The Gaming Den

Posted: **Wed Aug 24, 2016 11:52 pm**

So, I just bought a D&D 3.0 PDF off of DriveThru RPG for actual money called Deities & Demigods. Presumably, WotC gets their 64% of the money I paid.

So I am pretty mad at them that after flipping through this book for 20 minutes I have no fucking idea how to begin statting a motherfucking demigod even though that is the sole reason I bought this motherfucking book.

Can anyone who owns this book point out the page in this 14 year old bok where veteran WotC hacks Rich Redman, Skip Williams, and James Wyatt explain to me in any kind of coherent way how to stat a motherfucking demigod? Because I've read the index and I've been skimming and skimming and skimming through chapter after chapter and all I can find is full stats for all the D&D deities anyone could possibly care about, and 357 D&D deities no one has, plus the authors obnoxiously waxing philosophical on and on and on about every fucking topic vaguely related to the intersection of Dungeons & Theology they can think of...which makes sense because they were probably getting paid by the word.

This is not an OSSR[Deities & Demigods]. This is a plea for help actually using this impenetrable, ponderous, badly organized book I just bought.

(Oh, and if someone's all like "SCHWARZKOPF, YOU BLITHERING DUMBASS, IT'S CLEARLY SPELLED OUT HOW TO STAT YOUR OWN DEMIGOD FROM SCRATCH ON PAGE XYZ" I will gladly take the insult without any butthurt if such a page actually exists anywhere in this book. But I am doubtful it does.)

P.S. This is totally unrelated to the Dragonlance campaign I've been blathering on about in various threads.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 12:02 am**

Page 26, literally the second page of Chapter 2, Deities Defined tells you how to make gods. It's essentially a template that you put on an epic character that tells you just how much DM Penis Extension they get based on their Divine Rank. Demigods are DR 1-5, IIRC.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 12:13 am**

Page 26 seems to be the core of it, where you start with 20 Outsider HD and then apply Divine Rank effects.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 12:29 am**

Yeah, I figured that out as you guys were posting it...but 20 HD of what type of outsider? Does it matter? Is there any reason not to use an advanced Angel, Planetar with 20 HD as a starting point for a good demigod? And then add...MOTHER OF CHRIST....30 to 50 class levels.

The problem is most of the information on page 26+ seems to refer specifically to statting DEITIES, not DEMIGODS. There's a ton of information on statting characters with Divine Rank 6+ and relatively little on statting characters with Divine Rank 5-.

And what if I want a demigod that ascended (a la Vecna). Vecna should just have his 40-whatever Necromancer levels, right, no Outsider HD?

FWIW, they statted Hercules with 20 Barbarian levels and 20 Fighter Levels and no Outsider HD.

If it matters, I am specifically trying to stat demigods with divine rank 1 or 2. Like, thinks that the PCs (it's a high level campaign) can interact with in meaningful ways beyond staring in awe at the size of the DMpeen.

I feel like maybe just putting the half-celestial template on epic level characters might have been a better approach from the jump...but then I bought this book on the strength of it having demigod in the name

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 12:37 am**

Deities and Demigods is a dumpster fire. The smart way to stat up gods in 3.X is that anyone CR 21 or above counts as a demigod, and when you reach around CR 25-27 or so, you've reached the territory of proper gods. There's not really any reason for anything to be higher CR than that, since the Epic rules are a joke and even level 20 characters stopped functioning in any kind of reasonable manner (even if you picked the good classes) about five levels ago.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 12:49 am**

I wish I hadn't just purchased this dumpster fire, but sunk cost fallacy seems to have me climbing inside the dumpster trying to find the most useful pieces of burning garbage.

In all seriousness, the major problem is that the missing piece of the starting stat block for a completely generic "20 HD OUTSIDER"--your starting "god/demigod template"--is nowhere in the book. This is probably what has me most vexed.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 12:57 am**

As far as I can tell, it also does not say ANYWHERE what a deity or a demigod's starting ability scores should be, or how a creature's ability scores should be modified by BECOMING A GOD OR DEMIGOD.

If I wanted "guess that they're probably whatever arbitrarily high number I want", I could have gotten that for free, WotC.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 12:59 am**

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/typesSubtypes.htm

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/improvingMonsters.htm

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 1:04 am**

Yeah, basically you just make an arbitrary 20 HD Outsider using the MM guidelines, and then give it 40 class levels as appropriate, and then stack the Deity template on top of that. Demigods really just don't get much beyond "maxed stats and really good rolls."

