# Forum > Gaming > Roleplaying Games > D&D 3e/3.5e/d20 > Rules Q&A Negative LA-Assignment : Resurrection, but no diamond here

## Beni-Kujaku

The question of adjusting the level adjustment for some monsters to make them more playable than what WotC advocates is as old as the world (or at least 5 years, according to this thread). And since the beginning of this trend, there have always been monsters that felt too weak even without LA for their RHD. These were noted as needing a "LA -0" in Inevitability's thread above. Then, there were obviously attempts to give them a proper rating, by trying to come up with an acceptable definition of negative LA. 

To date, there was three major methods of calculating negative LA, each having one thread dedicated to it and having been abandoned since.
-*Direct negative LA (DNLA)* : This one is the most straightforward, and can be applied almost on the go to the monster. You just consider the ECL of the monster as lower than its number of RHD, then add class levels on top of it. This creates lots of problems as it allows for early entry in prestige classes and even pre-epic Epic Feats. However, its simplicity is still appealing, and it is the method that can be the best combined with other LA. To the extreme, we can tie epic feats to ECL instead of HD (in fact, this is even implied to be the RAW method in the Epic Level Handbook). And if the direct negative LA can only be used to buy off templates, or in low optimisation games, most problems do not arise at all, and this is the most accessible method. Method used in GreatWyrmGold's thread.
-*Racial Hit Dice reduction (RHDR)*: You take a monster, you remove RHD without altering its abilities, and you play at lower level. Pretty simple too, even if recalculating all of the monster's variable can be tedious (as a reminder, (Su) and (Ext) abilities DC scale as RHD/2). This method solves the high-level shenanigans of the previous one, allowing for a rules friendly, somewhat lower negative LA than the DNLA, but you never get to play the whole monster ("What is a Tarrasque? A miserable pile of RHD, before everything else."), with all its abilities capped at their reduced RHD level, and your sorcerer blue dragon is stuck with mostly d6s instead of its original d12. This method favors low level monsters, where the full abilities and ability scores of a monster thought for higher level outperform what a PC could do, but falls short when those become irrelevant before class features. One way to offset these issues is to have every ability of the monster scale with its class level afterwards. You never have all the RHD of the creature, but it allows for a way to play characteristic of the monster, even at higher levels. Method used, with the abilities scaling, in Martixy's, then Blue Jay's thread.
-*Partial Gestalt (PG)*: Finally, the method that allows for the strongest monster in terms of power per character HD and was also the first to be suggested is the partial gestalt. This one is very close to RHDR in that you start playing the monster with lower RHD, but you then take gestalt levels between the monster RHD and your class levels until you have the amount of gestalt levels to reach the number of the monster's RHD. (for example, a bugbear, with 3RHD was initially considered to be worth a partial gestalt LA of -1. In a ECL 3 game, a bugbear player would then have 2 normal humanoid RHD from the bugbear, then 1 gestalt between a humanoid level and whatever class he may want to play, probably barbarian in this case.). Considering how little RHD usually contribute to a build, this is roughly equivalent to RHDR with the abilities scaling with the level (notably Spell Resistance and SLA caster levels, which generally scales with RHD and not class levels). This method also keeps the difference in power between the various kinds of RHDThis method can be pretty challenging to implement, and can be pretty confusing when going up a level, but it keeps the whole flavour of a monster, allows for (almost) out-of-the-book play when the game starts with ECL larger than the monster's RHD and is generally the most rule friendly of the three. This method was used in Daedroth's thread.


For this thread, I will try to give a more comprehensive approach to the problem, and cover both the DNLA and RHDR methods. The RHDR and PG are two very similar methods, that will almost always give the same result. A monster played with PG gets marginally more advantages from its RHD, and a monster with RHDR gets more from its abilities when its number of HD goes above its natural number of RHD. However, the RHDR is overall simpler and saw more success in the past. Depending on your game, both are practically interchangeable.

*Spoiler: Detailed description of scaling abilities with the RHDR method used here*
Show


The DC of (Ext) and (Su) abilities are calculated as 10+1/2 HD (not RHD) of the monster+relevant stat modifier+a flat modifier to DC to obtain the initial DC in the monster's stat sheet.
The caster level (or equivalent) of (Ext), SLA and (Su) is the total HD of the creature if it is not explicitly noted on the stat sheet. If it is noted, it doesn't scale.
The Spell Resistance, if it has one, of the creature scales as +1 per total HD.
The ability scores, size, and natural armor do not scale with total HD, even if the creature could be advanced to reach a larger size.
The number of HP, save bonuses and BAB are determined by the class the creature chooses, not its natural creature type.
All other direct mentions of a monster's number of RHD are replaced with total HD.



Considering the mess that balancing becomes at very high levels, I will not cover the DNLA method for epic or near-epic monsters. I also do not consider myself to be perfect in this regard, very far from it, and do not have much experience in ECL estimation. I then strongly encourage everybody willing to discuss and give counter-arguments to everything, as long as it doesn't stall the thread for an indefinite amount of time. Non-intelligent monsters like constructs or some undead will be considered awakened or have acquired an Intelligence score somehow.

The monsters shall be examined considering a low-optimisation game, since most of them are beatsticks anyway, and since playing a monster race is as much for the rule of cool than for the actual mechanical advantages of it. We try to make the monsters viable, not overpowered. The target is around tier 3 to 4, if that is applicable. When possible, we may try to imagine a build around the monster to better assess how it may evolve, with the most common class that fits the monster (mostly, rogue, ranger and barbarian for non-casters and sorcerer/cleric for caster monsters). This may lead to discrepancies considering the power difference between mundanes and casters, but considering we try to give a unified LA in a game where classes are so unbalanced, that seems good enough to me.

*Spoiler: Covered Creatures from Monster Manual I*
Show

*Monster name*
*Estimated RHD Reduction*
*Estimated number of RHD*
*Estimated DNLA*
*Estimated ECL with DNLA*

Animated object (Large)
-2
2
-1
3

Animated object (Huge)
-5
3
-2
6

Animated object (Gargantuan)
-12
4
-7
9

Animated object (Colossal)
-27
5
-
-

Dire Bat
-1
3
-0
4

Dire Bear
-6
6
-3
9

Dire Boar
-3
4
-1
6

Dire Lion
-2
6
-1
7

Dire Shark
-14
4
-8
10

Dire Tiger
-9
7
-6
10

Dire Wolf
-2
4
-1
5

Black Dragon, Wyrmling
-0
4
-0
4

Blue Dragon, Wyrmling
-1
5
-0
6

Green Dragon, Wyrmling
-0
5
-0
5

Red Dragon, Wyrmling
-2
5
-0
7

Bronze Dragon, Wyrmling
-0
6
-0
6

Gold Dragon, Wyrmling
-0
8
-0
8

Black Dragon, Very Young
-2
5
-0
7

Blue Dragon, Very Young
-3
6
-1
8

Green Dragon, Very Young
-2
6
-0
8

Red Dragon, Very Young
-2
8
-1
9

White Dragon, Very Young
-1
5
-0
6

Brass Dragon, Very Young
-1
6
-0
7

Bronze Dragon, Very Young
-2
7
-1
8

Copper Dragon, Very Young
-2
6
-0
8

Gold Dragon, Very Young
-2
9
-1
10

Silver Dragon, Very Young
-1
9
-0
10

Black Dragon, Young
-4
6
-2
8

Blue Dragon, Young
-5
7
-2
10

Green Dragon, Young
-4
7
-2
9

Red Dragon, Young
-4
9
-2
11

White Dragon, Young
-4
5
-2
7

Brass Dragon, Young
-2
8
-1
9

Bronze Dragon, Young
-3
9
-1
11

Copper Dragon, Young
-3
8
-1
10

Gold Dragon, Young
-4
10
-2
12

Silver Dragon, Young
-3
10
-1
8

Black Dragon, Juvenile
-6
7
-3
10

Blue Dragon, Juvenile
-6
9
-2
13

Green Dragon, Juvenile
-5
9
-2
12

Red Dragon, Juvenile
-4
12
-2
14

White Dragon, Juvenile
-6
6
-3
9

Brass Dragon, Juvenile
-4
9
-2
11

Bronze Dragon, Juvenile
-3
12
-2
13

Copper Dragon, Juvenile
-5
9
-2
12

Gold Dragon, Juvenile
-4
13
-2
15

Silver Dragon, Juvenile
-4
12
-2
14

Black Dragon, Young Adult
-7
9
-3
13

Blue Dragon, Young Adult
-8
10
-4
14

Green Dragon, Young Adult
-7
10
-4
13

Red Dragon, Young Adult
-6
13
-4
15

White Dragon, Young Adult
-6
9
-2
13

Brass Dragon, Young Adult
-5
11
-2
14

Bronze Dragon, Young Adult
-5
13
-3
15

Copper Dragon, Young Adult
-5
12
-3
14

Gold Dragon, Young Adult
-6
14
-4
16

Silver Dragon, Young Adult
-6
13
-4
15

Black Dragon, Adult
-9
10
-4
15

Blue Dragon, Adult
-9
12
-
-

Green Dragon, Adult
-8
12
-5
15

Red Dragon, Adult
-8
14
-
-

White Dragon, Adult
-8
10
-4
14

Brass Dragon, Adult
-6
13
-3
16

Bronze Dragon, Adult
-6
15
-
-

Copper Dragon, Adult
-7
13
-4
16

Gold Dragon, Adult
-8
15
-
-

Silver Dragon, Adult
-7
15
-
-

Black Dragon, Mature Adult
-10
12
-
-

Blue Dragon, Mature Adult
-11
13
-
-

Green Dragon, Mature Adult
-10
13
-
-

Red Dragon, Mature Adult
-10
15
-
-

White Dragon, Mature Adult
-10
11
-
-

Brass Dragon, Mature Adult
-7
15
-
-

Bronze Dragon, Mature Adult
-8
16
-
-

Copper Dragon, Mature Adult
-7
16
-
-

Gold Dragon, Mature Adult
-9
17
-
-

Silver Dragon, Mature Adult
-9
16
-
-

Black Dragon, Old
-12
13
-
-

Blue Dragon, Old
-12
15
-
-

Green Dragon, Old
-11
15
-
-

Red Dragon, Old
-10
18
-6
22

White Dragon, Old
-11
13
-
-

Brass Dragon, Old
-8
17
-
-

Bronze Dragon, Old
-10
17
-6
21

Copper Dragon, Old
-9
17
-
-

Gold Dragon, Old
-9
20
-5
24

Silver Dragon, Old
-11
17
-6
22

Black Dragon, Very Old
-13
15
-
-

Blue Dragon, Very Old
-14
16
-9
21

Green Dragon, Very Old
-13
16
-
-

Red Dragon, Very Old
-12
19
-7
24

White Dragon, Very Old
-13
14
-
-

Brass Dragon, Very Old
-10
18
-7
21

Bronze Dragon, Very Old
-12
18
-7
23

Copper Dragon, Very Old
-11
18
-7
22

Gold Dragon, Very Old
-11
21
-7
25

Silver Dragon, Very Old
-12
19
-8
22

Black Dragon, Ancient
-15
16
-10
21

Blue Dragon, Ancient
-15
18
-10
23

Green Dragon, Ancient
-14
18
-9
23

Red Dragon, Ancient
-14
20
-8
26

White Dragon, Ancient
-15
15
-
-

Brass Dragon, Ancient
-11
20
-8
23

Bronze Dragon, Ancient
-13
20
-8
25

Copper Dragon, Ancient
-12
20
-8
24

Gold Dragon, Ancient
-13
22
-8
27

Silver Dragon, Ancient
-14
20
-8
26

Black Dragon, Wyrm
-16
18
-10
24

Blue Dragon, Wyrm
-16
20
-11
25

Green Dragon, Wyrm
-15
20
-10
25

Red Dragon, Wyrm
-15
22
-10
27

White Dragon, Wyrm
-16
17
-11
22

Brass Dragon, Wyrm
-12
22
-8
26

Bronze Dragon, Wyrm
-14
22
-9
27

Copper Dragon, Wyrm
-13
22
-9
26

Gold Dragon, Wyrm
-14
24
-9
29

Silver Dragon, Wyrm
-14
23
-9
28

Black Dragon, Great Wyrm
-17
20
-12
25

Blue Dragon, Great Wyrm
-17
22
-12
27

Green Dragon, Great Wyrm
-16
22
-12
26

Red Dragon, Great Wyrm
-15
25
-10
30

White Dragon, Great Wyrm
-17
19
-12
24

Brass Dragon, Great Wyrm
-13
24
-9
28

Bronze Dragon, Great Wyrm
-14
25
-9
30

Copper Dragon, Great Wyrm
-14
24
-10
28

Gold Dragon, Great Wyrm
-14
27
-9
32

Silver Dragon, Great Wyrm
-14
26
-10
30

Air Elemental (Large)
-1
7
-1
7

Air Elemental (Huge)
-7
9
-3
13

Air Elemental (Greater)
-11
10
-
-

Air Elemental (Elder)
-13
11
-
-

Earth Elemental (Medium)
-1
3
-0
4

Earth Elemental (Large)
-2
6
-1
7

Earth Elemental (Huge)
-9
7
-5
11

Earth Elemental (Greater)
-13
8
-
-

Earth Elemental (Elder)
-16
8
-
-

Fire Elemental (Large)
-1
7
-1
7

Fire Elemental (Huge)
-8
8
-6
10

Fire Elemental (Greater)
-12
9
-
-

Fire Elemental (Elder)
-15
9
-
-

Water Elemental (Medium)
-1
3
-1
3

Water Elemental (Large)
-4
4
-3
5

Water Elemental (Huge)
-11
5
-6
10

Water Elemental (Greater)
-15
6
-
-

Water Elemental (Elder)
-17
7
-
-

Ettercap
-3
2
-2
3

Ettin
-5
5
-2
8

Fungus (Shrieker)
-
-
-5
-3 (yes, negative)

Cloud Giant
-7
10
-4
13

Fire Giant
-7
8
-4
11

Frost Giant
-6
8
-4
10

Hill Giant
-6
6
-3
9

Stone Giant
-6
8
-4
10

Stone Giant (Elder)
-6
8
-4
10

Storm Giant
-7
12
-3
16

Gnoll
-1
1+1
-1
1

Golem (Clay)
-2
9
-1
10

Golem (Flesh)
-4
5
-2
7

Golem (Iron)
-7
11
-4
14

Golem (Stone)
-4
10
-2
12

Golem (Greater Stone)
-31
11
-
-

Gray Render
-2
8
-1
9

Green Hag
-1
8
-0
9

Harpies
-2
5
-1
6

Hell Hound
-2
2
-1
3

Hell Hound (Nessian Warhound)
-4
8
-1
11

Kraken
-8
12
-
-

Lamia
-3
6
-1
8

Lizardfolk
-1
1+1
-0
2

Locathah
-1
1
-0
2

Mimic
-2
5
-1
6

Mohrg
-9
5
-6
8

Nightmare, Cauchemar
-0
15
+0
15

Nightshade, Nightcrawler
-6
19
-4
21

Nightshade, Nightwalker
-4
15
-
-

Nightshade, Nightwing
-6
11
-4
13

Ooze Black Pudding
-6
4
-4
6

Ooze, Elder Black Pudding
-14
6
-10
10

Ooze, Gray
-1
2
-1
2

Ooze, Ochre Jelly
-3
3
-2
4

Otyugh
-3
3
-2
4

Purple Worm
-8
8
-3
13

Remorhaz
-1
6
-0
7

Roc
-8
10
-4
14

Rust Monster
-3
2
-2
3

Salamander (Average)
-4
5
-1
8

Salamander (Noble)
-7
8
-3
12

Satyr (pipeless)
-2
3
-1
4

Satyr (pipe'd up)
-1
4
-0
5

Sea Cat
-2
4
-1
5

Shambling Mound
-2
6
-1
7

Shield Guardian
-8
7
-4
11

Criosphinx
-2
8
-1
9

Hieracosphinx
-2
7
-1
8

Stirge
-0
1
-0
1

Swarm (Centipedes)
-7
2
-5
4

Swarm (Hellwasps)
-7
5
-5
7

Swarm (Locust)
-4
2
-3
3

Swarm (Rats)
-2
2
-2
2

The Tarrasque
-28
20
-23
25

Tendriculos
-1
8
-1
8

Thoqqua
-1
2
-0
3

Adult Tojanida
-4
3
-1
6

Elder Tojanida
-10
5
-5
10

Umber Hulk
-1
7
-0
8

Truly Horrid Umber Hulk
-9
11
-6
14

Will-o'-Wisps
-2
7
-1
8

Winter Wolf
-3
5
-1
7

Worg
-1
3
-0
4

Dread Wraith
-7
9
-4
12

Average Xorn
-1
6
-0
7

Elder Xorn
-6
9
-3
12

Yrthak
-5
7
-2
10

Yuan-ti, Pureblood
-1
3
-0
4

Yuan-ti, Halfblood
-1
6
-0
7

Yuan-ti, Abomination
-1
8
-1
8

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Extended covered creatures index*

*Spoiler: Animals*
Show

*Monster name*
*Estimated RHD Reduction*
*Estimated number of RHD*
*Estimated DNLA*
*Estimated ECL with DNLA*

Bear, Brown
-1
5
-0
6

Bear, Polar
-3
5
-1
7

Bison
-3
2
-1
4

Boar
-2
1+1
-1
2

Crocodile, Giant
-2
5
-1
6

Riding dog
-1
1+1
-0
2

Donkey
-1
1
-1
1

Elephant
-4
7
-2
9

Horse, Heavy
-2
1+1
-1
2

Horse, Light
-2
1+1
-1
2

Horse, Heavy War
-2
2
-1
3

Horse, Light War
-2
2
-1
3

Hyena
-1
1+1
-0
2

Lizard
-
-
-1
-1

Lizard, Monitor
-2
1+1
-1
2

Manta Ray
-3
1
-3
1

Mule
-2
1+1
-1
2

Octopus, Giant
-2
6
-1
7

Pony
-1
1
-1
1

Pony, War
-1
1
-1
1

Lizard
-
-
-1
-1

Porpoise
-1
1+1
-0
2

Rhinoceros
-4
4
-2
6

Shark, Medium
-2
1
-1
2

Shark, Large
-4
3
-
-1

Shark, Huge
-6
3
-
-1

Snake, Constrictor
-2
1+1
-1
2

Snake, Giant Constrictor
-7
4
-4
7

Snake, Medium Viper
-1
1
-1
1

Snake, Large Viper
-2
1
-1
2

Snake, Huge Viper
-3
3
-2
4

Squid
-1
2
-0
3

Squid, Giant
-4
8
-2
10

Toad
-0
1
-0
1

Weasel
-
-
-1
-1

Whale, Baleen
-5
7
-3
9

Whale, Cachalot
-4
8
-2
10

Whale, Orca
-4
5
-2
7

Wolf
-1
1+1
-0
2





*Spoiler: Vermin*
Show

*Monster name*
*Estimated RHD Reduction*
*Estimated number of RHD*
*Estimated DNLA*
*Estimated ECL with DNLA*

Giant Ant, Worker
-1
1+1
-1
1

Giant Ant, Soldier
-0
2
-0
2

Giant Ant, Queen
-2
2
-1
3

Giant Bee
-2
1
-2
1

Giant Bombardier Beetle
-1
1
-1
1

Giant Fire Beetle
-
-
-1
-1

Giant Stag Beetle
-4
3
-3
4

Giant Praying Mantis
-2
2
-1
3

Giant Wasp
-3
2
-2
3

Monstrous Centipede, Tiny
-
-
-2
-2

Monstrous Centipede, Small
-
-
-1
-1

Monstrous Centipede, Medium
-
-
-1
-1

Monstrous Centipede, Large
-2
1
-2
1

Monstrous Centipede, Huge
-3
3
-2
4

Monstrous Centipede, Gargantuan
-8
4
-5
7

Monstrous Centipede, Colossal
-19
5
-
-

Monstrous Scorpion, Medium
-1
1
-1
1

Monstrous Scorpion, Large
-2
3
-1
4

Monstrous Scorpion, Huge
-5
5
-3
7

Monstrous Scorpion, Gargantuan
-13
7
-9
11

Monstrous Scorpion, Colossal
-32
8
-
-

Monstrous Spider, Tiny
-
-
-1
-1

Monstrous Spider, Small
-
-
-1
-1

Monstrous Spider, Medium
-1
1
-1
1

Monstrous Spider, Large
-3
1+1
-2
2

Monstrous Spider, Huge
-5
3
-3
5

Monstrous Spider, Gargantuan
-11
5
-8
8

Monstrous Spider, Colossal
-25
7
-
-





*Spoiler: Heroes of Horror*
Show

*Monster name*
*Estimated RHD Reduction*
*Estimated number of RHD*
*Estimated DNLA*
*Estimated ECL with DNLA*

Bloodrot
-9
1+1
-5
5

Boneleaf
-1
6
-1
6

Corruption Eater
-10
5
-6
9

Taint Elemental, Large
-1
7
-1
7

Taint Elemental, Huge
-7
9
-3
13

Taint Elemental, Greater
-10
10
-5
15

Taint Elemental, Elder
-13
11
-8
16

Dusk Giant, Least
-1
5
-0
6

Dusk Giant, Lesser
-3
9
-2
10

Dusk Giant, Greater
-5
13
-3
15

Phantasmal Slayer
-4
12
-2
14





*Spoiler: Monster Manual III*
Show

*Monster name*
*Estimated RHD Reduction*
*Estimated number of RHD*
*Estimated DNLA*
*Estimated ECL with DNLA*

Arcane Ooze
-10
5
-7
8

Avalancher
-1
5
-0
6

Battlebriar, true
-15
10
-
-

Battlebriar, Warbound Impaler
-5
7
-3
9

Bearhound
-2
8
-1
9

Boneclaw
-5
5
-3
7

Bonedrinker, lesser
-4
3
-2
5

Bonedrinker
-6
5
-4
7

Brood Keeper
-10
12
-
-

Brood Keeper Larva Swarm
-17
5
-
-

Cadaver Collector
-4
13
-2
15

Cadaver Collector, Greater
-20
15
-14
21

Charnel Hound
-12
9
-
-

Chelicera
-10
12
-5
7

Chraal
-3
6
-2
7

Cinder Swarm
-12
4
-9
7

Conflagration Ooze
-2
5
-1
6

Infernal Conflagration Ooze
-7
8
-4
11

Deathshrieker
-9
9
-6
12

Battletitan
-27
9
-
-

Bloodstriker
-5
4
-3
6

Dragon Eel
-7
7
-3
11

Dread Blossom Swarm
-2
5
-2
5

Drowned
-14
6
-11
9

Dust Wight
-10
6
-6
10

Elemental, Storm, Large
-1
7
-0
8

Elemental, Storm, Huge
-6
10
-3
13

Elemental, Storm, Greater
-10
11
-
-

Elemental, Storm, Elder
-13
11
-
-

Ephemeral Swarm
-7
5
-5
7

Feral Yowler
-1
6
-1
6

Geriviar
-13
13
-
-

Giant, Death
-10
13
-
-

Giant, Eldritch
-10
15
-
-

Giant, Sand
-5
10
-3
12

Glaistig
-2
4
-1
5

Goatfolk (Ibixian)
-2
1+1
-1
2

Golem, Alchemical
-11
11
-8
14

Golem, Gloom
-1
7
-1
7

Golem, Hangman
-8
10
-6
12

Golem, Mud
-6
9
-4
11

Golem, Hangman
-10
8
-6
12

Golem, Prismatic
-8
12
-6
14

Golem, Shadesteel
-8
10
-5
13

Golem, greater Shadesteel
-15
12
-11
16

Golem, Web
-3
8
-2
9

Grisgol
-4
15
-3
16

Gulgar
-4
6
-2
8

Harpoon Spider
-1
4
-1
4

Harpoon Spider, Dread
-3
6
-2
7

Ironclad Mauler
-7
8
-4
11

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Animated objects (Large to Colossal)
*
As seems to be tradition in this kind of thread, we'll start with the animated objects, from the Large ("I am a table, please don't eat on me.") to the Colossal ("Have you ever tried to wrestle a house?"). 

Construct immunities are cool, but they far from make up for the inexistent abilities and the very unimpressive ability scores for their size (24 strength on a Gargantuan creature and it is its only bonus, really?).

Overall pretty bland entry. 

*Large*, 4RHD, 16 Str: Might have made a decent Barbarian at 3 RHD with constitution and without the awful hit to Cha. As it is, I believe it deserves no more than *2 RHD*, maybe even 1. For the DLA, I'd think a *DLA-1* for a final ECL of 3 is good, as GreatWyrmGold chose too. 

*Huge*, 8RHD, 20 Str: bigger, but not that much stronger. I'd say the increased Str and size make for two more useable RHD than the Large one, since you become a very good grappler, which makes *4 RHD*. At this level, you can start to take prestige classes reserved for level 6 martial characters, which would amount to ECL 6. You are very much behind in class features compared to a barbarian, but you are closer to getting another feat, and you are tougher to kill, so I'd say ECL 6 and *DLA-2*.

*Gargantuan*, 16RHD, 24 Str: The numbers keep growing, but that's all. Huge to Gargantuan is worse than Large to Huge, so only one more RHD, *5 RHD*, because as good a grappler as you are, that won't do everything without anything else, and *DLA-7* (the +3 ECL compared to Huge is because of the sheer number of feats it gets, and its natural reach).

*Colossal*, 32 RHD, 28 Str: Same reasoning, *6 RHD* for the Colossal... thing.

What do you think of this format, and of these Adjustment?


-----------------------------------------------------------------------


*(Bad) Dire Animals
*
Omitting the multiple critters that have already been covered in previous threads, notably Martixy's one, we get directly to dire animals ("You want a monster? Look outside, pick the first moving thing, then make it bigger."). And as their name implies, the are in dire need of a negative LA.

*Dire Bat*, 4 RHD: Well, this one isn't that bad, despite the animal RHD. Good all-around physical ability and Wis boost, despite the hit to Int and Cha, plus flight, blindsense and natural armor. The attack isn't that great, but it would make an acceptable rogue if they had just one less RHD. I think *3 RHD* is fine (even though the bat is Medium). I'm not comfortable giving it a DNLA, though. I believe *DLA-0* is good, if quite weak.

*Dire Bear*, 12 RHD: the great and mighty, 12 animal RHD, behemoth. Good Strength, but clearly not enough to compare to a barbarian of the same number of HD. I could compare it to a Dire Wolverine, which got +0 in the original thread for 5 RHD. The bear's chassis is clearly stronger (with +8 Str, somewhat compensated by the wolverine's Rage, and improved grab) but not incredibly so. I would give it a strong *6 RHD*, for 1 RHD more than the wolverine. Lower than full BAB make the RHD not that valuable, so I would elect for a *DLA-3*.

*Dire Boar*, 7 RHD: Worse attack than a raging Wolverine and doesn't have multiple natural attacks, ferocity is something, but it won't change your world. I'd suggest *4 RHD* in RHDR, or *DLA-1*.

*Dire Lion*, 8 RHD: Pounce is, as always, extremely good, and you always appreciate it with those multiple attacks. But the attacks themselves are not that good, and it doesn't have much else for it. Still a better chassis than the wolverine, in my opinion. *6 RHD* or *DLA-1*.

*Dire Shark*, 18 RHD: What have we got here... Weaker Str than the lion for more than twice the HD, one single natural attack that is not even that good, a lackluster grappling specialization, and a water dependency that will cripple most parties. I would say *4 RHD* and *DLA-8* but I am open to suggestion, I have trouble envisioning such a difference between HD and ECL.

*Dire Tiger*, 16 RHD: As Inevitability stated, this is a dire lion with more HD. Not even one size bigger. Giving it *7 RHD*, one higher than the lion, seems good to me, it doesn't deserve more. And I'd guess *DLA-6* but I'm not sure what one could do with this HD.

*Dire Wolf*, 6 RHD: Like the boar, pretty neat Str, but only one lackluster bite attack and an unimpressive ability on it. Same verdict, *4 RHD* and *DLA-1*.

What do you guys think about these? I'm not sure who would play a giant shark even like that, since it would need permanent Breathe Air and Flying items to even be able to function on land, not even counting the sharknado level of panic it would create, but heh, at least I think it is almost balanced for combat.

----------


## emulord

This thread is great! Looking forward to how it evolves. 

I think -13 DNLA for the Colossal object would be fair. I agree its hard to judge, personally I only think epic Spellcasting is OP enough to be worried about epic feat cheese, so a noncaster is safe from that. Bunch of epic feats but no nonepic class features seems balanced at ECL 19. You're a beatstick, so if your opponents can't nosell your abilites your numbers are strong.

----------


## H_H_F_F

Here's to this thread's success! I like the idea, though I think including the 2 methods could get confusing. Good luck!




> This thread is great! Looking forward to how it evolves. 
> 
> I think -13 DNLA for the Colossal object would be fair. I agree its hard to judge, personally I only think epic Spellcasting is OP enough to be worried about epic feat cheese, so a noncaster is safe from that. Bunch of epic feats but no nonepic class features seems balanced at ECL 19. You're a beatstick, so if your opponents can't nosell your abilites your numbers are strong.


I disagree, I think it should be much steeper. Even with 4 epic feats, this thing would get annihilated in an ECL 19 environment. Somewhere around -18-20 makes more sense IMO. Using feats and having class access is a game changer, of course, but there's still a good reason the  colossal object has a CR of 10.

----------


## emulord

@Beni
Can I suggest we have a table at the start of the thread for every monster evaluated with both types of LA so far? In the normal LA threads it helps easily find entries of appropriate CR for campaigns. 


@H_H_F_F 
Sure a normal animated colossal object is CR 10, but Magical Items can make a large difference. An AO is more of a puzzle encounter than a numbers encounter at the larger sizes. A more intelligently played one supported by a party would be stronger and more versatile. My range was -13 to -16, and I was leaning on the conservative side, expecting a player to be a reasonably optimized form like adamantine chariot, airship, or something with hands. Obviously a stone cube or windmill would be far weaker and -20 would be very fair.

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Air elementals (Large to Elder)
*
Skipping dragons, because those are a whole other can-o'worms (I would like some advice on how to tackle them, by the way. Organize them by color, or by age category? Most of them are pretty similar to each other, anyway), we have Air Elementals! 

"They see me whirling, they hating..." Air is the only element where the Small Elemental is listed as LA+1 on Inevitability's thread, and with a good reason: flying is good; (perfect) flying is better; 100 ft (perfect) flying is best. (Seriously, there is very little that reaches these speeds, and even less at this maneuverability; air elementals have, afaik, the second best non-epic flight speed behind the ghaele) Plus they get Improved Initiative and Weapon Finesse as bonus feats, which synergizes well with their very good Dexterity bonus. 

However, it lacks a bit (too?) much in the (Su) and (Ext) department. All they have is whirlwind, which only becomes interesting at a level where everybody starts flying, and is able to escape it, and a measly bonus against other flying creatures. That makes the Air Elementals look more and more like a simple beatstick as it increases in RHD but not enough in stats, and becomes irrelevant for its level.

*Large*, 8 RHD: You just got your second slam attack, with Large reach and a welcome DR 5/- (Why is it untyped? Why even have DR? How? The answer is blowing in the wind), but your stats are almost identical to the Medium elemental. The Air Elemental is still quite good at this level, and I think reducing to *7 RHD* will let it be an effective Rogue without being too much of a liability (with Evasion, this thing will never take any damage from anything that allows Reflex). It really isn't far from being equivalent to a character of its level, but I think it deserves at least *DLA-1*.

*Huge*, 16 RHD: This is where it all goes down. This size category offers litterally nothing beyond mediocre stat boosts. That's all. +8 total bonus. *9 RHD* make its ECL two higher than the previous one, and I'm not even sure that's warranted (you can whirlwind Large creatures now, which amounts to something at ECL 8, even though it might not matter much soon after). With its whole RHD, I'd tend to say *DLA-3*. I'm reluctant to go that much lower for a creature that, all in all, has still one or two tricks up its sleeve.

*Greater*, 21 RHD, Huge: They just noticed that doubling the amount of RHD each rank would make the biggest Elementals way over what even a ninth level spell should summon. But that just makes this transition even more lackluster. Only bonus of note is the doubling of the DR to 10/-. *10 RHD*

*Elder*, 24 RHD, Huge: And we finish with the Greater Elemental! Ah, it's Elder? I didn't see the difference. *11 RHD*, just to have the final ECL different from the Greater one, but the differences between the two are so slim that I would accept 10 RHD as well.

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

> @Beni
> Can I suggest we have a table at the start of the thread for every monster evaluated with both types of LA so far? In the normal LA threads it helps easily find entries of appropriate CR for campaigns.


Good idea! It should be done.




> @H_H_F_F 
> Sure a normal animated colossal object is CR 10, but Magical Items can make a large difference. An AO is more of a puzzle encounter than a numbers encounter at the larger sizes. A more intelligently played one supported by a party would be stronger and more versatile. My range was -13 to -16, and I was leaning on the conservative side, expecting a player to be a reasonably optimized form like adamantine chariot, airship, or something with hands. Obviously a stone cube or windmill would be far weaker and -20 would be very fair.


I'm not sure an animated humanoid statue would get as many magic item placements as an humanoid. I'm not sure an item placement is linked to the function of the body part, or just to having a body part where it fits. For example, having winged boots might not function if you have appendices but you use wheels to move around, same with magic glasses, hats and masks, since animated objects do not have eyes, or a head with a brain, technically.

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Earth Elementals (Medium to Elder)
*
They may not fly, but they can still _rock_ you like a hurricane! Next, we have the Earth Elementals. They were basically created as the opposite of the Air ones. Where an Air Elemental is fast, Dex-based, flying, light (yes, the Elementals weight are listed in the monster manual), and have a combat-based special ability, the Earth Elementals are the slowest, most Str-centered, heaviest and most earthbound of all Elementals, and have an utility-based special ability. So, where the Air is probably the strongest element, Earth is unsurprisingly the weakest, with maybe Water.

They all have an interesting ability in Earth Glide, if they want to scout ahead, and with their abilities, I'm guessing a TWF ranger would most fit their style (I consider Earth Glide also applies to its items and weapons, because that would be pitiful otherwise), if you put a few points in Wisdom. Or just a fighter, if you want that sweet sweet 27 AC in full plate.

*Medium*, 4 RHD: We start low, because even there, it is not worth taking. The natural armor is very good for a 4 RHD monster, and if the stat flaws are almost as big as the boosts, the flaws affect scores that you don't care about anyway and the bonus are to Str and Con, which are the only ones you'll ever use if you want to play Earth Elementals. Is it worth 4 weak RHD? Probably not. 2 would be much too strong, though, since it is still much better than its Small counterpart. Let's go with a strong *3 RHD*. The 4th RHD gives you 1 BAB and 1 Fortitude, which, with the usual prestige class/skill points it offers, is I think enough to push it over the edge. *DLA-0* for the Medium Elemental.

*Large*, 8 RHD: The story repeats, the Large elemental is the most powerful compared to the previous version. 2 slams dealing almost twice as much damage as the Medium ones, and with reach against medium and small creatures, +8 ability scores, including a very interesting +2 Int that will probably let it choose prestige classes without being too restricted, and damage reduction which is still very good at this level. I suggest *6 RHD* here, but it will maybe be a bit weak. For the DLA, Elemental hit dice are not that good. ECL 7 and *DLA-1* seems in order here.

*Huge*, 16 RHD: A huge disppointment. The natural armor that was interesting in lower size categories almost doesn't scale, and seems miserable at this level. You still get stats boosts and a size increase is good on a martial character. More than one ECL more than the Large one, though? I don't think so. *7 RHD* is in order because gaining a size category should amount to something, even more so with the Push ability of Elementals, as weak as it is. For the direct level adjustment, we're at a level where even taking 4 Fighter levels would be more valuable than 8 RHD of this, since you get one more feat and the Elemental really doesn't give much. *DLA-5* for the big rock, leaning to -6.

*Greater*, 21 RHD: Still a big rock, but more respected by its peers. The DR doubles compared to the previous category, and that alone probably makes it playable with *8 RHD*, if maybe a bit weak. And they get a whopping +2 Str! Yes, that's all.

*Elder*, 24 RHD: The oldest of big rocks. It has now the intelligence of a normal human! Only getting subpar stat boosts doesn't even net it one more ECL in my opinion. I believe in *8 RHD* for the Elder Earth Elemental.


Phew, these ones were bad. What do you think of these LA? What would you give Earth Elementals to make them viable or even interesting to play? 

Are we getting singular monsters any time soon instead of posts with a whole group? Do not get your hopes up, we still have two elements to cover.

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Fire Elementals (Large to Elder)*

"Eine mächtige Flamme entsteht aus einem winzigen Funken", said Dante Alighieri. Even a mighty flame is born of a tiny spark. Well, as always in D&D, you'd rather play the tiny spark than the mighty flame, if it meant less RHD. 

Next, we have the Fire Elementals, and when you look at their stat sheets, you know that they are not a passive kind. Every single one of their abilities are damage-oriented, and most are linked to its slam attack, which inflicts bonus fire damage and threatens to light something on fire with DC that scales very strangely with HD. The slam itself, however, is pretty bad on Small and Medium, but the damage gets way better starting on the Large Elemental. And they are fast bois. 50 ft on ground is very good for a Small creature, but quickly gets worse as the size increases. 

Let's go with LA:

*Large*, 8 RHD: 4d6+2 is actually really good damage on the slam attack, more than twice the previous size category! And since it is a natural attack, you could stack Power Attack (x1) and Weapon Finesse. An Elemental with 18 Str and 28 Dex (14 and 18 before racial) and 7 RHD will have +13 to-hit and 4d6+4=18. A raging half-orc barbarian of level 7 will have 27 Str (+17 to-hit and 2d6+12=19). That is better, especially with Power Attack, but Fire Elementals get fire immunity, a bit more health, a bit more reach, a bit more speed, and the nice unexplained Elemental DR, plus their ability to Burn things that starts to have a nice DC. I think *7 RHD* are good here, if a bit weak, and *DLA-1*, since the Elemental RHD doesn't do much good and the slam attack will probably be less and less useful later on.

*Huge*, 16 RHD: Going from Medium to Large was an incredible boost for the Fire Elemental, increasing its slam attack two-fold (double the damage, and double the number of slams) and giving it DR. Going from Large to Huge gives it +10 stats and nothing else. Disappointing. If we go by the rules that (Su) abilities DC scales as 1/2 the RHD, it even has a _lower_ DC that its Large counterpart! I have to say going as low as *8 RHD* is necessary here. And Elemental RHD with no scaling ability are pretty bad too, and even its speed is now low-tier for its size category. I think *DLA-6* is fair. A shame, since the Large form seemed so much better than the Earth Elemental. Natural armor makers a lot of difference.

*Greater*, 21 RHD: No new ability, the DR increase is nice, and surprisingly the natural armor doubles here. Anyway, same as always, give it one more RHD and call it a day. *9 RHD*

*Elder*, 24 RHD: And the last one, better than the previous but really not that much. I think *9 RHD* is still okay, like for the greater.


The Fire Elementals were interesting. As long as direct damage was still relevant, and really scaled with their level, their stats and nice damage were good, but they fell from grace faster than a blown out candle. That's what you get when all your special abilities rely on your slam natural attack.

What do you think of these LA? Do not hesitate to discuss. Next time, the Water Elementals. They are sure to be a weird bunch.

----------


## martixy

Oh, hey. I got a mention for something I did a long time ago.

TBH, I never meant to abandon that thread... it just sort of happened. Every once in a while I think about resurrecting it, but these days I'm not playing, so that might be some ways off.

I do wonder why you chose Partial Gestalt, given that it's merely a more complicated version of RHDR.
(Definitely not a fan of NLA, since it messes with a fundamental assumption of the game.)

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

> Oh, hey. I got a mention for something I did a long time ago.
> 
> TBH, I never meant to abandon that thread... it just sort of happened. Every once in a while I think about resurrecting it, but these days I'm not playing, so that might be some ways off.
> 
> I do wonder why you chose Partial Gestalt, given that it's merely a more complicated version of RHDR.
> (Definitely not a fan of NLA, since it messes with a fundamental assumption of the game.)


Yes, thank you for having started your thread, it was a good inspiration and showed that this kind of thread could survive for a long time and be interesting on its own.

I chose PG over RHDR because I just wanted to point out that the special abilities of the monster should continue to scale as it gains class levels, at least until their "natural" power, which isn't that clear with RHDR. That should help offset the fact that monster special abilities always tend to fall out of relevance before class features. Plus, I wanted to still give relevance to the difference between the various kinds of RHD. Really, the difference is so slim that you could use RHDR instead of PG without losing anything. Do you think I should just write it as being RHDR and pointing out that all abilities scale?

About DNLA, I know it isn't the best and messes with a lot of things, but there were a lot of discussions about what Negative LA method was the best, so I just wanted to include both main methods, in order for people to be able to just disregard one of them if they want. Plus, the Incarnate Construct method, where it only offsets templates LA, doesn't have any of its problems, and can be used more directly, so in a way, DNLA is the RAW method.

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Water Elementals (Medium to Elder)*

"The seaweed is always greener in somebody else's lake, You wanna play as some water, but that is a big mistake"

Finally, Water Elementals. Take the Air Elementals, remove everything that made them good, and you have Water Elementals. Incredible flight speed? Make that pretty good swim speed. A pretty good whirlwind? What if you could only use it underwater. Two bonus feats? Just get rid of those will you. A small bonus against flying creature? Change that into a huge malus against everything that isn't underwater!

Water Elementals are, with Earth, the toughest elementals, with the most amount of HP and natural armor, but the worst Elementals for combat, and they have even less utility. They are Str-centered, but have a -4 to hit _and_ damage against basically everything. They can be as useful as Air Elementals when underwater, which prevents me from dubbing them the worst element directly. But since most campaigns are in majority on land, they will almost always be a liability, even if we disregard the fact that they normally can't move more than 180 ft away from the puddle of water from which they were conjured.

*Medium*, 4 RHD: I'm not even sure the Small one deserved +0 on Inevitability's thread. And the increase in stats is pretty pitiful from Small to Medium. (I do not count the vortex since the number of underwater fight in D&D is very low, and you almost always want to lure water creatures on land when you have to fight them). Still, you get a very good natural armor.  That's why I think *3 RHD* is acceptable here, making them not playable at the same level as their Small counterpart, but not far. *DLA-1* also seems good. The low skill points and weak slam attacks make the Elemental RHD really bad here.

*Large*, 8 RHD: Like for all elements, this is the best improvement. DR 5/-, double the slam damage (still very weak compared to what the Fire can do, or even efficient Large weapons but you take what you can), and the ability to take Medium characters in your vortex, if you somehow can make anything accept to fight a Water Elemental in the water. That's also where the first characteristic of the Water Elementals shine the most: they have lots of health, not that they can do much with it. Can it justify 5 RHD? I'm not sure. I'd say *4 RHD*, leaning to 5 RHD or even 6 if the campaign is at least partially on the sea. And with awful HD, *DLA-3* seems in order. They can take a martial prestige class one level earlier than normal races, but what are they gonna do with it? Attack at -4? Note that this is the first size where its Str bonus balances its malus against terrestrial and flying creatures.

*Huge*, 16 RHD: The Large one had the better improvement between size categories, the Huge one has then the worst. No DR, a bit of physical stats is nice, but not enough, and an underwater vortex when people start to be able to fly. *5 RHD*, nobody would play this with more. It pains me, but they really are bad. They might do decent grapplers/bull rushers at this size, if you pay a feat (note that Earth didn't have to), but except if they can drag somebody to a nearby puddle to pummel them afterwards, they won't do much more. Oh yeah, and they finally get a movement speed boost. They now walk at a 30 ft speed, or as much as an average creature of two size categories smaller. *DLA-6*? This one is tricky. Giving it too many HD may make it open for a lot of cheese, but without cheese, it probably won't do much, even in an ECL 10 environment. Also the natural armor stopped scaling, for whatever reason, and will stay the same for the two other forms.

*Greater*, 21 RHD: Same as other elementals, good DR, nothing else. Those are a lot of stat boosts all in all, but the monster seems to have no direction at all. I suggest *6 RHD* for the Greater Water Elemental. The ECL is so low that having a bit of DR goes a long way.

*Elder*, 24 RHD: And the last one. This is painful to watch. The most impressive number on the stat sheet is the 24,000 lbs that it weighs. *7 RHD* is very low, but I think that is necessary.

And with that, we concluded the Elemental streak. Those were a lot of numbers. What do you think about these ones? Would you ever play a Water Elemental?

Next time, we'll do the Ettercap, a very bizarre creature that will be the first individual post on this thread.

----------


## martixy

> Yes, thank you for having started your thread, it was a good inspiration and showed that this kind of thread could survive for a long time and be interesting on its own.
> 
> I chose PG over RHDR because I just wanted to point out that the special abilities of the monster should continue to scale as it gains class levels, at least until their "natural" power, which isn't that clear with RHDR. That should help offset the fact that monster special abilities always tend to fall out of relevance before class features. Plus, I wanted to still give relevance to the difference between the various kinds of RHD. Really, the difference is so slim that you could use RHDR instead of PG without losing anything. Do you think I should just write it as being RHDR and pointing out that all abilities scale?
> 
> About DNLA, I know it isn't the best and messes with a lot of things, but there were a lot of discussions about what Negative LA method was the best, so I just wanted to include both main methods, in order for people to be able to just disregard one of them if they want. Plus, the Incarnate Construct method, where it only offsets templates LA, doesn't have any of its problems, and can be used more directly, so in a way, DNLA is the RAW method.


😄
I _knew_ I should have said something about this. In my original thread we actually discussed this in the latter pages. My personal solution was to just let abilities scale with class levels too, which I was using in my game* at the time and found no problems with.

Since you're explicitly soliciting my opinion: While PG is not strictly equivalent (RHD progression stops at some point), I do strongly lean towards RHDR+abilities scale with class too.

* Gestalt game even, so it was not the mechanic that was the problem.

P.S.



> Really, the difference is so slim that you could use RHDR instead of PG without losing anything.


 In the interest of fair evaluation, with class scaling you do lose the (likely marginal) bonuses of gestalting the RHD's BAB, saves and HD, but gain abilities that scale even beyond the original RHD. Game design wise, it's only the net positive of reduced complexity.

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

I guess you are right, and it would serve as a bit of uniformization with your previous thread. I will change the posts already in place to make it RHDR.


What do you think about the LAs themselves? Am I generally biased in one direction or the other?

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Ettercap
*
The Ettercap. The owlbear of the arachnid order. One of the numerous "let's put something's head on another thing's body and add a third thing's claws" creatures of the monster manual. I like it. I really do. It has this sort of cartoony parodic feel to it. I would like to play one. So let's make it playable. Because right now, it definitely isn't.

The Ettercap has a little bit of everything and a whole lot of nothing. 

- +4 Str, +6 Dex, +2 Con, -4 Int, +4 Wis, -2 Cha (total+10)
- Claws and Bite attacks with poison on the latter
- a web attack from a relative distance (50 ft)
- a bonus on Hide, Spot, Craft (Trapmaking) and a climb speed
- a whopping +1 natural armor

 It's to the point that I don't really know what to make of it. A barbarian/Fighter would not use the advantage on Dex for its attack and probably never use it's best attack, the web. A ranged ranger would try to be at a distance while the ettercap is designed to be at mid-distance. I think a rogue would be best here. You get to use Sneak Attack with all three natural attacks if the opponent is flanked, or you can sneak attack from a distance if safer and still be in range for your web if necessary. You couldn't really go to assassin with that hit to Int andit reduces your high number of skill points, but you choose what you can. You could still go Shadow Thief without much problem.

With that in mind, what number of aberration RHD are worth these kinds of bonuses. I think *2 RHD* is good. You get some, you lose some compared to full rogue, and I believe that makes for a balanced character, maybe even slightly above average with the plethora of attacks. You would still be feat-starved, of course, but slightly less so than a TWF rogue. 3 RHD would be pretty bad, though. With its whole RHD, I suggest *DLA-2*. This gives the Ettercap the equivalent of full BAB for its RHD and its various abilities should offset the delaying of class features. 

What do you think about the spider/bird/lizard thing? Would you play it with 2 RHD? Next time, we will have the two-headed Ettin, who promises to be hard to rate.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Ettins*

Can an ettin knit a net? Not naturally, considering each head controls one arm and they have -4 Int. However, they have a very good Str bonus, and having two heads lets them ignore any penalty due to Two-Weapon Fighting. That is good, granted, but still arguably worse than having Improved Two-Weapon Fighting and a full BAB. Doubling a breath weapon is neat, and can lead to funny shenanigans with Dragonfire adepts' breath effects. Of course, it hardly justifies 10 RHD.
In the end, the most interesting thing you could do with two heads is trying to take the Multivoice feat and cast two spells per standard action. But the prereqs are pretty ridiculous (two feats that litterally give you nothing since you have Superior Two-Weapon Fighting) and you would have a hard time filling the ability score requirements (15 Int when you start with -4 is rough). And anyway, if you're going to play a spellcaster, you're better off with the multiheaded template (2 RHD and +2 LA) and a race with decent mental scores.

In the end, Ettins are just the posterboy of a multiheaded ogre (seriously, look at their stats, they are so similar that I do not see how that can be incidental). With 6 RHD more. Ogres were really underpowered for their number of RHD, and Multiheaded really does not help the ettin much. I suggest *4 RHD* for the ettin, putting it at the same number as the official ogre, and the same ECL as a twin-headed character. Being nothing more than a beatstick really hurts the big guy. With the NDLA method, I think *DLA-3* is fair. It is still a beatstick, and class levels of those are somehow less valuable than caster ones, and less unbalanced compared to Racial Hit Dice. Plus, having high Str and natural armor is not negligible either.

Edit: Wielding two one-handed weapons, with a Str bonus on top of it may make the ettin do really hefty damage, even compared to a barbarian of level 4 or 5. Sure, it loses in versatility and BAB, but pure destructive power can go a long way at these levels. *5 RHD* and *DLA-2* might be more balanced.

What do you think of the ettin? Just a poor execution for an otherwise interesting and original monster? Or a failed concept doomed from the start to be replaced by the more general template?

And for next time, we stay in the theme of creatures that have one more mouth than they should, with the shrieker fungus!

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## PoeticallyPsyco

Love the thread.




> air elementals have, afaik, the second best non-epic flight speed behind the ghaele


And Wendigos. 120ft (perfect) fly speed.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Love the thread.
> 
> 
> 
> And Wendigos. 120ft (perfect) fly speed.


Glad to hear it! I will try to continue posting those, so don't hesitate to come visit!

Good catch on the wendigo, I totally forgot about this one

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Fungus (Shrieker)*


Behold, ladies and gentlemen, the one monster dubbed the weakest in D&D 3.5, and with good reasons. It is a happy coincidence that this one came up today, because this creature is an absolute joke. 

Where to even begin? The Shrieker Fungus is, in all the worst senses of the word, _awful_. Not "CW Samuraï without Imperious Command" awful. More like "seemingly designed so that whatever you try, this will never ever make a decent character" awful. And that is, majorly, because of its stats. Yes, it lacks three of them. No Strength, no Dexterity, and no Intelligence. And if you think that is bad, I hope to show you that it is way worse than that.

*Spoiler: How to get a mind*
Show

First, let's talk about the intelligence. Usually, in this kind of threads, we kinda handwave mindlessness as "it somehow got a score". But this one is good enough that I want to do it by the book. There are two main ways to get Intelligence: Awakening, and templates. But Awaken inexplicably only works on trees in 3.5e, not other plants. And I may be lenient, but mushrooms are definitely not trees (they should not even be Plants, but let's skip this discussion). So, templates it is. Fiendish is the general go-to in this case. But with the shrieker? You are a 5 ft-tall mushroom with no movement speed. Considering the picture, and the official page for mushroom density (yes this exists), I'd say you might weigh up to 100 to 200 kg. If your template doesn't give you a way to move around, nobody is going to carry you around. I only found one that gave both intelligence and a movement speed to plants: Flesh Plant, a disgusting amalgam of guts, intestines and bones in the vague semblance of a plant (Advanced Bestiary, pg. 115).

So, to be able to play as something else that a litteral plant, you have to give up the one interest of this creature, Plant immunities, and become an Aberration. And for that you get a 10 ft movement speed and a score of 1 in Intelligence. One point. Only marginally better than the 3 from Fiendish, but that still hurts. However, if we go by RAW, you still cannot move your body (no Strength, no Dexterity). The template gives you a movement speed anyway, so you are probably slowly sliding on the ground without moving a muscle, which in itself should give you a bonus on Intimidation, if playing that abomination of a creature wasn't already asserting dominance enough.



*Spoiler: What class is there left for a mushroom*
Show

Now that that's out of the way, let's get on the interesting part. I said that Shriekers are unplayable. And it is because no Strength and no Dexterity means no attack rolls. You are not just bad at attacking, because even being bad at something is very good for the shrieker, you just can't. Which means absolutely no martial class, from monk to warblade, is going to cut it. (I think that it is what it means to have neither of those, since you automatically fail any Str or Dex check. But if I am confused on the rules, please correct me. It would still be extremely bad, but not nearly as much as it is now)

But there are still casters! No. No Strength means no Somatic component, no wielding an arcane or divine focus that you couldn't carry anyway, and no using material components. Clerics and Wizards are not for you either.

*Spoiler: Why I didn't include druids*
Show

To be fair, a druid is not that bad, of course, because druids can do anything. You basically play as your animal companion till lv 5, that can carry you around without much problem, then you take Natural Spell, and you spend the rest of your career as whatever broken animal you want. You have -10 Wisdom. Yeah, so what? A druid without spells is still much stronger than most classes. But if you are here, you are here to play a shrieker, not play something else with a huge penalty to mental stats. Also the reason why I didn't include phylactery of change. That would give you physical stats, but these completely defeat the point of trying to assign LA.


What remains? Psionic classes could fit. They don't need somatic components, or focus. However, the shrieker still has a -10 in Intelligence. That is as low as it gets. Even putting all your leveling points in Intelligence, a Shrieker Psion 20 rolling an 18 has 13 in Intelligence. Yep. You are manifesting worse than most level 5 psionic characters. And getting items to boost intelligence will not only get you so far, but you _can't even carry them_ without a Strength score!! Getting custom ioun stones may be achievable, but so expensive that your character would not manifest anything before 10th level or so.

Then we have the incarnate. Most of its abilities are based of Constitution, so that's good... But remember that all soulmelds must be worn on a useable magic item slot (if you do not bind them, you can wear a magic item on top of it, but you still need the slot). You are a mushroom! No arms, no legs, no head for the crown, no face for the eyes, no chest for the vest, no shoulder and no hands. You may argue for the neck and waist, but that's all. Yeah, melding is out.

The warlocks are known for being able to function with 3s across the board, so surely they would fit, right? Weeeell... No attack roll means no Eldritch Blast (and no glaivelock) until you take Eldritch line at *level 11*! And -4 Cha modifier means your invocations with saves will probably never work on anything. It is hard to play a class when two-third of your class features just plain don't work. But you still have other invocations, right? Well, no. Invocations require somatic components, and since you have no Dex, this is also out. Also warlock really don't care much about Constitution. Also, also, even if we handwaved the somatic requirement with some sort of custom feat, a lot of invocations deal with getting you bonus to some skills. Which just won't help you since you don't have the Intelligence to get any skill decently high. There is basically nothing the warlock should do that a shrieker warlock can do. You can't even play a class known to require next to nothing from the character to be played efficiently. That is a testament to the horror that is playing a shrieker.

Binders also rely a lot on Strength and Dexterity, since they are more martial than casters per se.

So what? Are shriekers doomed to only advance by templates and never use a class level effectively? I don't think so. Because if you can shriek, then you may speak. And if you can speak, then you can Truespeak.

No, I'm not even kidding. What do useless HD give you? Maximum skill ranks. What do most utterances not need? Attack rolls and Saves. I believe the optimal class for the shrieker fungus is Truenamer. And when the best class a character can take is Truenamer with a racial -10 to Intelligence, you know there is a big, big problem. (You could say that an ardent with -8 Wis who can't manifest until level 4 would still outperform a Truenamer with only two item slots. And you're probably right. But because the difference between a shrieker and a normal race ardent is way higher than the same for Truenamer, and also because it is still April Fools, we'll go for Truenamer) Boosting a skill is way easier than boosting DC, and even having -5 to all Truespeak check does not amount to a lot when you should have +40 at least to really play a Truenamer. (if you roll at least 16, you have 6 Int, and with 4+int/lv, this is enough to keep Truespeak maxed out and have another skill for prereqs purposes) At least, lots of means to boost Truespeak do not come from items, or not slot items, so there's that. Of course, ask if you can use the Book of Words fix, but even without, you should do a not that much more terrible job than a normal Truenamer. 

Obligatory "I have no mouth and I must scream" joke, because that's what you will be doing most of the time if you try playing this. 





*Spoiler: Verdict: Level Adjustment*
Show

So, we have a mushroom whose best chance in life is to learn the language of the universe to fight its crippling (get it?) depression. The same way NDLA loses its purpose when the creature has too many RHD, RHDR loses its meaning here. Obviously, even at 0 RHD, the shrieker will still be far, far from playable. 

If the shrieker was LA+0 with no RHD, what LA would be a human? +10 in all mental stats, -2 Con, and a difficult to rate but definitely primordial ability to hit stuff with other stuff (without even getting to the ability to cast spells) and to hide without being forced to scream your lungs out, plus a bonus feat. I think it would warrant LA+3 for the human, maybe even +4. So, let's go with DLA-3 if the shrieker had no RHD. I'm not even sure a Shrieker Truenamer 4 would be balanced with an ECL 1 party, even an unoptimized one, but I think -4 is a bit too much, even for its numerous issues. But the Shrieker has RHD too! Even 2 of them! They give you some skill rank limit for your Truespeak, which is pretty good, but aberration RHD give you so few skill points that having two aberration HD before your first class level (which eats the x4 skill points at first level) actually makes you lose skill points! (unless you have at least 12 Intelligence, which the shrieker will probably never reach since it will die to absolutely anything way before its level 16 ability boost) And gaining BAB doesn't do much when you litterally can't use it. In the end, I think ECL -3 is still in order, for a final *DLA-5* for the Shrieker, even if Flesh Plant is free. Use at least 3 of these LA for templates, if you want to reduce the groaning of your DM and the throwing of books to acceptable levels. Anyway, playing a campaign with a Truenamer Shrieker is probably the biggest power move that any D&D player could ever accomplish, so just for that, it has merit.


This one... was a doozy. I know my final decision really doesn't make much sense in terms of rules and of gameplay, but hey, that's what I think is best. If one of you can make a DM accept that you play this during of of their games, then please, please tell me how it went. There was so, so much to this thing. Whenever you think you found something that it could half-decently do, there was another part of its statsheet that shut it down. I initially thought it could be a pretty good Spellfire wielder, but then I realized that spellfire blasts need a ranged touch attack, and that you'd be forced to be an out-of-combat healbot, and that even that wasn't useful since Flesh Plant gives you fast healing 2.

Welp, see you next time, everybody, for the over-RHD'd-but-still-way-better-than-the-shrieker giants!

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## emulord

The shrieker being a creature and not a trap or environmental hazard is the biggest April fools joke that WoTC ever pulled. Good analysis on truenamer being the class to compare.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Giants (all of them)*


"O, it is excellent
 To have a giant's strength; but it is tyrannous
 To use it like a giant."

Why even develop when Shakespeare says it all? 

Giants are _strong_ bois, but they generally lack any way to use it apart from "me hit you hard". They can explicitly wield weapons and are proficient with martial weapons, medium armors and shields. That is pretty good. Let's see how much their stats are worth.

*Cloud*, 17 RHD: Don't get swayed by its Oversized Weapon quality. Even if it applies to other weapons than the morningstar, you'll notice that the Cloud Giant wields his normally one-handed morningstar two-handed, which implies he only ignores the -2 penalty for using a one-handed weapon one size larger than you as a two-handed weapon, not that he could use, say, a Gargantuan greatsword. Apart from that, he can throw rocks (which is literally worse than just using a composite longbow adapted to his strength), use SLA that could have been useful around 10 ECL earlier (level 1 and 2 spells, really?), and has two utterly ridiculous slam attacks (1d6. That is as much as just unarmed attack.). So, the only thing interesting is the Huge +24 Str/+12 Con, and no penalty on other stats. That is enough for *10 RHD*, I guess, but it will be a pretty boring character to play. At least letting him have its whole RHD will give it some skills, and he hits hard enough that *DLA-4* seems good (barring epic feats shenanigans, of course), giving it BAB equal to its ECL.

*Fire*, 15 RHD: It says that they heat their rocks on fire geyser, which implies they should not be fought anywhere except in a volcano, where nigh on everything should already be immune to fire. Anyway, removing 2d6 damages on their already very mediocre Rock-Throwing will not affect the LA at all, so feel free to interpret the rules as you wish. Compared to the Cloud, -4 Str and Dex (first malus, yeah!), -2 everywhere else, no useless SLA, but an interesting fire immunity. I suggest *8 RHD*, since those are still pretty hefty ability hits, but generally, it plays as the Cloud. I think *DLA-4* is not that bad, since you will be bulky enough to survive one or two hits even in an ECL 11 environment and do a bit of work and a lot of hitting.

*Frost*, 14 RHD: Litterally the same as Fire, with 2 less Strength, 1 more natural armor, and the less useful immunity to Frost damage with Vulnerability to Fire. I don't think that warrants any change. *8 RHD* and *DLA-4*.

*Hill*, 12 RHD: Theoretically the weakest of them all, but with the lowest amount of RHD. Nothing to say about it, I suggest *6 RHD* and *DLA-3*. I would say DLA-2, but it has a really bad Int.

*Stone*, 14 RHD: Why is the giant made of litteral stone the most dextrous of them all? Even more than the cloud one? No one will ever know. The overall number of stats is the same as the Frost giant, which means it has more AC, but hits comparatively softer. It doesn't dislike the absence of the Frost type that much, so I will go with the same *8 RHD*/*DLA-4*.

*Elder Stone Giant*, 14 RHD: You get some SLA 1/day (only that often? Come on!) related to earth, which can be interesting in more social situations (they will really fall short in combat), but overall it's just a Stone Giant with more Charisma. I think the differences are too slim to warrant a change of LA, so *8 RHD*/*DLA-4*.

*Storm*, 19 RHD: Finally, some good freaking SLA! Control Weather is infamous, and Chain Lightning can help him do some damage against lots of minions. Finally, Freedom of Movement is incredible for a martial type. And these stats are nothing short of stellar. If only he had full BAB, he might even have gotten +0 LA (probably not, tho, 19 RHD is a lot). As it is, I think *12 RHD* should do the trick. And getting caster levels on its SLA means his RHD are not as mediocre as others of its type. I think I would allow DLA-4, but I will go for *DLA-3* for now. If anybody has suggestions, I would like to hear them.

What do you think about these LA? When I reread the stat sheets, I didn't expect the giants to be so... small. Most of them are only Large, I was expecting Huge for Hill and Gargantuan for Storm and Cloud. Anyway, see you next time, for "what if Shenzi decided to take up arms against Mufasa", the gnoll!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Gnoll*

And today, we have the gnoll! When I see this creature, I'm always reminded of my first contact with D&D. Not the Tabletop RPG, mind you. No, the european board game, where it was one of the very few enemies the players could encounter. Ah, how nostalgia can make you remember some silly things way longer than they are worth. 

In the actual game, however, I don't think I have ever used or seen one used for any purpose. And it is for a good reason. Humanoid RHD are very, very bad, and you don't want 2 of them. 

Apart from their RHD, Gnolls seem to be designed to be orcs ++. Compared to water orcs, generally considered the best orc subrace, they have 2 more Wis, +1 natural armor and no light sensitivity. The gnoll's favored class is worse and they have less support (they can't take orc-only feats and prestige classes), but in low-op, I would always take a 0 RHD gnoll over any other PHB race for a martial character. I would rather have a comparatively weaker monster race compared to a "normal" one, because playing a monster race should be more exceptional than the norm in D&D, so I suggest *1 RHD* for the gnoll, overriding the rule stating that a 1 RHD monster can have its RHD replaced by the first class level. However, the humanoid RHD are weak enough that gaining one of them doesn't really change the ECL. *DLA-1* seems good to me.

The gnoll is a very straightforward monster. The next ones, however, will be much more tricky to rate. See you next time for the golems.

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## PoeticallyPsyco

> so I suggest *1 RHD* for the gnoll, overriding the rule stating that a 1 RHD monster can have its RHD replaced by the first class level. However, the humanoid RHD are weak enough that gaining one of them doesn't really change the ECL.


It may be more elegant to make it *1 RHD, +1 LA*, with the RHD getting replaced as normal. Slightly weaker in games without LA buy-off; slightly stronger in games with.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> It may be more elegant to make it *1 RHD, +1 LA*, with the RHD getting replaced as normal. Slightly weaker in games without LA buy-off; slightly stronger in games with.


The thing is, the gnoll is already much weaker than most +1LA races, who have almost all some trick beyond just stat increases. Look at Goliath for a comparable example. Goliath loses Dex (which he generally doesn't need) instead of charisma and the all-important intelligence, and they have a nice toy with their Powerful Build. I was hoping having a RHD instead of a LA would help the gnoll shine a little bit more. I didn't take into account buyoff, tho, which wouldn't make the LA version better than other LA+1, but would make the 1 RHD way worse. 

I could always add a note for the LA, but I'm not sure it is the best course of action.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Golems*

Golems... A weird bunch. They have always struck me as an easy "piss off my players" button. They are just immune to so many things that half the party just stays there watching as the one or two martials wittle down the golem's HP slowly. Even more slowly with the DR/adamantine, when it's not DR/Adamantine and bludgeoning. And on the other hand, they really don't do much. You can literally kite almost any of them around a room and they wouldn't do anything to you until they inevitably go out of control and start breaking the stuff they are supposed to be guarding. A very frustrating fight most of the time.

On the other hand, with the intelligence of a PC and some class levels, they can make very effective fighters and other close combat-centered classes. And their defensive capabilities are nothing less than top-notch. Note however that all golems are explicitly incapable of speaking, so caster is not for them. We don't really care, that is far from their preferred role, but it will be annoying to make plans with the party.

*Clay*, 11 RHD: How did they expect a lv 10 party to overcome this DR again? Really, the clay golem is good all-around. +14 Str, +14 natural armor, and a built-in Haste 1/day? Plus you have a way to heal, even while being a construct. Sign me in, even with -2 Dex (you won't be intimidating much with -10 Cha, tho). I believe it is worth at least 8 RHD, and probably even *9 RHD* (if we get rid of Berserk, of course). That's how good immunity to magic is for anyone, and especially for martials. With its whole RHD, *DLA-1* seems good to me. It is good enough to not need much more.

*Flesh*, 9 RHD: Aaaaaand this one is bad. The loss of 4 natural armor and Str, and DR 5 instead of 10 hurt, but what really pushes the flesh golem over the edge is its reaction to magic. Any fire or frost spell affects it as Slow, which means it will probably fight more often than not with the same number of actions as a zombie, if the opponent knows a bit about golems. Still nice to be immune to most things, but it is far from the almost complete invulnerability of the Clay. *5 RHD*, maybe? I could see 6, but I think it would be a bit on the weaker side. And since gaining construct RHD will not help it that much, *DLA-2*.

*Iron*, 18 RHD: Yep, that's just a Clay golem with everything cranked to 11 (except the DR, which goes back to only /Adamantine). +22 Str and natural armor (have you noticed that the bonus is always the same for golems?), DR 15, and a weird breath attack as a free action, that might be an open door for cheese. No Haste, tho. Very far from being worth 7 RHD more than the Clay, but 2 should make for an interesting tank. *11 RHD*, and *DLA-4*.

*Stone*, 14 RHD: The only golem with a built-in way to bypass its magic immunity. Anyway, its differences with Clay are pretty slim. It Slows people instead of Hasting itself, which is probably worse. Stats are mid-way from Clay to Iron, the number of RHD shall be as well. *10 RHD* and *DLA-2* for the stone golem.

*Greater Stone*, 42 RHD: I'm sorry, what? Why give it 42 RHD if it was to give it basically the same stats as the stone? Why not even increase the Damage Reduction, or make it /Epic? With the adjustment due to HD, the DC of its Slow ability is actually the same as the normal stone. This is just a stone golem with the ability bonuses due to being one size bigger, but with 28 RHD more, for some reason. Its only appeal is that you only have to be 14th level to create it, the same as normal stone. Which means a 14th level wizard can craft a golem 2 CR above them, if it has enough money.
Compared to the iron golem, it has +4 Str, -1 natural armor (the Greater Stone even breaks the "same bonus for Str and NA" rule! It really doesn't respect anything!), and 5 less DR. Plus the Slow effect of the Stone instead of the free action breath. I will give it the same *11 RHD*, but I believe Greater Stone is even worse than Iron.

The existence of the Greater Stone Golem really irritates me to no end. If you are to create an epic golem, at least put some thoughts into it! Well, anyway, here are the LA I suggest. I'm really not that confident for those, since immunity to magic is pretty hard to rate, so if you think I made a gross error, do not hesitate to correct me. Next time, we will cover a creature that I had forgotten about, the Gray Render!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Gray Render*

And then, we have one of the purest cutie pies of the Monster Manual. Did you know that Gray Renders have a tendency to just choose people or animals leaving in their surroundings, then act as guardian angels for them, feeding them, and protecting them from harm? Even if they aren't accepted by their "pets" and even if the adopted creatures attack them out of fear, they will continue to protect them from afar and never strike back. Truly, the Lennie Small (_Of Mice and Men_, John Steinbeck) of _Dungeons and Dragons_. Must protect!

And in the stats department, Gray Renders do not disappoint (too much) either! Full BAB, everybody! The first creature to have that that we covered here! That kind of offsets the fact that it has 10 RHD to contend with. Also, +14 Con and +12 Str, how nice is that? Then +10 natural armor and an almost humanoid body shape make for a good AC with an armor if you take at least one fighter level. And finally, a simple but pretty good bite attack with improved grab and bonus damage on successful grapple checks, useable in conjunction with a two-handed weapon. That is a really good martial character, all in all. If only he didn't have Lennie Small levels of intelligence as well... That is really what prevents him from having +0 LA, in my opinion. 

In the end, full BAB and very good Constitution don't totally amount to the same as the clay golem's magic immunity and defensive capabilities, but they are close enough for me to be only one RHD below. I think *8 RHD* is pretty good for the Gray Render.

Giving more than full BAB to a chassis that good is pretty dangerous, but having DLA 0 would make the Gray Render really weak, and the huge hit to Intelligence means he will have a hard time qualifying too early for prestige class, so I think there will not be too many problems with *DLA-1*.


It is nice to see some wholesome descriptions once in a while in the monster manual. The render is definitely a weird guy in that regard. It only appeared in 3e despite its description looking like something that came from 1st edition, then every bit of wholesome disappeared in 4e to change them into "random frenzied predator that kills everyone in sight" (one more reason if you needed one to dislike 4e), then in 5e they specifically seek out people more intelligent than them, and no more animals, and act more like servants than guardian angels, which I find odd and less appealing than 3e.
What do you think about the Gray Render? Would you like one as a pet? If you prefer cruelty and torture to wholesomeness and protection, though, just wait a little bit. Next time, we have the green hag!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Green Hag*

And today, we have the green hag! 

*Spoiler: Rant on translating the word "hag" in other languages*
Show

There is a very interesting story with the hags that goes generally unseen, and it's the calamity that is translating their name in other languages. You see, "hag", in english, very conveniently describes both a witch and an insufferable old lady. However, there isn't nearly as much of an association between the two in other languages, so translators had to find innovative ways to translate the name. Often, they take something out of the folklore of the country. In german, they are called "Vettel", a kind of witch, which you find for example in _Hansel and Gretel_ and other _Grimm's_ fairy tales. In polish, they are _Babas_, linked to the typically russian/polish Baba Jaga, whose name also means "old woman", so this is a perfect fit. Yet, in french, there is no specific creature represented as a magic-using, deformed old woman. They could have called it _sorcières_, directly (_witches_), or _vieilles sorcières_ (_old witches_), but not only is that a very broad term that doesn't roll out the tongue, but it would create misunderstandings with _sorcier_, which is the translation chosen for the Warlock class, and with the _sorcerer_ class in english. 

So, instead of an inaccurate translation, they went and translated "hag" as _guenaude_. This is an incredibly antiquated word of old french that hasn't been used since at least the mid-19th century, and dates back to the 16th century, during the religion wars in Europe, . Then, one group of protestants in southern France were called the Huguenots, and in a squib against Huguenots, G. de Saconay invented the word "guenaud", combination of _Huguenot_, _guenon_ (female monkey) and _guigne_ (bad luck). 

The word later drifted to mean "somebody that can curse people and give them bad luck", and by extension, witch. 

I found this choice of name pretty interesting, since I never thought translators for D&D of all things would have a particularly hard job. Thinking again, there are a lot of non-standard words scattered here and there, that couldn't be directly translated, so kudos to all of them for their work, and even taking into account the inspiration the monsters have to include them when translating.


Linguistics and sociology aside, what does a green hag have for her? 
+8 Str, +2 Dex, Con, Int and Wis, and +4 Cha
Lots of SLA, at-will, with some interesting ones, like Invisibility, Tongues or Water Breathing (to go with her swim speed) 
A nice natural armor at +11,
Two unimpressive claws, 
A weird touch attack that doesn't seem to be useable with her claws, but deals Str damages, possibly enough to incapacitate most spellcasters, 
And an under average Spell Resistance (9+HD with SR scaling)
All of that capped with 9 Monstrous Humanoid HD, which really aren't that bad, with notably full BAB.

Green Hags seem to make good rogues, having the SLA, BAB and natural weapons for it, but they would prefer another class that make them use their pretty good Str bonus. Monk/Rogue multiclass?

In the end, green hags are not bad. There is nothing really crippling with them, and a lot of tricks that could be used. In the original thread, there even was a lot of people who moved for it to be assigned +0. However, most of her SLAs, except invisibility will not come up that often, and her stat boosts aren't the most adapted to her combat style.. I think they would be fine with just one RHD less. I suggest *8 RHD* for the green hag. Not much to say about the DNLA. I think *DLA-0* would fit them. I pondered if I should give her one more BAB than her ECL, because she would generally be pretty weak for this ECL, but she would be pretty strong with a DLA-1, so I think it is the best.

