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Gizladlo
2013-01-27, 02:17 AM
As mentioned here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=14601325&postcount=510), I'm generating a lot of material for Dungeons & Dragons Fourth Edition (4e). How much of a help this site will be is unclear, and I must admit as a first post I am a little reluctant, but here goes.

The following is a race option as a playable character. This is the one that is closest to completion.

Karaku
Telepathic and fearsome arachnids, awakened by an unknown force
Racial Traits
Average Height: 4’ 10” – 5’ 2”
Average Weight: 360 – 440 lb.

Ability Scores: +2 Constitution, +2 Wisdom or +2 Charisma
Size: Medium
Speed: 6 squares, climb 4 squares (spider climb)
Vision: Low-light

Languages: Common, choice of Deep Speech or Giant
Skill Bonuses: +2 Dungeoneering, +2 Intimidate
Beast of Burden: You use your Constitution score to determine your normal load, heavy load, and maximum drag load. This includes making a Constitution check in stressful situations to lift, carry or drag an object.
Telepathy: You can communicate telepathically with any creature within 5 squares of you that has a language.
Valorous: You have a +1 racial bonus to all defenses while you are bloodied.
Threatening Reach: You can use threatening reach as an encounter power.
Threatening Reach _____ Karaku Racial Power
“You enter the stance of your people, allowing you to threaten a wider area.”
Encounter • Stance
Minor Action _____ Personal
Effect: You enter a stance that lasts until the end of your next turn. While in the stance, you can make opportunity attacks against creatures that are 2 squares away from you as well as against adjacent creatures. As a free action, you can end the stance.
Sustain Minor: The stance persists.

Perhaps created by Ioun to fight the aberrant invasion, the karaku dot the landscape as well-trained captains and bodyguards. They are natural leaders, proving time and again to have both the fortitude and willpower to overcome even the greatest adversity.

Play a karaku if you want …
• to scale walls and crawl across ceilings.
• to play a large, intimidating creature that communicates telepathically.
• to be a member of a race that favors the battlemind, cleric and warden classes.

Physical Qualities
Members of the karaku race weigh around 400 pounds and are about 5 feet tall. Karaku females are heavier and taller than their male counterparts. They differ from the other races because they are not humanoids. Instead, they resemble large arachnids.

Members of the karaku race are characterized by their chitinous exoskeletons, jointed limbs and lean, segmented bodies. They have two arms and six legs. They have a mouth like a spider, complete with fangs. Their eyes usually lack color and they have no hair. Some undergo mutations in their lifetime, spontaneously growing venom sacs or even wings. Those born in the Underdark usually have a blackened skin color, whereas those born in the natural plane usually have a sandy skin color, but a mutation might cause one to have an abnormal skin color, like pink or forest green.

They reach maturity at the same time as the other races, but they lead short lives. Most never live past 50 years old, and those that do are usually hive leaders. Even so, no Karaku has been known to survive past 75 years.

Playing a Karaku
The history behind the awakening of the karaku is disputed. Some claim Ioun gave them intelligence, while others defend the legend that it was mortal wizards. Still others believe the karaku are the discarded creations of Lolth. Another legend states the karaku are yet another force awakened by the presence of aberrant creatures.

Whatever they believe, they defend it tenaciously, and often to the grave.

There are two known karaku hive clusters: Karak’kana, which lies in the natural plane, and Karak’antu, which lies in the Underdark. The other races know the general whereabouts of these kingdoms, but their borders have never been drawn because they change nearly every day. Not many are brave or stupid enough to venture onto karaku lands uninvited.

Every year, the karaku hives hold a proving to christen their children. This event, known to the karaku as Kara’Henu, hosts a number of proving grounds, from fighting and stalking to writing and magic use. Each child must try at least eight of them, and pass at least five of them. This rite of passage grants the child not only a name, but a hive surname as well. The children that fail are exiled, and those that survive often give themselves a name without a hive surname.

Every eight years, a potentate and an advisory council for each hive is selected through a tournament. The winner chooses seven others from the loser’s bracket, who then make up the advisory council to that potentate. The potentate represents the heart and mind of the hive. The potentate is also the spiritual leader of the hive, and the hive revere the deities and spirits at the direction of their leader. Still, most karaku venerate Ioun and either Pelor or Lolth, as well as the natural spirits of the realm. The potentate is called a broodfather if he is male or a broodmother if she is female.

