Making the Dwarf more unique

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Hungerstriker
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Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by Hungerstriker »

Maybe I'm alone in this sentiment, but I've always found the Dwarf class to be a little bit bland, relative to the other nonhumans. Halflings have cool a fighting ability, a Thief skill, and that 'good luck charm' thing going on. Elves don't really have many abilities that ordinary Wizards wouldn't already have, but they at least have a variety of abilities. A Halfling with bad luck could still be a capable combatant or scout, and an Elf can switch easily between spellcasting and using weapons.
But Dwarves? Really, they're just scaled-down Warriors. Unless I'm missing something, a Dwarf only has two* abilities to set him apart from an ordinary Warrior:
1) 'Sword and Board', which is functionally identical in most respects to the Halfling's Two Weapon Fighting.
2) 'Underground Skills', which are a neat bit of flavor, but they don't seem likely to make a big impact on the game.

Anyway, the next time I run DCC, whenever that is, I want to at least give my Dwarf players the option of some more unique and fun abilities. Curiously, DCC doesn't give Dwarves any ability to reflect the resilience that Dwarves are usually famous for. I don't know how early editions of D&D handled it, but I know 3.5 gives Dwarves a +2 bonus to saves against poison and magic. I considered something like this, but it just doesn't seem 'active' to me. I mean, when you cast a spell or perform a MDoA or burn luck as a Thief/Halfling, you're basically announcing to everyone around the table, "hey guys, I'm doing that cool thing that only I can do!" A little bonus that you quietly add to your rolls isn't quite so much fun. So, here's what I worked up:

Dwarven Resilience
Dwarves gain an added benefit when burning Luck for a Saving Throw. This represents the inherent toughness of Dwarven Biology. Instead of gaining a +1 to the roll for each point of luck burned, Dwarves roll a d6 for each point, and add that to their roll. Luck that is burned in this way recovers at a rate of 1 point per night, but this does not apply to luck that was burned for any other type of roll, or was lost in any other way.

What do you guys think about the Dwarf, and how do you feel about this ability? Is there some other ability that you would give to your Dwarf players instead?
--------------------------
*well, there's Infravision, but it doesn't count since all the nonhumans get that.
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by finarvyn »

I agree with your general premise -- as there are 7 core classes it would be nice to have 7 different classes, and the dwarf does seem to be "like a fighter" more than his own thing.

I was tinkering with giving dwarves some sort of "cleave" option in their attack, or a "berserker rage" when in combat.
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maxinstuff
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Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by maxinstuff »

For me Dwarves are more about flavour than anything - I have no problem with them RAW.

Dwarves have always been "basically fighters but different" as far as I am concerned in most D&D and fiction generally.

What I LIKE to do is really play up the cultural and social aspects - the fact the Dwarf is likely an outcast, or that he/she will know people and locations that the other players simply have no access to.

And the smelling gold/gems thing can be used outside of dungeons. Maybe there are bandits led by a Dwarf who smells out juicy victims for them. Maybe the Dwarf player cannot concentrate in a big busy marketplace because he smells all of the gold, all of it (IT'S EVERYWHERE AAAAGH!!!!).
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Raven_Crowking
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by Raven_Crowking »

FWIW, I agree that the ability to smell gold and gems is a pretty big difference between dwarves and everyone else. I like the class as written.
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Cathbad the Meek (herbalist Wizard 1): AC 9; 4 hp; S 7, A 7, St 10, P 17, I 13, L 8; Neutral; Club, herbs, 50' rope, 50 cp; -1 to melee attack rolls. Hideous scar.
Rostranor
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by Rostranor »

I like the class as written as well. The mighty deed whole mechanically is the same as a fighter has lots of possabilty for signature moves in the narrative, combined with the swoard and board makes them stand out from the fighter class I think at least close to the differene between elf and wizard.
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Skyscraper
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by Skyscraper »

Hungerstriker wrote: Dwarven Resilience
Dwarves gain an added benefit when burning Luck for a Saving Throw. This represents the inherent toughness of Dwarven Biology. Instead of gaining a +1 to the roll for each point of luck burned, Dwarves roll a d6 for each point, and add that to their roll. Luck that is burned in this way recovers at a rate of 1 point per night, but this does not apply to luck that was burned for any other type of roll, or was lost in any other way.
I think the dual mechanic for luck burn is a bit complex and is likely to yield errors and perhaps confuse inexperienced players.