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 1:13 am**

Literally nowhere in the book does it say to start with X HD of Outsider, especially not for Hero Deities or Demigods (which are DR 0, by the way). You take an Epic Character and give them Divine Rank 0-5, which gives you:

Max HP per HD
A higher base land speed
Divine Bonus to AC equal to Divine Rank
Deflection Bonus to AC equal to Cha Bonus
MAYBE Natural Armor equal to Divine Rank + 13 - if it has any Outsider HD, then definitively
Divine Bonus equal to Divine Rank on all attack rolls
Automatic Alignment on their attacks for bypassing DR
Divine Bonus equal to Divine Rank to Saves
Divine Bonus equal to Divine Rank to skill checks, caster level checks, ability checks, and turning checks.

Divine Immunities, bypassed by attacker being a higher Divine Rank: Polymorph, petrification, form-changing attacks, mind-affecting, energy drain, ability drain, ability damage, disease, poison, stunning, sleep, paralysis, death effects, and disintegration.

Divine Immunities that can't be bypassed by higher Divine Rank: electricity, cold, acid.

Fire Resist 5 + Divine Rank
Spell Resistance 32 + Divine Rank

1 Salient Divine Ability per Divine Rank.

Immortality (doesn't die from old age). Divine Rank 1 and higher makes you immune to death via Massive Damage.

SLAs of any Domain spell you can grant via your Portfolio at-will, caster level Divine Rank + 10, DCs of 10 + spell level + divine rank + Cha bonus.

Special senses (Darkvision, tremor sense, et al) extending out to 1 mile per divine rank.

That is literally all being a Demigod gets you. Higher Divine Ranks (between 6 and 20) give you additional things.

Also you really, really shouldn't have purchased Deities & Demigods, because all of this is available via OGL, and is on d20srd.org. A deity in 3.5 is literally only an Epic Character with Divine Ranks.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 1:14 am**

final bitching, directed at the book not any denner:

Rank 0: Creatures of this rank are sometimes called quasideities
or hero deities. Creatures that have a mortal and a deity as
parents also fall into this category.

NO ASSHAT, THAT IS LITERALLY AND EXACTLY A DEMIGOD YOU JUST DESCRIBED. THEY WOULD FALL INTO THIS FUCKING CATEGORY BECAUSE THAT HAS BEEN THE MEANING OF THE WORD DEMIGOD FOR LIKE 3000 FUCKING YEARS!!!!

Rank 1–5: These entities, called demigods, are the weakest of the deities

WHOVER WROTE THIS NEEDS TO GO FUCK THEMSELVES UNTIL THEY DIE FROM IT. /RAGE

Anyway, because I have no interest in statting deities and am solely interested in statting demigods, I have decided to ignore the "generic" Outsider HD because they're infuriatingly vague and a lot of shitwork.

I'm just going to try and reverse-engineer what they did with Hercules, which is to say, I'm going to arbitrarily give a mortal arbitrary arbitrarily high ability scores, make their type outsider, add 30-50 class levels, and then add the divine rank bonuses that start being described on page 26, because their mom got banged by Pelor or whatever.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 1:24 am**

Schwarzkopf wrote: Anyway, because I have no interest in statting deities and am solely interested in statting demigods, I have decided to ignore the "generic" Outsider HD because they're infuriatingly vague and a lot of shitwork.

How is this a lot of shit work compared to:

I'm just going to try and reverse-engineer what they did with Hercules, which is to say, I'm going to arbitrarily give a mortal arbitrary arbitrarily high ability scores, make their type outsider, add 30-50 class levels, and then add the divine rank bonuses that start being described on page 26, because their mom got banged by Pelor or whatever.

That's eve more work than the first option. I already put links to stat up a generic outsider.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 1:59 am**

I should dig out my notes about what being a god means that I wrote up completely disregarding Deities and Demigods when I was working on a campaign about becoming gods...

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 2:15 am**

@Leress: Maybe because it seems like demigods, as opposed to deities, aren't supposed to have any Outsider HD at all, based on all the sample demigods in the book, which have no Outsider HD: all their hit dice come from class levels.

Also, having 20 less HD in every way makes the character I am statting more likely to be something PCs can actually interact with in a meaningful way. A 30 HD NPC vaguely resembles something you might hypothetically beat in a fight or outwit if you were really really really really really good or really really really really really lucky or both.

A 50 HD NPC isn't worth statting out because you could just write the words "go fuck yourself" in huge letters instead and it would have the same effect.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 2:21 am**

You might have a look at the web enhancement, which has a guy statted out at various levels of divinity, including as a 1HD quasi-deity.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 2:50 am**

If it helps, I just finished statting out Tiamat.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 2:56 am**

Thanks angel!

This monstrosity is what I wound up with after several hours of dumpster diving through the trash fire that is complete divine. (I also used a 5-level PrC from the no-doubt-flawed but surprisingly useful Heroes of Battle.)

I was trying to stat the demigodess Aristemis from Goodman Games' Aereth setting which I'm actually a huge fan of.

