Throwing Half-Elf a Bone

[Voice of Kerensky]

I'm going to come right out and state my opinion directly: Half-elf sucks. It's the most underpowered base race in 3.5. If ECL could go negative, this would be the race for it. But hell, don't take my word for it. Aside from usually dominating polls for "weakest race", take a look at what a couple D&D design team had to say about it.

Mike Mearls: The half-elf is the least powerful race, because it is an elf with the weapon proficiency, secret door detection abilities, and racial ability adjustments removed and the bonus to Spot and Listen reduced. In return, the half-elf gains a +2 bonus to Diplomacy and Gather Information checks. These bonuses are useful only for a narrow range of characters – low Charisma characters and those who do not have Diplomacy and Gather Information as class skills gain little benefit from it since these skills operate against static DCs rather than opposed checks. In an opposed check, there's always a chance that you face an untrained or penalized foe, making any sort of bonus useful. Since both Diplomacy and Gather Information can be used untrained, they are poor investments unless you can use them to routinely beat high (20+) DCs. If anyone in the party aside from the half-elf invests in those skills, the half-elf's bonus is largely useless.



The ability to count any class as favored is a minor edge, especially compared to the human benefits. In comparison, the elf's secret door detection is useful to any character, while Spot and Listen are useful in almost every encounter.

And in response to him.

Jesse Decker: Mike's answer is correct, not because he chose the weakest race but because he demonstrated that the half-elf's puny bonuses don't compare at all with the other races. One of the not-so-obvious purposes of this question is to see how the potential developer deals with the word "weakest." There can be all kinds of weaknesses in a roleplaying product, but the developer's job is to focus on the power level of game elements -- which means that interpreting this question as an analysis of a race's combat ability is important.



Other popular answers to this question include the gnome and half-orc. While both of those races have their limitations (gnomes are mostly overshadowed by halflings, and half-orcs are severly limited in their choice of classes), both can shine in specialized builds.

Source: archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dd/20051007a

It stands out even worse in NWN than PnP, as NWN building tends to be more combat-focused (partly due to the neverending cycle of player power builds, devs adjust dungeons to compensate, more people are forced to focus builds on combat more to compete in dungeons... etc, and partly due to most of NWN's skills/feats being combat or dungeon focused). While power shouldn't be everything (I've played a half-elf myself for years), it is important that there is some basic level of balance. After all, when the staff considers an ECL race/template, they will ultimately try to fit the bonuses with an appropriate ECL. The half-elf simply doesn't compare to the other ECL 0 races.

As for what to do about it, that's an interesting discussion to be had. One possibility is to simply allow the various elf races half-elf types to inherit some of their bonuses. The other is to borrow from the fluff of half-elves. Taking from the fluff of half elves on the FR wiki (which includes a mix of 3e and 4e info, but it all jives) forgottenrealms.wikia.com/wiki/Half-elf -- half-elves are repeatedly described as having force of personality and having a tendency to be inspirational figures. Thus, you could perhaps argue a charisma bonus. On the other hand, they're also described as being outsiders wherever they go and not truly fitting into any society--this, along with their adventurousness, could perhaps manifest itself as a wisdom penalty.

So, let's assume that you take that idea and make half-elves +2 cha, -2 wis, just for example purposes. This is getting better; they can at least be a good specialization type character at ECL 0. However, their bonuses are still lackluster compared to other ECL 0 races, such as their fully elven cousins. Comparing to pure elves in this scenario

Half Elf:

+2 Ability
-2 Ability
+1 Spot, Listen, Search
Low Light Vision
Anti-Sleep
+2 vs mind spells
Favored class: Any

Elf:

+2 Ability
-2 Ability
+2 Spot, Listen, Search
Low Light Vision
Anti-Sleep
+2 vs mind spells
Bonus weapon profs (longsword, rapier, longbow, shortbow)
Keen senses (search checks w/o search mode, so can search while running)

Literally the only thing half-elf has over elf in this case is favored class, which is more or less utterly useless on CD (or most RP Servers). Even in this instance, the elf gets better skill bonuses, some valuable extra weapon proficiencies, and a unique ability in keen senses.

The half-elf gets some (honestly, pretty minor) traits from elf to represent that part of their heritage, but outside the valueless favored class: any, they have no representation of their human ancestry. I would suggest one of quick to master or skilled, but not both. Probably skilled--quick to master is the more valuable of the two human abilities, and should be left to them. Likewise, given that they lack the most unique elven feature, keen senses, and that their skill bonuses are nerfed in comparison, I'd suggest they could possibly get the bonus weapon proficiencies, but see this as less vital.

