Racial Balance

[Garage Trashcan]

Now, this is an idea I doubt would get implemented, but I'm mostly curious as to how well it would be received and what other people's thoughts on it are.

Basically, the idea here is to help out the ECL0 races a bit by updating them to Pathfinder. Stat-wise, this would make them more similar to ECL +1. These bonuses would probably not apply once something becomes mixed with an ECL race (because then it would also indirectly further BUFF ECL races, thus ruining the entire point of implementing this).

For those unfamiliar, it works like this:

Humans: +2 to any one stat
Half-Elves: +2 to any one stat
Half-Orcs: +2 to any one stat
Elves: +2 Dex, +2 Wis, -2 Str (or based on Subraces as they are currently, I dunno. Silly elves.)
Dwarves: +2 Con, +2 Wis, -2 Cha
Halflings: +2 Dex, +2 Cha, -2 Str
Gnomes: +2 Con, +2 Cha, -2 Str

Pros:
--Could help rebalance the standard races slightly, allowing them to compete more effectively with ECL races in the late-game

Cons:
--The change would have to be retroactive and informing every returning player and adjusting every existing character would be entirely troublesome.

What I'm wondering is, hypothetically, if this could be implemented with relative ease and not completely overburden the staff with handling racial re-adjustments, re-makes, re-builds, etc... would you support this kind of idea? Sort of a yes/no question, really, but feel free to leave your own thoughts.

[The Red Mage]

I like it. It wouldn't be that difficult to manage topside. It takes like three seconds to MODsomething someone.

[Arya]

I see no issue with this.  It can only benefit the players and what they play.  

I am assuming these bonuses are only applied to people without a template? I am not familiar with Pathfinder. But I know in 3.5 templates are in addition to what the race already possesses.

Sincerely,
Arya

[Garage Trashcan]

Jun 1, 2014 9:06:25 GMT -5 Arya Kalarathri said:

I see no issue with this.  It can only benefit the players and what they play.  

I am assuming these bonuses are only applied to people without a template? I am not familiar with Pathfinder. But I know in 3.5 templates are in addition to what the race already possesses.

Sincerely,
Arya

Pathfinder has no ECLs. Everything is balanced to be ECL0 (even stuff like Half-Giant). Therefore, it would make the most sense if these templates were not applied to ECL. The idea here is to bring them more in line with ECL+1, but if all the ECLs got these adjustments as well, the balance differential hasn't changed at all. It's just made the power creep worse.

[Arya]

That makes sense.  Though with that system, you would also have to consider whether the other things out there will need a -1 ECL to be on par with the implementation.  I do not see a big deal though, one way or another.  

 I am all for anything that can only benefit the players and not 'take' from them.  Can't you tell I was last on a server with folk who only nerfed things left and right, all the time? XD

~Arya

[The Red Mage]

I think the idea was only for standard races, since most half-somethings get current templates and ecl anyway. They wouldn't need adjusting for this.

[trylobyte]

The only obstacle I see to this is the sheer magnitude of changes that would have to be made, something Vincent has historically been against because of the monumental effort involved.

[Garage Trashcan]

That's why I was asking this hypothetically.

[Deleted]

Considering that current stat changes have to be done by DMs or LETO... I'm not sure it's worth the additional effort.

[daphne]

Perhaps I am feeling cranky today.  What problem are we addressing here?  

[Vincent07]

A few comments here.

FR races already receive various adjustments, many for the various sub-races of the main races you listed.  So the actual list of alteration would be -much- longer and I personally see no reason to deviate from the FRCS in this regard.

In addition, some ECLs are "applied templates", this means they are in addition to, not instead of the base racial adjusts.  This further complicates things.

Furthermore, going to the playerbase as a whole and saying: "We're editing all the base racial stat adjustments, your stats will be altered accordingly." ...No.  Not only is that likely to break some things for requirements which people may be on the cusp of meeting (not to mention spell level requirements etc), but forced retroactive adjustments are just not something I'm in favor of.  If something like this were ever implemented, we'd be far more likely to grandfather in any existing PCs than go try to change them.  This creates some other issues that are honestly the sort of thing likely best addressed upon a server's launch.

[Garage Trashcan]

That's why I asked this as a hypothetical, "What if we could magically implement this with no real effort?" I understand that it's not feasible to implement it, that's why I didn't propose it as such.

[Fire Wraith]

If we could magically change everything to Pathfinder with no effort?  Sure, I'd be all for that.

This is the real world though.

[Atomic Twinkie]

I reject your reality and substitute my own.

[Not Batman]

Pathfinder was crap. That is all. Necessary Paizo garbage talk done.