Can I be a 3.6 foot tall Tabaxi? What are the rules regarding character height?
Trying to make a Palico esque character for official 5e D&D, so no homebrew. Would it pass to have a Tabaxi in the small catergory? How would this affect the game to where it'll be troubling, how would it be any different from going gnome? Can we word it as a dwarf or young character of a character race? Or try to flavor it as a certain clan of such that are unusually small?
Merely changing your height does not officially change your size category. I could see a DM allowing you to be 3.6 ft but keeping you a Medium sized creature.
That said, typically Small creatures are 4 ft or smaller, while Medium sized creatures are 4ft or larger.
As a DM, I would let you be exactly 4' tall, which is pretty close to 3.6
I once played a 6’ 2” dwarf in 2e. I think as long as you keep the race’s size category the same, I’d consider height and weight to be fluff, and let you go pretty wild with it.
I’m pretty lenient on changes that add a detriment to the gameplay so long as the player understands they can’t beef up other things to compensate. A 3.6 foot tall Tabaxi would be a small creature with the inability to wield weapons with the heavy property, and I could argue a 5 foot reduction in walking speed, similar to the other small races. That’s easy enough to track without fully homebrewing a Palico PC
otherwise I’d set the limit on a height to the lowest height a dwarf can be, and Keep the weight the same (Palicos are a little on the chonk side anyway if I’m remembering correctly)
I once played a 6’ 2” dwarf in 2e. I think as long as you keep the race’s size category the same, I’d consider height and weight to be fluff, and let you go pretty wild with it.
As a DM I would not allow that but rather rule that the maximum height for a small race would be around 4'. There are reasonable limits to species size. There are some very tall humans but no 10' tall humans. o
Dwarfs are actually just barely medium creatures. They are 4-5 feet tall. So having one be a foot taller isn't actually unreasonable. After all, the tallest human known to exist was 8'11. They could also only be half-dwarf. So yeah, in summary, 6ft tall is actually a perfectly reasonable size for a dwarf. They are just generally shorter than humans, but they are quite a bit taller than halflings or gnomes.
I've often gone by the idea that having some extreme trait outside of the norm for a character's race is often a solid justification for why the character is wandering adventurer instead of like... a farmer or something.
That said... I also feel like deliberately just going opposite tends to feel more like being silly for silliness' sake. Not that there's anything wrong with that with the right campaign and group of friends, but I tend to do pretty RP-heavy games where everyone takes the story mostly seriously. I wouldn't be interested in playing as a 6 foot dwarf or a 4 foot goliath, but I can see myself enjoying playing as a particularly short Tabaxi. I know that I tend to visualize Kenku as being small, when really they're medium sized creatures that lean closer to 5 feet tall.
I'm also keen to just reflavoring racial features to play as someone or something that isn't necessarily supported by official material. Like... wanna play a Sasquatch? Just use Bugbear stats. Maybe adjust what languages you know. I remember getting into a long discussion with someone on these forums once who insisted that all players in their campaign be human (they also insisted that women have a minus to strength, and arguing about that got the thread locked), which I wouldn't personally enjoy, but if I was going to do that I would allow people to still play with the stats of the other playable races and just say that, in this setting,t hey're just a particularly unusual human.
I mean now. The whole basis for the silly lineage thing is to be able to play characters which do not correspond to the norm of the race. For me, this is once more about minmaxing and justifying it by being a weirdo for your race. And here it's about playing giant dwarves....
Not giant. It doesn’t change statistics at all your still medium. This has nothing to do with min maxing. Also, having bizarre character traits is a way to make characters stand out, and opens up a lot of roleplay. And besides not all groups mind players minmaxing, especially in 5th edition, as it’s a lot less of an impact making a more powerful character.
in short a tall dwarf is in no way minmaxing because if anything the only benefit you get is how high you can reach.
I've often gone by the idea that having some extreme trait outside of the norm for a character's race is often a solid justification for why the character is wandering adventurer instead of like... a farmer or something.