How about giving dwarves an increasing saving throw die instead? Say:

level 1-2: d24
level 3-4: d24+d2
level 5-6: d24+d3
level 7-8: d24+d4
level 9-10: d30

Yes, this would mean that dwarves always have a bonus to their saves. You can change the bonuses or the curve as you see fit. I like however that they'd get something as of level 1, i.e. d24 instead of d20.

It's active in that sometimes, they'll roll this big saving throw result that no one else could get. More power to them. I'm for: if you're to introduce something, might as well let it have some impact.

p.s.: I opted out demi-humans in my homebrew game, and one (minor) reason is that I thought that the mechanical aspects of dwarves and elves didn't scream "different class" to me. So I generally agree with you. The main reason for opting them out was that I prefer the flavor of a human-only world (as far as civilized races are concerned, there are, of course, many other monstrous races).
Maledict Brothbreath, level 4 warrior, STR 16 (+2) AGI 7 (-1) STA 12 PER 9 INT 10 LUCK 15 (+1), AC: 16 Refl: +1 Fort: +2 Will: +1; lawful; Armor of the Lion and Lily's Blade.

Brother Sufferus, level 4 cleric, STR 13 (+1) AGI 15 (+1) STA 11 PER 13 (+1) INT 10 LUCK 9, AC: 11 (13 if wounded, 15 if down to half hit points), Refl: +3 Fort: +2 Will: +3, chaotic, Robe of the Faith, Scourge of the Maimed One, Darts of Pain.
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Skars
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by Skars »

I have had way too much fun leveraging the Dwarf ability to smell gold and gems...if you haven't done so already, take a look at Daniels new CE:3 The Folk of Osmon for some creative ideas on tickling that acute sense of smell :P
Rostranor
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by Rostranor »

What about 2d12 instead of 1d24?
Hungerstriker
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by Hungerstriker »

maxinstuff wrote:For me Dwarves are more about flavour than anything - I have no problem with them RAW.

Dwarves have always been "basically fighters but different" as far as I am concerned in most D&D and fiction generally.
Did a lot of thinking about this at work today (there honestly isn't really anything else to think about where I work). Also, I consulted TvTropes, which conjured up the following: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/M ... AllTheSame

I think you're really right, Max-- Dwarves as we know them have always been about gold-mining-axes-hammers-industry-beards-etc. While I originally wanted to make the Dwarf more unique, I'm now realizing that there's really no reason to do this: Dwarves are, in traditional fantasy settings, not unique.

Still though, I feel like the Dwarf deserves a little boost. Dwarves are basically Warriors who didn't choose to be Warriors-- what I mean is, a human with 18 Intelligence can choose to be a Wizard instead of a Warrior, but a Dwarf with 18 Intelligence is doomed to be a Dwarf forever.
Skyscraper wrote:I think the dual mechanic for luck burn is a bit complex and is likely to yield errors and perhaps confuse inexperienced players.

How about giving dwarves an increasing saving throw die instead? Say:

level 1-2: d24
level 3-4: d24+d2
level 5-6: d24+d3
level 7-8: d24+d4
level 9-10: d30
You're probably right about confusing players, and I think this accomplishes my goal better than my original idea did. And, while you were nice enough not to mention it, your idea isn't quite as similar to a certain Thief ability... :oops:
Rostranor wrote:What about 2d12 instead of 1d24?
This is also a good idea. Giving the Dwarf some amount of bell-curve to his saves accomplishes the 'resilience' idea much better.
I think I'm going to use some amalgam of Skyscraper's and Rostranor's ideas for future games I run. Maybe 2d10, then d10+d12, then 2d12, and so on. I might also give my Dwarf players a minor free bump to their stats-- upon reaching level 1, a Dwarf gets his Strength OR Stamina (not both) boosted up to a minimum of 9, if it was lower than that. Hopefully, this will moderately cheer up new players who realize their Dwarf is being forced into pseudo-Warriordom. If not, they can rest assured that the poor fellow will probably be killed unceremoniously by a pit trap and replaced by a more 'playable' PC... :twisted:

