when the world becomes too much of a kitchen sink

[JoeJ]

If someone wants to play a Lizardfolk, you should probably let them unless you have some very compelling reason your setting has no Lizardfolk. "I haven't put down a Lizardfolk country" is not such a reason.

On the contrary, that is an excellent reason not to allow it unless the player in question is willing to do the work of creating the lizardfolk country and making it fit within the established history, mythology, politics, etc. of the world, including what people in whatever place we're starting typically know/believe about lizardfolk.

[Nifft]

On the contrary, that is an excellent reason not to allow it unless the player in question is willing to do the work of creating the lizardfolk country and making it fit within the established history, mythology, politics, etc. of the world, including what people in whatever place we're starting typically know/believe about lizardfolk.

Happy Scenario

Player: "Hey this empty swampy area on the map is next to where the PCs are going to travel next, right?"

DM: "Yeah."

Player: "How about my PC is a Lizardfolk from that area?"

DM: "Sure, that'd be cool."


Unhappy Scenario

DM: "... and that's the game so far, the dragons are all evil, kobolds were the early enemy, and yuan-ti are the current threat."

Player: "I wanna be a Lizardfolk."

DM: "No, reptile people are the enemy."

Player: "Yeah that's why, won't it be cool for me to be the only good rebel outcast of my evil race?"

[Kelb_Panthera]

To the question of how is there enough room for all these creatures; were you aware that the earth is an atypically dense planet? At the risk of killing a few cat-girls, a world with surface gravity comparable to earth would be much larger than earth unless it had a similar metallic core.

I'm not too familiar with the exact figures but a world with a 30% larger diameter would have 70% more surface area.

Bottom line; it's not unreasonable to simply have a larger world to accommodate the extra peoples.



On to monsters; magic is involved in the biology of more than a few of them and if you really try to dig down into some of the harder sciences it very quickly becomes clear that it doesn't work quite the same as reality at some of the more fundamental levels. That aside, earth used to support megafauna that differed from what we have now by quite a bit. A different balance of atmospheric gasses and food web arrangements on that larger planet I suggested above could explain away the variety of higher-level predators in large part with magic to cover the difference.


I'm not saying you have to be a kitchen sink DM, by any stretch. I'm just saying that doing so can be justified. Incidentally, I am such a kitchen sink DM.

[JoeJ]

happy scenario

player: "hey this empty swampy area on the map is next to where the pcs are going to travel next, right?"

dm: "yeah."

player: "how about my pc is a lizardfolk from that area?"

dm: "sure, that'd be cool."


unhappy scenario

dm: "... And that's the game so far, the dragons are all evil, kobolds were the early enemy, and yuan-ti are the current threat."

player: "i wanna be a lizardfolk."

dm: "no, reptile people are the enemy."

player: "yeah that's why, won't it be cool for me to be the only good rebel outcast of my evil race?"

no!! No scaly drizzts allowed! No drizzts of any kind! Ever!!!

[Slipperychicken]

On to monsters; magic is involved in the biology of more than a few of them and if you really try to dig down into some of the harder sciences it very quickly becomes clear that it doesn't work quite the same as reality at some of the more fundamental levels. That aside, earth used to support megafauna that differed from what we have now by quite a bit. A different balance of atmospheric gasses and food web arrangements on that larger planet I suggested above could explain away the variety of higher-level predators in large part with magic to cover the difference.

I'm sure that elemental air and soul-energy support much bigger monsters than our world's oxygen will.

[Kelb_Panthera]

I'm sure that elemental air and soul-energy support much bigger monsters than our world's oxygen will.

Indeed, I suspect so.

[Kami2awa]

When I see Tarrasque-Blooded as a playable race, I'll know it was this thread that was responsible.

Not necessarily, this has been up for over a decade:

https://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php...-the-tarrasque

[Quertus]

To the question of how is there enough room for all these creatures; were you aware that the earth is an atypically dense planet? At the risk of killing a few cat-girls, a world with surface gravity comparable to earth would be much larger than earth unless it had a similar metallic core.