That said... I also feel like deliberately just going opposite tends to feel more like being silly for silliness' sake. Not that there's anything wrong with that with the right campaign and group of friends, but I tend to do pretty RP-heavy games where everyone takes the story mostly seriously. I wouldn't be interested in playing as a 6 foot dwarf or a 4 foot goliath, but I can see myself enjoying playing as a particularly short Tabaxi. I know that I tend to visualize Kenku as being small, when really they're medium sized creatures that lean closer to 5 feet tall.
I am completely in line with you. Being a hero is extraordinary in itself, and being slightly out of place at start is a good reason for starting you an that path. But relying or extraordinary size looks very shallow to me, fun maybe once, but after that, come on, you can do better than this and be a bit more subtle about what defines your character as unique.
I'm also keen to just reflavoring racial features to play as someone or something that isn't necessarily supported by official material. Like... wanna play a Sasquatch? Just use Bugbear stats. Maybe adjust what languages you know. I remember getting into a long discussion with someone on these forums once who insisted that all players in their campaign be human (they also insisted that women have a minus to strength, and arguing about that got the thread locked), which I wouldn't personally enjoy, but if I was going to do that I would allow people to still play with the stats of the other playable races and just say that, in this setting,t hey're just a particularly unusual human.
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You keep mentioning how shallow things are, but no one ever said that was their only character trait. And as for using tropes, the reason tropes become tropes is because they are good for stories, and as long as you don’t make a carbon copy each time, then people judging you for using a trope are just nitpicking. A character raised by a race other than their own is interesting when used correctly. For example, an abandoned drow raised by a different race makes sense for a reason why they might not be as evil as their kin.
And I’m not sure you even know what minmaxing is. What does what race they were raised by have to do with stats? Yeah it could with the new features added to dnd beyond, but you don’t need to change your stats.
Set your height at exactly 4ft. You're still very technically medium size, but you're basically small sized narrative-wise. There is no downsides to this option.
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I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
Seeing how polarizing this is for people is really funny, especially the people who think you shouldn’t have fun with the height and weight of your character. We are playing a game where if Steve from down the street likes nature a lot he can become a bear, but it’s unbelievable that there is a 3’6 tabaxi, or 6’4 dwarf. Like, dude, it’s not nearly that deep. The main character that I’ve been playing for a while now is a 7’2 96lbs warforged. Now I can provide explanation for why (he’s made of palladium which is very lightweight) but still, unless they’re doing it for a reason besides just for fun, I understand why you’d do that (although I don’t get what mechanical bonus you get from being very tall,short,light, or heavy) but, IMO, it doesn’t really matter that much
sorry of this was long, but eh, whatevs
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Can I be a 3.6 foot tall Tabaxi? What are the rules regarding character height?
Trying to make a Palico esque character for official 5e D&D, so no homebrew. Would it pass to have a Tabaxi in the small catergory? How would this affect the game to where it'll be troubling, how would it be any different from going gnome? Can we word it as a dwarf or young character of a character race? Or try to flavor it as a certain clan of such that are unusually small?
Merely changing your height does not officially change your size category. I could see a DM allowing you to be 3.6 ft but keeping you a Medium sized creature.
That said, typically Small creatures are 4 ft or smaller, while Medium sized creatures are 4ft or larger.
As a DM, I would let you be exactly 4' tall, which is pretty close to 3.6
I once played a 6’ 2” dwarf in 2e.
I think as long as you keep the race’s size category the same, I’d consider height and weight to be fluff, and let you go pretty wild with it.
For understanding of these tables, the base hight in inches + the minimal modifier roll is the minimum that is intended for the species.