This would leave half-elf looking as such:

Cha +2, Wis -2 -- Half elves are typically outgoing, forceful personalities, but often have a hard time finding their place in the world.
+2 vs mind spells
+1 spot, listen, search
Low Light Vision 
Immune to sleep effects
Bonus weapon profiencies: Elven
Skilled: Half-elves gain an extra skill point per level (4 at 1st level)

In comparison to elf, this is much more balanced. Half-elf essentially sacrifices +1 spot, search, and listen as well as the unique keen senses feat for an extra skill point/level. While the latter can be argued as being more generally powerful, I would point out that in this case, half-elf's bonus stat is charisma. While charisma is mechanically useful to the classes that utilize it, for those that don't it is utterly useless outside of RP, making it the ubiquitous dump stat. This arguably specializes half-elf in some regards more than elf--wisdom is an inherent part of several classes, making it harder for half-elf to partake, but elf's con penalty doesn't directly affect any classes. Meanwhile, elf's dex bonus can be useful to many classes and builds.

I'm open to completely alternate suggestions on how to improve half-elf as well--I think the most important thing to focus on is the title of the thread.
 

Having played a very weak race for a longtime and doing rather amazing things with her I'll throw my two cents in.  
While they lack in many things that other races take for granted, not sure why this has not been balanced more, there is still a lot a person could do with a half elf at any given time.

But they will always be outdone by an ECL or really any other race.  Really though, it matters how one plays the game.  On an Rp server, this is less about mechanics to win perspective, as Vincent adequetly said, You take the challenge away from yourself.  But at the same time, half elves are striving more because they have less to work with.  Even if they are built like Sophia (I will mention that strictly because of gear, she has won more than lost.)

Now if you took both characters, gave them the same 4+ gear, say a Dwarf and a Half Elf, is it a matter of build or play style that Dwarf succeeds?

Or for that matter, any ECL race?  (I'm merely asking for perspective, I'm definitely not flaming against such things as I play some ECL's myself.  And I enjoy them.)

Anyway, food for thought.  

[suddenperihelion]

One server I played on had me write a script to give each half-elf a +1 bonus to any single ability of his or her choosing.

Also, they gave half-orcs +1 cha - so half-orcs had a total of +2 str, -2 int, -1 cha.

Don't really have a strong feeling of whether that's applicable to C-D or not, just mentioning that it is possible to do.

[Edge]

Favored Class is also a rather nil point here, as we've turned off the Favored Class penalties years ago, so characters on CD have always been free to multiclass as they see fit (barring restricted classes of course).

Pathfinder makes Half-elves a little less terrible, giving them a free Skill Focus feat (but removing the Diplomacy bonus) and doubling the number of classes they can consider favored - in PF, Favored Class is not a class your race is inclined toward that you avoid penalties for multiclassing into or out of, but rather a class you choose and gain small bonuses for staying single-classed, usually +1 HP or 1 extra skill point to spend, but later expansions have added class- and race-specific bonuses like increasing barbarians' and monks' speed, adding extra rounds of rage or bardic music or other per-day abilities, spont-casters getting extra spells known, and so forth. Half-Elves get to pick two classes as Favored instead of one, making them one of the few things in the game that doesn't get penalized by the loss of that feature when they multiclass. (But Pathfinder is also extremely multiclassing-unfriendly, so the mechanics of the classes go a long way toward dissuading multiclassing on top of this so... yeah, half-elf strikes out again.)

[Deleted]

Initial Thoughts:
Even giving Half-elf's the bonus skill point per level and 4 initial skill points that humans get would be a useful bump. Adding the bonus feat seems too much though with the other racial template bits they get, when compared to human's strictly.

Bigger Consideration:
If you start comparing them to other races that gets trickier. I believe though that if Multi-Class penalties aren't in play, that reduces probably the primary racial feature of both human's and half-elves. So relative to other base races that would make them weaker.

It would be an idea to look at what could be a bit more evening for half-elves and humans to get. Perhaps give half-elves the human bonus feat and skill points, then add something to human's to offset the half-elf racial abilities. Giving human's bumps to Concentration and/or Discipline is a thought, as these are both generally useful.

And I'm not stating this would completely make it even across the board, just a starting point from which to jump off from then see what other adjustments could be made. Generally it is better, I have found to make a series of small adjustments, test and then bump up if necessary.

[Edge]

Humans need absolutely zero boosting. The bonus feat alone makes them the best race in the game relative to other ECL +0 races (and since most of the common exotic races are templates like planetouched and half-things, they keep those human bonuses); the lack of racial penalty to any stat and the extra skill point per level only increase that.

