Talk:Sergal, Variant (5e Race)

Hey there! I made this because I was dissatisfied with the existing Sergal template, but didn't wish to overwrite work that someone else had clearly put a lot of effort into. I'm not actually familiar with Sergal lore at all and got the contents of this page from their wiki, so if anyone with a greater lore familiarity comes along, I would appreciate it if they expanded the page's lore- my skills are in creating mechanically fun and interesting races.

• Race summary line is missing.
• Nothing super overtly is overpowered but the peripheral vision trait is a bit concerning, primarily because of how surprise works. Generally, if you didn't notice them the first time, the DM declares you are surprised, and you don't get a do-over to overturn that. The way it sounds right now I guess could still work? Though peripheral vision only makes me think you deserve proficiency/advantage in perception using your eyes.
• Melee inclination basically deters you from choosing anything like ranger or caster, more so than how official races might be. This is a bit of a detriment that is not in 5e, where races may have specialties and better builds with certain classes, but they are not overtly penalized for wanting to try something else (aka, a kobold fighter or goliath bard don't have anything directly penalizing them despite their lack of race-class synergy.). This is more of a 3.Xe thing.
• Legacy of discovery is somewhat concerning because of how quickly you can bypass and swap attunements. The usage rate of "twice" is also not standard, as it's usually only one-use or a limit based on PB and then rest-recharge. Lore-wise, I am also curious what allows these sergals in particular to decipher possibly massive implications of a powerful magic item in such a short second or so (attunement includes "creature gains an intuitive understanding of how to activate any magical properties of the item, including any necessary command words.")
• Subraces, like races, also do not need capitalization unless the original content uses it (like Pokemon or SkyWings and camelscript). Advantage, disadvantage, bonus actions also do not need capitalization (but they could use a link). Alignments are not capitalized. Scores, skills, SRD need linking. Units (feet, pounds, eg) should be written out.--Yanied (talk) 10:19, 4 August 2023 (MDT)

Wiki states that they have peripheral vision and are generally incredibly hard to sneak up on or surprise. To me that reads like a Passive Perception boost, however most DMs don't make use of passive perception rules (same as how Guidance, despite the fact you're meant to pre-cast it, is effectively used as a Reaction in-game). As a result, to ensure the feature was actually used, then I wired it more directly to what you use Passive Perception for: Preventing Surprise.

Melee Inclination is required for lore accuracy; as their wiki outright states that sergals are not capable of using ranged weaponry effectively due to lacking bifocal vision, but can still hit things accurately within the throwing range of a spear.

Legacy of Discovery is an ability intended to allow for attunement swapping. Twice is not standard, but once makes the ability very awkward, and more than two uses really does open it up to abuse. Lore wise this is because the southern subrace is known for their civilization and greater intelligence, and also because I place more priority on creating something mechanically unique and fun to play than the only other real possibility here, a boring skillsbot.

--Consort (talk) 17:57, 4 August 2023 (GMT)

Hmm if your aim is passive perception, I can't say my experience is that DMs don't use it. Most DMs I've spoken with on this wiki do consider passive perception over any other skill passive. Maybe try using a leaf from the observant feat, which provides a boost to passive perc. If not, I guess this isn't so ridiculous considering that the alert feat exists. So I guess this is also okay.

However, even as is, I wouldn't expect players to jump on reflex to use this, since surprise often takes even players by surprise :3. It's also interesting that it does not and actually probably cannot really take a reaction, since surprise wouldn't narratively make sense that way (also surprise doesn't allow actions, period).

Lore accuracy is nice but if this is going to hamper the player this much and prevent them from playing something else they want in combination, a design disclaimer might be in need.

Actually, depending on how creative one is, I could see some alternative ways that make it at least an interesting skillbot. Southern sergals having the trait of being able to learn more skills/languages/whatnot at faster rates than others. It's not an outright skill proficiency and encourages the player to seek things in roleplay. Same for something that lends more to their "face" potential in civilization. The translation from "Oh I'm smart in civilization" into "I can immediately know what this macguffin does" is a bit lost on me.

But, again, nothing overtly crazy here, I guess. Just needs some formatting cleaning, mostly.--Yanied (talk) 11:27, 4 August 2023 (MDT)