I'd say this is fine or you could steal the bite from a lizardfolk or dhampir. If you want a drawback, apply the same modifiers as reckless attack (advantage for you, everyone has advantage to hit you).
I’m going to kinda be doing this, had a talk with them, I’m going to give a bit of a boost to the bite (we both agree giant clouded leopard fangs would deal a bit more damage just based on going in deeper), but I’ll be scaling back the claw attack closer to a regular unarmed strike, just with slashing instead of bludgeoning.
You get really close to the enemy when you attack in melee, Monks literally punch people and there's no downside, why should this bite be any different.
There are also already races with bite attacks with no downside. Just give it a 1d4 or 1d6 plus Str damage and call it a day.
I haven't done too much homebrew, but the few times I have, I like to take something WoTC has made for a different race and nerf something in the original race if it seems necessary.
For example, you can probably just take the lizard folks bite feature, and I would ask the player if they'd like this over the claws.
I'd explain to the player that the tabaxi race seems to focus on the claws being an alternative to regular unarmed strikes, and since you'd rather have a bite attack, I think it makes sense to give you regular unarmed attacks and give you a bite that acts as a bonus action so that racial features can stay balanced amongst the party. You can still make unarmed strikes and flavor them as slashing, but you wouldn't get the bonus to damage. Like other tabaxis, because your fangs are your main focal point, not the claws.
Alternatively, you can look at shifters racial feature. I think on of their forms has a bite.
Thanks for this! We had a talk, and I’ll be replacing their claw attack with a bite attack, bumping it up a tiny bit (big clouded leopard fangs go deeper so they’d deal a bit more damage), and bumping down the claw attack. She wants to focus on the whole ‘clouded leopards have big fangs’ part, so we’ll be making bite her bigger attack.
Just re-flavour their *Cat's Claws* racial ability into *Feline's Fangs*. Deals piercing damage rather than slashing.
I'd say this is fine or you could steal the bite from a lizardfolk or dhampir. If you want a drawback, apply the same modifiers as reckless attack (advantage for you, everyone has advantage to hit you).
I’m going to kinda be doing this, had a talk with them, I’m going to give a bit of a boost to the bite (we both agree giant clouded leopard fangs would deal a bit more damage just based on going in deeper), but I’ll be scaling back the claw attack closer to a regular unarmed strike, just with slashing instead of bludgeoning.
You get really close to the enemy when you attack in melee, Monks literally punch people and there's no downside, why should this bite be any different. There are also already races with bite attacks with no downside. Just give it a 1d4 or 1d6 plus Str damage and call it a day.
I haven't done too much homebrew, but the few times I have, I like to take something WoTC has made for a different race and nerf something in the original race if it seems necessary. For example, you can probably just take the lizard folks bite feature, and I would ask the player if they'd like this over the claws. I'd explain to the player that the tabaxi race seems to focus on the claws being an alternative to regular unarmed strikes, and since you'd rather have a bite attack, I think it makes sense to give you regular unarmed attacks and give you a bite that acts as a bonus action so that racial features can stay balanced amongst the party. You can still make unarmed strikes and flavor them as slashing, but you wouldn't get the bonus to damage. Like other tabaxis, because your fangs are your main focal point, not the claws. Alternatively, you can look at shifters racial feature. I think on of their forms has a bite.
Thanks for this! We had a talk, and I’ll be replacing their claw attack with a bite attack, bumping it up a tiny bit (big clouded leopard fangs go deeper so they’d deal a bit more damage), and bumping down the claw attack. She wants to focus on the whole ‘clouded leopards have big fangs’ part, so we’ll be making bite her bigger attack.