Nice little monster, the green hag, she really has that "fairy tale witch" feel to her. What do you think about the LA? See you next time for another monster very linked to tales and floklore: the harpy!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Harpies*

And next, we have the mythologically-inaccurate, "No, you're thinking about sirens", harpies. They really have "1st edition monster" written all over them. Very bland stats, "thing-that-kills-you" lore, and litterally one ability to make them unique, and a pretty badly worded one at that. Captivating Song has gone through the ages without much variation, retaining the whole "your DM will know" schtick of 1st and 2nd. What happens when someone is captivated by several harpies at a time? Does the harpy have to concentrate? What happens if a non-flying creature is captivated by a harpy that is flying? A move action being an action, by RAW, the captivated character shouldn't be able to move towards the harpy, since it can't take action... 

Apart from this mess, the harpy has +4 Dex, -4 Int, +2 Wis, +6 Cha, two secondary natural attacks, an average flight speed (80 ft), and 7 monstrous humanoid RHD. The ability boosts are really on the low side, it starts becoming pretty rare at this level for a monster to have no stat above 18.

These stats are weird. High charisma would lead to think a sorcerer would be nice, but they can't use verbal component while singing, and full BAB points towards martial, but they don't have good physical stats for it. I think they would make pretty good Snowflake Wardancers with a few levels in Bard and a few RHD less, since bards can explicitly cast spells while singing, and use their bardic music. I don't think a mass Save-or-Lose without HD restriction should be available before level 5, even if it can work only once per opponent. Even Wizards have to wait level 5 for that, with Stinking Cloud. And with the several other bonuses the harpies get, I'm comfortable giving it *5 RHD* and *DLA-1*. That is, if you can restrict the captivating song to your opponents. If not, then the radius of captivating song is so large that you will never be able to use it without problem. You should always be able to affect your party once every morning to make them immune for the day, but if you are close to a city or other non-hostile creatures, that might be a problem and make you less than welcome in most places.

What do you think of the sirens harpies? Next time, the Hellhound, and its Nessian version.

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## H_H_F_F

I'd like to point out that Savage Species offers the Siren PrC which is a great use for the Harpies' high Cha. I've used it on a ghost in the villainous competition, but it's obviously meant for harpies, and it's very good IMO.

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## Beni-Kujaku

I agree that Siren is a great PrC, with both power and fluff. However, I'm not sure it is best for the harpies. With that many HD, and the levels you invested in Siren, I believe you should expect more than a Save-or-Lose with two saves. If someone resists your sound attack, then you instantly lose almost everything you can do against this creature, since Siren really doesn't give much aside from new effects for your sound attack. I think Siren is better on ghost, who not only has less ECL, but has other things it can do with high charisma. It would be even better on something that can use its sound effect repeatedly, even on the same creatures. A vassal or soldier abeil would be pretty good, if it had better charisma, for example (with Unseelie fey/Magic-blooded, maybe?). In fact, I have not found any creature that could really use the prestige class to its full potential, with both a reuseable sound attack and high charisma. I don't know if you know of one.

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## H_H_F_F

I don't know of one, sorry. My system mastery isn't that great when it comes to monsters outside of core. 

I agree with much of what you've said, but it still seems like one of the best ways forward with the Harpy to me. Not ideal, sure, but a potent PRC using what they have to offer.

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## Dalmosh

How about Ardent as a Shrieker Fungus class?  The Freedom mantle would give it a 10ft speed, and access to powers that would let it teleport and fly. 
It's still pretty miserable, but it has to be an upgrade on Truenamer.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> How about Ardent as a Shrieker Fungus class?  The Freedom mantle would give it a 10ft speed, and access to powers that would let it teleport and fly. 
> It's still pretty miserable, but it has to be an upgrade on Truenamer.


I agree that Ardent is better than Psion, since the Shrieker only has -8, and not -10 Wis. But that only means it might reach 10 Wisdom during character creation. So it can't manifest anything until 4th level (except if you use other templates, but then I'm still not sure it needs less than ECL -3). The powers of the Freedom mantle are indeed very good (Dimension Hop will be an incredible boon if you go that way), but the +10ft only applies to existing movement speeds. It helps greatly if you already have Flesh Plant, but it does not replace it. In the end, I still think the Warlock would be a better choice than ardent, but that is close. And I don't think you could consider the shrieker playing as a "normal" Ardent. Its progression will be greatly slowed down and it will become more and more apparent as it levels up. On the other hand, even if the class itself is terrible, the shrieker will truespeak almost as well as anybody else, and the difference will decrease instead of increasing as it levels up. If I have to compare to a class to deduce a level adjustment, I'd rather do it with Truenamer, since there is a chance that with the right adjustment, the shrieker will be equivalent to another 'namer, while whatever the adjustment, a shrieker Ardent will be way stronger than a normal Ardent at the beginning (if it has enough negative LA), then quickly become way weaker (when it starts to not be able to increase its Wis fast enough).

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Hell Hounds*

The hellish hound who hounds in Hells, it's the Hell Hound! There are few ways to make a name more basic than that. And I'm not gonna lie, it does not make up for that with its stats. 

*Hell Hound*, 4 RHD: +2 in all physical, -4 in Int and Cha, an average bite attack, and a supernatural ability (breath weapon) that you are probably never going to use. What? Have I searched for "generic chassis for every unplayable monster in the manual" by mistake?

Outsider RHD are good, but the stats really are as underwhelming as they get. And with they body shape, they won't even be able to wield a weapon, except a mouth weapon. Which will prevent them from using their ability to add 1d6 fire damage when they bite people! At least they are fast (40 ft), have a bit of natural armor, and some racial skill bonuses (power is power, as Xykon said, which would make them decent rogues. And finally, there are the subtypes. Those, I can get behind. Fire immunity and Law+Evil on any weapon it wields? That is not unique, but at this level, it is still pretty rare, and that will be useful up until the high levels. How many parties have been annoyed by DR/Evil and Law because their casters didn't prepare aligned weapons?

The Hell Hound is a mixed bunch, but in the end I do not think it deserves more than *2 RHD*. The chassis is too basic, the ability scores are too low. With DNLA, they might even be really good at *DLA-1*, but I don't wanna give them a DLA-0, they are way too weak for that.

*Nessian Warhound*, 12 RHD: Surely with a chassis that bland, the evolved version will have added some interesting abilities, right? Of course not, who am I kidding. At least the stats have a bit of personnality now. +16 Str, +4 Dex, +10 Con, -6 Int (It's even dumber! How is it even dumber?), -4 Cha. And now the breath weapon deals 3d6 instead of 2! Woo! This is somewhat better than the Hill giant (+2 in all physical stats, full BAB, and the good subtypes), but not incredibly so. I think that makes it worth a pretty weak *8 RHD*, and similarly weak *DLA-1*. There is simply too little in there to make it interesting.

And with this one, we have completed the first table of monsters from the Monster Manual covered by Inevitability (except dragons). Next time, we start the second table, with the good old Kraken!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Kraken*

I never understood why WotC made the kraken a highly intelligent monster, capable of cruelty and enslaving other creatures, having a whole society under the sea, instead of the litteral animal that it is in all the folklores it appears in. The guy can even speak common, for Boccob's sake! I don't know, is that a reference to "Octopi are the most likely species to succeed to humans as rulers of the Earth"? Wasn't that already what the Illithids are for?

Anyway, let's cut trying to understand WotC, since they definitely didn't put a lot of thoughts into this creature, or it wouldn't be this much of a mess. 
-20 Magical Beast RHD, that's a lot but not bad _per se_. 
-Very good stats, that remind me of the Storm Giant, with godlike +24 Str and +19 Con, plus +10 in all mentals. 
-However, the other abilities are... lackluster. Some SLA only 1/day, with control winds as the only one interesting, but with only CL 9, you are not going to destroy cities. Then you have the poor man's dimension door, with the kraken's jet of water and the poor man's Quickened Darkness with its ink, both of which weirdly seem to function outside of water. But since the kraken only has a (laughably slow) swim speed and no land speed, I believe it is just an oversight from WotC who didn't consider it even could go out of the water. This would not be the first, even on this very creature. For example, lore-wise, it can breathe air, even though it's a squid. But it is stated nowhere in its stat sheet, and you have to go read other editions to know that. 
-Finally, 9 natural attacks is a heck of a lot, only beaten by Hydras pre-epic, and you have Improved Grab and Constrict on all of them. But the arms are really unimpressive, they only deal 1d6 damages (as a comparison, unarmed attack deals 1d8 points of damage for a gargantuan creature), and since they are twice shorter than the tentacles, they will probably not attack often. But if anyone is misguided enough to come nearer than 30ft from you, they will have a really, really hard time not getting grappled. The bite, on the other hand, hits hard, and somehow has a 15ft reach? Why not. But what really no-sells a lot of it is the fact that the tentacle and arms can be sundered. And contrary to normal weapons, they don't have hardness. Only 20 HP for each tentacle means any Fighter will remove your two most powerful attacks on the first turn of combat.

The kraken's lack of abilities other than its natural attacks seem to lead it to being only a big beatstick, a shame for something with mental stats that good. And even then, it is very vulnerable to a lot of things. People cutting its two tentacles, anything with Freedom of Movement, or just the laws of physics and the DM ruling that you can't jet nor spit ink while outside the water, which would make it even more one-dimensional. The stats are still better than Fire and Cold Giants, and it has full BAB, which, with so many natural attacks, offsets pretty well the impossibility to wield weapons. I suggest *10 RHD* for the kraken. That would let it take enough class levels to make something of its mental stats (or possibly break the game by going Ur-Priest, but I'm not responsible for the mistakes of DM that allow this class), while still being pretty balanced at the level it comes into play. 

Edit: After discussions, and considering the fact that grappling has a lot of support that mesh really well with the kraken's advantages, giving it notably more mobility (Scorpion's Grasp), plus the fact that its tentacles can AoO anyone trying to sunder them, *12 RHD* would probably be more adapted for the giant squid.

The DNLA will be more difficult. The first level it will take will give it an epic feat, and with full BAB, there are lots of things one could do. I am going to abstain from giving a DNLA here. Feel free to suggest what you think the giant squid is worth. 

I'll see you next time for the lamia. What is it with creatures that are very different in D&D than in their myths? Harpies, Krakens, Lamia, what is it going to be next, a chimera with the snake head not on its tail? Oh, wait...

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## PoeticallyPsyco

Hmm, the Kraken is in the awkward spot of competing against Savage Species' frankly excellent Anthropomorphic Giant Octopus. Much worse stats (especially since you most likely must drop another 2 Dex with the Amphibious Creature template), 3 sizes smaller (which'll hurt grappling), and no SLAs... but only ECL 2. How many HD are stats, a +12 size bonus to combat maneuvers, and SLAs worth? I dunno. 8 more (10 total) is probably about right, since Magical Beast RHD are halfway decent, but may be a bit high. I'll say *9HD* total.

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## H_H_F_F

In a weak defence of the Kraken, I will remind you it has Full BaB, high Str, and a +12 size modifier. As printed (no point buy, items, etc) it has a +40 in its opposed roll to avoid getting sundered. Most fighters will have a hard time chopping that off.

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## Beni-Kujaku

Well, since one of you considered the kraken weaker than what I assigned and the other a bit stronger, I am not going to change the number of RHD.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Lamia*

And today, we have "What do you mean, we already did centaurs? Improvise, I like this monster concept!", the Lamia. 

The lamia has well-balanced stats (+8 Str, +4 Dex, +2 Con, +2 Int, +4 Wis, +2 Cha), a lot of illusion- and enchantment-based SLAs, and a weird touch attack that drains a little bit of Wisdom. It has a 60 ft movement speed, and is a Large quadruped, so you won't be Bull-rushing it soon.

However, most of the time, it will use a regular weapon instead of the touch attack. Too weak, and 1/round. I like the SLAs, but even Charm-monster 3/day doesn't make 9 RHD interesting, even less so when the DC is Cha-based and Charisma isn't even the best mental stat of the Lamia.

Generally, the lamia is just underwhelming for what you could expect from a 9 RHD creature, but it has enough abilities to not be really unuseable. I think I will go with *6 RHD*. You have charm-monster one level early compared to bards and wizards, and enough of everything to make a pretty good TWF ranger. With the full BAB, and the increase to CL, I think giving it *DLA-1* is fair.

What do you think about the Lamia and this LA? The lamia is one of the most humanoid-like monsters that we covered here. Would you play it, given the choice? Next time, we have the lizardfolk, who have humanoid Hit Dice, but a much less humanoid face.

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## H_H_F_F

Maybe I misunderstood you, but from what you wrote it apperas you were thinking bards get 3rd level spells at level 5, which they don't - they get them at 7.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Maybe I misunderstood you, but from what you wrote it apperas you were thinking bards get 3rd level spells at level 5, which they don't - they get them at 7.


I brain farted. Hard. Thank you for pointing this out.

Edit: Corrected.

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## GreatWyrmGold

*Spoiler: Assorted Comments*
Show


_Lots_ of assorted comments.




> (Seriously, there is very little that reaches these speeds, and even less at this maneuverability; air elementals have, afaik, the second best non-epic flight speed behind the ghaele)


You didn't specify maneuverability with that last statement, so I feel obliged to point out that some very fast dragons aren't technically Epic. They tend to have bad maneuverability, though.




> You could still go Shadow Thief without much problem.


If we're talking about the same Shadow Thief...why? I see a prestige class which gives some small skill bonuses, a Leadership score boost, and progression of a couple basic rogue abilities. It doesn't look terrible, but I'm not seeing the appeal.




> Now that that's out of the way, let's get on the interesting part...[Shrieker classes]


I'm not overly familiar with the class, but it seems like Dragonfire Adept would also be a functional choice for the shrieker. Breath weapons don't require attack rolls, and some of the invocations are handy. Particularly notable is the lesser invocation _humanoid shape_, which lets you perform such incredible feats as moving under your own power as early as 6th level.




> ...utterly ridiculous slam attacks (1d6. That is as much as just unarmed attack.)


Yeah, it's not great, but it's _literally_ just a giant unarmed attack.




> Anyway, see you next time, for "what if Shenzi decided to take up arms against Mufasa", the gnoll!





> *Greater Stone*, 42 RHD: I'm sorry, what? Why give it 42 RHD if it was to give it basically the same stats as the stone? Why not even increase the Damage Reduction, or make it /Epic?


It's literally just a stone golem with the normal monster advancement rules applied. Except without the every-4-HD ability score increase.




> Did you know that Gray Renders have a tendency to just choose people or animals leaving in their surroundings, than act as guardian angels for them, feeding them, and protecting them from harm? Even if they aren't accepted by their "pets" and even if the adopted creatures attack them out of fear, they will continue to protect them from afar and never strike back. Truly, the Lennie Small (_Of Mice and Men_, John Steinbeck) of _Dungeons and Dragons_. Must protect!


I love it, this is great. I kinda want to play a gray render just to roleplay a monstrous Lennie Small in a party of murderhobos.




> Rant on translating the word "hag" in other languages


Translation is fascinating, yet underappreciated.




> What happens if a non-flying creature is captivated by a harpy that is flying?


I feel like the answer to that is the same as "What happens if a non-swimming creature is captivated by a siren that is on an island?", and except without the drowning.




> (It's even dumber! How is it even dumber?)


I suspect the elite array was involved at some point.




> I never understood why WotC made the kraken a highly intelligent monster, capable of cruelty and enslaving other creatures, having a whole society under the sea, instead of the litteral animal that it is in all the folklores it appears in. The guy can even speak common, for Boccob's sake! I don't know, is that a reference to "Octopi are the most likely species to succeed to humans as rulers of the Earth"? Wasn't that already what the Illithids are for?


I'd say it's probably because there aren't any other classic monsters to apply the "terrifying undersea mastermind" niche to, but then I remembered aboleths exist.




> What is it with creatures that are very different in D&D than in their myths? Harpies, Krakens, Lamia, what is it going to be next, a chimera with the snake head not on its tail? Oh, wait...


1. Actually, it's a dragon head. YMMV on whether that's worse or not.
2. I think ye olde D&D writers wanted the clout of recognizable monster names, but didn't find the monsters attached very compelling for some reason. Or they wanted to put their own spin on them?

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## Beni-Kujaku

> If we're talking about the same Shadow Thief...why? I see a prestige class which gives some small skill bonuses, a Leadership score boost, and progression of a couple basic rogue abilities. It doesn't look terrible, but I'm not seeing the appeal.


First, thank you for passing by, and for restarting the negative LA trend 4 years ago! This thread might not have existed if it wasn't for you.

For the Shadow Thief of Amn, this is a nice little prestige class that is meant to replace the "dead" levels of rogue, where you only get Trapfinding with some bonus feats. Since you start with 2 RHD with an Ettercap, you won't get the rogue's special abilities for another 2 levels, which makes it even more interesting to prestige class out. As you can just enter as a rogue 3, it removes the redundancy of uncanny dodge, gives you more sneak attack than straight rogue, and one bonus feat (two bonus minus the feat tax to enter). It also gives you reasonable skill points to go Unseen Seer later. I see little reason to do anything else than STA as my 4th level for an Ettercap rogue. 




> I'm not overly familiar with the class, but it seems like Dragonfire Adept would also be a functional choice for the shrieker. Breath weapons don't require attack rolls, and some of the invocations are handy. Particularly notable is the lesser invocation _humanoid shape_, which lets you perform such incredible feats as moving under your own power as early as 6th level.


That... Is an extremely good point. I didn't think about that, being not familiar at all with this class, and putting it in my mind as "same as warlock". It has a lot of the same problems, like the invocations being cha-based and a lot of them increasing skills that you simply don't have, but with the con-based at-will breath, and the absolutely incredible movement options of Lesser Draconic Invocations, you might make something out of your shrieker. Still not good, but decent. I think it may even warrant DLA-1 without RHD, and DLA-3 with its RHD (since you don't need skills as much as Truenamers, the supplementary HD will only give you 2/3 of a feat, which will offset the invocation tax of humanoid shape with Extra Invocation). Really, that class is extremely good. I will have to add an edit to the skrieker's reply.

*Edit: ignore most of the previous paragraph* the Draconic invocations, same as the warlock invocations, require somatic components. The Shrieker cannot move its body, hence it can't use these invocations, and a Dragonfire Adept with only its breath is even worse than a Truenamer.




> It's literally just a stone golem with the normal monster advancement rules applied. Except without the every-4-HD ability score increase.


Yes, I noticed that, but that is not less sad. They could have edited the crafting rules to allow the wizard to give more HD to the golem and it would have been way more elegant.




> I love it, this is great. I kinda want to play a gray render just to roleplay a monstrous Lennie Small in a party of murderhobos.


Right!? I love when they go out of their way to give twists to their monsters.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Lizardfolk*

Before saurials, before sarkriths, before even khaastas, even back in 1st edition, there always were lizardfolk. And even though it still describes them very well, that name is... a bit disrespectful. You don't call elves "long-ears", or goblins "greenfolk", do you? Well then again, you call dwarfs "dwarfs" just because they're a bit smaller than humans, and drows are literally known as "dark elves" by most people. So yeah, the common language is pretty heavily human-centric and denies other races most of their culture and specificity. I propose we riot to have dwarves be called whatever they are called in dwarf language. 

Lizardfolk are in a weird situation. On the one hand, they are so obviously stronger than the gnoll that it isn't even funny (*three* natural attacks and +5 natural armor is absolutely nothing to scoff at, even with -2 Str/+2 Int, compared to the gnoll), but on the other, two Humanoid RHD is still too much for them to be really useable. While I didn't go for it with the gnoll, I believe the Lizardfolk are strong enough that I can use the method PoeticallyPsyco suggested for the gnoll. I will say *1 RHD, +1 LA* for the lizardfolk. The RHD is replaced by the first class level, leaving it with +1 LA, which seems acceptable without being immediately better than the gnoll. However, with their 2 RHD, I really think they would be way too strong with DLA-1. Lizardfolk's characteristics are comparable with what a totemist can do at level 1, plus the ability boosts. So I'm going with *DLA-0*, and sorry to everyone who wanted to play them with DNLA.

And hey, if you really think they are too weak for their ECL, these are scaled-ones, so you can Pun-Pun cheese to adjust their characteristics as you see fit to get to the exact wanted power level. Isn't that nice? And next time, we will have the Locathas! I can already hear them bubbling in hope.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Locathah*

Water we looking at here? I am quite hooked each time I sea this creature, but each time I try to play it, I find myself crying an ocean, and for good reasons: not only are there other fish in the sea, but the Locathahs are also knee-deep in issues.

First, why are they not Monstrous Humanoids? I know there are otter aquatic races, like the aquatic elves, but at least those could wave a stick at dry land without feeling like a fish out of the water. Locathahs cannot breathe air, and they cannot speak common. So they will have a hard time socializing, even moreso with their fish-eating grin on some artworks. Choosing between taking the Amphibious template and having less dexterity than a whale for the rest of your career or waiting for a custom Air Breathing item and having to stay in the water for your first few levels really feels like being between the devil and the deep blue sea. But hey, they're Humanoids, that's water under the bridge, let's go over the other abilities. 

At least, they have a land speed, even though I'm not sure what they could do with it without air breathing, but that is the value that really takes the wind out of their sail. A 10 ft speed is abyss-mal. Most of the time, you'll be forced to splash helplessly behind your party like a glorified Magikarp.

Not that I want to show a red herring to divert you, but at least it has somehow decent stats. +2 dexterity (probably used to offset the amphibious template), but also a really rare +2 bonus to intelligence in low-HD monsters, and +2 Wisdom. So that's a net benefit. This is not stellar, but a spellcaster Locathah might be a fish in troubled water.

Then, still better than a + tuna-tural armor bonus, but still not enough to get one's head above the water, the locatha has +3 NA. That's not just water off a duck's back, though, and an unarmored wizard will appreciate it. 

In the end, the Locathah's chassis is, I think, a bit stronger than most core races, but still far from the power level of optimized LA+0 races. Playing it would not be like shooting fish in a barrel, with its speed and water dependancy, but a determined player could make that ship sail. I think it is fine with *0 RHD*, and *DLA-1*, but if you would eat the fish without wetting your feet, this race is not for you.

Edit : Note that these LAs are when you take the fish out of the water for an on-land campaign. Most likely, you'll be playing Locathahs in an aquatic campaign, where their major drawback, their awful speed, turns into a pretty good swimming speed of 60 ft (also they can breathe, which is not inconsequential). With that in mind, I think a *1RHD, LA+1* is good, to discourage the wizards and clerics a bit too eager to take this race. And *DLA-0*. They are very weak with 2 RHD but can still try to hold their own.

So, water you thinking of the locathah? Would you play it without RHD? How do you plan to offset its deep-runnning (even if deep-walking would be more accurate here) issues? Next time, we have another very fitting monster for a deep-sea adventure. So much so, in fact, that it could fit almost any role. We will rate the ideal treasure chest, the mimic!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Mimic*

Have you ever played Pokémon Mystery Dungeon? Have you ever found weird that you could find merchant Kecleons far deeper in the dungeon than they should be and than anybody could have explored due to monsters beating you down and forcing you to retreat? Well D&D has an elegant response to that: the mimic. The merchant doesn't fear monsters, because it is itself the monster that would beat you down given the chance. If you seem to weak, it would kill you and take your loot, and if you seem strong enough, it proposes deals: food for information and some of the gold it has stolen from other adventurers. Really, what better way to prevent your players from stealing from the merchant than having the merchant being litterally its own moving, common-speaking vault?

The mimic is not dumb. It has no mental penalty and +2 Wis. But it is much stronger than it is smart, with +8 Str, +2 Dex, +6 Con and +5 Natural Armor. Pretty good, but still nothing outside of what is expected of a 7 RHD monster.

It has two arms, which it can use to make two Slam attacks, and which it uses to drag the rest of its body on the ground (yes, this is why it only has a 10 ft movement speed). This could seem like a problem when you want to wield weapons, but when you're as good a shapeshifter as the mimic, this is no real issue. Just create a pocket in your arm where you store your weapons when you have to move, then take them out whenever.

Now, onto the special abilities. And they are really good ones, all things considered.

First, the adhesive. Whoever you touch is considered grappled, but they cannot break the grapple in any way until you die or decide to let them go. That means the enemy BSF will not be able to use their two-handed weapon, with nothing they can really do about it. If you somehow get access to _dimension door_, it can be a nice way to start a battle to just teleport yourself above the enemies and grapple as many of them as you can by falling on them. Plus you deal a bit of damage automatically when grappling someone. This also works on weapons, but it is significantly easier to break the grapple (only a Strength or Escape Artist check, but if someone can even attack you with a melee weapon, that generally means you are able to touch them the next round. The main use of this part of the ability will be when you are already grappling somebody and they try to attack you with a light weapon). It has a weird alcohol weakness, but if the marilith you're fighting takes out a flask of whiskey specifically to counter your mimic, then you can justifiably complain about metagaming.

And finally, what you were waiting for, the Mimic Shape. Contrary to what Inevitability said, there is a size restriction on it. "The creature cannot substantially alter its size, though." What this means is unclear, but as I see it, you cannot change the size category of the mimic, since its stats are supposed to be the same in any shape it takes. So the maximum size in any direction would be 10 ft or so. It does reduce the amount of cheese you can get away with, but that ability still have a metric ton of versatility. You can go through any opening, including keyholes or under most doors, you can hide as a rock, you can shapeshift into a tendriculos or a big amnizu and laugh as people try to blast you with acid to which you are immune, you can change into a pedestal with an object of any size on it, if your opponents would be wary of a 1.5 meter long chest. You can change into a wall with a ladder, and activate adhesive when people are climbing, or as a cupboard, or a table. You can hide literally anything inside your body by creating pockets.... That is a really good shapechanging ability.

So with all that, what is the mimic worth? Well, Mimic Shape shines in more RP-heavy situations, but I don't think it would really help in combat. Plus, it is very dependent on the amount of cheese your DM allows and the creativity of the player ("I store Orbs of Acid inside of my body and pour them all on the first enemy I grapple!"). Unbreakable grapple is extremely good, but this is pretty feat-heavy (you could take one level of monk and _Choke Hold_ to be better, for example) and will generally only work on one opponent at a time. In the end, the stats are only subpar and the type is bad, so I suggest *5 RHD* for the mimic. I have nothing to compare it to, really, so I'm waiting for your feedback. And the Aberration RHD are not that good, but are still something, so I would be comfortable with *DLA-1*.


I really like this monster. The fluff is incredible and it could be extremely fun to play. I think people would be more surprised by hearing the chest talk than just seeing it sprout teeth, and that is pretty funny. If I could convince someone to let me play this even though I'm the one who assigned the LA and already have a reputation of optimizer in my pretty casual gaming group, I would definitely do. But hey, anyway, that might make a pretty good DMPC/encounter (depending on how agressive the players are) in a campaign.
Next time, we will have the first Undead on this thread, the Mohrg!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Mohrg*

This one is what DM use to threaten their murder hobo players. If you continue killing everyone on your path, then when you die, you'll be reanimated as a mohrg, and you'll be horribly underpowered for your 14 RHD! Truly the most horrible threat for a power-hungry player.

The mohrg has almost nothing to justify 14 awful undead RHD. +10 Str and +8 Dex are not bad, but factoring the lack of Con hindering any beatstick career, and the fact that such bonus are not unheard of on 6-7 HD monsters, that is not good either. A slam attack that you will never use, even with Improved Grab (who makes a grappling build on a Medium character anyway). The tongue is interesting. This is a pretty rare natural attack, with a nice ability on it (a shame that you can only use it 1/round and that the DC is charisma-based while the monstr has no Charisma bonus, but that is pretty good). And finally, create spawn is of course skipped, with an asterisk to replace it. And that's all.

This monster is very one-dimensional in his stat sheet, and not really good at the one thing it does. I don't think undead immunity warrant giving it more than *5 RHD*. And with the awful lack of almost everything in undead RHD, I do not want to give it less than *LA-6*. It would have one less BAB than a fighter-type character, and I think that balances nicely the decent but not great abilities that it has, and the resistance that comes with having 14 RHD as an ECL 8 character (it would be almost immune to turning, for example).

Next time, we'll cover the translation nightmare that is the Cauchemar! And until then, remember to not play murderhobos, guys.

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## GreatWyrmGold

> First, thank you for passing by, and for restarting the negative LA trend 4 years ago! This thread might not have existed if it wasn't for you.


Oh, thanks!




> Yes, I noticed that, but that is not less sad.


I wouldn't call it _sad_ so much as _weird_. Why advance exactly one golem? And if you're doing that, why _stone_ golem? Why not the more powerful iron golem, the classic clay golem, or maybe do something clever with a Huge flesh golem?





> Well then again, you call dwarfs "dwarfs" just because they're a bit smaller than humans, and drows are literally known as "dark elves" by most people. So yeah, the common language is pretty heavily human-centric and denies other races most of their culture and specificity. I propose we riot to have dwarves be called whatever they are called in dwarf language.


Yeah, there's plenty of fantasy dynamics we take for granted that would make pretty neat worldbuilding ideas if we took them seriously.





> At least, [locaths] have a land speed, even though I'm not sure what they could do with it without air breathing...


Same thing that humans can do with the Swim skill. Well, I guess there's air on top of most water humans can stick their head into, but they can also dive underwater by holding their breath.




> So, water you thinking of the locathah? Would you play it without RHD? How do you plan to offset its deep-runnning (even if deep-walking would be more accurate here) issues?


First off, you obviously don't play this in a campaign that isn't water-centric. Playing a freaky fish guy in a typical dungeon-crawler isn't _completely_ invalid, but come on. The exact balance of water:land and how the two are combined (coastal city? pirate ship? Atlantis?) is going to strongly influence how I would handle this.
Beyond that, this isn't a very interesting monster to theorcraft for. Maybe I could sketch a primitive SCOBA apparatus for when you're forced out of the water in the early levels? The chassis is pretty good; you get a few +2 to ability scores, some solid natural armor, and a remarkable swim speed.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Nightmare, Cauchemar*

It can be planar bounded by a wizard of its level! Clearly it must be -0!

Of course we are not going to compare the Cauchemar to full casters. Even though its most defining feature is its incredible SLAs, it would function much more efficiently as a martial, or a totemist. Its smoke is better if it can be stacked several times in a row, and its stats are extremely combat oriented. Let's have a look:

 15 Outsider HD. Another evolved monster who is doomed to -0 by the number of HD, but contrary to normal, the Cauchemar is based on an absolutely broken monster for its number of HD, and is an outsider, so there might be hope for a more reasonable negative LA. Outsider HD are really good, of course, but they're nowhere near class levels, especially at high level like the Cauchemar is.
 +20 Str, +4 Dex, +14 Con, +6 Int, +2 Wis, +2 Cha. +16 Natural Armor. That's... Not that good. Don't get me wrong, those are incredible bonuses, especially for a martial with even an Int bonus, but for 15 RHD, that's much lower than a lot of other monsters, especially outsiders. 
 No ability to wield weapons, but 2 good hooves attacks (pretty rare kind of natural attack), and the all-important bite that will let them use a mouth weapon. That is good. Not incredible, just good.
 A very good (Su) ability that probably should be (Ext) with Smoke, a cloud useable by a free action who debuffs in a cone and grants the Cauchemar concealment in that direction. That is extremely useful in combat and would be too to approach enemies without getting blasted from afar, that is if the Cauchemar didn't have...
 Astral Projection and Etherealness at will. My gods those are strong. Etherealness is very good by itself. It allows you to pass through walls, not be affected by anything for 20 minutes, infiltrate anything with the whole group, make a swift action attack before the enemy can act by dismissing Etherealness behind their back... 
But the whole kicker here is Astral Projection. One of the most broken spells in the game. Planeshift, Clone, arguably even Fragmented Phylactery, all for the whole group, without material component, by a standard action. Plus a whole lot of abuse of limited-use items, or even of non-limited use items, if your DM allows it. In the original thread, Inevitability didn't consider Astral Projection when judging both forms of the nightmare, mostly because Astral Projection would be utterly ridiculous at ECL 8, but I don't think it is that unrateable around ECL 15, only 2 levels before wizards get it. Still a 9th level spell, but we're at the level where there is so many super strong spells everywhere that this one doesn't make the whole monster broken.

So, a pretty good fighter with excellent utility, and the ability to enter a lot of prestige classes. What does that make the Cauchemar? Really, with astral projection, etherealness and smoke, I don't think it deserves a negative LA. You'll probably object, but I'm gonna go with *15 RHD* and *LA +0* as a first draft. Feel free to object. Without Astral Projection, it is way less interesting, but is still a good brawler with interesting abilities and outsider ability scores (low outsider, but still). I think I would have given it 11 RHD and LA -2, since full BAB RHD are less valuable at high level than they are lower.

This was a weird one to rate, and I can only imagine the difficulty for Inevitability to rate the usual Nightmare (seriously, who names the evolved version of a monster with the translated form of the name of that monster?). I still hope I did an okay job, and we will continue with very-high powered monsters next time with the three flavors of Night Shade!

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## Beni-Kujaku

> I wouldn't call it _sad_ so much as _weird_. Why advance exactly one golem? And if you're doing that, why _stone_ golem? Why not the more powerful iron golem, the classic clay golem, or maybe do something clever with a Huge flesh golem?


There is already an advancement rules for golems, with +5,000 gp to the price for each HD above what is listed, and an additional +50,000 per size increase. I suspect the greater stone golem is listed due to shenanigans with printed adventures, like there maybe was a dungeon with a lot of advanced golems with 42 HD, and they wanted to make it iconic enough by giving it its own entry?




> First off, you obviously don't play this in a campaign that isn't water-centric. Playing a freaky fish guy in a typical dungeon-crawler isn't _completely_ invalid, but come on. The exact balance of water:land and how the two are combined (coastal city? pirate ship? Atlantis?) is going to strongly influence how I would handle this.
> Beyond that, this isn't a very interesting monster to theorcraft for. Maybe I could sketch a primitive SCOBA apparatus for when you're forced out of the water in the early levels? The chassis is pretty good; you get a few +2 to ability scores, some solid natural armor, and a remarkable swim speed.


That is a good point. I generally rate these monsters as if they were going to be used in a classic campaign, since I consider not everybody in the party will take aquatic monsters, and they will try to keep away from the water as much as possible (as I always say, he is a fool the one who accepts to fight a water elemental in the water, and that applies to nigh on every aquatic monster). If the campaign is entirely aquatic, or at least most of it is spent underwater, then the LA would probably change, since the locathah becomes one of the only low-level classes players could choose that can natively breathe underwater.

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## GreatWyrmGold

> A very good (Su) ability that probably should be (Ext) with Smoke...


I'm pretty sure the eternally-smoking hooves are magical actually. Handy magic, but definitely magic.




> But the whole kicker here is Astral Projection. One of the most broken spells in the game.


I see what they were trying to do; it matches up very well with the classic image of astral projection. That said, it matches up very poorly with going to physical places that you can physically go to.
By level 15 it's ratable, but I don't blame Inevitability for leaving it out of both nightmares' ratings. Especially since it's such an infamously busted spell. (Bright side, it gives everyone on the team basically equal benefits, so if you're wrong the cauchemar won't steal the show.)




> If the campaign is entirely aquatic, or at least most of it is spent underwater, then the LA would probably change, since the locathah becomes one of the only low-level classes players could choose that can natively breathe underwater.


Aquatic elf, lacedon (ghoul), merfolk, merrow (ogre), nixie, sahuagin, triton. Arguably all the low-level undead/constructs; maybe the kapoacinth (gargoyle), scrag (troll), and sea hag (hag). Definitely the dozen or so low-CR aquatic animals, if you can find a way to make them intelligent. Don't get me wrong, there's fewer in the water than on land, but not just _a_ few.

I suppose I can get behind the idea that locaths would have radically different level adjustments in land-based and aquatic campaigns.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> I'm pretty sure the eternally-smoking hooves are magical actually. Handy magic, but definitely magic.


That's not the hooves, only the Nightmare's breath when it is out of breath. Similarly to a heavy smoker breathing their cigarette smoke on somebody. The fact that it has the insides on fire is maybe (Su), explaining the rating of the ability, but the action itself is just breathing on the opponent. That kinda reminds me of the Horse God in Toriko, who can compress air in his lungs, and fights by just blowing extremely high pressure air on the opponent.




> Aquatic elf, lacedon (ghoul), merfolk, merrow (ogre), nixie, sahuagin, triton. Arguably all the low-level undead/constructs; maybe the kapoacinth (gargoyle), scrag (troll), and sea hag (hag). Definitely the dozen or so low-CR aquatic animals, if you can find a way to make them intelligent. Don't get me wrong, there's fewer in the water than on land, but not just _a_ few.
> 
> I suppose I can get behind the idea that locaths would have radically different level adjustments in land-based and aquatic campaigns.


Just comparing it to the aquatic elf (LA+0) or the merfolk (very weak LA+1), I think I would go with 1 RHD, or 0 RHD, LA+1 in an aquatic campaign. The Locathah makes for a pretty good caster if it has a decent speed. And if you don't want to lose too many caster levels, it becomes the default choice (aquatic elf is just too underwhelming).

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Nightshades*

Read, if you will, the Monster Manual, and look for the edgiest monster imaginable. "Powerful Undead composed of equal parts darkness and absolute evil"? Yep, that's the one, the Nightshade. Now read its tactics. "Their tactics vary according to their abilities, but they all make liberal use of _Haste_." That, my friends, is a clear leftover of the age of 3rd edition, before the 3.5 update. At the time, _Haste_ was not only single target, but allowed the target to use one extra standard action in their turn, including casting SLAs or spells! This spell was so potent that they felt the need to put it on every high-level monster to offset a bit the action economy. 

The Nightshades were supposed to always cast this before combat (why wouldn't they, it didn't even cost them an action), and so were supposed to have two standard action per round to attack and use SLAs. Why does it matter to us? You see these unupdated CRs? 14 for the Nightwing, 16 for the Nightwalker and 18 for the Nightcrawler? That means these CRs are fake! Fake, I say! Their abilities are updated, but they really are in the same ballpark as non-hasted 3.0 nightshades, so there's that. They even removed their cool "Immunity to all spells below 6th level" to replace it with a much more boring SR (6 to 10 +RHD).

So, what have we got here. Summon Undead is irrelevant at this level, even more so when the summoned undead takes 1d10 rounds to appear. Desecrating Aura is pretty good actually. +2 on a lot of things and effective immunity to turn undead is pretty necessary for high-level undeads. Aversion to sunlight is a drawback, but also pretty irrelevant at this level. Lots of SLAs, with the interesting ones being at-will Haste and Greater Dispel Magic, and 1/day Finger of death and Plane Shift. Good stuff here. 

However, they're Undead. Good immunity at low levels, bad HP and BAB at high-level. That's somehow compensated by the desecrating aura, but that still hurts, since Nightshades generally want to be in melee..

*Nightcrawler*, 25 RHD: Look at that +38 Strength! That is enormous (Gargantuan, in fact)! A nasty bite with poison, and Swallow Whole (with his stomach acids dealing negative levels) make for a dangerous foe. Does it deserve to be epic, though? I don't think so. This is a big stupid fighter, after all. A good BSF with some pretty useful SLAs, but most of the time you'll just rush the opponent to eat it. Also, you get a burrow speed. Make what you want of this information. Still, if you want to play an undead purple worm 40 ft long, then I think *19 RHD* or so is pretty balanced. 1 levels is just enough to give it a tiny bit of personnality and customization. Maybe it deserves a bit more than that, but I feel generous. Since it doesn't create an epic monster in a non-epic game, I think I can also give it a DNLA. Epic levels are generally better than non-epic ones, so I don't think the Nightcrawler will get enough leverage for those last 5 RHD. *DLA-4* for ECL 21 is acceptable in my opinion (if there is no Epic Magic involved, of course). It only makes it lose one feat, in the end.

*Nightwalker*, 21 RHD: Oh no, it has legs now! But it also has arms. So it can have rings, and boots, and whatever magic items you like. 10 Str less than the crawler, but a weird SoL gaze that could decimate a non-immune to fear party. Then again, lots of things are immune to fear at these levels. Crush Items allows it to destroy any magic item, which is interesting (are there magic items that are said to be indestructible, and would break the game if they weren't?) but is clearly supposed to harm a PC in a dungeon by destroying their weapons before the BBEG. For a party, this is just a way to destroy your own loot and doesn't really help you since you already need to have disarmed your opponent for it to work. This really doesn't have the focused abilities of the crawler, but just the body shape helps a lot. I think *15 RHD*  is pretty good here. Maybe a bit weak? The gaze really helps it during the first turn, and there are still interesting abilities in there.

*Nightwing*, 17 RHD: And the non-epic one of the bunch, who really should have been called Nightflyer, to fit the theme. Losing a lot of Str puts it around Giants tier, or lower, and it loses Greater Dispel Magic. But it has the highest SR of the three, with 10+HD, and Magic Drain is a pretty funny tool. Since you generally want to have as much special abilities as possible, most high-level weapons are +1 plus special abilities. Magic Drain will make them a normal masterwork item in one application. (Granted DC 22 is not that high, but that's pretty cool. Again, more of a DM tool than a player one, though. And you don't even have a humanoid shape. I don't think it deserves much more than *11 RHD*. You can compare it with the Iron Golem, who hits harder and has infinite SR, but much less versatility and doesn't fly. Undead RHD are really bad, though, and *DLA-4* seems warranted.

Weird creatures, these ones, much more adapted as enemies than PCs. But you have to acknowledge that the nightwalker art is freaking awesome. Next time, we'll happily blub blub with the Oozes!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Oozes*

You know how slimes are always the weakest monsters in RPGs? Well WotC tried its best to counteract this trend and make some strong slimes. And they utterly failed.

Immunity to crits and sneak attacks, blind_sight_, immunity to mind-affecting, polymorph, paralysis, sleep, stun and probably social events. What could possibly go wrong? 

Well, no good save, no full BAB, 2+Int (so, 1 skill point if sentry ooze or half-fiend), and a general lack of anything worthwhile. That makes all monster manual oozes too underwhelming to be interesting to play (except Gelatinous Cube. Everybody loves and respect the Gelatinous Cube, and if somebody disagrees, he can fight me). Their stats are all incredibly similar to each other, to the point that they are almost indistinguishable from just advanced versions of each other (again, except the glorious Gelatinous Cube). No int, -10 Dex, Wis, and Cha, decent Str and at least +10 Con, going to +18 for the elder black pudding. Not quite as restrictive as the shrieker, but you're not going to do anything except being a martial, probably a barbarian, even more so with the grappling focus of their ability. Some levels in Dragonfire Adept, to get an acceptable anatomy and have magic items, could be pretty interesting too.

Some Oozes have the split special ability, which we disregard here. Inevitability explained why.

*Black Pudding*, 10 RHD: +6 Str, +12 Con. I don't understand how the slam and constrict damages are calculated, don't ask me. A bit more stats than the Gelatinous Cube, but you remove the two abilities that made it interesting, and replace them with Improved Grab and Constrict. Is it worth 4RHD? Maybe even 3. Let's go with *4 RHD*. Huge size is good for a grappler, and despite the various drawbacks (handicaps?). Also, *DLA-4*. I see no reason to not allow a BAB higher than its ECL when you have _four_ unusable stats.

*Elder Black Pudding*, 20 RHD: +14 Str, +18 Con. Same as the greater stone golem, just an advanced version of the previous one, with even more nonsense in the slam and constrict damage. I'd say *6 RHD*. That makes it the lowest-ECL Gargantuan monster, but it doesn't have much to go with it, so making it an almost unbeatable grappler at this level seems to be fair. *DLA-10* is the biggest DNLA I have given, but with these mental stats, you can compare with the Dire Shark and see that the black pudding still doesn't make the cut. Are there broken prestige classes that you can enter easily if you have +15 BAB at level 10?

*Gray Ooze*, 3 RHD: +2 Str, +10 Con. A Medium Grappler, what could possibly go wrong. The ooze immunities make almost the whole worth of this, but they are good enough that I think this needs *2 RHD* and *DLA-1*.

*Ochre Jelly*, 6 RHD: +4 Str, +12 Con. Large, a bit better, but generally the same. *3 RHD*, *DLA-2*.


This is just sad. They're almost as boring as they are useless. And they are very useless. Next time, we will see the creature that is more well-known because there is a prison in which they are sometimes thrown, the Otyugh! And until then, never forget to praise the Gelatinous Cube 🙌!

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## Morphic tide

I'll comment mainly on the Kraken, as Grapplers have a startlingly intense frontloading and fairly limited ability to gain advantage over monsters like the Kraken. Basically, after PsyWar 3/Totemist 2/Barbarian 1 (plus Practiced Manifester and Open Chakra (Arms)), you've gotten the vast majority of non-PRC Grapple output, and the PRCs are being _very harshly_ shamed by your +24 Strength, Gargantuan size, eight Improved Grab triggers, and _Natural Attack derived Constrict_.

Looking over a Grappling handbook, a Dragonborn Azurin Totem Rager Black Blood Cultist, one of the more extreme Grapple pushes in the game, caps at +63. With Rage, an assigned 18, a +5 Tome, and +6 belt, it has only 6 more strength than your base statblock, ends up with 5 less BAB, gets +8 from feats you have _zero_ complications taking, and +12 from a single Soulmeld.

A PC Kraken _with no items or class levels_ can readily compare to this rather heavily optimized and kitted out PC grappler, by assigning an 18 to Strength, getting Improved Grapple, then Shape Soulmeld (Girallon Arms) and acquiring 4 Essentia from Bonus Essentia and two +1 Essentia feats, for +60 to Grapple checks. And can make twice as many per round. If you let this thing have 9 levels or more, _it will defile the game_ with Black Blood Cultist 8 making every successful Grapple check set off _every_ Natural Attack you have. All 10-12 of them. Of which 6-8 instigate Grapple checks when used as attacks (depending on if the Claws overlap your Arms or not).

I suggest 12 RHD, giving access to 3rd-level PsyWar powers and Totem Rager 5's duration extension while making Black Blood Cultist 8 nearly squaring your damage potential be your entry to Epic, and agree with not giving it a direct negative level adjustment because Legendary Wrestler is a +10 and, as demonstrated above, it's actually a well above-curve Grappler with optimized PCs just by making it a PC, even if it gets to do _literally_ nothing but Grapple. Being that it's Gargantuan with eight limbs, this is a quite possible winning strategy as far as beatsticks go, even if your raw damage potential isn't as dumb as an Ubercharger.

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## PoeticallyPsyco

> I'll comment mainly on the Kraken, as Grapplers have a startlingly intense frontloading and fairly limited ability to gain advantage over monsters like the Kraken. Basically, after PsyWar 3/Totemist 2/Barbarian 1 (plus Practiced Manifester and Open Chakra (Arms)), you've gotten the vast majority of non-PRC Grapple output, and the PRCs are being _very harshly_ shamed by your +24 Strength, Gargantuan size, eight Improved Grab triggers, and _Natural Attack derived Constrict_.
> 
> Looking over a Grappling handbook, a Dragonborn Azurin Totem Rager Black Blood Cultist, one of the more extreme Grapple pushes in the game, caps at +63. With Rage, an assigned 18, a +5 Tome, and +6 belt, it has only 6 more strength than your base statblock, ends up with 5 less BAB, gets +8 from feats you have _zero_ complications taking, and +12 from a single Soulmeld.
> 
> A PC Kraken _with no items or class levels_ can readily compare to this rather heavily optimized and kitted out PC grappler, by assigning an 18 to Strength, getting Improved Grapple, then Shape Soulmeld (Girallon Arms) and acquiring 4 Essentia from Bonus Essentia and two +1 Essentia feats, for +60 to Grapple checks. And can make twice as many per round. If you let this thing have 9 levels or more, _it will defile the game_ with Black Blood Cultist 8 making every successful Grapple check set off _every_ Natural Attack you have. All 10-12 of them. Of which 6-8 instigate Grapple checks when used as attacks (depending on if the Claws overlap your Arms or not).
> 
> I suggest 12 RHD, giving access to 3rd-level PsyWar powers and Totem Rager 5's duration extension while making Black Blood Cultist 8 nearly squaring your damage potential be your entry to Epic, and agree with not giving it a direct negative level adjustment because Legendary Wrestler is a +10 and, as demonstrated above, it's actually a well above-curve Grappler with optimized PCs just by making it a PC, even if it gets to do _literally_ nothing but Grapple. Being that it's Gargantuan with eight limbs, this is a quite possible winning strategy as far as beatsticks go, even if your raw damage potential isn't as dumb as an Ubercharger.


I hadn't actually given much thought to the Kraken as a grappler (which seems weird, but I'm not used to thinking of grappling as a strong strategy once you get to high level), but it actually sidesteps one of the big problems (can only grapple up to one size above your own) and really benefits from of a few of the weirder grappling tricks.

Scorpion's Grasp - at first glance, this is redundant with Improved Grab, but unlike IG it doesn't drag the target into your space. Instead it moves you into theirs, which is a frankly fantastic boost to mobility on the Kraken (also working on a full-attack, no less). Also unlike IG, works on any natural attack, including the Kraken's beak and any natural weapons granted by Totemist.

One limbed grappling - When grappled, you lose your Dex bonus versus anyone that you're not grappling (so, everyone but the person that grappled you) and your reach becomes zero. However, if you have Improved Grab or Scorpion's Grasp, you can conduct a grapple started with that ability using only one hand. You take a -20 penalty (mitigatable with the (Improved) Multigrab feat pair), but _don't count as grappled yourself_. So you get to keep your reach, letting you grapple as many opponents as you have limbs. For most creatures (including the Kraken), this only works on opponents smaller than you, but for the Kraken that's barely a problem, and the extra limbs mean you can lock down the whole battlefield.

Sneak Attack - So that mention of Dex above wasn't an idle comment. One-limbed grapple someone, and all your attacks against them start benefiting from Sneak Attack.


Being so many HD behind is really going to hurt your essentia and chakra binds if you go that route (ironically, the grappling soulmeld this will likely affect most is Kraken Mantle). You also still lack any way to deal with magic like _dimension jumper_ and _freedom of movement_... though I guess not being as dependent on magic for your grappling means you could just travel in an _antimagic field_.

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## Beni-Kujaku

Thank you for both of your inputs. I really love the scorpion's grasp on the kraken. You can Spider-man your way from enemy to enemy, grappling lots of them from 120 ft and keeping them with you as you roam the battlefield. Really, it almost seems like this was designed for the kraken to use (even though the physics of this are way less than unquestionable). Why would you take Kraken Mantle anyway? A Shape Soulmeld (Girallon Arms) is much more efficient and doesn't take any class level from you (note that the totem chakra is not really interesting, since you'd much rather grab from 120ft away than wait for them to come nearer than 30 ft to use the supplementary arms). Plus you have a high essentia capacity with all your HDs so you can get interesting bonuses.

And I didn't know of Black Blood Cultist, but those are some really nasty damages (10d6+6d8+128=190 damages per grab if you have 18 Str before modifiers), per grab. Still, this is 20th level. If anyone doesn't have permanent Freedom of Movement at this level, that's more their bad than you being broken. But I agree that there shouldn't be such a power bump from just one level (except if that level is the 21st). 

In the end, with three people moving to increase the kraken's number of HD, I think 12 RHD is good. Less versatility than a Storm Giant, but so much more damage if it can pull off its trick. I even wonder if 13 RHD would not be warranted. One of the major things that pulled the kraken back is its lack of mobility, and Scorpion's Grasp remedies that pretty well. More than well in fact. You would still be worried about Freedom of Movement, and Antimagic Field doesn't help that. It is a 10 ft emanation, and you try to grapple from 120ft away. But at this mid-high level, there is little chance that every one of your enemies will have it, so you can grab one of them, pull yourself to the opposing party, and pummel the FoM ones with your 8 other natural weapons. What do you think?

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## PoeticallyPsyco

If you're going hard into incarnum grappling, it only takes one feat (Double Chakra) to get both Girallon Arms (+2 and +2/essentia) and Kraken Mantle (+1/essentia + Constrict) for a nice x1.5 to your bonus and some damage. A straight Totemist grappler would probably grab it at 12 level (after getting Double Chakra (totem) at 9th). If they start with 12HD, the Kraken can't even get Open Lesser Chakra until ECL 15, and can't get Double Chakra until ECL 21 even if they go straight Totemist (at least at this point they'll have naturally unlocked the lesser chakras), and they'd probably want to spend that feat on either Open Epic Chakra or Double Chakra (totem).

And yeah, you don't _really_ need to bind Girallon Arms to the Totem like most Totemists, but it is still 4 extra natural attacks for attacking, holding enemies, and constricting. It's a strong contender for the totem bind even on the Kraken.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> If you're going hard into incarnum grappling, it only takes one feat (Double Chakra) to get both Girallon Arms (+2 and +2/essentia) and Kraken Mantle (+1/essentia + Constrict) for a nice x1.5 to your bonus and some damage. A straight Totemist grappler would probably grab it at 12 level (after getting Double Chakra (totem) at 9th). If they start with 12HD, the Kraken can't even get Open Lesser Chakra until ECL 15, and can't get Double Chakra until ECL 21 even if they go straight Totemist (at least at this point they'll have naturally unlocked the lesser chakras), and they'd probably want to spend that feat on either Open Epic Chakra or Double Chakra (totem).
> 
> And yeah, you don't _really_ need to bind Girallon Arms to the Totem like most Totemists, but it is still 4 extra natural attacks for attacking, holding enemies, and constricting. It's a strong contender for the totem bind even on the Kraken.


I'm pretty sure racial hit dice count for character level requirements, don't they? If not, what about racial progression?

Character Level: The total number of class levels you have in all your classes, plus any racial Hit Dice you have... <snip> Character
levels determine when you gain feats and ability score increases (see Table 3-2: Experience and Level-Dependent Benefits in the Players Handbook). Any feat you get by virtue of your character level is in addition to any bonus feats from your class levels.

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## PoeticallyPsyco

> I'm pretty sure racial hit dice count for character level requirements, don't they? If not, what about racial progression?
> 
> Character Level: The total number of class levels you have in all your classes, plus any racial Hit Dice you have... <snip> Character
> levels determine when you gain feats and ability score increases (see Table 3-2: Experience and Level-Dependent Benefits in the Players Handbook). Any feat you get by virtue of your character level is in addition to any bonus feats from your class levels.


Yes, but Double Chakra has a minimum meldshaper level of 9 (and there's no way to boost that that I know of), and Open Lesser Chakra requires you to be a meldshaper, which the Kraken can't be until its first level (ECL 13 with 12 RHD) unless you spend another feat on Shape Soulmeld.

I don't know if having a slow start with meldshaping is worth being knocked back down to 11 HD, but I thought it was worth pointing out.

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## Morphic tide

> Yes, but Double Chakra has a minimum meldshaper level of 9 (and there's no way to boost that that I know of), and Open Lesser Chakra requires you to be a meldshaper, which the Kraken can't be until its first level (ECL 13 with 12 RHD) unless you spend another feat on Shape Soulmeld.
> 
> I don't know if having a slow start with meldshaping is worth being knocked back down to 11 HD, but I thought it was worth pointing out.


...At a quick check, no, Open Lesser Chakra doesn't have a Meldshaper level requirement, just character level, and it has no tag that could give it an external mechanic (the [Incarnum] tag is for receptacle feats). This is probably due to the existence of rules for Binding Magic Items to Chakras, even if the described list is very limited.

---

Also, a general trend I'm noticing is that there's a massive underselling of the basic number properties, given mention of handing Undead with enormous Strength bonuses full BAB. Doing that actually gives them an enormous attack roll bonus. In general, you shouldn't ever reduce hit dice to match CR, because that's where the monster's intended to be balanced against a lone PC in its niche with its Natural Armor and ability scores. By default. As a PC, you then give it the entire pile of class-independent PC options for numbers that it's balanced to mostly already include, causing a horrible double-dipping phenomenon on parts of durability and offenses, especially when they have Constitution scores.

For example, the Ettin has +12 Strength and +4 Con as a PC, alongside +7 AC and +10 ft. speed, in exchange for -2 Dexterity and -4 Intelligence. The amount of hit dice you give needs to take into account how many levels what _stays_ is worth, and getting at least +3 to attack rolls and +6 to damage rolls is no small thing. Relative to the Ogre, they have +4 Charisma, +2 Natural Armor, and have +4 on two-weapon fighting with one-handed weapons. The latter two most definitely sound like material for some further RHD, as that's a 10% reduction in enemy accuracy and 20% increase in your own.

In a similar vein, the Locath is ultimately significantly stronger than standard races in practice if you're running an aquatic campaign where they meet their basic functionality. Compared to the Aquatic Elf, they have +4 Intelligence, +2 Wisdom, +2 Natural Armor, and +20 ft. speed. Definitely seems worth _something_, even if I agree it's not two Humanoid RHD. Remember, the LAs should include the environmental concerns when they're readily campaign-level like Aquatic restrictions, just as we judge to similar-niche conventional characters.

On to the Mohrg that is the impetus for this more thorough review: +10 Strength, +8 Dex, +9 Natural Armor. That's +5 to attack and damage over however much BAB you lose for being Undead, and a lunatic +13 AC. That's well over half the die, to the point you can axe an entire AC item and _still_ be shrugging off most attack-roll based harm. This thing is CR 8 for a reason: You make this thing a PC, give a 14 in chargen Dex, throw it in a +1 Mithral Chain Shirt, and now you have AC 30. Before the Necklace of Natural Armor (which stacks because it's an Enhancement bonus for some God-forsaken reason), before the Ring of Protection, before any applicable class features, you have enough armor class to demand a +12 to hit to exit crits-only territory. The Stone Giant at CR 8 gets a +17. This thing _needs_ to be no less than ECL 10 or else it's shrugging off anything resembling a bruiser from being so hard to hit.

For the Cauchemar over the Nightmare that Inevitability gave ECL 8: +12 Strength, +6 Con, +4 Int, +3 Natural Armor, and one size larger. This is +5 to attack rolls and +6 to damage, +3 hp/level, and a 10% reduction in chance to be hit. Over what's already a nigh-immortal beatstick _before_ the SLAs. Though ultimately I feel no _more_ than 13 RHD appropriate here for the opposite reason as the Kraken, though a different build, as it gives the room for Totemist 2/Barbarian 1/Totem Rager 4 to get the Least Chakras, and ECL 13 is also late enough for Astral Projection to be ratable as a "One Big Spell" since the shenanigans of at-will access to its intended use is mostly on point with available Contingency abuses. Less damage, mind-numbing boatload of durability, basically monster PCs in a nutshell here, and this one's _supposed_ to be a mount!

The Nightshades share in the Natural Armor problem, as well as the Strength issue, but they _seem_ to be just the norm of "numbers we should be crunching that we don't" and I'm kinda tired at this point. Oozes provide us the rare opposite as they appear to be one of a very select few monsters in the entire game that _really is_ just a bag of HP for defenses.

*checks Archive* So, next up seems to be the Otyugh:

-10 ft. speed, +8 Natural Armor, +2 Con, -6 Int, +2 Wis, -4 Cha, as well as two 1d6 primary Natural Attacks with Improved Grab and applying their damage as Constrict, and a 1d4 damage secondary Natural Attack. Net -6 ability scores, but your bonuses alongside Large size _do_ put you on course for being a quite solid Grappler. At five RHD, you can trade three Barbarian levels and two Black Blood Cultist levels from the comparison point I used for the Kraken appears to end up with the following:

*Costs:* +2 BAB, +2 in-rage Strength and Constitution, +1/day Rage, out-of-Rage Black Blood Cultist attacks, +2 DR/Silver, 1 Essentia (most significant shortfall is likely 10 ft. teleport from Blink Shirt), 1 feat (+2 Grapple for the you-ironically-don't-qualify Abberation Blood(Flexible Limbs)), Dragonborn selection (likely inbuilt 30 ft. Flight), -12 HP from 1st-level, four more d8 HD over the d12s you replaced, +3 Fort save, Uncanny Dodge.

*Gains:* +4 Size bonus to Grapple, two 1d6+Improved Grab natural attacks, slightly worse always-on Bite, +2 Dexterity (Dragonborn have a -2), +8 Natural Armor, +4 Will save

So, net result here seems to be an appropriate sidegrade to that fairly solid optimization, losing out on mobility for an edge in damage and ironically more attempts able to be made, and _a lot_ harder time being hit by conventional beatsticks. Saves are a wash, but Wisdom's harder to spare the resources to boost than your incidental Fortitude, so you're probably seeing an upside in that save shift.

Feel free to disagree (and definitely provide your own "proper" entry if you're doing this the early thread way, I'm not touching the pile of calculations to measure DNLA), but I'm really sensitive about Natural Armor screwing with game math. And if the DM starts shoveling Freedom of Movement at you in improbable masses, you're a Large Totemist with two extra Natural Attacks, _you have alternatives_.

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## Beni-Kujaku

I agree that I may not rate natural armor justly. I believe that beatstick will always be beaten by casters and casters will always be beaten by beatsticks. You don't try to hit the opposing warrior with yours, since if you don't one-shot it, it will have almost no drawbacks. And you rarely cast your SoL on the caster, who has high will saves and can probably heal themselves. And on the other hand, I highly value full BAB, class features and skill points. Most of the monsters we're covering here are martial types. And martials really depend on entering prestige classes as early as possible. With 1 skill point per level for a lot of the creatures covered for the first few levels, that is pretty difficult. 

That said, I agree ettins should be higher. I didn't consider that they could wield two one-handed weapons and only saw the fact that most two-weapon fighting requires feats that you simply can't take, and would be redundant anyway. But if we don't consider higher levels, the damage output of a 4 RHD ettin is almost twice the one from a standard barbarian. You are squishier against spells, and barbarians have good ACF and support, but you have a whopping 10 AC more and reach. I agree that it should warrant 5 RHD and being 2 BAB late. More than that would really hurt the guy.

*Spoiler: Comparison Ettin/Barbarian*
Show

18 Str, 14 Con, 12 Dex, 10 Int
Raging Water orc barbarian : +8 Str, +6 Con, -2 Int, Wis and Cha, -2 AC
Ettin : +12 Str, -2 Dex, +4 Con, -4 Int

WOB : 17+3x11.5=51 PV (43 without rage), BAB+4, +12 to-hit, greataxe : 1d12+9, AC 14 (10+5 armor-2 rage+1 Dex). DPR against 18 AC opponent : 10.5 ; 21 skill points
Ett : 12+3x8.5=37 PV, BAB+3, +12 to-hit, 2 swords : 1d10+10x2, or 3d6+15 (31 vs 26), AC 24 (10-1 size+0 Dex+7nat+8armor), DPR against 18 AC opponent : 21 or 18 ; 7 skill points



For the Mohrg, however, I'm not so sure. The CR argument doesn't work for RHDR, since really most of that CR is because of its absurd number of RHD that also affect the DC of its paralysis. (Also, I really believe it is over-CR'ed, even with 14 HD) A martial undead just doesn't work, most of the time, with the Con hit, the _half-_BAB, and of course the low skill points per level (still not as bad as others, granted, what with Awaken undead being able to go up to 10 Int). And what you said about the Otyugh is more of a counter-argument that otherwise. Monsters _don't_ have alternatives. Most monsters, especially high-HD, low-CR ones, are built around one gimmick at best (oozes, ettins) and no gimmick at all sometimes (the mohrg). They may hit harder (debatable for the mohrg) and be harder to hit with melee weapons, but that doesn't make a PC able to contribute efficiently in a party. Fighters have feat chain that allow them to do shenanigans, barbarians have support all-around and good acf, but the mohrg has 5 RHD for numbers only, and numbers that people will just bypass most of the time. This is an undead, you don't hit it with a sword, you burn it to the ground or turn it. See what I'm saying? You can be pretty good at defense, if you don't have something you can do, in or out-of combat, there's no reason anybody would play you, and opponents will just attack your allies instead of you, or bypass your immunities somehow. That's the difference between a good monster and a good PC. PCs need to do something, monsters just have to be there. Maybe I could see it be 6 RHD/LA-5, but not more.

Cauchemar and Nightshades are a different issue. It's not that I didn't crunch the numbers, it's that there are so many possible builds at this level that you can't crunch the numbers. People have prestige classes, 5 to 8th level spells... And AC starts to become irrelevant, as AC bonuses struggle to keep up with to-hit. I had to go with my gut for everything higher than 12 RHD, and just roughly compare to what's in the original threads.

Locathah has already been mentioned, and I am conscious that the proposed LA is more for a land campaign than an aquatic one, where you will probably choose the locathah. In this case, I completely agree it should be a bit higher, like 1 RHD, +1 LA (you replace the HD by your first level), and DLA-0, but it will be very weak.

For the otyugh, I will do it later, but I really don't think it needs 5 RHD. It's just a grappler with more negative stats than bonuses and really lackluster natural weapons. +8 natural armor is not bad, but not enough to be 2 BAB late.

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## GreatWyrmGold

> Read, if you will, the Monster Manual, and look for the edgiest monster imaginable. "Powerful Undead composed of equal parts darkness and absolute evil"? Yep, that's the one, the Nightshade.


They're in the interesting position of being "undead" who were never alive. Or dead, I assume.




> So, what have we got here. Summon Undead is irrelevant at this level, even more so when the summoned undead takes 1d10 rounds to appear.


PCs can summon the undead ahead of time without much issue; they stick around for an hour, after all. The fact that the weakest nightshade has 17 HD and the strongest summon is CR 11 does put a bit of a damper on them, though.
Of course, they're all incorporeal and do either Strength damage or Constitution drain. If you fight semi-epic enemies with no way of fighting incorporeal enemies, they can be pretty handy; ~8-12 shadows dealing ~3-4 Strength damage each most turns will reduce most big stupid brutes to immobile mounds of meat pretty quickly.
Of course, if the DM regularly throws those at you at this level, A. odds are other players also have solutions and B. the DM is either incompetent or letting you have a success.




> (are there magic items that are said to be indestructible, and would break the game if they weren't?)


Mostly your cursed-MacGuffin types, and most of those would be artifacts.




> *Nightwing*, 17 RHD: And the non-epic one of the bunch, who really should have been called Nightflyer, to fit the theme.


And you wouldn't have an ex-Robin looking at you funny.




> But you have to acknowledge that the nightwalker art is freaking awesome.


I wish we got similar art of the other two.





> That makes all monster manual oozes too underwhelming to be interesting to play (except Gelatinous Cube. Everybody loves and respect the Gelatinous Cube, and if somebody disagrees, he can fight me).


I can't see your point.
Jokes aside, the giant transparent acid-flavored Jello cubes are ridiculous yet iconic. D&D should have some way to let players play/use these iconic monsters.




> Also, *DLA-4*. I see no reason to not allow a BAB higher than its ECL when you have _four_ unusable stats.


Yeah. They've lost so much, let them keep that.




> *Gray Ooze*


Gray oozes look like wet patches of stone, which isn't _as_ good as being a transparent etc cube but it's probably a second place as far as ooze aesthetics are concerned. Not that I recall the others having much in the way or aesthetic descriptions...





> Scorpion's Grasp - at first glance, this is redundant with Improved Grab, but unlike IG it doesn't drag the target into your space. Instead it moves you into theirs, which is a frankly fantastic boost to mobility on the Kraken (also working on a full-attack, no less). Also unlike IG, works on any natural attack, including the Kraken's beak and any natural weapons granted by Totemist.


I am not imagining a kraken which zooms across the battlefield by grabbing one enemy after the other...




> One limbed grappling - When grappled, you lose your Dex bonus versus anyone that you're not grappling (so, everyone but the person that grappled you) and your reach becomes zero. However, if you have Improved Grab or Scorpion's Grasp, you can conduct a grapple started with that ability using only one hand...So you get to keep your reach, letting you grapple as many opponents as you have limbs. For most creatures (including the Kraken), this only works on opponents smaller than you, but for the Kraken that's barely a problem, and the extra limbs mean you can lock down the whole battlefield.


...dragging the entire battle alongside them.

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## Beni-Kujaku

So, since there doesn't seem to be any more arguments, I'm increasing the ettin to *5RHD/DLA-2* and the Locathah to *1 RHD+1LA/DLA-0*, and keeping the rest as is, for now.

Edit: And the kraken at *12 RHD*.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Otyugh*

By the two heads of Demogorgon this is an ugly monster. Look at the tentacle on the back. Yep, that's its head, with eyes and other sensory organs. It's probably very good evolution-wise, but that makes for a pretty disturbing look. I wouldn't want that as a pet even if it didn't try to eat me.

About the stats, there's not much to say, Morphic has already summarized the main points. In short, it tries to be a grappler, and it's bad at it. Large size is not bad, but clearly not enough to make Improved Grab worthwhile. Being able to grab Medium opponents is way better on a monster than it is on a PC. 

The tentacle attacks... exist, I guess. That's still better than a bare-handed attack for a Large character, even if marginally so. The bite attack, on the other hand, while mediocre at best (no, the disease will _never_ be a factor), allows the Otyugh to wield a mouthpick weapon, which becomes very good when iteratives come into play, and offsets a bit the awful anatomy that this creature has. No head, no shoulders, no torso, and questionable arms and fingers. That will hurt a lot at higher levels. Plus, these will probably not mesh well with Black Blood Cultist's natural weapons (the claws will probably be on the tentacles, which is a detriment).

And finally, the stats. These are awful. I know aberration are not known to have stellar stats, but really, these are PHB-LA0-races tier. And not on the good side. Very few large creatures don't have a Str bonus, and on a grappler build, this is horrible. -6 Int means you won't get into more than one prestige class, and even then you'll be pretty useless out of combat. Also, your class skills for your RHD do not mesh well with what you seek (Black blood cultist, if you weren't following). You also have only a 20 ft movement speed. Not that bad, but a Large barbarian going at the same speed as a normal human is not that good either.

Really, the only redeeming quality of the Otyugh is it's natural armor. +8 is very good, especially at low level. And since you won't be wearing armor anytime soon with this anatomy, that's especially necessary. If it didn't have it, I would much rather play an orc or a goliath. Way less malus to mental scores, and at least a Str bonus.

As it is, I don't think it would be playable above 3 RHD. There are just too many things that can't go well, and you're stuck in your role of mediocre grappler by your awful intelligence. I'm not sure between 2 and 3 RHD. I think I'm going to go with *3 RHD* for the Otyugh, even I still think it would be quite weak, even with that natural armor. Do bad intelligence and anatomy offset large size, natural armor and mediocre natural weapons? I think yes. No need to burden it with low BAB on top of that. *DLA-2*

And it doesn't even have Iron Will as a bonus feat! What? Otyugh's have survived the Otyugh's Hole for longer than any prisoner, so I don't see why they shouldn't get it. Next time, we'll have another creature with a less than favorable anatomy and no immediately visible eyes, the purple worm!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Purple Worm*

"You are what you eat", says the idiom. And in the D&D universe, where hunting strong monsters quite directly makes you stronger, that is even more true. Well, the purple worm's favorite food is the shrieker fungus.

The purple worm is like a discount Tarrasque, if you removed everything epic from the Tarrasque, and generally cut 2/3 of its HD and power. It is strong and tough, almost infuriatingly so, with +25 Str (as much as the storm giant!) and +15 Con, but dumb as a brick and less than average everywhere else (-4 Dex, -10 Int, -2 Wis and Cha). It has +15 natural armor, which is pretty standard for a creature of this CR, but is still nice). 
However, in terms of other abilities, it has no other abilities. The poison is lackluster (the worm still misses the days of 2e when it was instant death on a failed save) and you probably won't be able to use it several times per fight anyway, since it is only on your tail. Improved grab is passable, especially with Swallow Whole, but everyone who wants to grapple at this level will already have Scorpion's Grasp. Plus, it is only on your bite attack. And without arms, you want a toothpick weapon there.

The purple worm has all the worst traits of the storm giant and the kraken. It is a primary grappler that has nothing else it can do, and isn't nearly as good at grappling as the kraken, being forced to give up iteratives to grapple. It has the storm giant's strength, but cannot wield weapons without shenanigans, and has way too low an intelligence to go into prestige classes. Plus, it is slow. It can go anywhere, except in the air, but will always be slower than a regular human, despite being three size categories larger. 

What are pure destructive combat prowesses worth? Everything else in your build will have to rely on items, but these size, strength and natural armor bonuses, even if you give up grappling completely, are too humongous to be worth less than *8 RHD*. You can compare it to the stone giant. You hit significantly harder and can take more hits, with bigger size, strength and natural armor, but lose a lot of versatility, with much slower speed, no intelligence, and a way, way worse body shape. Magical beast HD are not bad, and at this level, epic isn't out of question soon-ish. I think *DLA-3* is adapted, maybe DLA-2.

I rated this one considering that it could percieve the enemy. It has eyes, but those are really small and inaccurate, and it relies on tremorsense, which becomes pretty bad once enemies start flying. Next time is the remorhaz, probably the one monster closest to the purple worm in terms of stats, with just one twist...

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Remorhaz*

Really nothing much to say here, a Huge beatstick with decent stats all-around, but an awful body shape with only one Bite attack and no possibility to wield weapons.

It tries to be a good grappler but lacks too many things for it to be effective. Easy 5 RHD, DLA-1.

Next time, we'll have the roc, the biggest animal in the monster manual, See you then.

Nothing to see here, this is obviously a very straightforward and easy to rate monster, right? Right?

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Remorhaz*

More seriously, this monster is a hot mess. So hot, in fact, that "anything touching its body takes 8d6 points of fire damage". Another very 1st edition-like monster with its one unique ability, who has expectedly been toned down slowly but surely with the time passing. 10d10 in 1st and 2nd editions, 8d6 in 3rd and 3.5, 3d6 in 4th and 5e (with the 4th edition having a weird 10ft heat aura instead of the touch activation). Moreover, this heat originates from chemicals produced by the remorhaz when it is aroused. Yep, when it is in heat, it's litterally in heat. Let's analyze it.

-7 Magical Beast RHD. That means low skill points (no real matter, since you already would have a hard time getting more than one skill point per level with your intelligence), 2 good saves, high HP and especially full BAB. You are a martial, very obviously, so this is good.
-Giant tier stats, with +16 Str, +2 Dex, +10 Con, -6 Int, +2 Wis. Total +24 with only a hit in intelligence. Real good stats, especially on a 7 RHD creature. +11 natural armor also is a nice bonus.
-No arms, possibly no legs, and only a bite attack. That is awful. But not as much as you might initially think.
-Improved Grab and Swallow Whole. Very standard. Similar to the Purple Worm, with one size category less. You can still swallow Large creatures, so that is good. The Remorhaz really has next to no special ability.
-Mediocre burrow speed but pretty good perception abilities with low-light vision and tremorsense 60ft. The burrow speed is especially interesting in conjunction with Swallow Whole. You eat somebody, then burrow underground. Even if they can inflict 25 points of damage to break free, either they just can't get out because you're in a tunnel that is exactly your body size, or they can get out but they are still touching you and take 8d6 damage, plus you can just move back to eat them again and they have nowhere to escape.

