Alternative to Savage Species' ECL system.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Thu Nov 12, 2009 5:45 am

Wouldn't it have been easier to just create a bunch of 'monster feats'/'monster classes' and force people who wanted to start play as, say, an Ettin Fighter take eight or whatever levels in fighter but force them to take the feats of 'Extra Head', 'Dual Mind Coordination', 'Large Warrior', and so-on? Succubi are sorcerers who are forced to take enchantment and summoning spells at first and take feats in 'Wings' and 'Unearthly Beauty'. Then they could continue advancing in sorcerer and pick whatever spells they wanted from then on.

Of course, this would require a rewrite of feats so that feats like Extra Head are equal to Weapon Focus. Or if you're lazy state that Extra Head requires an investment of two feats.

CatharzGodfoot · Post by **CatharzGodfoot** » Thu Nov 12, 2009 6:09 am

Part of the problem is that most people don't think of ettins, demons, or dragons starting as hobbit fighters and then growing extra heads, sexy, and scales.

I have no problem with the system of 'you must be this tall to start as X creature'. Savage Species & pretty much all of the post 3.0e DMG publications did an absolutely terrible job of it (the 3.0e DMG was just bad), while Races of War actually has a pretty decent system. It's all about the implementation.

Caedrus · Post by **Caedrus** » Thu Nov 12, 2009 6:30 am

Lago PARANOIA wrote:Wouldn't it have been easier to just create a bunch of 'monster feats'/'monster classes' and force people who wanted to start play as, say, an Ettin Fighter take eight or whatever levels in fighter but force them to take the feats of 'Extra Head', 'Dual Mind Coordination', 'Large Warrior', and so-on? Succubi are sorcerers who are forced to take enchantment and summoning spells at first and take feats in 'Wings' and 'Unearthly Beauty'. Then they could continue advancing in sorcerer and pick whatever spells they wanted from then on.

Of course, this would require a rewrite of feats so that feats like Extra Head are equal to Weapon Focus. Or if you're lazy state that Extra Head requires an investment of two feats.

I've been using a system that incorporates forced feat choices for using "powerful" races for years. Works quite well as a stopgap fix for ECL, in my experience.

Other things you can do to divert the whole ECL thing away from a cost in LEVELS is to, say, take points out of your point buy for attributes (So, you're an "average" ogre instead of an "elite" human), or to roll stuff in with class features (a la Dragonmarked Sorcerer, or racial substitution levels). Plenty of options are available to make a makeshift balanced LA 0 powerful monster.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Thu Nov 12, 2009 6:57 am

Lago wrote:Wouldn't it have been easier to just create a bunch of 'monster feats'/'monster classes' and force people who wanted to start play as, say, an Ettin Fighter take eight or whatever levels in fighter but force them to take the feats of 'Extra Head', 'Dual Mind Coordination', 'Large Warrior', and so-on?

No. Better yes, but easier not even close.

-Username17

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Thu Nov 12, 2009 9:01 am

I did something like that, back in the day. For YUan-ti, I made a basic race (skill bonus for handling snakes, ifyouknowwhatimean, +2 Dex/-2 Str, bonus on saves against poison).

I then gave it a poison bite ability (but no bite attack until a later level, meaning you have to grapple them or catch them off-guard) that generally remained "The DC is level appropriate, the effect is not. You don't care, it's a flavour power. Whatever." I also gave them the ability to transform into snakes (specific types), again it's not very useful.

Anything else required either feats (spit venom, "I has a tail", "Ra, Imma' cobra!"), sub-levels (Sorc gained a hypnotic gaze, some extra poison spells and a stronger familiar that dies like an animal companion in exchange for some spells/day, so a net gain. Cleric loses turning/rebuking and a couple of spells, gets an extra domain that Mersshaulk grants, and can spont. summon (each SM spell having one snakey thing that can be called forth).) or take the paragon class.

Paragon class was 3 levels long: +2 caster levels (any arcane), +2 Cha, rebuke serpents, some other random boosts.

So someone could say "Cool, I can bite people with poison, and turn into a snake!" and leave it at that, or they could turn their normal options into racial-themed packages that made them even more serpenty and infiltratory.

NineInchNall · Post by **NineInchNall** » Thu Nov 12, 2009 7:03 pm

I like the idea of using CR as starting point and adjusting HD&BAB when HD != CR.

Example: Ettin
CR: 6
HD: 10
BAB: +7
This is a pretty good example of HD inflation, and it makes me sad. It has the BAB of a 7th level character, though, which is pretty close to CR 6, so we've got an easy adaptation. Solution: give it 7 HD and full BAB. Congratulations, you have a 7th level character.

This falls apart with bullshit [Awesome] tag creatures, though. *cough* planetar *cough*

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Thu Nov 12, 2009 8:53 pm

Ok....

So, CR 7; BaB 7; that's workable. There's not crazy abilities or powers.

They have 10 HD, 3/4 BaB, Good Fort saves, and 2 skill pts per HD.

So, sort of like a barbarian.

Trim the HD down to 7; give them Full BaB; Good Fort Saves; and 4 skill pts a level to bring them to be in line with the Barbarian.

For Stats:

Str 23, -15= +8
Dex 8, -10 = -2
Con 15, -14 = +1, or +0
Int 6, -8 = -2
Wis 10, - 12 = -2
Cha 11 - 13 = -2

Basically, +8 to str, -2 to all mental stats, as well as Dex.

+7 Natural armour; only 1/2 is able to be used when wearing armour.

Superior Two-Weapon Fighting (Ex)
An ettin fights with a morningstar or javelin in each hand. Because each of its two heads controls an arm, the ettin does not take a penalty on attack or damage rolls for attacking with two weapons.

Skills
An ettin’s two heads give it a +2 racial bonus on Listen, Spot, and Search checks.

and that's pretty much it.

They're a Full BaB TWF fighter with no penalties to damage or to-hit when TWFing. They have decent AC; and can wear heavy armour to increase their AC even more.

At level 7 they've got 4 attack, 3 feats, and each of their attacks has (usually) a +6 to damage before anything else is added in; and they have a base +12 to hit before any magical buffs are taken into account. It's big, and scary looking, but it's not a super powerful monster.

tussock · Post by **tussock** » Fri Nov 13, 2009 4:52 am

Planetar's easy, it's a bog standard 17th level Cleric, with all the normal domain, item, spell, and cheese bonuses built into it's statblock (where someone accidentally wrote "natural armour", 20 Con, and such).

Hell, I'm sure people could cheese up a 14th level character with 17th level casting if they tried these days. Surely there's a spell gives SR 13+level somewhere, and DR, and immunities? Not even large without their all day DP/RM up and running.

Or you can do the work and make most of the shit you can't handwave into replacement class abilities, or racial prestige class levels with d4 HD and full casting, or whatever, if you're actually going to use it.

Want to play a Planetar? Just be a regular spellcaster, that's what they look like at higher levels anyway.

The Gaming Den

Alternative to Savage Species' ECL system.

Alternative to Savage Species' ECL system.

Re: Alternative to Savage Species' ECL system.