DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D source

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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by DM Cojo »

I guess, I see the ability to share luck at 2x the rate, and recover it more quickly as balancing out any other factors vs. the Warrior/Dwarf. Plus, they are a totally different character to play, and bring other things to the party. Their ability to sneak silently is also a big plus when used creatively by the player. I feel like it is an apples to oranges comparison.

I would definitely say that DCC halflings are an improvement over D&D versions because in D&D, they really have no benefits to speak of and literally are smaller fighters and pseudo thieves (if played that way). The D&D halfing is truly boring to play IMO, whereas the DCC one is an integral party member due to their luck battery mechanic. I agree with earlier posts that they are usually not the star of the show, but they contribute a ton in my games.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by Weisenwolf »

DM Cojo wrote:I guess, I see the ability to share luck at 2x the rate, and recover it more quickly as balancing out any other factors vs. the Warrior/Dwarf. Plus, they are a totally different character to play, and bring other things to the party. Their ability to sneak silently is also a big plus when used creatively by the player. I feel like it is an apples to oranges comparison.
That's fine; now compare it to the Thief whose luck attribute scales and who has a much wider range of skills, same HP etc.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by DM Cojo »

Weisenwolf wrote:
DM Cojo wrote:I guess, I see the ability to share luck at 2x the rate, and recover it more quickly as balancing out any other factors vs. the Warrior/Dwarf. Plus, they are a totally different character to play, and bring other things to the party. Their ability to sneak silently is also a big plus when used creatively by the player. I feel like it is an apples to oranges comparison.
That's fine; now compare it to the Thief whose luck attribute scales and who has a much wider range of skills, same HP etc.
I guess my players don't play halflings like thieves. They kind of have their own place with the luck sharing trait, and dual wielding without penalty. Most of the halflings in my game are a cross between swashbuckler and cutthroat. They can't fight like a warrior or sneak like a thief, but they do enough of both to be very playable. Plus, the luck sharing is huge in my games...so they are an invaluable member of the group. And still way cooler than D&D halflings...lol.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by Weisenwolf »

Yes they are neither Fighter nor Thief; each to their own but for me the Halfling hasn't done as well as the other classes in the conversion process so I have changed mine so they do have a niche

I think the biggest issue for me is that the luck thing just turns the Halfling into a battery for the party in a similar manner to the D&D Cleric being nothing but a Healbot. DCC gets rid of the Healbot but replaces it with another character the rest of the party leeches from. There is just not enough fun in it for the Halfling player.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by GnomeBoy »

Weisenwolf wrote:... in a similar manner to the D&D Cleric being nothing but a Healbot...
This comes down to style-of-play.

I've played, played along side, and GM'd for Clerics that were nothing like a "Healbot". Healing was the least of their contributions to the game.

I have yet to play DCC with Halflings involved, but I don't expect they will be "Luckbots" when I do.

Is it possible that there is something about your approach (or your group's approach) that's tending to force Classes into a niche?
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by bfg2600 »

I agree Halfing's really suck especially if your stats aren't very good. I've played several halfings and the only thing they are really good for is luck batteries. They are a little ok with magic weapons or better st score but if you were like my halfing with -1 strength your pretty screwed. My halfing was so worthless for combat and basic adventuring that I had find creative things to with him. He ended become a drug addict that sat in the background and smoked dope while the other members of the party actually fought. In my option he should be rolling two d20's, d16's are massive detriment to your ability to hit, and crits don't happen as nearly as often as you think they would. Every time you roll your chance to crit is 1 in 16 and lets say your enemy has an ac of 15 you will hit on a 15 or 16, while on a d20 you will hit on a 15,16,17,18,19,20, even when you take into account the two dice rolls your d20 will still have a better chance to hit and do damage. At the very least you should be rolling d18's

I've judged dcc for over a year before we tried a different system, and anyone who came to my table didn't like the halfing, I had people say they wanted to switch after a few sessions, they are just not fun classes to play, I would say the rogue is also pretty lame in dcc,

DCC really focuses a crap ton on magic, and some on sword and board, but it seems that magic is where the fun is at, halfings and to a lesser extent thieves really got the shaft.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by Tokage »