-Finally, Heat. High fire damage to everything you touch. The Remorhaz is made and unmade by its Heat ability. 

*Spoiler: Reflexion about the Heat ability*
Show

At first glance, this is ridiculously OP. Anyone grappled by the Remorhaz takes damage equivalent to a 5e fireball, without save. You are all but immune to touch spells from your enemies, who won't dare get close enough to deliver them, any opponent relying on natural weapons is royally f**ked when you deal three times as much damage to them with each attack than they do to you, and manufactured weapons have a risk of just shattering on impact, granting you a Vow of Peace-like immunity to any fighter trying to cut you down, or shoot you from a distance (remember that missiles are unatended, and almost always non-magical by themselves, so they don't get Fortitude checks and just shatter when touching you). And even if your opponent makes the save, the weapon still touches your body and takes 8d6 points of damage, probably melting it anyway in 2 or 3 attacks. You are a nigh-unstoppable juggernaut that shrugs off almost anything non-magical people try to throw at you. 
Plus, if you were wondering, you can turn it off at will. Not only the ability specifies "an _enraged_ remorhaz generates heat", but they are known (Combat tactics in the MM) to ambush their prey by burrowing into the snow of the arctic (which wouldn't be possible if they just melted everything eround them) and to be trained by frost giants (in 5e) as mounts, which wouldn't be possible if they just killed their master when they are touched. How can you rule that, I don't know, but since raging and going out of rage for a barbarian is a free action, I would think it is the same for the remorhaz. So you can still get buffed or healed by your allies.
However, the big problem is items. Everything that touches your body includes your weapons, your armor, and your magic items. Unless you can afford a Huge non-humanoid armor of obdurium, you are going to go naked on the battlefield. Arguably, even toothpick weapons are affected, even though heat doesn't seem to apply to your bite attack (?). And magic items are never made in fire-resistant materials, which means you won't be able to use magic items in combat. Ever. Or they will just melt in the first two rounds. For a martial, that is incredibly awful, especially at higher levels. What that means is that the remorhaz is heavily restricted to a Vow of Poverty monk build. Or just, you know, 2 levels in monk, then levels in swordsage or warblade, as you do. The point is just to get Improved Unarmed Strike. With it, you're able to use iteratives without losing your bite attack, of course, because grappling is still interesting even though it's generally sub-optimal, especially with a Swallow Whole and massive fire damage on each grappling check. So you're a monk, yes, and you don't have items, yikes, but you're a damn fine monk. You see, the thing with the monk's Improved Unarmed Strike is that you can strike the opponent with any part of your body. Of your body. That strikes your opponent. So it touches them. Yes. I'm saying that a monk Remorhaz would deal 8d6 points of fire damage with each unarmed strike. And with your tremendous strength and full BAB, you're going to hit most of these attacks. Yes, this is a favourable interpretation of the ability, but it is both the most logical one and the most interesting one in terms of gameplay. But does that balance the absence of magic items, even with Vow of Poverty (take Nymph's Kiss [ew...], Touch of Golden Ice, Nimbus of Light, Stigmata and Vow of Chastity as your bonus feats)? At high level, probably not. You still can't fly, and incredible fire damage doesn't amount to much when everything is immune to fire. But up to mid level (12-13), I really think a Remorhaz would outperform a low-op warblade, even with items. +11 natural armor, at least +7 exalted AC, with weapon destruction and natural weapon recoil make you next to untouchable in nonmagical combat. And if you get Moment of Perfect Mind, Action Before Thought, Evasion and Mettle (Templar 1, you qualify pretty easily if you take Nymph's Kiss), even magical means will have a hard time getting through to you. Yes, that is a lot, but these classes don't hurt your build, and you would probably take them anyway. 


In the end, I think I'm going to disagree with inevitability here, and say that the Remorhaz is worth *LA+1*. Yes, its choices are very limited, but it is really good in what it is forced into. If Heat doesn't apply to natural weapons, it's way worse, but you should still be able to make something of it, especially before level 10, and still decent from lv 10 to lv 12. Maybe *6 RHD* and *DLA-0* in this case. I would like some advice here, on notably what you think Heat should apply to, and what being forced into Poverty is worth.

The Remorhaz is the exact definition on why a strong monster doesn't make a strong PC. As a monster, it is a fearsome encounter, probably capable of dealing heavy damage to a party even above its CR, with its ambush, it's burrow speed and its incredible superiority to mundanes. As a PC, however, everything that makes PC more powerful than monsters (items and a united party) don't work in its favor in combat, making it way worth than it ought to be. I really like the Remorhaz. It has everything that would make playing a monster interesting. A unique ability that encourages strategizing around, heavy RP-requirements and weird specialization. If anybody wants to play a monster at mid-high level, I'd recommend trying the remorhaz. Next time, we'll have a pretty boring entry, for real this time, the strongest animal in all of the land, the roc!

----------


## PoeticallyPsyco

I'll note also that Incarnum is the saving grace of VoP builds, granting flight, phasing, and other abilities to fill in the gaps left by magic items. Not having an arms chakra stings, but it still presumably has a shoulder chakra for Pegasus Cloak, and definitely has a foot chakra for Airstep Sandals.

OTOH, the Remorhaz's main schtick can essentially be replaced by the Heart of Fire soulmeld. The offensive damage being done won't be as great, but the defensive damage will actually be better, it doesn't damage friendlies or items you're wearing, and a pure Totemist can more easily get a load of natural attacks to take advantage of it. On the third hand, you can't get access to the defensive benefits until Totemist 14, fully 7 HD after the Remorhaz, meaning the Remorhaz has a large level bracket in which it outshines even a fully optimized Heart of Fire.

Side Note: Oddly, it's only creatures grappling _you_ that take fire damage at the end of each round from Heart of Fire, so if you're one-limbed grappling your victims won't be subject to it. So I guess that's another point towards the Remorhaz, which can still do its bonus damage after swallowing and while one-limbed grappling, leaving it free to engage more opponents without sacrificing some damage.

EDIT: No opinion yet on the final value of the Remorhaz; just putting relevant points out there.

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## Remuko

did you go and read the discussion that was had for it in the original assignment thread?

also youre not disagreeing with him, if you think its worth +1 instead of -0 as its a vote, as you well know and the majority decided it wasnt worth its HD. I'm come right out and say that I dont agree with any decisions that happen in this thread that contradict the LA Assignment Threads, as I know happened at least once before already. Honestly I feel if you can't agree with the -0s assigned as is, maybe you shouldn't be doing this task; or at the least that you need to set your personal bias aside and accept what the discussions and votes in the Assignment Threads decided on.

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## PoeticallyPsyco

> did you go and read the discussion that was had for it in the original assignment thread?
> 
> also youre not disagreeing with him, if you think its worth +1 instead of -0 as its a vote, as you well know and the majority decided it wasnt worth its HD. I'm come right out and say that I dont agree with any decisions that happen in this thread that contradict the LA Assignment Threads, as I know happened at least once before already. Honestly I feel if you can't agree with the -0s assigned as is, maybe you shouldn't be doing this task; or at the least that you need to set your personal bias aside and accept what the discussions and votes in the Assignment Threads decided on.


In fairness, only 4 people voted on the Remorhaz, and one of them was +0 (and I don't know Inevitability's original vote, because they edit it to match the mode for the monster's final score). So that's only two confirmed votes for -0, and probably three total.

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## Morphic tide

Bit of a correction on items not surviving more than two rounds, you halve the Fire damage before applying Hardness, so to do any damage at all to an Adamantine item you have to roll 40 or more, Mithral is Hardness 15, and direct magic plusses raise Hardness as well. 8d6 has a 23% chance to do any damage at all to +1 Mithral, and only a 0.18% chance to damage +1 Adamantine. A Mithral item without additional Hardness has a ~61.5% chance of taking _any_ amount of damage in two rounds, and taking more than one damage in a single instance is a 13% chance. Armor _should be_ overwhelmingly safe.

So no, you don't _need_ to outright fireproof your gear since Adamantine is honestly close enough, you just need to get to special materials and have somebody take the downtime hit of fixing the remarkably occasional damage, if there isn't a spell that covers heat damage. Granted, there's the chance of the DM noticing this and deciding to make use of you not having any Fire resistance _for some God-forsaken reason_ and punish you with Heat Metal damage.




> did you go and read the discussion that was had for it in the original assignment thread?
> 
> also youre not disagreeing with him, if you think its worth +1 instead of -0 as its a vote, as you well know and the majority decided it wasnt worth its HD. I'm come right out and say that I dont agree with any decisions that happen in this thread that contradict the LA Assignment Threads, as I know happened at least once before already. Honestly I feel if you can't agree with the -0s assigned as is, maybe you shouldn't be doing this task; or at the least that you need to set your personal bias aside and accept what the discussions and votes in the Assignment Threads decided on.


Full BAB and therefor full-time +8 to attack and damage, +5HP/hd on any future levels, Improved Grab+Swallow Whole on a Huge body, sizable reactive damage that as per above is Adamantine-safe, and even against Full Plate you have +3 AC to afford losing to the costs of fireproofing your items. And can completely leave out the Con item and remain ahead.

Against the blunt Barbarian 4/Totemist 2/Totem Rager 10/Totemist +4, you trade three levels of Barbarian and four levels of Totemist, and therefor one Soulmeld, one Chakra Bind, four Essentia, Uncanny Dodge, and a daily use of Rage, for +16 to Grapple checks, +8 to attack rolls and damage, actually being able to Grapple all the way to Colossal, and a free 2d8 Bite. In the end, you seem to quite literally substitute Heart of Fire with being a Remorhaz, and get a _truly astonishing_ pile of bonuses on top of this. LA +1 is understandable, literally the only question for viability is if you can have items on, and Totemist is perfectly capable of answering the core qualitative problems to shrug and say "Vow of Poverty".

You literally have so much strength that you match a +4 Strength race with Girralon Arms empty. By the raw numbers, _this is worth it_. The question is how much extra it costs to get the rest of the numbers to stick, and since you can quite likely ignore your Strength and Con items alongside armor, fireproofing would need to be a _truly ludicrous_ expense since you get to pass up three primary items. And probably an AC item for a while, to boot.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> did you go and read the discussion that was had for it in the original assignment thread?


I did, incidentally, and not only was almost half of it a discussion on if you could deactivate it (on which I provided evidence, or at least argument that you definitely could), the fact that it applies on unarmed attack was hardly mentioned, and it's kind of a super important point. Note also that I mentioned that if it wasn't the case, then I think 6 RHD is fine for the beast. 




> So no, you don't _need_ to outright fireproof your gear since Adamantine is honestly close enough


You are right, and I mentioned obdurium in that regard, even though adamantine could have made the job. But not only is a huge nonhumanoid adamantine full plate 42,000 gp (that's almost the whole WPL of a level 10 character!), it doesn't seem applicable to items other than weapons and armor, and you'd either have to don and remove the armor for each fight, or cast mend several times a day on it, if it isn't +1. Magic items will clearly not be fine, though. The next best thing is mithral, since adamantine is not applicable to "other items", and 23% of being damaged each round means they need mending every 20 minutes or so. Each of your items. I still consider it a liability, and would probably advocate taking VoP instead of an adamantine armor.




> I'll note also that Incarnum is the saving grace of VoP builds, granting flight, phasing, and other abilities to fill in the gaps left by magic items. Not having an arms chakra stings, but it still presumably has a shoulder chakra for Pegasus Cloak, and definitely has a foot chakra for Airstep Sandals.
> 
> OTOH, the Remorhaz's main schtick can essentially be replaced by the Heart of Fire soulmeld. The offensive damage being done won't be as great, but the defensive damage will actually be better, it doesn't damage friendlies or items you're wearing, and a pure Totemist can more easily get a load of natural attacks to take advantage of it.


You'll notice that the Heart of Fire is incidentally supposed to be the soulmeld of a Remorhaz, which is why it's abilities are so reminiscent of the ones from the original creature ^^. That is also another, much more indirect and lore-related, and hence, probably to be disregarded, argument to apply Heat to natural weapons, but that's another story. Heart of Fire is good, but not only is the damage weaker (you can't put 4 points of essentia in it before level 18, or 12 plus 2 of totemist), you can't bind it to the Waist before level 14. And if you want to cheat with Open Greater Chakra, not only is that only level 18, but you can't even bind it to both totem and waist before Totemist 12. Not only is fire immunity much more common at this level than it is at level 6 to 8, staying in an incarnum class for so many level is generally not recommended, and you'd lose as much if not more versatility than going Remorhaz, in my opinion.

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## Morphic tide

> You are right, and I mentioned obdurium in that regard, even though adamantine could have made the job. But not only is a huge nonhumanoid adamantine full plate 42,000 gp (that's almost the whole WPL of a level 10 character!), it doesn't seem applicable to items other than weapons and armor, and you'd either have to don and remove the armor for each fight, or cast mend several times a day on it, if it isn't +1. Magic items will clearly not be fine, though. The next best thing is mithral, since adamantine is not applicable to "other items", and 23% of being damaged each round means they need mending every 20 minutes or so. Each of your items. I still consider it a liability, and would probably advocate taking VoP instead of an adamantine armor..


Actually, Adamantine Full Plate would be 120,000 GP in special materials, being 15,000x8 (a +1 Adamantine Chain Shirt would be 42,800, plus however Masterwork functions with size increases) and you _did_ suggest having it be at-will rather than passive so it's 20 minutes of _active use_ out of Mithral, meaning they're almost certainly safe for several entire days without breaking. Vow of Poverty's definitely the better move if you have an alternative source of Flight, though this is at level 16 at the absolute earliest for Pegasus Cloak via Totemist 9, and level 19 if you want to do it with Totem Rager.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Roc*
I strongly encourage you to go read the original thread on the roc. The concentration of bad bird/rock puns is extreme and admirable.

"I want a big bird." 'What, like an eagle?' "No, bigger." 'Oh, I know, a dire eagle!' "Hmmm... Still not big enough" 'Like, a horrid eagle from Eberron?' "Oh, no, nothing of all this acid and magicky thing, I want just a normal bird, but big enough to lift an elephant as a light charge." '...I think I have something for you'

The roc is just a big bird, with an incredible lack of lore and description, despite being there from 1e and lots of real-life legends and myths being based on it.

-18 Animal RHD. Incredibly bad.
- +24 Str, +4 Dex, +14 Con, -8 Int, +2 Wis, +0 Cha. +9 Natural armor. For a Gargantuan 18 RHD creature, that's really not good. And you're not going to be anything else than a martial. Especially the armor, the Roc is one of the monsters at this level with the lowest AC.
- 80ft average flying, this is nice but is very, very far from balancing 18 RHD.
- 2 average talons and a bite attack. The bite allows for toothpick (or beakpick, in this case), so it's not too bad, but nothing stellar here.

What are pure stats worth? Everything else in this monster is average. I am going to say *10 RHD* as a first guess. Compare to the bulette, rated at ECL 10, you have more strength and fly instead of burrow, and the bulette has two more claw attacks and full BAB. With direct LA, I think the roc is fine around *LA-4*, just short of full BAB, allowing it to have 4 attacks at ECL 17. 

Next time, we will have yet another monster that would much rather be an encounter than a PC, the rust monster!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Rust Monster*

What is it with all these loot-destroying monsters? It's almost like they didn't consider the possibility of players creating a forum, then discussing what could be the LA of creatures that the game designers explicitly described as not fit for a PC!
The rust monster has a very interesting ecology. In fact, the rust monster itself is only the larva. Once it eats enough metal, which it can't do on the Prime Material Plane, so it goes in other Planes, like Acheron, it creates a cocoon made of scrap metal. It will rest there for 3 years, then emerge in the form of the rust dragons of Acheron. It will then live the life of a rust dragon, from wyrmling to great wyrm (or more likely from wyrmling to death). So, the rust monster is the only monster in d&d to both have an exoskeleton and an endoskeleton during its life, and to grow both by moulting, by metamorphosis _and_ by traditional growth. Both interesting and pretty messed up.

- 5 Aberration HD. Not good at all.
-+6 Dex, +2 Con, -8 Int, +2 Wis, -2 Cha. Total +0, with a hefty hit to Int. Hardly justifiable, but still better than no stats adjustment at all, supposedly.
-Only one damaging natural attack. At least it's a bite, but it's secondary and does miserable damage. At early levels, you will have an incredibly hard time contributing in combat. 
-Finally, Rust. The rust monster has a similar ability to the remorhaz, in that, if it is struck by a metal weapon or attacks an opponent with an armor, it may destroy it, except hilariously worse in almost every way, although not as restrictive. Rust doesn't affect your own gear, but it doesn't affect anybody that doesn't use metal gear (so for 90% of encounters, this will do litterally nothing). It is on its own attack (your antennae), so you have to choose between dealing damage and destroying your opponents gear. And its defensive capabilities are null, since it doesn't do anything on grapplers and natural attackers (again, 90% of the monster manual), and even on metal weapons, the ability activates after you take damage, not before, so it will not protect you a lot.
However, this is still interesting in a lot of situations, especially at low levels, that will help you alleviate a bit your lack of skills. You can rust any lock or any trap, and infiltrate anywhere who has metal walls. But this ability will still be a li-ability most of the time.

So, what do you do with that? Frankly, I don't know. The stats are those of a ranged ranger or rogue, but with no real natural weapons and no way to use ranged weapons, that is not possible. This could make a pretty good cleric, except being at least 2 levels behind (I'm not putting anything with a +6 in a stat and +5 natural armor lower than 2 RHD) is much steeper for a caster than a mundane, and it would be too much behind. You could be an interesting swordsage, but the absence of ways to deal damage will still make the first levels really hard, plus you don't really want to get in melee, since either your ability will do nothing, or it will destroy loot.

Also, you eat metal, so it might be a problem if you are travelling and the cities you visit don't have some sort of scrap metal disposal, which would be pretty rare in a medieval setting (how did this species survive again?).

In the end, I think the rust monster is worth *2 RHD*. I could change it to 3 if someone can find me something good to do with it. And aberration RHD are extremely bad, so *LA -2*.

Next time, we'll rate the salamanders! No, not the amphibians, the yuan-ti ripoffs from the Plane of Fire.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Salamanders (Average and Noble)*

Salamanders, because a real amphibian, a folklore lizard, a WH40k Astartes legion and a kind of molten metal with the same name were not quite confusing enough. These snake people have the particularity of worshipping themselves as representative of their god, the litteral element of fire. Surely, they would have what it takes to back up such cockiness, right? Right?


Okay, so. Outsiders can't really be unplayable, save really hampering abilities. By their very nature, they have good hit points, full BAB, good skill points and weapon proficiency, along with all good saves and several miscellaneous advantages. Outsider HD could be compared, all on their own, to fighter class levels. However, the average salamander would be a strong contender in a contest of "how mediocre can you make an outsider with technically only advantages?"

*Average*, 9 RHD: The average salamander has a lot of things going on, but everything is incredibly minor. 
-The stats are miserable. +2 in Dex and Cha, +4 elsewhere, +7 Natural armor. That's all well and good, but when I would have expected these stats on a 4 RHD creature (like the lesser version of the salamander, for example, who has almost exactly the same stats), they are much too low for a 9 RHD one. Medium size is probably a disadvantage compared to the lesser version, all things considered. 
-1d6 fire damage on all natural and metal weapons is interesting, if underpowered. 
-Improved grab and constrict without grapple bonuses on a medium creature is anecdotic. Fire subtype and +4 Craft(blacksmithing) are not worth mentioning. 
-The tail is much better, with pretty good 2d6 damage, and is pretty much the only real lure of the average salamander compared to the firebrother. 
-DR 10/magic. Even at this level, it will probably not come up that often, but that's something.
-Finally, what is probably the most minor ability that is technically a bonus in the whole game: you can take multiattack without prerequisites. You don't get it as a bonus feat, you just are able to choose it despite having only one natural attack (and hence, the use of the feat becomes questionable anyway). The way the ability is phrased can even be understood as "you are forced to choose Multiattack as one of your feats", which becomes a drawback.

The lesser salamander was deemed +0 with 4 RHD and the differences (DR 10/magic, +2 Str, 2d6 and 10ft reach tail, Medium size) don't seem quite enough to justify more than one HD. *5 RHD* and *DLA-1* for the average salamander.

*Noble*, 15 RHD: Compared to the average one, we have:
- Large size, which means you could probably grapple some people at low level. The reach is much appreciated.
- +8 Str, +2 Con, +2 Int, +2 Cha. Probably just size increase+epic array, but that is still nice. +1 natural armor (woohoo!) to balance the size malus. Still a lower AC than the firebrother and its 4 RHD.
- Still the 20ft movement speed from the firebrother, which is really slow for a Large creature.
- DR 15/magic and 1d8 fire damage instead of DR 10/magic and 1d6. You take what you can.
-SLAs. Those are the big ones. If they are incredibly outdated at ECL 15, they can be devastating at lower levels, like wall of fire 3/day (nice) or Summon Huge Fire Elemental 1/day (really good, could auto-win you one fight per day until ECL 8 or 9). The rest is some fire blasting and dispel magic 1/day. Not awful, but nothing stellar.
I hesitate between 7 and 8 RHD. At ECL 7, SM7 is overpowered, but with 8 RHD, it will probably fall behind at higher levels. I will say *8 RHD*, since good grappling abilities really do make the noble salamander quite a threat. What are 7 additional Outsider HD worth in terms of ECL? Probably 4 ECL. *DLA-3* for the noble salamander.

I did not expect these to be so bland... Next time, we'll have the satyr and their fabled flutes!

----------


## Morphic tide

So, over the Flamebrother that's judged a +0 Rogue or TWF Ranger, the Average Salamander has +2 strength, -1 to AC and attack rolls, +4 to Grapple and Trip but , +1 average damage to Heat, and 10 DR/Magic. Overall ability bonuses +4 Str, +2 Dex, +4 Con, +4 Int, +4 Wis, and +2 Cha. Still a sensible Rogue, but less sneaky and more beat-sticky, indicating potential use of War Mind, perhaps spliced with PsyRouge? Definitely worth _at least_ 5 RHD, that is a _lot_ of durability and nothing to sneeze at for damage, and with your skill list there's a non-zero chance you can immediately PRC. *checks* Huh, you can actually enter Assassin out of the box and perfectly on schedule, since 5 RHD gives you 4 ranks cross-class and both Hide and Move Silently are class skills.

I'd say the Noble would be easily _functional_ with as much as 9 RHD. Referring to my usual Grappling benchmark, the bare necessity is Totemist 2, Barbarian 1, Black Blood Cultist 8, and you bring +1d8 Fire damage per natural attack, a bonus natural attack, a Constrict, under-qualified Multiattack _assuring_ your secondaries are at +3 relative to normal, and _being Large to start off with_. With 22 Strength and Large size, you get a racial +10 to Grapple checks permanently against two extra Rages at a furthered +2 Str/Con. You are, in every way, significantly better than a standard Totem Rager Grappler, as what you're losing _at absolute best_ gives +9 to Grapple checks, and more realistically only +5.

But not so dramatically better as for me to feel comfortable forbidding Savage Grappler, particularly since you're actually more comparing to a Psychic Warrior with the Energy damage, in which case your Multiattack's virtual +3 and full BAB for 9rhd is saving _a lot_ from accuracy boosters to address your PP shortage. PsyWar 11+Practiced Manifester at 16+4+6 Wis vs. PsyWar 20 with 14+6 Wis is 35+60 PP vs. 127+50 pp, putting the Slamander Noble 82 PP behind. You lose access to 6th-level Powers, costing Form of Doom, but you still have a +8 Strength advantage, so between +4 from Strength, +1d8 from Heat, and having a tail, you remarkably neatly continue comparison with the full-burn Natural Attack PsyWar, ultimately saving as much as 25pp (6 Expansion augment, 8 Grip of Iron augment, 11 Form of Doom) per fight if looking to just match outputs.

And you have an extra size category and iterative on the weapon PsyWar on top of the Strength at 9rhd, so... You're _definitely_ doing more damage with way less there. Really, against PsyWar we could probably argue 11 RHD with how much PP you can save on just not being damaged, but again I don't feel this has a big enough advantage to forsake Savage Grapple if one wishes to Black Blood Cultist. It's basically _the_ big thing that turns on Grappling as a serious competitor to Charge builds, so even if you're dealing literally double the damage at +7 on the check, losing that would end up with you having _half_ the damage overall, if that, because you don't get all your Natural Attacks on every individual Grapple check to deal damage.

In general, anything less than 10 RHD is probably going to be a question of versatility, and with Martials there's just not enough to begin with to be losing a critical amount, the question is if it's "worth" missing the big PRC boosts. Even with the canned gishes there isn't much to do.

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

> So, over the Flamebrother that's judged a +0 Rogue or TWF Ranger, the Average Salamander has +2 strength, -1 to AC and attack rolls, +4 to Grapple and Trip but , +1 average damage to Heat, and 10 DR/Magic. Overall ability bonuses +4 Str, +2 Dex, +4 Con, +4 Int, +4 Wis, and +2 Cha. Still a sensible Rogue, but less sneaky and more beat-sticky, indicating potential use of War Mind, perhaps spliced with PsyRouge? Definitely worth _at least_ 5 RHD, that is a _lot_ of durability and nothing to sneeze at for damage, and with your skill list there's a non-zero chance you can immediately PRC. *checks* Huh, you can actually enter Assassin out of the box and perfectly on schedule, since 5 RHD gives you 4 ranks cross-class and both Hide and Move Silently are class skills.
> 
> I'd say the Noble would be easily _functional_ with as much as 9 RHD. Referring to my usual Grappling benchmark, the bare necessity is Totemist 2, Barbarian 1, Black Blood Cultist 8, and you bring +1d8 Fire damage per natural attack, a bonus natural attack, a Constrict, under-qualified Multiattack _assuring_ your secondaries are at +3 relative to normal, and _being Large to start off with_. With 22 Strength and Large size, you get a racial +10 to Grapple checks permanently against two extra Rages at a furthered +2 Str/Con. You are, in every way, significantly better than a standard Totem Rager Grappler, as what you're losing _at absolute best_ gives +9 to Grapple checks, and more realistically only +5.
> 
> But not so dramatically better as for me to feel comfortable forbidding Savage Grappler, particularly since you're actually more comparing to a Psychic Warrior with the Energy damage, in which case your Multiattack's virtual +3 and full BAB for 9rhd is saving _a lot_ from accuracy boosters to address your PP shortage. PsyWar 11+Practiced Manifester at 16+4+6 Wis vs. PsyWar 20 with 14+6 Wis is 35+60 PP vs. 127+50 pp, putting the Slamander Noble 82 PP behind. You lose access to 6th-level Powers, costing Form of Doom, but you still have a +8 Strength advantage, so between +4 from Strength, +1d8 from Heat, and having a tail, you remarkably neatly continue comparison with the full-burn Natural Attack PsyWar, ultimately saving as much as 25pp (6 Expansion augment, 8 Grip of Iron augment, 11 Form of Doom) per fight if looking to just match outputs.
> 
> And you have an extra size category and iterative on the weapon PsyWar on top of the Strength at 9rhd, so... You're _definitely_ doing more damage with way less there. Really, against PsyWar we could probably argue 11 RHD with how much PP you can save on just not being damaged, but again I don't feel this has a big enough advantage to forsake Savage Grapple if one wishes to Black Blood Cultist. It's basically _the_ big thing that turns on Grappling as a serious competitor to Charge builds, so even if you're dealing literally double the damage at +7 on the check, losing that would end up with you having _half_ the damage overall, if that, because you don't get all your Natural Attacks on every individual Grapple check to deal damage.
> 
> In general, anything less than 10 RHD is probably going to be a question of versatility, and with Martials there's just not enough to begin with to be losing a critical amount, the question is if it's "worth" missing the big PRC boosts. Even with the canned gishes there isn't much to do.


The average salamander doesn't have 1 damage more on Heat, it's 1d6 for both firebrother and average, only 1 more damage due to strength. In the end, between a firebrother with a fighter level and an average 5 RHD salamander, the average salamander has -1 AC, +1 damage, DR 10/magic (even at this level, there is a pretty high chance an enemy will just bypass this), a bit more skill points and a feat less. That seems pretty balanced to me.

For the noble, I agree that it is better at grappling than almost every non-monstrous PC of its level, but a PsyWar has other powers besides combat ones, a totemist has an extremely large choice of soulmelds, giving it potentially defense, heal, flight, skills.... I can agree with 8 RHD, but I believe the loss of versatility must amount to something, especially at this level, where PCs start to get the most interesting mid-level abilities of their classes.

----------


## GreatWyrmGold

> And without arms, you want a toothpick weapon there.


I guess _any_ weapon is a toothpick to a Huge creature.
("I'm halping!" says Otto Korrect.)





> -No arms, possibly no legs, and only a bite attack.


Possibly no legs? It's a friggin' centipede!




> -Finally, Heat. High fire damage to everything you touch. The Remorhaz is made and unmade by its Heat ability.
> [Reflexion about the Heat ability...]


I think your (relatively) high rating for the rhemorhaz comes down almost entirely to a fairly permissive interpretation of the Heat ability. Without that, or with a build that doesn't let you turn that into ridiculous offensive damage, it's definitely -0.





> The bite allows for toothpick (or beakpick, in this case)


Toothpick again?? It's "mouthpick weapon," isn't it?





> -Finally, what is probably the most minor ability that is technically a bonus in the whole game: you can take multiattack without prerequisites. You don't get it as a bonus feat, you just are able to choose it despite having only one natural attack (and hence, the use of the feat becomes questionable anyway). The way the ability is phrased can even be understood as "you are forced to choose Multiattack as one of your feats", which becomes a drawback.


The Multiattack feat is there to reduce the penalty for a "secondary" tail slap (after primary weapon attaks) to -2 instead of -5, which is reflected in the stat blocks. Whether +3 to one of your 3+ attacks when you full attack is worth a feat is another matter entirely...

----------


## Morphic tide

> The average salamander doesn't have 1 damage more on Heat, it's 1d6 for both firebrother and average, only 1 more damage due to strength. In the end, between a firebrother with a fighter level and an average 5 RHD salamander, the average salamander has -1 AC, +1 damage, DR 10/magic (even at this level, there is a pretty high chance an enemy will just bypass this), a bit more skill points and a feat less. That seems pretty balanced to me.
> 
> For the noble, I agree that it is better at grappling than almost every non-monstrous PC of its level, but a PsyWar has other powers besides combat ones, a totemist has an extremely large choice of soulmelds, giving it potentially defense, heal, flight, skills.... I can agree with 8 RHD, but I believe the loss of versatility must amount to something, especially at this level, where PCs start to get the most interesting mid-level abilities of their classes.


Ah, misread the Salamanders I see. With regard to the Noble, the 11-level "Grappling stub" and Psychic Warrior are getting extremely marginal versatility from the 12th class level. PsyWar gets 1 more Power of up to 4th level, not a new Power level, alongside 8pp, while the Totemist BBC gets at most Totem Rager 1 for +1 Essentia in rage. You'd need to go down to 7rhd for PsyWar to reach 5th level Powers, which are a very limited value proposition, and this gives you closely on-level damage SLAs while simultaneously being a quite capable Martial with Grappling allowances.




> The Multiattack feat is there to reduce the penalty for a "secondary" tail slap (after primary weapon attaks) to -2 instead of -5, which is reflected in the stat blocks. Whether +3 to one of your 3+ attacks when you full attack is worth a feat is another matter entirely...


Totemist or PsyWar, Multiattack will apply to the feature-granted Natural Attacks for +3 to all of _those_. +3 to as many as six attacks (if you Double Chakra Girallon Arms with a Bite and keep the tail) is definitely worth a feat, and perhaps doubly so for Psychic Warrior since they can't qualify without exceptional cheese or odd race choices otherwise so they're usually stuck with the full -5, and getting +3 on both their Claws, their Bite, and the Salamander Tail _while also_ having +1d8 Fire damage on each is... Quite a big swing.

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

> I guess _any_ weapon is a toothpick to a Huge creature.
> ("I'm halping!" says Otto Korrect.)
> 
> Possibly no legs? It's a friggin' centipede!
> 
> I think your (relatively) high rating for the rhemorhaz comes down almost entirely to a fairly permissive interpretation of the Heat ability. Without that, or with a build that doesn't let you turn that into ridiculous offensive damage, it's definitely -0.
> 
> Toothpick again?? It's "mouthpick weapon," isn't it?


No auto-correct just me misreading the name of the weapon property and not knowing how to speak english. 

Yeah I reread the DMG and it definitely has both arms and legs in regard to magic items. My bad. 

Yes it is a permissive reading that I explained and even gave an alternative rating if you don't rule it this way.





> For Totemist or PsyWar, Multiattack will apply to the feature-granted Natural Attacks for +3 to all of _those_. +3 to as many as six attacks (if you Double Chakra Girallon Arms with a Bite and keep the tail) is definitely worth a feat, and perhaps doubly so for Psychic Warrior since they can't qualify without exceptional cheese or odd race choices.


In that case it's not a racial bonus from salamander. You will most likely level up with your natural attacks available and hence would be able to take the feat anyway it would just only apply when you have 3 or more natural attacks (which are the only times it is useful anyway)

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## GreatWyrmGold

> Totemist or PsyWar, Multiattack will apply to the feature-granted Natural Attacks for +3 to all of _those_...


I wasn't trying to make a "Multiattack is useless on salamanders" argument; I was, in fact, trying to make a "This is why the designers thought Multiattack was a good idea" argumentor, from a different angle, "Multiattack _isn't_ useless on salamanders".

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## Morphic tide

> In that case it's not a racial bonus from salamander. You will most likely level up with your natural attacks available and hence would be able to take the feat anyway it would just only apply when you have 3 or more natural attacks (which are the only times it is useful anyway)


That'd be the case for Totemist, but a Psychic Warrior would need to source two from magic/psionic items or Extend Claws of the Beast at ML 13 or higher. You need to have a duration greater than a day to qualify for feats and PRCs off of temporary effects, to my recollection.




> I wasn't trying to make a "Multiattack is useless on salamanders" argument; I was, in fact, trying to make a "This is why the designers thought Multiattack was a good idea" argumentor, from a different angle, "Multiattack _isn't_ useless on salamanders".


I'd thought you critical of the use of the feat due to this part of your post:



> Whether +3 to one of your 3+ attacks when you full attack is worth a feat is another matter entirely...


It made it appear you were unaware of the fact a PC will effectively instantly acquire more of them.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> You need to have a duration greater than a day to qualify for feats and PRCs off of temporary effects, to my recollection.


You do? I never knew that always thought you only had to meet the prereqs once you take the feat and whenever you want to use it. Can I have a source?

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## GreatWyrmGold

> I'd thought you critical of the use of the feat due to this part of your post:
> 
> It made it appear you were unaware of the fact a PC will effectively instantly acquire more of them.


Because all PCs are Totemists?

There are builds that can make better use of Multiattack, but not everyone uses natural-weapon-based builds.

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## Morphic tide

> Because all PCs are Totemists?
> 
> There are builds that can make better use of Multiattack, but not everyone uses natural-weapon-based builds.


Psychic Warrior again, and Bite builds exist. It's an underqualified feat, why wouldn't you build to use an unusual advantage of the monster? It's like taking a monster with Bite/Claw/Claw and then never getting Natural Attack enhancers. You are of course also able to be a Grappler with the Construct, but that specifically references Tail Slap damage. So you want Natural Attack enhancers even absent the Multiattack, whether that's Dread Carapace bound to Shoulders, Expansion, Improved Natural Attack, or whatever else applies.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Satyrs*

These are so much of a bard that their name litterally means "pervert" in several languages! Need I say more?

So, the satyr. Do you see this merry goat man with his flute? Yeah, take it. Break it, fill it with remorhaz "horniness juice", play modern music on it, anything so that he doesn't use it ever again. Yes, we are first covering the pipeless satyr.
+2 to all stats, that's good but nothing stellar. NA+4, DR 5/cold iron, these are really good defensive abilities. Nobody carries cold iron with them, especially not monsters, while everybody carries something magical. One of the weakest kind of natural weapons, but a natural weapon nonetheless, a subpar bonus feat, bonuses to interesting skills and a 40 ft movement speed. Yes, I think that is a pretty good race for LA+2, I have to admit WotC did their job on this one... Ah, it had 5 RHD on top of this? Well, into the negative LA thread you go.

And fey RHD are... meh, at best. You have good skills, almost as much as an outsider, and proficiency with light weapons. But you have half BAB. Since the satyr will probably be a caster anyway, that's not crippling, but it is a pretty big problem nonetheless, and also means your defensive abilities have a good chance of not coming up that often. And no immunity. In the end, I think the satyr still deserves *3 RHD*, just for the heap of bonuses it gets to kind of everything. Maybe even a low 4. Definitely *DLA-1*, though.



Ok, now give the flute back. What do you mean your animal companion ate it? Then buy one back! What do you mean they don't have listed prices!? Aah, forget it, see this other satyr with his pipes? Go kill him, take his instrument, then give it to the first satyr. No "buts"! We're covering satyrs with pipes now.
So, with their pipe, satyrs can use charm person, sleep and fear essentially at will, with even a higher DC than the original spells for charm person and sleep starting at 4 HD, and ever-scaling (both 1st level spells, but the DC is 10+1/2 the satyr's HD+Cha), and a lower one for fear (who cares, this is still a 3rd level spell casted with a CL10, which means anyone who fails the Will save will be out for the entire fight). Now, these are low-level spells, and anything mindless or mind blanked will not care, but that will end fights on its own up to mid-level, and is a pretty good entry for Siren. I believe that is worth *4 RHD* and *DLA-0* for the satyr with pipes.
Also, notice that the pipes effects are only really soft 1/day. Not only if somebody fails their save, you can affect them again, but the immunity only applies to a particular set of pipes, so if by some sort of DM madness you happen to stumble upon another satyr and steal his pan pipe, you can just switch and use your save-or-lose (because that's what they are, without a doubt) again on everyone. Plus, by RAW, it doesn't seem to take up an action, by itself, it's just "when it plays", and some bardic music uses don't use actions, so you could probably just play on several pan pipes sequentially in the same round at the beginning of each fight, and even if the opponents succeed at all of their saves, they are still shaken twice, so terrified for 1 round, plus whatever effect you use from the Siren PrC. But really, we're going into book-throwing cheese there.


_Edit_: The Satyr monster class in Savage Species states that the pipes of a satyr are not in fact magical themselves, and that a satyr can "Attune" to any set of pan pipes that they own for a day, with seemingly no limit in how many sets of pan pipes they can own. With this reading, always use the "with pipes" rating above, and if you allow the satyr to possess any number of pan pipes, effectively deleting the 1/day on their SLAs, they become extremely good Sirens, to the point that I believe they would be more than playable at *LA+0*.


Next time, we'll have a monster who, contrary to the satyr, had no business ever existing outside of 1st edition, and yet here we are, the Sea Cat! Don't expect many water puns, I've already run dry with the locathah.

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## Morphic tide

So, comparing at 4rhd and Rogue 3 to a "blank" face-Rogue 7:

Chassis: -2 BAB, -14 skill points, +2 Ref, +4 Will
Features: 2d6 vs. 4d6 Sneak Attack, Uncanny Dodge one stage lower, -1 Trap Sense, lose one Special Ability.
Attacks: Extra 1d6 Headbutt if willing to eat -5 to other attacks, get iterative at ECL 12 instead of 8, so theoretically +1d6 damage if the accuracy doesn't fail you.
Defenses: +5 Natural Armor, DR 5/Cold Iron (so demons and other Fey with Natural Attacks and the _very_ occasional manufactured weapon user loaded appropriately)

Now for the meaty bit where I dig into 28 point buy: Let's say the standard face-Rogue has Str 10, Dex 14, Con 12, Int 14, Wis 8, and Cha 16, because this is a utility-focused Rogue rather than combat-focused. The Satyr can have Str 10, Dex 14, Con 12, Int 18, Wis 10, and Cha 18, equalizing their skill ranks with Rogue on their RHD by having +4 Int from using their Dex and Con to spend less points on the same score while also having a bonus to Int, then gets +2 skill ranks/level each further level of Rogue, +1 to Wisdom and Charisma skills, and +2 to Intelligence skills.

Seems perfectly functional at 4rhd, as a Rogue, since you get one extra attack to offset the Sneak Attack. As a _Bard_, however... Yeah, not worth being over a spell level behind, you're already losing a terrible chunk of Bardic Music.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> So, comparing at 4rhd and Rogue 3 to a "blank" face-Rogue 7:
> 
> Chassis: -2 BAB, -14 skill points, +2 Ref, +4 Will
> Features: 2d6 vs. 4d6 Sneak Attack, Uncanny Dodge one stage lower, -1 Trap Sense, lose one Special Ability.
> Attacks: Extra 1d6 Headbutt if willing to eat -5 to other attacks, get iterative at ECL 12 instead of 8, so theoretically +1d6 damage if the accuracy doesn't fail you.
> Defenses: +5 Natural Armor, DR 5/Cold Iron (so demons and other Fey with Natural Attacks and the _very_ occasional manufactured weapon user loaded appropriately)
> 
> Now for the meaty bit where I dig into 28 point buy: Let's say the standard face-Rogue has Str 10, Dex 14, Con 12, Int 14, Wis 8, and Cha 16, because this is a utility-focused Rogue rather than combat-focused. The Satyr can have Str 10, Dex 14, Con 12, Int 18, Wis 10, and Cha 18, equalizing their skill ranks with Rogue on their RHD by having +4 Int from using their Dex and Con to spend less points on the same score while also having a bonus to Int, then gets +2 skill ranks/level each further level of Rogue, +1 to Wisdom and Charisma skills, and +2 to Intelligence skills.
> 
> Seems perfectly functional at 4rhd, as a Rogue, since you get one extra attack to offset the Sneak Attack. As a _Bard_, however... Yeah, not worth being over a spell level behind, you're already losing a terrible chunk of Bardic Music.


But wouldn't it be as much, or more functional with 3 rhd? The outshining of the satyr if you add a level of rogue instead of the fourth rogue level is not really overwhelming. You get more defense with natural armor and DR, but less offense (-5 on the horns is a lot, and increases the sneak attack is really important, even more so when the rogue picks up more natural attacks and iteratives later, which slowly offsets the "one more natural attack" thing). And this is kind of the sweet spot for the satyr vs rogue. At lower levels, the sneak attack discrepancy is even more marked, and at higher levels, the rogue has actually good class features earlier. I'm keeping 3 RHD, at least for now.

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## Morphic tide

> But wouldn't it be as much, or more functional with 3 rhd? The outshining of the satyr if you add a level of rogue instead of the fourth rogue level is not really overwhelming. You get more defense with natural armor and DR, but less offense (-5 on the horns is a lot, and increases the sneak attack is really important, even more so when the rogue picks up more natural attacks and iteratives later, which slowly offsets the "one more natural attack" thing). And this is kind of the sweet spot for the satyr vs rogue. At lower levels, the sneak attack discrepancy is even more marked, and at higher levels, the rogue has actually good class features earlier. I'm keeping 3 RHD, at least for now.


The thing of it is that a 4rhd Satyr Rogue 1 can easily be a better skillmonkey of every kind simultaneously due to the +2-to-all-but-Strength allowing more Intelligence spending while meeting the same benchmarks elsewhere, and the equation of damage gradually goes _against_ the Rogue as there's more spare accuracy to afford the -5 and more Sneak Attack dice coming out of the headbutt while also being more durable from the DR 5/Cold Iron. The thing gets _increasingly_ better than Rogue everywhere but situational features like Uncanny Dodge and Trap Sense until you hit Special Abilities, and a lot of _those_ will be operating better for you to boot!

I agree with 3rhd on the basis of Bard because that's much more iconic to the Satyr's themes, even when you don't have The pan-pipes, but made the Rogue comparison because the only non-spellcaster more MAD is a Monk.

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## GreatWyrmGold

> Next time, we'll have a monster who, contrary to the satyr, had no business ever existing outside of 1st edition, and yet here we are, the Sea Cat!


The Sea Cat had business existing in 1st Edition?





> DR 5/Cold Iron (so demons and other Fey with Natural Attacks and the _very_ occasional manufactured weapon user loaded appropriately)


_adjusts glasses_ Um, actually...
With the exception of /magic and /epic DR, basically no DR lets natural weapons overcome similar DR. Demons with DR 10/cold iron and good can't overcome /cold iron DR any more than they can overcome /good DR.
Not sure this changes your analysis, but the more you know.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Sea Cat*

Ladies and gentlemen, the one you were all waiting for... Oh no, it's just the sea cat. Did you know that this was supposed to be the same species as the 1st edition sea lion? Even though, while in previous editions the head was definitely a lion's, with fur and no scales, in 3rd and 5th, the entire body is covered in scales, really pushing forward the "this is a fish, it just looks like a lion" part of the monster. Plus, it is described as having gills, so it is indeed a fish, right? Nope. It can only stay underwater for 10 minutes. That's around the same as a dolphin, a full mammal. So it can't live completely underwater, and it can't really live on earth (it can live one week on earth if it is constantly drinking or wet, but will eventually die, and can't really move on earth, having to drag its own body slowly, so it lives mostly in the water. Then why does it have hair!? Wet hair on earth will just slow it down even more and make it look weak, so land predators will attack it, and in the water it will increase water resistance and make it way less discrete everytime it slows down while hunting. This monster really has nothing for it and I find it really hard to imagine where they wanted to go with it. I feel like I'm looking at an inverse Dracovish kind of monster.


Aaaaaanyway. The sea lion.
- 6 Magical Beast RHD. At least it's not animal HD, but still, 6 is a lot for a creature with no ability.
- +8 Str, +2 Dex, +6 Con, -8 Int, +2 Wis, +0 Cha. Generic bad monster ability scores. Total +10, though. Not that bad for a beatstick. That's good, since you can't do anything else than beat people.
- +8 natural armor. Neat.
- Darkvision, Low-light vision, scent, hold breath. That seems tailor-made for a monster of the abyss, or at least respectable depth, like a shark. Not one who can only go 1 km deep if it doesn't want to suffocate. Anyway, almost non-abilities.
- 2 claws with rend and a bite. That's good. You can hammer a lot of things away with those. The bite is secondary, which is even better is you want to use mouthpick aquatic greatswords. Yeah that starts to be really expensive for just "you can use a weapon almost as well as a human", but there's that.

So, the tarasque in the room: where are you going to use this? It's unusable on earth without high movement speed investment, and it's hard to use in an aquatic campaign since your swim speed is kinda slow and you have to go back to the surface every 100 rounds.

In the end, you are strong, but hard to use. Just a land magical beast with these stats and 40 ft land speed would have gotten 5 RHD. A bit weaker than the Dire Wolverine in stats, but higher natural armor and full BAB. As it is, *4 RHD* seem fine to me. And a pretty strong *LA-1* for good measure.

So, where are your bets? "A wizard did it", and it spread so much that it is now a full blown species, probably an invasive one; or is it some sort of missing link between fish and mammals that still have gills but lost the ability to use them before being able to fully walk on earth? One way or the other, next time, we'll review the shambling mound, the father of all infinite ability loops, way before Pun-Pun, actually available since the ancient days of AD&D 1e, and only disappearing with the coming of 4th edition and the removal of its "grow from lightning" ability.

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## PoeticallyPsyco

I'm going to guess that the hair is camouflage, making the Sea Cat blend into seaweed and kelp while lying floating in ambush.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> I'm going to guess that the hair is camouflage, making the Sea Cat blend into seaweed and kelp while lying floating in ambush.


I thought about it, too, of course, but no. You know the problem with ambush? You have to stay at the same place for a long time, waiting for your prey. And when you have to go back to the surface every 10 minutes... Well, I don't think that would work. Are there sea mammals that ambush their preys? I know dolphins and orcas are very proactive in their hunting, dolphins surround a fish school to gather them at the same place, then charges mouth first, hoping to eat as many as possible, and orcas straight up destabilize the ice on which penguins are, or create mini-tidal waves with other orcas to push penguins into the water to eat them.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Shambling Mounds*

"Shambling Mounds, their lore is good, not their statblock!"
Please put it on a T-shirt.

So. Swamp vine animated by a thunderbolt _a la_ Frankenstein, which made it resistant to fire and growing from electricity, probably with some manner of humanoid soul trapped inside. Also, what is it with all these monsters that are described as loving to eat shrieker fungi? Don't they see that it automatically makes them eligible for the negative-LA thread?

- 8 Plant HD. That means lots of immunities, plus it's own lightning immunity (even if we remove the growing factor) and fire resistance, but not full BAB. This is annoying to kill as a monster, and pretty resilient as a PC. That also means that it is immune to crits even though it has a brain and vital organs. Let's not dwell too much on that.
- +10 Str, +6 Con, -4 Int, -2 Cha. Total +10. At least it's not mindless, but those are not good stats for a 8 RHD monster. Or even a 5 RHD monster.
- +11 Natural Armor. Thou shalt not kill me.
- Large size, 2 slams with improved grab and constrict, and pretty good damage on it. That is interesting. He could make a pretty good grappler.
- A few handy skills, and that's all. Really boring compared to what I was expecting.

I would say *6 RHD*. It has 2 BAB less than the average salamander, no fire on its weapons and sh**ty skill points, but +6 Str, and the frankly excellent plant immunities. I think that kind of averages out. Oh, and *DLA-1*. Once you have the immunities, more plant HD don't do you that much good.

Next time, we'll have a monster that I completely forgot existed, and that probably has to be forgotten by its master to even be playable: the Shield Guardian!

----------


## Vizzerdrix

Hmm... I wonder if you can make something stronger using the druid plant companion from Dragon mag.  :Small Confused:

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## Morphic tide

Large Grappler with extra +5 to attack, damage, and Grapple via Strength, as well as +3 hp/hd from Con. -2 skill points per hd from Intelligence, and -1 to Charisma functions, but neutral Wisdom, so the Psychic Warrior comparison point works well here. To make an _attempt_ at equalizing basic numbers, a Psychic Warrior with an ML no higher than 8 must use the following:

1pp/round/level Expansion to Large, +2 Str/-2 Dex/-1 AC
7pp/10 minutes/level Thicken Skin, +3 AC
5pp/minute/level Force Screen, +5 AC
1pp/minute/level (Concentration) Deflection Field, +4 AC
8pp/minute/level Animal Affinity, +4 Str/Con
3pp/10 minutes/level Specified Energy Adaptation, Energy Resistance 10

...And that seems to be it for applicable 3rd-level or lower PsyWar powers. +6 Str, -2 Dex, +4 Con, +11 AC, Energy Resistance 10, for 25 pp per fight. Before your Natural Weapon granters, before speaking of Constrict. At 8th level, you need at least 14 Wis to _vaguely_ ape static properties of a Shambling Mound _for a single fight_, and have literally two Powers left over to try and compete with the Slams and Constrict. You may be a big dumb beater, but the non-dumb beaters have a _horrifyingly_ difficult time catching up to your numbers. A PsyWar going _total_ burn on matching precisely is still at -4 Str and -2 Con unless they've gone Water Orc, in which case they're at -2 Wisdom _as a Psychic Warrior_.

I'd suggest 6 rhd and DNLA -1, because it very much has the numbers to compete with well-built PCs, and 13 levels is enough to turn on most versatility packages.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Large Grappler with extra +5 to attack, damage, and Grapple via Strength, as well as +3 hp/hd from Con. -2 skill points per hd from Intelligence, and -1 to Charisma functions, but neutral Wisdom, so the Psychic Warrior comparison point works well here. To make an _attempt_ at equalizing basic numbers, a Psychic Warrior with an ML no higher than 8 must use the following:
> 
> 1pp/round/level Expansion to Large, +2 Str/-2 Dex/-1 AC
> 7pp/10 minutes/level Thicken Skin, +3 AC
> 5pp/minute/level Force Screen, +5 AC
> 1pp/minute/level (Concentration) Deflection Field, +4 AC
> 8pp/minute/level Animal Affinity, +4 Str/Con
> 3pp/10 minutes/level Specified Energy Adaptation, Energy Resistance 10
> 
> ...


That's what I was going for too at first. I went down a bit because of the lowish int on a fighter-type, but I agree that it's probably not that important here. Also, in your comparison, you forget that the Psychic Warrior has an armor, while you'll have a hard time finding one for the Mound, and can do something else with their power point than spamming AC bonuses, or dip barbarian and not have to use Animal Affinity... But the mound can do the same, if much later. Granted. Well, as I said, I am also comfortable with 6 RHD/DLA-1 (the 6th RHD has +1 BAB, and +1 in all saves, so that makes it less of a liability compared to a PC level), so I will wait for other people to discuss, and if there is no objection, I will change that.




> Hmm... I wonder if you can make something stronger using the druid plant companion from Dragon mag.


I'm not sure what you mean by that. Can an 8th level druid have a Shambling Mound-equivalent as their plant companion? If that's the question, then assuredly no.

A plant companion of a level 8 druid, having taken Powerful, Ironbark, Alacrity, and Growth Spurt (total: 8th level)
6 HD, Large, 2 slams (1d6)
14 Str, 12 Dex, 14 Con, 2 Int, 10 Wis, 10 Cha, +10 natural armor, 

It has 2 HD (hence 2 BAB) less, -6 Str, +2 Dex, -2 Con, -4 Int, +2 Cha, the same AC and size as the shambling mound, but no immunity to lightning, no improved grab/Constrict, and a way weaker slam. There is no way to give these missing abilities to the plant companion, except by giving it feats, but it won't be the exact same. In the end, I believe it would compare in terms of utility and power to a shambling mound around 12-14th level.

----------


## Metastachydium

> n your comparison, you forget that the Psychic Warrior has an armor, while you'll have a hard time finding one for the Mound


Well, armour for unusual (as in nonhumanoid) creatures is an issue explicitly covered by the rules. Sure, it would cost some and it would make the 'mound would look like a Kugelpanzer (which is not necessarily a drawback, mind you), but I'd argue that it's doable.
Magic items, on the other hand might be a bigger issue.

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Shield Guardian*

"Shield guardians are straightforward in battle, bashing with their heavy stone fists. They are made for defense and are not particularly impressive on offense."

Yep, the Monster Manual says it itself. In a game whose name is offense, the Shield Guardian is an hermite immortal, able to survive a lot of things but not do much in return. However, even these very mediocre capabilities come with a terrible cost: you are created to be a slave, and a slave you shall remain. Every Shield Guardian is created with an amulet that puts it under the control of the wearer. It is a Shield, after all.
If an enemy steals your amulet, then that's game over. Even worse than that, you instantly turn against your allies and try to kill them, or just to protect the new wearer. And if the amulet is destroyed? Well, immediate shut down. If a program is not responding, the only solution is to restart it. And by that, I mean recreate an amulet.

Now, don't get me wrong, there are ways to avoid the amulet being taken by anyone. If the previous wearer dies and the amulet is unattended, the Guardian continues carrying the last instruction out. So we can imagine a dying wearer uttering in his last breath "Aegis... Just be free...", and then awakening you. And then you are free to act. At least if you protect your amulet well. And I mean very well. _"I protected my first one by making it out of riverine, buying a light spiked shield with a shield compartment in it, sticking the Amulet in the compartment on the shield, and using an Eternal Wand of Absorb Weapon to absorb the shield into my flesh while I slept."_ (thank you Zaq for this quote)
However, in this case, you still lose 3 out of your 4 abilities, which means you might want to trust a teammate with the amulet anyway.

So, what does that give you?
- 15 Natural Armor. Ouch. That's a lot. To the point that it's not really relevant anymore. Plus, you're humanoid, and will be able to find an armor easily. You're just not going to be touched by non-touch attacks, period. People trying to kill you will just have to use spells instead. Or just target the wearer of the amulet, if you decide to give it to someone else.
- Construct traits, and fast healing 5. Fast healing 5 is... neat, especially if your party doesn't have a wizard or an artificer that can heal you, but that's not game-changing on a character meant to be a sponge. Construct immunities, however, are excellent, and make you the wall that you are meant to be.
- +12 Str, -10 Wis, no Con, no Int. That's just ridiculous at this point. +2 total ability scores and 2 non-abilities is just laughable on a 15 HD creature. Granted, 12 Str is acceptable, but not having anything else ... The +30 HP from a Large size construct help alleviating the lack of constitution, up until mid-level.
- Find Master, Shield master, Guard master. If you don't hide your amulet, you can give +2 AC, and take half the damage your master takes in their stead. Equivalent to 2nd level spells, but always active and with a high range. That is not bad, but that's just defense, and you much prefer your master not taking damage at all by obliterating your opponents before they can deal them.
- Spell storing. At first glance, this seems like a contingency spell, with the "when a certain situation occurs", but I really think RAI is that you can just cast the spell as if from a scroll. Underwhelming, but not bad. Can only store spells of up to 4th level that people have cast on you.
-30 ft movement, 2 bad slams that you will just replace with a 2 handed weapon anyway.


This monster is a mess. I really don't know what to make of it. Maybe a knight, with its challenges, that will make the monstrous AC have a purpose instead of just being there. But the ability scores are really bad. Just for the defense, I still think it may need *7 RHD*. Less Str, less speed and way less HP than the Hill Giant, but more natural armor and the incredible Construct immunities. Plus so-so abilities kinda offsetting the whole amulet deal. With 15 RHD, I think it makes *DLA-4* to give it full BAB to compensate for the absence of abilities adapted to these levels.

That's another monster that I really don't think will ever see play. The contradictions and RP restrictions are just too much in my opinion. Next time, we'll look at the Sphinxes, prepare yourself for philosophical questions!

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Animal-headed Sphinxes*

What's this kind of monster who always come by four? 
These two come with a face, know of magic and lore.
They keep gifts from the gods, with might and elegance.
The other two, weaker, lack much intelligence
All their beastly nature can be seen on their head
And they belong in the negative-LA thread.

All of them have understood, of course that today, we are going to talk about sphinxes. Not the higher gyno- and androsphinxes, but more the much more animalistic Criosphinxes and Hieracosphinxes. As dim-witted sphinxes, they really are just what you would expect: a flying lion with still more mental stats and a different attack on their head.

*Criosphinx*, 10 RHD: This monster has the head of a ram on his winged lion body. However, considering that more than half of their description in most editions are about how he mates, it might have been the original head of a satyr before they replaced it with a human one.
-10 Magical Beast HD. It is important for a beatstick to have full BAB. If you're not going to do anything else, at least you will cut people down effectively.
- 60ft poor flying. Always nice, but as always with poor flying, you will have a hard time using it in combat, except to get out of reach. 
- +12 Str, +6 Con, +11 Natural Armor, +0 everywhere else. That's... decent. Not that good outside of a purely martial build, but he likes purely martial build, and no malus in intelligence makes it even more desirable.
- 2 claws, one gore. Standard attack routine. Weaker than claw/claw/bite due to the absence of gore support, but not that bad.
- Pounce. Pounce? Pounce! The holy Grail of martials. Well, he's not lawful, so he could have just dipped barbarian, but   now he can get Improved Grab instead, for an interesting flying grappling build that will make many casters cry. 
Plus, you get Rake for another attack when grappling.
In the end, I'm pretty surprised to find it not that bad, and I think it deserves *8 RHD*. Maybe on the weak side of 8 if he doesn't find Gloves of Man. And *DLA-1*. Magical Beast HD would make for a bad but half-way playable character at -0, the absence of other abilities really is a problem.

*Hieracosphinx*, 9 RHD: I don't really understand what purpose this monster serves when you already have the criosphinx. They really don't vary much compared to each other.
-9 Magical Beast HD. Beatsticks like full BAB.
- 90ft poor flying. That's poor alright, but that's fast. With Flyby attack and pounce, you could stay at 90 ft from your opponent, leap towards them, make a full attack, then land 90 ft behind to avoid a counter-attack.
- +10 Str, +4 Dex, +4 Con, -4 Int, +4 Sag. That's less focused that the Criosphinx, hence worse, and the hit to intelligence isn't nice. +8 Natural Armor. 3 less than the criosphinx.
- claw claw bite. Bite allows for Mouthpick, but otherwise, the same as criosphinx.
- Pounce, rake, yaddi yadda potential grappler.

In the end, the Hieracosphinx has a worse stat repartition, than the criosphinx, worse natural armor and bite damage. But it has better flying. I still think he should be one RHD lower. *7 RHD*, *DLA-1*


The next monster is hard to look at
In fact, some could think it's a bat
Four arms, four wings, but not so four-midable foes
They will suck your blood as if from a hose.
Who are they?

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Stirge*

Stirges have problems. And I don't mean only their inconsistent number of wings, or the fact that they are somtimes described as bugs, sometimes as mammals, and sometimes even as birds, with feathers either only on the body, on the wings, or both. These are just standard "wizard did it" problems. Their problem is, mechanically, they are hyper-specialized on a trick that doesn't work.

-1 Magical Beast RHD. That is pretty good. Not the type itself, since it only gives you darkvision in the end, but the fact that you get to replace the RHD with your first class level, and hence start at ECL 1.
-Tiny size, 40ft average flying. Casters love them. They would love it more with good maneuverability, but by the time you really need your move action in your turn, you will be able to improve maneuverability. Effectively +2 to hit and AC is also pretty good.
- -8 Str, +8 Dex, +0 Con, -10 Int, +2 Wis, -4 Cha. Total: -12. There it is. Two unuseable stats, including Int, and hyper specialization in Dex (with a nice Weapon Finesse bonus feat to top it off). These make and unmake the stirge.
- Touch attack, Blood Drain, Attach. The only abilities of the stirge, and the reason why I say it doesn't work as a monster. It's grappling that doesn't restrain the opponent since you're tiny, and that just doesn't work since you have no Str, despite the hefty racial bonus (long past are the times where stirges just couldn't be removed while alive). And you can only use it twice before just flying away and digesting for a week. Yep. As is, the stirge is pretty bad.
-And they tried what they could to make it unuseable by PCs as well. Notably, you can't speak, and you don't have hands. And you don't have mouth. So you can't cast spells without a feat tax, and you can't wield a weapon whatever you try (except with gloves of man, but you're not spending 42k for a tiny weapon damage anytime soon).


So it has problems, and if you play one, you will feel it every day of the campaign. But the difficulties to play it only apply to base classes from the PHB. If you play an ardent, you don't have to wield weapons, you don't have to use your horrible blood drain in combat, and you don't have to use Str. If you play an unarmed swordsage with a monk level, you can attack with any part of your body and not worry about your size malus on damage. And in both cases, you can still fly and get your size bonuses. You'll still have miserable intelligence and not have a useable move action for a while, which will harm your ability to psionic focus cripplingly, and your ability to prestige class later, but that would be quite useable.

Playing a stirge has its perks, notably this incredible Dex, but let's not fool anyone here, it's still pretty bad. However, there's really no way to improve it. It has only 1 RHD, which gets replaced, so you can't use RHDR, and all its issues clearly do not amount to a full level ahead in manifesting compared to a base class, especially when it has a bonus on its manifesting stat. So in the end, *1 RHD*, and *DLA-0*. No change compared to the original thread.

Next time, we will look at swarms! Inching ever closer to the Tarasque...

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Swarms (Rats and insects)*

I could have also chosen "all non-carnivorous ones", or "all those where your lips don't touch each other when pronouncing it, plus hellwasps", but that would have been too long.

Swarms are a weird bunch, in that they will invariably be unplayable at high level and unkillable at low level. Their natural properties are just that overwhelming. No targeted spells means no buffing 99% of the time (even Personal effects do affect a specific number of creatures (only the caster)), and considering how necessary that is for everybody, and especially for casters to protect themselves from harm, this is a big problem. I really don't know how they would interact with items. Would they just have one member wear them and the items give benefits to the whole swarm? Or not be able to use items at all? Also, they can't make iteratives or sneak attacks, and they have to enter the opponent's space to attack them. And you are vulnerable to all AoE effects. And finally, you won't ever get rid of these with polymorph, since there is no AoE polymorph effect that I know of. 

On the other hand, you are totally impervious to weapon damage and all targeted effects. In most cases, this is more defense than incorporeality and undead immunities combined, without the turning weakness. Like, how do you even fight one of those at low levels? You'll notice that DLA makes ECL really close to the number of RHD. This is because whatever your kind of RHD, they will really not help you much when you have abysmal Int and no attack needing an attack roll.

 So, I'm going to assume a low-level game, since whatever the number of RHD or DLA I choose, they will still be underpowered above ECL 10. So, how do you play a monster that can't use regular attacks, can't make somatic components, and most probably has -8 Int? As with a lot of these "exotic" monsters, the answer is probably wisdom-based manifester, or invocation user. 


*Centipedes*, 9 RHD: Nine!? It has worse stats than the bats and really nothing to make up for it! And it doesn't fly! *2 RHD*, *DLA-5*, and you'll have to explain to me what is +4 natural armor worth when you are immune to weapon damages and to all targeted effects.

*Hellwasps*, 12 RHD: Yay! Full BAB! If only you could make attack rolls beyond your eldritch blast. The only swarm that can be affected by single-target mind-affecting, and you are effectively disabled by becoming mindless when you have low health, but it makes up for it with fire resistance, not really useful damage reduction, pretty good stats, and especially Inhabit, which all but suppresses the swarm's weakness to AoE and breaks the action economy all in one. In the end, Inhabit will still be lacking in the minionmancy department, though. I'd say a strong 4 or a weak 5. Let's go with *5 RHD*, and *DLA-5*.

*Locust*, 6 RHD: Worse stats than the bats, poor flying instead of good, and not even some poison on the swarm attack. *2 RHD*, *DLA-3*.

*Rats*, 4 RHD: No real ability, no flying, and you are not even completely immune to weapon damage, since you are Tiny. Where do I sign? *2 RHD*, only because I don't want to allow immunity to targeted effects at ECL 1. *DLA-2*. One bonus feat and a few hit points compared to the RHDR version will not make it broken.


And here are the swarms! Thank you inevitability for putting some guideline with some of them being LA+0.
Sorry for being late, I had things going on IRL, and I couldn't post for a bit. Next time, we will have the king of the negative-LA thread; the representative of RHD bloat; the world-shattering, unplayable behemoth: the Tarasque!

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## PoeticallyPsyco

I mentioned this over in the Swarm Shifter discussion in the LA thread, but swarms can make solid Scouts. A Swarm Attack is still an attack, and since it doesn't require an action, activating Skirmish is trivial for a swarm. Plus it never misses and can hit multiple enemies. And Scouts have Evasion and a good Ref save, shoring up a swarm's only real defensive weakness. Go Swift Hunter to bypass immunity and throw in Wild Shape Ranger and you've got yourself a build.

Not as good offensively as a traditionally optimized Swift Hunter build, which will be making full attacks with Skirmish, but way stronger defensively, and never misses.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> I mentioned this over in the Swarm Shifter discussion in the LA thread, but swarms can make solid Scouts. A Swarm Attack is still an attack, and since it doesn't require an action, activating Skirmish is trivial for a swarm. Plus it never misses and can hit multiple enemies. And Scouts have Evasion and a good Ref save, shoring up a swarm's only real defensive weakness. Go Swift Hunter to bypass immunity and throw in Wild Shape Ranger and you've got yourself a build.
> 
> Not as good offensively as a traditionally optimized Swift Hunter build, which will be making full attacks with Skirmish, but way stronger defensively, and never misses.


That's an interesting take on it. However, the power (if you can say that for one of the damage-wise weakest base class) of the scout, and generally any precision-based character is the ability to make several attacks and apply the damage bonus on all of them. When the swarm is always limited to one attack... Well, that's not ideal. However, that can be a pretty good addition in other builds, like a touch-attack-centered character. For the price of one level and a feat (Craven), you can deal number of HD hit points basically for free every turn. I'm not sure there are many invocations or psionic power that would benefit from the swarm being close to melee, though.

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## Beni-Kujaku

The Tarrasque



The bane of all adventurers, stronger, bigger and tougher than a half-minotaur Fire Giant, absolutely unkillable in normal circumstances (which monsters have Wish as an SLA anyway, except Genies?), with more immunities than the typical wizard has HP and more damage per round than a low-epic barbarian if it can full attack. The Tarasque is the creature in the monster manual with the highest number of RHD, and will remain it until a year later and the publication of the Epic Level Handbook. You really can't describe the Tarrasque with anything else than superlatives. The biggest, but also the baddest and the why-doesn't-it-have-mind-affecting-immunity-est. In fact, it's even worse than that. "The Tarrasque" *is* a superlative. I have read several times the "with this build, you could even wrestle the Tarrasque", or "even the Tarrasque can't resist this spell". 

The Tarrasque is extremely strong, but has too many glaring weaknesses, which have led to people trying to "fix" it, and reconcile its stats with its reputation as the most unforgiving, party- and world-destroying monster of all. Pathfinder gave it more immunities and a ranged attack to make it a real challenge. This pretty high number of threads tried to improve it by giving it items, feats or changing it's statblock. Tippy proposed to just have an epic psion True Mind Switch with it. And what did WotC do? Well, 4e and 5e fully embraced the "outclassed" side of it and just shoved the Tarrasque under the carpet, removing most of it's unkillableness and reducing it to just another strong warrior-type monster.

*Spoiler: Because Inevitability didn't do it*
Show


*Long post about epic levels, CR/HD imbalance and the viability of warrior-types beyond level 5
*

_(This is not a particularly interesting rant, with just generalities, it was just because of the original thread)_

The Tarrasque is the representation of the problem of Level Adjustment as a whole, and the idea of playing as a monster. The monsters of D&D are just not meant to be the same as players, especially not in a 3.5 game where the "attack" and "defense" of players are not balanced with one another. The "attack" of players must be balanced with the "defense" of monsters, and vice-versa. And in a game where the damage output greatly outpaces the number of levels, at an exponential rate no less, a high CR monster must inevitably have a much higher number of HD. If it didn't, then anything that increases damage, or people who optimize their DC a little bit could just blow monsters with average HP or saves away in one spell or one hit. This is pretty much always the case, and the only real way to have similar CR and HD is to give monsters PC-only kinds of abilities, such as spellcasting monsters, or those with enough abilities to be a challenge without having to directly engage with the PCs. But that means that, in turn, PCs will just be on a race to defeat this boss with greatly increased offensive capabilities instead of defensive ones. It is an interesting take, but most of the time, WotC prefers that their final boss last more than 2 rounds, especially if, like in the case of the Tarrasque, they're known for their durability. 
And that leads into the second problem: warrior-type monsters. These monsters, or characters who are really only about hitting something hard and taking hits. The problem is that 3.5 is a really vast game, and there are a lot of ways to bypass just toughness alone. Which means that if you're not immune to all saves-or-lose (which is kind of impossible), or have a way to restrain the people who can actually cast these (which, by definition, warrior-types haven't) you're going to be taken out very quickly as soon as these "you-lose" effect appear, mostly at level 5 to 7, but down to level 1 for some of them. And this is even more the case in high level, very-high level, and epic level. Epic-level characters can literally do anything. 9th level spells are utterly broken, prestige classes can turn anybody into someone capable of dealing NI amounts of damage or incapacitating almost anything instantly, and we don't even talk about epic spellcasting. An epic level adventure is not about "just higher numbers", it's about something novel and interesting, puzzle encounters more than fighting ones. This is what WotC didn't understand, or at least didn't in the MM1. Monsters in the ELH are more than what the Tarrasque is, and encounters in Elder Evils are even better defined, but none of them deal with levels as high as 48. A monster that can only do one thing will just not be able to hold its candle at these ECL.



So, let's summarize the beast (no detailed commentary, just assume that everything except its intelligence is absolutely godlike, but just not godlike enough for 48 Magical Beast RHD):

- +34 Str, +6 Dex, +24 Con, -8 Int, +4 Wis, +4 Cha
- +30 Natural Armor, Colossal size (pretty low total AC of 35, for a CR 20 monster)
- 6 Natural weapons including Bite (18-20/x3) and Tail (Prehensile Tail, anybody?)
- Improved Grab, Swallow Whole, with incredible grapple checks
- 20ft speed, but can increase to 150ft for one round when it matters
- Frightful Presence, not good with RHDR, but can be incredible with DNLA.
- Immunities to: ability damage, death effects (still deals a lot of damage and you can have to regenerate little by little), sickness, poison, all line and cone effects (30% chance to send back to the caster, I don't know if that applies to an eldritch blast) and energy drain.
- Even if your spells should affect it, RM 32 (or RHD-16, which is awful), damage reduction 15/epic
- Finally, Regeneration 40 with no bypass. That's the big point.
- *not* immune to : Polymorph and petrification effects, mind-affecting effects, ability drain, daze, stun, paralysis, nonlethal damage.


*Spoiler: RHD Reduction. Final verdict: 20 RHD*
Show


So, the big question here: does this deserve to be epic? With only these stats, and no immunities, I would say it should be around 14 RHD-15 RHD, huge Str, natural armor and all that. But then there are the immunities and regeneration. On a regular character, one of the first thing you should ask yourself when going in really high levels is "How can I be immune to what my character is the most vulnerable to?". In the case of the Tarrasque, it's a bit different: "how can I be immune to everything I am not already immune to?" And that is quite possible, due to one simple thing: you are immune to lethal damage. That is huge, heck, colossal. Please take a look at the Favor of Ilmater spell, for example, then compare it to the list of non-immunities of the Tarrasque. With just one persisted spell, there really is nothing that people can do to you, except mind-affecting effects, and even that can be overcome (Deformity(Madness) if you accept to be Evil, or Warblade 1/Martial Study->Moment of Perfect Mind). There are also other ways to be kind of immune to nonlethal damage, like a Contingent regeneration when you get to more than 868 points of damage. I know we're reaching levels where wanting a balanced scaling is kind of a lost cause, but when a character has almost complete immunity to everything in the game short of a Disjunction (and even then, good luck to be able to cast disjunction on something with a 20ft reach), I just can't see it be really underpowered pre-epic. If I let the Tarasque have even one level, then it can choose Warblade to be able to use MoPM each round instead of once per encounter, or Hulking Hurler to just throw houses up to 125 ft and deal 450d6 (and that is with no investment in Str, items, or anything. The Tarrasque is just an out-of-the-box optimized War Hulk), or simply Barbarian to be able to Charge for 300ft then full attack on anything there. If you rule that it can wield weapons, it's even worse, since it can Full attack on top of it's 5 natural attacks without even having to take Mouthpick or Prehensile Tail. All that with being immune to basically everything. (Also you can literally carry the party on your back when charging, so everyone can be moved 150ft with a move action) 
This will not be wizard-tier, of course, but none of the monsters covered here will ever be. But this will be a good functional martial character, if you get a few items. I think a good rating is *20 RHD* for the Tarrasque. As it is, it is extremely strong and difficult to kill with the right feats and items, but it won't be overwhelming in a non-epic game. And then you can take Hulking Hurler 1 as your first epic level with Distant Shot as your first epic feat, and immediately you reach kind of epic levels of power, being able to deal "you lose" amounts of bludgeoning damage to anything whatever the distance if it is not immune (and really, being immune to bludgeoning damage is kind of harder to get than functional immunity to energy damage, or to spells). You will pretty quickly get access to a lot of really strong effects in a few levels, and really, that's what I imagine low-epic should look like for a martial character.



