable. See, for my upcoming game, I decided I wanted dwarves that were alot more magically resistant than stock dwarves, but I can't think of a good way to do it. I'm talking moreso than standard dwarves, who have a small bonus to saves when magic is involved and perhaps some flavor text about disdaining the use of magic.

SR is the obvious answer, but it doesn't cover all the angles, even in terms of spells on the dwarves, so I'm also considering at least a +2 bonus to saves versus magic.

The payoff is supposed to be in the fact that dwarves can't use magic at all. Well, that's obviously not going to work, so I'm kicking on the idea that they can't cast spells at all. Arcane, Divine, even the crappy spells gotten by second-or-third string magic-using classes like Paladin or Ranger.

So, is there any way to make a race like this workable at all? Are there any suggestions for how to achieve the concept without making them overpowered or underpowered?

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Re: Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by Username17 »


So, is there any way to make a race like this workable at all?


Nope. Taking a level of a spellcasting class is a choice, and from a game balance point of view it is not supposed to make any difference whether you make that choice or a different choice.

In short, if you can't take levels of certain classes, you are "trading" the ability to have certain character conceptions for more power in whatever class you end up choosing. Which means that either it completely hoses your character concept or it gives you something for free.

Either way, that's bad game design.

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Desdan_Mervolam
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Re: Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by Desdan_Mervolam »

Well, it wouldn't be so much that you can't take levels of Wizard, just that you would never want to, since you can't cast any spells you might have. Basically, the wizard is just d4 hit points, 2+int skill points, good will save, and a crappy BAB, Skill list and fort and ref saves.


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Re: Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by RandomCasualty »

The problem is that you're not balancing a race per se, you're balancing a character from that race.

If this were elves versus dwarves, then the race not being able to use magic would hurt them, but on the scale of a single character that just doesn't matter. It just means you don't make a magic using character of that race. But for the person taking the race, the disadvantage is basically nil, because he picked a dwarf knowing he wouldn't be a spellcaster.

The only time this can balance anything is if you think a certain benefit may be too powerful in the hands of a spellcaster. A race that gained +6 int for instance might be able to be LA +0 if they weren't able to wield magic or psionics, since the int just means more skill points otherwise.

But for a general benefit like +2 to spells, class restrictions don't balance anything out.
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Re: Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by The_Hanged_Man »

I think that's a cool idea. For "dwarves" as a whole, like in a Warhammer game, that would work great. But for an particualr dwarf, that's giving a lot of power right away.

It's really hard to balance. Think of the Forsaker. To get that minor magic resistance effect (IMO), you give up all magic power. This would be giving a similar level of power for free. Unless the balance is similar to the Forsaker (no magic healing, no magic items, etc.), it's going to be too much.

You could just give a +2 to saves and get rid of some of the dwarf abilities that matter to non-casters, like movement in armor bonuses, weapon familiarity, and stability. But the no casting is a RP issue that doesn't really affect balance much, IMO.
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Re: Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by User3 »

Unless your dwarves radiate an AMF, the fantasy universe that is standard in most games will reduce them to a gully dwarve-like race.

As an evil wizard, I know who my prefered slaves will be.
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Re: Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by Username17 »

K wrote:gully dwarve-like race


What did we say about posting without checking it in a word processor, drinking tequilla, or paying money for sex?

---

Anyway, I don't see what the big hard-on over spell resistance is anyway. It's very similar to having a bonus to your saves.

Imagine, if you will, that your character has SR of 11+level, and is confronted by a Hold Monster spell cast by an enemy that is the same level as you and doesn't have spell penetration. They have a precisely 50% chance of passing your SR.
Let's also imagine that they have a save DC of 20, and take a quick look at what kind of saves that would be equivalent to.
Save Bonus:/Chance of Saving:/Chance of saving with SR:/Save Bonus equal or better:
+0 / 5% / 52.5% / +10
+1 / 10% / 55% / +9
+2 / 15% / 57.5% / +9
+3 / 20% / 60% / +8
+4 / 25% / 62.5% / +8
+5 / 30% / 65% / +7
+6 / 35% / 67.5% / +7
+7 / 40% / 70% / +6
+8 / 45% / 72.5% / +6
+9 / 50% / 75% / +5
+10 / 55% / 77.5% / +5
+11 / 60% / 80% / +4
+12 / 65% / 82.5% / +4
+13 / 70% / 85% / +3
+14 / 75% / 87.5% / +3
+15 / 80% / 90% / +2
+16 / 85% / 92.5% / +2
+17 / 90% / 95% / +1
+18 / 95% / 97.5% / +1
+19 / 100% / 100% / +0
+20 / 100% / 100% / +0