Halflings, and thieves to a lesser extent, share the same problem: their true power lies in clever plans, double-crossing, subterfuge, and other sort of roleplaying - all things that are very difficult, if not outright impossible, to build any mechanics for. If you recall, Bilbo was essentially useless until he found his magic ring, and even after that all he ever did was either through the ring or through his own clever things, along with a bit of sneaking: he never became a great warrior by any stretch of imagination. Frodo and his friends, a giant spider and a troll notwithstanding, were never anywhere near as impressive as the rest of the Fellowship - you just know Gandalf or Aragorn or even Gimli could have diced up Shelob with far less trouble than Sam Gamgee had (and then they would have proceeded to keep the One Ring and the story would've had a whole different kind of an ending, but I digress), and Gandalf probably could have single-handedly scoured the Shire.

If you just focus on mechanics, then yes, halflings are pretty weak and unsatisfying to play - because they were never, even in the stories, anywhere near as impressive as the others. But if you toss the class to the single most clever and rp-prone player in your party, he'll make it work.

Frankly, I respect Goodman Games for sticking to their guns and making halflings mechanically weaker, unlike later editions of D&D that try to bring them to the same level with the other races and thus entirely miss the point.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by Max_The_Judge »

Definitely a support character and a substitute thief with limited use. Our party halfling tends to burn luck for every roll that other players miss. I've noticed that when she's not around it is a LOT easier for me to kill PCs and screw over the party. But I agree with the OP, they do seem a little more fragile than their D&D counterparts.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by Weisenwolf »

The class is weak but that's not the biggest issue.

The biggest issue is that there is little variety; all Halflings are essentially the same and the class forces them to be played essentially the same.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by Tokage »

Weisenwolf wrote:The class is weak but that's not the biggest issue.

The biggest issue is that there is little variety; all Halflings are essentially the same and the class forces them to be played essentially the same.
Same is true with elves and with dwarves as well. It's a part of the old-school attitude DCC seeks to emulate.

It's certainly no worse than in Basic D&D.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by Weisenwolf »

I don't agree:

For example An elf with good intelligence but poor physical attributes can chose to model themself as an Elvish version of a Wizard, light armour, immediate adventure type spells and so on. An Elf with decent physical attributes and a lesser intelligence can favour
Combat, wearing heavy armour and learning slow times spells. Perhaps modelling as an Archer.

Halflings can't do any of that, irrespective of their characteristics they can only be better or worse versions of the same thing; a thing that isn't very interesting...
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by GnomeBoy »

Weisenwolf wrote:...a thing that isn't very interesting...
This may be the crux of the conversation, and the thing that makes the title sort of not actually mean anything.

Some people aren't going to find the Thief interesting, others may not find the Cleric as having any appeal. But those that are into what the Halfling puts on the table may be very entertained by playing one.

It may not be a case of it being 'worse', but it just not appealing to 100% of players.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by Weisenwolf »

No I don't agree; I find all of the other classes engaging but not the Halfling which is my point. I enjoy all of the other characters and can make a unique character out of all of them except the Halfling.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by GnomeBoy »

Weisenwolf wrote:No I don't agree; I find all of the other classes engaging but not the Halfling which is my point. I enjoy all of the other characters and can make a unique character out of all of them except the Halfling.
Fair enough -- but my point is that is your experience. Others may have other experiences.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by Tokage »

Weisenwolf wrote:No I don't agree; I find all of the other classes engaging but not the Halfling which is my point. I enjoy all of the other characters and can make a unique character out of all of them except the Halfling.
This is only your subjective opinion now. The rest of us may well heartily disagree - I for one do.

Don't bring opinions up in discussions like these, at least if you've nothing else constructive to add with it. They turn the whole thing into a mess.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by Gameogre »

I gave this some thought and after a player asked me if his Halfling could be a Thief or Thiefish I came up with this add on to halflings that might work if you really feel badly about the Halfling.

Halflings Gain Sneak Silently, Hide in shadows, Pick Pocket as the same levels as Thief.
They Gain Pick Lock, Find Trap and Disable Trap as a Thief -1 level.

So They will never get Backstab,Climb,Forge Document, Disguise Self,Read Languages, Handle Poison and Cast Spell from scroll.


This gives them a handy leg up and at the same time protects Thief some by denying some of the Thief abilities and making it so some of the ones they get that a party wants the most..are not as good as a thief could have.