*Spoiler: Direct Negative LA - Final Verdict : DLA-23*
Show


DNLA: Now, we're definitely epic. Which means, while we're at it, and since there's no limit on HD anymore, you can even put some templates on the Tarrasque, why not, what would you lose? 2 epic feats and a few bonuses? Once you get Distant Shot and maybe Uncanny Accuracy or Epic Speed, there are not really a lot of Epic feats that benefit you. So you can make something like a Spellwarped Gravetouched Ghoul Tarrasque (the idea of an undead Tarrasque is absolutely ridiculous, but I love it.). That means the immunity to both mind-affecting and nonlethal damage becomes etched into your character, so even Disjunction will not really make anything. You become vulnerable to turning, but since this is DNLA, you'll probably not have to worry too much about that, since you have many HD more than a lot of threats you'll encounter. Another advantage of having 48 RHD is that your frightful presence is actually useful. A fear effect that only affects people once every 24h is not really good at epic-levels, but there's that. More interesting is the spell resistance, which becomes much more interesting with your full RHD, even though still probably irrelevant in most cases (any spellcaster at this level will have pumped its caster level high enough that SR 32 will be beaten with a natural 1).
So, what are 28 RHD worth of saves, attack bonus HP, and 9 epic feats, plus Frightful Presence, the ability to go undead with no real problem and SR worth? Well, quite a lot, but not that much, really. As I said, 9 epic feats will probably go to waste pretty quickly, and +28 to hit is still enormous, but you should be able to hit next-to-anything anyway with your native +37 (before any bonuses). I believe an ECL 25 to be... I won't say balanced, since there is no balance at this level, but fun to play. *DLA -23* for the Big T. 



And you, yeah, you reading this! What do *you* think? How would the Tarrasque fare in this kind of environment?




Another one monster where I went a bit overboard. When I was searching for Tarrasque informations, I found Tarrasques from all editions, with or without hands, bipedal or quadrupedal, undead or flying Tarrasques, Warhammer 40k Chaos-corrupted Tarrasques, Tarrasques on cards of any kind, from Magic to Pokémon, mythologically accurate Tarrasques, Rule 34'd genderbent Tarrasques (several of those), chibi Tarrasques, Robot Tarrasques, realistic Tarrasques, Tarrasque plushies and homebrew humanoid Tarrasque races for days.

There should be some sort of Internet rule that "if it exists, then there is a Tarrasque-related version of it". No other D&D-specific monster has recieved the same treatment, even mimics and beholders. This monster has become so iconic that it has become a representation of the worst D&D monster, whatever the setting. Its actual stats don't really matter in most cases. If your DM wants to describe "an invincible monster", then it's the Tarrasque they'll choose, and whatever you'll try to beat it will fail. Because the Tarrasque's best defense isn't its immortality. It's not its shell, or its claws, or its damage reduction. It's plot armor. It isn't as much a monster as a McGuffin, a plot point to kickstart a campaign. And with all that said, I feel it is pretty sad to see such a monster be all but forgotten and nerfed into oblivion in 5e, who removed it's most important feature, its immortality, to just make it another big monster. This is a trend that we see with a lot of monsters or spells with iconic abilities that would just not translate well in newer, more well-defined editions. The Shambling Mound doesn't grow anymore from lightning, Conjure Elemental doesn't summon a Huge elemental from a 5th level slot, but with no way to control it, the ghost doesn't age you 10 years per touch attack. This is for the good of balance, but this is a world-building diversity and richness that we may never get back. 

Anyway, thank you for reading (don't worry, I promise next posts will be shorter, I just had to make honor to big T), and see you next time for the Tendriculos!

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## Remuko

> The Tarrasque
> 
> 
> So, let's summarize the beast (no detailed commentary, just assume that everything except its intelligence is absolutely godlike, but just not godlike enough for 48 Magical Beast RHD):
> 
> - +34 Str, +6 Dex, +24 Con, -8 Int, *+4 Sag*, +4 Cha


is Sag the french abbreviation for Wisdom?

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## Beni-Kujaku

> is Sag the french abbreviation for Wisdom?


Oh crap, you're right. It's "sagesse" in french. I change that right away.

----------


## GreatWyrmGold

> Then why does it have hair!?


Presumably the same reason seals, polar bears, otters, and (real) sea lions have hair: Protection from the elements. Marine mammal fur is actually good at keeping cold water away from the skin, trapping a layer of air between the body and the ocean for insulation.
Granted, the _distribution_ of fur is rather inexplicable.





> Are there sea mammals that ambush their preys?


Technically, yes. Polar bears are often considered marine mammals, and they are well-known for ambushing seals. They don't hide out _underwater_ to ambush them, but it's technically a marine mammal ambushing prey.





> However, considering that more than half of their description in most editions are about how he mates, it might have been the original head of a satyr before they replaced it with a human one.


What's with that, anyways? Is establishing them as sphinx-rapists really _that_ important?!?




> I don't really understand what purpose [the hieracosphinx] serves when you already have the criosphinx. They really don't vary much compared to each other.


The hieracosphinx is the incel to the criosphinx's PUA. So yeah, they're pretty redundant.





> There should be some sort of Internet rule that "if it exists, then there is a Tarrasque-related version of it". No other D&D-specific monster has recieved the same treatment, even mimics and beholders. This monster has become so iconic that it has become a representation of the worst D&D monster, whatever the setting.


Quoted for truth.




> This is for the good of balance, but this is a world-building diversity and richness that we may never get back.


Ditto. This is how I feel about a lot of 5e's changesthey obviously play better at the table, but the _absence_ of that broken garbage leeches out a certain _je ne se quois_ from the game/setting as a whole. Making creatures/classes with such vibrant and varied abilities without breaking the game one way or another is tricky, but I wish WotC would push the envelope more.
(I wonder if some kind of "set rotation" system like MtG has would open up that kind of design space? If the designers only had to worry about combos with core material and stuff released from the last X books, would they be more free to allow characters to pick up some wacky abilities? Seems like something worth a bit of thought, even if that thought will probably conclude that it's a dumb idea.)

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

Update: You don't have to stack templates to change its type twice to make an undead Tarrasque! There is a way easier way! I just found the spell "Undeath after Death" (Initiate of Bane 7), which works on any creature and lets it keep all its special attacks and qualities, while changing it into undead when they die. That's even possible pre-epic, you just need 2 scrolls (UaD and Miracle to kill yourself, 31,100 gp, pocket money at level 20), and an evil cleric to cast both (and let's be honest, you're the Tarrasque, if you _don't_ have evil clerics following you, you did something wrong), and poof, immunity to everything and +2 turn resistance.




> Technically, yes. Polar bears are often considered marine mammals, and they are well-known for ambushing seals. They don't hide out _underwater_ to ambush them, but it's technically a marine mammal ambushing prey.


Technically correct is the best kind of correct.




> What's with that, anyways? Is establishing them as sphinx-rapists really _that_ important?!?


Of course! Almost as important as establishing that the Remorhaz leaks its fiery fluid when it is aroused! That's primordial!! It seems WotC has some sort of fixation on explaining how every iconic monster mates. Do you know about the Youtube series "What they don't tell you about...", from MrRhexx? It has become kind of a joke in his community that whenever a video is long enough, it will always come back to the reproduction of the monster.




> leeches out a certain _je ne se quois_ from the game/setting as a whole.


I don't know, I find the fact that the french expression "un certain je-ne-sais-quoi" gets just used in english with no translation whatsoever hilarious, and even more that "certain" is not italicized, when it's almost just as much part of the idiom as the rest.




> (I wonder if some kind of "set rotation" system like MtG has would open up that kind of design space? If the designers only had to worry about combos with core material and stuff released from the last X books, would they be more free to allow characters to pick up some wacky abilities? Seems like something worth a bit of thought, even if that thought will probably conclude that it's a dumb idea.)


This kind of reasoning works well in a competitive game, like MtG, where there are tournaments and prize money, but putting some arbitrary restrictions on which books are allowed and which aren't would not be easily accepted by the players (or they would just ignore it for their game). Plus, lots of problematic things are in Core, and they are there because the devs are never sure what might break the game at first. 

For more competitive play, like RPGA for 3.5 and Adventurer's League for 5e, they tried to just limit restrictions to a minimum. For example, they banned Polymorph, and only Polymorph, from the PHB. In 4th edition, they banned Spellscarred from Forgotten Realms's Player's Guide (I have no idea what it is, I just looked up the rules for RPGA, but the point is, they banned only very specific problematic things). I think that's a good rule, if a bit hard on the devs, because D&D, and ttrpg in general is an environment where you like to create your character and have options to do so. 

But what I find really genius is what they chose for 5e. In 2016, a few months after 5e was released, the Adventurer's League ruleset was changed. You could choose from every published book, but only one except core. This was called the PHB+1 rule (Player's Handbook + one other book). I think this really is one of the best ways to rule this, since you only have to playtest the expansions with the PHB and not with everything else, while still letting people choose basically what they want if they are a big fan of one specific thing. So yeah, they were pretty much using what you're suggesting, but letting players choose which "expansion pack" they want.

...Aaaaaaaand they removed it. Did players complain? I have never played with this ruleset, so maybe it was really restrictive, but I guess you could still have a pretty decent character, and it would reduce the amount of munchkinism possible. I still don't really understand what they which to replace it with, but, yeah. Here it is. As of now, 5e has just about the same laxist ruleset as 3.5 and 4e had.

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Tendriculos*

The tendridiculous, as some call it (nobody does, this monster is _that_ forgettable). Badly written, with reach that applies to both tendrils and bite even though it's clearly not intended for the latter, and regeneration that makes no sense whatsoever (bludgeoning and acid... why?). No lore to speak of (the lore is litterally "A wizard did it, question mark?"). And finally, low mental stats and no original useable ability. Next.

- 9 Plant RHD. It likes the immunities a lot, but losing 3 BAB hurts a lot.
- +18 Str, -2 Dex, +12 Con, -8 Int, -2 Wis, -8 Cha, +9 Natural Armor. That's a strong boi. Real strong. But nothing else and no skill points.
- Huge size. We like those.
- Regeneration. Still can't understand these weaknesses, but nice.
- Improved Grab, Swallow Whole, Paralysis. That would be much better if it could wield weapons and didn't have to have a Mouthpick weapon to use iteratives.

Well, this screams PsyWarrior. The tendriculos would make a good grappler with a few powers. It would take some Wisdom investment and would hard-press the tendriculos even more to take full BAB classes if it wants to get 4 iteratives, but would still be really strong. That said, the best scenario would be to get Gloves of Man. Without, the tendriculos will have a hard time reconciling iteratives and grappling.

I would also like to see some tripping build with a 45ft reach on a mouthpick spiked chain.

In the end, the Tendriculos is definitely stronger than the Shambling Mound, and has more attacks, but much less intelligence, and Regeneration instead of the elemental immunities. I don't know if 7 or 8 RHD is better, but since there were a few LA+0 in the original thread, let's go with *8 RHD* and *DLA-1* for the Tendriculos.

Small entry today, and next time will probably be no different. See you then for the Thoqqa!

----------


## H_H_F_F

I support 8 RHD, it's the 9th that really hurts anyway.

Is this not a popular monster? Maybe it's just my core-only upbringing, but I've used these guys more than once. They're great.

----------


## PoeticallyPsyco

Fun Fact: It's possible to grow a Tendriculous without stomach acid and then train it as a mount that you ride from inside its mouth.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> I support 8 RHD, it's the 9th that really hurts anyway.
> 
> Is this not a popular monster? Maybe it's just my core-only upbringing, but I've used these guys more than once. They're great.


I don't know... I've used and seen used a lot of trolls and shambling mounds, but never a tendriculos. I really don't think it is really popular anywhere, but if you say you have used it, then why not.
I can tell with some measure of certainty that even at least some of the devs didn't really care about it, though. They didn't even check to be consistent when translating the name. Which means, in french, it has different names in 3.5 and Pathfinder (respectively "Tendricule" and "Tendriculaire"). Also, a quick search of the name in google displays 4,500 results for the tendriculos, that's around the same as the tojanida (the weird diformed turtle, we'll cover it in a week or so) and 10 times less than a less-than-iconic, 3.5-only monster like the mohrg. So, yeah. Really not that popular. 




> Fun Fact: It's possible to grow a Tendriculous without stomach acid and then train it as a mount that you ride from inside its mouth.


Where did you find that? That would be extremely uncomfortable and remove most of the combat ability of the Tendriculos, but it would be incredibly cool to see a tendriculos come up to you, open its mouth, and you see a wizard casually walking off it.

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## PoeticallyPsyco

> Where did you find that? That would be extremely uncomfortable and remove most of the combat ability of the Tendriculos, but it would be incredibly cool to see a tendriculos come up to you, open its mouth, and you see a wizard casually walking off it.


Arms & Equipment Guide, pg 87. The seed costs 3,000gp, and if you pay to have it trained that's another 2,000 (or you could make the DC 27 check to rear it yourself). Like you said, it's not the most effective mount, but sometimes you just have to go for novelty and style.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Thoqqua*

You: the Thoqqua
The one she tells you not to worry about**: the Remorhaz

Man, that's an unfavorable anatomy if I've ever seen one. No arms, no legs, no appendices for Gloves of Man, and not even a mouth (Why would it? It feeds by just melting minerals and adding them to its body. Note that 2e gave it a mouth anyway, with no real justification). And the flexible body coupled with non-controllable Heat means you will never be able to wear armor. The Thoqqua has no bite for mouthpick, no tail for prehensile tail and no appendices at all. You will not wield a weapon anytime soon. Or ever, really (save for some graft shenanigans). The Thoqqua is saved from not being able to do any iteratives by the existence of the monk, and at least one level in this class is kind of mandatory on any Thoqqua build (or unarmed swordsage, if you rule that they can unarmed strike with any part of their body too).

- Medium, 3 Elemental RHD. Bad but not many of them. The point is, you lose one BAB.
- +4 Str, +2 Dex, +2 Con, -4 Int, +2 Wis, that's some fighting potential. The Int hit is not even that bad and should allow you to get a few skills with a bit of investment.
- 7 natural armor. Impressive on a 3RHD creature. That balances quite well the impossibility to wear armor, and still allows for the monk abilities (you have a wisdom bonus, which means you'll likely get a very respectable AC)
- Worst body shape ever, with around half the slots of an humanoid.
- Heat, and Burn. A boon and a curse. On the one hand, you get a respectable 2d6 on every slam and unarmed strike, and discourage grappling you. On the other hand, your teammates won't like giving you touch buffs, and you'll have to fireproof some of your items. Burn is anecdotal.
- Burrowing speed and tremorsense are always interesting, if not game-changing.

In the end, not much to say here. You have some nice damage and AC bonus and some issues in its everyday life (good luck sleeping in an hotel when you burn every wooden building you enter, for example). *2 RHD* seem balanced to me. It will be much better at low-level than later. Also, *DLA-0*. It has a lot of things going for it, even if it doesn't seem like much.

After Fire and Earth, it's time for Water! Next time, we'll cover possibly the weirdest shaped monster of the manual: the Tojanida!

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## GreatWyrmGold

> I don't know, I find the fact that the french expression "un certain je-ne-sais-quoi" gets just used in english with no translation whatsoever hilarious, and even more that "certain" is not italicized, when it's almost just as much part of the idiom as the rest.


"je ne sais quoi" sounds more like a thing than "I don't know what". The foreign language gives it a...well, you know.

As to why the "certain" isn't italicized...I dunno, probably because we stole that word long enough ago that we forgot it was ever French. Whatever the reason, the idiom slimmed down when it was adopted by the English (or some time thereafter maybe, all I see is the end result).




> ...Aaaaaaaand they removed it. Did players complain? I have never played with this ruleset, so maybe it was really restrictive, but I guess you could still have a pretty decent character, and it would reduce the amount of munchkinism possible.


PHB+1 would probably be better if more potential +1's had a wide variety of content. Look at Volo's Guide to Monsters for the most extreme version of this; pretty much the only PC-relevant content they got was new races. If you wanted to play a full-orc or a lizardfolk, you were locked into core for everything else. Yeah, you can build a pretty decent character with those restrictions, but you can build a pretty decent character with PHB+0 too.

(PHB+1 probably wouldn't be as bad if sourcebooks were designed more like the 3.5 Races of X books, with content united more by theme than mechanical role.)





> ...regeneration that makes no sense whatsoever (bludgeoning and acid... why?)


If you cut a vine, it'll just grow back. So obviously, if you club a vine, it won't.
No, I haven't actually tried this, why do you ask?

(Acid is pretty straightforward. The absence of fire is bizarre, though.)

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Tojanidas (Adult and Elder)*

Okay, sometimes, you've got to give credit where it's due. And today credit is definitely due to the Pathfinder devs. Their work on the Tojanidas is admirable, and they turned a highly boring and pretty silly monster in an interesting plot point that could be integrated in quite a lot of campaigns. And all this while changing almost nothing in their statblock and keeping most of its existing lore, just building on it. 

The 3.5 Tojanida: weird, misshaped creature, seemingly intelligent but only has interest in food. Can reorganize its limbs and head to see all around it, which makes it look ridiculous... And that's all. 

The Pathfinder Tojanida: coming from an ancient race of Water Elementals, they where stuck in this form by some ancient magic. They are blessed and cursed with an absolute memory of all the members of their race, which means they can't find new satisfaction or knowledge anywhere, since they know everything they can. They only have interest in food, yes, but that's because it's the last thing they can still enjoy. They are still proud creatures who like to show off their knowledge to polite members of lesser races. Their all-around vision now stems from hundred of eyes around its shell, which is much less silly looking.

I highly encourage you to use the Pathfinder version of this monster's lore whenever you want instead of the 3.5 version. Plus, the Pathfinder statblock is almost identical to the 3.5 Adult Tojanida one, so this rating will be relevant for both. Isn't that incredible?

And now, back to the rating! As a reminder, the juvenile one got a weak +0 LA in Inevitability's thread with 3 RHD.

*Adult*, 7 RHD: A juvenile Tojanida going up to Adult is probably the evolved monster gaining the least amount of things in the game. It gains +2 Natural Armor, +2 Str, and Medium size. And that's all. Medium size being probably more of a downside that anything else (you lose the bonus to-hit and to AC while not gaining reach or significant damage. Plus your Improved Grab is not really more versatile now than it was one size smaller. PCs will just not encounter many Small size enemies worth grappling). Same number of RHD as the lower one, *3 RHD*, and since the Outsider RHD is still pretty good, I believe *DLA-1* is fair. Maybe -2 would have been better but that's a big difference and I prefer the conservative option.

*Elder*, 15 RHD: As turtles, Tojanidas never stop growing, and they are now Large, possibly even able to grab something with Improved Grab! Compared to the Adult, +6 Str, +4 Con, +2 natural armor. That's even less than what they would have gotten by advancing to the next size normally. Anyway, and since they have full BAB and a lot of skill points with no hit to Int, I think they deserve *5 RHD*. Large size helps them much more than Medium. And *DLA-5* if you don't go epic. This one is a bit eyeballed. A lot of Outsider HD on an otherwise mediocre monster do not make for an easy rating.

Those were a lot of -0 creatures back-to-back in the monster manual. The next one is quite a bit later, and is another evolved monster: the Truly Horrid Humber Hulk! (What, was Abominable Shrimpman taken?)

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Umber Hulks*

You may be badass, but are you "willingly getting swallowed by purple worms just for the thrill of killing it from the inside for sport" badass? Umber Hulks are. That's one over-the-top monster that doesn't know if it wants to be an insect or a vertebrate. Two sets of eyes, one compound, one with pupil and iris; one reptile-like jaw with vertebrate teeth, but mandibules on top of it, and hands with fingers at the end of insectile limbs with joints. Also, the 4th edition art is dabbing. It's awesome, don't get me wrong, but it's dabbing. 
Some sources say that their race is impossibly old, existing since the very dawn of the universe, before the primordials were even replaced by the gods. That makes very little sense, considering they have characteristics of "modern" animals, like compound eyes, but then again, even primordials look like humans in this world so that might not be that weird.

Mechanically, the Umber Hulks are, with the medusa, the poster boys for gaze attacks, a pretty potent kind of ability that will work extremely well against everybody that is not aware of it, and much less against somebody that is. Most monsters won't. (total concealment from everyone who doesn't want to make one or two Will saves per round is pretty good, especially when we know what happens when a lot of people are confused around each other. Out of combat, you can restrain yourself to your compound eyes and close the ones with the confusing effect, but in-combat, note that you might affect any ally that looks in your general direction.

*Regular*, 8 Aberration RHD: 

- +12 Str, +2 Dex, +8 Con, +2 Cha, total +24, and +8 natural armor. That's... Alright. That would be strong on a 4-5 RHD beatstick. On a 8 RHD monster, that's underwhelming. Having no malus, especially in Int, is good. 
- Large size, 2 claws and one bite, on a body that can most probably wield weapons. Nice.
- 20ft movement land and burrow. Not good. You will have a hard time getting in melee.
- 60ft darkvision and tremorsense. Standard burrowing package. Pretty high range, but nothing game-changing.
- Confusion Gaze. Your bread and butter. A lot of problems (mind-affecting, can affect your allies, people have still a chance to act normally when under its influence...), but free action save-or-suck are always extremely good, and when it is an AoE on top of that, that's game-changing.

In the end, this monster is borderline playable as-is, depending on the circumstances and how you rule Confusion Gaze (are any allies in range affected, or are people that are obviously turning away from you immune; can you close the confusing pair of eyes while keeping the other one, or do you have to wear goggles all the time and spend a move action to remove them....). In the end, I think the Umber Hulk wouls still like to only have *7 RHD*, but that DLA -1 would be too much, so *DLA -0*. Do discuss.

*Truly Horrid*, 20 RHD: I surprisingly really like this naming. This really sounds like something that primitive people would call a bigger, scarier version of an ancient monster. "There was an Umber Hulk gang, but then, there was another one, but bigger, like 15 ft high, you know, a truly horrid one!"

So, compared to the smaller version, you get: 
- Huge Size, +6 Natural armor. Ok.
- +14 Str, -2 Dex, +10 Con, +2 Wis, +2 Cha. That's a lot of stats, much more than most evolved versions get.
I think these bonuses, with the fact that at higher level more and more enemies will get immune or resistant to your gaze, are worth 3 RHD, for a total of *11 RHD* for the THHH, or TH3 for short. Also, it has aberration HD. That's not good HD. I'd say *DLA -6* for a total ECL equal to its CR.

The umber hulks are a good design, in that they are designed to look dumb as bricks, but still have intelligence and cunning equal to humans. In their lore, they're described as always underestimated by adventurers as stupid beasts, and that translates really well into real life. Every time umber hulks are mentioned, there is always one person to mention that they didn't expect it to have such intelligence. I guess WotC knows pretty well how to design dumb-looking monsters. After all, they had a lot of practice (_looks at the rest of this thread_)...
Next time, we will look at a monster that has many more RHD than it looks like it should have, the Will o' Wisp!

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## Morphic tide

With regard to the Truly Horrid, it gets +7 to attack and damage rolls via Strength in exchange for -4 over full BAB from the RHD. +5 HP/HD over the regular, which is already +4 HP/HD to end up ahead of a Raging Barbarian's health. Huge size and +14 Natural Armor? Yeah, I'm pretty sure the Truly Horrid Umber Hulk is able to be turned into a viable Martial with just one level to get Spirit Lion Totem. Of course, you'll have no versatility worth mentioning, but you'll be pretty much on-par for damage numbers.

I've honestly no idea how much is "worth" taking away from RHD or ECL here, because you end up _enormously_ in excess of the basic statistics of a "standard" Martial from all that Strength, Constitution, and Natural Armor, and 7 feats is enough to _allow_ almost any Martial package, which you at least _can_ have the stats for with your lack of any malus. 'Tis confusing.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> With regard to the Truly Horrid, it gets +7 to attack and damage rolls via Strength in exchange for -4 over full BAB from the RHD. +5 HP/HD over the regular, which is already +4 HP/HD to end up ahead of a Raging Barbarian's health. Huge size and +14 Natural Armor? Yeah, I'm pretty sure the Truly Horrid Umber Hulk is able to be turned into a viable Martial with just one level to get Spirit Lion Totem. Of course, you'll have no versatility worth mentioning, but you'll be pretty much on-par for damage numbers.
> 
> I've honestly no idea how much is "worth" taking away from RHD or ECL here, because you end up _enormously_ in excess of the basic statistics of a "standard" Martial from all that Strength, Constitution, and Natural Armor, and 7 feats is enough to _allow_ almost any Martial package, which you at least _can_ have the stats for with your lack of any malus. 'Tis confusing.


When rating evolved monsters and generally monsters with way too many RHD I generally base my rating on CR advancement as a first estimate (since CR is surprisingly accurate for a lot of monsters save for really high level ones). 12 more Aberration RHD (13 in fact here) and one size increase from Large to Huge are worth with everything that entails 4 CR for a result between 11 and 12. Then what are these stats increases worth? On their own I'd say they would be around 4 to 5 levels. But when they eat your 12th level and above (which are almost always PrC levels or other combo abilities)  I think they are not worth more than 3 ECL. Hence a final estimation of ECL 14

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## Remuko

> 12 more Aberration RHD (13 in fact here) and *siee* increase are worth


you did the french thing again lol

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## Beni-Kujaku

> you did the french thing again lol


Ah no! Do not underestimate me! I wouldn't do the same mistake twice! (Except the times when I do make the same mistake twice please disregard those) No this has nothing to do with french it's just a typo when I wanted to type "size"

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## H_H_F_F

> Ah no! Do not underestimate me! I wouldn't do the same mistake twice! (Except the times when I do make the same mistake twice please disregard those) No this has nothing to do with french it's just a typo when I wanted to type "size"


I feel lucky because that couldn't happen to me. Accidently typing חסנ or זרז in the middle of an English sentence would require me to be  *very* seriously preoccupied, I think.

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## Remuko

> Ah no! Do not underestimate me! I wouldn't do the same mistake twice! (Except the times when I do make the same mistake twice please disregard those) No this has nothing to do with french it's just a typo when I wanted to type "size"


ah fair enough lol

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## GreatWyrmGold

> Some sources say that their race is impossibly old, existing since the very dawn of the universe, before the primordials were even replaced by the gods. That makes very little sense, considering they have characteristics of "modern" animals, like compound eyes, but then again, even primordials look like humans in this world so that might not be that weird.


I wonder if anyone's made a list of all the monsters said to have existed ~before even the gods set foot on this world.~ I can't help but imagine that time was a lot more crowded than people make it sound.




> *Truly Horrid*, 20 RHD: I surprisingly really like this naming. This really sounds like something that primitive people would call a bigger, scarier version of an ancient monster. "There was an Umber Hulk gang, but then, there was another one, but bigger, like 15 ft high, you know, a truly horrid one!"


Not thrilled with the "primitive" framing. A, it gives the impression that people with less technology are dumber, too dumb to even come up with a decent name for a monster. B, it gives the impression that advanced modern people _wouldn't_ give equally superlative yet vague names.

But yeah, it's nice when WotC doesn't just slap a "greater" on the high-level version and call it a day.





> Originally Posted by Remuko
> 
> 
> you did the french thing again lol
> 
> 
> Ah no! Do not underestimate me! I wouldn't do the same mistake twice! (Except the times when I do make the same mistake twice please disregard those) No this has nothing to do with french it's just a typo when I wanted to type "size"


I'd poke fun at Remuko, but if Beni had said "nah, siee is totally French" I'd have believed him. (It looks kinda French, and he'd presumably know better than me...)

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## Remuko

> I'd poke fun at Remuko, but if Beni had said "nah, siee is totally French" I'd have believed him. (It looks kinda French, and he'd presumably know better than me...)


it had happened before. sie (iirc?) was the french shorthand for wisdom like WIS is in english. which is what I thought he had done (again).

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Will-o'-Wisps*

What is, in your opinion, the most perplexing, inexplicable monster of D&D? Maybe some sort of animal hybrid demon, like the Phisarazu, who spits in the face of both the square-cube law and every kind of biological consideration, or the modrons (yes, these are sentient geometric shapes. No, I won't elaborate further.), or simply any monster of the MMII, like the famous mind-controlling underwears, the Raggamoffyn. Some time ago, I would have said the same thing, but currently, my money is on the Will-o'-wisps, and that is for reasons that are not immediately obvious, both in the game's lore and the real life evolution of the game.

*Spoiler: The convoluted story of the most confusing D&D monster, and how WotC made it worse by trying to fix it*
Show


Why does the Will-o'-Wisp have immunity to magic, and especially why are these two spells the ones to bypass it? Nothing in either the stat sheet or the lore of the WoW suggests the reason. And that's because there is no reason except that the WoW is plagued by its heritage from previous editions.

*Spoiler: The original will-o'-wisp, and special relativity*
Show

You see, in 1st and 2nd editions, the WoW was very different from what it has become. It was not a standalone monster, but the adult form of another monster, some small humanoid shapeshifter Fey called a boggart. The boggart could shapeshift into any humanoid of its size, but also in an incorporeal ball of light with no physical substance: the will-o'-wisp (and here is the second big difference between 1st and 3rd edition will-o'-wisps, in 1st edition, WoW were completely incorporeal, with no real body, only some concentrated, sentient light). As they matured, they spent more and more time in will-o'-wisp form until they couldn't go back to being a boggart anymore. Yes, you heard that right, a corporeal being that could shapeshift into an incorporeal one. That is already quite strange, but what is most unique is that Gary Gygax actually considered real-world physics in this transformation. Indeed, E=mc², and destroying mass liberates incredible amounts of energy, while creating mass consumes the same amount. When the boggart changed into a will-o'-wisp, the air in the vicinity heated up so much that anyone there took 1d6 damage. But this energy is far from what would be liberated by the body of a small humanoid completely vanishing (as a reminder, the strongest man-made explosion ever, the Tsar Bomba, who could obliterate any metropolis and kill everybody in a 40 miles radius represented no more than 3 kg of consumed matter). The vast majority of it was channeled through the will-o'-wisp into the Negative Energy Plane, then retrieved when the will-o'-wisp took a physical form again.



*Spoiler: The will-o'-wisp's weaknesses, and quantum physics*
Show


It's this connection with the Negative Energy Plane that gave the will-o'-wisp magic immunity. Any magic that could affect it was just channeled to the Negative Plane and lost. The exceptions were Magic Missile and Maze. The explanation was that magic missile somehow disrupted the lattice of information of the will-o'-wisp itself (Magic Missile never misses, even if the target doesn't really exist), and hence could damage it, while Maze blocks the pipeline to the Negative Plane but my headcanon is that a monster with a name starting with two W's can't handle so many M's in a spell's name. 

But another thing that could disrupt this link was simply physical weapon attacks. You see, will-o'-wisps in 1e were just a ball of information with no physical form, even the light was just some energy leaking through its link with the Negative Energy Plane, which is why it's invisible when turning the light off, there really is nothing to see (also why it couldn't sustain its invisibility permanently at the time). However, hitting it with physical matter could "possibly" disrupt it. The event is described as completely random and unlikely even if you strike the light of the will-o'-wisp, as if the light was only the probability of presence of the "damageable" part of the will-o'-wisp. That really reminds me of wavefunctions in quantum physics and how interfering lasers can create physical matter for an instant in a completely random manner. This randomness translates into the ludicrous AC bonus that later became the Deflection bonus we see in 3e.



*Spoiler: When WotC gives up on trying to understand their own monster*
Show


So, at this point, the will-o'-wisp was two intricately linked monsters with weaknesses that only made a little sense when factoring multi-Plane theory and real-life advanced physics. On top of it, one of the two was an incorporeal one that could be still hurt by physical nonmagical weapons and could turn invisible and be seen by See Invisibility, but with no physical form to really see. That was *way* too much for the clear, well-defined edition they wanted for 3e. 

But the thing is, they seemingly liked the will-o'-wisp. I don't know how that happened, if one of the devs already had a campaign ready with some will-o'-wisps as a major enemy, or if they considered that it was one of the most iconic monsters in the game, but they decided not to cut it from 3e, and even to keep its stat sheet almost exactly identical to what it was. However, to keep it from being as complicated as before, they just removed every instance and reference of the boggart, of the Negative Energy Plane and of that weird randomness that prevented it to be hurt most of the time, and changed every last bit of its lore to create something completely different, but with the same final result. 



*Spoiler: How WotC wants the same monster, but different, but still same*
Show


It can be hit by physical weapons? Then make it not incorporeal at all, and call it a day.
It can channel energy into lightning attacks? Let's say that it's because of a chemical reaction when it eats swamp gases.
It evolved out of a sadistic fey that hates humans? Ah no, no more fey! Nothing from before, except the stats. Let's make it instead an aberration which feeds on the chemicals produced by humanoids when they experience fear and pain. I don't care if that doesn't make sense! Make it not magical at all, I don't want anything complicated on this monster anymore!
It shines and can extinguish its glow to be invisible? Now it's because it exhales flamable gases that ignite when in contact with oxygen, and it can just hold its breath. Plus it's naturally transparent because... It's gas itself! Give it the Air subtype!
It has incredible AC? I said now it has the Air subtype, make it deflection bonus or something due to it exhaling gas that repel weapons.
How can an air aberration be so intelligent, even more than an humanoid? Make it some sorte of cluster of smaller sentient gas bubbles that can think together as a hive mind (I'm absolutely not kidding, that's what the will-o'-wisp is in 3.X)

And finally, it has immunity to all magic except Maze and Magic Missile! ..... There's no mundane way to explain that, is there? Just put a "nobody really knows why" and everything will be fine. 


And that's how WotC changed everything, but kept all the abilities, and made the monster even more incomprehensible by having the magic immunity, the almost absent strength and the deflection bonus to AC not be explained at all. Truly the best way they could have went.



*Spoiler: What about after 3rd edition*
Show


A few years later, 4th edition came up, and once again, the devs were self-conscious that the will-o'-wisp made no sense, maybe even less so than in 2nd edition. So they decided to come back. It's a Fey again, with a lot of clearly magical light abilities. I can only assume this is the same will-o'-wisp as it 1st edition, but since this is 4th edition, who cares about iconic abilities, or just interesting ones? Immunity to magic just doesn't exist, and they don't have particularly good AC either, so no need to explain anything, and you can have fun just hitting the thing with a stick... *sigh* 4e never fails to disappoint. 

5e wasn't much better. This edition brought back a lot of interesting abilities, and gave much more thought to the lore. But once again, doing that for the Fey will-o'-wisp would be way too complicated. So they changed it again. Not a Fey, not an Aberration, now it's an Undead! The spirit of criminals killed in a swamp. At least they didn't want to keep the same stats from before. That makes the 5e will-o'-wisp just a completely different creature from before. And honestly, that's probably the best course of action on their part.



So, in its existence, the lore of the will-o'-wisp changed so utterly that even its creature type was different, not once, but *three times*! And the 3rd edition one was probably the worst iteration of that, with some endeavor to keep nonsensical abilities while not explaining the majority of them within the new lore. That's why I consider the WoW the most confusing monster in all of D&D, it's the combination of every single worst design decisions WotC could have made, from the very beginning of D&D to the modern era.




That aside, with the current iteration of its stats, what is the best course of action if you want to play one of those? You have no manipulators, and absolutely no way to get some except with grafts (and if you do get graft, you have no reason to keep your invisibility, since even when your glow is off, your zombie arm will still be visible). However, you have disgustingly high Dex and above average Wis and Int. That screams Unarmed Swordsage with all its lungs, with a level in monk to be able to Unarmed Strike with any part of your body. Then, just improve Swordsage, or go into a Sneak Attack class. You should be able to do decent damage with maneuvers, even though you have -10 Str (and if you take Shadow Blade, this will be _strong_!). The real problem here is the absence of items. At high levels, this will be crippling. 

- 9 Aberration RHD: Why so many? Just, why? This is a monster that is already hard to hit, no need to make the fight last forever when it's a monster, and no need to make the life of poor innocent souls that want to play it a nightmare.
- -10 Str, +18 Dex, +0 Con, +4 Int, +6 Wis, +2 Cha. These are extremely good stats. You dump Str that you wouldn't really use anyway, and you get a ludicrous Dex with good mental stats all around including Intelligence. What's not to love here?
- +9 Deflection bonus to AC, natural Invisibility, immunity to magic, fast (Perfect) flying. You have quantum resistance to everything. This is almost ridiculous at this point. What party is gonna hit consistently an AC 29 at lv 6? As a player, this makes you nigh indestructible. This is much worse than for a monster, though. Opponents will just attack your friends, and since you can't manipulate wands, you can't use your invincibility to heal everyone. You'll just have to beat the hell out of your enemy and hope that they notice you. (and with Shadow Blade and a bit of sneak attack, you're definitely able to do just that)
(Note that immunity to magic probably also means immunity to healing and to buffing. Every silver lining has a cloud. Still a plus, but not that overpowered)
- Awful body shape, with maybe one or two item slots, but not more. How many would you be able to carry anyway with Small size and -10 Str? 
- Darkvision 60ft, touch attack natural weapon. Probably irrelevant, except if you can add it in an unarmed full attack, and even then, probably not incredible. 


So, you have a whole lot of defensive abilities, and pretty good offensive ones with that. Your skill list is acceptable and you have a lot of skill points. So many goodies, but so much bad too. I believe it would be pretty interesting and fun to play with 6 or *7 RHD*. Less and it would crush everything with just one level of Swordsage and Shadow Blade. More, and it doesn't have time to make a decent build before it is brought down by it's absence of item slot. 2 more RHD are not incredible, of course, but it will benefit from them. Something like *DLA-1* seems acceptable to me.



If you wanna play as a will-o'-wisp, note that you are contractually obligated to be an absolute jackass the whole campaign, with every single NPC. Will-o'-wisps have always been CE, but I feel like they pushed it to eleven in 3rd edition. If you want, just read Dragon Magazine 328, and you can see how much these little balls of light can be mother f***ing bastards. Next time, we'll have the alternate evolution of the wolf if you give it an Ice Stone instead of leveling it up into Dire Wolf: the Winter Wolf!

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## Beni-Kujaku

> I wonder if anyone's made a list of all the monsters said to have existed ~before even the gods set foot on this world.~ I can't help but imagine that time was a lot more crowded than people make it sound.


Yugoloth, Slaads, Umber Hulks, Sarrukhs, Illithids, and possibly dragons and aboleths (they worship Elder Evils, is that enough to believe they were there when the EE were in charge ?), on the top of my head. Yeah, that starts to be a lot, but those are spread throughout the infinite planes.

About the TH Umber Hulk, my point was not "people with less technology", and more "people who are still in the process of evolving from apes and don't have a fully formed language yet". But yeah, there's a good chance modern people might not have much more imagination.




> it had happened before. sie (iirc?) was the french shorthand for wisdom like WIS is in english. which is what I thought he had done (again).


It was "sag", but close enough ^^

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## Remuko

> It was "sag", but close enough ^^


yeah that one lol

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Winter Wolves and Worgs*

Why would Winter Wolves and Worgs wind up in this woeful wasteland? Would they be worth way more than they do if they were written with a wee bit more well-placed work?

Seriously, how many wolf variants do you really need in a game? With the Brachyurus, that makes six wolf-like canines (regular, dire, winter, worg, legendary, brachyurus) with little difference except their strength. At least these ones are Magical Beasts, with full BAB to boast and acceptable intelligence.


Winter Wolf, 8 RHD: Compared to the Dire Wolf, we have -6 Str, -2 Dex, +6 Int, +2 Natural Armor, the Magical Beast type and everything that comes along, and the Frost subtype. It also has a kind of negligible damage bonus on its bite (only the bite, so not for mouthpick), and an interesting breath weapon that is honestly kinda powerful, and is eligible for Metabreath (you'll still need the Dragonblood subtype for Entangling Exhalation). I believe it's worth at least 1 ECL more than the Dire Wolf. I suggest *5 RHD* and *DLA-1* for the Winter Wolf.

Worg, 4 RHD: Compared to Dire Wolf, you have +1 BAB, -8 Str, -2 Con, +4 Int (for a salvageable but still problematic -4 total), +2 Wis, -1 Natural Armor and especially one size smaller. Definitely worse. But is it bad enough to only be worth 2 RHD?... Maybe, but I will choose a conservative *3 RHD* for the Worg, and *DLA-0*. I'm not comfortable giving lower ECL than its BAB to a monster with less than 5 RHD. It would allow early entry in prestige classes, which its flaws doesn't balance.

Not much to say here, they are almost identical to a previous monster and have no lore to speak of. See you next time for the Dread Wraith.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Dread Wraith*

The wraith is another translation issue, simply due to the sheer number of words meaning "ghost" or "spectre" in english. After the first 4 incorporeal undead creatures, other languages just didn't have any word left. And the wraith gave us some of the best translation ideas in my opinion, due to how badass they sound. In french, it's "Âme-en-Peine", which means "Sorrowful Soul", while in german, it's "Todesalb", or "dead/deathly Alb", the Alb being some sort of sleep paralysis demon strangling people in their sleep. Maybe not that accurate, but definitely very cool.

The wraith's characteristics have gone through various changes through the ages. They started as corporeal creatures, and were in fact copies of the Ringwraiths from Lord of the Ring (even being called Nazguls in some early design notes from Gary Gygax). They became incorporeal starting in 2nd edition, and their corporeal form was very possibly retconned into the sword wraith, who really doesn't have much in common with the incorporeal wraith except the name.


In terms of stats, the Dread Wraith is the strongest in the long list of MM incorporeal undead creatures, with 16 Undead RHD. However, it doesn't really back it up well with abilities. 

The dread wraith only has its Constitution Drain, and lifesense 60 ft. The Con drain is pretty bad, all things considered. 1d8 is interesting, but it is only once per round, and the target has a Fortitude save on top of it. You should down some spellcasters, but you'll be as powerless as in sunlight against any big brute. Or anything that doesn't have constitution. Lifesense is always very good, but it doesn't do much by itself. And apart from that, there is only stats. Not even Turn Resistance. Lots of stats, don't get me wrong, but a CR 11 creature with not even an SLA is pretty one-dimensional. No, unnatural aura is not an ability worth mentioning. Or just to say that it makes adventuring with a druid harder.

- Incorporeal undead, no strength, no constitution. These are standard issues, you'll have problems finding equipment and be pretty squishy, but incorporeality is so much of a boon that it balances it nicely.
- Large size. Probably more of a detriment than an advantage, decreasing your AC and your to-hit for a negligible increase in physical damage. At least you have reach.
- Con drain, life sense, daylight powerlessness.
- +18 Dex, +6 Int, +8 Wis, +14 Cha. Even at this level, this is impressive on an undead. Your two stats that add to your AC are extremely high. And Charisma adds to your drain DC. Compared to the regular Wraith, that's +12 Dex, +2 Int, +4 Wis, +10 Cha.

So, what are +28 in stats and going from 1d6 to 1d8 con drain worth when you compare this to the regular version?
Probably 4 RHD more? Your stats are much better than a spectre and everything else is slightly worse. I believe the dread wraith should be 1 ECL higher than the spectre is, for a total of *9 RHD*. And as always with undead, gaining 7 RHD doesn't give it a lot except feats. I suggest *DLA-4* for a total of ECL 12.


What would you do with a dread wraith? It has too many RHD for spellcasting, even half-casters, and I don't think it would mesh well with rogues, since you have low BAB and it's hard to get a lot of attacks. Maybe a crusader? 
Next time, we'll have a monster that I've always put between the gibbering mouther and the Otyugh in the "my design is that I have lots of limbs, eyes and teeth, and that's all" pile, the Xorn!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Xorns (at least average)*




> Originally Posted by No brains
> 
> 
> This gets me thinking: how many HD should a Xorn have to be LA+0? Somewhere between minor and average must be a butter zone of power for these guys. Perhaps that +1 to LA could be taken as a hit die?
> 
> 
> It does make them _slightly_ stronger (more HP, more BAB, better saves...) +2 HD might be required.
> The proper LA/RHD ratio is about as easy to intuit as LA is in the first place.


And now people are doing my job for me! Thank you! I dream of a day when I would just write the name of a monster and people would find the appropriate ECL for me. (I know this is about the Minor Xorn, but still)

So, today, we have the Xorn! The Outsider-typed, Elemental-fluffed, Aberration-shaped counterpart to other denizens of the elemental planes in the Monster Manual, like the Tojanida, the Arrowhawk, and the Salamander.

And man, is that a sad monster. Tojanidas eat water, Arrowhawks eat meat, Salamanders are omnivores, but Xorns eat precious metals and gems. While these are pretty common in the Plane of Earth, the Xorns who find themselves on the Prime Material Plane quickly end up starving, since the treasures they eat are often well-guarded and valued. That makes most Xorns beggars of sort, asking adventurers (the most likely kind of person to carry a lot of precious stones) for sustenance, only attacking if they are hungry to the point of danger. If you want to play a Xorn, I highly advise you to get a ring of sustenance, and if you can't, well, you'll have to discuss with your DM how many gp per day a Xorn eats.

*Average*, 7 RHD: All Xorns have very good defensive abilities, and the average follows this rule. +14 (!) natural armor, can't be flanked, DR 5/bludgeoning (much better than 5/magic), two elemental immunities and one resistance. The offense is also pretty nice. 3 arms for Multiweapon Fighting, one big Bite attack, Cleave as a bonus feat (do you imagine this thing cleaving anybody?), and full BAB as an Outsider. The only thing really pulling it back is its speed (20ft is slowish), and its stats. +6 Str, +4 Con, and that's all. That's really low for 7 RHD, even if it wasn't an Outsider. The thing still borders on playable even with these stats, and I think it deserves *6 RHD* and *DLA-0*. That's one RHD more than what GWG estimated the Minor Xorn, and I think it's acceptable for +2 Str and natural armor, one size increase and a bonus feat (it would probably even be pretty good).

*Elder*, 15 RHD: Behold! An advanced Average Xorn!! Yep, that's all. One size larger, and the size modifiers (+8 Str, +4 Con, +2 natural armor). *9 RHD*, and *DLA-3*.



Those were pretty easy to rate, if not to look at. Next time, we'll rate the animal (?) companion of Oona, the Yrthak!

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## GreatWyrmGold

> That is already quite strange, but what is most unique is that Gary Gygax actually considered real-world physics in this transformation. Indeed, E=mc², and destroying mass liberates incredible amounts of energy, while creating mass consumes the same amount. When the boggart changed into a will-o'-wisp, the air in the vicinity heated up so much that anyone there took 1d6 damage. But this energy is far from what would be liberated by the body of a small humanoid completely vanishing (as a reminder, the strongest man-made explosion ever, the Tsar Bomba, who could obliterate any metropolis and kill everybody in a 40 miles radius represented no more than 3 kg of consumed matter). The vast majority of it was channeled through the will-o'-wisp into the Negative Energy Plane, then retrieved when the will-o'-wisp took a physical form again.


Here's a thought for worldbuilders out there: If you try to explain your magic with physics, but then need more magic to patch up the holes in your physics, just leave the physics out of the equation.





> With the Brachyurus, that makes six wolf-like canines (regular, dire, winter, worg, legendary, brachyurus) with little difference except their strength. At least these ones are Magical Beasts, with full BAB to boast and acceptable intelligence.


I'd say the intelligence of worgs, the ice breath of winter wolves, and the size of dire wolves gives them at least some justification for existing. Legendary wolves are a bit more questionable, brachyuruses are just magical epic dire wolves with the specific name of an obscure American canine, and normal wolves shouldn't need to justify their existence.
I don't think having lots of wolf-like canines is a bad thing; they[re common in folklore, mythology, and fantasy. But each lupine monster should have a distinct identity that it leans into. Winter wolves are the northern ice wolves, pale as snow and packing frostbite in their normal bite. They're alright. Dire wolves are bigger, stronger, more savage wolves, and they're successful at that. Worgs are supposed to be big bad wolves, by which I mean intelligent and malevolent, and...they're kind of that? (I don't know what brachyurus or legendary wolves are supposed to be, though.)





> The wraith is another translation issue, simply due to the sheer number of words meaning "ghost" or "spectre" in english.


The English language isn't the most elegant, or the most straightforward, but no other tongue in the world can rival the vocabulary it's plundered from around the globe!

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Here's a thought for worldbuilders out there: If you try to explain your magic with physics, but then need more magic to patch up the holes in your physics, just leave the physics out of the equation.


Surprisingly that's something I see more in the domain of science fiction where you can basically say "this technology works like magic and you can't tell me otherwise". Isaac Asimov has a lot of these. For example the faster-than-light travel is discovered by a robot that works kind of realistically with the data it's given but in the end FTL has the souls of the passengers travel through actual hell because their information can't travel faster than light contrary to the matter of the bodies. Same thing with the Force. It's just a biological process with the Midichlorians but then that just means it's the Midichlorians who have telepathic and telekinetic powers. 

When it's well-written I kind of like this sort of lampshading. It's "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" in its purest form after all. And the corollary "any sufficiently studied magic becomes a science" is my favorite trope in fantasy when the characters do not stop at just "this is magic let's use it as is" and go "why is this magic and how could we invent something to exploit it better".




> I don't think having lots of wolf-like canines is a bad thing; they[re common in folklore, mythology, and fantasy. But each lupine monster should have a distinct identity that it leans into.


I would agree if it wasn't such a recurring theme in 3.5. There are 6 wolves  at least 5 wraiths dozens of dragons with little variation besides their color (their lore varies but the statblock is basically the same)  golems in any shape material or color five slimes in just the MM and several others elsewhere... The wolves are not the worst as you pointed out and it is nice to have so many options but I feel like they could have used some of this creativity to give more personality to the first few versions instead of rehashing each of their ideas over and over again. For example just a few more options on evolved monsters or really different ways of playing for chromatic and metallic dragons... But yeah I'm ranting about a game more than a decade old what is done is done.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Yrthak*

And we're back, boys! After two weeks of holidays, the negative-LA thread can continue, and the first monster is... Drumrolls... What the heck is this? 

The Yrthak, like a pterosaur, but blind, and screaming to echolocate itself. It screams to see you, it yells at you to attack you, and it shouts to break rocks. To describe its viability as an encounter, I'll just say that it has +5 Will, and that Silence is a level 2 spell. To describe its viability as a character, I'll just point out that it has only one mouth, which it uses to cry its lungs out, which means it can't speak, not having the vocal chords for that, and it is also probably blind whenever it eats. Truly a marvel of evolution.

- 12 Magical Beast RHD. Full BAB never hurts, but it goes without saying that we're going to reduce that number. 
- Huge size, +10 Str, +4 Dex, +6 Con, -4 Int, +2 Wis, +0 Cha. And +8 natural armor. Pretty sad array here, especially for a Huge creature with so many RHD. Compare to something like a Large Earth Elemental, 4 RHD less and a size category smaller and still better stats.
- Average 60 ft flying. That's average indeed, but always nice to have.
- Sonic Ray: useable once every other round, 6d6 damage in a ray, or a small AoE of 2d6 damage. That's around the power level of a blasting 2nd level spell. Really not good. You're Huge, rely on your natural attacks instead.
- Speaking of, claw-claw-bite. Pretty nice. Nothing stellar here, but Flyby and a level of barbarian should get you respectable DPR.
- And Blindsight 120ft. That. That is extremely good. And probably the only reason you'd play an Yrthak in the first place. Blindsight can bypass so many things in such a large range of levels, it's just a shame it's put on such a chassis.

So, how do we rate that? That's pretty close to the hieracosphinx, bit better Con, blindsight and sonic lance against pounce and rake, and the sphinx can talk. I'm gonna say they're even. *7 RHD* for the Yrthak, and *DLA -2*.


The Yrthak passed like a shooting star. Appeared in 3e, disappeared in 4e. That's pretty sad. In fact, almost everything in this monster is tragic. Tragic statblock, with blindsight on an unuseable chassis, tragic real-life story, being cut after one appearance, and tragic lore, the first Yrthak being a bard that has been tricked by a demon into accepting a "horn", then enslaved by sonic-immune monsters. 
Next time will be the last non-animal creatures of the monster manuals, the Yuan-ti! And after that, there will be a surprise...

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Yuan-ti (all of them)*
Rule 34 of the Evil Overlord List: "I will not turn into a snake. It never helps."
And in d&d, except if you're into crafting your own poison, or if you like to give people ophiophobia, that is true as well.

*Spoiler: Daddy, where do yuan-tis come from?*
Show

So, Yuan-tis! 35,000 years ago, the Sarrukhs said, Let us make yuan-ti in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground." And they tried, using the most available resource at the time: primitive humans, combined with the genes of snakes. Twice, they failed. The first created the pureblood, still so close to a human that sarrukhs didn't see their blood in them. The second bred the halfblood. Half of a sarrukh, but not the right bottom part. On the third try, however, they finally created their masterpiece: the abomination, looking like a sarrukh in all regards, and living up to 6000 years. Some godly creature. 
Then all sarrukhs disappeared, and we only got snake people with weird breeding methods. Because, yeah, they can't breed normally, since they are an artificial race. So, how did they subsist after sarrukhs disappeared? Well, that's very simple. When a yuan-ti and a yuan-ti love their society very much, they go and kidnap humans. They use some of their poison modified with a ritual (which may or may not use some power from the 111th layer of the Abyss) to change them into Histachii (tainted ones and broodguards from Serpent Kingdoms). And now, we have one of the most random results from breeding I've seen. 

Histachii+Histachii->Pureblood
Histachii+Pureblood->Halfblood
Histachii+Halfblood->Halfblood
Histachii+Abomination->Halfblood
Any combination of Pure-blood, Halfblood and abomination-> Abomination.

So we have almost-human people who can, just by interbreeding, become more and more snakelike. I say, sarrukhs should have sticked to pun-pun.


The Yuan-tis are some ranger-type monsters with full BAB on their racial hit dice, some SLA and PLA, most of which have something to do with crowd control, or stealth, and some juicy SR 9+HD (except for the pureblood, who has 10+HD. The most humanlike one should obviously have the most marked nonhuman abilities, of course.). They can go ranger indeed. Or almost any martial class in fact. They will excel nowhere but will benefit from their abilities whatever their path. Their ability to get easy poison with decent DC would lend itself for a class that likes to attack several times, like ranger, rogue or scout. All in all, all of them are pretty close to +0, they are just underwhelming, with unfocused abilities that makes it difficult to find a perfect class for any of them.

*Pureblood*, 4 RHD: this is mostly worth an LA+0 race by stats alone, with only +2 in Dex, Int and Cha (good stats to have a bonus in, especially with so many SLA). Then we have the very nice Spell Resistance, and a lot of very nice 1st level SLA 1/day. This will not scale well, but Darkness, Charm Monster, and Entangle 1/day is incredible at low-level. Plus, you can change into a viper (nice for sneaking, and to get some cheap poison) and you get two bonus feats. Alertness and Blind-fight are trash, but they can be prerequisites, and feats are feats. All in all, I feel like I would gladly play that with *3 RHD*, and they aren't even that bad at *DLA-0*.

*Halfblood*, 7 RHD: This was one of the monsters that was heavily reworked from 3.0 to 3.5. It used to exist in several versions, with different snake parts of its body which gave it various abilities. For example, the snake-headed one had a bite attack but no SLA. 3.5 changed it by giving it all of the best abilities from every form, because there really was little reason to make it so complicated. In 3.5 you only have 3 variants with very minor bonuses, and the one you're almost always choosing is Snake Tail, which gives you a swim speed and a weak constrict. You're not gonna constrict a lot anyway, since you're Medium with only +4 Str. Compared to the Pureblood, you get lots of stats: +4 Str,  +2 Con, +4 Int, +8 Wis, +2 Cha, which makes for some very respectable mental stats; your SLA become stronger (either they go from 1/day to 3/day, or they're replaced by the stronger version, like Suggestion instead of Charm Person), plus a +10 to Hide checks; +3 Natural Armor; and a bite with some viper venom on it. I'm not sure the halfblood will be very strong with *6 RHD*, but with 5 it would be probably overwhelming. If it wasn't for prerequisites, I would probably say DLA-1, but having BAB higher than ECL can still break things at this level, like getting Divine Crusader one level early and get 9th at 15th level. So *DLA-0*.

*Abomination*, 9 RHD: this one had almost the same thing as Halfblood, where it could have snake or human head, but it was removed altogether instead of changing to variants. Anyway, more of the same, just a bit stronger. Compared to the Halfblood, they have a size increase to Large, a tiny bit more stats (+4 Str and Con, +2 in all mentals, which makes for pretty underwhelming stats all in all), +6 Natural armor (now we're talking), Improved Grab (you're not a great grappler anyway, but that's nice to have in some situations, especially since it works on large creatures), and another improvement to SLA and PLA, notably Baleful Polymorph and at-will Aversion, which makes people afraid of snakes. I would say that all in all, it's worse another 2 RHD more than the Halfblood, for a total of *8 RHD*. And this time, *DLA-1* seems in order.


And with these, we reach two milestones! First, these were the last stand-alone monsters in the Monster Manual. After that, there are only templates and animals left. And second, this is the 139th post in this thread, which makes it the longest-running negative-LA thread by number of posts (Martixy's thread was abandoned after 138 posts)! To celebrate that, we will start looking at dragons starting next week! I believe the best way to address this is to have a post for each age category instead of one post for each color of dragon. So, next time, we will look at all the wyrmlings in the Monster Manual! Let's rate these newborns!

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## H_H_F_F

Congratulations, Beni-Kujaku! Here's to many more.

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## Beni-Kujaku

It's been far too long since last time, but I'm back! And today, we're talking about TRUE DRAGONS!


*Introduction to True Dragon negative LA*

Let's face it, dragons are awesome. True dragons are the creatures in D&D with the most support, having an astounding number of feats, spells and items that are either dedicated to them or that work differently when they're the ones that cast it or that are affected by it. Draconomicon, Dragon Magic, Races of the Dragon, Dragons of Faerun... They're the eponymous creatures of the game, and it shows. On top of it, they naturally get at least a limited access to everything any character would like. Innate spellcasting using both the sorcerer and cleric spell lists, spell resistance, natural weapons, full d12 hit dice, BAB and all three good saves, natural armor, and alternate movement forms, notably flying. And finally, Dragons of Eberron introduced the Sovereign Archetypes. For the cost of your possible cleric casting, you gain very nice advantages, notably 2 more levels of sorcerer (Loredrake), or a fighter feat every 4 HD (Wyrm of War, including non-racial HD).

All of that on top of the incredible advantages from Sovereign Archetypes means that, if it wasn't for LA, you could probably just play any dragon in the MM up to level 20 and not lack too much behind an unoptimized martial, and would definitely be better than a straight fighter. What that means is that, more than for any other creature, the class to which the dragons are compared is important. If we compare them to full casters (like sorcerers, for example), they would almost all need a number of RHD close to their sorcerer level to be viable, and would be overpowered in any other role. If we compare them to fighters, or even most mundanes, like a barbarian, they could probably just be played as is without too much RHDR. I chose to compare them to something like a Warblade or a Swordsage when they have no spellcasting (so, when they're young enough, or for Xorvintaal dragons), that is, able to natively pull some tricks other than just "I hit it, then I hit it again", notably some mobility, but still definitely melee-based. In these case, always assume a Wyrm of War sovereign archetype. When they do have at least one level of sorcerer casting, they should be compared to a sorcerer-fighter-Abjurant Champion gish, because that's about what a dragon is gonna do. One level of sorcerer to allow Abjurant Champion to improve something, maybe one level of barbarian because Flyby pounce is good, then five levels of Abjurant Champion, and just continue as if you were a normal gish. 



So, with this out of the way, we can ask ourselves how we can play a...


*True Dragon (Wyrmling)*


Wyrmlings are dragons who are less than 5 years old. Compared to their lifespan, that'd be the equivalent of a 6 months old human. And even then, they can speak, fly faster than Usain Bolt can run, breathe fire (or whatever element they like) and generally kill any normal adult human in less than 6 seconds. If you find yourself against one of these, just remember it's still a baby. Distract it with something shiny, and you should be off the hook.

All wyrmlings are quite similar. Extremely good flying speed with lowish maneuverability, some nice but not outstanding ability scores and natural armor, an elemental immunity and a weak breath weapon that could be very good if it's damage scaled off of HD. And natural weapons for days. At least 3 natural attacks, and 5 for Gold and Red. 
White, Brass and Silver wyrmlings all got a LA+1 rating in the original thread. White and Brass because they're the lowest-RHD'd dragons in the manual, and Silver because it is the strongest dragon for its age category in a lot of ways, and it isn't because of its number of RHD. It's because it has Alternate form, plus the best breath weapon of all: a paralysing gas that lasts longer than it takes for the dragon to be able to breath again.

*Black Wyrmling, 4 RHD*: Tiny size, +2 Con, -2 Int and Cha. I'm really not sure why this got LA-0 when the white wyrmling got LA+1, since the black wyrmling is pretty clearly superior to the white one, if they are both playable at ECL 4. Black is a slower flyer and can't burrow (but it will still outspeed almost any earthbound creature), but it has +1 natural armor, a smaller malus on mental stats, better damage on its breath attack, and especially one more dragon RHD, with BAB and everything. Of course, that definitely isn't enough for LA+1, but I feel it deserves at least *4 RHD* and *DLA-0*.

*Copper Wyrmling, 5 RHD*: Still tiny, but now with a slow breath weapon, much better ability scores (but still way below what is expected at this level) with +2 con and to all mentals, a permanent spider climb and +4 natural armor. That's a similar situation with the brass as the Black was in with the white. Copper is better than brass if both are playable at ECL 5, even though copper's breath weapon is not as good as brass's. *5 RHD*, *DLA-0*

*Green Wyrmling, 5 RHD*: This one is born small instead of tiny, which gives it at least some reach, but otherwise is not much of an improvement over black. That's on the high end of 4 RHD, or the weak end of 5. As always, I prefer to be conservative, and will say that this is worth *5 RHD* and *DLA-0*, but I fear it will be too weak compared to other options.

*Bronze Wyrmling, 6 RHD*: Better than Copper in almost every way, but by a small amount. Some panick-inducing breath that is mind-affecting but doesn't count as a fear effect, +4 to all mentals instead of +2, and +2 to strength, a swim speed, Small size... I feel like that's worth a RHD bump. *6 RHD*, *DLA-0*

*Blue Wyrmling, 6 RHD*: The chromatic dragons' breaths are always more underwhelming than the metallic ones, even if they do more damage. And with the low, low ability scores (+2 Str and Con, and that's all) and the underwhelming SLA (destroy water is... funny, but not that useful), I feel like that's a good first dragon with some real RHDR. *5 RHD*, *DLA-0*

*Red Wyrmling, 7 RHD*: Medium-sized. That means 5 natural weapons. That's a lot, especially since wing attacks are really hard to come by. Red wyrmlings have a bit more stats than blue ones, but they are extremely one-dimensional and don't bring much to the table beyond standard true dragon stuff. I don't feel like it should change it's number of RHD compared to blue. *5 RHD* and *DLA-0* for the red wyrmling. 

*Gold Wyrmling, 8 RHD*: Once again, medium-sized, but that's not what we're looking for. Alternate Form! You can now sneak almost anywhere as a spider, get any movement mode or blend in most societies. Your original form will still probably be best for combat. Also, this is by far the strongest wyrmling in terms of stats, with a whopping +6 in strength, and +4 Con. Sadly, that comes at the expense of a good breath attack, which means you'd still probably be better off choosing the Silver wyrmling over this one. *8 RHD* and *DLA-0*.


And here we have the first batch! You'll notice none of them have DNLA. That's because dragon RHD are so good that gaining one or two of these can increase your effectiveness enough that it almost makes up for lost ECL.
Next time, we will cover the Very Young dragons, if you're still hellbent on playing babies!

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## ShurikVch

> That aside, with the current iteration of its stats, what is the best course of action if you want to play one of those? You have no manipulators, and absolutely no way to get some except with grafts (and if you do get graft, you have no reason to keep your invisibility, since even when your glow is off, your zombie arm will still be visible).


Well, firstly: RAW says "becoming invisible as the spell." Invisibility spreads to the all of your body - including grafts (and even backpack, if you have it on!)

Secondly: "The Ecology of Will-o'-Wisp" article included the Soul of Rage as example of Advanced Will-o'-Wisps:



It have Half-Fiend template, Claw attacks, and +25 to Sleight of Hand


Also, to another subject: considering the thread discussing negative LA - what people think about the actual negative LA from the _Epic Level Handbook_?
I mean - since their ECL<HD - it should mean negative LA, right? 
Atropal LA: -22
Hagunemnon (Protean) LA: -8
Hunefer LA: -23
Ruin Swarm LA: -25
Uvuudaum LA: -8

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Well, firstly: RAW says "becoming invisible as the spell." Invisibility spreads to the all of your body - including grafts (and even backpack, if you have it on!)


Strictly RAW, I completely agree (though the strict RAW is "you can't play that", but that's besides the point). The point of my sentence was that it makes no sense that an invisibility based on its anatomy works on something that is clearly not its anatomy. RAW, the Will-o-Wisp can't extinguish its glow in an antimagic field (it ca use its ability, since it's (Ex), but it would have no effect), and you could dispel it extinguishing its glow, which makes absolutely no sense whatsoever, considering it's just it holding its breath. And if it attacks, it must reactivate its glow?? No, really, considering this ability to be identical to the spell really makes no sense.

And even if it could make everything it touches invisible, having to use high level items (most arm grafts cost around 25,000 to 50,000 gp) that are pretty extensively in the hand of the GM (when are you going to find a fiend willing to graft you anything anyway) to get manipulators is the problem here. And the graft rules strongly imply that you have to replace one of your limbs of the right kind to get a graft, except specifically noted. Since no arm graft say that you can graft them on top of your other arms, you just can't get a graft, really. Your ability to make them invisible or not isn't really what matters here. But it could matter if you wanted to make something like your ioun stones invisible.




> Secondly: "The Ecology of Will-o'-Wisp" article included the Soul of Rage as example of Advanced Will-o'-Wisps:
> 
> It have Half-Fiend template, Claw attacks, and +25 to Sleight of Hand


That's hilarious ^^ The little toothed mouth is what sold it to me. But these are definitely not manipulators. They are just claws, and having claws doesn't give you the ability to manipulate anything (joke's on you, housecat! Maybe you can kill a commoner, but you can't open a tuna can without them!). Also, I fail to see where this comes from. The only "ecology of will o wisps" I found was in Dragon Magazine 328, and it doesn't seem to have the Soul of Rage.





> Also, to another subject: considering the thread discussing negative LA - what people think about the actual negative LA from the _Epic Level Handbook_?
> I mean - since their ECL<HD - it should mean negative LA, right? 
> Atropal LA: -22
> Hagunemnon (Protean) LA: -8
> Hunefer LA: -23
> Ruin Swarm LA: -25
> Uvuudaum LA: -8


DNLA breaks the game in three ways. First, it allows the character to take prestige classes and feats before they are supposed to. Then, it allows the character to take epic feats in a non-epic game, and finally, it interacts weirdly with effects based on the number of HD. Notably, it allows to use your frightful presence on characters of your ECL. The first two don't apply to epic, since... Well, since you should be able to access any and all prestige classes and feats already. The most it can do is give you two or three more uses of epic spells than other people at your ECL, but considering the rest of your spellcasting will be 20+ levels late, it doesn't seem like a really big problem. 
Finally, characters in epic levels have so many abilities and immunities that getting immunity to Dictum and free action shaken with your Frightful Presence doesn't break the game at all. This is why it's the only time in all of 3.5 where we see actual, official DNLA (Incarnate Construct doesn't count since it doesn't allow you to get more HD than your ECL). 

That said, the values they assigned... aren't exactly horrible?
-The Mercane should possibly get a LA+1, but bad editing aside, +0 seems fair.
-The ability of the atropal to create and control undead natively up to 36 HD makes for some extremely powerful minionmancy shenanigans, even up to ECL 44 (what's the matter if you can't cast epic spells when your mummified servant can). I think that's a good DNLA.
-The Hagunemnon is so incredibly broken it makes no sense. Any four extraordinary abilities in the whole game? Even at these absurd levels, I think it's worth way more than ECL 36 (even if we don't consider that one of these four can be Alter Shape, and the Hagunemnon could theoretically gain an infinite number of Extraordinary abilities that way).
-The Hunefer is... nice. But I don't think it should be this high. In the end, it's just a fast boi that hits you with things that most anything will be immune to. And Ruin is a total joke. How is that an epic spell exactly? A disintegrate cast at CL 11 does more damage. Maybe something around ECL 22 to 25, just because of the absurd amount of stats and DC to its abilities?
-Ruin Swarm. Ha, ha, ha. No, that almost should be nonepic. There's absolutely nothing here. ECL 21 just because 10 epic feats should amount to something, but that's ridiculous. This probably would have 9 to 12 HD in RHDR.
-Uvuudaum has some really really nice SLAs. Notably, Contingent Resurrection can be cast infinitely since you don't have to lose an epic spell slot (you don't have one). And its head spike can be extremely deadly too, if you find a way to make several attacks per round. Still, compared to what people can do at these levels, it comes a bit short. I'd say ECL 24, maybe??

Then again, we'll come back to those if the LA assignment thread ever goes to rate the ELH, but really I was pretty impressed by how they managed it.

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## ShurikVch

> Strictly RAW, I completely agree (though the strict RAW is "you can't play that", but that's besides the point).


Actually, you - technically - can: _Dragon_ #293 gave ECL to many creatures from _Monster Manual_
Unfortunately, Will-o'-Wisp got enormous LA +10 (which looks less like "It's *that* powerful!", and more "Don't play weird creatures!"  :Small Mad: )
Also, that article implemented negative LA too: 14 of listed creatures have ECL 0, which may imply they're "LA: -1" (or even "-3" - if Animals listed presuming they're Awakened or Celestial/Fiendish)





> The point of my sentence was that it makes no sense that an invisibility based on its anatomy works on something that is clearly not its anatomy.


The same problem as with aforementioned Hagunemnon using their Alter Shape to get extraordinary qualities of a Golem - despite a Golems aren't anatomical too...




> RAW, the Will-o-Wisp can't extinguish its glow in an antimagic field


 :Small Confused:  [citation needed]




> (it ca use its ability, since it's (Ex), but it would have no effect)


AMF don't suppress extraordinary abilities.
What's you mean?




> and you could dispel it extinguishing its glow, which makes absolutely no sense whatsoever, considering it's just it holding its breath.


Can you quote the relevant part?
Neither the "Ecology" article, nor description in the _Monster Manual_ itself says such thing...




> And if it attacks, it must reactivate its glow?? No, really, considering this ability to be identical to the spell really makes no sense.


Even if it, really, must - maybe, it just can't "to hold its breath" while attacking?





> And even if it could make everything it touches invisible, having to use high level items (most arm grafts cost around 25,000 to 50,000 gp) that are pretty extensively in the hand of the GM (when are you going to find a fiend willing to graft you anything anyway) to get manipulators is the problem here.


Good point!




> And the graft rules strongly imply that you have to replace one of your limbs of the right kind to get a graft, except specifically noted.


It's incorrect: you never replace anything unless the graft itself required so
Say, grafted wings - did you had a pair of wings before which you replaced with the graft? Same thing about the grafted tails.
Neither Crown of Eyes, nor Eye Stalk are, actually, replacing your eyes...





> Since no arm graft say that you can graft them on top of your other arms, you just can't get a graft, really.


Clawed Arm give you ability to make Claw attack in addition to your any other attacks
How is it possible, if the graft in question just replaced your arm?
But if it's addition rather than replacement - then everything is clear.





> That's hilarious ^^ The little toothed mouth is what sold it to me. But these are definitely not manipulators. They are just claws, and having claws doesn't give you the ability to manipulate anything


But Sleight of Hand bonus hints: it, clearly, can!
After all, there are plenty of creatures with perfectly good pair of hands - such as Elves - who don't have any SoH bonus...




> Also, I fail to see where this comes from. The only "ecology of will o wisps" I found was in Dragon Magazine 328, and it doesn't seem to have the Soul of Rage.


It's from the article in the Dragon Monster Ecologies:

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## Beni-Kujaku

> _Dragon_ #293 implemented negative LA too


And just like that, we have something to answer to anybody asking why we don't include Dragon Magazine in competitions.



> The same problem as with aforementioned Hagunemnon using their Alter Shape to get extraordinary qualities of a Golem - despite a Golems aren't anatomical too...


Why wouldn't they be? We have no lore reason on why golems are immune to magic, it's possibly because of how they're made, so anatomic.




> AMF don't suppress extraordinary abilities.
> What's you mean?
> Can you quote the relevant part?
> Neither the "Ecology" article, nor description in the _Monster Manual_ itself says such thing...


No, that's my bad on the antimagic and dispelling.

For the "holding its breath", from _Dragon_ 328: Will-o-wisps gain sustenance from two sources: natural gas and emotional energy. A wisp inhales the gas formed by decomposing plant and animal matter and processes it in several ways. It expels some of the gas to propel itself through the air with great precision and speed while absorbing the rest of the gas to fuel its biological functions. Digesting gas in this way produces a by-product that ignites in a heatless light when it comes into contact with air. When a will-o-wisp exhales, this by-product flares up on the surface of its skin, creating its flickering flames and the faintest smell of sulphur.
[...]By ceasing to exhale, a will-o'-wisp can extinguish the flames that surround its body, leaving an effectively invisible transparent globe behind. The will-o'- wisp can remain invisible as long as it likes by breathing very shallowly and slowly.




> It's incorrect: you never replace anything unless the graft itself required so
> Clawed Arm give you ability to make Claw attack in addition to your any other attacks
> How is it possible, if the graft in question just replaced your arm?
> But if it's addition rather than replacement - then everything is clear.


