Talk:Lamia, 2nd Variant (5e Race)

This looks fun. Can I help?

I have some questions and comments, of course. Just brainstorming :)

• Why the +2 Dexterity bonus? I would think they'd lean more into +1 Constitution and +1 Charisma bonuses, considering their large bodies and striking appearance.

• Having both an innate swimming and climbing speed seems quite overpowered. To nerf them, you could instead give them advantage on Athletics checks for climbing and swimming. Alternatively, you could set the climbing/swimming speeds lower, say at 15 or 20 feet.

• Alternatively (again) you could give the climbing speed to just the Jungle subspecies, with maybe a Dex or Str bonus (if we're going with the base stat increase being Con and Cha). Then to compensate give the Desert subspeciesa +5 or 10 to its walking speed. Gotta be fast to avoid getting burned on hot sand.

• Armor on a snake tail seems pretty impossible. I would consider forbidding them from wearing heavy armor as a representation of that. One could argue that the scaled tail offers its own protection, to a degree, I suppose.

• When grappling with their tail, consider having them count a Large, but taking away their mobility. I could see a Lamia easily wrestle down a horse, but that's a leg-lock they're performing.

• I'm also not convinced a human could hold a Lamia in place. Of course just making them Large has it's own issues. Theoretically you could do so while making their carrying capacity/max push/pull calculated as medium, and letting them squeeze through small spaces and pass through medium spaces without squeezing. They're really intermediately-sized, so whichever size you pick requires exceptions to the rules.

• The page mentions names for male Lamias (which I'm all for), but also seems to imply that Lamia only mate with non-lamia. Consider cleaning up the language on that. I'd love to see happy all lamia families too, slithering along holding hands all wholesome-like lol.
• Eggs??
• They don't get any skills? At least give them Performance. You know they've got natural rhythm.

--Jikennosamurai (talk) 23:20, 16 February 2023 (MST)