The karaku, at their core, believe the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one. This can result in a massive emigration from a hive if an unpopular potentate gains power. Also, in other pursuits, the karaku are known as driven and stubborn, often repeating the same method over and over without refusing to change course. Their telepathy makes it easy for them to communicate with others, and most of them empathize well with strangers.

Karaku characteristics: Brooding, combative, empathizing, fierce, intimidating, loyal, protective, proud, resilient, restless, tenacious, traditional

Male names: Blus’antu, Jjor, Kata’kana, Rith’antu, Wryk’kana, Zzao

Female names: Anak’kana, Ewoa’antu, Iash’antu, Otho’kana, Uuka, Yyro

Karaku Backgrounds
Here are some background elements for the karaku.

Karak’kana Warrior: You are a member of the desert hive, lively and robust. Intense heat does not affect you, and relentless conditioning has pushed your body past its limits time and again. Perhaps you are noble and just, or maybe you are abused and resentful. Do you seek out fame and fortune, amassing wealth for the hive? Or do you want to be free to lead your own band of warriors across the lands?
Associated Skills: Athletics, Endurance

Karak’antu Mercenary: You grew up in Karak’antu, the Underdark hive, where politics are a way of life. It is here you have learned how to find whatever you’re looking for, from illegal goods to a good informant, or you know, from all your experience, exactly when a situation starts to go the wrong way. Either way, your skills have been put to the test time and again. But have you a long history of successes or failures? Do you seek an escape from your world, or perhaps something more?
Associated Skills: Insight, Streetwise

Exiled Karaku: You left your hive when you failed to pass at least five of the eight tests in the Kara’Henu, or maybe when your candidate for potentate lost. Either way, you began a nomadic life free of the pressures of the hive. You survived by scavenging for food and, more importantly, watching for predators. Do you yearn for the life you left? Or have you come to terms with your exile?
Associated Skills: Nature, Perception

Potentate Guardian
“The only path to my allies is first through me.”

Prerequisite: Karaku

The highest level of service for a member of the karaku race to reach without retiring to political life is to serve as a potentate guardian, a member of an elite class that reports directly to the potentate of the hive. These followers undergo the same basic training, from rallying others to dragging a fallen comrade to safety. They serve as pillars of character in the karaku community.

Potentate Guardian Path Features
Exhorting Action (11th level): When you spend an action point to take an extra action, each ally that can see and hear you gains temporary hit points equal to your Constitution modifier plus one-half your level.
Guardian’s Burden (11th level): You are considered to have one hand free even when carrying a heavy load, and carrying a heavy load does not make you slowed.
Paragon Power Points (11th level): You gain 2 additional power points.
Vindictive Resurgence (16th level): When you spend your second wind, each enemy adjacent to you suffers a –2 penalty to all defenses until the end of your next turn.

Potentate Guardian Powers
Telepathic Jeer _____ Potentate Guardian Attack 11
“You get inside the minds of your foes with a psychic taunt.”
Encounter • Augmentable, Psionic
Standard Action _____ Close burst 2
Target: Each enemy in burst
Attack: Constitution + 6 (+ 8 at 21st level) vs. Will
Hit: 2d6 + Constitution modifier psychic damage, and you mark the target until the end of your next turn.
Augment 2
Effect: As above, but you gain a +1 bonus to all defenses for each enemy marked by this power.

Guardian’s Repositioning _____ Potentate Guardian Utility 12
“You blink to a different location, becoming sturdier in the process.”
Daily • Teleportation
Move Action _____ Personal
Effect: You teleport to a square up to 6 squares away, then spend a healing surge and regain additional hitpoints equal to your Constitution modifier + one-half your level. Until the end of the encounter, you have resistance to all damage types equal to your Constitution modifier.

Grid of Omnipresence _____ Potentate Guardian Attack 20
“With the power of your mind, you make yourself everywhere at once.”
Daily • Psionic, Teleportation, Weapon, Zone
Immediate Interrupt _____ Close burst 3
Trigger: An enemy in the burst targets an ally in the burst
Target: The triggering enemy
Effect: You teleport to a square adjacent to the target
Attack: Constitution vs. AC
Hit: 2[W]+ Constitution modifier damage, and you slide the target 2 squares.
Miss: Half damage, and you slide the target 1 square.
Effect: The burst creates a zone that lasts until the end of the encounter. While in the zone, you may repeat this attack so long as its trigger is met.