I disagree. For grafts on the arms and legs at least, I'm pretty sure the intention in Fiend Folio was to replace the limb. The Clawed Arm just attacks on top of your other actions if it isn't used for anything else. You can cast spells with your other arm, or attack with a one-handed weapon, then the clawed arm attacks. This is clarified by two things: First, in the introductory paragraph of the fiendish grafts (p209), it is said that there are devices that can "remove one of its limbs, [...] and replace the limb with a fiendish graft", even though no fiendish graft explicitly says they replace a limb. On top of it, the Springing Leg fiendish graft talks of "the discrepancy between its two legs", which means pretty clearly that they intended the graft to replace one of the creature's legs, even though they didn't say it explicitly.

Anyways, as always, it's a matter of reading and you can rule it as you want in one of your games.





> But Sleight of Hand bonus hints: it, clearly, can!
> After all, there are plenty of creatures with perfectly good pair of hands - such as Elves - who don't have any SoH bonus...


There is no correlation between people with hands not having Sleight of Hand, and people with Sleight of Hand obligatorily having hands. And I see nothing in the half-fiend template that gives the ability to manipulate items. There even is a clause that if the base creature has the ability to wield weapons, then the half-fiend retains it. Which means the half-fiend acknowledges the possibility of the base creature to not be able to wield weapons, and doesn't give any ability to do so.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Very Young Dragons*

Puny Human: Uh, my ancestors sent
a little lizard to help me?
Very Young Dragon: Hey! Dragon. Duh-rah-gawn. Not lizard. I don't do that tongue thing. 
PH: You're uh...
VYD: Intimidating? Awe-inspiring?
PH: ...Tiny Small.



The dragons now have left the nest (or lair), but they are still small enough that people often won't take them seriously. And with good reasons. They're still young, and if they think they are already a big deal (and they are, to normal humans and animals), they are still inexperienced and won't be a threat to any party who knows what they're doing. If you ever cross the road of a very young dragon, just play with it for a few minutes. If it is amused enough, you'll be able to just go away. 


Most dragons don't get new abilities at this age, so you're paying 3 RHD for low stats increases and sometimes a size increase. Spectacular. That also means that's the first level where all of the MM dragons are underpowered when played at their ECL.

*Very Young White Dragon*: 6 RHD: White dragons are known to be the stupidest kind, and it shows, with -4 in both Int and Cha, but it has a number of RHD equivalent to that of a wyrmling. In fact, it is surprisingly similar to the green wyrmling, with worse mental stats (-4 in both Int and Cha), better natural armor (5 instead of 4) and better movement speeds. The same rating seems justified, even though the VY White will probably see less play. *5 RHD*, *DLA-0*.

*Very Young Brass Dragon*: 7 RHD: Same stats as the white dragon, but with no mental stats malus, a +6 in natural armor, and a cone of sleep as a breath weapon, which is way better than anything else the white can pull off. 
*6 RHD*, *DLA-0*

*Very Young Black Dragon*: 7 RHD: Remember what I said about White Dragons being close to Green Wyrmlings? As above, so below, but only -2 to mental stats, an even better natural armor, but no good flying speed. With its swimming speed, its Hide skill and its ability to breathe underwater, it might make a good ambush in a swamp or something like that. Anyway, *5 RHD*, and *DLA-0*

*Very Young Copper Dragon*: 8 RHD: Worth than a gold wyrmling in almost every way, and doesn't have alternate form, but it still has decent mental stats, and an useable breath weapon, even if it is not as good as Copper's. I'd say it just barely would be competent enough with *6 RHD*, and it seems the right place for the first DNLA for true dragons, since ECL 7 is a point where most BAB-based prestige classes are already accessible, and having *DLA-1* will not break anything (except of course if you go Ur-Priest and take Epic Spellcasting at level 20)

*Very Young Green Dragon*: 8 RHD: Already the Green one? Just two dragons ago I discussed a comparison with the green wyrmling! That's to say how little the green dragon really gains at this level. +2 Str and Con, +7 NA instead of +4, you increase your flying speed but lose maneuverability, and you become Medium, which means you gain 2 natural attacks with 2 wing buffets. That's nice, but is it worth more than 1 HD, I don't think so. *6 RHD*, *DLA-0*.

*Very Young Bronze Dragon*: 9 RHD: That's just a Gold Wyrling that's a bit slower, has a way better breath attack, but doesn't have Alternate Form. That should be testament to how overpowered the gold wyrmling is compared to the other wyrmlings to you have to go up to the VY bronze to find an equivalent. Anyway, lack of Alternate Form really hurts your utility. *7 RHD*, *DLA-1*

*Very Young Blue Dragon*: 9 RHD: This is the first color where it becomes evident how weak chromatic dragons are compared to their Metallic equivalent in terms of RHD. Blue has -4 in all mental stats and a way worse breath weapon than Bronze, and nothing to compensate. This feels like a strong *6 RHD*, but no more. And *DLA-1*.

*Very Young Silver Dragon*: 10 RHD: And if you start comparing Blue to the best color, Silver, it becomes even more obvious. The silver dragon had everything it wanted at birth, and only got the standard +2 Str and Con, worse maneuverability and size increase to Medium, with natural attacks to boot. That's a gold wyrmling with an actually good breath weapon and two immunities instead of one. *9 RHD*, *DLA-0*.

*Very Young Red Dragon*: 10 RHD: The strongest chromatic dragon color is heads and shoulders above Blue in terms of stats, with +6 Str, +4 Con and +2 in all mentals compared to its colleague. That, on top of Large size and the strongest breath weapon damage-wise of all VY dragons (equal with Gold), is no doubt worth *8 RHD* (even though I suspect it may be a tiny bit weak at this ECL), and *DLA-1*.

*Very Young Gold Dragon*: 11 RHD: And here we have Gold. The first Large metallic dragon. That's 6 natural weapons, +6 to all mentals, +10 Str, 60ft walking speed and 200ft flying speed... Everything dragon pushed to eleven, except the breath weapon, which is still underwhelming as ever. Probably the only metallic dragon who will always use its fire breath instead of its alternative one. Is it better than a VY Silver Dragon? Most probably, even with that unuseable breath weapon. Is it better enough to warrant +1? Most probably no. We're starting to see 5th level spells in the opposition, after all. *9 RHD*, *DLA-1*.

And here we have all the Very Young Dragons! This is the last age category where Alternate Form will be the exclusive property of Silver and Gold, as well as the last where Alternate Form will really be a big deal. This is also the first where Whites are LA-0. You see, Whites are pretty unique, because they are so dumb. Usually, intelligence is associated with memory, and you'd think that Whites can't remember much of anything with their 6 Int, compared to other dragons. On the contrary, they have photographic memory, and will remember every truce they had to get revenge eventually, or where they got every single one coin of their hoard. This low Int in fact represents the fact that their memory only applies to physical events, and not to the knowledge that is linked to it. A white dragon could remember exactly how someone wielded a sword, but could not translate it into doing it itself, or if it was hard to dodge, only "I dodged it" or "I didn't dodge it", which of course translate into having difficulty to learn new skills, and why they have such a hit to intelligence. 

What did you think about these ratings? Are the Gold and Silver a bit too high? Next time, we will cover Young Dragons, and that's where the "gish" part will come into play...

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## ShurikVch

> Why wouldn't they be? We have no lore reason on why golems are immune to magic, it's possibly because of how they're made, so anatomic.


Well, firstly: Constructs have no anatomy by definition - thus, any of their qualities aren't anatomic
And, if it isn't convinced you - let me point to Animated Object's Hardness and Colossi's Antimagic Field: they're extraordinary too, and thus - legal for Hagunemnon's Alter Shape





> I disagree. For grafts on the arms and legs at least, I'm pretty sure the intention in Fiend Folio was to replace the limb. The Clawed Arm just attacks on top of your other actions if it isn't used for anything else. You can cast spells with your other arm, or attack with a one-handed weapon, then the clawed arm attacks. This is clarified by two things: First, in the introductory paragraph of the fiendish grafts (p209), it is said that there are devices that can "remove one of its limbs, [...] and replace the limb with a fiendish graft", even though no fiendish graft explicitly says they replace a limb.


Check the Aboleth Tentacle:



> An aboleth tentacle *typically* replaces an arm or forelimb on the grafted creature, though sometimes it is attached just *above* a forelimb or *below* an arm.


Thus, "replacement" is an option - not a requirement.




> On top of it, the Springing Leg fiendish graft talks of "the discrepancy between its two legs", which means pretty clearly that they intended the graft to replace one of the creature's legs, even though they didn't say it explicitly.


The Springing Leg have problematic RAW: you take the -10' speed penalty because of "the discrepancy between its two legs"; but if you graft the second leg - you take -10' more
(Let's hope you aren't quadruped and spent 140000 gp on 4 Springing Legs...  :Small Amused: )





> There is no correlation between people with hands not having Sleight of Hand, and people with Sleight of Hand obligatorily having hands.


I humbly ask to demonstrate a single official creature which have ranks in Sleight of Hand while lacking any actual hands (or other suitable substitution - like tentacles, or telekinesis)




> And I see nothing in the half-fiend template that gives the ability to manipulate items. There even is a clause that if the base creature has the ability to wield weapons, then the half-fiend retains it. Which means the half-fiend acknowledges the possibility of the base creature to not be able to wield weapons, and doesn't give any ability to do so.


I see nothing in the Will-o'-Wisp description which says it's incapable to manipulate items - even without Half-Fiend template
After all, Will-o'-Wisp have



> *Treasure:* 1/10 coins; 50% goods; 50% items


How, exactly, it amassed those treasures if it incapable to manipulate items? (And where, exactly, it keeps them?)

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## Remuko

> *Very Young Dragons*
> 
> Puny Human: Uh, my ancestors sent
> a little lizard to help me?
> Very Young Dragon: Hey! Dragon. Duh-rah-gawn. Not lizard. I don't do that tongue thing. 
> PH: You're uh...
> VYD: Intimidating? Awe-inspiring?
> PH: ...Tiny Small.
> 
> ...


I played a Brass Dragon and I didn't feel too underpowered, so I think this rating seems about right. I kinda miss Ixen tbh, he was super fun once he got some levels in Warshaper.

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## Metastachydium

> And here we have all the Very Young Dragons!


(Except, ahm, the red one?)

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## Beni-Kujaku

> (Except, ahm, the red one?)


... Indeed. Let's say he was ashamed to stand between the silver and gold dragon. I will add it tonight, but it will be 7 RHD and DLA-1. A strong 7 RHD, I'd say maybe even worth 8 RHD. Size increases do wonders to a dragon.


Edit: Done, and I believe 8 RHD was better. A Large dragon with these stats can be pretty devastating, especially with Wyrm of War.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Young Dragon*

"A hatchling, that is what you are. A hatchling struggling into the world. I may be younger than you in years, but I am ancient in my thoughts. Do not worry about these things. Find peace in where and what you are. People often know what must be done. All you need to do is show them the way  that is wisdom." 
An inexplicably Chaotic Good young blue dragon boasting her +2 racial wisdom to her half-elf adventuring buddy



At that age, dragons start becoming fierce opponent for low-level parties, notably because of their breath weapon and the sorcerer level that the strongest ones can get. They also now have, except for White, mental capabilities on par with that of a human, but they also start developing the pride that will define them for the rest of their life. To defeat one, taunt it until it comes close enough that you can beat it into submission.

Mechanically, we see a real schism between metallic and chromatic dragons at this level. Chromatic dragons (except Red) gain almost nothing at this level, only so-so stats and a size increase to Medium for those who were still Small as a Very Young Dragon. On the other hand, all the metallic dragons, as well as Red, gain their first level of sorcerer casting, which allows them to really diversify their gameplay. And that is, by two main ways: either you get Loredrake and you cast as a 3rd level sorcerer, and you're a sorcerer who can fight, or you get any other Sovereign Archetype and you try to make the most out of your fighting skills, and you're a melee combatant with a few tricks. Either way, you're probably always better off taking Abjurant Champion as soon as possible, to increase your options without losing BAB. Do note that if your DM allows Dragon Magazine, the Spellhoarding template (#313) allows a Lightbringer dragon to scribe any wizard _and cleric_ spells in their spellhoard. That's some near-Tier 0 shenanigans right there. Or it would be if you could get the whole progression. You won't get 9th, and you aren't a persistomancer.

*Young White Dragon*, 9 RHD: Anyway, let's go back to the non-casting ones. And White really lacks behind even its chromatic brethren. Compared to the red _wyrmling_, you have -2 Str, -4 Int and Cha, much better movement speeds with +50ft flying and the same (poor) maneuverability, a burrow speed and a swimming speed, +2 Natural armor, and an almost equal breath weapon (Young White: 10.5 damage average, Red Wyrmling: 11 damage average).  I think that pretty much evens out. *5 RHD* for White. And *DLA-2*, just because with these mental stats, it won't be able to use these bonus skill points efficiently.

*Young Brass Dragon*, 10 RHD: Smarter than the toughies, and tougher than the smarties, the brass dragon is unimpressive stat-wise, and comparable to a very young Bronze or a gold wyrmling, with everything ever-so-slightly worse, but with a first level sorcerer casting. *8 RHD*, *DLA-1* for Brass.

*Young Black Dragon*, 10 RHD: Very close to Brass, but without a Save-or-Lose breath and with no spellcasting? Yeah, I'll pass on this one. *6 RHD*, *DLA-2*.

*Young Copper Dragon*, 11 RHD: Slow is not that good on a breath weapon, and it doesn't like getting (poor) maneuverability. I don't think it's worth more than the Brass dragon. *8 RHD*, *DLA-1*

*Young Green Dragon*, 11 RHD: Congratulations, you gain nothing! Or, well, +2 in Str, Int, Wis and Cha, +3 Natural Armor, and a bit stronger breath weapon, but is that really worth 1 more RHD? Yeah, I guess so. *7 RHD*, *DLA-2*

*Young Bronze Dragon*, 12 RHD: 1st level sorcerer casting *and* Alternate Form! Clean! A shame that everybody and their mother starts to have at least Alter Self at this level, But that's still some good advancement. And with the absolutely excellent breath weapon it has (nobody is going to convince me that this is not just Bronze not having washed its teeth with enough mint), it is worth at least *9 RHD* and *DLA-1*

*Young Blue Dragon*, 12 RHD: Congratulations, you gain noth... Ah, I already made this one? Blue is a carbon copy of Green, with +1 more natural armor and +6 average damage on the breath weapon. *7 RHD*, *DLA-2*

*Young Silver Dragon*, 13 RHD: How does it feel to not have the exclusivity on Alternate Form anymore with Gold? Yeah, that feels like *10 RHD*, *DLA-1*. Young Silver is still one of the smartest dragons, with the best breath weapon, and sorcerer casting will be another boon.

*Young Red Dragon*, 13 RHD: +4 Str, +3 Natural Armor and 1st level sorcerer casting compared to 10 years prior. Let's add one RHD and call it a day. *9 RHD*, *DLA-2*

*Young Gold Dragon*, 14 RHD: +4 Str, +3 Natural Armor and 1st level sorcerer casting compared to 10 years prior. Let's add one RHD and call it a day. *10 RHD*, *DLA-2*

Have you noticed that every young dragon with at least 12 Cha had a sorcerer level, except Green and Blue? In fact, every single MM dragon gains their sorcerer casting when they first get at least +2 Cha and young age, except these two, who have to wait one age category more. Strange design if you ask me.
Next time, we will continue on the timeline, and cover the Juvenile dragons, one of the two age categories, with ancient, with an original name.

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Juvenile Dragons*

"No hunter of the sky should end his days as prey. Better to die on the wing than pinned to the ground." Juvenile Dragon, one round before hitting a wall because of their poor maneuverability.



The juvenile age category is the last one where you can play a MM true dragon, following the official rules. And that's fortunate, since they _really_ start to lag behind in terms of power and characteristics. They all used a good bit more than half their nonepic progression, and they don't even get their 2nd level spells without a sovereign archetype. And they don't get much more than that, except 1st level spells as an SLA for most of them. If you ever encounter them, wait for them to use their breath weapon, then attack them during their recharge time.

*Juvenile White Dragon*, 12 RHD: This one is just sad. These ability scores (+6 Str, +4 Con, -2 Int and Cha) would be weak on a 4 RHD creature. The breath weapon is weaker than most Very Young dragons', and _it's still freaking medium_! *6 RHD*, *DLA-3*.

*Juvenile Brass Dragon*, 13 RHD: What if a white dragon was intelligent? And had magical training? And had a soporific gas breath weapon? That would probably make something akin to a brass dragon. And that would change quite a bit. Yet, it's really not that better than a Very Young Brass Dragon. 2 sorcerer levels, yes, but apart from that it's just +2 Str and +3 natural armor. As I see it, *9 RHD* and *DLA-2* seem adapted, but let me know if you think that gaining 2 levels of sorcerer casting should always be worth +2 ECL at least, even if it comes so late and doesn't give a new spell level.

*Juvenile Black Dragon*, 13 RHD: Compared to its young self, the Juvenile Black has +2 Str, for a total of +6, +2d4 on its breath weapon, and +3 natural armor. Is it even worth 7 RHD? Yeah, probably. *7 RHD*, *DLA-3*

*Juvenile Copper Dragon*, 14 RHD: Exactly the same progression as Brass, exactly the same verdict. A pretty strong *9 RHD*, *DLA-2*

*Juvenile Green Dragon*, 14 RHD: Now's your chance to be a [Big Shot]! Or, I mean, a [Large Dragon]! Reach, full 6 attacks routine, and longer breath range. That, plus gaining +2 to Str and all mental stats, plus your first level sorcerer casting means that you should be worth at least 2 ECL higher than your Young self. A strong *9 RHD* and *DLA-2*.

*Juvenile Bronze Dragon*, 15 RHD: Large size, _and_ 3rd level sorcerer casting? Is it christmas already? Bronze definitely has some strong age categories when everybody else doesn't. *12 RHD*, and *DLA-2*

*Juvenile Blue Dragon*, 15 RHD: Blue also made it Large this time, and awakened its innate magic. Like the Green Dragon, *9 RHD* and *DLA-2*

*Juvenile Silver Dragon*, 16 RHD: Seemingly everything Silver had on top of Bronze disappears at this age category. Still a slightly better breath, +1 natural armor and cloudwalking, but I don't think it's worth one more HD. *12 RHD*, *DLA-2*

*Juvenile Red Dragon*, 16 RHD: The jump in ability score between Red and the other chromatics is stupendous. In total, that's +18 Str, +8 Con, +4 to Int, Wis and Cha. It might even be acceptable for a 8-10 RHD creature. And the 8d10 breath weapon will sting. Along with 3rd level sorcerer casting, I believe it almost makes up for the weaker breath weapon and mental abilities compared to Silver. *12 RHD*, *DLA-2*

*Juvenile Gold Dragon*, 17 RHD: The physical stats of Red, the mental stats of Silver, and still 60ft movement speed. Only the breath weapon leaves something to be desired. It still misses the days of 2nd edition where it had a weird cloud of chlorine as a breath weapon, that supposedly dealt the breath damage every round to people that stayed inside. I believe, all in all, Gold could be worth *13 RHD*, and *DLA-2*. At this level, the difference due to a different breath weapon becomes less and less noticeable.


And that's all the Juvenile Dragons. As I research these, I'm amazed at the depth of the lore surrounding them. Did you know that they even had scientific designation in 1st edition? Black is _Draco Causticus Sputem_; Bronze is _Draco Gerus Bronzo_; Red is _Draco Conflagratio Horriblis_ and Gold is _Draco Orientalus Sino Dux_. These names are a combination of the most remarkable characteristics of the dragon, be it their breath weapon, their appearance or their strength. I have no idea why they did it, but I always like seeing some bit of scientific thinking in the D&D universe, and such a classification means that despite the fact that the world was obviously created by the gods, they still have a Theory of Evolution, although probably a pretty limited one.

Next time, we will cover the Young Adults, and the biggest jump in power in a dragon's life.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Young Adult Dragons*

"My armor is like tenfold shields. My teeth are swords, my claws spears. The shock of my tail, a thunderbolt! My wings, a hurricane! And my breath... Death."
_A young adult black dragon, bragging before a halfling rogue separated from his party_



_If you deny a dragon their snack, then be prepared to become the snack yourself_


There's no going around it, when you're planning an encounter against a dragon, chances are that you're thinking about a Young Adult. That is the exact point in life where they go from "Technically dangerous but ultimately a cute fire-breathing child" to "Terrifying magical beasts capable of wiping entire parties without extreme care". A Young Adult gets everything that makes them into a worthwhile boss. First, their Frightful Presence, to keep peons and NPCs away. Then, their second level spell, for most of them, making each of them a customizable fight for the DM and a surprising experience for the players. Third, all of them are now at least Large, with the strongest of them being Huge. They now all are able to attack from their front with their bite, from their back with their tail, from below with their claws, from above with their wings and from afar with their breath weapon. That's the way to set the mood. Against a dragon, you're not safe _anywhere_. And finally, maybe above all, they get damage reduction, which probably won't do much at this level, and spell resistance, which both helps to make the dragon seem invincible against weak opponents, and gives it the chance to survive more than a few rounds to make the fight a real boss fight. 

That, ladies and gentlemen is genius design. This is the way to, in one fell swoop, make a terrifying creature for new players, and create a hard break in the power level to tell everybody "Now it's an adult, now it's okay to fight it. Go have fun killing it.". But it's also the age category where dragons can enter the Great Game Xorvintaal. Forsaking their caster abilities to gain instead the ability to influence "pawns", to send them somewhere, and other abilities to make them harder to kill, but not that much better at dealing damage. In a word, to send PCs on quests, or NPCs to meet them. That is the age category where dragons can become plot points. And that's the only real way to gauge a campaign. In any given campaign, there will eventually be a dragon. If the first thing that comes out of its mouth is words, then it's a RP-heavy campaign. If it's a breath attack, then it's a combat-focused one.


But what about playing it as a PC? Well, Young Adult is probably the age category I would recommend playing a dragon the most, except wyrmling. That's when you're really a full dragon. If you had any expectation about what a dragon PC could do, then they should be met right now. Of course, they still have lowish stats and have so many options now between full attack, spells and breath weapon that they can't be good everywhere. If you put too many feats in your breath weapon, you might become a bit helpless during recharge rounds. If you become a Wyrm of War and fight mostly in melee, you'll be vulnerable to spells and be dependant on your low maneuvrability. And if you specialize solely in spells, you'll probably have a hard time keeping up with full casters. If you have to fight one, try to assess the situation with a tank and make it use its breath weapon, then pin it to the ground somehow before acting accordingly to its strengths and weaknesses.


*Young Adult White Dragon*, 15 RHD: You know how litterally every single other dragons of every other age category have the same Intelligence and Charisma? Yeah, just for Young Adults and Adult White Dragons, Intelligence will be 2 points lower. Just to hammer the fact that they're dumb as bricks. What that makes is that their stats and breath weapon are strictly inferior to those of a _Very Young_ Red Dragon. Of course, they now have DR 5/Magic and SR 1+HD. Yes, you read that right. A caster at the same level as the dragon will bypass your resistance even on a natural 1. The thing is, dragon Spell Resistance is based on their CR instead of their HD. Which makes it almost unusable right from the moment they get it. The only dragon who will really get to use it is the steel dragon, which we will not cover for a pretty long time. The only use for this SR is with DNLA, or if you're somehow going  Forsaker for that sweet, sweet stacking SR. In RHDR, however, what this means is that you'll almost always choose to play a Xorvintaal Dragon. You lose nothing (no caster level and no SR), and you get... kind of a lot actually. First, you get one out of a list of abilities (the most interesting ones being a sort of secondary breath as a swift action that deafens and deals half as much as your regular breath, _Intimidating Presence_, which means you lose _Frightful presence_ but instead can use Intimidate to automatically set the attitude of an NPC closer than 150ft to friendly (no limit on the NPC's hit dice, but your DC is higher according to their number of HD; a form of immortality (you start regenerating 10 minutes after reaching -10 hit points, but you still die from death effects and beheading); and _Twist of Fate_, which gets you some immediate action defenses). Also, you can grant your companions the exarch template, which mostly allows you to scry on them and speak with them wherever they are, and some nifty abilities that may or may not be renewable. With all that, I believe it should be stronger than the VY Red, but not by that much. *9 RHD* for White. With their Frightful Presence actually usable and their Spell Resistance active, DNLA is not a bad place for a Young Adult Dragon. I still think they would benefit from entering Xorvintaal, but less so. *DLA-2*.

*Young Adult Brass Dragon*, 16 RHD: Spell Resistance 2+HD, woohoo! Anyway, that's just the standard package, but Brass got their 2nd level spells and Large size, plus a nice +2 across the board on their stats. Metallic dragons have much less incentive to enter the Great Game, but that's still a very nice increase. I believe it would be pretty strong at *11 RHD*, but too weak at 12. And *DLA-2*

*Young Adult Black Dragon*, 16 RHD: Congrats, you get your 1st level spells when most other dragons get their 2nd! The improvements compared to White are negligible. *9 RHD*, *DLA-3*

*Young Adult Copper Dragon*, 17 RHD: SR 2+HD might come up once in a blue moon. The rest is very similar to Brass with just +2 in all mental stats. A weak *12 RHD*, and a strong *DLA-3*.

*Young Adult Green Dragon*, 17 RHD: I just realized the chromatic dragon with the air subtype has a swim speed, and doesn't even have that good of a flying speed compared to other dragons. Your breath weapon starts to be interesting, with 2d6 per age category, compared to Black's 2d4 and White's 1d6, you have a bit more stats, but above all, you have +2 caster levels, to a total of 3! Still no 2nd level spells, but we're getting there. Pretty obviously *10 RHD* and *DLA-4*

*Young Adult Bronze Dragon*, 18 RHD: Still 2+HD SR. I don't think Alternate Form and a slightly better breath weapon can justify having more than one RHD more than Copper. *13 RHD*, *DLA-3*

*Young Adult Blue Dragon*, 18 RHD: Rarely have I seen so few things changing, even between other instances of Blue and Green. *10 RHD*, *DLA-4*.

*Young Adult Silver Dragon*, 19 RHD: As above, so below. That's almost exactly the same statblock as Bronze. *13 RHD*, *DLA-4*

*Young Adult Red Dragon*, 19 RHD: HUGE! However, Huge size doesn't give a dragon as much as Large size does, since their crush is a standard action and doesn't affect creatures above Small. Red is pretty comparable to Silver, with very slightly better stats and one more size category, but much less utility via notably Alternate Form and Cloudwalking. I suggest *13 RHD*, *DLA-4*.

*Young Adult Gold Dragon*, 20 RHD: Who wants to play _only_ this at 20th level? Definitely not me. But it might work nicely around *14 RHD* and *DLA-4*. Adding dragon hit dice starts to not have that much impact when we're nearing level 20.


And here they are, in all their majesty and pride, the Young Adults! As always, please tell me what you think of my ratings. Next time, we will take a small dip into epic territory and review the Adult dragons!

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## ShurikVch

Question: how negative LA would work for E6 rules?
+8 ability points for every "-1"?

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Question: how negative LA would work for E6 rules?
> +8 ability points for every "-1"?


That's a good question. I'm very, very far from an expert in E6, so these are only suggestions. First, I think using DNLA is not the way to go. DNLA is generally simpler to use in a low optimisation game, and would be usable in E6, but with so few levels, you'd like to have as many class levels as possible to create a more customized character (not even counting the fact that using DNLA and replacing negative LA with ability points would prevent you from playing as any monster with natively more than 6 RHD). So I would suggest using RHDR instead, with no change compared to a normal 20-level game (you reduce the monster's number of RHD and play it as if it was LA+0 with the new number of RHD). 

If you for some reason want to play with Direct Negative LA (if you want to play a shrieker, for example, or just if you want the feel of being a full monster and not a reduced version of it), I would suggest not replacing it with ability points. The whole point of "positive LA=less ability points" in E6 is to allow the player to have more class levels, in a game where it is a rare commodity. DNLA does just that, so I don't see why you would change that. Plus, monsters don't really need more stats. They have that already. What they need is some class features. So if you want to play a Large Water Elemental (8 RHD normally, DLA-3, total ECL 5), you could play a Large Water Elemental with one level of Barbarian in E6 (note that since you have 9 HD in total, you get a feat more than other people before going into epic).

Once again, I'm not an expert, and if somebody proposes another way of handling it, I'd like to hear it.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Adult dragons*

_"How fortuitous. Usually I must leave my lair in order to feed my young"_
- An impressively well-represented Adult Black Dragon to misguided adventurers wanting to raid her lair.




What is adulthood for a dragon? For a human or a real-life animal, being an adult can mean a variety of things. Having reached your maximum size, being considered mature enough to be held responsible for your actions, being able to safely procreate and carry babies, being able and authorized to choose for yourself and vote to influence your future, or leaving the parents' home to live by yourself. This is not the case for dragons. Dragons never reach a maximal size and always get bigger and wiser. They can legally be held responsible for their actions from birth, can have children from Young age, are not authorized to vote until they are Great Wyrms, and generally leave their nest around Very Young age. No, for a dragon, being an adult means understanding the necessity to put their species before themselves. Dragons under young adult age don't really care for their wyrmling. They often breed, but mostly leave the eggs be, leading to a very high mortality rate among wyrmlings born of young parents. On the other hand, an adult dragon will start taking care of them, raising them and feeding them for the first few years of the wyrmling's life. That is one of the main reasons why a species so arrogant and so self-centered could survive until now. If you're trying to attack an adult dragon's lair, take into account that no animal is fiercer than when they protect their young. In fact, the best target in this case is to attack a dragon who mated with a dragon of another color. The eggs resulting from such a union may have the immunity to only one parent's breath weapon, making the dragons refrain from using their breath inside their lair, lest they kill their own unborn offspring.

As PCs, adult dragons do not gain much that their young adult self didn't already have. Most of them gain their second 3/day SLA, but considering how weak dragons SLA are, that doesn't make up for increasing their ECL by three. Also, around half of them now have more than 20 RHD. As always, I won't give DNLA to those ones. If you want to, feel free. 

*Adult White Dragon*, 18 RHD: Ladies and gentlemen, it has done it! White now has the same intelligence as a regular human! Round of applause, please. Apart from that, it gets +4 Str, +2 Con, +2 Cha, and its first sorcerer level, which you will probably forego to still go Xorvintaal. *10 RHD*. With DNLA, White gains SR 0+HD and a DC 20 Frightful Presence, which is honestly very high compared to last category. Probably would make a strong *DLA-4*. Oh, yeah, and it has Gust of Wind as an SLA.

*Adult Brass Dragon*, 19 RHD: See, White? That's what you should be able to do. 3rd level sorcerer spells (7th level casting), Suggestion as an SLA, 14 in mentals, and of course still a cone of sleep breath weapon. Not much to say here, it's just a slightly buffed Young Adult. Still, Suggestion is good utility, and the sorcerer casting seems to really come online. *13 RHD*, *DLA-3*.

*Adult Black Dragon*, 19 RHD: There's only one question to ask yourself: is Black worth one RHD more than White. +2 Int and Wis, worse movement speeds, somehow worse SLAs (what does corrupt water even do? Who would ever go fight angels armed with a flask of water?), but +2 sorcerer levels (with no new spell level, though). I believe that, as long as the benefits from Xorvintaal still outweigh having a functional spellcasting ability, Black will not outrank White. *10 RHD*, *DLA-4*

*Adult Copper Dragon*, 20 RHD: Compared to Brass, you have +2 to all mentals, Stone Shape as an SLA (which I find a bit more useful than Suggestion, but your mileage may vary), and worse movement speeds, with very slightly worse breath weapon. I don't think a change is required. *13 RHD*, *DLA-4*.

*Adult Green Dragon*, 20 RHD: I'll never understand how they choose size categories for dragons. Green and Copper have the same number of RHD and Strength (before size adjustments), yet Copper is Large, and Green is Huge. Not that Green will complain of course, but that's still weird. Being Huge nets it +4 Str and +2 to all other stats (except Dex, of course), a nigh-useless crush, a nice Suggestion SLA, and 5th level sorcerer casting giving you 2nd level spells. Nice bonus, I guess. *12 RHD*, *DLA-5*.

*Adult Bronze Dragon*, 21 RHD: And the medal for weakest epic dragon goes to... Adult Bronze! Don't worry, you'll get the bronze medal later. And here we have another typical case of "chromatics can't have nice things". Green doesn't get an SLA as a Juvenile dragon, which means it only has one SLA as an Adult. Bronze doesn't have Juvenile SLA either, but it has two as an Adult to make up for it. Create Food and Water, and Fog Cloud. Fog Cloud probably should have been a Juvenile SLA too. Apart from it, 7th level sorcerer casting, +2 to all stats, +4 to Str, and the standard +3 natural armor, plus Huge size. That seems like an acceptable *15 RHD*, if a bit weak.

*Adult Blue Dragon*, 21 RHD: Finally! Blue and Green are finally distinguishable from each other! And the adult blue dragon, instead of the very good 3rd level spell Suggestion, gets a weak 1st level spell as an SLA, Ventriloquism. Still, that's far from enough to make it one RHD less. *12 RHD*

*Adult Silver Dragon*, 22 RHD: You were the chosen one, one of the two wyrmlings with LA +1! And now you have suboptimal SLAs that put you ever lower than Bronze, with nothing to make up for it (no, +1 natural armor doesn't count). I'm really considering giving it 14 RHD, but no. *15 RHD* for the adult silver dragon.

*Adult Red Dragon*, 22 RHD: Who needs SLA anyway when you have +6 Str, -4 Int and Cha, -2 Wis, compared to Silver, and no paralysing breath weapon? Well, the adult red dragon would like some. Alas, it has nothing. Not even a feather fall. A pretty weak *14 RHD*.

*Adult Gold Dragon*, 23 RHD: Here again, no SLA, but a very nice ability to create a Luck stone, which radiates (at this age category) a +1 luck bonus on saving throws, skill checks and ability checks for at least 19 hours in a 60ft radius. Honestly, that's probably better than most SLAs from other colors. Apart from that, you only really have +6 Str compared to the adult silver dragon (and better movement speeds). Considering your worse breath weapon, I don't think that's worse bumping your ECL up. *15 RHD*.


Once upon a time, a knight tried to attack an adult dragon's lair. The red dragon didn't waste any time and breathed fire on the knight and their steed. The horse succumbed, and the knight, taking the saddle from its corpse, swore that the next creature they would ride would be the dragon itself. He charged, and defeated the dragon, but could not ride it. Why? He needed to _scale up_ the saddle! Hehahhahahehaha!! Haaaa... I shouldn't try to make puns in another language. Anyway, next time, we will take a look at the Mature Dragons, which when compared to dragon's life expectancy, is equivalent to 18-35% of their life. I believe if we were dragons, most of the Playground would be around the Mature age category, or maybe Old for the 1st edition veterans.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Mature Adult Dragons*

_"If you ignore the dragon, it will eat you. If you defy the dragon it will overpower you. But if you ride the dragon, you will take advantage of its strength and power."_ - Chinese proverb



_There's something wrong with this picture of a mature Bronze Dragon. It's not the knight, there are records of humans riding dragons into battle. The absence of a dorsal fin on its back may be explained by injury or mutation. Even the pretty evil-looking and useless armor might be for intimidation or infiltration. However, a dragon would never accept a bridle and reins._


Mature adult dragons have lived long enough that almost no other creature on the material plane can challenge them (you can check the monster manual, the only non-Outsiders with a CR higher than the typical Mature Dragon's 15 are nightwalkers and inevitables, which are extraplanar anyway, the greater stone golem, which should not exist anyway, and the Tarrasque). Most of them (All but Black, White and Green) don't have to hunt anymore either, since they can natively cast Create Food and Water. Which means that, if a mature dragon dies, it is either because they willingly chose to put themselves in danger (many metallic dragons like to go on crusades against evil, for example), because of a feud between dragons, or because some filthy humanoid adventurers go on quests specifically to kill them and take their hoard. They know that, and will invariably overly prepare for the latter eventuality. Which means that, if you're some filthy humanoid adventurers with a taste for easy gold, you absolutely need to fight the dragon outside of their lair (yes, it's the opposite advice from the previous age category. Observe and know your dragons, if they're protective, they're adult, if they're paranoiac, they're mature). Find any excuse to make them go outside, be it that the nearby town sent people to rob them, or that one of their friend is about to die in an ice country, or kill their young to make them thirst for revenge. Because their lair will be so riddled with traps that you won't even be able to see them before you're toast. 

As a PC, however, this age category is probably the most disappointing so far. 4th level spells is not that bad (and even really good), but DR/magic is completely useless (even in 3.0, it was still DR 10/+1, what were they thinking?), and the stats increase are almost inexistent. 

*Mature White Dragon*, 21 RHD: The four weakest dragons do not have it that bad, since they at least get Huge size, and the reach thereof, and actually interesting stat increases with +4 Str, +2 Con, and +2 to all mental stats. White now has +16 Str, +10 Con, and +2 in mental stats, plus... Still no 2nd level spells? What are you waiting for, Great Wyrm? The question is: is it worth 12 RHD? Is it an instant pick compared to a Young Adult Brass or a Juvenile Bronze? Compared to the former, White has +8 Str and +4 Con, for -2 Int, Wis and Cha, +5 natural armor, a better DR and a size increase, but is 2 sorcerer levels late and has a worse breath weapon. I believe this still makes the Mature White very marginally better than Young Adult Brass, but not enough to make it go one RHD above it. I suggest *11 RHD*.

*Mature Brass Dragon*, 22 RHD: As I already said, 4th level spells are pretty interesting, and with the stats increase dragons get when they become huge, I think it should make for a solid *15 RHD*.

*Mature Black Dragon*, 22 RHD: That's just an Adult Green Dragon with -2 in Int, Wis and Cha, a better DR and +2 natural armor. *12 RHD*.

*Mature Copper Dragon*, 23 RHD: Compared to an Adult Bronze or Silver, it really only loses 2 points in all mental stats, Alternate Form (which is almost useless when you can cast Polymorph in combat and Alter Self elsewhere) and an ever-so-slightly weaker breath weapon, and has the utility of Stone Shape, a better natural armor and of course better DR. I believe it is the lower limit of *16 RHD*.

*Mature Green Dragon*, 23 RHD: +2 Strength, and +3 natural armor. Apart from the two sorcerer levels, this is the extent of what they gain at this age category. And it will be the same for every dragon after this one. The simple fact that you get no class feature instead of the prestige classes you should be about to complete at this ECL make me not want to give it any more than 1 RHD more than the previous age category. *13 RHD*

*Mature Bronze Dragon*, 24 RHD: You know what is nice with Alternate Form? You lose almost everything that makes a dragon strong. Attack modes, breath weapon, natural armor, physical stats... All gone. You become a weak sorcerer with 10 Constitution. Which means any guy with True Seeing, a dagger, and a flask of Black Lotus Extract has 25% chance to just kill a 24 RHD, CR 17 creature in one swing if they try to fit in society. Anyway, a slightly weak *16 RHD* for the Mature Bronze Dragon.

*Mature Blue Dragon*, 24 RHD: You know what I always say about Blue and Green being the same? Well it's not changing anytime soon. *13 RHD*

*Mature Silver Dragon*, 25 RHD: And we have the metallic counterpart of Blue, Silver is just like Bronze with worse SLAs, better breath weapons, no swimming speed and +1 natural armor. *16 RHD*

*Mature Red Dragon*, 25 RHD: "+2 Strength only? Who decided that? I'm the one who decides those things!" - Mature Red Dragon, probably. Red completely reverts the pattern of previous dragons and gains +2 Con, Int, Wis and Cha instead. That's better than the others, but isn't worth more than *15 RHD*.

*Mature Gold Dragon*, 26 RHD: "What? Red is trying to have an ability score higher than mine? Unacceptable!" - Mature Gold Dragon, probably. Gold gains +2 Strength as normal, but also gains +2 Con just to match Red's score. Still not worth more than 1 RHD more, especially at this level. *17 RHD*.


There is something I strongly dislike in the way WotC handles true dragons, which is particularly visible here. True dragons have so much individuality in lore. Green dragons are intriguing, deceptive masterminds. Bronze dragons are almost Lawful Stupid dragons who will enforce absolute justice to an exaggerate extent. Black dragons are ambush predators and gold dragons like to study "real" magic as a wizard rather than using their innate powers. And yet, when it comes down to mechanical stats, they all get basically the same things, and their SLAs are simply inconsequential compared to their sorcerer casting. How cool would it be if bronze dragons got a paladin's smite? If black dragons got some sort of stupid Hide bonus when they're underwater, or could just turn invisible? If green dragons could change their color and shape to look like any other dragon at will, or if gold dragons could convert their innate sorcerer casting into wizard levels when they gain normal wizard level, the way shadowcasters do? That would make them much more unique and interesting to play and to DM, in my opinion. 

Fortunately, they still have a few SLAs which are unique to each type of dragon, and next time, we'll see what they get as their third, by reviewing the Old dragons!

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## QuadraticGish

> There is something I strongly dislike in the way WotC handles true dragons, which is particularly visible here. True dragons have so much individuality in lore. Green dragons are intriguing, deceptive masterminds. Bronze dragons are almost Lawful Stupid dragons who will enforce absolute justice to an exaggerate extent. Black dragons are ambush predators and gold dragons like to study "real" magic as a wizard rather than using their innate powers. And yet, when it comes down to mechanical stats, they all get basically the same things, and their SLAs are simply inconsequential compared to their sorcerer casting. How cool would it be if bronze dragons got a paladin's smite? If black dragons got some sort of stupid Hide bonus when they're underwater, or could just turn invisible? If green dragons could change their color and shape to look like any other dragon at will, or if gold dragons could convert their innate sorcerer casting into wizard levels when they gain normal wizard level, the way shadowcasters do? That would make them much more unique and interesting to play and to DM, in my opinion. 
> 
> Fortunately, they still have a few SLAs which are unique to each type of dragon, and next time, we'll see what they get as their third, by reviewing the Old dragons!


One thing I  give PF is that they gave the dragons some unique abilities to differentiate them more, such as how red dragons can eventually see perfectly through smoke or how White Dragons eventually become masters of arctic conditions by being able to shape ice and snow at will and see perfectly through snowy conditions.

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## PoeticallyPsyco

I also really like 5E's Legendary Actions and Lair Actions. In addition to getting to act off-turn a couple of times per round, if you're foolish enough to fight a dragon _in its lair_ it gets a whole 'nother set of thematic actions at initiative count 0.

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## PhoenixPhyre

> I also really like 5E's Legendary Actions and Lair Actions. In addition to getting to act off-turn a couple of times per round, if you're foolish enough to fight a dragon _in its lair_ it gets a whole 'nother set of thematic actions at initiative count 0.


Initiative count 20, not 0, but yes.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> One thing I  give PF is that they gave the dragons some unique abilities to differentiate them more.


Did I already say how much I love Pathfinder's monsters? Because I do. The way they have to make enemies more flavorful and truer to their intent while changing only a few things to their statblock is genius. I've already talked about thd tojanida but have you seen what they did with the Tarrasque? That's everything it's ever wanted! Same thing with the demilich. With just one line ("a non-awakened demilich can only act against people directly threatening its corpse or treasure")  they created something that acts as a pharaoh's curse which curses or kills greedy people (which mirrors the original demilich of tomb of annihilation) while letting the DM play a 3.5 demilich with the option to be "awakened". I love so many of these monsters! 




> I also really like 5E's Legendary Actions and Lair Actions.


Interestingly it seems they already had that idea in the late 3.5. Look at the Xorvintaal dragon template from MM5. Don't these abilities look like an early version of Legendary Actions and Legendary Resistance? No real Lair Actions I know of though (except the powers the gods have in their domain).

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Old Dragons*

_"I kill where I wish and none dare resist! I laid low the warriors of old and their like is not in the world today. Then I was but young and tender. Now I am old and strong, strong, STRONG!! "_ - An old red dragon laughing at a halfling who thought they could escape with a ring of its hoard despite its _Locate Object_.



_At this point, the mere sight of a dragon's eye should be enough to create awe and fear in mortal men. Also, if you have a fairly large computer screen, this picture should be the right scale for an old dragon's eye. A dragon's eye grows much slower than its body length as it matures._

There is a fundamental difference between a dragon and any other race. More than wings, scales and fiery breath, what distinguishes the dragon from a human or a dwarf is its lifespan. When all humans of its generation are long gone and forgotten, even by their descendants, when dwarves have returned to the earth and even elves are on the very twilight of their lives and prepare for the last journey, the dragon hasn't reached half of its natural lifespan, and is stronger than ever. This means that a dragon is a living library. In 600 years of life, you have mastered every subject to ever catch your interest. The "present" starts to become blurry, and everything you always do is prepare the future, so that this future will allow you to prepare another farther future. An old dragon will most probably have allies and extended its influence through the lands all around its lair. If you ever have to face one of these, try explaining how leaving you alive will benefit the dragon in the long run. They will probably leave you be, just in case you're right.

Being old is a step up in a dragon's life. Indeed, if you look up the 66th page of Draconomicon, you'll find that every Old or older dragon can take epic feats instead of regular feats, with no other restriction. This can change everything in the way the dragon is played. And I'm going to completely ignore it for the purpose of this thread. First, because this is obviously not the intended reading, as all old true dragons have more than 21 RHD (and dragonwrought kobolds can go run a cheese factory and stop bothering everyone). And second, because that would make some ridiculous combos available pre-epic with RHDR. Legendary Wrestler is already nice on a grappling build, but the best ones are the Divine Epic feats. Planar Turning, Undead Mastery and Zone of Animation can be monstrously powerful feats on a nonepic dragon with the Lightkeeper Archetype. So, I elected to not take them into account. Not sure if that will change a lot but hey, there's that.

*Old White Dragon*, 24 RHD: Freeing fog is a surprisingly powerful SLA, it's some good BFC with no save for the primary effect. White also gets it's 2nd level spells (better late than never, I guess). Honestly, and I say that in the saddest way possible, White might still benefit more from Xorvintaal abilities than their spells. +4 insight to all saves is nothing to sneeze at, after all (sigh). And that's on top of the inexistent ability boost white dragons get at this age category. A really weak *13 RHD* should be appropriate here, mostly because of the natural armor, which becomes really hard to go through at this level. Maybe even 12. 

*Old Brass Dragon*, 25 RHD: Control Winds is also a very good SLA, and if you have a Sovereign Archetype, you can't even cast it innately. That's very good. Same inconsequential stat boost as White. A weak *17 RHD* should be good here. 

*Old Black Dragon*, 25 RHD: You know, I was thinking, with what White and Brass got, that SLAs at this level would really improve dragons' power level. And then Black got Plant Growth. Take your *13 RHD* and get out. No, even 2 more sorcerer levels won't make it worth one more RHD than White, even if it's close.

*Old Copper Dragon*, 26 RHD: Basically 2 SLAs with Transmute Rock to Mud and Mud to Rock. Nice utility! What else? Nothing? Well, *17 RHD* seems the right choice to me.

*Old Green Dragon*, 26 RHD: Plant Growth again !?? Black is probably the most keen of all dragons on hunting fresh meat, and Green likes to speak and trick with humanoids before eating them! Why do you get gardening SLAs!? I guess it's explainable in the case of the forest-dwelling green dragon, but still, that's almost upsetting! Anyway. Interesting ability scores, with +2 everywhere (except Dex) compared to the previous age category, and 9th level sorcerer casting. That... is acceptable, I guess. I suggest *15 RHD* for the green dragon.

*Old Bronze Dragon*, 27 RHD: Ladies and gentlemen, we have a new low. A 2nd-level spell as an SLA, when the dragon can innately cast 5th level spells. Ridiculous. I guess, they still get some ability boosts, 11th level sorcerer casting and natural armor. A solid *17 RHD* it is. And I believe that with its 3rd epic feat and so many Dragon RHD, it should be playable around ECL 21 (if the party is not very optimized). *DLA-6*

*Old Blue Dragon*, 27 RHD: Illusionary Terrain is really not that good a spell... And when you could have cast it yourself, it's even less impressive. As always, they're worth the same as Green. *15 RHD*

*Old Silver Dragon*, 28 RHD: Control Winds is much better than Detect Thoughts, and it is also pretty thematic to the Silver dragon's affinity with the sky. If you didn't take a sovereign archetype, you could have already been able to cast that, but let's be honest, you most probably did take a sovereign archetype. That, and Silver still has the best breath weapon of all. 18? Probably not, but the high-end limit of *17 RHD* in my opinion. *DLA-6* seems balanced too.

*Old Red Dragon*, 28 RHD: Silver's rival is now Gargantuan. Yet, they don't get increased stats as most dragons do when they change size. They still get increased flight speed, reduced maneuverability, increased reach and breathing area, grappling modifiers... I believe that, all in all, they're slightly stronger than Silver, and deserve *18 RHD*, and *DLA-6*.

*(G)Old Dragon*, 29 RHD: Have you ever seen a fictional creature so prideful, that they willingly increase their stats to conform to their idea of greatness? Because I feel like that was the design idea behind old gold dragons. Most of their life, they have the same mental stats as Silver and the same strength as Red, but starting now, they get 2 more in Int, Wis and Cha than Silver, and 4 more Str than Red. None shall challenge their superiority! Also, they're Gargantuan, get the faster flight speed any MM dragon ever gets (250ft), get a 6th level spell as an SLA like White, but gets another ability at this level, because why the hell not? Detect Gems is... not that useful, but at least it's unique, and it allows the dragon to know in 12 seconds if any single gem of its hoard is missing, but the real kicker here is Geas. This spell is generally pretty useful since it's the equivalent of a no-save Domination ("Your geas is to never attack me or my companions and always follow my orders"), but as an SLA, it's absolutely broken. It is a standard action no-save-just-lose, which gives you control on the creature as a bonus. Fortunately, we're reaching levels where immunities to mind-affecting and Spell Resistance can make it not that automatic, but you're still going to end more than your fair share of encounters just like that. The Old Gold Dragon is all about overkill in every aspect of its stat sheet, and just for that, I think it deserves *20 RHD*. And they're pretty clearly epic, with *DLA-5* and ECL 24 in my opinion.


That was a really nice age category, pretty flavorful, and showing once again if it was necessary that Gold Dragons are meant and would like to rule the world. Next time, we'll come back to the "you only get more DR" age categories, with even an unoriginal name: the Very Old Dragons!

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## MightypIon

While this is not a mechanical thing, the following things worked pretty well and created memorable encounters:

1: Relatively low level:
Ettercap with levels in Warpriest/Cult leader, fighting with 2 throwing axes. Makes use of the ettercaps relatively high dex for two weapon fighting, makes use of the ettercaps relatively high strength, makes use of his fairly high wisdom, and getting webbed by it and then pelted from range is not fun.

2: Pretty high level: Nocticulas/Shamiras Succubus Speznaz team.
Several Succubus snipers with 7 levels in mysterious stranger and Mosin Nagants (they have been to earth to figure out what was going on there during world war 1), backed by several two weapon fighting kidnappers. The snipers open up, the kidnappers lay in ambush when the party start splitting up as it tries to get to the snipers, abduct or kill a party member for interrogation or conversion, retreat via teleport or ethereal jaunt at will, rinse and repeat until the heroes cry "auntie" to Nocticula/Shamira.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Very Old Dragons*
"_The thing is, we are all, in a sense, supper. Walking, talking, breathing suppers, that's what we are. Take you, for instance. YOU are about to be eaten by ME, so that makes you supper. That's obvious. But even a murderous carnivore like myself will be supper for worms one day. We're all snatching precious moments from the peaceful jaws of time._" A very old dragon having a midlife crisis



_You're not forced to follow my advices as to how to handle a dragon, but please, for your own sake, never approach a very old white dragon like that while wearing something shiny on your head._

Very old. Like old, but moreso (what do you mean I'm running out of quips to animate the age category? Nonsense.). Age doesn't do much to reduce a dragon's pride, and they are still very far from twilight. If a very old dragon somehow captures you, you can try to pretend worshipping them and play on their pride to catch them by surprise. Or you can distract them by telling them stories of faraway places. The dragon doesn't leave their hoard for too long, and their thralls will only report the most important events. They are unlikely to know details about what happens on another continent, and might enjoy a storyteller enough to not eat/burn/enslave them.

*Very Old White Dragon*, 27 RHD: Good stat boosts (+2 in all stats), an obsolete DR/magic, a 7th level sorcerer casting that you'll always wish to be just a tad higher, and +3 natural armor. No more than *14 RHD*, even if only touch attacks will ever get past your natural armor.

*Very Old Brass Dragon*, 28 RHD: With 6th level spells, we're reaching levels where dragons will spend almost all their turns casting spells instead of actually being a dragon. A sad truth, but that's what 3rd edition is all about. Still, a dragon is a dragon, and this one is worth at least *18 RHD*. With DNLA, other dragon advantages will play a much greater role, and I think *DLA-7* should make for some interesting plays. It will allow entry into the epic dragon prestige classes, which are underpowered anyway, so it should make them decently playable.

*Very Old Black Dragon*, 28 RHD: White, but better in almost every way. Surprisingly, the breath weapon starts to become really dangerous around these age categories, with the range, and the fact that the damage scales faster than the reassigned number of RHD. 18d4 will probably drop one or two spellcasters at these ECL. *15 RHD*

*Very Old Copper Dragon*, 29 RHD: As always, a bit better stats than Brass, equivalently useful SLAs, and a worse movement speed. *18 RHD*, and a weak *DLA-7*.

*Very Old Green Dragon*, 29 RHD: For how long have you been Huge, dude? Don't you think it's time to evolve even further beyond? Look at what you get for this age category. +2 Str, +3 NA, 2 sorcerer levels, and that's all? Seriously, that's the bare minimum, make an effort! You should be ashamed of yourself. *16 RHD*, and it would be DLA-9 if it didn't make it into nonepic.

*Very Old Bronze Dragon*, 30 RHD: Gosh these stat increases are awful. *18 RHD*, not one more. It will maybe be a bit strong, but at these levels, there will be all the competition it needs. *DLA-7* seems appropriate too. You can also go dragon ascendant immediately, if you want to become a god at ECL 42, but nobody will do that if it means giving up your spellcasting (and no, Xorvintaal hasn't been worth it for a few age categories now).

*Very Old Blue Dragon*, 30 RHD: I should just write one entry for both Green and Blue. *16 RHD*, *DLA-9*.

*Very Old Silver Dragon*, 31 RHD: Can somebody explain to me who decided that now was the good time for Silver to randomly get more mental stats than Bronze, while they had the same for their whole life? Anyway, Silver likes that very much, which could make it worth *19 RHD*, but it may lag a bit behind compared to the opposition. Maybe 18 could be acceptable too. And *DLA-8* looks appropriate.

*Very Old Red Dragon*, 31 RHD: Moar stats, moar fire! It's the 4th age category in a row that Red gains mental stats, which is unheard of. No other dragon ever gets more than two intelligence increases in a row, let alone four. It's definitely stronger than Silver in my opinion, even with that breath weapon. I suggest *19 RHD* and *DLA-7*.

*Very (G)Old Dragon*, 32 RHD: Even Gold didn't get 4 intelligence increases in a row, but since it randomly got +4 intelligence last category, it has the same increase of +8 intelligence compared to its Young Adult self. I'd pay some money to be able to witness the meeting in which the stats of the true dragons were decided, because I've been trying to find some sense in there for two months now, and I've yet to find any. Mechanically, it's more of the same, and Geas will still carry you through one fight a day with no problem. *21 RHD*, *DLA-7*, obviously.

We're reaching a point where, even if they were playable, nobody would ever play these dragons except in the most epic of games. It will always be more interesting to play a Young Adult with ten class levels than a Very Old one with nothing but its original stats, even if the result is balanced. Why am I continuing, you ask? Dunno. Probably a mix of morbid curiosity and respectability, I guess. Next time, it's Ancient time, baby! Or not baby at all, but you know the drill.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Ancient Dragons*

"_I, too, have a passion for the arcane arts. I am curious, however... what would happen if we turned the magic off? 
You cease to be a mighty wizard and become a fragile pointy-eared wizard. While I? 

I am still a dragon._ "
- An Ancient Black Dragon, showing her tendency to both ambush and torture her preys.


_An ancient dragon stands before you. The sun reaching from behind its wings prevent you from making out its colors. Is it a bronze dragon or a red dragon? The answer, and your attitude according to this color, may determine if you live or die._


How do you feel about ants? If an ant climbs on your leg while you're sitting in a yard, do you squash it? Do you catch it and throw it elsewhere? Or do you let it climb as much as it wants as long as it doesn't try to enter your mouth or something? That is what an Ancient Dragon thinks of humanoids. They're weak, ignorant, predictable, and can be controlled as easily as you can control a line of ants by making a line with a wet finger through the procession. Most Ancient Dragons have one or more regions, or even kingdoms, under their control. That is how they spend their time, since nothing else is even a challenge for them. Seeing humans as little more than pawns also makes their pride in themselves and their race reach its climax. If you feel confident in taking an ancient dragon down, the best way is to taunt them first, to anger them and make them attack and come close enough that you can beat them into submission without dealing with all their traps and peons.

As PCs, ancient dragons would most probably be very authoritarian, trying to ascertain themselves as the leader of the group at every occasion. After all, no other race comes close to them in terms of wisdom and charisma. Mechanically, this age category gives the true dragons their 4th SLA, but their sorcerer casting is for the most part much better than that, and this SLA becomes little more than another spell known that you can't choose yourself. It probably has a better caster level, since it's based off your number of RHD and not your sorcerer level, and it's only a standard action to cast, which could give an advantage over simply choosing the spell, but most of them depend weakly on the caster level, and only summon swarm has a real utility when it is cast as a sstandard action instead of a full-round one.


*Ancient White Dragon*, 30 RHD: I can't overstate how much it pains me to see that sorcerer casting. 9th level sorcerer casting is just so disappointing on a creature that was supposed to be CR 18. At least the SLA is pretty good. That's one of the few where caster level has an effect on a lot of the spell's parameters, and it's a good utility that will free one spell known from the highest level you can cast at this point. I believe it would make for a strong *15 RHD*. And even with all its RHD, I don't think it's worth ECL 21.

*Ancient Brass Dragon*, 31 RHD: Many RHD about nothing. Control Weather is one of the worst 7th level spells for an adventurer. It's nice if you want to destroy a city, but as a metallic dragon, there's little chance you'll ever want to do that. And even if the casting time goes from 10 min to 1 round, the time the weather takes to manifest is still 10 minutes, so it's still completely useless in combat. Also, like White, you get only +2 Str and +3 natural armor (for a respectable total of +30, same as the Tarrasque). A pretty weak *20 RHD*, and *DLA-8*.

*Ancient Black Dragon*, 31 RHD: What is Vaarsuvius' nemesis worth? Well, as much as I like flavorful SLAs, this one is just useless. It's only there to say "Hey look at how evil black dragons are that they summon clouds of vermin!". But as written, Insect Plague only summons a bunch of CR 3 creatures that can't even move. If you have no way to restrain the opponents to one square, this spell will literally deal 2d6 to them and that's all. 11th level casting is enough that I'm comfortable giving it *16 RHD*, though. And *DLA-10* on top of that. What are you gonna do in environment higher than really low-epic with your 5th level spells, even with 31 RHD worth of BAB and feats?

*Ancient Copper Dragon*, 32 RHD: Wall of Stone is better than Control Weather, but I don't think it's enough to make a difference with Brass. I suggest *20 RHD*, *DLA-8*

*Ancient Green Dragon*, 32 RHD: Big! Big! Bigger and better than ever! The Green Dragon finally reaches its final size of Gargantuan, and as often with true dragons, it comes with a full increase of its stats. Dominate Person is also a very nice SLA. A weak *18 RHD* seems to fit it, along with *DLA-9*.

*Ancient Bronze Dragon*, 33 RHD: More Gargantuan dragons! I'm pretty sure Control Water has a use, in an aquatic campaign, to capsize boats... Which are campaigns where you shouldn't play a dragon anyway, not even counting the fact that a Gargantuan creature with +24 Str should have no problem capsizing a boat on its own. Most of the time, this will be completely useless as an SLA. Still, a pretty average *20 RHD* and *DLA-8* should fit the Ancient Bronze Dragon.

*Ancient Blue Dragon*, 33 RHD: Same as Green, but with Mass Disguise Person as an SLA (yes, they call it Veil, but it's Mass Disguise Person, change my mind). This will be marginally useful, but as always with illusions like these, they will be easily found out if you disguise somebody as somebody with a size or body shape vastly different. And since you're a dragon... Anyway, a weak *18 RHD*, *DLA-10* would be a decent estimation, I think.

*Ancient Silver Dragon*, 34 RHD: Control Weather again? Whyyy? Anyway, good stats is good, and that makes for an easy *20 RHD*, *DLA-8*

*Ancient Red Dragon*, 34 RHD: Not enough stat bonuses to really stand out compared to what Silver has more than it (notably, Silver's excellent breath weapon). Find the Path is fun as an SLA, but it won't change your life except if the scenario is specifically about finding your way in a maze. It's interesting to see how the most violent and combat-oriented of all chromatic dragons mostly has divination SLAs. I guess it prefers to find more gold than sow destruction. *20 RHD*, *DLA-8*

*Ancient Gold Dragon*, 35 RHD: Did I already mention how Gold dragons get all the good stuff? I did? Well I'll say it again. Only dragon with an 8th level SLA (more than what it can cast naturally with its sorcerer levels), and yet another full stat increase. I suggest a pretty average *22 RHD* and *DLA-8*


Have you read the 2nd edition Draconomicon? It's very interesting in that, more than any 3.x book I know, it deals with the origin and history of dragons. It says that dragons in the ancient times were not intelligent and were little more than winged lizards. I believe it's a reference to dinosaurs in our world, and maybe to the fact that dinosaurs in japanese is Kyoryu, or "terrifying dragons". Then a meteorite fell (one of the Tears of Selune) and most pre-dragons went extinct. The remaining ones were forced to rapidly evolve, to become more intelligent and more magical to face the year-long winter. Dragons existing before true dragons, and their descendants, like wyvern (in short, everything that would be in the Dragon type in 3.5), were called "dracoforms". I know it's less appealing than "dragons", but we would have a fair bit more understandable rule text if they had kept the appellation (*cough* dragonwrought *cough*).

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## Beni-Kujaku

_Nota Bene_: I have edited the "Old" and "Very Old" dragons entries for the Gold Dragon. I didn't take into account how crazily strong Geas as an SLA is. Spell-Like abilities have a casting time of a standard action at most, which, for Geas, is extremely good. It literally becomes a 1/day Dominate Monster with no save. If the opponent doesn't have a good enough SR (and in DNLA's case, it will be very hard to have a good enough SR) or is immune to mind-affecting effects (which, apart from undead and constructs, even though you can find a few at these levels, do not exist in every fight), that's one fight per day completely bypassed. And you get a slave. That's, in my opinion, strong enough to warrant a RHD increase.

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## H_H_F_F

> _Nota Bene_: I have edited the "Old" and "Very Old" dragons entries for the Gold Dragon. I didn't take into account how crazily strong Geas as an SLA is. Spell-Like abilities have a casting time of a standard action at most, which, for Geas, is extremely good. It literally becomes a 1/day Dominate Monster with no save. If the opponent doesn't have a good enough SR (and in DNLA's case, it will be very hard to have a good enough SR) or is immune to mind-affecting effects (which, apart from undead and constructs, even though you can find a few at these levels, do not exist in every fight), that's one fight per day completely bypassed. And you get a slave. That's, in my opinion, strong enough to warrant a RHD increase.


I was very proud of being able to cast geas as a swift action when under Tenser's Transformation with Faderyn, my enfry for round CVII. I tend to agree that this ability is important enough to reconsider the rating.

Also, I've been meaning to say: you've been really on point with the art for the dragon posts.

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## Metastachydium

> *Ancient Red Dragon*, 34 RHD: Not enough stat bonuses to really stand out compared to what Silver has more than it (notably, Silver's excellent breath weapon). Find the Path is fun as an SLA, but it won't change your life except if the scenario is specifically about finding your way in a maze. It's interesting to see how the most violent and combat-oriented of all chromatic dragons mostly has divination SLAs. I guess it prefers to find more gold than sow destruction.


And, ahm, the verdict is?

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## Beni-Kujaku

> I was very proud of being able to cast geas as a swift action when under Tenser's Transformation with Faderyn, my enfry for round CVII. I tend to agree that this ability is important enough to reconsider the rating.


I just read it, it's a very nice build that combines lots of strong things into something even better, and even uses Tenser's Transformation, which is quite unheard of. Too bad that the build didn't flow that well together, and that the other builds of the comp were this good. 




> Also, I've been meaning to say: you've been really on point with the art for the dragon posts.


Thank you! Pictures of dragons that are both good-looking and could look like they represent dragons from D&D are not that common, especially if you're looking for metallic dragons. The V-shaped wings of metallic dragons except Bronze is very specific to D&D, which makes it pretty difficult to find and is why you'll not see any Copper, Brass or Silver-like dragons in these. Initially I wanted to put at least one picture from "How to train your dragon", since my second favorite dragon-quote (the "we are all, in a sense, supper" quote. My absolute favorite being of course the Smaug boast from the Hobbit) is from the book the movie is based on, but dragons in it are either Small to Large (and I was already at Young Adults when I had the idea) or Colossal+++, which is very un-D&D-like. In the end, I do like these ones, they're a good mix of epic, wholesome and goofy (especially the Very Old one, whose meaning is completely different when you apply D&D lore to it, and changes from nice and wholesome to sad and a bit ridiculous).




> And, ahm, the verdict is?


Oh, yeah, forgot. Same as Silver, 20 RHD, DLA-8.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Wyrms*

"_By my standards, those wizards trying their best to emulate my blazing aeronautic greatness are a dismal failure. But, I appreciate their effort and their taste._" - A hybrid blue/red wyrm having spent his long life dominating an entire Plane to the point that he is now revered as the sole keeper of the peace on it.



_A Gold Wyrm spends so much time studying the inner workings and secrets of the world that they are probably the only creature that could hold their own in an argument on this forum._


What is left to do when you have everything? When you know everything there is to know about the Material Plane, have explored half of it yourself and sent your thralls to report about the other half, when your hoard is too big to fit in even the grandest castle and no greedy adventurer can even last 6 seconds against your unfathomable  power, then the bggest threat remaining is not death. It's ennui, and becoming so bored of everything that you fall into madness. It's not rare for wyrms to spend their time hibernating for years at a time, or pushing "mortals" of the countries under their influence to go to war against each other, just for the thrill of seeing what side would win. Others research niche pieces of knowledge and ancient, outdated rituals, just for the sake of it. Some dragons who can planeshift (namely, red dragons and metallic ones) spend most of their time in outer planes to feel like they are contributing to the endless conficts against the forces of Evil, but most of them stay in the Material Plane. Denizens of the Material Plane simply don't belong there, and even wyrms know that there is a chance for them to die out there. Mount Celestia isn't a good vacation place when you can't pass the challenges to climb the moutain and you risk being swarmed by paladin angels at the first misstep. 

If a wyrm confronts you, know that it's probably not a fight for it. Nothing more than a game. Just play with it for a few minutes. If it is amused enough, you'll be able to just go away.

As player characters, wyrms get a huge boost to their DR, going from 15/+2 to 20/+3! Most people carry weapons with a +2 enhancement bonus, but +3 becomes such a big investment that there won't be too many things that bypass your.... What? We're in 3.5 and the DR is only 20/Magic? So anyone has been able to bypass it for more than 15 levels? Okay. Well, then the only thing dragons get is even more AC, some stats, 8th level spells for metallics, 5th level spells for White, and a new size category for a few of them, notably Gold becoming Colossal. Overall not a bad age category (especially 8th level spells). But how does it hold up to epic or near-epic challenges? Let's see.

*White Wyrm*, 33 RHD: Okay, so, +24 Str, +14 Con, +4 Int, +4 Wis, +6 Cha, +32 Natural armor, these stats are low, even for true drag.... Wait... They once again reduced its intelligence compared to its charisma!?? WHY? Stop it! Let the guy have something! It makes even less sense considering it will once again have the same score in intelligence and charisma as a great wyrm! These dragon ability scores are starting to physically hurt me when I read them... White still gets a decent amount of stats, and its sorcerer casting would now be almost appropriate for a half-casting class. Plus, it's gargantuan. And everybody wants to be bigger (except if your lease has a low ceiling, I guess). A pretty strong *17 RHD* in my book. And maybe *DLA-11*? Yeah, let's go with that.

*Brass Wyrm*, 34 RHD: The most magic-oriented dragon in the MM doesn't disappoint as a Wyrm. It reaches the +10 Int/Wis/Cha milestone, is one small level away from getting 9th level spells, is Gargantuan too and still has the nigh-impassable AC of true dragons. A weak *22 RHD*, and *DLA-8*. At this point, the difference between your sorcerer level and your number of RHD is pretty constant.

*Black Wyrm*, 34 RHD: As litterally always, it's a bit better than White, but the only worthwhile thing is 2 more sorcerer levels. Pretty strong *18 RHD*, *DLA-10*.

*Copper Wyrm*, 35 RHD: Copper is worse than Brass. At this point, a few mental stats don't make for worse mobility. *22 RHD*, *DLA-9*.

*Green Wyrm*, 35 RHD: Do you like sorcerer levels? Then you should play a metallic dragon. But still, 15th level is nice. The rest is nothing to write about, but spellcasting is such a part of your gameplay now that I can't give it less than *20 RHD*, and *DLA-10*. I really don't know which is better between that and an Ancient Copper.

*Bronze Wyrm*, 36 RHD: Good stats, good sorcerer casting. Nothing to hate, but I would have liked a bit more to love. *22 RHD*, *DLA-9*

*Blue Wyrm*, 36 RHD: I just noticed I haven't made a Cyrano de Bergerac joke on Blue's nose horn. Oh, well, look it up. Nothing new, same as Green, with worse SLAs. *20 RHD*, *DLA-11*.

*Silver Wyrm*, 37 RHD: I sometimes forget this thing can walk on clouds. I never understood why, since it can fly faster than it can walk since wyrmling stage. Same as Bronze, with better breath weapon, and better stats. Surprisingly (or not, considering how dragon stats seem to have been rolled randomly during WotC meetings), it gets +4 Con compared to Ancient Silver. Yep. The single one and only age category of all Monster Manual true dragons that get +4 Con. And they waited Wyrm for it. I hate it. Have some consistency in your own books dammit! Pretty weak *23 RHD*, and *DLA-9*.

*Red Wyrm*, 37 RHD: On the other hand, Red gets one of the worst stats increase of their life. +2 Str and +2 Con. And still Gargantuan. Even though it became Gargantuan two age categories before Silver, Red will have to wait Great Wyrm before becoming Colossal. That's sad. *22 RHD*, *DLA-10*.

*Gold Wyrm*, 38 RHD: And the king returns! For the first time, Gold is bigger than Red, and reaches Colossal status! You now have so much reach that a dwarf can start their turn in your threatened area and still not be able to reach you with a move action. Your claws also deal 4d6 damage, which is pretty rare, but won't matter at all at these levels. As is now usual, Gold gets a full ability boost, and 17th sorcerer levels will never be irrelevant. *24 RHD*, *DLA-9* 


We can see that the endgame is close, and that this part of the game wasn't proofread too much. The stats are so chaotic that it becomes frustrating, and the DR was obviously not thought through. Still, the fact that they're called "wyrms" instead of "xxx dragons" is a nice way to artificially create some tension and awe when players encounter one of those. That's a trend with WotC. Everything is good, except the mechanics. Next time, dragons reach the absolute climax of their power, with Great Wyrm! And White will still be nonepic.

----------


## dhasenan

> *Blue Wyrm*, 36 RHD: I just noticed I haven't made a Cyrano de Bergerac joke on Blue's nose horn. Oh, well, look it up.


_fails charisma check_

Excuse me! Sir, your nose... your nose is... rather large!

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Great Wyrm*

_In the sky, the wings of the great old dragon beat above the sea. The sky was filled with his flight. The light of the sun, now high in the sky, passed through the arabesques of his wings. His golden eyes met the blue eyes of the elf boy. All the tenderness in the world lay in these eyes, and all the pride, all the possible love, all the strength and arrogance. All the magnificence.
Magnificence.
Magnificence.
Magnificence.
Magnificence.
Magnificence._
- The last flight of the only fictional dragon I know of who actually died of old age (Seriously, read _The Last Elf_, by Silvana Mari. If you have a child or a brother between 8 and 14 years old, or are yourself in this range, then this is a really good read, both wholesome and with a psychological side. In my opinion a pretty good Christmas gift. Initially italian, but translated in english, french, german, portuguese,... and called The Last Dragon in the US, and only in the US. Because why the hell not.)


*Spoiler: To sing to the tune of "Great War", by Sabaton, link in the title of the post*
Show


Before their might I'm paralyzed, my brothers are all gone
I'll submit or I'll die here in this nameless grave
Wisdom, knowledge, infinite strength, I feel them in my bones
Claws and wings in the beast's den, there's nothing I could save...

Where are the riches Ive been told?
This is the lies that we been sold,
Their hoard's not worth our sacrifice!

Great Wyrm!
And I cannot stand firm!
Great Wyrm!
Burnt by their breath weapon!
They'll rule from their lair
Until they reach their...
Twilight!
End of a dragon's life!

_(feel free to continue with the second and third verses)_



So this is the end. Even creatures as long-lived as a true dragon eventually reach their time to go. The only time of their life where they grow weaker rather than stronger. During these years or these decades, the dragon knows full well they are about to die. Only one thing matters, then: their legacy. If they're going, then the world will remember them for generations. Metallic dragons create great institutions and schools where they teach all their knowledge to mortals or to other dragons, and use their hoard and magical might to save entire countries from natural disasters, topple tyrannies and annihilate armies of rampaging demons. Chromatic dragons try to get as much enjoyment as they can, with no limit or self-preservation, they seek the most powerful foes to fight to the death, devastate continents in their wake, and challenge their greatest dragon rivals to battles akin to the worst typhoons that have ever scorched the earth. Other dragons travel the planes without fear, to have a first taste of their eternal home, or to meet Tiamat or Bahamut in flesh. Those great wyrms often disappear without a trace, and no one knows what the dragon gods do to them.
If you find a typical great wyrm, then distract them with something shiny, and you should be off the hook. But if you encounter a dragon in their twilight, there is no running away. Stand your ground, make sure you have a couple diamonds prepared for your resurrection, and give them the fight they crave. This is the chance for your name to go down in history as one of the heroes who fought against such a terrible creature.