Apart from all that, I'm intrigued by the ideas about treasure-smelling. It never came up in my games, because my Dwarf players basically ignored/forgot the ability. In the future, maybe I'll put it back into the game by force-- "you smell an extremely enticing scent in the room to the West", until the Dwarf player catches on.
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Skyscraper
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by Skyscraper »

Re: bell curve, it has pros and cons. 2d10 means that the dwarf is more likely to avoid medium-DC effects, but less likely to avoid any high DC effect, compared to rolling 1d20. This includes saving agianst a spell effect successfully cast by a wizard, since the DCs are usually the caster's spell check result. Any successful spellcheck by an enemy caster will be 12+.

I purposefully used a higher die on the dice chain for that reason, instead of adding two lower dice (2d10, 2d12, etc...)

(There is, of course, a small bell curve effect in d24 + d3, but let's agree that it's not too important.)

Whereas the d24 or d30 simply helps, even if it less reliable towards medium DC checks.

Just my two cents,

Sky
Maledict Brothbreath, level 4 warrior, STR 16 (+2) AGI 7 (-1) STA 12 PER 9 INT 10 LUCK 15 (+1), AC: 16 Refl: +1 Fort: +2 Will: +1; lawful; Armor of the Lion and Lily's Blade.

Brother Sufferus, level 4 cleric, STR 13 (+1) AGI 15 (+1) STA 11 PER 13 (+1) INT 10 LUCK 9, AC: 11 (13 if wounded, 15 if down to half hit points), Refl: +3 Fort: +2 Will: +3, chaotic, Robe of the Faith, Scourge of the Maimed One, Darts of Pain.
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beermotor
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by beermotor »

You could just let them add their deed die to their saves. PRESTO!
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Skyscraper
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by Skyscraper »

beermotor wrote:You could just let them add their deed die to their saves. PRESTO!
This is another simple solution, and has the advantage of not requiring another table.
Maledict Brothbreath, level 4 warrior, STR 16 (+2) AGI 7 (-1) STA 12 PER 9 INT 10 LUCK 15 (+1), AC: 16 Refl: +1 Fort: +2 Will: +1; lawful; Armor of the Lion and Lily's Blade.

Brother Sufferus, level 4 cleric, STR 13 (+1) AGI 15 (+1) STA 11 PER 13 (+1) INT 10 LUCK 9, AC: 11 (13 if wounded, 15 if down to half hit points), Refl: +3 Fort: +2 Will: +3, chaotic, Robe of the Faith, Scourge of the Maimed One, Darts of Pain.
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by Rostranor »

PRESTO works for me.

Though now that I have been running for about a year now I find that I am slowing my tinkering down to see the long term effects of things and try to stay true to the RAW. As my house rules page gets longer I dont want to loose the flavor and effect of the core game. so for now in my game the dwarf is going to stay as is. If I do consider changing it I think the deed die for saves works well for the dwarf.....maybe one more house rule wouldnt hurt....
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beermotor
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by beermotor »

Yeah FWIW I don't agree that the Dwarf isn't unique enough. They're different enough from Warriors to me, and my tabletop crew. We don't have a Warrior, though, but we do have a Dwarf.
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by cthulhudarren »

Another vote for "Dwarfs are good as written".
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by mgelinas »

while you were nice enough not to mention it, your idea isn't quite as similar to a certain Thief ability.
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Weisenwolf
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by Weisenwolf »

Raven_Crowking wrote:FWIW, I agree that the ability to smell gold and gems is a pretty big difference between dwarves and everyone else. I like the class as written.
Me too

The DCC classes are obviously based on Basic D&D and in basic D&D the Dwarf was exactly the same as a Warrior except for a couple of weapon restrictions, a few Dwarvish skills and better saving throws. Overall the Dwarf was slightly superior and therefore cost a few more XP's to level up.