Let's not forget that gravity need not work the way it does in our reality. In 2e D&D, for example, we know, thanks to Spelljammer, that gravity either "is" or "isn't" - even a small sailing ship can produce gravity (of full planet-level strength).

IIRC, there's some crazy epic city in 3e that demonstrates similar principles that gravity just "is".

So my campaign worlds come in quite a diverse range of sizes - from, say, asteroid sized, to, say, the size of the solar system. Because why not?

Now I have the urge to run an infinite-sized planet...

Heh, exactly my thoughts.

"Nifft's Tarrasque Burgers - World's Only Infinite Eat-All-You-Want Diner"

There are so many monsters that can work for all you can eat, but only one (literally) that gives the Illithid Savant what they want.

They'll happily trade you.

When I see Tarrasque-Blooded as a playable race, I'll know it was this thread that was responsible.

You know, I've got a character who, among other goals, was trying to use magic to breed a Tarrasque-Blooded race...

Not necessarily, this has been up for over a decade:

https://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php...-the-tarrasque

Dang, has it already been done?

[upho]

There are so many monsters that can work for all you can eat, but only one (literally) that gives the Illithid Savant what they want.

They'll happily trade you.

I'm sure they would.

That is, at least until their hive-brain mastermind decides to set its plan of a hostile takeover of "Nifft's Tarrasque Burgers" in motion. And you can be certain the squid-head Victory Party Committee has long since come to an unanimous decision on the choice of snacks to be served during the ensuing festivities: the grey matter of poor ranch owner Nifft and the many innocent hard-working specialist vivisectionists butchers, tanners, bone-carvers, chefs and waiters in his employ...

You are what you eat. After generations of a city living on a terrasque dominant diet, the people start acquiring terrasque features, like healing faster than their neighbor cities and their skin hardening into natural armor.

When I see Tarrasque-Blooded as a playable race, I'll know it was this thread that was responsible.

You know, I've got a character who, among other goals, was trying to use magic to breed a Tarrasque-Blooded race...

Dang, has it already been done?

Not the race AFAICT. So I guess I better get this started before someone else does...

Spoiler: Nifftilim (Tarrasque-Bred)

Show

Physical Description: Though the appearance of nifftilims nearly always include a few specific features inherited from one of the many originally distinct humanoid races which have inhabited Tarrasque City for centuries, most features are shared by nifftilims of all heritages. These typically include a large, robust and heavily muscled build, with a short thick neck supporting a large low-set head with wide jaws and heavy brows, all clad in a thick leathery and hairless skin of a striking orange hue. But while these traits may be the most common, the nifftilims' unique supernatural diet may have numerous other visible effects, usually in the form of features with a striking resemblance to those of the magic beast which have fed the nifftilims for generations. For example, most nifftilims grow at least one miniature set of the Tarrasque's many terrifying weapons, usually in the form of large clawed hands or jaws filled with pointed serrated incisors and canines, but sometimes in the form of a forehead adorned with wicked forward-curving horns, or long sharp spikes protruding from the vertebrae of the neck or the end of a long tail.

Society: Tarrasque City!

Relations: Probably hates squid-heads, but who doesn't?

Alignment and Religion: Eh...?

Adventurers: Nifftilims often adventure in order to find out whether other weird magical creatures are as tasty and nutritious as the Tarrasque.

Male Names: Beer, Kami, Kelb, Pleh.

Female Names: Niffta, Panthera, Querta, Upha.