For their last age category, six great wyrms out of ten finally reach sorcerer level 19th, which allows them to cast 9th level spells on their own. The inherent power of these can absolutely not be overstated. True dragons also get their final SLA. A lot of these are great spells, but when most dragons are casting 9th-level spells natively, everything leaves a bit to be desired. Only Red and Silver get a new size category, meeting Gold in the very select group of Colossal dragons, and generally chromatics get some good ability boosts while metallics don't (except Silver and Gold).

*Great White Wyrm*, 36 RHD: Do you wanna laugh (or cry)? That breath weapon deals less damage than that of a _Juvenile_ gold dragon. Still, when you have more strength than a cloud giant on top of at least 13th level casting and all the dragon goodies that come with it, you're bound to be worth something. As always, White gets surprisingly nice SLAs. Control Weather will not change your life, but it is a nice utility to have, especially in winter with Icewalking. Compared to a Black Wyrm, it has +2 Str, Con and NA, better movement speeds and way better SLAs. I believe that's worth going to the next number of RHD. A slightly weak *19 RHD*, and *DLA-12*.

*Great Brass Wyrm*, 37 RHD: 9th level spells. Just... Just Shapechange 4/day. Or Gate. Or Mordenkainen's Disjunction. Or Miracle if you took Lightbringer or no archetype. That's just as insanely good for you as for anyone else. You also get the ability to (seemingly at-will, but there's a 99% chance that they just forgot the 1/day) summon a djinni. Nice. That's free permanent Major Creation. Create infinite amounts of Black Lotus Extract and break the economy! Oh, wait, you're epic, the economy would already be broken if you wanted to do that. (Can you Major Create some epic poisons if you can make the DC but don't have the Epic Poison Crafter feat? The Lyzeum seems very vegetal to me) Despite the lack of good stats, it's an extremely good age category for Brass. A strong *24 RHD*, would maybe even be 25 RHD if your djinnis could planeshift. And *DLA-9*

*Great Black Wyrm*, 37 RHD: Can somebody explain to me why a Great Wyrm gets an overly restrictive version of a 5th level spell, that is even described as equivalent to a 1st level spell (with DC to boot)? I know Black has never gotten good SLAs, but this is just ridiculous. At least you get a full stat increase and 7th level spells. *20 RHD*, *DLA-12*

*Great Copper Wyrm*, 38 RHD: And we continue with Copper proving that you'd better play a brass dragon. Move Earth is interesting as an SLA since you can affect the full area of effect with only a standard action casting, but even then, I fail to see in what condition this spell can be of any use to an adventurer. Really, what does it do? Not even counting the fact that you're supposed to face epic threat, the worst this spell can do is create a 10-ft high wall before your opponents, which is... Not absolutely bad, but clearly not worth a 6th level spell, and completely useless for a Great Copper Wyrm. Oh, and you gain no mental stats. Weak *24 RHD*, *DLA-10*.

*Great Green Wyrm*, 38 RHD: Old Green got Plant Growth, Ancient Green got Dominate Person. How do we combine those to create the ultimate SLA for the Great Green Wyrm? That's right, Command Plant, a situational and weak 4th level spell. Get outta here. At least you get nice stats. You're comparable to a Brass Wyrm, with better stats but worse SLAs. Weak *22 RHD*, and *DLA-12*

*Great Bronze Wyrm*, 39 RHD: These stats are really stellar. They've been for some time now, but still, that's always beautiful to look at. Apart from them, it's just a djinni-less Brass, but when your worst stat (not counting Dex) is only 2 points lower than a Solar's best, I think that's enough for *25 RHD*, and *DLA-9*

*Great Blue Wyrm*, 39 RHD: Another SLA three levels below what you natively cast, and just enough difference to not get copyright-struck by Green. *22 RHD*, *DLA-12*

*Great Silver Wyrm*, 40 RHD: 40 RHD is a milestone few creatures ever reach, and if Silver would be completely unplayable at that ECL, it still has got a lot of nice things. Full stat increase, Colossal size, 19th level casting, and the interesting Reverse Gravity SLA. Compared to Bronze, that's +4 to all stats and better SLAs. *26 RHD* should be interesting, even if I fear Silver will be slightly underpowered. And *DLA-10* to go with it.

*Great Red Wyrm*, 40 RHD: Another Colossal dragon, but clearly weaker than Silver, with the mental stats of Bronze. Once again, Red gets a divination SLA, Discern Location. Really good one, for sure, and useful in a variety of situation, but not good enough to change Red's rating on its own. Better physical stats and size than Bronze and better SLAs, but worse breath weapon and movement speed. Let's go for *25 RHD* and *DLA-10*.

*Great Gold Wyrm*, 41 RHD: Of course Gold would be the only one with a 9th level spell as an SLA. Foresight is a really fun spell to have in a dungeon or otherwise dangerous environment, to avoid any ambush and unexpected surprise rounds. That's the kind of spell you would like as a 3/day instead of 1/day. Also, look at that strength score. The Great Gold Wyrm is the strongest of all MM dragons, and one of the strongest creatures in the game period. More strength than the Tarrasque, more than an Elder Titan, and only 2 points less than the avatar of Tiamat herself. And the rest of its stats do not lag behind, with +22 to all non-Dexterity stats. I suggest a final score of *27 RHD* for the Gold Dragon, with *DLA-9*.


And... That's it. All the true dragons of the monster manual given negative LA. Almost as many as all the other creatures of this thread. That was a journey, and I love dragons and dislike WotC's editors even more after it's finished ^^ And now, as the dragons reach their twilight and wither away, so too will we turn away from power and look into more mundane creatures. Starting next week, to really wrap up the Monster Manual, we will review the animals and vermins. As always, I look forward to your comments, and see you then!

----------


## Remuko

> *Great Wyrm*
> 
> _In the sky, the wings of the great old dragon beat above the sea. The sky was filled with his flight. The light of the sun, now high in the sky, passed through the arabesques of his wings. His golden eyes met the blue eyes of the elf boy. All the tenderness in the world lay in these eyes, and all the pride, all the possible love, all the strength and arrogance. All the magnificence.
> Magnificence.
> Magnificence.
> Magnificence.
> Magnificence.
> Magnificence._
> - The last flight of the only fictional dragon I know of who actually died of old age (Seriously, read _The Last Elf_, by Silvana Mari. If you have a child or a brother between 8 and 14 years old, or are yourself in this range, then this is a really good read, both wholesome and with a psychological side. In my opinion a pretty good Christmas gift. Initially italian, but translated in english, french, german, portuguese,... and called The Last Dragon in the US, and only in the US. Because why the hell not.)
> ...





good stuff

----------


## H_H_F_F

Congrats on finishing the dragons, Beni!

*Spoiler: Raymond E Feist's Magician*
Show


Rhuagh, the golden dragon met by Thomas in the caves, also dies of old age.

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

I haven't read the Riftwar Saga. Is it any good?

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Animals (Bear to Hyena)*


I'm impressed by the fact that WotC included a short description for every animal, even though I think they could have used that space for something else. Why should we be reminded of what a regular badger looks like but still not know for sure how tendriculoses (tendriculi?) came to be?

Animals have a few shared characteristics. They all have low HD and pretty good physical stats, which can make them pretty attractive as player characters, but this is balanced by abysmally low intelligence (shot up to 3 for the purpose of this thread, but that's still -8 for a player character), lowish charisma, an inability to wield weapons (at least, for all the animals that got -0 in the original thread), and even no primary natural weapon for a few of them (generally not-predator ones. For these ones, at least a level of monk or battle dancer will be required to be able to contribute in battle). Still, a lot of animals got positive LA in the original thread, and I'm only reviewing the bad ones here.

*Brown Bear*, 6 RHD: And we start with the quintessential animal, the Brown Bear, and its absolutely massive +16 Str, +2 Dex, +8 Con, but -8 Int, +2 Wis, -4 Cha. All of you barbarians enjoyers should know these stats adjustments as those you get from a 5th level bear warrior (a generally excellent melee class). You also get Large size, and Improved Grab on your claw attack. 2 claw attacks, one bite attack. That is a chonky piece of meat we've got there. Compared to a raging Dire Wolverine, you have -4 Dex, Con and Cha, the equivalent of +3 natural armor, Improved Grab, +10ft movement speed and the ability to use spells (what? a brown bear cleric isn't _that_ far-fetched) and to run away without a Calm Emotions spell (which may or may not be a life-saver in some situations). That seems even, with a slight advantage for the Brown Bear. *5 RHD*, *DLA-0* (the 6 RHD gives it a point of BAB, which could make it overpowered for its level). 

*Polar Bear*, 8 RHD: So is the number of RHD just the amount of fat on the creature? Since a polar bear is just a brown bear adapted to cold temperature (the hybrid, named grolar, from grizzly+polar bear, is even fertile and there is a chance both species will become one in the next centuries or millenia, since the global warming makes more and more polar bear go south and mate with brown bears instead of their own kind). The only difference between the two, besides the number of RHD, is that the polar bear has a 30ft swim speed. No, that doesn't make for a higher number of RHD. *5 RHD*, *DLA-1*

*Bison*, 5 RHD: Gore is a pretty rare form of natural weapon. Aside from that, the bison has nothing. Reachless Large size, no useable ability, only one natural weapon and less strength than a brown bear. Not good. A strong *2 RHD* should fit it, and *DLA-1*. DLA-2 may even be good, but having +12 Str and full BAB is definitely too much for low levels. Stampede is an interesting ability, in that it allows us to calculate how much damage Mufasa took in that one scene of the Lion King (if we're assimilating wildebeests to bison, which does not seem too far-fetched, also wildebeest is definitely a name I would put on a D&D creature rather than a real animal). 30 seconds pass from the first to the last wildebeest going down the cliff (shown here) with 94 wildebeests being visible after the first 4 seconds of the stampede. That is around 24 gnus per second, and 720 for the whole stampede. Mufasa took 144d12 damage, or around 25 times his max health. I'm suprised there even remains a corpse for Simba to mourn.

*Boar*, 3 RHD: Same problems as the bison, but -8 Str and Medium size. If it wasn't for this nice natural armor, 1 RHD would be good. As it is, I can't give anything else than the PPsyco rating, *1 RHD, LA+1*. I'm sure there's a way to leverage Ferocity, but I really don't see it. Also, *DLA-1*. No problem giving that thing full BAB. 

*Giant Crocodile*, 7 RHD: Damn that's a strong bite. The Giant Crocodile lives up to its reputation as the real-life animal with the strongest bite, bar none. A crocodile's bite has been estimated as rivaling even a T-Rex's. Sad that there's nothing else here and that it can't even combine it with the tail slap, except when it has somebody grappled. Apart from the Huge size and the natural weapons, the stats are almost identical to the polar bear's, with -4 Cha and -20ft land movement speed. I'm really not sure why this was initially rated as +0, because I'm not playing that. I guess the Huge size balances the lack of full attack options and the lower speed outside water. *5 RHD*, *DLA-1*

*Riding Dog*, 2 RHD: Better stats than the boar with notably +4 Dex, slightly worse natural armor, but a bite that can eventually be used for a mouthpick weapon. Also, Track as a bonus feat. Nice. *1 RHD, LA+1*, *DLA-0*

*Donkey*, 2 RHD: Worse stats than the boar with no Str bonus, much worse natural armor, and a weak bite that will be useless until you can afford a mouthpick weapon. And no bonus feat. *1 RHD*, *DLA-1*, and it will probably still be underpowered.

*Elephant*, 11 RHD: It is stronger than a brown bear, yes, but so slightly that I don't think it will make much of a difference. Compared to a brown bear, the elephant is Huge, has +4 Str, +2 Con, +2 natural armor, different natural weapons that won't matter much except if you wanted a mouthpick weapon, and Trample (with a really nice DC thanks to your strength) instead of Improved Grab. All in all, I'm comfortable with *7 RHD* and *DLA-2*, maybe DLA-3. The Indian variant has -2 Str and +2 Wis. Is that a reference to the fact that elephants are sacred in India, to let them take a few levels of cleric without too much problem? It wouldn't surprise me. Anyway, no change for the Indian elephant.

*Heavy Horse*, 3 RHD: And we have the four kinds of horses, all with varying levels of LA-0. They're all really fast, with a 50ft land speed for the heavy ones and 60ft for the light ones, but have pretty bad ability scores and above all horrendous natural weapons. The heavy horse has two hooves, which are _secondary_ weapons, and aren't fit for mouthpick. That is awful. You can almost already include your first level as monk already. At least Large size may make it worth *1 RHD, LA+1* and *DLA-1*

*Light Horse*, 3 RHD: The same, with less Str and 60ft movement speed. *1 RHD, LA+1* and *DLA-1*

*Heavy Warhorse*, 4 RHD: +2 Str, +2 Con, +1 natural armor, and trained hooves and bite! Surely that would be worth something! Except I probably still would take a bison over that. *2 RHD*, *DLA-1*

*Light Warhorse*, 3 RHD: The same, with less Str and 60ft movement speed. *2 RHD*, *DLA-1*

*Hyena*, 2 RHD: As Inevitability mentioned, the same as riding dogs with no track, 2 natural armor less, but +10ft movement speed. *1 RHD, LA+1*, *DLA-0*

Well, that went quick. The fact that almost all animals are variations of each other makes them pretty easy to rate. We'll continue with those next time.

----------


## H_H_F_F

> I haven't read the Riftwar Saga. Is it any good?


Like many books from the time, it's pretty trope-heavy and the dialogue&character work is lacking IMO, but it's worth reading. The stories and worldbuilding are good, and there's a strange sense timelessnes to the writing and pacing which makes itvvery engaging, in my opinion. 

It's not my favorite series ever or anything, but if you have the free time and energy to put into it, I'd say it's worth a read. Can't comment on the following series in the cycle - only the Saga was translated to Hebrew, and though I have a few of the sequels in English I haven't made the time for them yet.

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Animals (Lizard to Shark)*

More pets, yeah! Why be a human who turns into a bear with a bear who summons bears, when you can be a *bear* who turns into a bear with a bear who summons bears!?

*Lizard*, 1/2 RHD: And we start off with possibly the weakest animal stat-wise. -8 Str, +4 Dex, -8 Int, +2 Wis, -8 Cha. You are also Tiny, which means even lifting your equipment will be a challenge, and only have a weak bite as your natural weapon. 20ft movement speed on land and climb is bad, but not awful, and you have +8 on Balance checks due to your feet having an adherent surface. As always with bad creatures with low RHD, no RHDR, and I think these stats are bad enough to warrant a *DLA-1* here. 

*Monitor lizard*, 3 RHD: Or, as I like to call them, venomless komodo dragons. Because no one will play this except for the thrill of being able to call themselves a dragon. Medium size, decent stats (+6 Str, +4 Dex, +6 Con), only one bite attack, no ability. Overall slightly worse than the riding dog. *1 RHD, LA+1*, *DLA-1*

*Manta Ray*, 4 RHD: What is with over-RHD-ing every aquatic creature? Anyway, nevermind the number of RHD, this thing is unplayable. +4 Str, +2 Wis, -8 Int, -8 Cha, can't breath outside water, very disadvantageous body shape (do these "wings" count as arms? Can it wear a belt? A shirt?), and a unique natural weapon that highlights the fact that a manta ray is absolutely not adapted for fighting creatures remotely close to its size. A ram. Secondary. Not even a slam, the manta just bumps its opponent. *1 RHD*, but probably still unplayable, and *DLA-3* (all this extra HP should make the difference at low level).

*Mule*, 3 RHD: A heavy horse with +2 Con, primary hooves, but -20ft movement speed. *1 RHD, LA+1*, *DLA-1*

*Giant Octopus*, 8 RHD: Yep, that would be much better as an anthropomorphic animal. Who decided to put 8 RHD on this!? The giant octopus almost doesn't feel like an animal, with the number of natural attacks it gets (9! That's a lot!) and the actual special abilities: Improved Grab/Constrict (very nice with 8 tentacles); and the same ink cloud and jet as the kraken. Really a pleasant surprise for an animal. +10 Str caps off the good grappling chassis, but the rest of stats are pretty lacking for its HD: +4 Dex, +2 Con (very low for a Large creature), -8 Int, +2 Wis, -8 Cha. Also, +7 natural armor. Average value, but still appreciated. If only it had better movement speed, it would be a melee monster, with 8 20ft-reach attacks. Still, this is a barbarian with every fiber of its being. *6 RHD*, *DLA-1*

*Pony*, 2 RHD: You liked the horse, you'll love its bite-sized cousin. +2 Str, Dex, Con, -8 Int, -6 Cha, secondary hooves, +2 natural armor. *1 RHD*, *DLA-1*

*War Pony*, 2 RHD: A thousand of the more brawly episodes of My Little Pony come to mind when reading this name. Compared to the regular pony, +2 Str and Con, and primary hooves. No difference. *1 RHD*, *DLA-1*

*Porpoise*, 2 RHD: Did I read that right? Blindsight 120ft? That's great! And even though you can't move on land, you have an 80ft swim speed. Sadly, no meaningful natural weapon, pitiful stats aside from +6 Dex, and an impossibility to move on land. *1 RHD, LA+1*, *DLA-0*

*Rhinoceros*, 8 RHD: Big, armored and over-RHD'd. Well, not so armored (+7 natural armor is kind of average), but +16 Str and +10 Con are good. Shame that you only have one natural weapon, that it isn't a bite or a tail, and that Powerful Charge can't be combined with ubercharging (or any kind of charging really, since it sets your damage to a fixed, albeit pretty high, amount). Clearly worse than a brown bear. *4 RHD*, *DLA-2*

*Shark*: Stop. Giving. So. Many. HD. To. Aquatic. Creatures! Or at least give them decent stats to boot? Or original abilities? Base yourself on the giant octopus, not on... Sharks. How did they even live through hundreds of millions of years like that?
*Medium*, 3 RHD: +2 Str, +4 Dex, +2 Con, +2 Wis, -8 Int. One bite, blindsense, decent swim speed. I see nothing that would make this even remotely overpowered with *1 RHD*. Maybe a bit strong, but nothing insurmountable. And *DLA-1*. It's not bad enough to have 2 BAB at ECL 1.
*Large*, 7 RHD: Yeah, of course, +4 Str, +1 natural armor and Large size is worth +4 RHD. Except not. *3 RHD*, *DLA-2*
*Huge*, 10 RHD: Bigger is not always better (I can't wait for vermins, that will be great, prepare for DNLA in the 20s). Same increases as from Medium to Large. *4 RHD*, *DLA-4*


Well, I thought we could finish it today, but it appears almost all the animals in the latter part of the alphabet are extremely bad, and there are 5 different types of snakes in there. It's starting to be late in my time zone, so see you next time for the (real) end of the animals.

----------


## PoeticallyPsyco

Reminder for those of you that want to play an octopus-like monster: the feats Scorpion's Grasp and (Greater) Multigrab are your best friends. Unlike Improved Grab, Scorpion's Grasp moves you into their space for free instead of dragging them into yours for free. Utilize the one-limbed grappling rules to drag yourself around the battlefield as part of your full attack, with (Greater) Multigrab to reduce the penalty, while also locking down each opponent you hit and dragging them along for the ride.

I'm waffling back and forth on whether the shark is too strong for 1 RHD. I guess the poor body shape (on top of terrible Int/Cha) is probably enough to compensate for otherwise good stats and blindsense.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Animals (Snakes to Wolf)*
No more delay! Today, we finish the animals! Today we have even more suboptimal creatures! And today we rate them!!

*Contrictor snake*, 3 RHD: A python or a boa, this is a Medium-sized grappler (see the problem already?) with no manipulator. At least you get +6 Str and Dex, and +2 natural armor, along with a weak bite with Improved Grab and Constrict. You are pretty slow, but can climb and swim, which is at least interesting. All in all, I feel like that makes for a worthy *1 RHD, LA+1*, with *DLA-1*.

*Giant constrictor snake*, 11 RHD: This must be a Titanoboa, the biggest constrictor snake to ever crawl the earth, with 14 meters long. Huge size and +14 Str is very good for a grappler, but 11 RHD kill its viability completely. This is most probably worse than the giant octopus, 4 Str and one size category do not amount for having 8 natural attacks less, and since you really have nothing apart from your grappling abilities, I think *4 RHD* would be good. *DLA-4* gives it one more BAB than its ECL, but it doesn't feel too much in my opinion. What do you think?

*Medium viper snake*, 2 RHD: +3 natural armor, -2 Str, +6 Dex, -8 Int, +2 Wis, -10 Cha, one bite with a 1d6 Con/1d6 Con poison, obviously no hands and 20ft movement speed. That poison is not bad, but I don't feel like it balances the advantages of other races, especially with animal stats. *1 RHD*, *DLA-1*

*Large viper snake*, 3 RHD: In the viper snake's case, being Large just means having less chance to hit and a lower AC. Your bite doesn't even deal more damage. There must be some use to being reachless Large in this case, but I don't feel like they make this better than the Medium one. It doesn't even have more natural armor. *1 RHD*, *DLA-1*.

*Huge viper snake*, 6 RHD: Finally, they remembered that increasing size should give you ability boosts. +6 Str, +2 Con, Huge size (and finally a bit of reach), +5 natural armor, and your bite now does 1d6+1-1/2 Str! Incredible (I'm pretty sure it's not supposed to, but hey, not gonna complain)! That will be enough for *3 RHD*, sure. And *DLA-2* should make it interesting too. 

*Squid*, 3 RHD: As Inevitability said, a larger octopus with another HD, slightly better stats (though intelligence went down), a higher jet speed, and the removed ability to move around on land. Similar enough to be worth the same. *2 RHD*, *DLA-0*.

*Giant Squid*, 12 RHD: And there we have the bigger one. Is there any nonepic, non-hydra creature with more natural attacks than that? You have 10 tentacles and one bite, for a flurry of eleven attacks in a full attack. +16 Str, +6 Dex, Huge size and 30ft reach with your tentacles. That's really strong, and definitely the best animal there is. I suggest *8 RHD* for the giant squid, two more than the giant octopus and 4 less than the kraken. It's maybe even a bit strong at that number. It also should like *DLA-2*.

*Toad*, 1/4 RHD: You have no attack. That's hilarious. Not many creatures with a Dex score don't have even a slam attack. Still, you somehow have the best Wisdom out of all animals, equal to the Owl, the Indian elephant and some whales. With your ginormous Hide bonus (who has +21 at ECL 1?), you should make an okay-ish divine caster, but you will always be a bit underpowered compared to a humanoid race. No change, *1 RHD*, *DLA-0*.

*Weasel*, 1/2 RHD: Attach is an incredible ability. For the low-low price of losing your Dexterity bonus to AC and risking getting pinned by anything above Tiny size, you can deal 1 HP to a single target per round. Round of applause, please. You have skills bonuses that could make you an okay rogue, but as with the toad, it's just not worth taking and reminds more of the lizard than anything else. *1 RHD*, *DLA-1*

*Baleen Whale*, 12 RHD: GARGANTUAN. Yes, it's the only advantage of being a baleen whale. You're stronger than an elephant (+24 Str) and have Blindsight, but have less attacks, and live in water but have to go back to the surface to breath. *7 RHD*, *DLA-3*.

*Cachalot Whale*, 12 RHD: A Baleen Whale with a bite on top of your tail slap, +2 Con and +2 Wis. Let's go with *8 RHD*, but I think I would still rather play a giant squid. *DLA-2*

*Orca*, 9 RHD: Eh, not that bad with 3 RHD less. Same selling points, but only +16 Str, a bite but no tail slap and only Huge size. *5 RHD*, *DLA-2*

*Wolf*, 2 RHD: And finally, we get the OG wolf! A riding dog is better, but I don't think +4 Str, +4 Dex and 50ft movement speed should be allowed in ECL 1. *1 RHD, LA+1*, *DLA-0* (yes, same rating as the riding dog, but then again, the riding dog was at the very top of the 1RHD+1 group). 


And that's 38 creatures reviewed in a 10-days period (and 138 in this page of the thread). The most I've ever done, and the most I'll probably ever do, but animals really don't have much for them. Next time, it's the vermins, with their famous beatsticks with more HD than most great wyrms and less stats than a baleen whale. See you then!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Vermin (Insects)*

There are two types of vermin creatures in the Monster Manual. Insects are described as "Giant", and everything else is described as "Monstrous". So, either the one who came up with these names loved insects so much that they did not consider them monstrous even when they are 10 meters long, or they hated insects so much that they thought them already monstrous in their natural size. Your guess. Of course, there will be a handful of exception in later books (Giant sun spider from Lost Empires of Faerun, Giant Lobster from Dr321...), but overall this rule stands and seems intended. 

All monstrous vermin come in several sizes, while most giant vermin come in roles, or specialties. That makes them slightly more interesting, as they have a chance to have various abilities, but most of the time they will be almost as identical as monstrous vermin. 

Generally, Vermin are very similar to animals, in that they invariably have acceptable physical stats and +0 to +2 Wis, but a hit to charisma and -8 intelligence (shot up to 3 from mindless). However, their physical stats are generally worse than animals', but they make up for it with very good natural armor, and immunity to mind-affecting effects.

*Giant Ant, Worker*, 2 RHD: And we start with an ant. You know how ants are supposed to be extremely strong and be able to carry several times their mass? Well, they clearly don't retain any of that when they grow up. No physical bonus at all and a weak bite (you'll probably be able to take a mouthpick weapon later). However, you have +7 natural armor, which is incredible at low level, 50ft speed, mind affecting immunity, and track. That seems like some decent Totemist chassis. *1 RHD, LA+1* and *DLA-1*? That seems even.

*Giant Ant, Soldier*, 2 RHD: Eeeerrrr... What is this doing here exactly? Compared to the riding dog, which was already at the very top of 1 RHD+1, you have -4 Dex and -2 Con, but +10ft land speed, a 20ft climb speed, +3 natural armor, Improved Grab, Darkvision instead of low-light, a simili-Constrict with the acid stinger, and freaking mind-affecting immunity. I don't think it would be balanced with less than *2 RHD*. And obviously *DLA-0*.

*Giant Ant, Queen*, 4 RHD: It's pretty obvious that this is supposed to stay in the anthill and not do anything. 2 more RHD and Large size, but lower speed and Dex than the soldier, no reach, only +2 natural armor and Str... Still, Large size is good on something with Improved Grab and almost-Constrict. *2 RHD*, *DLA-1*

*Giant Bee*, 3 RHD: Bees. They fly. That's pretty much all. +4 Dex, -8 Int, +2 Wis, -2 Cha are really bad modifiers, you only have +2 natural armor. And finally, the worst natural weapon in all of D&D. The only monster that kills itself when it tries to attack. I really see nothing of value here. Maybe an unarmed swordsage? Yeah, maybe. *1 RHD*, *DLA-2*, escaping the DLA-3 just because of that nice flight speed.

*Giant bombardier beetle*, 2 RHD: A soldier ant without most of what made the soldier ant good. +2 Str, +4 Con, -8 Int, +2 Wis, +6 natural armor, these leave as much to be desired on a beetle as they did on an ant soldier, but you don't have the speed or the grappling, or the bonus feat, or anything really except an unscaling acid attack that becomes irrelevant after 3 levels. I suggest a pretty strong *1 RHD* and *DLA-1*.

*Giant Fire Beetle*, 1 RHD: No, you don't have fireball as an SLA 1/day. Your name comes from the fact that you're able to light up your eyes, but it doesn't give you a better darkvision than any other vermin and only illuminates 10ft. For comparison, a regular torch illuminates 20ft. You are almost strictly worse than any PHB race, with no physical ability boosts, -4 Cha and -8 Int, no manipulators, no improved speed... You only have +5 natural armor and immunity to mind-affecting which, while good, do not make up for your body type. *DLA-1*.

*Giant Stag Beetle*, 7 RHD: You won't be able to use this giant insect to transport you through Hallownest, with its 20ft movement speed, but it should be a pretty good bruiser with less RHD. It's like a bison with 20ft less speed, +6 natural armor and immunity to mind-affecting. *3 RHD* should make it playable, and *DLA-3* will offset the terrible Racial Hit Dice. 

*Giant Praying Mantis*, 4 RHD: I like the fact that they gave it a poor flying speed to represent the fact that it can jump incredible heights but not really fly. That's like the early versions of superman, where he just could jump several miles because of the Earth's reduced gravity. Then again, in the context of the game, poor flying isn't really good, and having a +20 to Jump checks would have benefitted the GPM much more. The rest of your stats are not strictly bad, but nothing stands out as amazing. At least you get two natural attacks. A weak *2 RHD* and *DLA-1* should fit the praying mantis.

*Giant Wasp*, 5 RHD: Do you like wasps enough to play them? Absolutely not. Nobody does. If you're playing that, it's only to be able to be the worst murderhobo thief ever and still be able to say "that's what my character would do" with nobody being able to object*. Wasps are like bees, but more combat oriented, with +8 Str, +2 Dex, +4 Con, and an actually useable stinger with a somewhat lackluster poison (1d6 Dex/1d6 Dex) but 1-1/2Str on damage. Still, 5 RHD is way too much for what it brings. Maybe *2 RHD*? Probably average at this level thanks to your poison. And *DLA-2*.


The discrepancy between high natural armor and super low ability scores make the vermin not that easy to rate. Still, I'm pretty content with the result (and I feel like nobody will ever play those, in an actual game or in an optimisation competition, so there's no issue even if one of them is overpowered). Next time we'll be looking at monstrous vermin. Prepare to be underwhelmed.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Vermin (Monstrous ones)*

Hey everybody! You know what time it is? It's new year time! Happy 2022 to all of you! And you know what that means? That means everybody deserves to be happy, even those who want to play as Elder Centipede from One-Punch Man. So, as the last entry of the MM1, let's review the monstrous vermin!

Monstrous vermin are the various non-insect invertebrates of unusual size of the monster manual, ranging from a few dozen times to several hundreds of times larger than their real life counterparts. And as for the elementals (and most monsters except Oozes, really), the best way WotC found to represent them being big and sturdy is increasing their number of RHD up to ridiculous amounts. Which, even if you handwave their mindlessness, would make all monstrous vermin above medium size completely unplayable. Let's see how we can reduce that.

Even more so than elementals, monstrous vermin are similar to each other: 
-Absolutely awful stats with almost no progression except strength. Monstrous vermin gain +2 Con going from Large to Huge, _lose_ -2 Dex going from Gargantuan to Colossal, gain 4 to 6 Str per size category, and. That's. ALL. This is pathetic even by evolved monsters standards. They also all have -/10/2 as their mental stats, very similar to other vermin but with unusable Charisma on top of it. More than anything else, this is what makes monstrous vermin this weak. 
-Animal body shape, with more legs, with all the problems that entails (no manipulator, no reach when Large...). At least spiders and centipedes have a bite attack for an eventual mouthpick weapon.
-They all get bonuses on Climb, Hide and Spot checks, and bonus Weapon Finesse. Of course, there's usually no point since they have more strength than dexterity when at least Huge, but that's nice for the small ones. 
-They all get some poison, scaling with their size, until they become really interesting later on. That's the reason you want to play one of those.

*Monstrous Centipede*
Starting stats, excluding Str: +4 Dex, +0 Con, -8 Int, +0 Wis, -8 Cha
Spiders have their webs, scorpions have Improved Grab, but centipedes have nothing (except a racial +8 on Hide checks). They're the weakest monstous vermin, with the lowest stats and natural armor. Their poison damages Dex, which is probably the least useful physical stat to damage, since it's vital to almost nobody yet everybody has at least a decent value in it. They also have only one bite as their natural weapon.
*Tiny*, 1 RHD: -10 Str, no Natural armor, 20ft speed, poison deals 1 Dex. The weakest poison in the game and a 2lb light load without heavy investment (for those wondering, that's the weight of a component pouch). Even with some Ur-priest levels, I can't see this being overpowered with *DLA-2*. I really don't see what to do with it. 
*Small*, 1 RHD: -6 Str, +1 NA, 30ft speed, poison deals 1d2 Dex. At least you can now carry a few items and have reach. Still, your body shape is really bad, your poison is unuseable and you are dumb as a brick. *DLA-1*
*Medium*, 1 RHD: -2 Str, +2 NA, 40ft speed, poison deals 1d3 Dex. Negligible improvement. *DLA-1*
*Large*, 3 RHD: +2 Str, +2 NA, 40ft speed, poison deals 1d4 Dex. Still negligible improvement (you'll still use dexterity and not Str to hit), and since you lose Hide bonus and to-hit, this is probably weaker than Medium. *1 RHD*, *DLA-2*
*Huge*, 6 RHD: +6 Str, +6 NA, 40ft speed, poison deals 1d6 Dex (lots of 6s with this one).
The strength and poison are now pretty useable, and you got reach. You'd like some grappling support. *3 RHD*, *DLA-2*
*Gargantuan*, 12 RHD: +12 Str, +10 NA, 40ft speed, poison deals 1d8 Dex.
When the best benefit you get from being one size larger is... being one size larger, there's a problem. *4 RHD*, *DLA-5*
*Colossal*, 24 RHD: +16 Str, +16 NA, 40ft speed, poison deals 2d6 Dex.
This reminds me of an animated object, with no good immunity and less HP, less Str, less reach and a worse body type. Still, 2d6 Dex is good, sad that it's keyed off Con. *5 RHD*

*Monstrous Scorpion
*Starting stats, excluding Str: +0 Dex, +4 Con, -8 Int, +0 Wis, -8 Cha
The beefiest monstrous vermin, with the highest natural armor and constitution. It also gets 3 natural weapons (claw/claw/sting) and Con poison. Nice. Sad that the poison is on the secondary sting. You also get tremorsense, and especially Improved Grab/Constrict on its claws, which will be extremely useful for the really big ones. That's strong enough that Tiny and Small both got +0 in the original thread.
*Medium*, 2 RHD: +2 Str, +4 NA, 40ft speed, poison deals 1d3 Con.
Also probably weaker than Small. *1 RHD*, *DLA-1*
*Large*, 5 RHD: +8 Str, +7 NA, 50ft speed, poison deals 1d4 Con.
You start to grapple pretty well. The poison is still pretty irrelevant, but may be decent to put on other weapons with Craft (Poison). *3 RHD*, *DLA-1*.
*Huge*, 10 RHD: +12 Str, +12 NA, 50ft speed, poison deals 1d6 Con.
The Con boost is nice for poison DC, Huge size is nice for grappling. *5 RHD*, *DLA-3*
*Gargantuan*, 20 RHD: +20 Str, +18 NA, 50ft speed, poison deals 1d8 Con.
Only size category with +8 Str. A strong 6 RHD, or a weak *7 RHD*, *DLA-9*
*Colossal*, 40 RHD: +24 Str, +25 NA, 50ft speed, poison deals 1d10 Con.
That's some really high natural armor there. Also, even with *8 RHD*, you have +42 to grapple. Nobody ain't getting off these big, meaty claws. 

*Monstrous Spider*
Starting stats, excluding Str: +6 Dex, +0 Con, -8 Int, +0 Wis, -8 Cha
Just be a web-spinner. Hunters have a +10 on Jump checks, so they make better swordsages and warblades, so that's probably even in terms of pure power, but if you're a spider, it's much cooler to be able to ensnare your preys from afar and create web traps. Spiders are also the slowest monstrous vermin, and have only one bite, but get Tremorsense as the scorpion, and weirdly also gets +2 Con when becoming Medium, on top of Huge. Spider poison deals Str damage, which is nice both against casters and bruisers, and also has the highest numbers, with 2d8 Str for the colossal spider. 
*Tiny*, 1 RHD: -8 Str, no natural armor, 20ft speed, poison deals 1d2 Str.
The web doesn't scale based on size category, only HD. So that's really good, since you have a full-fledged web with no level investment. Still, you have such a bad body type that this feels like *DLA-1*.
*Small*, 1 RHD: -4 Str, no natural armor, 30ft speed, poison deals 1d3 Str.
The spider reached its maximum speed. Negligible improvement otherwise. *DLA-1*
*Medium*, 2 RHD: +0 Str, +1 NA, 30ft speed, poison deals 1d4 Str.
Just play the Small one. *1 RHD*, *DLA-1*
*Large*, 4 RHD: +4 Str, +2 NA, 30ft speed, poison deals 1d6 Str.
There's not much here, you're not strong enough for grappling and not small enough for hiding. Still, your poison starts to be decent. *1 RHD, LA+1*, *DLA-2*
*Huge*, 8 RHD: +8 Str, +5 NA, 30ft speed, poison deals 1d8 Str.
Marginally better than the centipede, but still very similar except for the web. High *3 RHD*, *DLA-3*
*Gargntuan*, 16 RHD: +14 Str, +10 NA, 30ft speed, poison deals 2d6 Str.
That's a really good poison you've got there. By this point, you should have invested in a Mouthpick weapon, but you could craft really nice poisons with it. *5 RHD*, *DLA-8*
*Colossal*, 32 RHD: +20 Str, +18 NA, 30ft speed, poison deals 2d8 Str.
And it continues. Nothing new, just more numbers. At these sizes, hunter spiders may be better, since Jump scales with strength and web scales with constitution. *7 RHD*

And that is all the vermin! As always, do not hesitate to argue that my ratings are unbalanced, and once again a merry christmas and a happy new year to all!!

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## Beni-Kujaku

And with that, every -0 creature in the Monster Manual has been given a negative LA! Thank you all for the support and comments you have written all along!

Starting next week, we'll go over the Heroes of Horror creatures, then the Monster Manual III. Do you have any suggestions to change the way these creatures should be reviewed? Any previous creatures that you want rere(re)viewed? If so, speak up, and we'll see about that.

Thank you again for sticking around and see you next time!

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## Emberlily

Just want to say how thankful I am that you're putting all this effort in. 8HD Colossal Scorpion sounds like a character I'd love to try out tbh. The party can ride you like a tank...

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## H_H_F_F

> Just want to say how thankful I am that you're putting all this effort in.


+1 to this sentiment. Very well done, Beni.

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## PoeticallyPsyco

Mission accomplished! Forward and onward!

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Just want to say how thankful I am that you're putting all this effort in. 8HD Colossal Scorpion sounds like a character I'd love to try out tbh. The party can ride you like a tank...


You're very welcome, I'm just glad some people read and maybe will one day use these monsters in a game. WotC's weird and quirky monsters are just too interesting to just be abandoned in a random splatbook forever.

About playing the scorpion, I had a kinda similar character once, it was a paraplegic gnome riding in an iron golem. My advice for that is: be aware of your limitations. A colossal scorpion won't be able to enter most buildings, will have difficulties getting out of random obstacles, but will on the other hand trivialize others, including a few boss fights if your DM doesn't know what to expect. Don't try to be always useful or to force yourself on your party. Your time will eventually come. Try to overcome your weakness by being creative more than just using magic items, both bcause you'll probably be less useful than your teammates with the same items anyway, and because playing a monstrous race is more about having a unique experience than playing any kind of "normal" play.

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## Emberlily

The experience of being big enough that yr friends can build a house on you...

That's one reason I love this thread so much. It's a work in taking the weird and wild types of characters that D&D theoretically allows and making them even remotely able to contribute adequately to the systems D&D necessitates you engage with, without just going "well be a wizard and use the infinite power to limit yrself to a weird niche"

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## Beni-Kujaku

Bloodrot

And we're back! And for today, we have the quintessence of this thread: the bloodrot. So, remember how oozes had some of the worst stats compared to their HD and their only good ability score was constitution? What if... We made them undead. Good idea, huh? Yeah, I thought so. Now, bloodrot are not really oozes per se, not even reanimated dead oozes. Just animated blood and other fluids from people dissolved in acid. Makes me wonder what made a necromancer choose to try to animate what is essentially only acid at this point, and how the newly formed bloodrot got out of the acid considering it doesn't have any acid resistance. In fact, the bloodrot is much closer to an elemental than an ooze, with only a slam attack and the weird DR 5/-. Of course, 4e expectedly didn't get the memo, and the bloodrot is now ooze-typed (as well as undead, since 4e doesn't have creature types the way 3.X does). 4e also gives us this great bit of flavor text: "The creature is a vaguely humanoid-shaped mass that reeks of blood."



_The "humanoid-shapedness" will be left to the reader's appreciation._


Ok, so, what does being a mass of blood with roughly 5 times as many hit points as the creature it comes from gets you?

- 10 Undead RHD. Off to a great start. Undead grants you very good immunities, but that doesn't excuse the downright awful perks of the type after a few RHD.
- +6 Str, -10 Dex, no Con, -8 Int, -10 Wis, +4 Cha (total -18), _NO natural armor_. Are you kidding me? What are these stats exactly? There are 1 RHD creatures with better Str and Cha than that, and without the 3 unuseable stats. Also, you have no Con, which is a problem when you'd like most of your HD to be class levels. The fact that it has no natural armor and -10 Dex continues the tradition of ooze(-like) monsters having some of the lowest AC in all of D&D, with only 4 AC more than the absolute lowest AC possible, the Elder Black Pudding. If it wasn't clear by now, this is worse than awful.
- One 10ft reach slam with blood fever. This is strong disease, with 1d6 Con/1d4 Cha damage, and really hard to heal (Break Enchantment or Remove Curse, plus a Heal check), but still a disease, with a 1 min incubation. Hence probably irrelevant. That also means that your only way to use your less-than-decent Strength is to hit people one at a time, with no way to use either gloves of man or mouthpick weapons.
- 20ft land and climb speed. Not only can you not hit people effectively, you can't reach them effctively either. Did I mention this monster is awful?
- Improved Grab, Constrict. You're medium, with only +6 Str and Improved Grab only on your slam. You won't use it. 
- Blindsight 60ft, DR 5/-... Okay, that's actually pretty good, especially with...
- Sanguineous Mount. If you infect someone with blood fever, you can enter their body and nauseate them for as long as you wish. Effectively, this is a Save-or-Lose, since not only are they unable to attack, the blood fever continues to affect them and they will slowly die. On the other hand, dual-save SoL are not new, and most of them do not require you to stay motionless the whole time while letting to your enemy the choice of throwing themselves off a cliff to kill you in the process. 

So... What can you do with that? Well, decent strength and charisma look like barbarian fuel, but with low HP, low speed and your main ability requiring you to not tank anymore, that's not really good. I think it would make an acceptable glaivelock, which would allow it to have some iteratives while having some actual class features. The other way would be to go monk, but Evasion doesn't really work with -10 Dex, and you get no Wisdom either. Now, is this even worth 1 RHD? Most of your chassis is awful, but you still get really good immunities, blindsight, DR... That should make it a pretty strong *1 RHD, LA+1*. Maybe you could even get someone out of the picture if you hit them with hideous blow into Improved Grab into blood fever into Sanguineous mount... Once in a blue moon. And undead RHD being some of the absolute worst there is, even *DLA-5* doesn't seem exxagerated. 


The bloodrot is a combination of the worst parts of two of the worst types there is. It is extremely passive by itself, and the absence of split hurts it even more than other oozes. Still, that's a good introduction to Heroes of Horror, which is the only book reviewed so far in the LA-assignment thread with not even one monster above LA+0. Buckle up boyzengirls, we're going on a ride!

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## emulord

I think the downsides of unusable mental + hit me dexterity are enough that it seems unusable at 3 RHD.  Undead immunities are nice, but no other defense, effectively 10 Con HP as some kind of melee character makes me think *1 RHD* is more appropriate. 

I can see -5 DNLA because otherwise its base attack bonus > level which would break stuff. This route would have decent HP at least

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## Beni-Kujaku

> I think the downsides of unusable mental + hit me dexterity are enough that it seems unusable at 3 RHD.  Undead immunities are nice, but no other defense, effectively 10 Con HP as some kind of melee character makes me think *1 RHD* is more appropriate.


I would agree if you were only going for a melee character. You're too slow too frail too weak for that. But you don't really have to. Your int is awful yes but your charisma isn't bad and you don't really need wisdom with your mind-affecting immunity (at least at low-to-mid levels). A warlock or even a favored soul or sorcerer would not have to spend the whole fight in melee and appreciates most of the immunity while dodging attacks without relying too much on AC (miss chance flight invisibility...). -8 int is still ridiculously low but those classes don't need to PrC as much as martials. Also low HP will only matter against spells. Against physical attacks your excellent DR 5/- will more than make up for it. I really don't think this should be put in an ECL 1 environment. Now I agree that 3 is probably too many and I'll gladly reduce it to 2RHD or 1+1LA if other people speak up.

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## QuadraticGish

> I would agree if you were only going for a melee character. You're too slow too frail too weak for that. But you don't really have to. Your int is awful yes but your charisma isn't bad and you don't really need wisdom with your mind-affecting immunity (at least at low-to-mid levels). A warlock or even a favored soul or sorcerer would not have to spend the whole fight in melee and appreciates most of the immunity while dodging attacks without relying too much on AC (miss chance flight invisibility...). -8 int is still ridiculously low but those classes don't need to PrC as much as martials. Also low HP will only matter against spells. Against physical attacks your excellent DR 5/- will more than make up for it. I really don't think this should be put in an ECL 1 environment. Now I agree that 3 is probably too many and I'll gladly reduce it to 2RHD or 1+1LA if other people speak up.


I feel like 1+1LA is more appropriate for this thing, especially if used as a caster as suggested. I could also imagine some silly things happening with this thing on a mount if you could simultaneously find a way to inflict your disease by touch and speed up incubation. Probably if you leverage some touch attack maneuvers?

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## Dalmosh

Hello, love your work, and don't mean to derail your thread....

But, looking at your vermin in particular, this jumps out at me.

Do you think there are instances where reducing the HD of a monster PC race should trigger an accompanying size reduction?

I can see arguments either way.
On the one hand, level drain from Negative Energy is a means of incurring one without the other - though is quite background dependent and not applicable to constructs and undead.  A reduced HD Great Wyrm makes a lot more intuitive sense than a reduced HD animated house. 

On the other, if you are representing monsters as a weaker/younger form of their normal statblock (and they are going to "grow" by taking class levels instead of their normal HD) it might make more sense to drop the size as well. If you have to shave half the HD of a dinosaur to make it viable, why should it retain it's size category? Maybe this is more relevant to the gestalt approach...

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## Beni-Kujaku

> I feel like 1+1LA is more appropriate for this thing, especially if used as a caster as suggested. I could also imagine some silly things happening with this thing on a mount if you could simultaneously find a way to inflict your disease by touch and speed up incubation. Probably if you leverage some touch attack maneuvers?


Yeah, 1 RHD+1LA should do. I still think it would be a bit strong, but not overwhelmingly so. However, for your melee tactics, I'm much more doubtful. 

First, this thing on a mount. No. You "have a diameter of roughly 8 feet and a thickness of 2 to 6 inches. A typical specimen weighs about 400 pounds.". First, what? The hell is thickness for something like that*? Anyway, you're supposed to be mostly liquid, you'd leak on the side of your horse, and you're at least a medium load (or a heavy one, if you're on a light horse), which means you're not going faster than 40ft either way. If you can make your Ride checks. With -10 Dex. But that's only the first problem. The second one is that you're a bloodrot. Your horse will get blood fever the second you try to get on it, and die in a few days. You are not riding anything anytime soon.

Then, speeding up incubation. I don't think there is even one spell or class feature that allows you to skip the incubation period of diseases (if you know of one, please let me know). If there was, this thing would be much much better. The damage from the disease is really high and you infect your opponents with any touch, specifically including grappling and them attacking you unarmed. Normally, everything you fight is supposed to die in the next weeks if they don't have access to a cleric with some ranks in Heal. That's why the thing is CR 7 (that and Split). It's just that it doesn't actually help them during the fight. 

And touch maneuvers. Why not. Especially the Setting Sun throws, which use your strength and have an actual effect apart from the disease.


*(After calculation, what they meant was that this is supposed to be a flattened half-sphere with the surface touching the ground being 8ft in diameter and 2 to 6 inch "tall", like some sort of gigantic bloodbloater. With a "thickness" of 3 inches, such a shape would weigh 450 pounds. Obviously this looks nothing like either the picture in Heroes of Horror or the description from 4e. I like this monster more with every new piece of information I get on it.)






> Hello, love your work, and don't mean to derail your thread....
> 
> But, looking at your vermin in particular, this jumps out at me.
> 
> Do you think there are instances where reducing the HD of a monster PC race should trigger an accompanying size reduction?


No, I don't think we should reduce a monster's size. We're trying to rate a monster to find when they are playable, not when a smaller version is playable. Most of the time, being big is an advantage all by itself, and reducing it would necessitate to rate them again, and so on and so forth. Some monsters could even get several appropriate ratings. For example, if we said the scorpion becomes Medium at 2 RHD and Large at 5 RHD, then the process to rate the "Huge" scorpion would be: 
-rate it as Huge, give it 5 RHD. 
-Make it smaller because a scorpion is not huge at 5 RHD.
- rate it as if it was Large, give it 4 RHD (maybe 3 but whatever)
- Make it smaller because a scorpion is not large at 4 RHD.
- rate it as if it was Medium, give it 3 RHD.
- A scorpion is indeed Medium at 3 RHD, so we keep it that way. 

This is way too complicated, reduces the difference between different versions of the same monster (all the elementals would be medium or small, for example), and overall goes against the spirit of the thread which is to allow people to play weird creatures. A colossal decapod below ECL 10 is definitely a weird creature, and it would hurt me to not allow it. 

Also, that's not even counting the fact that we would have to choose arbitrarily the threshold at which a creature becomes larger (when does a Remorhaz become Huge exactly? Do we have to consider the lore and only reduce the size of non-outsiders, non-construct, non-undead, because they are created as-is and do not grow, for the most part?), if they get the standard stats for having their size? What of the will-o-wisp, which probably becomes Tiny, and has a negative Strength score? The elder black pudding, and its -7 natural armor?

No, that creates waaaaaaay too many problems for almost no advantage beyond verisimilitude. And when we're talking of houses, rat swarms and mushrooms going out adventuring to become wizards, verisimilitude becomes the least of our problem.

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Boneleaf*

What makes something a plant? The cambridge dictionary tells us that a plant is "a living thing that grows in earth, in water, or on other plants, usually has a stem, leaves, roots, and flowers, and produces seeds". A boneleaf grows in earth, has stem, leaves and roots, and may have seeds, since we have no idea how it reproduces outside of vegetative reproduction by rhizomes. (Also, it's almost indistinguishable from a plant so it may have fruits and seeds to complete the illusion) This may be an aberration, but almost any biologist would tell you that this is in fact a carnivorous plant, using illusions to lure humanoids the way _Saracennia_ uses sweet nectar to lure insects. 

Also, this creature is among the less discussed ones in d&d as a whole it seems. There has been no official text even mentioning it beyond HoH. We know absolutely nothing of the thing except the one paragraph in Heroes of Horror, and even that doesn't answer much, like how it reproduces or how it came to be (however, how it hunts and how it feeds is extremely well-described, which is honestly what you need for such a monster, so I can't really throw the first stone). Even on the internet, I've seen exactly two websites mentioning it, beyond simple creature lists and translations of the first two. That is, GitP, with the LA assignment thread and another thread asking what happens when you wild shape into one, and a confused guy on RPG Stackexchange who asked how to kill it, and whose question was copied on a few other websites. That is absurdly low, so let's give the guy a bit more love, and maybe let some of you play it to rekindle some interest in the weird plant thing!


-You are an aberration. Let's be honest, that's not good. A plant would have been much better. Also you're litterally several white bushes grouped together using vines to attack. I have no idea how item slots work in that case but you'll certainly miss a few.
-The boneleaf has average stats for a Large melee 7 RHD monster, with +14 Str, +4 Dex, +12 Con, -2 Int, +6 Wis, +2 Cha (not having awful intelligence is a nice change of pace in this thread), with +8 natural armor (that will help balance out the difficulty to get an armor adapted to your body shape). 
-You also get 4 natural weapons, of which you can only use 2 per round. Your two slams have higher damage than your two tendrils, which have greater reach, Improved Grab and Constrict. Constrict uses your slam damage. That's not half bad.  Your strategy will be pretty simple: grab two people with your tendrils, then pummel them with your slams. 
-Plant immunity are really good, with notably mind-affecting immunity. The rest is less useful, but it will come into play once in a while. 
-You can create Major Images that last 1d6+1 rounds. That will only be useful to amuse children, since the duration is so short, but that's a fun ability for RP moments. 
-The real problem here is your speed. 10ft land speed is really low. Even with a level of barbarian and the Burst power, you'll struggle to move around. 

In the end, the boneleaf will be an excellent grappling Psychic Warrior, with stats very well-fit for this role, but you'll have a lot of trouble with your speed. Your first goal should be to find something that allows you to fly with a fixed speed. Owlfeather armor (if you can find a blacksmith who will make one for you), or a winged vest (if you can afford a standard action at the beginning of each fight, which you probably can't), or a standard continuous Fly item (supposedly 27k gp). 

You have much better stats than the shambling mounds, better natural weapons and reach, but worse type, worse body shape slightly worse immunities and skills, and half its speed. I think the boneleaf is still slightly stronger, especially with that good Wis, but not enough for one more RHD. I suggest *6 RHD* and *DLA-1*.


That one actually wasn't that bad. However, this is only a respite before next time. We'll have another of those monsters where WotC assumed one of their subsystem would be successful enough to have some support, then they didn't print any. See you then for the Corruption Eater!

----------


## PoeticallyPsyco

With the Scorpion's Grasp feat to improve your in-combat mobility, 6 RHD seems fair to me. Maybe a bit high, actually, since these guys will probably be missing some item slots, which will especially hurt if they go Totemist. So yeah, 6 or 5 RHD.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Corruption Eater*
"Kenzen naru tamashii wa, kenzen naru seishin to, kenzen naru nikutai ni nai de yadoru."
"Ein gesunder Geisteskrankegehirn in einem gesunden Körper."
נפש לא בריאה בגוף בריא
"Un esprit malsain dans un corps sain."
"An unhealthy mind in a healthy body."
"Mens insana in corpore sano."

That idiom is the opposite of the stupid one which has spread throughout the world. It represents the need for someone to care about nothing and neglect their state of mind to be able to  not see the eldritch horrors behind the veil and live a happy life. The corruption eater embodies that philosophy exactly, draining one's corruption from their body and spewing it back to cloud their mind. This allows you to progress faster through depravity as you forget improving in your chosen field and learn new skills to help killing your friends.

One single whiff of its tainted exhalation and you'll not be able to live without it ever again! Just give the Eater one single temporary hit point (but more is always better) and you'll feel your mind deformity expand in no time! You can come back any time if you feel your body being corrupted again. That will only make it ever stronger.


What a nice creature, helping poor creatures in need. The corruption eater is one of the many creatures in Heroes of Horror based on the concept of the Taint of Evil. Each creature can have a score of depravity (making them become insane and un able to perceive reality as it is when it increases) and corruption (which is body decay due to exposure to evil). The corruption eater is specialized in fighting creatures with corruption score and adept in decreasing it by using its bite while being able to slowly increase their depravity with its breath attack.

Now, the issue with that monster is that taint is not (it should be) used in most campaign worlds. So all its special abilities will be moot against the vast majority of regular enemies, leaving it as a big beatstick with lowish stats and a bite which damages itself. It's also one of these monsters where you don't really know why WotC gave it so many HD. 15 RHD on a medium creature is very nonstandard, and doesn't really make sense. That feels like an attempt to make it as a DM tool instead of a real monster, and just have it at least get a chance to use its bite so that PCs realize that it reduces their corruption and that they can use it.

- 15 Aberration RHD, Medium size. Whatever starts with so many is already sure to end up in this thread, but the Corruption Eater (that makes CE, like its alignment. Do you think that was intended? Me neither.) is especially bad.
- +10 Str, +10 Dex, +8 Con, +2 Int, +4 Wis, +4 Cha, with +6 natural armor. Those would be really good stats for a 7- or 8-HD creature with some actual abilities. On the Corruption Eater, that's ridiculously low.
- An average bite you will never use in combat, since it deals damage to you when it hits a creature with no corruption score, and two secondary tentacles with mediocre damage (1/2 Str) and Rake. You'll have to take a mouthpick weapon asap, but otherwise that's pretty standard, if a bit weak as an attack routine.
- Lots of abilities when you fight corrupted creatures: DR 10/Good, your tainted exhalation deals more damage, you can Scent them, and your bite reduces their corruption but gives you a lot of pretty good bonuses: +1 to hit, to damage, to saving throws, and 5 temporary hit points for one hour. I'm pretty sure the temp HP is supposed to stack, but not only is it not written, you'll generally never get to use any of these abilities in an actual play. 
- Tainted Exhalation. That's it. That's the Corruption Eater's one ability that it can use in a normal campaign. And if it's not really useful in battle, it may help your friends a lot. Getting to high depravity scores can give people two free feats in exchange for a few disadvantages if they don't mind becoming neutral or evil in the process and violating their code of conduct.
In the end, the Corruption Eater can exhale whenever it has temporary hit points, which is pretty easy to come by, and give the equivalent of a flaw+bonus feat to everyone in the party. That is extremely good. If you can choose your Depravity symptom, then I suggest Compulsive->Delusional->Unresponsive. Your character has OCD, becomes conspiracist and apathetic, but the only mechanical effect is 1d4 nonlethal damage per day, -2 Wisdom and an additional -2 on Wisdom skill checks. If you can't choose your symptoms, then I advise you to not go up to severe depravity, because some of those are really harsh to play with (would you want to be confused every other turn?). 


In the end, I'm not really sure how to rate that. It has very balanced stats which kind of remind me of an ettercap on steroids, but only Medium size and no ability. On the other hand, potentially giving two feats to each member of the party is incredibly good. I'd say something like 6 RHD would be balanced, but really not fun to play, since a lot of that is just spewing on your party members in your downtime. Maybe *5 RHD* and *DLA-6* would make for something interesting?  I'd like some feedback. 

*Spoiler: If your DM is crazy*
Show


There is something interesting with taint. Creatures with the Evil subtype are automatically considered to have corruption and depravity scores equal to half of their Charisma score. What that may mean is that a Corruption Eater could eat corruption infinitely from an Evil outsider (if you consider "corruption effective score" to be edible). In that case, then a Corruption Eater with 5 levels of wizard, Stormguard Warrior and Improved Familiar can glue their lips to the imp familiar's ass and get an average of +600 to hit, damage rolls and saving throws. I'm not sure how that would affect the rating, since TO infinite damage loops have always been possible around level 10, especially if there's some wizard levels in there, but that's that.


So, that was "how not to make a creature based on a niche subsystem". Next week, we'll have "how to make a creature based on the same niche subsystem which can actually stand on its own two legs". See you then for the Taint Elemental!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Taint Elemental (Large or larger)*

Taint elementals ask and answer a lot of questions about what taint really is, since they litterally are a physical manifestation of it. First, they speak Abyssal and have the [Evil] subtype, which would mean that Taint is probably linked to the Abyss in some way, shape, or form. However,  they don't have the Chaotic subtype, even though they're usually chaotic. So it's probably either some part of the Abyss using a place of great evil to leak into our world in order to corrupt it (and since it can only appear in places of evil and not chaos, it loses some of its chaos), or it's from a more moderately chaotic plane like Carceri. Anyway, Taint Elemental are what would an elemental be if it was created by the substance of an Outer Plane instead of an Inner Plane. Its dimension door ability is also very interesting. The same way a fire elemental summoned in the Material Plane forms from a nearby fire and "animates" it, the Taint Elemental doesn't have a substance of its own. It "animates" the evil around it and concentrates it into a solid form. That means that, since there is evil everywhere, it can dissipate its own body then animate the taint existing afar. That's how it seems to teleport, it's the same creature with the same conscience, but not the same body.


Taint Elementals are really close to regular elementals. Decent starting ability scores, but failing to scale with its RHD doubling with each size category. Only slam attacks, but two of them starting with the Large size, and a DR/- scaling slowly with its category. It, however has a few abilities taking it apart from the others. Instead of Vortex/Whirlwind/Earthglide, the Taint Elemental has a 3/day dimension door as a move action, which doesn't prevent it from taking action afterwards. Really good. Shadowpouncer, anybody? Instead of gaining +1 or inflicting -1 on a few rolls when they are close to their element, the Taint Elemental gains Surge of Malevolence as a bonus feat, which gives them a pretty substantial bonus on one roll (+9, if you play your cards well), but only 1/day. Overall, I feel like I prefer that to an Element Mastery, since you are sure to have access to it when needed, and it opens access to Debilitating Strike (2/day your attack deals 4 Wisdom damage or 2 Con damage, no save). It also gets better ability scores than most elementals, with notably no intelligence penalty. It also deals corruption with its Slam attacks, which may give your party bonus feats but is expectedly useless in combat. 

That makes for an above average elemental, but still slightly weaker than Air at low levels. Teleporting 400ft is nice, but that's not 100ft (perfect) flying. However, the difference in pure ability scores makes the Taint Elemental better later on. Their role are also different. The air elemental is more of a rogue or unarmed swordsage, while the Taint Elemental would be a much more standard Warblade, or Cleric. It could be anything, really, with those balanced stats. Maybe Duskblade or psychic warrior, but you'll suffer the loss of many caster levels. 


*Large*, 8 RHD: +10 Str, +4 Dex, +10 Con, +2 Int, +4 Wis, +4 Cha. +9 Natural Armor. As always, becoming Large is a boon for an elemental, with DR 5/-, 2 slams, and overall excellent stats. This would be almost playable as-is, really. You get some utility with Dimension Door, and you're overall almost as tough as the Earth Elemental, but with decent mental stats and more dexterity and mobility. A pretty good *7 RHD*, *DLA-1*.

*Huge*, 16 RHD: And, expectedly, you don't get 8 ECL worth of abilities. You now have 40ft movement speed, +14 Str, +8 Dex, +12 Con, +2 Int, +4 Wis, +4 Cha, +9 NA. Yeah, that should be worth 2 RHD more than Large. *9 RHD*, *DLA-3*, like Air.

*Greater*, 20 RHD: You double your DR, and gain +2 Dex, Str, and Int. Nothing worth more than *10 RHD*, and *DLA-5*.

*Elder*, 24 RHD: Once again, +2 Str, Dex, and Int. It's weird that you don't increase your natural armor with these categories. *11 RHD*, *DLA-8*


It's interesting to see how WotC revisited the elemental chassis with these ones. I feel like if they had to rewrite the monster manual with the knowledge from 3.5, to make some sort of new edition, they would give elementals stats scaling more like that, with more than one stat increasing with each size category, and more weird abilities like Touch of Taint. *looks at the 5e air elemental statblock, which is almost a carbon copy of the Large 3.5 Air Elemental* ... Nevermind.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Dusk Giant*
The Dusk Giant, standing between the Sun Giant and the Moon Giant, and weaker than them both. This creature is most well-known for the industrial amount of cheese that it produces when you try to Polymorph into one. Cannibalize means you can gain as many HD as you want and qualify for any number of feats before the end of the Polymorph effect, while also somehow gaining Charisma. Suffice to say, such an ability can never be allowed in normal play, and was immediately asterisked.

Without cannibalize, the dusk giant is still a giant with overall much better stats for its number of RHD, especially in its mental scores (as seems to be a motif in Heroes of Horror) and even a few SLAs for the greater versions. They also get a weird aura akin to the No Light cantrip, but also giving -2 to saves to people in the area. Won't probably ever be game-changing, but flavorful. So, what do we have here:

*Least Dusk Giant*, 6 RHD: This is one of the very few Medium-sized giants in the game. It has pretty good ability scores for its number of RHD, with +10 Str, +2 Dex, +8 Con, +4 Int, +4 Wis, +4 Cha, +6 Natural armor. Its aura only has a 10-ft radius. 2 claws, one bite, and Rend on its claws. There is nothing particularly useful here, and being Medium sized is not ideal for something that clearly wants to be in melee. But the stats are really good, and I would easily see a paladin or ranger Least Dusk Giant. *5 RHD*, *DLA-0*

*Lesser Dusk Giant*, 12 RHD: The authors of Heroes of Horror learned from their predecessors' errors and made the advanced version of their monsters actually much more powerful than the lesser one. +24 Str, +0 Dex, +14 Con, +4 Int, +4 Wis, +6 Cha. Now we're talking melee. Compared to a frost giant, you have -4 Str, +2 Dex, +4 Con, +4 Int, +6 Cha, +2 natural armor, and you get Enervation and Ray of Enfeeblement 1/day. Much stronger than a Frost Giant, and more on par with a Cloud Giant's level. Let's go with *9 RHD*, *DLA-2*.

*Greater Dusk Giant*, 18 RHD: And the biggest of them all, Huge in size, with an impressive +38 Str, +22 Con (stronger than a Great Gold Wyrm! I didn't think the Wyrms would be outmatched that quickly), but not much else to show. The SLAs are nice, notably Energy Drain, but most of the time you'll just go in melee and start hitting stuff. Still better than a Storm Giant, but not having the continuous Freedom of Movement is a problem. *13 RHD*, *DLA-3*

It's nice to see good mental scores on martial characters once in a while, and Heroes of Horror delivers on the subject. Apparently, you have to be smart to be efficiently evil. And the next monster (and last of the book) will certainly not go against that principle. See you next time for the Phantasmal Slayer!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Phantasmal Slayer*

_This image intentionally left blank, please fill in your greatest fear._

Ugh. These guys. I can excuse hard-to-rate creatures. I can excuse creatures with no lore and I can even excuse unnecessarily edgy creatures. However, the Phantasmal Slayer is both hard-to-rate for all the wrong reasons, so completely unnecessarily edgy that it prevents them from having any meaningful lore, and very boring as a creature all at once, both as a monster and especially so as a PC. Don't play this one, folks, nobody will like it and especially not you. It really pains me that such an art is wasted on such a monster. Because yeah, the art is pretty great, one of the best ones in this book in my opinion. That's a good combination of all the most common phobias and fits the monster perfectly.

So, the phantasmal slayer, an [Evil] Outsider which exists only to spread fear, for no reason whatsoever. It's Native, most probably because the writers couldn't think of a home Plane for it, but there's no mention of what it eats, how it lives or why it spreads fear. They even prefer to let their victims go unharmed so that they can "pass the tale of terror", which really makes no sense for a creature which needs to eat to survive... 

- 16 Outsider HD, [Evil, Native, Incorporeal]. Great RHD, with all the goodies of being incorporeal. Obviously, sixteen is a lot, and even reduced a bit it won't allow for a lot of customization. The skill list is very close to a wizard's, with lots of Knowledge, Spellcraft and Concentration. Shame that losing more than 10 caster levels has never made for a good caster. 
- Str -, Dex+10, Con+10, Int+12, Wis+6, Cha+16, 4+Cha Deflection to AC. Those are great, well-rounded stats. Along with the incorporeal outsider type, they would already probably be worth 8 or 9 RHD. The charisma bonus is especially good for the DC of your SLAs and of Phantasmal Facade.
- A few SLAs, mostly mind-affecting, and the not mind-affecting ones are not really good. Most of the time, you'll only use Feeblemind 1/day.
- Two incorporeal touches with uninteresting damage, really only useful to channel Phantasmal Facade. 
- 60ft fly speed, nice to catch up to people to touch them.
- Immunity to fear effects, 100ft telepathy, Spell Resistance 6+HD, ability to bypass any DR not bypassed by a specific material. All pretty good abilities, but don't make or break the creature.
- Finally, Phantasmal Facade. When a creature sees you, they have to make a Will save to disbelieve seeing their worst fear "as _Phantasmal Killer_". These last words mean this is probably [Mind-affecting]. If one _succeeds_ at this save, they are dazed (!) for a round and get immunity for 24 hours. If they fail, they have no immediate adverse effect, but the next time they are hit by the PS's touch attack, they have to make a Fort save against death, and even if they succeed, they take 3d6 additional damage. If they succeed, they can also attempt the Will save once again, with the same risk of getting dazed.

The Phantasmal Slayer has a lot of things going for it, but nothing particularly interesting, except Phantasmal Facade. It's a weird ability forcing a lot of saves, but in essence, either your opponent is dazed for 1 round, or your touch attack gets a SoD rider against them. This is extremely strong, especially the free action AoE daze on everything that sees you. The best way to abuse that is to hide or become invisible and only appear when your party close enough to take advantage of dazed enemies. The problem here is that any enemy immune to mind-affecting or fear effects, as well as any one immune to death effect will be completely immune to it (the daze effect is not a death effect, but a creature immune to death can willingly fail all their saving throws and take absolutely no damage from this ability. This makes the Phantasmal Slayer pretty much a one-trick-pony, with phantasmal facade being overwhelming in some fights and completely useless against a lot of enemies and pretty much every boss battle. With that in mind, it still has lots of good resistances and excellent ability scores. Maybe something like *12 RHD* would let it get some levels of something to increase its versatility and make use of that charisma. Maybe Warlock would be good, or Binder. And 4 more Outsider HD may make for a pretty strong *DLA-2*, I guess. What do you think?


Well, the last monster of Heroes of Horror was in the image of the whole book: Evil for the sake of being evil, even if it doesn't really make sense, lots of good ideas, but pretty terrible and unbalanced execution. Starting next week, we'll have a lot more variety in our monsters' alignment, with the Monster Manual III and its overflowing number of -0s. Out of the 156 creatures in the book, 119 have been rated as LA-0 in the LA assignment thread. That's more than 75% of the book, and the first of those gentlecreatures will be the fabled Arcane Ooze! See you then!

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Arcane Ooze*





> That one is so bad it makes me wonder if we need to start tracking a king-of-the-hill style position for 'Worst Choice for PC.' -0 all the way.


Need I say more? The arcane ooze has all the worst points of oozes (notably four unuseable stats, including Int, and no natural armor) on top of 15 RHD and a special ability that will hurt your party much more often than your foes. Yep, this one would like some negative LA. Let's give it some!

- Huge size, 15 ooze RHD. Oozes have pretty good immunities, but really? This many RHD? Huge size is interesting for a grappler build, even though having Engulf would be better than simply Improved Grab.
- +12 Str, -10 Dex, +16 Con, -8 Int, -10 Wis, -10 Cha. Abandon all hope of making this any kind of caster. This is a martial and a martial only. You'll also have abysmal saves apart from Fortitude, considering oozes have no good save. 
- One slam attack with acid damage, Improved Grab and Constrict. Really would have been better to have more than one natural attack. Plus, your potential unarmed strike do not benefit from Improved Grab (but do still deal +2d6 acid)
- 60ft blindsight (always good), 20ft movement speed (really bad, especially considering it is hard to buff and has no item slot)
- Magic immunity, Spell Siphon. That's the one thing these oozes have for them. They have a golem-like immunity to magic which will be really great in a fight and will help alleviate its awful saves. A dragon breath will still destroy it though. And Spell Siphon would be pretty good if you could deactivate it. As it is now, any arcane spellcaster in your party will quickly hate you for making them lose their highest level spell slots almost every round they're closer than 60ft from you.


Playing an arcane ooze is doable in a party with no arcane spellcaster (Spell Siphon doesn't affect divine casters, or manifesters). However, no item and immunity to magic means you'll probably be playing that thing with no buff whatsoever for the whole campaign. For a martial with no built-in ability to fly, this is awful. First, I thought the only class with which it may be passable is warlock, with Fell Flight at level 6 and Eldritch Glaive at level 1. But then you lose on your big Str bonus, since Eldritch Glaive only deals Blast damage. Hideous Blow would be better, but no touch attack means you'll hit much less often. And Fell Flight also has its own problems. It uses your land speed, so only a 20ft fly speed, and it arguably checks Spell Resistance on yourself, so you can't even use it. Barbarian may be the way to go after all, but that's really bad. In the end, I think the better stats and magic immunity make it better than the Black Pudding, despite... Well, despite magic immunity, but not as good as the Gargantuan Elder Black Pudding. *5 RHD*, and *DLA-7*. I suggest so much DNLA because the inability to get buffed will become more and more crippling as you level up, and is already a huge problem at ECL 8. 


A sad monster, that one. The concept is nice, and it makes for an interesting fight just before the final boss, to nerf the party's casters, but that's exactly why it's so unuseable as a PC. This is an immoveable blob that cannot be either improved or weakened, and that doesn't make for a balanced PC.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Avalancher*

The avalancher: when you absolutely, positively want to use the environmental hazards rules without it feeling (too) forced.

That _Breath of the Wild_'s Guardian-looking monster is best known for its eponymous ability to cause avalanches, even though it's probably its least useful trait as a PC. They can emit sonorous hums (not the spell) that destabilize rocks on a slope and create a rock slide to bury their opponents. The flavor text says that they can ride their avalanche, but considering they usually "hunt" on cliff sides and they aren't immune to fall damage, I'd say that's unlikely. 

The best part about this monster in my opinion is that it's specifically stated to be delicious to eat, to the point that some people go hunt CR 5 monsters just to be able to eat them. Others are stated to "herd" them in plains, which makes roughly as little sense as locking up vampires in cages, considering they have both a burrowing speed and _transmute rock to mud_. Ya gotta work for yer high quality meal, goddammit!


- Large size, 6 Magical Beast RHD, weird that it isn't an aberration or an elemental, but I'll take the full BAB, thank you very much. 
- +12 Str, +2 Dex, +10 Con, -6 Int, +2 Wis, +0 Cha. +8 natural armor. Welp, that is a beatstick if I ever saw one. The hit to int hurts, but otherwise those are decent, if expected, stats. +8 natural armor is pretty good.
- 40ft movement speed, 10ft burrowing, all-around vision, immunity to bludgeoning (!). These are... Really good, in fact. A bit of mobility is nice for a fighter-type and a lot of creatures only have one slam, or unarmed strikes, to deal damage. Unfortunately, this immunity doesn't extend to partially bludgeoning damage, such as a bite. Still, these traits help a lot.
- Avalanche, _Transmute Rock to Mud_: Avalanche is nice, but two saves and this kind of restriction to use (sloped terrain, unstable rocks) make it pretty unlikely to ever see use. TRtM, however, is some really nice BFC at low level, and will be invaluable to improve the avalancher's utility. 
- Only one slam, no arms. Ouch. That's really what brings the avanlancher down. One level of Monk is all but necessary, and one or two of totemist would also not be superfluous to make use of its strength.

In the end, this is clearly much stronger than the rhino, and more on par or slightly stronger than the brown bear (+2 BAB, immunity to bludgeoning and TRtM against +6 Str and two more natural weapons). *5 RHD*, *DLA-0*.


I didn't know this monster, and honestly it feels interesting enough to put in a game, maybe as support for a boss or just on a cliffside to try and bull rush people over. As a PC it's... less interesting, to say the least, but may still make for some funny plays. Next time, we'll rate the impaler of the battlefields, the strongest shrubbery there is, the Battlebriar!