Goodman Games wrote: Demigod, NG — Strategy, Diplomacy
Aristemis (uh-riss-teh-miss),
the Clear Thinker, the Insightful One, the Arrow of Vision, is the demipower of strategy and intelligent combat.

She is the patroness of warriors and generals, and sometimes politicians, traders, and even rogues.

Alhough Aristemis bears the courage of her lieges, Gorhan and Justicia,
she also knows the wisdom of choosing her battles, when to walk away
from them, and when to use diplomacy in the place of violence. Generals
who redirect their armies in bold maneuvers, engage in daring strategies,
or even retreat, call upon Aristemis for her insight. Clerics of the Clear Thinker often serve as war advisors and some multiclass as rangers to serve as military scouts.

Aristemis is portrayed as a woman in robes with piercing eyes, strong features, and short-cropped dark hair. She carries a great bow, but she is seldom shown using it. In religious art, Aristemis is often depicted standing to the right of Gorhan, whispering in his ear.

The domains Aristemis is associated with are Good, Knowledge, and War.

Her favored weapon is the longbow, and her symbol is an arrow wrapped loosely in a scroll.

So there's their fluff. Here's my crunch.

Aristemis
Female demigod fighter 10/ranger 15/legendary leader 5; CR LMFAO; Medium outsider (Native, Good); Divine rank 1; HD 20d8 + 100 plus 10d10 + 50; hp 410; Init +9; Spd 60 ft.; AC 43, touch 21, flat-footed 38; Base Atk +30, Grp +34; Full Atk +42/+42/+37/+32/+27 ranged (1d8 + 11 /x3, +5 holy speed composite [+4] longbow) or +37/+32/+27/+21 melee (1d8 + 6 19-20/x2, +2 holy ghost touch longsword); SA two free automatically successful actions per round, remote communication 1 mile, greater command 2/day (Will DC 24 negates); SQ Natural 1s don’t automatically miss attacks or fail saves, immune to transmutation, energy drain, ability drain, ability damage, mind-affecting effects, electricity, cold, and acid, disease, poison, stunning, sleep, paralysis, death effects, and disintegration, DR 36/magic, fire resistance 21, SR 33, immortality, megascale senses, limited portfolio sense, divine aura 10’ (DC 19), battlesense, Track, wild empathy, favored enemy (orcs +4), favored enemy (goblinoids +4), favored enemy (humans +4), favored enemy (undead +2), combat style mastery, endurance, woodland stride, swift tracker, evasion, camouflage, fearless, hero’s luck +3, legendary reputation +5, heroic success 1/day, to hell and back; AL NG; SV Fort +25, Ref +24, Will +26; Str 18, Dex 20, Con 20, Int 26, Wis 24, Cha 26.
Skill Ranks: 400/400
Skills: Bluff +31, Climb +20, Concentration +21, Craft (Bowyer) +24, Diplomacy +24, Handle Animal +24, Gather Information +26, Heal + 23, Hide + 21, Intimidate + 24, Jump + 20, Knowledge (geography) + 24, Knowledge (nature) +24, Knowledge (history) +24, Knowledge (nobility and royalty) +24, Knowledge (religion) [cc] +16, Knowledge (the planes) [CC] +16, Listen +23, Move Silently +21, Profession (general) +23, Ride +21, Search +24, Sense Motive +30, Spot +23, Survival + 23, Swim +20.
Combat Expertise (B), Far Shot (B), Improved Initiative (B), Point Blank Shot (B), Weapon Focus (Longbow) (B), Weapon Specialization (Longbow) (B), Dodge, Iron Will, Leadership, Mobility, Shot On The Run, Mounted Combat, Mounted Archery, Ready Shot, Veteran Knowledge, Skill Focus (Bluff), Skill Focus (Sense Motive), Rapid Shot*, Manyshot*, Improved Precise Shot*
Possessions: +5 holy speed longbow, +2 holy ghost-touch longsword, 30 adamantine arrows, 30 cold iron arrows, 30 silver arrows, glamered celestial armor, whatever the fuck else she wants, I’m tired.

DOMAINS: Good, Knowledge, War
Spell-like abilities: At-Will, CL 11th, Save DC 19 + spell level.
1—protection from evil, detect secret doors, magic weapon
2—aid, detect thoughts, spiritual weapon
3—magic circle against evil, clairaudience/clairvoyance, magic vestment
4—holy smite, divination, divine power
5—dispel evil, true seeing, flame strike
6—blade barrier, find the path, blade barrier again
7—holy word, legend lore, power word blind
8—holy aura, discern location, power word stun
9—summon monster IX, foresight, power word kill

My final thoughts on Deities & Demigods...besides that I still kinda want my fifteen bucks back whatever, it's not exactly a fortune...is that for what it is, and for what it's worth, it does a much better job of supporting DMs that want to know the "can you beat it in a fight" stats of DEITIES than it does supporting DMs that want to know the "can you beat it in a fight" stats of DEMIGODS.