Heroic Feats
Adept Climber
Prerequisites: Con 13, karaku
Benefit: You can charge and shift when climbing.

Chitinous Exoskeleton
Prerequisites: Con 13, karaku
Benefit: You gain a +1 bonus to your AC and Fortitude defense.

Eager to Punish
Prerequisites: Con 13, karaku, threatening reach racial power
Benefit: While your threatening reach power is active, you gain a +2 feat bonus to opportunity attacks rolls.

Venom Sacs
Prerequisite: Karaku
Benefit: When you score a critical hit with a melee attack, the target takes an additional 10 poison damage and is slowed until the end of your next turn. The additional poison damage increases to 15 at 11th level and to 20 at 21st level.

Paragon Feats
Crippling Venom
Prerequisites: 11th level, karaku, venom sacs feat
Benefit: The addiontal poison damage and slow is now an effect a save can end. The target takes a –2 penalty to save from this effect.

Spidersilk Descent
Prerequisites: 11th level, karaku
Benefit: You take no damage from falling provided the following conditions are met:
• You fall fewer than a number of squares equal to one-half your level.
• You begin the fall from a ceiling.
• You are not petrified, stunned, or unconscious.

Quick Climber
Prerequisites: 11th level, karaku
Benefit: Increase your climb speed by 2.

vasharanpaladin
2013-01-27, 02:58 AM
Spiderwalk should be dropped, format the speed line as "6 squares, climb 4 squares (spider climb)" for that. :smalltongue:

No precedent for stances as racial powers. Sustainable racial powers are considered to be a Bad Idea (and no, shades have too much wrong with them to be held as an example). :smallmad:

Chitinous Exoskeleton is a bit wonky. Suggest removing the scaling, change to untyped bonus, switch from Reflex to Fortitude defense. The evolutionary advantage of an exoskeleton is that effects that turn your insides to jelly are less effective because your insides are already jelly. :smallwink:

Other than that, no further comment. Spider race is nice, but I kept getting hung up on driders. :smallredface:

Gizladlo
2013-01-27, 08:02 AM
Spiderwalk should be dropped, format the speed line as "6 squares, climb 4 squares (spider climb)" for that. :smalltongue:

No precedent for stances as racial powers. Sustainable racial powers are considered to be a Bad Idea (and no, shades have too much wrong with them to be held as an example). :smallmad:

Chitinous Exoskeleton is a bit wonky. Suggest removing the scaling, change to untyped bonus, switch from Reflex to Fortitude defense. The evolutionary advantage of an exoskeleton is that effects that turn your insides to jelly are less effective because your insides are already jelly. :smallwink:

Other than that, no further comment. Spider race is nice, but I kept getting hung up on driders. :smallredface:

Thanks for your help. I'll make the changes to Spiderwalk and Chitinous Exoskeleton that you suggested.

I want to discuss Threatening Reach before I make a decision on it. I didn't make it a racial passive because I thought it would be too powerful. I made it a sustain minor because a stance on an encounter power -- especially one as powerful as this -- shouldn't last until the end of the encounter.

That said, I have a couple of options here. I could make it last only one turn, or I could redesign it, or I could even make it a racial passive, or I could keep it as it is. I would like to hear your thoughts on the subject.

Zelkon
2013-01-27, 10:54 AM
Scaling of Venom Sacks needs to be dropped by 5 points a tier. Improved Venom Sacks is still a very good pick, even after that. The racial power needs to be sustain standard. It's far too powerful as is. The PP capstone needs to be a sustain minor. Overall well made and professional.

vasharanpaladin
2013-01-27, 02:44 PM
Thanks for your help. I'll make the changes to Spiderwalk and Chitinous Exoskeleton that you suggested.

I want to discuss Threatening Reach before I make a decision on it. I didn't make it a racial passive because I thought it would be too powerful. I made it a sustain minor because a stance on an encounter power -- especially one as powerful as this -- shouldn't last until the end of the encounter.