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Battlebriars*

Honestly, when I first learned about these monsters, they didn't seem much to me. Just another Big Bushy Beatstick like we've had at least two or three before. But after taking a closer look, they are honestly really well-designed. They're fighter-types clearly centered around battlefield control, aiming to deny the opponent any kind of movement in its threatened area then lock them even more with Improved Grab and Impale. But contrary to other creatures specialized in one single thing, the battlebriars also have a few other things they can do even if their opponent cannot be grappled or is afar, namely, Thorn Volley and Thorn Field. And it even has a bit of lore, with the being magically-genetically engineered (magenetically?) plants to be living siege weapons, which subsequently escaped the control of their masters, leaving only their lesser, weaker and tamer cousins, the Warbound Impaler, in regular armies, while true 'briars are only controlled by high-level druids and druid circles. I understand why this is one of the few MM3 creatures that was ported to 4e.

First, I'd like to precise that I'll be considering this creature as capable of holding weapons. There was a whole discussion in the original thread about it not being able to, but the battlebriar is described as capable on walking its two rearmost limbs, and its limbs being "gorilla-like", which includes hands and opposable thumbs, also visible on the creatures' art. I don't really understand why it couldn't hold weapons, or magic items for that matter, and it's even intelligent enough for simple tactics. This also means that both briars could attack with a two handed weapon then use two slams with its middle limbs, threatening to grapple. Same thing with attacks of opportunity. With even one limb free, a briar can use all of its attack of opportunity with its slam, making a grapple check each time and Impaling Medium opponents as a free action. 

*Battlebriar*, 25 RHD: 
- Huge Plant, 25 RHD. Obviously we're going to reduce this frankly ridiculous number of RHD. Plant RHD are really not good, but immunity to mind-affecting is an extremely good trait to have when you're otherwise that bulky and that good to ward off conventional attacks (resistance 20 to fire and lightning helps here).
- +22 Str, -4 Dex, +16 Con, -6 Int, +0 Wis, -4 Cha. +24 natural armor. Underwhelming stats for such a big creature. 24 NA is really good, but the rest is a bit below the curve and more on par with giants with 10 less RHD. Also, you're not going to be skilled. -6 Int and a skill list with only Hide on a Huge creature? Yeah, no. 
- 4 arms, 4 slams with Improved Grab and Impale. Impale allows you to stick a Medium or smaller creature on the thorns on your back, which allows you to act normally while grappling them and not take an arm for it. Really good grappling package, especially with this chassis. Not bad damage either for a natural attack.
- Thorn Field. The dream of any lockdown fighter. Built-in Combat Reflexes, Tumbling to avoid AoO takes a -10 penalty, and small creatures can't move in your space. 
- Trample, Thorn Volley. Your alternative attacks. Trample is really bad, especially if you gain Pounce somehow, which you should, but may be interesting against large groups of mooks. Thorn Volley is good to hit flying opponents and if you somehow get immobilized, but the damage is a bit low, even if the save is Str-based and hence pretty high. Overall a bit of utility goes a long way to not have the 'briar stay on the side during some fights.


This is very clearly a grappler. I'd say my first 4 levels would be PsyWarrior 2 with Practiced Manifester for Expansion, Barbarian 1 for Pounce or Fast Movement, then Binder 1 for Naberius and Body Fuel, to be able to swift expansion all day long without worrying. With that said, the stats are still worse than a Cloud Giant's, with worse reach and worse speed, but more natural weapons, Thorn Field, Thorn Volley, the grappling package and much better natural armor. I'd say the battlebriar would be a bit better, with more options. I suggest *10 RHD*.

*Warbound Impaler*, 12 RHD: 
The Warbound Impaler follows the evolution pattern of other monsters, but backwards. For half the RHD, you really only lose a size category and the equivalent in stats, including half your natural armor. 

- Large size, +12 Str, -4 Dex, +12 Con, -6 Int, +0 Wis, +4 Cha, +12 natural armor. The stats are better than those of the battlebriar for its number of RHD, but are still not great, except the NA. Being Large is much worse than Huge for a grappler with Improved Grab, and you're basically required to abuse Expansion if you want to play an Impaler.
- Only two slams and reduced Volley damage from 8d6 to 5d6. You don't care about the slams, as you were gonna use two arms for a weapon anyway. Your Volley was never your primary mode of attack anyway. 

Overall, the Warbound Impaler doesn't lose that much, and would be much better than the full battlebriar, but being smaller than its greater cousin really hurts the poor bush. Definitely stronger than a Hill Giant, but not quite on Stone Giant level. A pretty strong *7 RHD* in my opinion, and *DLA-3*, since class levels really help the Impaler a lot, and delaying them reduces its power level quickly.


I am really impressed with the quality of monsters in the MM3 so far. They all seem pretty interesting as encounters, with well-rounded characteristics and unique features. The battlebriar in particular almost seems designed to allow PC use, with lots of varied abilities to supplement its one trick. Let's hope it continues for the whole boo... and the next creature is another wolf. Silvanus damn it! See you next time for the Bearhound!

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## Metastachydium

> Plant RHD are really not good


Wait, what? It's easily one of the best types of RHD (I'd put it down as the third best myself; undead are overrated). It's only true downside is the vulnerability to fire (which the fire resistance offsets somewhat); otherwise the sole problem with it is that it keeps getting used to make boring, dumb bruisers for which other types would probably offer a more appropriate chassis.




> I am really impressed with the quality of monsters in the MM3 so far. They all seem pretty interesting as encounters, with well-rounded characteristics and unique features.


It's one of the better books indeed. I like it a lot, although _not_ for stuff like




> the Bearhound!


I have some serious difficulty figuring out why _anyone_ thought that's a good idea.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Wait, what? It's easily one of the best types of RHD (I'd put it down as the third best myself; undead are overrated). It's only true downside is the vulnerability to fire (which the fire resistance offsets somewhat); otherwise the sole problem with it is that it keeps getting used to make boring, dumb bruisers for which other types would probably offer a more appropriate chassis.


The type itself is pretty good, with a few good immunities (although obviously not on par with Construct and Undead), even if it has no proficiency, but the Hit Dice themselves are really bad, giving d8 HP, 3/4 BAB, 2+int skill points and only one good save. For a beatstick, the only worse hit dice are the 1/2 BAB ones. Even Humanoid is probably better, since Reflex is more useful than Fortitude when you have so much Con. That's what I meant by "Plant RHD are really not good".

Also, vulnerability to fire? No type has any real vulnerability, and only the [Cold] subtype has vulnerability to fire.

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## Metastachydium

> The type itself is pretty good, with a few good immunities (although obviously not on par with Construct and Undead),


I'll continue to hold that undead and _especially_ construct are seriously overrated; undead has half-BAB, one good save (which is _Will_ of all things), no CON score, is difficult to heal, dies at 0 hp and can't really be brought back. Construct has no good save, no CON, is even more of a pain to patch up once damaged, dies at 0 hp and can't be brought back. Plant has fewer immunities, but much fewer drawbacks at the same time.




> even if it has no proficiency, but the Hit Dice themselves are really bad, giving d8 HP, 3/4 BAB, 2+int skill points and only one good save. For a beatstick, the only worse hit dice are the 1/2 BAB ones. Even Humanoid is probably better, since Reflex is more useful than Fortitude when you have so much Con. That's what I meant by "Plant RHD are really not good".


Ah, got it. (Still, even then, it easily edges out aberration, elemental, giant and ooze).

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Bearhound*

_"Many laugh at the mention of the elusive bearhound."_

I'm not laughing, I'm bored. That's our 5th wolf in this thread alone, and far from the last. Were you so proud of the Trip ability that you wanted to create as many creatures with it as possible? The bearhound has no lore. Like, at all. It's impressive how hollow that monster feels.

In terms of abilities, it's not much better. The bearhound is a Large Magical Beast with 10 RHD (a lot of good RHD doesn't a good creature make). It has physical scores equivalent to a bear (+16 Str, +4 Dex, +10 Con), mental scores absolutely not equivalent to a hound, not even a hound archon (the bearhound is surprisingly intelligent, with +6 Int, +4 Wis, +2 Cha), the wolf-standard Trip on its bite, the bear-standard Improved Grab on its claws, and a few weird abilities that probably won't matter much for the creature. 
The druid's trackless step and the ranger's Track and wild empathy may help enter prestige classes, but since most ranger and druid prestige classes are spellcasting-focused classes, these will probably be niche at best. 
And finally, Cold Resistance 10 and a permanent Magic Fang on all its natural weapons... Why? See, WotC? That's why we usually have lore, to explain why something that sounds like it's an owlbear-type wizard-did-it creature is neutral good and has resistance to cold damage and druid abilities. 


The bearhound is kinda strong, and with full BAB and good intelligence, most classes would fit the bearhound. Maybe Duskblade 5 then Warblade? Yeah, seems decent. This should be good with *8 RHD* and *DLA-1*. Next time, we'll cover the Boneclaw.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Boneclaw*



> Though I think that might be question we should start considering, which I have with this book: how many RHD would you need to shave off to reach LA +0 ? For this, I would be shaving off a of minimum 4 to reach your 4th iterative, but would still be too weak to consider. If it could use humanoid equipment without a problem, I might say LA +0 at 5 RHD.





> this seems like it would be good for its own thread. How many LA -0's could be made at least +0 by removing some RHD and nothing else from them, and how many would it take for each LA -0.





> If this thing hand, like, four RHD, it might be worth using.


ViperMagnum, Remuko, Celestia, if you can read me, you are right. It would indeed be good for its own thread  :Small Big Grin: . And thank you for making my job easier here.


There is only one constant in D&D: if a monster's name starts with "bone", then it's an undead. The boneclaw is no exception, and is in fact kind of bland. It's mostly just a Large, stronger skeleton. It has pretty good ability scores, with +10 Str, +8 Dex and Cha, and +4 Int to actually give it skills. Then the standard "intelligent skeleton" package (DR 5/bludg, immune to Cold, +2 against turning,..). And, really, not much else. The only interesting ability of the boneclaw is, unsurprisingly, its claws (which only deal piercing damage for some reason). 2d6 damage and 20ft reach is extremely interesting. The claws are probably too long for it to wield other weapons effectively, but their damage output means it won't matter as much as for other creatures. The boneclaw also gets Unholy Toughness, which offsets the absence of Con bonus to HP of undead. All in all, that's decent, but completely crippled by the 10 Undead RHD. Unholy Toughness does not an effective brawler make when your RHD only has half BAB. 

The boneclaw is better than most melee undead, especially as a lockdown fighter, using its great claw reach, but will really need lots of feats or class abilities to feel a bit less bland. I agree with Remuko and ViperMagnum, this feels like 4 or 5 RHD. I'm gonna be cautious and call a kind of weak *5 RHD*, since having good intelligence may go a long way to allow PrC and give some more utility, and undead immunity are always really good. Undead RHD, on the other hand, are really bad, especially for a beatstick, and will not give it much more than more HP. I believe *DLA-3* would not be problematic, and prevent it from being turned, which is a pain in the bony *ss for a PC.


"Bone" creatures never come alone, and next time we'll review another undead, the Bonedrinker!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Bonedrinker*

"Because, b**tch, I _drink_ people."

What is it with undead keeping their guts as creepy wormlike weapons when they come to unlife? Between the mohrg, the bonedrinker, and arguably the skulking cyst, we could make an entire party of adventurers and call them the win-nards.

When you Create Undead on a goblin or bugbear's corpse, it animates as a bonedrinker, an intelligent undead with an inescapable craving for bones. The bonedrinker is what vampires would be if they drank bone marrow instead of blood. And if they lost most of their cool abilities and replaced it with bland "+X to Y" abilities. And had freakish tentacles coming out of their belly. Interestingly, the fact that only bugbears and goblins are changed into bonedrinkers is only due to tradition, and the book says that you could change other humanoids into bonedrinkers by slightly altering the ritual. It's just that the ritual is almost only known to hobgoblin casters, and those don't want to animate corpses of other races (which they consider as enemies) as pretty powerful undead retaining the mind they have in life (the ritual is said to be similar to the one creating mummies, which retains the base creature's mind, and the first bonedrinkers were created out of "fallen bugbear warriors", so probably on the battlefield. On the battlefield, there's no reason to not apply the ritual to all corpses available, except if the reanimated enemies have a chance to attack you). I "like" how they explain the origin of the rituals and the tradition of hobgoblin clerics, but they don't explain why in Baator, the bonedrinkers have tentacles sprouting out their chest, or why... You know... They drink bones. 

Bonedrinkers have a few nice abilities, but not only do they not make a coherent whole, their number of RHD immediately doomed them to unuseability.
*Regular Bonedrinker*, 11 RHD:
- +10 Str, +4 Dex, - Con, -2 Int, +4 Wis, +4 Cha, +4 natural armor. These stats would be decent on a 4 RHD brawler. But you're a 11 RHD Undead. 
- 2 tentacles, 2 claws, Improved Grab on the tentacles (and +4 on grapple checks), Pounce, and Bonedrink. Pounce is always good, especially with some natural attacks not linked to your hands. Improved Grab, on the other hand, is not that great on a Medium creature (since it will only affect Small or smaller creatures). Your main ability is keyed off grappling, and you're not good at grappling.
- Resistance 10 to cold, fire and sonic, DR 5/Silver or Good, Unholy Toughness (Charisma to HP), all pretty good abilities to have.

I believe something like *5 RHD* is good here. Not awful intelligence, good natural weapons and Pounce, along with all the goodies of Undead without most of its drawbacks, but bad BAB. And *DLA-4*, because you have really nothing to do with Undead RHD. 

*Lesser Bonedrinker*, 7 RHD:
- Compared to the greater version, 4 fewer RHD, -6 Str, +2 Dex, -2 Wis, -3 NA, and your energy resistances are only 5. You like your Str, so that hurts.
- One size category smaller, no +4 to grappling checks. Okay, now it's just sad. Your Improved Grab works only on Tiny opponents and you're litterally worse at it than a 1st level human warrior. Let's just say you're not gonna bonedrink your opponent anytime soon. 

Well, nothing really interesting here except 4 natural weapons and Pounce. *3 RHD*, *DLA-2*


Go out and get some vitamin D, folks! Osteoporosis is bad, and we don't need a reanimated goblin with tentacles to catch it in the real world. Next time, we'll review the Formian Quee... Er, the Brood Keeper!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Brood Keeper (and Lava Swarm)*

Maybe it's a weird question, but do you own a vermicomposting worm bin? That's a bin with several "floors" covered with dirt, on which earthworms live that is supposed to replicate the natural soil. You put organic waste on the top floor, and the worms eat it and progressively change it into fertilizer, that you can use afterwards for your garden. It's a great thing to have, but pretty disgusting when you open it to put some food and the worms come crawling out. The brood keeper comes equipped with the same thing on its back, being a living uterus able to open its back to reveal its larva.

In terms of other abilities, however, it's really sad. It's a hot-potch of every low-level abilities that you could find on regular animals, which is not inherently bad, since they synergize decently good, but you really lack too much utility and overall stats to thrive in mid-to-high level plays. Also... What does the poison do? The brood keeper's statblock mentions that there is poison on its bite, but I can't for the life of me find what damage it deals. I don't know, is there an errata I missed? It might qualify it for Venomfire, though.

- Huge Magical Beast, 22 RHD. You are a beatstick. That's what you do. So full BAB is good.
- +14 Str, +6 Dex, +14 Con, -4 Int, +6 Wis, -2 Cha. +14 Natural armor. That's... pretty low for such a high-RHD creature, but in mid-levels, that would be decent. Good repartition for a beatstick. Having 10 Int would be nice, though.
- One bite, 2 claws, Pounce, Rake (*four* claws), Improved Grab, Rend, 60ft movement speed. Wow. That's... a lot of attacks. That's a great way to use your high strength and BAB. And you can even choose a mouthpick weapon, but you're not even forced to to be efficient. Honestly, a level of monk (not two) or unarmed swordsage (not as much a problem as it is for others to lose one claw attack) will make the brood keeper a great PC.
- Evasion, SR 4+HD, DR 5/-, fast healing 5. I mean... okay? These are great abilities to have, they really are, but why? DR/- is rare on monsters, and generally reserved for elementals and amorphous creatures. There is nothing in that creature's lore to explain all of that.
- Fear. When you rend somebody (so, normally in the first round of combat), everybody makes a Will save or is frightened for 1d10 rounds. Even if they succeed, they're shaken for 1d4 rounds. That's really good. Considering how fear effects stack, this may very well become a free action AoE frighten for 1d4 rounds in most fights.
- Larva Swarm. The larve swarm is pretty bad, but summoning a 22 RHD swarm at mid-level may be really useful.


There's a lot of things here. Fear is great and doesn't cost an action, and you can just muscle through most encounters with so many attacks. I don't think it's as good as a kraken (even though the brood keeper is surprisingly more versatile despite its low intelligence), but it may be good with 11 RHD. Maybe even *12 RHD*, to be conservative. Less Str and worse body shape than a cloud giant, but more abilities, way more attacks and more abilities, including the ability to attack flying opponents.

*Larva swarm*

The swarm has 22 Magical Beast RHD, but since it can't natively attack, it doesn't help it. However, Evasion and Fast Healing 1 are great for something that can't easily be healed with magic. SR equal to its HD is interesting but not game-changing, and your natural armor is pretty bad, especially for something that still takes half-damage from weapon damage, a bit offset by your +14 Dex.
It suffers from all the worse drawbacks of being a swarm (no item, no non-AoE buff, -8 Int, no somatic components...) and doesn't have immunity to weapon damage. It may still make an acceptable cleric, with its +6 Wis and flying speed, but even with all the goodies it gets and its 5d6 swarm attack, I can't give it more than *5 RHD*.


There is a distinct lack of lore on the creature of this book. This is what you get when the next edition throws all existing lore out the window and the following one has litterally ten times fewer sourcebooks than 3.5.
Fortunately, a few monsters have still been adapted, including our next one, the Cadaver Collector, also featured in 5e's Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes!

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## Morphic tide

Bit of an important note about the Larvae Swarm, the damage of a Swarm attack is actually specifically based on hit dice. So reducing to 5 RHD would intrinsically mean the Swarm attack would fall to 1d6, but then it also automatically grows to 2d6 with the first class level. Being as how it's damage at end of move with not even so much as an attack roll and brings a Con-based DC against Nauseated, this is _fine_, being a Swarm is _really good_ action economy.

I'd also consider the adult to still be perfectly playable at 14 RHD, since it _does_ come with a four-attack Pounce and Improved Grab at Huge with +14 Str, and can shrug off pretty much every source of raw-HP danger better than any standard race without _serious_ effort into survivability thanks to how Natural Armor, Fast Healing, and DR/- add up. It's actually a pretty impressive canning of what a PC Martial wants in life, leaving want for item numbers, a Fly speed, and the piles of situational stuff that are the job of full casters readying a laundry-list of Abjurations by scroll, slot, wand, staff, or Contingency. Occasionally Runic Guardian.

...Also the game breaks horribly when you have SR much more than 10 above your level. At 5 RHD, SR 22 is HD+17, meaning it'll take a caster seven levels higher to get a 50/50 chance and a same-level caster has only 15%, and much of what they can do to you will be subject to Evasion and an unusually high Reflex save. The same goes for the Huge adult, including the Reflex save. They be sticky.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Bit of an important note about the Larvae Swarm, the damage of a Swarm attack is actually specifically based on hit dice. So reducing to 5 RHD would intrinsically mean the Swarm attack would fall to 1d6, but then it also automatically grows to 2d6 with the first class level. Being as how it's damage at end of move with not even so much as an attack roll and brings a Con-based DC against Nauseated, this is _fine_, being a Swarm is _really good_ action economy.
> 
> I'd also consider the adult to still be perfectly playable at 14 RHD, since it _does_ come with a four-attack Pounce and Improved Grab at Huge with +14 Str, and can shrug off pretty much every source of raw-HP danger better than any standard race without _serious_ effort into survivability thanks to how Natural Armor, Fast Healing, and DR/- add up. It's actually a pretty impressive canning of what a PC Martial wants in life, leaving want for item numbers, a Fly speed, and the piles of situational stuff that are the job of full casters readying a laundry-list of Abjurations by scroll, slot, wand, staff, or Contingency. Occasionally Runic Guardian.
> 
> ...Also the game breaks horribly when you have SR much more than 10 above your level. At 5 RHD, SR 22 is HD+17, meaning it'll take a caster seven levels higher to get a 50/50 chance and a same-level caster has only 15%, and much of what they can do to you will be subject to Evasion and an unusually high Reflex save. The same goes for the Huge adult, including the Reflex save. They be sticky.


Thank you for the swarm damage, I had forgotten. Still, I don't think it changes much the rating, what you really like is the distraction. Being a swarm is really good for action economy, but in the end they don't have much they can do with their action. At least this one could make a decent Ardent with its Wisdom, but not much more.

About Spell Resistance: since the beginning, I've been rating monsters as if they lost one point of spell resistance for each HD they lose, since it's what Martixy did in his thread, and since most monsters have SR calculated as "X+number of HD". This also seems more balanced, and prevents monsters from having SR 20 above their number of RHD if I reduce their RHD. 




> The Spell Resistance, if it has one, of the creature scales as +1 per total HD.


With that in mind, I may have undersold it. My comparison was the cave troll of the same book, which has almost the same abilities, a few natural attacks less but more overall stats and a much better skill list, plus the invaluable ability to wield actual weapons. Still, DR 5/- and SR 4+HD are still good, and should be worth something, as well as the great ability to summon a larva swarm. Maybe *12 RHD*? I'm really reluctant to put the brood keeper above the kraken, considering the grappling monster that it is, and how it can zoom through the battlefield with Scorpion's Grasp. As good defensively as it is, the brood keeper cannot really keep up in terms of offense. You get to the same number of RHD as a War Troll, which got +0 in the original thread, and doesn't have Improved Grab or Pounce, but has fuill BAB, better stats, better SR, Regeneration 8, DR 5/Adamantine (not a far cry from DR 5/-) and can wield weapons.
Edit: And the extremely strong Dazing Blow. Honestly I still think the brood keeper is a bit behind the troll. Probably enough for 11 RHD instead.

 Can other people speak up on that note?

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## remetagross

I'm impressed by your diligence and your thoroughness, Beni! And the awesome dragon pictures too. _The Last Elf_ was indeed a very good read, and the linguistic considerations about the wraith and the hag were very interesting (I know, right?? Like, how do you translate in French when one monster is called a _Nightmare_ and the one right after is called a _Cauchemar_??). _Bien joué._

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## Beni-Kujaku

> I'm impressed by your diligence and your thoroughness, Beni! And the awesome dragon pictures too. _The Last Elf_ was indeed a very good read, and the linguistic considerations about the wraith and the hag were very interesting (I know, right?? Like, how do you translate in French when one monster is called a _Nightmare_ and the one right after is called a _Cauchemar_??). _Bien joué._


Thank you very much, I appreciate it! I'm happy to hear you liked the translation tangent, I'll try to add a few of those in the future, and to answer your question, the nightmare wasn't that interesting. It's just "destrier noir" in french, or "black steed", since the only reason it was called nightmare in the first place is for the "night mare" pun, and there's really no way to translate that. Germans did the opposite, and completely gave up on the horse thing to name it "Nachtmahr", which simply means nightmare but loses all the pun potential.



In the end, since nobody objected, I'll adjust the brood keeper to *12 RHD*.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Cadaver Collector*

Well, how did you think necromancers gather bodies for their unholy experiments? Send undead that they created? Go on battlefields or plunder graveyards themselves!? No, absolutely not, they obviously ask artificers to build a 17 HD Construct with spikes on its back to bring the bodies back 4 by 4. Because convenience has never been more important than style.
5e also gives us more insight on this. The reason necromancers love having a cadaver collector is because when it impales a body on its spikes, it also traps a part of that creature's mind, allowing its master to create both corporeal and incorporeal undead. This, along with the fact that most collectors are created by fiends on Acheron, explains why it has developped intelligence, an alignment and a sense of purpose, while it's still pretty clearly a golem. The paralyzing gas it breathes also seems to come from these trapped souls, which may explain why it's a (Su) ability in 3.5 (or not, considering even the iron golem's regular poisonous breath is (Su)).


The cadaver collector is a golem in every way except in name, with the same bonus to strength and natural armor (+20, between stone and iron), unusually strong slams (this one's deal 4d8! That's as if the collector was constanly wielding two _Gargantuan_ bastard swords!), DR 10/Adamantine and magic immunity. 
On top of that, the collector has a breath weapon that paralyzes people with a Reflex save (reflex SoL are pretty rare, so that's good), is slowed by sonic attacks and healed by lightning (any lightning attack removes the slow effect), among other specific weaknesses. It's good for a construct to have a way to heal itself, and lightning attacks are way more common than sonic ones, so that's not too bad. Still, slowed is a harsh debuff, and the cadaver collector may have a hard time fighting spellcasters if they know what they're doing, even if it has 40ft movement speed. It can also trample its opponents and bounce low-level spells (nice, but ultimately probably useless at these ECL).
And finally, it can collect cadavers. Improved Grab on its slams, and it can also Impale its opponents. In essence, when it pins an opponent, it impales them on the spikes on its back, which makes it not be considered grappled anymore and deals hefty damage to the impaled guy (Slam+1-1/2 Str when first impaled, 2d8 on each subsequent round, and 4d8 when they try to escape, which is almost impossible, since it's a Strength check DC 28). It will be useful against a few Medium opponents, but will most probably be of little use against bosses. 

The cadaver collector is much better than even an iron golem, especially with its semi-useable mental stats (-6 Int, +6 Wis, +4 Cha). The sonic weakness is a big problem, but the paralyzing breath, grappling capabilities and stronger slams much more than make up for it. I think it would be useable and even pretty strong with *13 RHD*. The first thing you should do if you want to play this is grab some at-will lightning capabilities. This allows you to infinitely heal outside combat and all but remove your sonic weakness. Unfortunately, Dragonfire adepts are immune to their own breath weapon, so I advise Cadaver Collector 13/ Sorcerer 1/ Dragon Disciple X. You gain a lightning breath weapon at level 3 of Dragon Disciple, and two claws and a bite at level 2, which gives you more attacks to try to Impale your opponents, or to use a mouthpick weapon. This requires you to put all your skill points in Knowledge (Arcana) and Speak Language (Draconic), but really, were you expecting to be able to use skills with -6 to Int? With 17 RHD, I guess *DLA-2* should make for a playable character.

*Greater Cadaver Collector*, 35 RHD:
Yup, still hate advanced golems. This is just a bigger Cadaver Collector, with only size adjustments to the stat block. They didn't even update the Impale ability to allow it to impale Large creatures (which I assume it can, since it really doesn't make sense otherwise). On the plus side, its slams are now equivalent to Colossal bastard swords. Meh, *15 RHD* I guess? And what are a 35 BAB and 5 epic feats worth in epic levels? I guess you should be able to go toe-to-toe with very low-epic characters, even though your main schtick has been obsolete for a while by now. Let's go with *DLA-14* for an ECL 21.


This must be a really creepy monster to fight. Covered in corpses, and breathing the enslaved soul of your deceased friends, before bringing them back to its master to turn them into undead and send them back to fight you? I understand why cadaver collectors are primary targets on most battlefield. Next time, we'll see one of the possible fates of all those collected corpses, with the Charnel Hound!

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## remetagross

Does the breath weapon give a 24h-immunity? If not, it's even better, and if yes, you can breath on the party early in the morning till they all make their save, so that later on you can include them in the area of effect with little care.

I like it when Undead actually have meaningful things to do at more than low levels. You could also gain infinite electricity damage with Undead Meldshaping and a soulmeld somewhere, couldnt' you? This would free up some class levels to go into something more interesting than Sorcerer.

No idea on whether the proposed negative LA/reduced HDs are accurate, but it's at least tempting to try one at 13 RHD.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Does the breath weapon give a 24h-immunity? If not, it's even better, and if yes, you can breath on the party early in the morning till they all make their save, so that later on you can include them in the area of effect with little care.


No, there's no immunity, but the paralysis is broken immediately when the target is dealt lethal damage, so you'd better coup de grace them before anything else. It's supposed to be just enough time to grab them and impale them without having to go after them.




> I like it when Undead actually have meaningful things to do at more than low levels. You could also gain infinite electricity damage with Undead Meldshaping and a soulmeld somewhere, couldnt' you? This would free up some class levels to go into something more interesting than Sorcerer.


I think you got confused by the name ^^ It's a cadaver collector in the sense that it collects cadavers, not in the sense that it's a cadaver that happens to be a collector. The monster's a Construct, not an Undead. That is good, in that it gains more HP, but on the other hand, it cannot take Undead Meldshaping, and doesn't have the constitution to meld a single soulmeld.




> No idea on whether the proposed negative LA/reduced HDs are accurate, but it's at least tempting to try one at 13 RHD.


That's the point of the thread ^^ Don't hesitate to ask your DM to let you try one and tell me how it went!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Charnel Hound*

_I like how there's a human for scale, as if the fact that it's litterally made of human skeletons wasn't enough._

Someone on the internet once said that this should have an ability that makes any creature in its space get grappled by all the skeleton that compose it, and eventually get absorbed in the Charnel Hound. That would have made it a pretty interesting monster, instead of the HD-bloated melee thumbless undead it is. 

As it is, the charnel hound is mostly a Huge beatstick with enormous strength (+28 Str), pretty good HP (+8 Cha and Unholy Toughness), the regular claw-claw-bite and a +16 natural armor that will be pretty good with a lower amount of HD. Apart from it, it has a few moderately useful abilities, like DR 10/Silver and Magic (I'm sure the Magic part will be useful at these levels), Rend and Power Attack as a bonus feat; a few barely useful abilities, like SR 2+HD, Frightful Presence and the ability to heal itself each time it kills a humanoid (that would be extremely good if it was any creature); and a few outright detrimental abilities (lack of thumbs, -8 Int, and aversion to daylight which gives it -4 to most rolls under the sun). So, what is something that strong, but with half-BAB, no hands, and the least amount of versatility I've seen in a long time, worth? It's definitely worse than a Cloud Giant, with worse overall stats, BAB,  and body shape, but the undead immunities with Unholy Toughness make it better than a Fire Giant in my opinion. I'll say *9 RHD* is good here.

Next time, after the horrific over-RHD'd dog with no good ability, we'll have the horrific over-RHD'd spider with no good ability! See you then for the chelicera!

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## remetagross

Hmm, 9 HDs seems rather low. It has more Str and to-hit bonus than the proverbial raging 9th-level Water orc Barbarian. Like, with base 18 and a +2 item for both, 48 v Str vs 28 Str and +21 vs +18, bonus damage +19 vs +13. Accounting for PA for a natural weapon for the hound and a 2-handed weapon for the barbarian at -7 penalty for the hound and -5 for the orc (so +14 in the end for both), that's +26 vs +23, and then secondary natural attacks for the hound. But also wayyy more HPs and resistances of all kinds, is pretty much immune to grappling, etc. etc. Sunlight vulnerability can be accounted for without too much trouble. Body shape is a pain, I agree. 

If we put it at, say, *13 RHD*, then the barbarian gets Greater Rage and that ends up at hound: +23 vs barbarian: +23. That seems a better base to me. How about that?

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## Beni-Kujaku

> How about that?


I... Disagree. You are a dog. You can't wield weapons or manipulate items or even open a door without somebody helping you or a level in sorcerer to get Mage Hand. Even if you find a way to wield a weapon you won't ever get to 4 iteratives because you have the worst melee type of the game and you lost more than 5 BAB with your RHD alone. You are also a dog that won't be able to enter most buildings because the door is too small. You spend your days outside where you get -4 because you're allergic to sunlight. You're also an undead with undead immunities which is good and undead traits which are bad. You can be turned by clerics and paladins (with no innate turning resistance mind you) can't be resurrected if you're destroyed and the most common health items will damage you instead. And there are very few prestige classes you can actually enter because you're so much behind in skills BAB and saves.

That plus the fact that you have no skill almost at all (at most you can gain 6 ranks in Jump by ECL9) must amount to something. The charnel hound is still probably better than an equivalent level PHB character in melee combat. But it's not enough for such a monster to be better than an equivalent character in melee combat to be worth playing. There are other sides to D&D and the charnel hound fails at basically all of them.

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## Metastachydium

> I... Disagree. You are a dog. You can't wield weapons or manipulate items or even open a door without somebody helping you or a level in sorcerer to get Mage Hand.


(Well, _technically_ it does have a throat slot for something like a Hand of the Mage or, better yet, a Collar of Perpetual Attendance. It's too bad that)




> [e]ven if you find a way to wield a weapon you won't ever get to 4 iteratives because you have the worst melee type of the game and you lost more than 5 BAB with your RHD alone. You are also a dog that won't be able to enter most buildings because the door is too small. You spend your days outside where you get -4 because you're allergic to sunlight. You're also an undead with undead immunities which is good and undead traits which are bad. You can be turned by clerics and paladins (with no innate turning resistance mind you) can't be resurrected if you're destroyed and the most common health items will damage you instead. And there are very few prestige classes you can actually enter because you're so much behind in skills BAB and saves.
> 
> That plus the fact that you have no skill almost at all (at most you can gain 6 ranks in Jump by ECL9) must amount to something.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Chelicera*
_Even if we can't see the picture in the original thread anymore, I'm not putting it here. This is litterally just a big spider._

Well this one is just incredibly bad. The chelicera is little more than a monstrous spider, with no supernatural ability and fun but ultimately useless extraordinary ones. Its stats are similar but ultimately worse than those of an ettercap (+4 Str, +8 Dex, +2 Con, -8 Int, +2 Wis, +2 Cha) except a half-decent +5 natural armor.

It has the regular claw-claw-bite routine (primary claw) and clearly has a grappling focus, but is pretty bad at it. They tried to balance the fact that it's a Medium Vermin by giving it +4 to grappling checks and the ability to use Dex instead of Str on grappling checks, but since Improved Grab only works on creatures at most one size category smaller than you, you cannot efficiently grapple anything above Small size. That's extremely bad, and means that you won't be able to use your Blood Drain in most combats (1d4 Con drain each round you have pinned a creature is extremely slow anyway, and drain is little better than Con damage against monsters-of-the-week).

It can also reproduce sounds it hears, kinda like a spidery lyrebird (just a limited Ghost Sound at will); it has immunity to sonic (probably the least common energy type); has scent (underpowered, but useful I guess) and Weapon Finesse as a bonus feat. 

And now, let's play a game of "how many RHD did WotC give this one?". Well, it's a Medium creature with stats a bit better than a Large Monstrous Spider, so 4 or 5 RHD? Maybe 7? Wrong. It has freaking _twelve_ of them. That's unplayable in all the worse ways. Compared to an ettercap, you have that weird use-impaired grappling focus, more natural armor and dexterity, and immunity to mind affecting, but less intelligence, no web and especially no ability to wield weapons and items. That seems comparable to me. I'll suggest *2 RHD* for the Chelicera. It should make for an okay rogue, maybe with a ranger dip. And it's bad enough that *DLA-5* doesn't seem too overpowered.


The chelicera is like the Lamia from MM1, an underpowered, uninteresting monster that probably got created because they had an idea for a specific adventure involving them, but nothing else on them, so they got next to no lore. Next time, we'll have the first of the very few elementals of that book: the Chraal!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Chraal*
I'm sure nobody here ever wondered how the 'ch' in that creature's name is pronounced. I mean, is there a single word in english where 'ch' in 'chr' isn't pronounced [k], like in "chronicle"? Well, WotC seemingly thought that it still wasn't good enough, and translated this creature's name as "Kraal" in french, despite 'ch' following basically the same rules as in english, and the name not meaning anything by itself.

The chraal is a somewhat humanoid in-between an undead and an elemental, formed when a creature dies on the elemental planes of air and water, but it doesn't have any undead trait, or any elemental subtype of its birth planes (instead, it has the [Cold] subtype), or any swimming or flying speed. Seeing how it's completely inadapted to its home planes, it's no wonder it particularly likes to answer wizards Planar Binding them. However, it's a wonder any wizard has ever considered binding it, considering it has 9 RHD (just above what you can call with a lesser binding, even with Infernal Bargainer), isn't an outsider, and has basically no useful ability. Well, let's reduce that number at least to the point it can be bound by lesser binding, and hopefully even to the point of playability!

- Large Elemental with 9 RHD. That type does not give full BAB, so it's not great. At least it's not undead.
- +10 Str, +10 Con, -2 Int, +4 Cha. No surprise here. Basic beatstick stats.
- +8 natural armor, +4 deflection to AC, DR 5/-. Nice defense, but nothing stellar.
- claw/claw/bite, with +1d6 cold damage. Once again nothing unexpected, just some damage. Its body shape allows it to wield weapons, which conduct the cold.
- A 3/_day_ cold breath weapon (seriously? Why not at-will?) and a 20 damage death throes (would basically only make you harder to resurrect, if the fact that you're an elemental didn't mean you already need a true resurrection).

This is painfully standard. The numbers are better than a Large Earth elemental and it can wield weapons, but I would probably choose a Huge one over it. A pretty strong *6 RHD*, and *DLA-2*, since none of its abilities scale and it only gains +2 BAB out of these three additional HD.

Yeah, you're probably still not binding this one, even with lower RHD. Next time, we'll have the only elemental swarm of the game that isn't just a swarm of elementite, the Cinder Swarm! See ya!

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## remetagross

There's this neat thumb rule from I can't remember who on the LA-assignment thread but hat's off to you whomever you maybe because it's a useful one, where beatsticks should get a net +4 to all ability scores per ECL to be useful. So that dude at 6 RHD seems about right since it caps off at +22 net ability modifiers.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Cinder Swarm*

Played as is, this one may be even worse than the shrieker fungus. Not only do you also lack the ability to make regular attacks or to have any kind of magic item (you reach the elusive 1 lb. max heavy load and have basically no body slot) and almost can't be buffed by magic, you have to pay SIXTEEN RHD for it. Yeah, we're removing most of that. And then some. 

The cinder swarm is a swarm of fine elementals coming from one or the other Elemental Plane of Fire depending on where you're looking. What? You weren't expecting such a monster to have good lore, did you? It's unexplainably evil (they even acknowledge that it's weird for an Elemental, but don't explain it) and only wants to burn and kill people. I'm sure it makes for great encounters and even better PCs.

Anyway, it's basically just a swarm with all that entails, including woefully inadequate stats. -10 Str, +12 Dex, -6 Con. It also has the Fire subtype and the Burn ability. The Fire subtype is generally useful, which, with that great Dex bonus, will make you avoid the most common AoEs. The vulnerability to Cold isn't great, but nothing crippling, especially if you get Evasion (which you should). Burn gives you 3d6 additional damage and a chance to make your opponents catch on fire (so, at most 1d6 more damage per round for 1d4 round). It also makes any creature hitting you with a natural weapon take damage as if you hit it with your swarm attack. A creature hitting you. A Fine swarm. With a natural weapon. Which they explicitly can't do without a really niche enchantment that probably wasn't put on natural weapons in the history of the game. So, it sucks, everybody knows it. Still slightly better than other swarms, but probably not as strong as the hellwasp swarm. I suggest *4 RHD*, *DLA-9*.


Seriously, there are few worse choices as a PC than this one, no matter the ECL or number of RHD. Don't play a cinder swarm. Next time, after "Undead but it's really an evil Elemental" and "Swarm but it's really an evil Elemental", we'll have "Elemental but it's really an evil Ooze"! The conflagration ooze awaits.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Conflagration ooze*

The conflagration ooze, because if you put enough fire inside something, then it awakens to sentience. And becomes evil. Because of course it does. 


_I won't lie, the charred skeleton does wonders for the badassery of the thing._

Let's be clear and honest here: this monster makes absolutely no sense. This is an ooze that has a fire inside of it and eats constantly to sustain that fire, but its body is litterally too weak to sustain itself, and it constantly leaks fire. That's as if someone with diabetes constantly made themselves puke and had to eat again afterwards. It also lives underground, because it's obviously the best place to find something to eat and not a place where its fire would consume all oxygen in a matter of minutes, leading to it extinguishing and dying almost immediately.
But the worst here is that it's intelligent. Sentient, even. Its type literally has the extraordinary quality of being mindless, and they are all True Neutral except one or two from Dragon Magazine! Why is the conflagration ooze evil? Hilariously, it is also said to be able to study magic, even though it couldn't hold a spellbook without it burning down on contact. And it speaks ignan despite not coming from the Elemental Plane of Fire and isn't an elemental despite being constituted of literal fire. 
Mechanically, it's not much better, and it goes against everything that makes oozes what they are. It has two slams while all other oozes have one, explicitly has oozes traits while still having an intelligence score (so it's mindless with an intelligence score. Sure.), has frankly ridiculous natural armor with a type known to have none, inexplicably has reach, and is, I believe, the only monster in the game with Ability Focus as a bonus feat (the racial bonuses to DCs exist for a reason). And finally, it somehow has +8 to Hide and Move Silently. I challenge anybody to find one reason why a 3 meters tall flaming sphere that shines all around, sizzles with fire and heats air all around it to an almost unbearable degree, would have a bonus to stealth. 

I mean, there are a lot of monsters with one or two weird traits, but I think that's the first time since the Will-o-Wisp that a monster is so completely without any semblance of consistency or realism.


However, as a PC, the conflagration ooze is not completely awful. Mindless with intelligence is a good combination, and the stat bonuses are nice, especially the +12 to Str and the incredible +14 natural armor. The slams are really great, with Improved Grab, and +2d6 fire damage and +1d4 Constitution damage for two turns if they fail a save. It also has blindsight, like all oozes, and a few interesting 1/day mind-affecting SLAs, the best of which being Hold Monster. Sadly, it's crippled by its body shape which won't let it manipulate any items. The conflagration ooze will especially miss weapons. I guess *5 RHD* would be good. Your natural armor makes you really tough at these levels, but you don't hit that hard in return, even with Fire in the Blood. And *DLA-1*, but I believe it would still be pretty weak. DLA-2 is too much in my opinion.

*Infernal Conflagration Ooze*: An advanced Conflagration Ooze going to Huge size with the Fiendish template applied. It now also speaks Infernal despite not having a mouth, and has both vulnerability and resistance to cold. Anyway, the higher Strength and Charisma are good, as is Spell Resistance 5+HD. I suggest *8 RHD* and *DLA-4*.

What do you think of these oozes? Do you think WotC were right to create a creature contrasting so much with the rest of its type, or do you think there should be some consistency in the abilities of one creature type? At least the next creature comes back to the norm, and conform to all standards of its type by being an edgy, incorporeal, RHD-bloated undead. Next time, we'll review the Deathshrieker!

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## remetagross

Man, the Infernal conflagration ooze having both resistance and weakness to cold is just the darndest thing  :Small Big Grin: 

But I like them. They might not abide to the normal stereotype of Oozes, and it would have made quite some more sense to be Elementals instead...but I really dig the evil sentient fireball creature.

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## Metastachydium

> Man, the Infernal conflagration ooze having both resistance and weakness to cold is just the darndest thing


Now, now. They share that setup with such respectable creatures as the shambling mound!

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Now, now. They share that setup with such respectable creatures as the shambling mound!


That's a common misconception. The Plant type has never given a monster Fire vulnerability, and the shambling mound has never had vulnerability to fire at all (it, however, always had resistance to fire, except of course in 4e, because 4e doesn't respect anything)

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Deathshrieker*

And today, we have the incarnation of that cliché creepy child's voice that you often hear in horror movies: the deathshrieker. That's an incorporeal undead arising from the sorrow of the last cries of the dying. Another undead with the nightshades that wasn't ever really alive. It was supposed to fill its enemies with dread with its screams to render them insane. In actual play, however, it doesn't really work as intended.

- 18 RHD, Medium incorporeal undead. Ouch. That is an awful lot of HD. We'll remove most of that. Incorporeal Undead has a few downsides, but considering it has +4 turn resistance, that's mostly very positive and will make it invincible against some encounters.
- +14 Dex, -2 Int, +4 Wis, 10 Cha, +1/3HD profane bonus to AC. Obviously no Con or Str. That's a lot of AC. The rest is expected, and really low for an 18 RHD creature, but would be worth 5 or 6 HD on its own on an incorporeal undead. You have no energy resistance. That's not good. That means you're going to be pretty weak to no-save spells, and even to regular Fireball-type spells.
- Despair. That's the big one. First time an opponent sees you, they make a will save or are paralyzed for 1d4 round (hello coup-de-grace). Really strong.
- Scream of the dying: Supposedly strong, in fact more of a liability. You have to keep screaming for 3 rounds without doing anything else, forcing saves against deafened, then stunned, then insanity. That's good and all, but it's an unmoving 30ft area. In actual play, nothing will be more than deafened by that. And you lose 3 turns for that. And it's only 1/day, because of course it needed one more restriction.

Your offense is really good, but you have almost nothing against spells. I strongly suggest going rogue if you plan on playing this. Not only will it give you a much needed Evasion, being able to efficiently hide means you can use Despair when you want for maximum effect. It also improves your currently weak incorporeal touch attack from 1d4 charisma damage to actually good DPR. With that in mind, what is the deathshrieker worth? Even without Despair, it's slightly better than a Spectre, despite its much worth incorporeal touch. With Despair, I'd say a strong *9 RHD*, or maybe even 10. And as always, Undead RHD are worthless, except to give more turn resistance. *DLA-6*.


What do you think of that guy? Do we have enough incorporeal undead yet? Not even close! Just wait for libris mortis... Before that, next time, we'll review this book's dinosaurs, the salvageable Bloodstriker and the absolutely awful Battletitan!

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## Metastachydium

> That's a common misconception. The Plant type has never given a monster Fire vulnerability, and the shambling mound has never had vulnerability to fire at all


(

How on earth did I fail to notice that? Go planties!)

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## remetagross

Ah, too bad this ability is both 1/day and completely useless. It has to be entirely disregarded to assess the monster's power, basically. Rogue seems a good choice: going Maiming Strike allows you to double up on Cha damage up to the point where it's a OHKO on a lot of monsters. But the utter lack of anything useful brought forth by the racial HDs makes me think that 9 or 10 RHDs is quite a lot, already. I'd go 7: this way you can nab 2 Rogue special abilities before level 20.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Ah, too bad this ability is both 1/day and completely useless. It has to be entirely disregarded to assess the monster's power, basically. Rogue seems a good choice: going Maiming Strike allows you to double up on Cha damage up to the point where it's a OHKO on a lot of monsters. But the utter lack of anything useful brought forth by the racial HDs makes me think that 9 or 10 RHDs is quite a lot, already. I'd go 7: this way you can nab 2 Rogue special abilities before level 20.


In this kind of situation, where there is one far-reaching ability that may have heavy consequences on basically the whole campaign, my main goal has always been consistency with the original thread. You take a similar monster and you compare the current monster with it. Case in point, incorporeal undead. The spectre got a LA+1 in the main thread, for a total of ECL 8. Now, offensively, Charisma Drain and 40ft flying is much worse than 2 negative levels on your incorporeal touch attack and 80ft, but comparing that with the defensive abilities of +8 Dex, -6 Int, +6 Cha, +2 Turn Resistance, no sunlight powerlessness, death's grace and freaking Despair, I can't put the deathshrieker below the spectre. Not that much higher, but definitely stronger. 9 RHD is a minimum in my opinion, but putting the deathshrieker higher would be a stretch, since it is really passive without at least one or two class levels. So there you have it.

Of course, the standards for Level Adjustment have slightly changed during the years, and maybe the Spectre would have gotten LA+0 nowadays, but that's the best scale I've got for some of these monsters. I've never actually played an incorporeal creature, you know (the closest I've done was a Shadowcaster/Master of Shadow), but even with that I know that it is really a boon, especially with dedicated stats like those of the deathshrieker.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*(Bad) Dinosaurs*

And today, we are back with the dinosaurs! MM3 is the last Monster Manual where there is a dinosaur entry, and we can see that they were running out of interesting real-life dinosaurs, and they chose to simply invent new ones with abilities that really shouldn't be put on animals. Acid blood, Poison spray, and whatever the hell they thought they did with the fleshraker... It's nice for the diversity of the edition, but they should have thought about druids beforehand.

The battletitan (basically a t-rex bred to serve as army fodder) and bloodstriker (a horned ankylosaurus that attacks by biting its opponents) have all the advantages and drawbacks of regular animals. High strength and natural armor, but almost no intelligence, and basically no ability apart from pure, dumb combat. Let's see how they fare.

*Battletitan*, 36 RHD: That picture is hilarious. The battletitan has legs so small that it always seems to be on the verge of falling over, and with its eyes covered it's a wonder how it can even see what's in front of it. Also, look at its feats. It spent three of them on armor proficiency, supposedly just to justify the picture. Because +7 AC is absolutely necessary when you already have +20 natural armor, and well worth losing a third of your speed. I mean, at least it's not Toughness three times.
- Huge Animal, with so many RHD that a cleric of its CR couldn't even Animate Dead one without Desecrate.
- +32 Str, +0 Dex, +18 Con, -8 Int, +2 Wis, +6 Cha, +20 natural armor. Strong and toughas nails, but only 10 Dex and dumb as a brick. Are we sure this isn't just a wingless white dragon?
- Bite, 2 claws, one tail attack. The white dragon theory is evermore accurate. It also has Improved Grab and swallow whole on its bite.
- That's all, thanks for reading.

So, Improved Grab with so much Str and size is great, but really nothing else of note. That's definitely not as good a grappler as, say, a kraken. Also, you have no skill and probably can't wield weapons without losing your main schtick. Better stats than the purple worm and more natural attacks, but no poison and worse type. I suggest *9 RHD* for the battletitan.

*Bloodstriker*, 9 RHD:
Why does this not have a gore attack again? 
- Large reachless Animal
- +12 Str, +10 Con, -8 Int, -2 Cha, +10 NA. Good natural armor here, but less strength than a bear.
- When you try to attack it, you take 1d8+6 from its spikes. If you succeed and draw blood, it is acidic and deals 1d6 additional damage. This doesn't apply to reach weapons. It can also squirt acidic blood from its eyes to deal 2d6 damage in a 30ft-line. This just means once more that you shouldn't attack this thing in melee.
-Only one bite attack, with no ability except a Powerful Charge bonus feat. You are going to be extremely passive, at least until you can find a Mouthpick weapon.

Good defenses, but less strength and fewer natural attacks than a brown bear, and no improved grab. It won't be playable with more than *4 RHD*. And Animal RHD are not worth much more than their BAB. *DLA-3*.


It's quite impressive how they managed to merge so many animals (T-Rex and stegosaurus for the battletitan; rhino, short-horned lizard, and the hippopotamus's acidic "blood" for the Bloodstriker) and still end up with something that basic and boring. And it's not over! Next time, it's the dragon eel, with the battletitan's swallow whole, the bloodstriker's powerful charge, all that underwater! See you then.

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## dhasenan

> - +32 Str, +0 Dex, +18 Con, -8 Int, +2 Wis, +6 Cha, +20 natural armor. Strong and toughas nails, but only 10 Dex and dumb as a brick. Are we sure this isn't just a wingless white dragon?
> 
> So, Improved Grab with so much Str and size is great, but really nothing else of note. That's definitely not as good a grappler as, say, a kraken. Also, you have no skill and probably can't wield weapons without losing your main schtick. Better stats than the purple worm and more natural attacks, but no poison and worse type. I suggest *9 RHD* for the battletitan.


I'm a novice with these ratings, but I thought people generally though +4 to stats was worth roughly +1 to effective class level. Am I misremembering? Or is the rest of the chassis sufficiently bad to be worth -3 LA?

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## H_H_F_F

> I'm a novice with these ratings, but I thought people generally though +4 to stats was worth roughly +1 to effective class level. Am I misremembering? Or is the rest of the chassis sufficiently bad to be worth -3 LA?


These generalizations aren't worth much when we're talking about different types of HD - outsider HD are far better than animal HD. Body shape is also relevant.

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## Beni-Kujaku

Every stat increase is also not made equal. Charisma for example does litterally nothing if you don't have SLAs or other ways to exploit it. And going from +24 to +32 in Str is way less impactful than going from -8 to +0 in Int. In one case you increase your damage output even more for a creature that should already hit most of the time +4 to damage per hit is really not that great (or +8 if you consider that all the bonus you get is going into Power Attack. That's not negligible but not game changing either). On the other hand the intelligence score means the difference between being able to contribute effectively out of combat or be restricted to 1 skill point per level out of a pitiful list.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Dragon Eel*

Yes, it's just a dunkleosteus on which they inexplicably put the Dragon type. Yes, it's sentient and even usually evil (this is still MM3 after all). Yes it sometimes even negotiates safe passage with ships even though it doesn't have arms (what does it even ask in return). Yes, it's described as being 20ft long but still Large and fitting in a 10ft square. And yes, obviously it has many more RHD than it should have to be viable. But no matter, because this monster single-handedly confirms the sahuagins as simply being underwater kobolds who worship dragons just because of their strength and status, even when said dragon is just a big fish with no manipulators.

The dragon eel (worst name of an already less-than-decent book in that department) has the same stats adjustments as a Mature Adult White Dragon... With -4 Int, -2 natural armor, one size category smaller, only one attack and none of the True Dragon goodies, like SLAs, or sorcerer levels, or sovereign archetypes...
On the plus side, you get a decent swim speed (60ft), a really strong bite (4d8 is _four_ sizes stronger than the regular bite damage, even stronger with Powerful Charge as a bonus feat) with added Improved Grab and Swallow Whole, and DR/Adamantine. Still, I don't see the dragon Eel competing any time soon with a true dragon. Maybe with seven or eight RHD? Let's go with *7 RHD* (obviously in a fully underwater campaign), since not having arms will be a real detriment, and even using a Mouthpick weapon would mean giving up your great bite attack. 

I'd recommand going Thayan Gladiator as soon as possible if you play a Dragon Eel (that or Kensai, but I don't know what lord would accept the fealty of a giant water dragon). Being able to make iterative attacks with your bite will be great. (Of course, as always with creatures who can't hold weapons, a level of monk or battledancer is welcome to be able to make iterative unarmed strikes)
As for DNLA, dragon RHD are as great as always, so I'd say *DLA-3* maybe? What do you think?


Next time we'll review Saint Seiya's Pisces Aphrodite's attack, the Dread Blossom Swarm!

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## remetagross

What a nice picture, though!

I'd say dragon HDs are neat, but the dragon eel really makes a poor use of them. What are you going to do with that many skill points when you don't have hands, which is required for performing a fair number of the available skills? Besides, this monster needs more options, not more numbers. You can't go overboard (heh) even if you give that guy, I don't know, DLA-6.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> What a nice picture, though!
> 
> I'd say dragon HDs are neat, but the dragon eel really makes a poor use of them. What are you going to do with that many skill points when you don't have hands, which is required for performing a fair number of the available skills? Besides, this monster needs more options, not more numbers. You can't go overboard (heh) even if you give that guy, I don't know, DLA-6.


Simply having full BAB and saves makes Dragon HD pretty good, and there are many things you can do with skills that do not involve hands. Simply Spotting, Listening, Spellcrafting, Bluffing, Hiding, Intimidating... In fact, most skills (and all of the Dunkleosteus's class skills) can absolutely be performed without hands. And it also gives you higher maximum skill ranks if you want to go Truenamer! Aren't you happy? (I'm not even sure truenaming would work underwater, how does that work? What about verbal components?)

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Dread Blossom Swarm*


_I mean, seriously. A swarm of roses flying to embed in your heart to suck your blood? And it can also paralyze you? Masami Kurumada is gonna sue somebody._

First, can I say that I love this monster? Their presentation is such an eerily beautiful scene, with the superposition of a calm flower field and the barely visible bodies on the ground. And when the PCs come to investigate, the swarm takes flight. Do you imagine what it would be in real life? To see a field of roses or red poppiesfly up in a coordinated fashion? And then the fight starts, and you understand that no matter what you're doing, the flowers just regrow, even from severed stems, and you have to burn it all to the ground. Really, this monster has it all. Presentation, mystery, beauty, a fight that you can't win by brute force alone, and especially the mechanics to go with it all... I'm really in love with it.

However, as a PC, the DBS (Dread Blossom Swarm, not Dragon Ball Super) is really not that great. Swarms do not make good PCs, with the lack of hands, of items, and inability to be buffed. And you are only Tiny, so you still take damage from weapons. Finding a way to somehow lose a size category may be worthwhile, but I'm not sure there is any (spell-storing Reduce Person, then permanency, maybe? Does compression work? How do personal spells/powers work on swarms?). For a 7 RHD Plant with only +6 Dex and +4 Con, but -8 in Str, Int and Cha, that's really not good. That said, you have a few abilities which make a world of difference. 
First is poison pollen. I know half the Monster Manual is immune to poison, but the half that isn't (basically everything living you'll fight up to level 8-10) will have to contend with a *lot* of saves versus paralysis. And it doesn't cost an action, so an ardent Dread Blossom Swarm can still spam whatever power they want while still poisoning anybody within 15ft. And it stacks with distraction for a very nice 2-saves or lose per turn. And each time they fail, they lose some Con. Ability Focus, Virulent Poison and Poison Expert all (probably) combine to give a total +5 to your DC. Note that you get the former for free, on top of Alertness and Lightning Reflexes (more reflex is always good for a swarm).
Second is regeneration. Most creatures with regeneration, when they get too much nonlethal damage, are just asking for a coup de grace. A swarm, on the other hand, disperses when it becomes unconscious, and so cannot really be affected efficiently. Creatures with no cold or fire will have a lot of issues with you. Not even counting the fact that being able to heal as a swarm is invaluable. And since most Save-or-Lose have a limited number of targets, regeneration is really great for a swarm.

All of that makes the Dread Blossom Swarm much better than most other swarms, and actually able to contribute in combat, even at high-ish levels. Yet, it's really hit or miss. Either you can completely lock down the opponent, or you just watch from the sidelines with nothing to do. Like always, I advise getting Evasion the fastest possible, then probably taking levels of a psionic class to be able to do things without holding a weapon and without somatic or verbal components (here, we're obviously looking for ardent, seeing the abysmal Int and Cha). I think it should be playable with *5 RHD*, if a bit weak. And since it's a case where you get basically nothing from 2 RHD except +1 to all saves and 13 HP (you don't use BAB and it's not enough to make your swarm attack stronger), I'll say *DLA-2*, but maybe a bit strong this time.


What do you think of this monster? Have you ever used it in an actual game? The overall vibes remind me a lot of Made in Abyss. Next time we'll have another monster with a flavourful aura ability, but who doesn't translate into mechanics as well as the DBS, it's the Drowned!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Drowned*

The Drowned, because the drowning rules in D&D are much too punitive for them not to make a monster out of it. And give it 20 Undead RHD. And no level-appropriate ability. After the avalancher and this, I'm expecting a suffocating-based monster next. Oh, right, Voidwraith. Or lava effects... Oh right, there's the Phaethon. Is there a starvation-based monster? Wouldn't surprise me.

The Drowned is a Medium Undead with ability scores worthy of an awakened bear (+14 Str, +2 Dex, -2 Int, +2 Cha, +8 natural armor), 2 weak slams with no abilities, fast healing 5 and unholy toughness. That's... extremely bad. The only redeeming quality of the drowned is its Drowning Aura, an unfriendly 30ft aura forcing everyone to make Constitution checks every turn or go unconscious and start drowning. With Ability Focus, anything with less Con than the Tarrasque will be at risk of instant death with basically no way to boost their resistance. That is honestly really good, but having a creature with half BAB in melee, and risking your own allies drowning if they try to help you in basically any way, is definitely not. And it doesn't work on anything that doesn't breathe, so no Undead, no Construct, no Elementals, and no creature with the ability to breathe underwater. A one-trick pony whose one trick will litterally be more harmful to its teammates than its enemies. I still think it's slightly better than the bear, due to... Well, mostly being able to wield weapons. But really, it won't do _anything_ in combat except moving around enemies and try to drown them. I think I would advance it as a knight or a crusader, to make people stay close to it a much as possible. I'd say something like *6 RHD*? Maybe? And Undead RHD are bad. Really bad. Especially when your main ability doesn't scale with them. *DLA-11* doesn't seem exaggerated. 


The next one will be another undead with an overpowered aura and nothing else to show for it, the Dust Wight!

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## Emberlily

Honestly, dread blossom swarm character sounds like it could be interesting to play, conceptually. Had never heard of them before this thread, actually, either. Kinda really like them!

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## remetagross

I guess you could say the Wendigo template _is_ a starvation-based monster.

I really like these two last monsters, as monsters. As PCs, I agree the Dread Blossom Swarm sucks a little less than ordinary swarms...it should definitely go Ardent, for the ability to do stuff with no hands, to still get high-level powers despite the RHDs, and to get Compression (which I think works just fine on swarms since the target is "you", not "one humanoid"). I dunno about the RHDs and negative LA to give. Yours seem fine, it's hard to gauge such a complicated monster.

The Drowned is an oppressive monster, but yeah, as a PC it's not so good, what with being even more ally-unfriendly than the Dread Blossom Swarm...I like 6 RHD because it can still nab 9th-level maneuvers if going initiator.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Dust Wight*
Rust monsters: now with twice the CR and three times the number of RHD!

The Dust Wight is the [Earth] equivalent of the chraal, an undead created by the combination of negative energy and elemental earth (even though the Chraal was an elemental, which makes no sense whatsoever). Basically, it's an obvious reference to the Quasi-Elemental Plane of Dust (the combined part of the Elemental Plane of Earth and the Plane of Negative Energy), even though the Quasi-Elemental Planes are not mentioned anywhere in 3rd edition except as a fleeting sentence in the Manual of the Planes. The Negative Quasi-Elemental Planes are supposed to be the exact opposite (or the representation of the destruction) of the element they're based on. The Quasi-Elemental Plane of Dust represents of course the destruction of stone and metal. And the Dust Wight is hence hell-bent on destroying every worked mineral that crosses its path, reducing it to dust, then eating it. And of course, it can transform people into stone. Because if your hobby is destroying one specific thing, you might as well know how to create that thing just to have more to destroy. Seems the Dust Wight is one of those tormented artists who always destroy their own pieces of art because they're never perfect.

As a PC, the Dust Wight would be awful even with half the number of RHD. It has the stats of a 4-5 RHD beatstick (+10 Str, -2 Dex, -2 Int, +11 Natural armor) with a pretty good DR 5/Adamantine but the worst beatsticky type (Undead with no unholy toughess) and only Medium size, has only two slams as its natural attacks (and probably won't bear any weapon for both the RP hate of metal and the fact that it will prevent it from using its crumbling touch), and has one of its two main abilities that will just destroy loot. If we disregard the loot-destroying, Crumbling Touch is actually pretty interesting but also very limited, since it applies only to the armor of people you're striking with your slams (not a touch attack, despite the name). The armor is slowly destroyed and heals you slightly in the process. 
And finally, there's the Petrifying Aura. Now, in general, save-or-lose auras are much better if they have a 24h-immunity, since you can render your whole party immune in the morning. But that's the case for auras with effects limited in time. When the effect of the aura is a flesh to stone effect, you don't want to ever apply it to your friends, especially not the cleric (the effect of the aura can be neutralized if you cast Stone Shape during the first round after someone if affected, but 3rd level spells won't become so expendable that you can cast one for half the party each morning for quite a while). Which means this aura has all the weaknesses of a 24h-immunity without any of its benefits. Also you have no Charisma bonus to improve its DC, and monsters generally have way higher Fortitude than PCs and you're basically useless once they made their first save. That is really once of the worst ways you can implement a SoL aura.

Considering the loot-destroying, ally-petrifying abilities of the thing, I really don't think anyone would play it with more than *6 RHD*. Maybe 7 at most. And having decent DC on the petrifying cloud will help tremendously, so maybe the 15 RHD are not as bad as most Undead RHD. Still, *DLA-6* is a minimum. 


Well, this monster can be summed up with one quote:



> Looks like this one will be collecting dust.


Next time, we'll have another creature from a combination of planes: the Storm Elemental!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Storm Elemental (Large and larger)*


Storm elementals are a weird amalgamation of all the best parts from the original four elementals: Air's (perfect) flying, Fire's strong slams with additional energy damage, Earth's high Str and Con, and obviously nothing from Water (it only gets the good parts after all). That said, everything isn't perfect, and Storm's dexterity is the lowest of all true elemental reviewed, except Earth. Storm also loses on some versatility, by replacing Air's Alternate Form or Earth's earth glide for just damage. Honestly pretty good damage, with Thunder and Lightning (both a line dealing the Elemental's RHD in d6s and an emanation dealing half as much, both as a single full-round action, sad that it's only 1/min) and a free action 1/rd Shock dealing a bit of nonlethal electricity damage (nonlethal energy damage is pretty rare, but I'm not sure there's a way to abuse it). 

Their various perks made them similar enough to get the same rating as Air for the Small and Medium sizes. Let's see how the bigger ones fare:

*Large*, 8 RHD: Str +12, Con+8, Int-4 Your slam isn't quite as damaging as the fire elemental's is, but it's still pretty good, and contrary to Air, your flight speed steadily increases with size categories. You're now only 20ft short of Air, and deal more damage, but have less AC due to lower Dex. Electricity and Sonic healing mean that the party caster with Storm Bolt can give you unlimited healing. Niche, but effective. Still, the Large Storm Elemental is well-balanced and can hold its own in combat while keeping most of the versatility associated with 80ft (perfect) flying. *7 RHD*, *DLA-0*

*Huge*, 16 RHD: Str +20, Dex-2, Con +12, Int -4 Well, that's a lot more strength, and even though youre paying a bit of your Dex. That's what happens when you stick too closely to advancement of monsters. You also get better slams, and especially better Shock and Thunder and Lightning (the equivalent of 24d6 as an AoE is nothing to sneeze at, even with saves for half). I'd say a weak *10 RHD*, *DLA-3* would be good, since it has lots of advantages compared to Air.

*Greater*, 21 RHD: Slightly better Thunder and Lightning, slightly better ability scores across the board, and DR 10/-. Eh, sure, a weak *11 RHD*, *DLA-6*.

*Elder*, 24 RHD: I am flabbergasted by this age category. You only get +2 to Int and Dex, and +1 to natural armor. And that all. Nothing else. *11 RHD*, *DLA-8*.


Contrary to the Air elemental, the Storm elemental is definitely intended to be a bruiser in melee, but no class really helps it beyond its racial abilities, since Thunder and Lightning doesn't scale with caster level, or HD (except for DC), or really anything. The best way is probably simply to embrace the melee and go barbarian, or warblade, or maybe psychic warrior (it is in dire need of something to do with its swift actions). Next time, we'll have one of the many swarms with exotic types from the MM3. This time, an undead swarm, the Ephemeral Swarm!

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## remetagross

These dudes, having such a powerful flight ability and elemental damage healing, are more versatile than most pure bruisers. I wonder if there is a way to turn all the damage dealt by a natural attack into energy damage...maybe there's some magical property you could put on a Necklace of Natural Weapons? If yes, add in the Vicious weapon property, where each melee hit deals 1d6 damage to yourself, and you can now auto-heal in combat, or by boxing a house. 

Anyway, I like how conservative you went with your estimations there. But if playing with reduced RHD, there would be no point to pick a Greater Storm Elemental over an Elder one, right? Would'nt that be better to assign 12RHD to the Elder one, or maybe 10 to the Greater one?

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## Beni-Kujaku

> These dudes, having such a powerful flight ability and elemental damage healing, are more versatile than most pure bruisers. I wonder if there is a way to turn all the damage dealt by a natural attack into energy damage...maybe there's some magical property you could put on a Necklace of Natural Weapons? If yes, add in the Vicious weapon property, where each melee hit deals 1d6 damage to yourself, and you can now auto-heal in combat, or by boxing a house.


Sadly, that doesn't work. Storm elementals have an explicit clause preventing them from healing from their own attack. Otherwise, they could just Thunder and Lightning at themselves and heal that way (the thunder is explicitly an emanation and doesn't include you, but a line starts from any side of your square and in the direction you want, so you can include yourself in it).




> Anyway, I like how conservative you went with your estimations there. But if playing with reduced RHD, there would be no point to pick a Greater Storm Elemental over an Elder one, right? Would'nt that be better to assign 12RHD to the Elder one, or maybe 10 to the Greater one?


An ECL is a pretty large estimate. Except in rare circumstances, there's basically no benefit playing an orc compared to a water orc, yet both are +0 because a water orc isn't strong enough to be worth +1 LA and an orc isn't weak enough to deserve LA-0, or a wolf compared to a riding dog, yet both are 1 RHD+1 LA, because the riding dog wouldn't fit with 2 RHD. The point here is to find the place where they would be playable in a regular party, and the differences between the two storm elementals aren't large enough that I think they should be in different ECL. +4 stats, +1 NA and +4d6 for Thunder and Lightning isn't nothing, but it's also not enough that I'd say the Elder belongs with 12 RHD.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Ephemeral swarm*


What happens when a martial initiator pisses a DM off by killing hundreds of rats with Blood in the Water to gain enough bonus damage to one-shot the BBEG? Well, first, they get nerfed and/or told politely but firmly to cut it out, but more importantly for in-game purposes, an ephemeral swarm happens. This incorporeal undead swarm arises from the anguish of hundreds of similar Tiny beasts dying from the same event and searches the source of their death to exact revenge.

Now, mechanically, this monster is incredibly frustrating. It has the single three types and subtypes with the highest amount of immunities in the game, being an Undead [incorporeal, swarm]. With all that, you would expect something basically unkillable, that would roam the battlefields slowly draining people's life while shrugging off any effort to harm it. However, in practice, this is far from the case, for two main reasons. 
First, its immunities are largely redundant. Undead are immune to death and mind-affecting, but most dangerous death and mind-affecting effects (except a few like cone of dimness, calm emotions, deep slumber, wail of the banshee and some gaze attacks) already don't affect swarms because they're single-target or affect a fixed number of targets. The swarm ability to squeeze in basically any hole is made moot by incorporeal. 
Second, and most importantly, the ephemeral swarm is immune to everything EXCEPT the things that will actually kill it. It's not immune or even resistant to pure, dumb energy damage, and takes 1-1/2 damage from it. It is not immune or resistant to Turn Undead. And finally, it's not resistant beyond regular incorporeal miss chance to bludgeoning damage (and has Undead HP, so... not great). Being Tiny is really a pain for these sorrowful rats. The ephemeral swarm is like a tardigrade, that small animal that can resist nuclear radiation, temperatures of hundreds of degrees, decade-long dehydration and the freaking void of space, but dies like anything else when it is eaten and digested, which is the most common way to die.

-12 Undead RHD. That's too much. I believe it's only to allow it to kill people on its own before dying, because there is almost nothing else it affects
- No Str, no Con, +8 Dex, -8 Int, +8 Cha. At least you have really good AC, to go with being incorporeal. You're not unkillable, but still a pain to defeat. Do take up Evasion as fast as possible.
- Your swarm attack deals Str damage instead of HP damage. This explicitly only affects living creatures. You will have a hard time fighting other Undead, and other incorporeal creatures. Still, probably better than just pure damage. You'll be able to weaken your party's opponents and reduce the danger for your friends.

In the end, the Ephemeral Swarm is still really good for a swarm. Being incorporeal has a lot of upsides and its stats are good. However, being Tiny and not Diminutive or Fine is a huge downside, and having no turn resistance might be crippling once in a while. How good is it? Probably similar or stronger than the Dread Blossom Swarm? *5 RHD*, *DLA-5*.


I'm really not sure about this one. It has so much good and so much bad, inertwined with each other. Next time, we will review the feral yowler, a much, much more standard creature.

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## remetagross

I seem to remember there's a swarm of Fine incorporeal undead insects somewhere...these guys are the proto version of it.

They are worse than the dread blossom swarm. They have crappy HPs and do not regenerate. They are not immune to that much more stuff than the flowers are. They have less interesting attack options. If the DBS got 5RHD, I cannot see these guys get 6. They have to have 5 at most too.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> I seem to remember there's a swarm of Fine incorporeal undead insects somewhere...these guys are the proto version of it.


I'm pretty sure there's no such swarm (except a swarm-shifter undead to which you apply a ghost template, even swarmshifter cannot be applied to a corporeal undead). Maybe you're thinking of the bloodmote cloud from Libris Mortis? That's a swarm of undead Fine mosquitoes who suck your blood. It's pretty cool. But I believe my favorite swarm (except the DBS, I've really fallen in love with that one) would be the divine wrath swarms from BoED, who represent the 10 Plagues of Egypt from the Bible. Especially the deathraven swarm, just because it is so over the top in its way of killing people. When it hits you, not only does it deal 4d8, it has a built-in SoD in its swarm attack, and even if you survive you have a 20% chance to have your eyes pecked off and become blind until you recieve a Heal spell. Because when the gods don't like you, they _really_ don't like you.





> They are worse than the dread blossom swarm. They have crappy HPs and do not regenerate. They are not immune to that much more stuff than the flowers are. They have less interesting attack options. If the DBS got 5RHD, I cannot see these guys get 6. They have to have 5 at most too.


I knew there would be some disputes for this one. I didn't underline it in the review, but incorporeality is really, really good. Basically everything that can hit you (and already not much can hit you since you're a swarm) has 50% chance to just not do anything. What monsters have natural weapons counting as Magic anyway? If you go by the assumption that "natural attacks of monsters with DR/magic bypass DR/magic" works against incorporeal, then you still have only 50% of being affected. If you don't, then nothing will hit you for a very long time (there is literally no monster I can think of that has Mass Cure [...] Wounds as an SLA). You don't resist Fireballs or Meteor Swarms, but they still have only 50% chance of affecting you. Also, crappy HPs? They don't have Con, yes, but they have still d12s. With all their defenses, they should be the last man (?) standing in the party. In terms of defense, and even without Regeneration, the Ephemeral Swarm is noticeably better than the Dread Blossom Swarm. Of course, in terms of offense, it's not as good, and it's not quite balanced by the utility brought by the (incorporeal) nature of the EphSwarm. 
Both are extremely good swarms, adding on the qualities of swarms and patching some of their weaknesses. I'm really not sure which is better. But yeah, the EphSwarm is probably worth a bit less than 6 RHD. I'm reluctant to give it less than the DBS, but *5 RHD* is probably better. What do y'all think?