Standard Racial Traits
Ability Score Racial Traits: Nifftilims have strong and sturdy bodies, but not very keen minds and appear strangely beastly. They gain +2 Strength, +2 Constitution, and -2 Intelligence.
Type: Nifftilims are humanoids with the beastblood subtype, and are therefore treated as both humanoids and magic beasts for the purpose of effects and prerequisites.
Size: Nifftilims are Medium creatures and thus receive no bonuses or penalties due to their size.
Speed: Nifftilims have a base speed of 30 feet.
Languages: Nifftilims begin play speaking Common and Aklo. Nifftilims with high intelligence scores can choose from the following: Abyssal, Draconic, Dwarven, Elven, Gnome, Goblin, Halfling, Infernal, and Orc.
Hardened Skin: Nifftilims have thick carapace-like skin, increasing their natural armor bonus by +2.
Immortal Food (Ex): Nifftilims regain hp every hour as though they rested for 8 hours. They also regrow any lost limbs in 1d4 days.
Weapons of the Food: The physical stature of a nifftilim lets him function in many ways as if he were one size category larger. Whenever a nifftilim is subject to a size modifier or special size modifier for an opposed check (such as during grapple checks, bull rush attempts, and trip attempts), the nifftilim is treated as one size larger if doing so is advantageous to him. A nifftilim is also considered to be one size larger when determining whether a creature's special attacks based on size (such as improved grab or swallow whole) can affect him. A nifftilim can use weapons designed for a creature one size larger without penalty. However, his space and reach remain those of a creature of his actual size. The benefits of this racial trait stack with the effects of powers, abilities, and spells that change the subject's size category.
Rush of the Food: Like their food, nifftilims can be surprisingly fast, and gain a 10-foot racial bonus to their speed when using the charge, run, or withdraw actions.
Skills of the Food: Nifftilims gain a +2 racial bonus on Jump checks and Intimidate checks.
Favored Class: Crusader or cleric? A multiclass nifftilim's crusader class does not count when determining whether he takes an experience point penalty (see the XP for Multiclass Characters section, page 60 of the Player's Handbook). Nifftilim society values devotion to their unique source of wealth and produces many deeply religious individuals.

Alternate Racial Traits
The following alternate racial traits may be selected in place of one or more of the standard racial traits above.
?

Please help me complete this extremely important work!

[Resileaf]

As far as I'm concerned, everything in the core book and the first bestiary easily fits in any campaign. Everything in supplementary books is optional and can be allowed or declined at the GM's will.

[wumpus]

In the first universe I created, there was a nexus - a portal to other worlds. Within 50 miles of it, you might encounter anything - even Klingons, Vulcans, Kryptonians, moties, fuzzies, or boggies. But further away, you would only encounter races or monsters from classic European legend.

One party once bumped into a Philmont Ranger - who was able to help them find their way.

How did he (she?) identify himself as such? Proper branded boots (available to scouts)? Did the water "say hello [HELLO!]"?

I'd have to say that gripes about builds taking multiple spatbooks* are an issue in balancing optimization. If the build is "optimized for cool" instead of "optimized for power", then I'd suspect that most problems would be considered "metagaming" if advanced by the player (unless the classes exist in game similar to how OOTS players read the rule books, then claiming the class "doesn't exist" is pretty metagamy).

In the case of "known druid animals" (and to a lesser extend ranger animals) you might have to clamp down on things on how in the world the druid found *that* particular animal (think back when dinosaurs had the animal class. Or perhaps the druid wants to know a rare "monster in the darkness").

When doing E6 worldbuilding, I made the determination that any being with a CR of 10+ was a unique entity. I also established that such beings occurred at a ratio of roughly 1 per 1 million (with people being defined as basically anything that lacks racial hit dice). This means that a fairly large quasi-medieval nation would only have a handful of powerful and iconic monsters.

Doing this, and correspondingly banning anything CR 16+ (necessary for E6, and useful generally, since 3.X D&D breaks at ~ lvl 12 anyway), really cuts down on the kitchen sink problem. Monster entries are bloated out by huge numbers of high-CR enemies that really have no need to be in your game as anything more than one-offs.