And I don't understand why any DM would want or need to know the former, but I completely understand why I wanted to know the latter, so poo on this 14 year old book.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 3:29 am**

Despite the number overload and the fact that the game breaks, I'm still tempted now and then to run a mini-campaign where the PCs are gods using the Immortals Handbook Ascension and IH Bestiary. Just need to find a reasonable group of people to try it with.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 4:03 am**

I started a new thread with the god stuff I wrote up, since it's not exactly on topic

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 4:50 am**

Schwarzkopf wrote:As far as I can tell, it also does not say ANYWHERE what a deity or a demigod's starting ability scores should be, or how a creature's ability scores should be modified by BECOMING A GOD OR DEMIGOD.

If I wanted "guess that they're probably whatever arbitrarily high number I want", I could have gotten that for free, WotC.

You are not angry enough.

When I asked the authors in WotC's post releas hype chat for the 3e Deities and Demigods whether the Divine ability score array was a prerequisite for ascending to divinity or a benefit granted by ascending to divinty, I got an answer of "that's up to you". So go ahead and make shit up -- because that's what the authors intended.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 4:58 am**

Just use the Monster of Legend template. It's combatworthy, but spellcasters could probably just get by with using Wish to add +5 to each stat instead.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 8:03 am**

RelentlessImp wrote:Literally nowhere in the book does it say to start with X HD of Outsider, especially not for Hero Deities or Demigods (which are DR 0, by the way).

Actually, it's worse than that: the book does lay out guidelines for having outsider HD, but it's pointlessly obscure and obtuse about it.

The Divine Characteristics section tells you to start with 20 outsider HD:

D&DG, p.26, very top left wrote:Most deities are creatures of the outsider type (usually with 20 outsider Hit Dice).

D&DG, p.26, Armor Class wrote:Most deities (all those with 20 outsider Hit Dice) have a natural armor bonus of their divine rank +13.

D&DG, p.26, Levels Beyond 20th sidebar wrote:Most deities are 20 HD outsiders with 30 to 50 character levels as well. These additional character levels beyond an effective character level of 20th follow special rules covered in more detail in the Epic Level Handbook.
[...]
Deities gain a +1 epic attack bonus at 21st level and every other level thereafter, meaning that a deity with 40 class levels (on top of the base 20 outsider Hit Dice) has an attack bonus of +40.
[...]
Deities also gain a +1 bonus on saving throws at 22nd level and every other level thereafter. A deity with 20 outsider Hit Dice and 40 class levels has saving throws (Fortitude, Reflex, and Will) of +32.

...but it's easy to miss if you just skim that page.

What they don't explicitly state is that "most deities" means "those who are not ascended mortals"--you have to look at Hercules's description:

D&DG, p.122 wrote:Hercules is the son of Zeus, born to a mortal mother, and he had to earn his way to godhood. (As an ascended mortal, Hercules does not have outsider Hit Dice as other members of the pantheon do.)

...and also notice that the stat blocks of all the gods described as ascended mortals lack the outsider HD to discover the pattern. St. Cuthbert is the single exception, having outsider HD despite being an ascended mortal, but...

D&DG, p. 57, How the D&D Pantheon Came to Be wrote:it’s possible to ascend to godhood—Vecna has done so fairly recently, and St. Cuthbert ascended in a bygone age.

...so the rule is actually "you get outsider HD, unless you're an ascended mortal, unless you ascended long enough ago to be an honorary 'real god'." As for a demigods vs. deities thing:

Schwartzkopf wrote:@Leress: Maybe because it seems like demigods, as opposed to deities, aren't supposed to have any Outsider HD at all, based on all the sample demigods in the book, which have no Outsider HD: all their hit dice come from class levels.

There are actually three demigods with 20 outsider HD--Nike (Greek), Sobek (Egyptian), and Odur (Norse)--so it's definitely a matter of whether they ascended, not a matter of divine rank.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 9:03 am**

Hit dice shouldn't be taken as a measure of a creatures absolute "toughness"; unless they also have Ability Damage/Drain immunities. Now, I know that Divine Rank grants that; but a 40 HD creature is actually inversely proportional in terms of their toughness when confronted by a PC that can deal lots of Constitution damage per round (expect 2-3 Con dmg per attack; times 2-8 attacks).

I pretty much build any mid-to-high level martial characters with Con damage if they're not a massive damage dealer in their own right since it makes the idiom about size correlating to scale of failure more accurate.

Posted: **Thu Aug 25, 2016 11:32 am**

I feel an OSSR of the Primal Order coming on.

The Gaming Den

Statting A Motherfreaking Demigod with Deities & Demigods

Statting A Motherfreaking Demigod with Deities & Demigods