My player seemed really happy with it and the rest of the party just nodded and said "Frecking Halflings are all thieves aint they?"

Also so halfling could cover the sneaky job in a group if a thief wasn't around.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by GnomeBoy »

...Maybe they should get Anklestab... :wink:
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by Tokage »

I always thought locks and traps were what dwarves were good at. You could give those to them instead, seeing how dwarves too have a bit of trouble getting on the level of warriors.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by GnomeBoy »

Tokage wrote:I always thought locks and traps were what dwarves were good at. You could give those to them instead, seeing how dwarves too have a bit of trouble getting on the level of warriors.
Shieldbash and gold detecting can go a loooong way... YMMV
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by Zorrah »

Well, my niece had her only survivor of a funnel be a halfling. She was all upset about it, but we were going right into our level 1 game, and after 2 such level 1 games, the halfling clicked for her, she figured out her character's role in the party and now she is enjoying her halfling.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D source

Post by pulsemeat »

Balance aside, the lack of scaling abilities is a big motivational issue. The halfling in our long campaign never really seemed to get much better as he leveled (I had to give him various powers and items to keep up his interest).

It's not something that ruins the game and clever GMs/players can definitely overcome it, but it is a flaw.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by Judge_Yossarian »

NJPDX wrote: Thu Dec 11, 2014 8:30 am ..they aren't meant to be front-line fighters standing shoulder to belt with warriors.
Tell that to the guy in my online campaign who rolled a halfling haberdasher with +1 STR, +2 Luck and the "Charmed House" sign. After finding one of the sets of chainmail in Sailors she had an AC of 17. As a zero-level. With the +2 to attacks she has like a 34% chance to crit when fighting with double axes.

Even as deadly as DCC is, I think it is possible to play any class any way you want, and for a GM to reward that. A high STR character could still play as a wizard as a front-line combatant who finds a spell/patron to improve his surviviability, and a low STR character could easily still play as a ranged warrior who only does trick-shots from cover. With race as class, demi-humans don't have that choice, but the rules give them flexibility to be useful in multiple roles depending on stats. If your player wants to play as a halfling, and doesn't have sick skills like the one above, has maybe they just focus on non-combat skills, or they get creative with stealth and doing unconventional things in combat. Or, maybe halflings just don't make as good adventurers as humans do; they surely did not in Tolkien, apart from an exceptional few.

On a separate side note, I wonder if I'm the only one who wonders why D&D should be the standard... I've never played any edition and never intend to. I think the carryovers from D&D, especially late editions, are what most limit DCC. The system shines most when it bucks tradition and reaches back to the source material, the best of which was written long before TSR existed.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by BanjoJohn »

Judge_Yossarian wrote: Mon Mar 02, 2020 6:19 pm
NJPDX wrote: Thu Dec 11, 2014 8:30 am ..they aren't meant to be front-line fighters standing shoulder to belt with warriors.
Tell that to the guy in my online campaign who rolled a halfling haberdasher with +1 STR, +2 Luck and the "Charmed House" sign. After finding one of the sets of chainmail in Sailors she had an AC of 17. As a zero-level. With the +2 to attacks she has like a 34% chance to crit when fighting with double axes.
Wouldn't a halfling still only crit on a natural 16 when doing two-weapon fighting? 6.25%?

Of course, every character I've rolled up has either had a 0 modifier for luck or a negative modifier, but you take what you get.

I still like halflings in general. As a support class they do tend to get outshone by other classes in the higher levels. I suppose when you do get a second action die as a halfling, you could "attack" with the first and then "sneak and hide" with the second to avoid retaliation.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D sour

Post by thogard »

BanjoJohn wrote: Tue Mar 03, 2020 4:17 am Wouldn't a halfling still only crit on a natural 16 when doing two-weapon fighting? 6.25%?
As long as the attack beats AC. It's almost double that to roll a 16 on at least one of the two dice. Bonuses would help the attacks land, but RAW crits come up about 12.1% of the time.
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Re: DCC Halfling only class that's worse than Basic D&D source

Post by Raven_Crowking »

By RAW, a Halfling fighting with two weapons automatically hits and crits on a 16. Armor Class be damned!
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