Big Boned
Prerequisite: Human, Half-orc, Gnome, or Halfling; 1st level only
Benefit: The character is at the absolute largest size for a member of his or her race. Big Boned members of medium races are actually Large size. Big Boned members of small races are actually Medium size.
Special: A character cannot take both Big Boned and Wee Git.
Wee Git
Prerequisite: Human, Elf, Dwarf, Gnome, or Halfling; 1st level only
Benefit: The character is at the absolute smallest size for a member of his or her race. Wee git members of medium races are actually Small size. Wee Git members of small races are actually Tiny size.
Special: A character cannot take both Big Boned and Wee Git.
Size Doesn't Matter
Prerequisite: Big Boned or Wee Git, Escape Artist 10 ranks
Benefit: Characters with this feat may switch between two size categories as needs dictate. They may use Big Boned or Wee Git when it is to their advantage, or use their race's normal size when that would be advantageous.
Special: This feat does not apply to worn items such as armor or clothing that must be fitted to the appropriate size.
Notes
The genesis of these feats lie in the relative growth of dwarves and elves since the earliest days of D&D. I blame Games Workshop and their big chunky dwarf models. And half-orcs are pretty frequently portrayed as larger than man-sized nowadays. That used to be the criteria for whether or not a critter was mechanically defined as large. Listing specific races in the prerequisites is a pretty ham-handed way of preventing Large dwarves, but I couldn't think of a better way to get the job done.
Has anyone seen feats like these before? I figure with so much OGL material out there that a lot of new crunchy bits are actually re-inventions of already published mechanics.
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Posts
There's something similar to Big-Boned from WotC that they used for Goliaths and, I think, Half-Giants. Basically, they're treated as Large in many respects, but they're basically not /really/ Large.
ReplyDeleteMight be worth taking a look at. Goliaths are in Races of Stone, as I recall.
Hah! Good catch! That's a newbie mistake! Correction forthcoming...
ReplyDeleteA size increase is considered to be pretty important, so there are some cases where WotC took quite some effort to avoid actually changing size categories while retaining some of the advantages.
ReplyDeleteSome Forgotten Realms accessory (Unapproachable East?) had the "Jotunbrod" feat, Half-Giants (Psionics Handbook) and Goliaths (Races of Stone) have the "Powerful Built". You'll gain the grapple and bull rush modifiers of Large creatures and increased weapon damage.
Greater reach seems to be the big thing they don't want you to have without an ECL increase. Even a character with all the other benefits and without the AC and attack penalty seesm to be better balanced...
So I'll wager a guess that you'll never see a feat that lets you increase the size from Medium to Large from WotC. Small to Medium doesn't matter as much, if I remember correctly, there are small dwarves somewhere.
While reach is powerful I'm not as worried about it as Wizards seems to be. Reach isn't the end-all and be-all of combat. Try telling all the countless ogres and giants killed by PCs over the years how great reach is!
ReplyDeleteWell, reach is powerful and giants have become a lot more dangerous than in previous editions...
ReplyDeleteLet's take a first level human fighter: Big Boned, Exotic Weapon Proficiency(Spiked Chain), Combat Reflexes. He now threatens everything within 15 feat of him. At third level he'll take Improved Trip. He now has a +8 bonus to tripping (+4 size, +4 feat) and anyone within his immense reach who stands up grants him another AoO. I won't even start about Enlarge or psionic Expansion...
And by the way, shouldn't it say "Big boned members of small races are actually Medium size." in the Big Boned text? If you ever want to sell to female gamers, better call them "petite" and "plus-sized" ;)
Green Ronin's Wrath&Rage has a Runt (general)
ReplyDeletefeat that drops your size one catagory.
The AoO and threat rules seem to keep
size increases to +1 or better LA races.
Not necessarily a bad tradeoff, but ranged threat
{Feats, orig. from mongoose} allows a 5-6
level fighter to threaten a 20ft area with
ranged attacks.
'And by the way, shouldn't it say "Big boned members of small races are actually Medium size." in the Big Boned text?'
ReplyDeleteYeppers, it should. Correcting some more...