That said, I have a couple of options here. I could make it last only one turn, or I could redesign it, or I could even make it a racial passive, or I could keep it as it is. I would like to hear your thoughts on the subject.

Because it would be too powerful. Threatening reach is not something given to PCs like that. And, let's face it... does it really fit the concept? Looking at the description, I'm put in mind of something like an eight-legged bug-centaur. That doesn't really cop to threatening reach, just from the appearance.

And, while Zelkon's got a good suggestion for "fixing" it, no. Racial powers are minor, move or free actions. They're supposed to supplement attack powers from a class, not replace them. The shade, which does this, is a prime example of Bad Design.

That said, my suggestion? Scrap it. Do something with webs, use this for a poison bite attack (suggest using the newer +3/6/9 bonus for an attack power, Wootsie doesn't seem to have learned), or for something just a bit more unique? Quick movement power. Spiders can motor when they need to. :smallbiggrin:

Zelkon
2013-01-27, 03:42 PM
Because it would be too powerful. Threatening reach is not something given to PCs like that. And, let's face it... does it really fit the concept? Looking at the description, I'm put in mind of something like an eight-legged bug-centaur. That doesn't really cop to threatening reach, just from the appearance.

And, while Zelkon's got a good suggestion for "fixing" it, no. Racial powers are minor, move or free actions. They're supposed to supplement attack powers from a class, not replace them. The shade, which does this, is a prime example of Bad Design.

That said, my suggestion? Scrap it. Do something with webs, use this for a poison bite attack (suggest using the newer +3/6/9 bonus for an attack power, Wootsie doesn't seem to have learned), or for something just a bit more unique? Quick movement power. Spiders can motor when they need to. :smallbiggrin:

Yeah, just it lasting one round is good enough. Alternatively, you could use it as a reaction to moving that gives you an OA even if they shift or otherwise avoid OAs. Gets that lightning fast pincer kind of thing down.

Gizladlo
2013-01-28, 02:56 AM
Scaling of Venom Sacks needs to be dropped by 5 points a tier. Improved Venom Sacks is still a very good pick, even after that. The racial power needs to be sustain standard. It's far too powerful as is. The PP capstone needs to be a sustain minor. Overall well made and professional.

I made the changes to Venom Sacs and Crippling Venom that you suggested on my saved document. Thank you for your help!


Because it would be too powerful. Threatening reach is not something given to PCs like that. And, let's face it... does it really fit the concept? Looking at the description, I'm put in mind of something like an eight-legged bug-centaur. That doesn't really cop to threatening reach, just from the appearance.

And, while Zelkon's got a good suggestion for "fixing" it, no. Racial powers are minor, move or free actions. They're supposed to supplement attack powers from a class, not replace them. The shade, which does this, is a prime example of Bad Design.

That said, my suggestion? Scrap it. Do something with webs, use this for a poison bite attack (suggest using the newer +3/6/9 bonus for an attack power, Wootsie doesn't seem to have learned), or for something just a bit more unique? Quick movement power. Spiders can motor when they need to. :smallbiggrin:

I think I will scrap it. This means I get to design additional racial powers for the karaku, which pleases me. Good to know the job isn't yet complete.


Yeah, just it lasting one round is good enough. Alternatively, you could use it as a reaction to moving that gives you an OA even if they shift or otherwise avoid OAs. Gets that lightning fast pincer kind of thing down.

A main idea for the karaku was to make them menacing, and I wanted to make the racial power reflect that, as well as do something unprecedented. But I no longer desire to keep Threatening Reach as its racial power.

Both of you have given me good suggestions, and I was wondering what you thought of the following power:

Skitter _____ Karaku Racial Power
“You dart across a surface, be it a floor, wall or ceiling.”
Encounter • Racial
Move Action _____ Personal
Effect: You shift 8 squares across a horizontal surface, or 6 squares across a vertical surface.

Thanks again for your help!

vasharanpaladin
2013-01-28, 04:59 PM
That one's actually much better. You want them to seem menacing? Karaku can move long distances in short bursts of speed. You can never just assume one can't get In Your Face if it felt like it. :smallbiggrin:

EDIT: ...And why did that get me thinking of SCP-173? :smalleek: