Hey, just wondering. Does anyone know a good and balanced fairy race I could use for my game? The tiny ones, with the wings. I'm not 100% confident in my own skills of balancing things, so if you know anything good, mind sharing it with me?
(I mean, i could probably just use gnome stats for a fey character, but that semms kind lazy. so....)
Flight breaks a LOT of the game, particularly at will. Tiny also causes issues - low speed that pretty much needs you have to ride small creatures, including flying ones.
I would probably build one specifically for a game. Possibly give them 'wings' that allow you to glide down, a good jump ability combined with the ability to stick to the ceiling/wall. That gets rid of a lot of the abuses of flight. (Sharp shooting from on high).
Also not being humanoid is a big issue. It's immunity to a whole bunch of effects like Charm Person. The only non-humanoid race I know is centaur. Even the Eladrin are "fey ancestry" but still humanoid type.
There's no good way to adapt those races in a way that makes them balanced with a standard race without just handwaving away the huge differences in anatomy. The PC rules just aren't designed for creatures that small. A quick look at the pixie and sprite shows that their stat blocks line up with common sense: they're extremely fragile and unable to deal meaningful damage with weapons, and their strength score is well below anything the standard array or point buy could reasonably produce. Most equipment and magic items will not be sized correctly for them either. So you're faced with making a character that's true to their traits but is always one bad saving throw away from instant death, or a character that's comparable to a standard race but doesn't really feel like a tiny creature.
If I had to take a stab at homebrewing a race like that, I'd start with something like...
Hit Die. Your hit die is a d4 (average of 3) regardless of your class.
Diminutive Strength. Your weapon attacks deal 1 damage instead of the weapon's damage, and you don't add your ability modifier to the damage roll. In addition, your Strength score is divided by 4 (rounded up.)
Diminutive Dexterity. Your maximum Dexterity Score is 30 instead of 20.
Giant's Protection. While you occupy the same space as a friendly creature that isn't incapacitated you have three-quarters cover, and if you are subjected to an effect that allows you to make a Dexterity saving throw to take only half damage, you instead take no damage if you succeed.
Ability Score Increase. DEX+5, CON-4. Pixies get CHA+2, Sprites get INT+2.
Other than that I'd give them the same speeds, languages, traits and actions as their monster stat blocks, except the pixie's spells should have the same level requirements as full spellcasters (3rd level for second level spells, 5th for third level spells and 7th for fourth level spells.) As for the sprite's poison, I'd let the player forage in a forest for a full work day (8 hours) to make enough poison to coat 20 pieces of ammunition.
Eladrin are faeries, but if their stats aren’t exactly what you’re looking for, find a stat block for what you ARE looking for and try to approximate it, using existing races as templates for balance. If you want flying, for example, that’s pretty much all your race is going to have going for it.
I think InquisitiveCoder’s thoughts are good, but I personally wouldn’t stray so far from existing racial features.
Depending on the nature of your campaign or character, you might consider a fairy race that has Medium Size, but can briefly shrink down to Tiny - a more extreme version of the "reduce" effect on enlarge/reduce. You might also look back at the Mystic discipline that allowed size changes for ideas here:
Diminution
Immortal Discipline You manipulate the matter that composes your body, drastically reducing your size without surrendering any of your might. Psychic Focus. While focused on this discipline, you have advantage on Dexterity (Stealth) checks. Miniature Form (2 psi; conc., 10 min.). As a bonus action, you become Tiny until your concentration ends. While this size, you gain a +5 bonus to Dexterity (Stealth) checks and can move through gaps up to 6 inches across without squeezing. Toppling Shift (2 psi). As a bonus action, you shift to an incredibly small size and then suddenly return to normal, sending an opponent flying backward. Choose one creature you can see within 5 feet of you. It must succeed on a Strength saving throw or be knocked prone. Sudden Shift (5 psi). As a reaction when you are hit by an attack, you shift down to minute size to avoid the attack. The attack misses, and you move up to 5 feet without provoking opportunity attacks before returning to normal size. Microscopic Form (7 psi; conc., 10 min.). As a bonus action, you become smaller than Tiny until your concentration ends. While this size, you gain a +10 bonus to Dexterity (Stealth) checks and a +5 bonus to AC, you can move through gaps up to 1 inch across without squeezing, and you can’t make weapon attacks.
Combine the italacized bit with the disadvantages of reduce (STR disadvantage, damage reduction), and you might have a viable balanced feature. Keep that 10 minute (concentration?) limit and tie it to a few uses a long rest.
Flight does break some things in low levels at 5E - but there are races like Aarakocra that have it, so it's not totally imbalanced. I'd go with a smaller number - 30 instead of 50 at the most. Likely a light or no armor restriction.