[Deleted]

May 16, 2015 13:23:14 GMT -5 Edge said:

Humans need absolutely zero boosting. The bonus feat alone makes them the best race in the game relative to other ECL +0 races (and since most of the common exotic races are templates like planetouched and half-things, they keep those human bonuses); the lack of racial penalty to any stat and the extra skill point per level only increase that.

Fair enough. Then I'd say throw half-elves the bonus skill points for humans and see how that plays. At least that extends to them the skill heavy role in the party.

[Vincent07]

Unfortunately, I'm fairly sure the bonus skill point/level is coded to the racial type.  So we could add it via script, but you'd always get it post level gain and have to spend it on your next level I think.  It'd be a kludge at best.  Not that I'm against doing it,  but the other option involves a lot of LETO work for Bella, and ah.. no.

[Edge]

It's tied to the Skilled feat, actually, I believe. As it doesn't go away when you change your type to Outsider for planetouched/half-planar templates, for example.

[Voice of Kerensky]

May 16, 2015 19:35:37 GMT -5 Edge said:

It's tied to the Skilled feat, actually, I believe. As it doesn't go away when you change your type to Outsider for planetouched/half-planar templates, for example.

It is indeed tied to the skilled feat. I wanted to make sure I suggested something reasonably possible.

My alternate suggestion regarding half-elves would simply be to give them the skilled feat, as well as +1 ability score based either on the parent elf, or of the player's choice. I think this simple would be reasonably simple and also fairly balanced.

[Deleted]

Honestly, they don't need more mechanical benefits of skill points or feats.

I'd be okay with giving them elven weapon proficiency, and it makes sense as well.

[Voice of Kerensky]

May 17, 2015 21:54:19 GMT -5  @belladonna said:

Honestly, they don't need more mechanical benefits of skill points or feats.

Compared to the other ECL 0 races, on what basis? I can understand "not everything needs to be powerful", but that doesn't mean that some things need to be necessarily and obviously out of alignment with similar things, either.

May 17, 2015 21:54:19 GMT -5  @belladonna said:

I'd be okay with giving them elven weapon proficiency, and it makes sense as well.

To be honest, I wasn't that keen on giving them this (more stumped for ideas at the writing of the post). The elven weapon proficiencies are based upon an elf having literally a hundred years of initial learning and maturation and the time needed to learn use of these weapons being part of their culture. A half-elf doesn't have that sort of time, nor do they necessarily even grow with an elven parent (neither do some elves, but they are an exception to the rule, whereas that's not all that abnormal for many half-elves).

Note: I'm not opposed to a solution that doesn't involve skill points or a bonus feat, just that the above seemed to me to be saying that there's nothing wrong with them mechanically, which I have no problems in stating that I disagree with that notion. My apologies if I read that wrong. I have no problems with half-elves being "their own thing" rather than borrowing some of the bonuses from both the parent races.

[thorien]

May 18, 2015 2:49:20 GMT -5 psappho said:

To be honest, I wasn't that keen on giving them this (more stumped for ideas at the writing of the post). The elven weapon proficiencies are based upon an elf having literally a hundred years of initial learning and maturation and the time needed to learn use of these weapons being part of their culture. A half-elf doesn't have that sort of time, nor do they necessarily even grow with an elven parent (neither do some elves, but they are an exception to the rule, whereas that's not all that abnormal for many half-elves).

I agree. +1 Bonus skill point (Skilled feat) sounds fair and legit for me. 

[Deleted]

The feat can be added on login.  Skill points require LETOs for starting skills.  Mechanically, the skill point option is unlikely to happen.  (There's enough trouble with bard/ranger/etc. who are given their 3.5 skill points.)  Likewise for a bonus feat.  Bonuses that require LETOs are generally not going to be approved, since the people processing them (namely myself and Vincent) have limited time.

Also,  the elven proficiency is not -just- for having a hundred years or so practicing.  According to the Races of the Wild, and the Complete Book of Elves, most of that century is spent being apprenticed to different instructors/masters of varying things.  In later material, options for taking elven weapon proficiency in exchange for a different bonus was made available to half-elves, so simulate those raised with their elven parent rather than the human one.

[suddenperihelion]

The +1 to a single stat bonus was entirely automated. And that, by itself, seemed to be enough to make people consider half-elf a mechanically attractive race. So anything in addition to that might be overkill.

The +1 charisma for half-orcs didn't have as large an effect, but it opened up a bit more diversity in the KINDS of builds people tried out with half-orcs (you'd be a tiny bit more likely to see half-orc blackguards and bards and such cropping up).