One thing I liked about 4e was the idea that characters would progress in multiple stages: 1-6 7-16 16-25 or some such. As such, you need only craft your original world as an E6 world. Then you build a E12 (or whatever) around it and railroad your characters to "the big city" far way or some other such thing that introduces the big bad world (but not all the planes, that's the next enlargement).

You could easily not include large parts of the monster manual, at least until hitting "the multiverse" where limited planes almost certainly "include everything".

* I've heard that "official Hasbro/WOTC/whoeverveownsD&Dnow play allows characters to be made with the Players Handbook and one [official] splatbook. This keeps lookups at a minimum, keeps costs sane (while still encouraging buying books), and makes playtesting possible (because each rule doesn't effect every other rule ever published). It might not be a bad thing to encourage in normal play.

[Andor13]

Unless you're playing in Darksun which has intentionally limited access to other planes, I don't even see a conflict.

You can have an entire world that looks like medieval Detroit with Goblins, and still have your half-centaur/half-dragon/half-illithid/were-lobster Paladin of Disco somewhere out there in the infinity of the planes. He's just not coming here unless the GM says so.

As for Lizardmen, why do they need a nation? Nations are for organizing large projects. They have their swamp, they have their crawdad pots, they have a shrine to Justin Wilson, what more do they need?

[Nifft]

I'm sure they would.

That is, at least until their hive-brain mastermind decides to set its plan of a hostile takeover of "Nifft's Tarrasque Burgers" in motion. And you can be certain the squid-head Victory Party Committee has long since come to an unanimous decision on the choice of snacks to be served during the ensuing festivities: the grey matter of poor ranch owner Nifft and the many innocent hard-working specialist vivisectionists butchers, tanners, bone-carvers, chefs and waiters in his employ...

Not the race AFAICT. So I guess I better get this started before someone else does...

Spoiler: Nifftling (Tarrasque-Bred)

Show

Physical Description: Though the appearance of nifftlings nearly always include a few specific features inherited from one of the many originally distinct humanoid races which have inhabited Tarrasque City for centuries, most features are shared by nifftlings of all heritages. These typically include a large, robust and heavily muscled build, with a short thick neck supporting a large low-set head with wide jaws and heavy brows, all clad in a thick leathery and hairless skin of a striking orange hue. But while these traits may be the most common, the nifftlings' unique supernatural diet may have numerous other visible effects, usually in the form of features with a striking resemblance to those of the magic beast which have fed the nifftlings for generations. For example, most nifftlings grow at least one miniature set of the Tarrasque's many terrifying weapons, usually in the form of large clawed hands or jaws filled with pointed serrated incisors and canines, but sometimes in the form of a forehead adorned with wicked forward-curving horns, or long sharp spikes protruding from the vertebrae of the neck or the end of a long tail. D.

Society: Tarrasque City!

Relations: Probably hates squid-heads, but who doesn't?

Alignment and Religion: Eh...?

Adventurers: Nifftlings often adventure in order to find out whether other weird magical creatures are as tasty and nutritious as the Tarrasque.

Male Names: Beer, Kami, Kelb, Pleh.

Female Names: Niffta, Panthera, Querta, Upha.