Hmm, I did find a homebrew one and it tried to circumvent the size issue by giving you a racial ability to shrink down euqipment to make it fit you (at the risk of weapons become weaker, similair as while reduced). They also give you an abysmall walking speed of 10, but a flying speed of 30, though you can't fly higher than 10 feet without getting exhausted (not the condition) and being forced back closer to the ground, so that might be one idea to balance the race.
But honestly, I was more thinking of going the "a midsummer night's dream" route and really not make fairies all that small. For example, in that tale, both Oberon and Titania are realativly close to human sized, and while that is mostly due to them being royalty, or so I seem to remember, there is defenietly a case for larger sized fairies to exist and even the smaller ones in that story could easily go up to somewhere around your knee, so maybe roughly around the same size as gnomes, maybe just a tiny bit smaller, but still within the small range, rather than tiny.
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Hey, just wondering. Does anyone know a good and balanced fairy race I could use for my game? The tiny ones, with the wings. I'm not 100% confident in my own skills of balancing things, so if you know anything good, mind sharing it with me?
(I mean, i could probably just use gnome stats for a fey character, but that semms kind lazy. so....)
Flight breaks a LOT of the game, particularly at will. Tiny also causes issues - low speed that pretty much needs you have to ride small creatures, including flying ones.
I would probably build one specifically for a game. Possibly give them 'wings' that allow you to glide down, a good jump ability combined with the ability to stick to the ceiling/wall. That gets rid of a lot of the abuses of flight. (Sharp shooting from on high).
Also not being humanoid is a big issue. It's immunity to a whole bunch of effects like Charm Person. The only non-humanoid race I know is centaur. Even the Eladrin are "fey ancestry" but still humanoid type.
There's no good way to adapt those races in a way that makes them balanced with a standard race without just handwaving away the huge differences in anatomy. The PC rules just aren't designed for creatures that small. A quick look at the pixie and sprite shows that their stat blocks line up with common sense: they're extremely fragile and unable to deal meaningful damage with weapons, and their strength score is well below anything the standard array or point buy could reasonably produce. Most equipment and magic items will not be sized correctly for them either. So you're faced with making a character that's true to their traits but is always one bad saving throw away from instant death, or a character that's comparable to a standard race but doesn't really feel like a tiny creature.
If I had to take a stab at homebrewing a race like that, I'd start with something like...
Other than that I'd give them the same speeds, languages, traits and actions as their monster stat blocks, except the pixie's spells should have the same level requirements as full spellcasters (3rd level for second level spells, 5th for third level spells and 7th for fourth level spells.) As for the sprite's poison, I'd let the player forage in a forest for a full work day (8 hours) to make enough poison to coat 20 pieces of ammunition.
The Forum Infestation (TM)
Eladrin are faeries, but if their stats aren’t exactly what you’re looking for, find a stat block for what you ARE looking for and try to approximate it, using existing races as templates for balance. If you want flying, for example, that’s pretty much all your race is going to have going for it.
I think InquisitiveCoder’s thoughts are good, but I personally wouldn’t stray so far from existing racial features.
Depending on the nature of your campaign or character, you might consider a fairy race that has Medium Size, but can briefly shrink down to Tiny - a more extreme version of the "reduce" effect on enlarge/reduce. You might also look back at the Mystic discipline that allowed size changes for ideas here:
Combine the italacized bit with the disadvantages of reduce (STR disadvantage, damage reduction), and you might have a viable balanced feature. Keep that 10 minute (concentration?) limit and tie it to a few uses a long rest.
Flight does break some things in low levels at 5E - but there are races like Aarakocra that have it, so it's not totally imbalanced. I'd go with a smaller number - 30 instead of 50 at the most. Likely a light or no armor restriction.
Hmm, I did find a homebrew one and it tried to circumvent the size issue by giving you a racial ability to shrink down euqipment to make it fit you (at the risk of weapons become weaker, similair as while reduced). They also give you an abysmall walking speed of 10, but a flying speed of 30, though you can't fly higher than 10 feet without getting exhausted (not the condition) and being forced back closer to the ground, so that might be one idea to balance the race.
But honestly, I was more thinking of going the "a midsummer night's dream" route and really not make fairies all that small. For example, in that tale, both Oberon and Titania are realativly close to human sized, and while that is mostly due to them being royalty, or so I seem to remember, there is defenietly a case for larger sized fairies to exist and even the smaller ones in that story could easily go up to somewhere around your knee, so maybe roughly around the same size as gnomes, maybe just a tiny bit smaller, but still within the small range, rather than tiny.