Human male e.g. is 60+2d10 inches tall so 62-80" = 5'2" to 6'8"
I’m pretty lenient on changes that add a detriment to the gameplay so long as the player understands they can’t beef up other things to compensate. A 3.6 foot tall Tabaxi would be a small creature with the inability to wield weapons with the heavy property, and I could argue a 5 foot reduction in walking speed, similar to the other small races. That’s easy enough to track without fully homebrewing a Palico PC
otherwise I’d set the limit on a height to the lowest height a dwarf can be, and Keep the weight the same (Palicos are a little on the chonk side anyway if I’m remembering correctly)
Dwarfs are actually just barely medium creatures. They are 4-5 feet tall. So having one be a foot taller isn't actually unreasonable. After all, the tallest human known to exist was 8'11. They could also only be half-dwarf. So yeah, in summary, 6ft tall is actually a perfectly reasonable size for a dwarf. They are just generally shorter than humans, but they are quite a bit taller than halflings or gnomes.
It was the ‘90’s, man. Who doesn’t experiment in college?
I've often gone by the idea that having some extreme trait outside of the norm for a character's race is often a solid justification for why the character is wandering adventurer instead of like... a farmer or something.
That said... I also feel like deliberately just going opposite tends to feel more like being silly for silliness' sake. Not that there's anything wrong with that with the right campaign and group of friends, but I tend to do pretty RP-heavy games where everyone takes the story mostly seriously. I wouldn't be interested in playing as a 6 foot dwarf or a 4 foot goliath, but I can see myself enjoying playing as a particularly short Tabaxi. I know that I tend to visualize Kenku as being small, when really they're medium sized creatures that lean closer to 5 feet tall.
I'm also keen to just reflavoring racial features to play as someone or something that isn't necessarily supported by official material. Like... wanna play a Sasquatch? Just use Bugbear stats. Maybe adjust what languages you know. I remember getting into a long discussion with someone on these forums once who insisted that all players in their campaign be human (they also insisted that women have a minus to strength, and arguing about that got the thread locked), which I wouldn't personally enjoy, but if I was going to do that I would allow people to still play with the stats of the other playable races and just say that, in this setting,t hey're just a particularly unusual human.
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Not giant. It doesn’t change statistics at all your still medium. This has nothing to do with min maxing. Also, having bizarre character traits is a way to make characters stand out, and opens up a lot of roleplay. And besides not all groups mind players minmaxing, especially in 5th edition, as it’s a lot less of an impact making a more powerful character.
in short a tall dwarf is in no way minmaxing because if anything the only benefit you get is how high you can reach.
You keep mentioning how shallow things are, but no one ever said that was their only character trait. And as for using tropes, the reason tropes become tropes is because they are good for stories, and as long as you don’t make a carbon copy each time, then people judging you for using a trope are just nitpicking. A character raised by a race other than their own is interesting when used correctly. For example, an abandoned drow raised by a different race makes sense for a reason why they might not be as evil as their kin.
And I’m not sure you even know what minmaxing is. What does what race they were raised by have to do with stats? Yeah it could with the new features added to dnd beyond, but you don’t need to change your stats.
To be honest, I just wanted to be a Palico because Palicos and small characters are cool.
With the Custom Lineage from Tasha's, making a mechanically small tabaxi is now possible :)
Set your height at exactly 4ft. You're still very technically medium size, but you're basically small sized narrative-wise. There is no downsides to this option.
I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
Seeing how polarizing this is for people is really funny, especially the people who think you shouldn’t have fun with the height and weight of your character. We are playing a game where if Steve from down the street likes nature a lot he can become a bear, but it’s unbelievable that there is a 3’6 tabaxi, or 6’4 dwarf. Like, dude, it’s not nearly that deep. The main character that I’ve been playing for a while now is a 7’2 96lbs warforged. Now I can provide explanation for why (he’s made of palladium which is very lightweight) but still, unless they’re doing it for a reason besides just for fun, I understand why you’d do that (although I don’t get what mechanical bonus you get from being very tall,short,light, or heavy) but, IMO, it doesn’t really matter that much
sorry of this was long, but eh, whatevs