The DCC Dwarf is slightly less effective in combat than a Warrior (and it really is only slightly less) but he also has a set of Dwarvish skills which are much more interesting than they were in D&D, retains a better save against magic and no longer needs more XP's.

The Warrior has to be the best Fighter because that is literally all he does; the Dwarf has other abilities.
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by Ravenheart87 »

The only thing I would add to dwarves is higher poison and alcohol tolerance so they can eat and drink whatever they want without any serious consequences. That would totally make dwarven culinary more unique without hurting game balance too much!
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Weisenwolf
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by Weisenwolf »

Is this about making Dwarves more intersting or more powerful?

What's interesting about a beefed up saving throw?
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by NJPDX »

I think the general idea is how to make Dwarfs more their own thing, not more powerful.

Like most here, I like the class as written, but I do agree that they could use something to stand out more.
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by AQuebman »

Ive always felt like Dwarves are the masters of using shields in combat and its reflected clearly in the rules of DCC. A warrior doesn't get a free shield bash he'd have to blow his MDoA to do that. My dwarf gets two attacks can bash the bloody hell out of something else AND gets a mighty deed.

Warriors get a critical threat range and initiative bonus so at least to me I find them to feel very different in the game. Now if were just trying to have a contest of which is more "powerful" then I don't know if DCC is the game for you. Powergaming honestly doesn't work for DCC and its why I don't get to run it with my buddies because that thought really sticks in their craw lol.
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Weisenwolf
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by Weisenwolf »

NJPDX wrote:I think the general idea is how to make Dwarfs more their own thing, not more powerful.

Like most here, I like the class as written, but I do agree that they could use something to stand out more.
Does the Dwarf stand out any less than the Warrior?

In simple terms the Warrior is a better fighter than the Dwarf but he isn't that mush better, in reality most of his attacks will be no more effective than those of the Dwarf so he hardly stands out to any great degree.

I suggest the Dwarf stands out more in having most of the gucci combat skill of the Warrior with his own combat speciality and a bunch of racial talents some of which are unique.
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by NJPDX »

Weisenwolf wrote:
NJPDX wrote:I think the general idea is how to make Dwarfs more their own thing, not more powerful.

Like most here, I like the class as written, but I do agree that they could use something to stand out more.
Does the Dwarf stand out any less than the Warrior?

In simple terms the Warrior is a better fighter than the Dwarf but he isn't that mush better, in reality most of his attacks will be no more effective than those of the Dwarf so he hardly stands out to any great degree.

I suggest the Dwarf stands out more in having most of the gucci combat skill of the Warrior with his own combat speciality and a bunch of racial talents some of which are unique.
Ah, I see what's going on. We appear to be having some miscommunication. I thought you were asking a real question and not posing a rhetorical one. I have zero interest in arguing with you about this. Have a nice day!
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Weisenwolf
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by Weisenwolf »

It was a real question; sorry to trouble with chat on a chat forum........
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Re: Making the Dwarf more unique

Post by NJPDX »

Weisenwolf wrote:It was a real question; sorry to trouble with chat on a chat forum........
Sorry. Not trying to kill discussion. I really mean what I say, I have no interest in arguing about the topic - especially since I actually like the dwarf as written. My read on the topic at hand was people are thinking of ways to make the Dwarf class stand out as unique entity unto itself, rather than just being a short fighter with a Scots or Yorkshire accent, not that people want to make the Dwarf "more powerful" or "better" than a warrior.

Ultimately this is more of a discussion for me about flavor and style vs. power or mechanics. Which leads me to a good rule of thumb, "De gustibus non est disputandum." "In matters of taste there is no debate."
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