Standard Racial Traits
Ability Score Racial Traits: Nifftlings have strong and sturdy bodies, but not very keen minds and appear strangely beastly. They gain +2 Strength, +2 Constitution, -2 Intelligence, and –2 Charisma.
Type: Nifftlings are humanoids with the beastblood subtype, and are therefore treated as both humanoids and magic beasts for the purpose of effects and prerequisites.
Size: Nifftlings are Medium creatures and thus receive no bonuses or penalties due to their size.
Speed: Nifftlings have a base speed of 30 feet.
Languages: Nifftlings begin play speaking Common and Aklo. Nifftlings with high intelligence scores can choose from the following: Abyssal, Draconic, Dwarven, Elven, Gnome, Goblin, Halfling, Infernal, and Orc.
Hardened Skin: Nifftlings have thick carapace-like skin, increasing their natural armor bonus by +2.
Immortal Food (Ex): Nifftlings regain hp every hour as though they rested for 8 hours. They also regrow any lost limbs in 1d4 days.
Weapons of the Food: Nifftlings gain one of the following natural attacks of their choice: a primary bite, pair of claws or gore attack, or a tail with a secondary tail slap attack.
Powerful Build: The physical stature of nifftlings lets them function in many ways as if they were one size category larger. Whenever a nifftling is subject to a size modifier or special size modifier for a Combat Maneuver Bonus or Combat Maneuver Defense (such as during grapple checks, bull rush attempts, and trip attempts), the half-giant is treated as one size larger if doing so is advantageous to him. A half-giant is also considered to be one size larger when determining whether a creature’s special attacks based on size (such as grab or swallow whole) can affect him. A nifftling can use weapons designed for a creature one size larger without penalty. However, his space and reach remain those of a creature of his actual size. The benefts of this racial trait stack with the effects of powers, abilities, and spells that change the subject’s size category.
Rush of the Food: Like their food, Nifftlings can be surprisingly fast, and gain a 10-foot racial bonus to their speed when using the charge, run, or withdraw actions.
Skills of the Food: Nifftlings gain a +2 racial bonus on Jump checks and Intimidate checks.

Alternate Racial Traits
The following alternate racial traits may be selected in place of one or more of the standard racial traits above.
?

Please help me complete this extremely important work!

This work is indeed extremely important.

Suggestions on race name: Nifftilim, a sub-type of Nephilim.

The ranch / BBQ house / mercenary company known as Nifft's will feature advertisements like:
- "Dirty feeds, done dirt cheap."
- "All requests considered, no questions Terrasqued."

[Quertus]

Powerful Build: The physical stature of nifftlings lets them function in many ways as if they were one size category larger. Whenever a nifftling is subject to a size modifier or special size modifier for a Combat Maneuver Bonus or Combat Maneuver Defense (such as during grapple checks, bull rush attempts, and trip attempts), the half-giant is treated as one size larger if doing so is advantageous to him. A half-giant is also considered to be one size larger when determining whether a creature’s special attacks based on size (such as grab or swallow whole) can affect him. A nifftling can use weapons designed for a creature one size larger without penalty. However, his space and reach remain those of a creature of his actual size. The benefts of this racial trait stack with the effects of powers, abilities, and spells that change the subject’s size category.

Please help me complete this extremely important work!

Hilarious! I especially love their version of regeneration, and their names.

See above for my help.

[upho]

OK, this is becoming OT and might even belong in a thread of its own in Homebrew, but I can't seem to stop myself...

This work is indeed extremely important.

Suggestions on race name: Nifftilim, a sub-type of Nephilim.

Ha ha! Yes of course! "Sons of the Great Beast" or something along those lines...

The ranch / BBQ house / mercenary company known as Nifft's will feature advertisements like:
- "Dirty feeds, done dirt cheap."
- "All requests considered, no questions Terrasqued."

Total ROFL!

Seriously, you need to write a background description for these guys, including past and present slogans of Nifft's ranch/BBQ/merc company. And Pleh should do a piece on their current society and the possible "Tarrasque City". I imagined nifftilims having some kind of Tarrasque religion where they thank the great beast for all their fortunes. There probably should be actual divine power connected to the faith, including spells and domains, so I added Crusader and Cleric as possible favored classes and removed the Cha penalty.

Hilarious! I especially love their version of regeneration, and their names.

See above for my help.

Thanks! Though I have to admit I simply stole the regen trait from the PF "half-troll" Grendle, (from Bloodforge, published by Dreamscarred Press). And yeah, who wouldn't want to play a brave nifftilim adventurer named Niffta, Querta or Upha? Those are beautiful names, perfect for the great heroines of future legends!

I've removed the Cha penalty, changed the race's name to nifftilim, and changed the Powerful Build trait to the 3.5 goliath version and hopefully swapped all mentions of "goliath" to "nifftilim" in the description.