I mean, honestly, you are like a 10th level character when confronted with this situation. You've got resistance bonuses and crap. How big is the SR really going to be? Remember that the bigger your save bonuses already are, the smaller an additional save bonus has to be to exceed the value of SR.

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Re: Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by Draco_Argentum »

Plus SR frells beneficial spells. I don't even know why people want it in the first place.
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Re: Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by The_Hanged_Man »

Forgot one thing. SR doesn't fail on a 1. Otherwise, yeah, not that cool.
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Re: Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by Username17 »

The_Hanged_Man at [unixtime wrote:1084467099[/unixtime]]Forgot one thing. SR doesn't fail on a 1. Otherwise, yeah, not that cool.


Saves only fail on a 1 if using the 3.5 rules or the Deities and Demigods rules.

Under 3d edition core, a save is a form of check and therefore doesn't automatically fail on a 1.

This actually makes the entire game work a lot better.

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Re: Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by The_Hanged_Man »

Your right, but in 3.5 that's the rule. If you fail saves on a 1, but SR doesn't, SR is a better deal than those numbers show. And psychologically, it's a much better deal.
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Re: Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by Desdan_Mervolam »

Alright, so that idea's a complete write-off. How can I create a dwarven race that works mechanically but still fits the flavor of a race that has eschewed magic so completly that it has made them much harder to effect?

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Re: Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by The_Hanged_Man »

What if they had better saves, but a vulnerability to something relatively common that would balance it out?

Or they could be immune to a school of magic, or types of magic (like undead and constructs). They could be immune to, say evocations, but lose a bunch of other dwarf stuff and maybe have a -2 to saves against something else, necromancy maybe.
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Re: Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by Username17 »

Humans get a feat and a skill point.

Fighters get a feat and dick all.

So by cost equivalence, a character race which only granted all of the abilities granted by any other character class for an entire level would be underpowered.

So a race might, for example, have the ability to counter a number of spells equal to their Constitution bonus per day as an attack of opportunity with the same game mechanics as for using Greater Dispel Magic (substituting character level for caster level, obviously). And that wouldn't be out of line for an ability for a LA +0 race to grant, if they didn't do a whole lot of other cool things.

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Desdan_Mervolam
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Re: Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by Desdan_Mervolam »

Y'know... I like that. With infravision, and a pair of net-zero ability mods, that should be pretty playable.

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Re: Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by Essence »

Frank wrote:Humans get a feat and a skill point.

Fighters get a feat and dick all.

So by cost equivalence, a character race which only granted all of the abilities granted by any other character class for an entire level would be underpowered.


I just wanted to point out the total disconnection with reality that this quote conveys:

A race is effectively a one-time bonus, chosen at first level, to a set of more-or-less randomly chosen abilities.

A level provides you with, well, a Level: Hit Dice, Skill Points, a Skill List, Proficiencies, a BAB, three Saves, and after all that gives you class features.

Saying "Fighters get a feat and dick all" means that 10 hit points, 2 skill points, 6 proficiencies, a point of BAB, and two points to a save are "dick all".

You can't do that. Well, you can, but you'll be demonstrating that you're totally non compis mentis in doing so.

The race "human" grants you a feat and a skill point -- which is 5.5 HP, one skill point, two save points, six proficiencies, and a point of BAB less than what the Fighter grants you.

Class Features can't be examined in a vacuum and used for balance purposes. They come with the rest of a class, and are balanced (in theory) with the other attributes of that class.
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Re: Nonmagical Dwarf race

Post by Username17 »


Essence wrote:Class Features can't be examined in a vacuum and used for balance purposes. They come with the rest of a class, and are balanced (in theory) with the other attributes of that class.

That's hillarious!

You just made my day.

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