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## remetagross

Ah well, maybe that was a made-up memory. And these divine swarms seem quite nice too  :Small Big Grin: 

Yes, you're incorporeal, but then, what good does that for you? There is so little you can actually _do_. Your swarming attack does not work on constructs, nor on undead, and a lot of foes do not give a damn about suffering Str damage - until you've drained their last point of it. Any ranged or spellcasting monster will happily trade away HP damage for Str damage - unless the whole party is able to deal that kind of damage, the swarm is not contributing much to actively ending the encounter. And yes you can infiltrate everywhere, but with no physical presence, this is even worse than having no hands - do not that the swarm does not have any hands, in addition to that. So yeah, I stand by that 5 RHD.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Feral Yowler*



And we're back to (relative) normalcy with what is (with the hell hound) probably one of the most generic name there is. And lo and behold, it's also a canine! It yowls? It is feral? Then it is a feral yowler! Seriously, there is so much more to this monster than just being "feral", it's just a shame that it isn't reflected in its name. The feral yowler is the product of experiments meant to cross-breed a displacer beast with something else (most probably a shadow mastiff, considering it has Trip and a weaker version of Bay as well as a weaker version of the displacer beast's Displacement) using copious amounts of necromantic powers, to the point that the resulting beast not only looks almost as undead as a krenshar, but is completely immune to energy drain and negative energy as a whole. The thing is, if you're a necromancer, it's a bad idea to create something that is immune to your best spells, that you also can't command (since it is a Magical Beast and not a true Undead). The feral yowlers obviously rebelled, and fled in the wild, where their violent nature and lowish intelligence make them attack anything and everything. I'm not even sure they can really mate.

As a PC, the feral yowler is really not that bad, with a variety of useful abilities (Fast Healing 3 is really nice, and Minor Displacement and Trip on a 7 RHD full BAB chassis make it really good in melee), absolutely excellent ability scores with the crippling exception of Intelligence (Str +8, Dex +6, Con +16, Int -4, Wis +4, Cha +6) and a few situational but useful abilities (immunity to energy drain may save your butt once in a while and Yowl of Fear, while weak, may combo well with Intimidating Rage or Never Outnumbered to make a lot of people terrified for really long). However, the impossibility to hold a non-mouthpick weapon (and even then, losing your Trip) or manipulate items is a real issue, and the claw-claw-bite routine will only take you so far. Medium size is also not ideal for a bruiser. In the end, it deserves some negative LA, but really not much, and I think *6 RHD* and *DLA-1* should make the feral yowler playable.

What do you think of this? If you were a necromancer, would you create a feral yowler knowing the risk of it escaping if it meant having a chance to create a better creature later? Next time, we'll review the Geriviar, as a good introduction to the high-level giants from this book. Have a nice day!

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## dhasenan

The scariest thing about the Feral Yowler is the implication that there are both Wild and Tame Yowlers.

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## remetagross

I agree that the feral yowler is close to being playable as-is. Its Int penalty is not so big that it makes a PC completely unplayable, it has a variety of immunities and tricks, and it has reasonable ability scores. I'm fine with *6 RHD, DLA-1* too.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Geriviar*

The Geriviar hates buildings. This 26 RHD Huge Giant with basically grenades growing on its skin, that we are supposed to make fit into an adventuring party, has an irrational phobia of any permanent building as basically its only personality trait. Need. I. Say. More? 

The geriviar is a desperate attempt to make an epic-level beatstick. It has immunity to mind-affecting (but not to death effects), a 70ft movement speed with the ability to move 420ft with a full-round action (which amounts basically to an at-will Dimension Door SLA, which is not bad), the ability to take 10 on Jump checks (for a whopping 15ft-high or 55ft-long jump. Nice for Sudden Leap, but irrelevant to reach flying opponents), and the ability to throw organic "nodules" (they're grenades. They're really just grenades.) with... Infinite range? I mean, I have tried to find the range, but there's nothing in the statblock except "hurl them at its opponents", and nothing in the errata about it. The geriviar was errataed, but only because they forgot to put rock throwing in its full attack. So, you can just throw two 10d6 grenades to anyone in sight by a standard action? I mean, that's still far from worth ECL 26, but that's at least interesting. 
It also has some of the worst SLAs I've seen on epic creatures (not counting dragons), notably Invisibility 1/day (...seriously? You're supposed to basically bomb your opponents from miles away. In what world is becoming invisible until you attack ever useful?), Telekinesis (sure, go ahead, use combat maneuvers with a lower bonus than just doing the same with your arms), and Reverse Gravity (what was the use case here? Reverse your own gravity to attack flying casters). 

Apart from these few abilities, the chassis is painfully bland. Great stats, with +22 Str, +2 Dex, +16 Con, +0 Int, +6 Wis, +8 Cha, +28 Natural Armor, a nice DR 10/Adamantine and Magic and Regeneration 8/Cold or Acid in defense, 8 slams and rock throwing in offense, SR RHD+2 (useless), ignores object hardness (flavourful but useless at this level), and Improved Bull Rush and Sunder as bonus feats (just a few ECL late).


 I don't understand how this is CR 19 when the Kraken is CR 12 with better stats, better natural weapons, better grappling and similar mobility. The defense of the geriviar is much much better, but we all know defense doesn't win fights. Still, the infinite nodule launch is great, and both your natural armor, DR and immunities will allow you to spam it with no regards for opponents in a lot of situation. The absence of SoL is concerning, however, and infinite range damage doesn't matter if you don't spot enemies before they're close to you. I don't know, maybe *13 RHD* or 14? How can there be so much and so little to a monster at the same time?


Next time will be even worse, with new and exciting giants. All of them are Large to Huge beatsticks with next to no useful ability besides pure numbers, and epic or near-epic numbers of RHDs. See you then for the Death, Eldritch and Sand giants.

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## remetagross

It's hard to pin down a specific number of RHDs for such bloated creatures, but 13 RHDs fits the "1 RHD for each +4 in ability scores adjustement" rule of thumb, so I guess it works. Reverse Gravity is actually not bad of an SLA, especially if it happens at the same ECL when casters access it.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Giants (Death, Eldritch, Sand)*

Giants, now with three flavors of exotic abilities!

As always, MM3 strives to give new twists to old monsters, and if it can be hit or miss (the conflagration ooze was a cluster of unexplained weirdness), I feel like they did a very good job giving these giants a lot of personality with some mechanically minor changes. As PCs, I think it would translate into some really interesting roleplay. So let's give them some negative LA to support it!

*Death Giant, 23 RHD*: Karsus's Folly taught us that desperate measures taken to save your civilization from attacking phaerimms can backfire much more than expected. And when the desperate measures against phaerimms consist in selling the souls of all current and future Death Giants to entities from the Negative Energy Plane... Well, you can see how it goes. Death Giants are now a depression-riddled lot living with the fear of death and scorn against their ancestors. But they got cool powers from it! As big, strong and intelligent but much more charismatic than Cloud Giants, they can wield the souls of their victims to protect themselves (Cha to saves, initiative and a few checks, really good with their +14 Cha), to make anybody in a 100ft radius panicked while they stay in the area (unfriendly and no 24h-immunity, so watch out) and to be healed by both negative and positive energy. They also get immunity to energy drain and fear effects, and some semi-interesting SLAs, notably Flame Strike and Greater Dispel Magic (CL 16). All in all not an epic character, but really interesting and much stronger than a Cloud Giant, and even probably than a Storm Giant, despite their overall lower ability scores. I'll go with the same rating as the Geriviar, with *13 RHD*.

*Eldritch Giant, 25 RHD*: With +32 Str, the Eldritch Giant is as strong as some Great Wyrms, but that's far from everything it's got for it. Eldritch Giants dedicate their life to studying magic, which gives them the invaluable ability to Greater Dispel (CL 20) at will. This is great to get rid of effects opponents put on your party, even during combat. The feat selection of the standard eldritch giant is honestly pretty good, and Quicken SLA (Greater Dispel) might be one of your first picks. It can basically use spell trigger and spell completion items as if he was a wizard (cue "rogues are tier 3 casters because they get UMD" discussion) and has Globe of Invulnerability 3/day and a racial +6 to Will in defense. Sadly no specific immunity. Still, the Eldritch Giant is extremely good and versatile, and may warrant 14 or *15 RHD*.

*Sand Giant, 15 RHD*: Finally, one of them is non-epic. Only Large and with a lower speed (40ft) than the other two, the Sand Giant is also the most sociable giant so far, creating very organized settlements in the desert, compared to the tribes of giants from the MM1 and the pretty solitary Death and Eldritch giants. Their stats are close to that of a Stone Giant, but with much higher Dex (+10) and Wis (+6). Apart from that, it has Statue and a personal Blur as SLAs, that it is able to maintain basically all day long, which give it surprisingly good defenses. Apart from that, however, there's not much to note, and I don't see the sand giant getting some love with more than *10 RHD*. Giant RHD are also pretty bad, and *DLA-3* seems fair.


Death Giants are in my opinion the most well-designed of the three, with the souls they have taken from their opponents swirling around them, which prevents resurrection the same way they themselves can't get resurrected as their soul is destroyed in the Negative Plane. I could really see the BBEG of a campaign be a Death Giant who tried to cheat death by all means necessary and became either Adept of the Green Star or simply Undead to become timeless and spends all his time collecting as many souls as possible, to the point that his castle is always engulfed in a maelstrom of howling souls.
Next time, we will review the scottish mermaid/siren/nymph, the glaistig! Until then, enjoy your stay!

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## PoeticallyPsyco

> I could really see the BBEG of a campaign be a Death Giant who tried to cheat death by all means necessary and became either Adept of the Green Star or simply Undead to become timeless and spends all his time collecting as many souls as possible, to the point that his castle is always engulfed in a maelstrom of howling souls.


I did a Villainous Competition character kinda like that. A Wendigo instead of a Death Giant, and thus driven by purely corporeal hunger, she nonetheless accumulated the souls of her victims in a cloud around her, initially giving her access to a couple of Incarnum powers but ultimately reaching the point where she got the full on Symbiotic Creature template with a Dream Vestige (this was all taking place in the Plane of Dreams).

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## remetagross

These Giants are honestly rather cool. It's nice to seem them doing something else than throwing and catching rocks (has anyone ever tried to optimize that?). Hard to gauge the appropriate RHD on creatures with that many HDs as usual, but your assessment seems fair. At-will CL 20 Greater Dispel Magic is bonkers, I'd veer towards 15 RHS rather than 14 for the eldritch giant I guess.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> I did a Villainous Competition character kinda like that. A Wendigo instead of a Death Giant, and thus driven by purely corporeal hunger, she nonetheless accumulated the souls of her victims in a cloud around her, initially giving her access to a couple of Incarnum powers but ultimately reaching the point where she got the full on Symbiotic Creature template with a Dream Vestige (this was all taking place in the Plane of Dreams).


That was a nice read! A possible death giant would probably also see themselves as the victim, doomed from the start by forces they can't control and doing only what they can to survive, maybe even begging the PCs to just let them live alone.




> These Giants are honestly rather cool. It's nice to seem them doing something else than throwing and catching rocks (has anyone ever tried to optimize that?). Hard to gauge the appropriate RHD on creatures with that many HDs as usual, but your assessment seems fair. At-will CL 20 Greater Dispel Magic is bonkers, I'd veer towards 15 RHS rather than 14 for the eldritch giant I guess.


I really don't think there's any optimization possible here. The main problem is that the ability is not well-defined enough to have generic support for it. The damage and range of the rock throw is specific to each giant, and is more akin to a special natural weapon than to an ability. For example, a Geriviar throws rocks with a 160ft range increment dealing 2d8+1.5xStr, a Stone Giant has a range increment of 180ft and deals 2d6+1.5xStr, and a Cloud Giant throws rocks at 140ft and deals 2d8+1xStr. There is no rule, no printed way to scale the damage with bigger size categories (although you can infer from Mountain Giants that a Gargantuan Giant would deal 3d8 and a Colossal one would deal 4d8), the damage doesn't follow the improvised weapon rules, so you can't argue that throwing a pointy rock would deal more damage, and thrown weapons really don't get that much love to begin with. Of course, Brutal Throw and Ranged Throw are pretty good, but not only am I not sure they can really apply, since the rocks are not really thrown weapons _per se_, all of that becomes irrelevant when compared to just one level of Hulking Hurler. Still, it can be interesting for really long distance attacks (900ft max range for the Stone Giant), but optimizing is a bit far-fetched. 




On another hand, I recently learned that becoming [Epic] does take into account level adjustment, so a creature with 16 HD and LA+5 can take Epic feats. The main reason why I didn't assign DNLA until now to epic creatures was that I didn't want to deal with Epic feats in a non-epic environment, but the epic LA rule should work in both direction, and DNLA wouldn't create non-epic creatures with epic feats. I'm contemplating assigning a DNLA to epic creatures I didn't before (like, for example, the Death and Eldritch Giants above). Would you find that interesting? Maybe after we're finished with Monster Manual III?

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## Emberlily

> On another hand, I recently learned that becoming [Epic] does take into account level adjustment, so a creature with 16 HD and LA+5 can take Epic feats. The main reason why I didn't assign DNLA until now to epic creatures was that I didn't want to deal with Epic feats in a non-epic environment, but the epic LA rule should work in both direction, and DNLA wouldn't create non-epic creatures with epic feats. I'm contemplating assigning a DNLA to epic creatures I didn't before (like, for example, the Death and Eldritch Giants above). Would you find that interesting? Maybe after we're finished with Monster Manual III?


I would definitely be interested, at least.

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## remetagross

Wow, I completely didn't know that. Though to be fair, who in this forum has already played a game where that situation arises? 

I find assigning DNLA to be a task more difficult than merely reducing RHDs, so I can only approve if you take the time to do so, but I can't really participate either way.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Glaistig*



There is exactly one official picture of a glaistig in D&D and they still managed to miss the two most important details about her: that she has goat legs like a satyr and that she has pointy teeth like a vampire (do note that despite heavy comparisons between the three of them, the actual myths are almost completely independant, with the glaistig being from the Irish folklore, the satyr is from greek mythology and vampires only appeared during the 18th century in Eastern Europe, probably Austria). A glaistig is basically a water dryad, using songs and dance to lure men to the place they're bound to (for the glaistig, a body of water or a river). But, where the dryad generally enrolls them to defend her forest, the glaistig simply drinks their blood and/or drowns them. Or helps them solve their problems, when she's in a good mood. What? She's chaotic neutral, she at least acts like it.

The glaistig is one monster where I'm kind of sad the asterisk of the LA-thread only removes abilities instead of modifying them. As it is, the Symbiosis is removed so that the glaistig can go adventuring, but her most interesting ability, her song (one single person is fascinated and can only come near the glaistig, then is charmed when he is adjacent to her), can still only be used within 300 yards of her designated pool, which makes it useless in basically any campaign. 

The glaistig remains a 6 RHD Fey (not the worst RHD) with slightly below average but balanced ability scores (+2 Str, +2 Dex, +4 Con, +2 Int, +4 Wis, +8 Cha, total +22, +4 natural armor), the regular DR 5/cold iron, a bite with a blood drain similar to a vampire's that you will probably never use, and above all some decent-to-good SLAs. Notably (and honestly, almost exclusively), at-will Fog Cloud and Suggestion. I'm sorry glaistig, but you don't really compare to a dryad. But the ability scores make her probably slightly better than a satyr. *4 RHD*, *DLA-1*

Too bad we won't ever see Beguiling Song in the hands of PCs. Or, well, not unless you play a Harpy. But next time, we'll go in the opposite direction from the mouth and instead delve deeper into these goat legs with the Goatfolk!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Ibixians (keep reading, there's more below)*

Yes, Ibixians. Because "goatfolk" is a derogatory slang term with roots in the conscription-based oppression of minotaur-like people. Honestly it was that or "horny people, no, not satyrs".

Ibixians are designed as customizable NPC mercenaries, with basically no ability of their own and ability scores only slightly higher than a regular humanoid race, but 3 RHD. That way, you can use them as-is as low-level bosses or in number as mooks, but also give them any class level you want and make a nice PC-like opponent in a dedicated campaign. Of course, this design decision makes them woefully inadapted to PC play as they are.

-Medium size, 3 Monstrous Humanoid RHD, +4 Str, +2 Con, 2 Int, 2 Wis, +2 NA, MWP (greataxe).
- That's all folks!

Creatures whose abilities can be summarized on a single line are rare, and that doesn't bode well for their viability (if you forget about the +2 on attack and damage when they are near other ibixians, which won't come up except with Leadership). Definitely stronger than most humanoid races, it's basically a water orc with 2 natural armor and no light sensitivity. The water orc is at the very top of the LA+0, so I guess this is at the very bottom of *1 RHD, LA+1*. Sad. On the other hand, full BAB HD means it will probably hold its own at low level with *DLA-1*.


Welp, that was quick. And the next ones are golems? Screw it, I'm starting now.


*Golems (Alchemical, Gloom, Hangman and Mud)*
As always, MMIII tries to reuse old creatures while putting a new spin on them. Today, golems! But not simple golems, noooooo! Golems made of nonsolid matter, planar golems, and a freaking golems made of rope! They even listed golems for every main plane for us to imagine without statting them, like the Amorphion golem from Limbo which emanates wild magic trait. They're great! Well, not as PCs of course, but we can change that.


Golems are still great in melee with immunity to magic and high natural armor and DR, but low or absent Int, hard to buff due to immunity to magic, and generally bad RHD and low stats except Str. They're all Large except the Shadesteel Golem which won't appear today.

*Alchemical, 22 RHD*: Is that the same kind of membrane as the Conflagration Ooze? How does it not just collapse into a puddle of acid? And above all, who thought 22 RHD was a good idea !? Awful stats, with +12 Str, +2 Dex, -8 Int, -10 Cha, +16 natural armor. It has a mediocre breath weapon dealing 2 Con+5d6 in a small cone that activates everytime it is dealt 10 damage (interesting, but highly abusable by opponents with ranged attacks to damage your allies). And finally, you deal 2d6 acid with your touch. Which doesn't help you much but prevents you from wearing non-magic non-mithral armor and may make using some unprotected magic items difficult. Still, immunity to magic and the ability to fully heal with the Poison spell is extremely good. Overall slightly better than the Stone Golem (despite the worse stats), but I feel like I'd prefer playing an Iron Golem. *11 RHD*, *DLA-8*

*Gloom Golem, 8 RHD*: Nice alliteration. And we have the first planar golem, made from EVIL stuff from the Wastes of Hades, with a black hole for a head and faces embedded in its skin. Really nice appearance. However, that thing has the ability to apply *permanent* Crushing Despair effect in a 30ft radius. No 24h-immunity, doesn't seem to go away if you get outside the radius. Yep. Your whole party will most probably get a permanent -2 to all rolls just for adventuring with you. You drain 1d6 charisma with any attack, even with weapons, which is great, especially with your free Exotic Weapon Prodiciency (Spiked Chain). And DR 10/Good is also interesting, especially since your immunity to magic has no exception. And finally, you have lowish stats and average natural armor (+8 Str, +4 Dex, -8 Int, +4 Cha, +11 NA). Really hard to rate, this one. Despair is an awful ability, but how awful is hard to say. You might have deaf party members, or necropolitans, or other people immune to mind-affecting. Or you can have nobody able to cast Good Hope and miss all rolls 10% of the time. Still, the golem isn't that bad and there were a few +0 in the original thread, so *7 RHD* and *DLA-1*.

*Hangman Golem, 18 RHD*: Ah, back to normalcy (yes, a golem made of ropes is normal now), I was worried golems might end up becoming playable with that last one. This one is definitely bad. The stats are slightly better than Alchemical's, with +16 Str, +4 Dex, -8 Int, -10 Cha, +16 NA (finally, they remembered that golems are supposed to have the same Str and NA bonus. Don't expect any other golem to follow the trend). This golem really has a grappling focus, with great reach, Improved Grab, constrict and the ability to strangle (daze) creatures it grapples. Not really useful, but not that bad, especially with the ability to fully heal 1/day out of combat (I like the fluff of this ability. The golem unravels itself then knots itself back into shape. Takes 1 round per 10 damage healed). Basically a more dextrous Stone Golem, with more interesting abilities but no slow. *10 RHD*, *DLA-6*

*Mud Golem, 15 RHD*: Well that's not good. +14 Str, -2 Dex, -8 Int, -10 Cha, +13 NA, only 20ft movement speed, Grease+blinded "breath weapon" (only one of these effects would be underwhelming, but both at once is actually interesting), and the ability to engulf opponents with a standard action and a grapple check. I'm not sure if I prefer this or the Clay Golem, so let's go with the same rating. *9 RHD*, *DLA-4*


And that's half of the MM3 golems (on top of the goatfo... Ibixian, sorry)! Next time, we'll continue with the other half, and notably the Prismatic Golem, the only Incorporeal Golem (I think) of the game. Until then, feel free to tell me why my ratings are wrong!

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## remetagross

I agree with the Glaistig. Maybe some tricks involving an Acorn of Far Travel might allow a PC one to keep her Symbiosis ability? Anyway, her ability modifiers are a bit too low to warrant anything other than 4 RHDs, as you've mentioned.

The goatfolk are completely uninteresting, I'm fine with your assessment too.

I think a good trick could be used by the Alchemical Golem: maybe a Persisted Cloud of Knives to deal 10 damage to itself every round so as to spray Con damage everywhere, added to a way to cast Poison to heal itself every now and then. I've seen one in a VGC comp with a ton of soulmelds to overcome the acid-emanating issue for magic items. 

The Gloom Golem is actually neat, it's rare to find golems with such a good Cha modifier, and no way to bypass its magic immunity is really nice. I'd play one in a low-powered game, I think. Beware, because the link to the Gloom Golem from the LA-adjustement thread is not good

The two other golems are fun but ultimately useless as PCs.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> I agree with the Glaistig. Maybe some tricks involving an Acorn of Far Travel might allow a PC one to keep her Symbiosis ability? Anyway, her ability modifiers are a bit too low to warrant anything other than 4 RHDs, as you've mentioned.


Yeah, maybe. Acorn of Far Travel is a pretty badly written spell, and the intended effect (counting as being in a forested terrain) is way weaker than what people usually use it for (counting as being less than x feet away from something to get an extra effect). That said, Acorn of Far Travel was explicitly initially meant for dryads, and Glaistig are specifically compared to them (mostly because they dislike each other, but still, the term "similar nature" appears in MM3). You could homebrew some sort of "water flask of far travel" that would work for glaistig spellcasters to count as always being close to their bonded pool/river.





> I think a good trick could be used by the Alchemical Golem: maybe a Persisted Cloud of Knives to deal 10 damage to itself every round so as to spray Con damage everywhere, added to a way to cast Poison to heal itself every now and then. I've seen one in a VGC comp with a ton of soulmelds to overcome the acid-emanating issue for magic items. 
> 
> The Gloom Golem is actually neat, it's rare to find golems with such a good Cha modifier, and no way to bypass its magic immunity is really nice. I'd play one in a low-powered game, I think. Beware, because the link to the Gloom Golem from the LA-adjustement thread is not good.


I'm not sure the knives really come from "a direction" that you can control, and you might just create a cloud of poison around yourself since the knives hover above your head. Still not a bad technique, but not worth an 8th level spell (nor DMM and 6 Turn attempts, for that matter). What is a VGC competition? 
Yeah, Gloom is cool, the only real problem is its Despair ability. At the level you're at, you might even be able to ask the resident wizard for an extended Trait Removal every day. Of course, since that's a touch spell, you're way better just buying a CL12 extended Trait Removal 1/day item (25960 gp, expensive but fair). That is, if you buy that a golem can lower its spell immunity the way other spell resistance work. If you don't, well, I don't really see what you can do. Maybe gag all the howling faces on your belly?

And thank you for the link, it's fixed.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Golems (Prismatic, Shadesteel and Web)*

Do you like being a non-sentient machine only imprinted with the lingering moral code of a plane and the instructions left by your creator? Well, too bad! Today, we rate more golems!

*Prismatic Golem, 20 RHD*: This golem is very unique. First, it's one of the Planar Golems, made from gems from Elysium. But more importantly, it's the only one in the entirety of the game to be incorporeal. Its body is made from Elysian light reflected through the gems, which supposedly destroys them (since you can't reuse the gems to create other Prismatic Golems). That makes it even more invincible than other golems. Like, how do you even start? SR:No spells generally have a physical effect, which it is immune to or can simply go through. Physical attacks have to go through its 50% miss and its DR 10/evil (/Adamantine and Evil would have been even better, but /evil is already pretty good). There are a lot of creatures with natural attacks counting as evil, but it doesn't work here, since everyone touching the golem gets hit by its prismatic touch and risks getting zapped with 5d6 damage or even Insanity. And finally, even if you can damage it, you have to go through the massive +16 deflection to AC and +22 Dex of the thing. That said, apart from the 1-in-8 chance to inflict insanity with its incorporeal touch (of which it interestingly has 2 per round), the monster is very passive. You have no stats except Dex (no Str, Con or Int, +0 Wis and Cha), you have no item slot, you can't hide (you're a 10ft ball of intense light described as being visible from litterally miles away), you can't speak, you have no hand. What can you do? Well, you probably can be a good warlock. A really good warlock actually. You're not actually required to use actions to use your prismatic touch. Just... Move over someone. And you still have your standard action for Eldritch Blast, or better, for Eldritch Glaive to actually get reach. I'm not sure how to rate this, but the sheer impunity of it all makes me not want to give it less than *12 RHD*. And more HD gives you almost nothing, so *DLA-6*. If you have a build idea, I'm looking forward to it.

*Shadesteel Golem, 18 RHD*: Yes, this one has its skull-shaped head at the tip of its tail, just for the sake of making its body more spindly. Reminds me weirdly of Mewtwo and its two necks. What did you expect from a golem made using metal from the Plane of Shadow? The shadesteel Golem is the only Medium golem from MM3, and is also probably the most interesting one. Your stats are pretty low (+14 Str, +6 Dex, -8 Int, +0 Wis, -4 Cha, +20 natural), but you get a fly speed (considering one of the biggest problems of golems is getting buffs, it's great), concealment in shadows, an immunity to magic with no drawback, and you are also hasted by Light effects. This might mean that you can keep a Continual Flame on you and always act as hasted, or just that people can target you with a 0th-level spell to haste you for 2d4 rounds (much worse, but probably the intended interaction). And you have a free action 40ft negative energy emanation every 1d4+1 rounds dealing 12d6 damage and breaking turning effects. That's really unique, but maybe a bit niche, except if you're adventuring with a necromancer. Still, that's a good AoE, and you can do nice things if you're continually hasted. *10 RHD*, *DLA-5*.
*Greater Shadesteel Golem, 27 RHD*: Ah, yeah, advanced golems. Identical to the regular version with DR 15/Adamantine and Magic instead of 10, +10 Str, -2 Dex, +2 natural armor, and Large instead of Medium. *12 RHD*, *DLA-11*.

*Web Golem, 11 RHD*: Is it really a golem? The MM3 says it's made exclusively of spider web, but it clearly has eyes, and a mouth with poisonous fangs (1d6 Str/1d6 Str). It has lower strength than the clay golem, but better dexterity, Web 3/day and the ability to automatically grapple people when they attack (basically the same ability as a mimic, but only in defense). Your DR is the regular 10/Adamantine and you somehow have Fast Healing. Not bad, but not good enough for +0. Vulnerability to fire is also quite the burden. *8 RHD*, *DLA-2*

And that concludes our golems! See you next time for a creature that could really have been a golem itself, down to the immunity to magic, the Grisgol!

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## GreatWyrmGold

Obviously, the spider webs making up the web golem were not properly cleansed of spiders beforehand. Which makes sense; spider webs are vulnerable to most things spiders are, they're even more fragile, and spiders generally won't abandon their webs even if you ask nicely.

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## Morphic tide

> Obviously, the spider webs making up the web golem were not properly cleansed of spiders beforehand. Which makes sense; spider webs are vulnerable to most things spiders are, they're even more fragile, and spiders generally won't abandon their webs even if you ask nicely.


Makes me think of a Living Construct version that's explicit about the magic making a Monstrous Spider "core". Perhaps ask for Giant Vermin, Magic Fang, and Summon Swarm.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Makes me think of a Living Construct version that's explicit about the magic making a Monstrous Spider "core". Perhaps ask for Giant Vermin, Magic Fang, and Summon Swarm.


So, basically, the puppet taratects from "I'm a spider, so what?"? They're golems made from tightly woven spider thread with a live sentient spider controlling them from within. It might be a really interesting monster, maybe with the ability to remodel themselves by working for a few hours or days like an Astral Tasker to gain new limbs (max. 8) than can serve as arms, or legs (+4 stability and +10ft movement speed) or wings (30ft flying (Poor), +10ft speed and +1 maneuverability for each pair of wings beyond the first).

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## Emberlily

A party with both a gloom golem and a prismatic golem seems like it would be really fun, at least just conceptually. And mechanically, with spiked chain and eldritch glaive and both of their passives they could be fun for potent area denial (especially since the prismatic golem can just go wherever it wants)

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## loky1109

> Obviously, the spider webs making up the web golem were not properly cleansed of spiders beforehand. Which makes sense; spider webs are vulnerable to most things spiders are, they're even more fragile, and spiders generally won't abandon their webs even if you ask nicely.


I don't agree with you. Firstly, web is one of the most tear resistant material, it isn't fragile or vulnerable. Second, it isn't complex task to milk spiders for web especially if we take into account magic.

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## remetagross

Well, spider web is vulnerable to heat at the very least, and while it is highly resistant to being ripped apart, that's because it's highly elastic. So, OK your web golem has not been destroyed when these two Fire Giants have grabbed one the feet and one the arms and pulled, but its limbs are now fledging outstretched 5-foot-long lengths of silk. So eh.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Grisgol*

And today, we have the living Magic Item Compendium of D&D. It's seemingly an attempt to concentrate as much magic as possible in a single place in the hope that something powerful would come out of it. Its bones are wands and rods, its joints are flasks of magic potions, its head and torso are the helm and cuirass of a magic armor and its skin is made of hundreds of scrolls sewn together. And, of course, its heart is a phylactery still containing the soul of the lich who once called it their own. This over-the-top amalgamation couldn't not have at least access to the ultimate power of 9th-level spells. Sadly, it natively lacks the intelligence to use its world-altering powers to their full extent. This is why we're here to make it playable by humans!


Note: This monster is one of those where the asterisk in the original thread is the least clear. Nifft summarized this monster in a single sentence: 


> I feel like the only way to make this thing viable is to make it broken, and that's not a good sign.


A grisgol with Mage Armor, Repair Moderate Damage, Haste, Animate Dead, Permanency, Geas, Simulacrum, Greater Planar Binding, and mother-freaking Wish would be similar or probably even stronger than a Wizard 20, simply due to the sheer power of XP-free, Material-free SLAs castable as standard actions, but also probably not representative of what a grisgol would be capable of in a regular campaign. The only thing Inevitability said was "Aside from abuse of a few choice spells". I choose to interpret this as "*no spell with XP cost, no spell with material component of 100gp or more, no spell taking more than one minute to cast*". The first two criteria are the criteria upon which you should increase a grisgol's crafting price according to the MM3, and the last one is meant both to prevent abuse and to emulate the fact that the grisgol is supposed to cast these spells from magic items (hence the DC being 10+1.5 times the spell level).

Still, the grisgol's SLAs are by far its most interesting feature, to the point that the total cost of the construct is only marginally higher than the cost of sorcerer-crafted items allowing to cast spells from 1 to 9 each 1/day (210,000gp for the grisgol, 204,840gp for the nine items).
In core only (and if you pity your DM enough to not take the Polymorph line), I think I'd go for Mage Armor, Repair Moderate Damage, Haste, Evard's Black Tentacles (no problem if there's no need for a save), Overland Flight, Greater Dispel, Greater Teleport, Greater Shadow Evocation, and Foresight or Etherealness. Remember that since you have Magic Immunity, only your own spells can affect you, which means you have to be the one able to cast Greater Teleport or you're not going anyway. Teleportation isn't absolutely necessary around ECL 10, but it starts to be starting at 15.

Apart from the SLAs, the Grisgol has both the qualities of a lich and a golem. Paralyzing slams (two of them. Take Rapidstrike) going relatively well with its +8 Str (as pathetic as it is on a 19 RHD Construct), magic immunity (much better on something that can buff itself) with no drawback to speak of, DR 10/Magic and Piercing (sure, I think slashing would have been more flavorful as its skin is made of scrolls but why not), a weird unfriendly defensive ability, Chocking Dust which deals Con damage around it when it is damaged by a non-piercing weapon, and a weird death throes, which gives the people who destroyed it a maniacal need to try to make sense of the heap of worn out magic items it leaves behind it. And as they lose themselves in this impossible task, they lose one point of intelligence each week. Very flavorful, completely useless.


The grisgol is a pretty magic-oriented gish, but doesn't have enough slots to last very long before having to rely on its paralysing slams only, and doesn't have enough raw stats to be good with its slams. The ability to cast a 9th level spell is still as excellent as ever, and I think Magic Immunity and getting them two levels early should balance the lack of intelligence and of slots. *15 RHD*, *DLA-3* (this DNLA should allow it to improve in the melee department, notably to reach +16 BAB).


What about you? What would be your choice of spells for a grisgol? This is a really great concept for a monster, and I give full credit to the guy who decided to draw a cape on it, it looks awesome. Next time, we'll have the complete opposite of the grisgol, with not even one (Su) ability, the Gulgar!

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## GreatWyrmGold

> I don't agree with you. Firstly, web is one of the most tear resistant material, it isn't fragile or vulnerable. Second, it isn't complex task to milk spiders for web especially if we take into account magic.


Point 1: Spider silk is tear-resistant, compared to other things that are three micrometers thick. They are _very_ tearable compared to things that are, say, a millimeter thick. Spiders are often multiple millimeters thick.
Point 2: It was a joke ya dingus.





> It's seemingly an attempt to concentrate as much magic in a single place in the hope that something powerful would come out of it.


Historically, this is a viable strategy. Assuming you don't care about what _kind_ of power it has, or what it _does_ with that power.




> Next time, we'll have the complete opposite of the gulgar, with not even one (Su) ability, the Gulgar!


The Gulgar, well known for being its own antithesis.

On one hand, being able to cast 9th-level spells at 15th or 16th level is a bit eyebrow-raising...but my eyebrows are lowered a bit by recalling that it can only cast 9th-level _spell_. And since there's so little else it can do...seems fair.


Since you didn't limit expensive _focus_ components, I think Shapechange would be on my list, along with other buff spells like _haste_ (and yeah, some kind of long-distance teleporty effect). Focus on making those slams as good as possible. Maybe see if I could con persuade the DM into letting me take a homebrew Persistent Spell-Like Ability feat...

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## loky1109

> Point 1: Spider silk is tear-resistant, compared to other things that are three micrometers thick. They are _very_ tearable compared to things that are, say, a millimeter thick. Spiders are often multiple millimeters thick.


You can weave web into millimeter or more thick threads.




> Point 2: It was a joke ya dingus.


Ouch. I didn't buy it. Sorry. )

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## GreatWyrmGold

> You can weave web into millimeter or more thick threads.


Not before collecting it, you can't. And if you collect it before cleaning out the spiders, you're just going to collect spiders with it. Which somehow transmute from ordinary spiders into giant spider facial features, because this was supposed to be a joke explanation for why the web golem had those.

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## loky1109

> Not before collecting it, you can't. And if you collect it before cleaning out the spiders, you're just going to collect spiders with it. Which somehow transmute from ordinary spiders into giant spider facial features, because this was supposed to be a joke explanation for why the web golem had those.


Why should I not clean out spiders from the web? Moreover, why should I collect web snares instead of milking spiders?
Plus, there are monstrous spiders of any sizes in D&D. Big spiders should give big threads. And have big mandibles.

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## Beni-Kujaku

Have... Have you all forgotten that Web exists (and both Web and Permanency are required for a Web Golem anyway)? 2nd level spell explicitly harvestable when Permanencied and regrows in 10 minutes. Far "thicker and tougher" web than a regular spider's... All you ever needed for your golem-crafting purposes! Oh and you kill a Large Monstrous Spider to harvest its eyes and mandibles. Because it's far cooler with eight eyes than with none! 

I know this is a joke I just wanted to double down on the "we live in fantasy why should we follow real-life logic?

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Gulgar*

Today, Gulgars! One of the very few creatures with the [Earth] subtype but no burrowing speed, the gulgars share with the xorns their origin in the Elemental Plane of Earth and the fact that they eat gems and other rare stones. However, they all fled the genies of the Plane of Earth so long ago that they aren't Outsiders anymore, only big Monstrous Humanoids with adamantine skin who hate dwarves for hoarding all the "food" for themselves. Also they speak in subsonics and their gender is color-coded (females are white to light gray and males are dark gray to black). Why? Why not?

As PCs, Gulgars are pretty boring (so at least it's consistent with their lore). Large 10RHD Monstrous Humanoids, they have physical stats similar to that of an ogre (+10 Str, -4 Dex, +6 Con) and the mental stats of an Asimaar (+2 Wis, +2 Cha). Let's say that's really bad, but not completely unuseable with fewer RHD. They also get a good DR 10/adamantine, a decent +8 natural armor and the ability to make all their racial natural attacks (2 slams, one gore) count as adamantine. Not completely awful, but nothing really interesting, and I feel like this was over-CRed. On top of that, the gulgar can fire a sonic cone dealing 3d6 and deafening foes. Okay, but I'm not sure you won't deal more damage just hitting things with a warhammer. And finally, subsonic speech, which is more of a drawback than anything. You can only be heard by people with tremorsense, blindsense or blindsight. This may make adventuring hard. All in all, I feel like this is a pretty weak 6 RHD, or a strong *5 RHD*. Considering how hard it will be to communicate, I'm thinking the latter for now. What d'you think?
Edit: *6 RHD, DLA-2*. Should have given it that from the beginning.


These guys are training Yrthak for war. They serve as their eyes and Yrthaks are some of the few creatures who can actually hear them. It would be quite wholesome if it wasn't explicitly called out as enslaving another sentient species. Next time, we will review spiders that are litterally twice as intelligent as these humanoids and can actually talk, it's the harpoon spider!

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## GreatWyrmGold

Ogres are strong ECL 4 characters. They're a bit tougher, less dextrous, and have better mental stats. Defensively, they have better natural armor and a decent bit of DR. (Not many enemies are likely to have adamantine weapons, and it'll be a while before 10 damage isn't a significant chunk of each enemy attack.) Oh, and they're hard to knock over.

Offensively, they have two slams that are barely better than Improved Unarmed Strike (which might see use in a monk or totemist build alongside better attacks); a gore attack that's actually comparable to decent weapons, at the cost of counting as Light and looking ridiculous; and a weak legally-not-a-breath-weapon which is only really useful for fighting swarms. Also, their gore is an adamantine weapon, good for smashing shenanigans and fighting golems. (I guess the slams technically are too.)

They also have a bonus to Listen checks and a penalty to Spot checks, which is a flavorful little detail I love and probably a small net perk. It's balanced out by the fact that you can't talk to people. Hopefully, _someone_ in your party learned sign language...

So it's mostly a tougher ogre with a decent natural weapon and some miscellaneous perks. That seems vaguely comparable to some single class levels. Totem barbarian (lion) 1, for instance. I wouldn't feel this way if the gulgar was _just_ tough, but it's as big and strong as an ogreit gives enemies as much reason to focus on them as a fighter does. Since all of this is added to a _strong_ ECL 4 chassis, I'd argue for 6 RHD or a DNLA of -2 or -3.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Ogres are strong ECL 4 characters. They're a bit tougher, less dextrous, and have better mental stats.


Yeah, I guess that's right.




> Defensively, they have better natural armor and a decent bit of DR. (Not many enemies are likely to have adamantine weapons, and it'll be a while before 10 damage isn't a significant chunk of each enemy attack.)


You know, defense has never won you fights.




> Oh, and they're hard to knock over.


OH MY GOD THEY ARE! 10 RHD, LA+8 IMMEDIATELY!




> It's balanced out by the fact that you can't talk to people. Hopefully, _someone_ in your party learned sign language...
> 
> So it's mostly a tougher ogre with a decent natural weapon and some miscellaneous perks. That seems vaguely comparable to some single class levels. Totem barbarian (lion) 1, for instance. I wouldn't feel this way if the gulgar was _just_ tough, but it's as big and strong as an ogreit gives enemies as much reason to focus on them as a fighter does. Since all of this is added to a _strong_ ECL 4 chassis, I'd argue for 6 RHD or a DNLA of -2 or -3.


More seriously, I was already on the verge of giving it 6 RHD and only stopped because I wasn't sure of the impact of subsonics. But at least it has a mouth, I guess. Anyway, I'm perfectly comfortable giving it *6 RHD*. However, I don't think 4 full BAB RHD are balanced for one ECL, so I'd prefer it with *DLA-2* than DLA-3.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Harpoon Spiders*



*Spoiler: In response to a Mortal Kombat reference*
Show




> What utter buffoon put the "get over here!" ability set on a weirdo spider instead of a _scorpion_?


That's the thing! The harpoon spider is not a spider! It has ten limbs and not eight! Still, it spins web and has a clearly separated abdomen/opisthosoma and all its legs attached to its cephalothorax. It also has no wings and non-compound eyes. It is clearly an arachnid, and more specifically a chela-spinner, who are also known as "pseudo-scorpions"! If WotC really thought of that, then mad respect to them. If not (much more probable), then no problem, but I really think WotC gets a lot of unjustified hate on this forum. Yes, they are a bit (too) weak in the mechanics department, but the design and lore department has a lot of good surprises in store.



The harpoon spider is basically a super-intelligent arachnid (14 Int) that can propel its mandibles attached to a string of web. As they hit an enemy, it can reel them back to bring foes to it and trip them. That's a nice method of ambush, but will probably not be as useful for a PC.

- Large size, 5 Aberration RHD (I don't understand why it's not a magical beast but sure). It's really not that much for what it brings to the table
- +6 Str, +8 Dex, +8 Con, +4 Int, +2 Wis, -2 Cha, +3 NA. Total +26. Honestly great stats, and pretty balanced to, with lower bonuses being to less important stats and high improvements to the basic physical stats and intelligence. That's the main draw of the monster.
- no hands, one bite attack with a 1d6 Dex/2d6 Dex poison. Good poison, and having ten legs can be interesting for those "one claw per limb" template (hello revived fossil), but the bad body type really kills the viability of the harpoon spider.
- Harpooning is the ability to throw one (or two by a full-round action) fangs. If you hit, you can make a free trip attempt against a creature strictly smaller than itself. If you succeed against , the enemy is prone and brought adjacent to the spider and it can make its Improved Trip attack with its bite. If you fail the trip or try it on a creature too big, the fang rips itself off the opponent and deals the fang damage once again.
- Evasion, Webwalk, and Spines (creatures hitting you with a natural weapon are dealt 1d6 damage and you can impale helpless creatures on your back cadaver collector-style)

The harpoon spider has great stats, but can't wield weapons (except Mouthpick, but then it loses its poison), and its main ability has just too many moving parts to be consistent (attack roll + trip attempt + doesn't work on Large creatures + another attack roll for the bite). It seems taylor-made for some kind of initiator, probably unarmed swordsage. I'm comfortable giving it a somewhat weak *4 RHD*. That way, it at least only loses one BAB because of its RHD. And since the fifth RHD doesn't give it much, *DLA-1* seems good. 


*Dread Harpoon Spider*, 9 RHD: Well that's just an advanced Harpoon Spider. The size increase is pretty interesting but Harpooning is still pretty unreliable. *6 RHD*, *DLA-2*


What do you think of these spide... pseudoscorpions? If the regular version was a Magical Beast instead, it might have even gotten +0. Next time, we will have the panserbjørn from "His Dark Materials", the Ironclad Mauler!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Ironclad Mauler*

*Buy a bear, get an armor free!* 
(non-removable armor, the company is not responsible for any infection, unhealed injuries and diminutive or smaller creatures getting stuck between the armor and skin of the subject)

The Ironclad Mauler is nothing surprising, just a bear on which you magically grafted an armor and Wolverine-style enhancements to its natural weapons. 

Compared to a dire bear, what do you get? Not much. 
- You're a Magical Beast, so you have at least full BAB.
- +2 Str, +2 Con, and +5 armor bonus (no reduction of skills or speed due to the grafted armor). Total +22 Str, +2 Dex, +10 Con, -8 Int, +2 Wis, +0 Cha, +7 NA
- Natural weapons dealing damage as one size larger and notably claws now having reach.
- Trample and a weak sickening aura. Uninteresting.

How much is all that worth? 2 more RHD maybe? I think *8 RHD* and *DLA-4* is good.


Even the coolness factor of "bear with an armor" cannot save a creature that bland. Next time, we will have the guy they sent when Inevitables are too busy, the Justicator!

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## remetagross

About the Grisgol, are they eligible to the Magic in the Blood feat? If yes, bam, all their 1/day SLAs turn into 3/day ones, which is much more interesting. Maybe a convoluted trick implying the Stoneblessed class to get them. Actually, even if the Stoneblessed class is utter crap, it might still be worth it if it allows the PC to nab two extra uses of Shapechange per day.

Ironclad maulers make me think about the panserbjørne from His Dark Materials, but are unfortunately less cool. I'd never take that as a PC, even for 1 RHD.

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## GreatWyrmGold

> You know, defense has never won you fights.


No, but if your race has good defenses, you can play more aggressively or invest more in your offense. And again:



> I wouldn't feel this way if the gulgar was _just_ tough, but it's as big and strong as an ogreit gives enemies as much reason to focus on them as a fighter does.


I feel that there's an important distinction between "This race only has defensive abilities" and "This class has a good melee chassis, plus really good defenses". The first is not good. The second...well, it's limited by the tier system, but it's good compared to peers.

To put it another way: Adding good defensive abilities to a featless human doesn't increase its power that much. Adding those same defensive abilities to an ogre increases its power more.





> About the Grisgol, are they eligible to the Magic in the Blood feat?





> *Region:* Dwarf (Oldonnar or Underdark [Darklands]), elf (Menzoberranyr), gnome (the Great Dale, Thesk, or Underdark [Northdark]), planetouched (Calimshan, Mulhorand, or Unther), or spirit folk (Ashane).


RAW, no. Grisgols are not Oldonnar/Underdark dwarves, Menzoberranyr elves, Great Dale/Thesk/Underdark gnomes, Ashane spirit folk, or planetouched.
RAI, this is a feat intended for humanoid races with some petty SLAs to use those more casually. Also, grisgols don't even _have_ blood.
RAW with a DM who houserules that you can ignore the Region text of Regional feats? It's allowed. And if you didn't mention which regional feat you planned to take on your grisgol, you could probably get away with it. Your DM would be annoyed though.




> Maybe a convoluted trick implying the Stoneblessed class to get them. Actually, even if the Stoneblessed class is utter crap, it might still be worth it if it allows the PC to nab two extra uses of Shapechange per day.


Just checked out the class; not sure I'd be excited even if I got all the abilities in one level of the class. But as long as the grisgol was from Oldonnar, the Great Dale, Thesk, or the Underdark, this would be 100% RAW-legal. And it's not like you're gonna find many other classes that'll boost your SLAs.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Just checked out the class; not sure I'd be excited even if I got all the abilities in one level of the class. But as long as the grisgol was from Oldonnar, the Great Dale, Thesk, or the Underdark, this would be 100% RAW-legal. And it's not like you're gonna find many other classes that'll boost your SLAs.


Isn't Magic in the Blood a 1st level feat only? You'd have a hard time taking it since prestige class levels  automatically disqualify you. Also I'm not sure Greater Humanoid Essence could be used to qualify for it there are a lot of disputes on how long an effect should last to allow for prerequisites.

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## GreatWyrmGold

> Isn't Magic in the Blood a 1st level feat only? You'd have a hard time taking it since prestige class levels  automatically disqualify you. Also I'm not sure Greater Humanoid Essence could be used to qualify for it there are a lot of disputes on how long an effect should last to allow for prerequisites.


It's not specified in the feat, but I just searched for rules on regional feats in general. Apparently, _all_ regional feats are first-level-only.

So yeah, if the DM doesn't waive region prereqs, you're SOL.

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## Bohandas

> -*Racial Hit Dice reduction (RHDR)*: You take a monster, you remove RHD without altering its abilities, and you play at lower level. Pretty simple too, even if recalculating all of the monster's variable can be tedious (as a reminder, (Su) and (Ext) abilities DC scale as RHD/2). This method solves the high-level shenanigans of the previous one, allowing for a rules friendly, somewhat lower negative LA than the DNLA, but you never get to play the whole monster ("What is a Tarrasque? A miserable pile of RHD, before everything else."), with all its abilities capped at their reduced RHD level, and your sorcerer blue dragon is stuck with mostly d6s instead of its original d12. This method favors low level monsters, where the full abilities and ability scores of a monster thought for higher level outperform what a PC could do, but falls short when those become irrelevant before class features. One way to offset these issues is to have every ability of the monster scale with its class level afterwards. You never have all the RHD of the creature, but it allows for a way to play characteristic of the monster, even at higher levels. Method used, with the abilities scaling, in Martixy's, then Blue Jay's thread


Why stop there?  Why not remove its RHD without altering its abilities OR recalculating, so tne effects of its racial hit dice become racial bonuses to HP, Saves, BAB, special abilities, and skills. (which is honestly yhe way they should have been building the monsters to begin with instead of treating the racial HD as some kind of bizarre pseudo-levels)

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## Morphic tide

> Why stop there?  Why not remove its RHD without altering its abilities OR recalculating, so tne effects of its racial hit dice become racial bonuses to HP, Saves, BAB, special abilities, and skills. (which is honestly yhe way they should have been building the monsters to begin with instead of treating the racial HD as some kind of bizarre pseudo-levels)


This has extremely minor and fiddly functional differences from the blunter Direct Negative Level Adjustment, which just has its ECL lower, associated scaling to the RHD intact.

As for using RHD as "some kind of bizarre pseudo level", it eases a lot more core rules than it complicates to share the statistics derivation process, as abilities will easily work the same way regardless of the target. Con damage is Con damage, lose Fort save, Concentration check bonus, and HP accordingly. Also means that you can scale up monsters by just adding RHD, for what little value that "really" has.

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## remetagross

> It's not specified in the feat, but I just searched for rules on regional feats in general. Apparently, _all_ regional feats are first-level-only.
> 
> So yeah, if the DM doesn't waive region prereqs, you're SOL.


Ah, crap. See, off the top of my head I was convinced Magic in the Blood was 1st-level only, and thus that my trick was doomed to fail, but upon reading its description it wasn't written anywhere. Alas, I remembered right but the rule was hidden somewhere else.

I still think it's possible to nab it with a tad more cheese: once you've completed the Stoneblessed class, go for Dark Chaos Feat Shuffle and swap your 1st-level feat for Magic in the Blood. Wouldn't that work?

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Ah, crap. See, off the top of my head I was convinced Magic in the Blood was 1st-level only, and thus that my trick was doomed to fail, but upon reading its description it wasn't written anywhere. Alas, I remembered right but the rule was hidden somewhere else.
> 
> I still think it's possible to nab it with a tad more cheese: once you've completed the Stoneblessed class, go for Dark Chaos Feat Shuffle and swap your 1st-level feat for Magic in the Blood. Wouldn't that work?


Nah, the strength of Shun the Dark Chaos is that it checks if you qualify for the new feat now, not if you qualified for it before. You're not "shuffling" your 1st level feat, you're losing your 1st level feat to get an Abyssal Heritor feat, then losing the Abyssal feat to get a new feat. It's not 1st level, so you can't go with MitB.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Justicator*



*Spoiler: Been a while since we had a translation tangent*
Show


Justicator is a weird one, because it doesn't rely on english having a vocabulary too vast, but on english having words already from other countries in its vocabulary just to put more emphasis on something. See? I could have just said "to highlight your point", but emphasis is so much grander a word. For example, a meeting is just two people. A rendezvous is the same thing, but will probably lead to something more interesting. Freedom is just a lack of constraint, liberty is the very philosophical concept of it. In french, these words are just basic things, a rendez-vous means a meeting or planning a meeting (litterally meaning "you go there"), and we have to add "rendez-vous galant" ("romantic meeting") to mean a date. "liberté" means both freedom and liberty, and is an exceedingly common word, unlike liberty.
The same way, justicator is a great name in english. It's the concept of justice put as a noun, with the "ator" suffix meaning "someone who exerts", like the terminator. It sounds badass, and it really drives the point that these guys are not just all about justice, but that they are the very embodiment of it, defined solely by it. In french, however, we already have a word for someone who exerts justice. It's a "justicier" (from justice and "-er" which is used to create a lot of job names). A "justicier" is mostly a vigilante, but can be a cop, or someone fighting bullies during school breaks, anybody who tries to do what is good. The thing is, just naming the big Lawful angel with a single common word would be really underwhelming, we would lose the feeling that this guy is the embodiment of justice if it had just a name used for regular humans, and french doesn't have the same "-ator" suffix that just makes everything look more intimidating by its very presence. So, what do you do? You could put a variation on "justicier", like "justicateur", to stick to the original name. That's what they did for the wheep from Libris Mortis. Wheep is a variation of weep, so they called it "larmoyeux", a variation of "larmoyant" (weeping). Really great translation. But that sort of things makes the name look a bit ridiculous, like it's corrupted. It's good for an undead or an aberration. For a Lawful outsider it might feel out of place. So they chose to just put two words. In french, the justicator is called a "justicier planaire". Simply "planar vigilante" (not great translation, considering vigilante is mostly against the official law while "justicier" isn't, but that's the best I've got.). It keeps the idea of justice and makes it artificially more impressive by making it on the scale of the planes. Still not perfect, but I guess that's the best they had.

Fun fact, that's not the last time this exact issue has occured. In Complete Warrior, there is a vigilante-themed class named "justiciar", which has the exact same problem. In english, they used the ancient latin word for "judge" (which incidentally later became "justicier" in french), but just naming the class "justicier" would be bland, so they named it "justicier solitaire" (lone vigilante) in french, which is a simple but effective change in my opinion.


Anyway, the justicator is a really cool monster visually. Black-winged angels with golden armor and silvered two-handed sword are terrific. Justicators care only about the law-chaos axis of the alignment, and might help devils against eladrins as well as archons against demons. Interestingly, they speak celestial, infernal but also abyssal languages. I guess you have to speak to your enemies to know them, and know them to fight them.

The justicator is an outsider. That means that its HD are really, really good. It's really rare to have humanoid-shaped outsiders get LA -0. The only other ones we got were the Xorn and Salamander. It even has a few interesting features. That said, 17 RHD is just way too much for most martial-oriented monster to be viable, save really obscene stat adjustments like the Tarrasque. 

- 17 Outsider RHD, Large size, 30ft land speed and 90ft flying speed (Good)
- +10 Str, +6 Dex, +4 Con, +2 Int, +8 Wis, +2 Cha, +5 Natural armor. This is all really low, especially the natural armor (then again, they're supposed to show up with a full plate armor), and I would have liked these stats adjustment more on a creature with half the RHD.
- DR 10/Chaos, SR 7+HD, Smite Chaos 4/day, Lawful subtype. Sure, that will improve your effectiveness on the battlefield
- A few SLAs, most of which are not that good, but still Planeshift 1/day is nice, the rest (greater command and dispel chaos 1/day, dimensional anchor, silence, invisibility purge and cure serious wounds 3/day) is situational but not awful.

I'm not sure what you would do with such a chassis. I want to say warblade would be good, but you'd leave that big wisdom bonus behind. Probably still an initiator, maybe crusader. The justicator is much worse than the valkyrie (who got 10HD+2 LA), with worse stats, no initiator level, and no free action AoE damage. The SLAs are interesting, but I still feel like I'd rather have the valkyrie's maneuvers. Seems more on par or slightly weaker with a ferrumach rilmani (worse stats and SLAs but flying and a size category bigger. ), so I'll go with a maybe weak *9 RHD*. And with all its RHD, I think something like *DLA-5* is good? ECL 12, one less than its CR.

That's really one of the most humanoid non-Humanoid monsters in all of D&D. Even angels have some manner of colored skin or something, the justicator only has blond hair and wings. That will not be a problem for our next entry, the knell beetle!

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## remetagross

Man, this monster's ability modifiers are really disappointing for that number of HDs. I'd go with 8 RHDs. The only other nice stuff is that really fast flight speed. What's annoying with this monster is that you can't not buy him an expensive full plate armor made of whatever crazy materials you wish, given the pitiful natural armor bonus. And there's no natural attack that allows you to not buy a good magic weapon either...

I'd go with DLA-6: this way, it can nab 9th-level maneuvers at ECL 20 if it goes straight to an initiator class. 

(By the way, I'm always impressed by the cleverness of the French translations of D&D, even though "justicier planaire" is not the best one I've heard. For example, I'm a big fan of "pit fiend" turned into "diantrefosse", which is a made-up word composed of "diantre" - an old-fashioned curse word coming from the word for "devil" - and "fosse" - literally a pit.)

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## Bohandas

> This has extremely minor and fiddly functional differences from the blunter Direct Negative Level Adjustment, which just has its ECL lower, associated scaling to the RHD intact.
> 
> As for using RHD as "some kind of bizarre pseudo level", it eases a lot more core rules than it complicates to share the statistics derivation process, as abilities will easily work the same way regardless of the target. Con damage is Con damage, lose Fort save, Concentration check bonus, and HP accordingly. Also means that you can scale up monsters by just adding RHD, for what little value that "really" has.


Makes things a lot harder if your monster doesn;t have the standard int score for its race

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Knell Beetle*

Before I played D&D, I didn't know what "knell" meant. Now, thanks mostly to the "death knell" spell, I do, and I can appreciate that this beetle and its trumpet-like horn on its head that "warbles and trumpets when it communicates", and has the ability to shake the earth with low-frequency sound, has next to nothing to do with the ringing of a bell for the dead. And to make it even more confusing, they call the horn a bell several times. But only because it looks like a _trumpet_ bell. And they call its main ability Sonic Chime. Even though there's no actual bell involved and the trumpet can ostensibly not make any sort of chiming sound. The lesser version even has its equivalent called "sonic screech", for no discernible reason. I really don't get the naming of that guy.

The knell beetle at least doesn't hide it, it has absolutely no lore beyond "wizard did it". For some reason, it seems WotC really wanted to have that guy be a vermin instead of a Magical Beast  even though they are clearly a beast created by magic, but still have them use semi-complex tactics: the beetles communicate with each other and put the lesser beetles in the front lines while the regular ones are in the back and abuse Sonic Chime to both damage their enemies and heal the lesser ones. 
However, since vermin are all mindless, they awkwardly explained all their cooperation as just being instinctual. The lesser version also has three bonus feats and the regular one has five, which is the exact number of feats they would have gotten had they had an intelligence score, which makes me think knell beetles were changed to vermin pretty late during design and were supposed to be a magical beast. Anyway, are they useable as PCs?


-12 Vermin RHD, Large, 50ft land speed, 10ft burrow. Way too many HD, but being able to burrow without Earth Glide means it leaves a tunnel and can get the whole party through walls. That's good.
- +16 Str, +12 Con, +15 Natural armor. Actually good NA, but the rest is pretty low, and being mindless doesn't help.
- Shake the Earth to make people prone in a piddly 5ft radius, Trample if you want to lose most of your attacks, and Sonic Chime for a 1/day 30ft cone dealing 10d6 sonic. Not absolutely bad but it won't change your life.
- 2 really strong claws (2d8+Str after Improved Natural Attack with Rend to boot) that will maybe make you hesitate to use a Mouthpick weapon for a bit. 
- Weapon Focus (Claw), Multiattack, Alertness, Improved Natural Attack (Claw) and Lightning Reflexes all as bonus feats. Would really have been better for all parties involved to just make it a Magical Beast.
- Also, you are healed by sonic. Almost irrelevant since sonic is the least used of the five basic energies, but as always, it will give you infinite out-of-combat healing if you have the right kind of Dragonfire adept in your party.

There's technically only positive here (except intelligence and body type), but far from worth ECL 12. The bonus feats are nice, but won't help you qualify for much except Soul Eater (which, to be honest, is a pretty good choice of career). The natural armor is decently high, but the abilities are overall bad. I don't think anyone would play that with 7 RHD, but 5 seems really low for these claws and for sonic chime, so I guess *6 RHD* would be good. And *DLA-4* to have its BAB one higher than its ECL.

*Lesser Knell Beetle*, 6 RHD: Basically the same, but Medium, with only +8 Str, +2 Dex, +8 Con, +9 NA, and screech instead of sonic chime (5d6, 20ft). Also, only three bonus feats (Alertness, INA (claw), Multiattack). Looks like a strong *3 RHD* or a weak 4 RHD. And *DLA-2*. Not much to say here.


What is with monsters just looking like animals with more legs? The knell beetle has twelve instead of six, the harpoon spider has ten, the behir has eight instead of four, and I can think of at least four feline monsters with six legs (those are surprisingly common). That seems just a cop-out to artificially make monsters more exotic. And I promise I didn't look at the next monster before writing this, but next time will be the Lhosk, the eight-legged gorilla! See you then!

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Man, this monster's ability modifiers are really disappointing for that number of HDs. I'd go with 8 RHDs. 
> I'd go with DLA-6: this way, it can nab 9th-level maneuvers at ECL 20 if it goes straight to an initiator class.


8 RHD might work, but DLA-6 seems a bit too much to me. Outsider HD have full BAB and fantastic skills, especially with the Int bonus and the super long list of class skills of the justicator. They're almost better than some of the lesser class levels and I think so many of them at ECL 11 might lead to problems. I don't know, what do other people think? I'll change it if there is some consensus in one way or the other.




> (By the way, I'm always impressed by the cleverness of the French translations of D&D, even though "justicier planaire" is not the best one I've heard. For example, I'm a big fan of "pit fiend" turned into "diantrefosse", which is a made-up word composed of "diantre" - an old-fashioned curse word coming from the word for "devil" - and "fosse" - literally a pit.)


"Diantrefosse" is pretty great, yeah. There are a lot that I like, like the splinterwaif which becomes "esquille homochromique", which is unnecessarily over the top and basically ignores the english name to focus on its ability to camouflage itself. There's also the wraith becoming "âme-en-peine" and swordwraith becoming "lame-en-peine" which is deliciously punny. But my favourite is probably the elemental weirds being translated as "sybilles élémentaires" (elemental sibyls). It's just how they should have been named in the first place. Let's be honest, "weird" is just a lame name, and "sibyl" keeps the element of mystery in them with the secondary meaning of sybilline being "mysterious" or "cryptic", while really distinguishing the weirds from other elementals by focusing on the foresight powers.




> Makes things a lot harder if your monster doesn;t have the standard int score for its race


I'm not sure I understand. If you roll an 18 for your ability you just add 4 skill points per RHD of the monster, just the same you would add 4 skill points per level of a character that you build at an ECL higher than 1. What's the problem?

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## Bohandas

> I'm not sure I understand. If you roll an 18 for your ability you just add 4 skill points per RHD of the monster, just the same you would add 4 skill points per level of a character that you build at an ECL higher than 1. What's the problem?


I was thinking more if its lower. Then you have to reverse engineer the creature to figure out how many skill points it actually has in each skill so you can know how far you can drop each particular one, and of certain ones get dropped it may disqualify some of the creature's base feats, over and above the potential skill and feat disqualifications for any ability score being below standard. Better for the monster to simply _have_ the skills and feats associated with its species by virtue of being its species, rather than by virtue of "levels" in what is basically a really **** NPC class (except for Outsiders, their monster class is actually a pretty decent NPC class, better than the Expert, probably also better than the adept and magewright at low levels). 

It works better from all three perspectives. It makes more sense from a gamist perspective both for the reasons above, and because it makes the game more symmetrical; you no longer have these wierd pseudo-classes that most PCs and NPCs are locked out of, and now all your monsters are built in the same way as PC races, with a bulleted list of bonuses and penalties. It makes more sense from simulationist and narrativist perspectives because it makes the monsters less needlessly formulaic; the skills, feats, saves etc can be assigned independently and you no longer have nonsense like creatures having a higher base reflex save essentially just for being really big

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Spoiler: About removing the RHD system and having monsters just have stats "as-is" that are just added to class levels for PCs*
Show




> I was thinking more if its lower. Then you have to reverse engineer the creature to figure out how many skill points it actually has in each skill so you can know how far you can drop each particular one


That's only a problem if you're using the monster as an enemy. As a player, you just recalculate your Int score and calculate the skill points and choose feats that way. And as an enemy, you very rarely alter its stats in a way that asks you to recalculate everything.




> It works better from all three perspectives. It makes more sense from a gamist perspective both for the reasons above, and because it makes the game more symmetrical; you no longer have these wierd pseudo-classes that most PCs and NPCs are locked out of, and now all your monsters are built in the same way as PC races, with a bulleted list of bonuses and penalties. It makes more sense from simulationist and narrativist perspectives because it makes the monsters less needlessly formulaic; the skills, feats, saves etc can be assigned independently and you no longer have nonsense like creatures having a higher base reflex save essentially just for being really big


"All your monsters are built the same way PC races are". WHAT? That is the whole point of having the racial hit dice system. Monsters are literally created the same way PCs are, with just a "racial class" instead of just being a pile of bonuses. So what if it's a glorified NPC class? NPCs are more simply useable because they have NPC classes. A great warrior is a Warrior 10. I don't want to give fighter feats, or rage, or stances and maneuvers to every single guy the PCs cross. Monsters are basically NPCs with bonuses on top of their NPC class. They can be affected by ability damage, or negative energy, they can make skill checks, their abilities have DC adapted to their level, and above all they can be advanced. Let's say I want a powerful mimic. I'm not saying "I increase its HP bonus from 52 to 146, its attack bonus from +9 to +18, I basically double its saves, and increase its Adhesive DC by let's say 6, I give it more reach and increase its size, and let's go for 3 more feats. What the hell is its CR now?" I'm saying "I increase it to 15 RHD. Aberration RHD are worth 1/4 CR and the size increase is one more. It should be a good CR 7 monster now". The RHD system provides a great way for DMs to improve monsters while keeping offense and defense in line with each other, it allows for things that affect PCs to affect monsters proportionally. Bear's endurance gives more HP to a lv20 character than to a level 1 one. Why shouldn't it give more HP to a pit fiend than to a goblin? That's what the RHD abstraction is meant to represent. How well a creature can resist Sleep, or Holy Word. How many skills and how high they can get. 
Now, it's not impossible to advance monsters even without RHD. In 5e, RHD are way less important, and most everything is based on CR, but you can advance monster on the nose by just increasing its DPR, AC and HP. It's not bad, but not nearly as streamlined as 3.5, which prides itself on enabling the DM and players to do almost anything they want without homerule. It's also much easier for WotC to design monsters that way. "It's an Outsider with the Evil subtype, 3 RHD and 14/12/10/4/12/6 for its ability scores and Spot, Listen, Sense Motive, Bluff, Concentration as its class skills" is easier to imagine than "It's an Outsider with the Evil subtype,14/12/10/4/12/6 for its ability scores, +5 to its attacks, +7 to Spot, +7 to Listen, +7 to Sense Motive, +4 to Bluff, +6 to Concentration, +3/+4/+4 as its saves, 17 HP, having two feats, gaining 6 HP from a bear's endurance, gaining nothing from Tenser's Transformation, and dying if it gets 3 negative levels". The numbers are more modular, but it's really superfluous compared to just having the RHD system.
And if I want to play as a monster character, I prefer to know how all these numbers are calculated, how many points I can put in any single skill at most and how these evolve. I prefer to have a few bullet points and a number of RHD than a giant pile of numbers that I would have to adjust on my character sheet and couldn't find again after a few levels. In my opinion, the RHD system is the best thing to ever come out of 3.5, and this idea that monsters and PCs are exactly the same - with both of them having types, HD, class/racial features, and circumstancial bonuses instead of one having class levels and the other having just numbers like in 4e - is what made playing monsters so attractive and basically gave birth to this thread and the original one.


Now, I'd be happy to continue discussing this, but I feel like this has already disturbed this thread enough and is kind of off-topic considering this is a thread based on another thread, itself intricately linked to the RHD system of a system that is now certain to never change since it hasn't been supported for now 15 years. If you want to answer me or discuss, create another thread on the subject.

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## remetagross

The knell beetles are held back by their poor type of RHD, but their abilities are good : resilient, strong, fast, energy healing (a very rare ability) and alternate movement mode. I would play one for 7 RHD. It seems to me a strong - though maybe not overpowered - 6 RHD monster. The lesser kind, yeah it's not large, so 3 RHD, I'm good with that. It's definitely a strong one too.

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## GreatWyrmGold

*Spoiler: Been a while since we had a linguistics tangent*
Show





> Justicator is a weird one, because it doesn't rely on english having a vocabulary too vast, but on english having words already from other countries in its vocabulary just to put more emphasis on something. See? I could have just said "to highlight your point", but emphasis is so much grander a word. For example, a meeting is just two people. A rendezvous is the same thing, but will probably lead to something more interesting. Freedom is just a lack of constraint, liberty is the very philosophical concept of it. In french, these words are just basic things, a rendez-vous means a meeting or planning a meeting (litterally meaning "you go there"), and we have to add "rendez-vous galant" ("romantic meeting") to mean a date. "liberté" means both freedom and liberty, and is an exceedingly common word, unlike liberty.


And the reason that words like "rendezvous" and "liberty" have more profound connotations than "meeting" and "freedom" is almost literally because "rendez-vous" and "liberté" are just ordinary words in French. For those who don't know, English as we know it exists because the Normans got their linguistic peanut butter in the Anglo-Saxons' chocolate. (Despite the best efforts of the Plantagenets, they were unable to get Anglo-Saxon chocolate in French peanut butter.) So the aristocrats spoke French, and the commoners spoke Old English. Since fancy people used the French versions of words, and common people used the Old English versions, the French versions were associated with fancy people and fancy use, while the Old English versions were the opposite.

There's one specific place where this distinction lead to different _definitions_, in a unique way. See, most languages don't distinguish between beef and cow, or pork and pig; the same word is used for meat and animal. But the aristocrats were the ones most likely to interact with the meat, and the commoners were the only ones that interacted with the meat, so the French names for the animals became words for meat and the Old English names for the meat became words for animals.

(Also note that Norman French was less like modern French than Chaucer's Middle English was like modern English.)





> Before I played D&D, I didn't know what "knell" meant. Now, thanks mostly to the "death knell" spell, I do, and I can appreciate that this beetle and its trumpet-like horn on its head that "warbles and trumpets when it communicates", and has the ability to shake the earth with low-frequency sound, has next to nothing to do with the ringing of a bell for the dead. And to make it even more confusing, they call the horn a bell several times. But only because it looks like a _trumpet_ bell. And they call its main ability Sonic Chime. Even though there's no actual bell involved and the trumpet can ostensibly not make any sort of chiming sound. The lesser version even has its equivalent called "sonic screech", for no discernible reason. I really don't get the naming of that guy.


I speculate that the person who originally designed the knell beetle didn't communicate the concept well enough to the artist, and it's a _lot_ easier to edit text than art.




> Also, only three bonus feats (Alertness, INA (claw), Multiattack).


INA as a bonus feat bugs me. It's probably just an effect of deciding it would be a vermin _way_ too late, but...just increase the base damage die?

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Lhosk*

What? Was Lolth drunk enough that she mistook a gorilla for a drow and made a drider out of it? Come on, they even hate elves too!

The Lhosk's entry is pretty interesting, detailing their society and their beliefs (they're all animists, believing in spirits inhabiting everything in nature), which obviously push them towards a ranger or druid career. There's only one thing I'd like to know: Do they lay eggs, or do they give birth? I can't be the only one to notice that they don't have mammalian genitals, but still have a belly button, which implies really weird ways for youngs to be born.

Lhosks are pretty standard as far as spider-like creatures go. They're 8 RHD Large Monstrous Humanoids with decent physical stats and low mental stats (+8 Str, +6 Dex, +8 Con, -2 Int, +2 Wis, -4 Cha) but a very low +3 natural armor. They have the three basic senses (low-light, darkvision and scent), two slams and one bite. They have no ability except Entangling Web, with the regular 10ft range increment and entanglement. Interestingly, the save DC is Dex-based instead of Con-based, but it's not really a great thing since you have a lower Dex bonus than your strength.

The Lhosk doesn't have much going for it, and we have to give it a number of RHD where its size and pure stats will make it thrive. At least it can wield weapons, speak and has reach. This is basically a better centaur in terms of physical stats, but much slower. Centaur got +1 in the original thread, for a total of ECL 5. I think the Lhosk might be useable with *5 RHD*, despite being kinda weak for this ECL. And *DLA-2* gives it 8 BAB at ECL 6, which... Allows it to enter Primeval two levels early or bear warrior one level early. There's worse uses of your levels.


Okay, this one was easy. However, it was only the calm before the storm, because next time, we will review the absolute nightmare that are the living spells, the only template to which the LA-assignment thread hasn't assigned an LA!

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## remetagross

What a disapppointing monster. I think you're too generous with it. Its ability modifiers are nothing to write home about, and its special attacks lackluster. They're large and have no trouble using weapons, which is their one redeeming feature. I'd go with *5 RHDs* and *DLA-2.*

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## Morphic tide

> So, basically, the puppet taratects from "I'm a spider, so what?"?


Was actually thinking in terms of Druid access with the goal being funnel-web behaviors where there's giant webs covered in spiders, not an up-front combatant with weapon use.




> The Lhosk doesn't have much going for it


Entering Primeval does open up "Reject Lolth, return to Monke" jokes, and is a perfectly fine move because its bounds are size-dependent, the ability scores are rendered into _bonuses_, and if an item you're wearing fits on the animal you get to keep it. So if you want to use the joke with Dire Ape, you carry over any gear above the waist and keep your Str/Dex/Con advantage over a normal race, while you can also be a Dire Snake with a net +22 Strength, +18 Dexterity, and +12 Constitution for impressive effectiveness in chewing on unfortunate enemies.

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## GreatWyrmGold

> What? Was Lolth drunk enough that she mistook a drow for a gorilla and made a drider out of it?


Why would Lolth turn a drow into a drider if she thought it was a gorilla?


I used to think these were cool, just like the Spider-Monkeys from Spy Kids 2. I will acknowledge that spider-people who aren't just villains _are_ kinda neat, there should be more of those...but these are literally just tool-using animist gorillas. The whole "Lhosk Society" section is just describing gorilla troops, except building "temporary shelters" instead of gorilla beds.

Okay, that's not completely fair. There are additional details given in the fluff section, they're just nonsense. Lhosk select leaders by ritual combat, for instance, and lhosk "nests" have half as many females as males. In reality, gender balance in gorilla troops is about even if you count juveniles, the head silverback is usually the other males' dad, and when gorillas display spiritual beliefs they tend to reflect those of neighboring human settlements.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Living spells*

Aaah, living spells. Probably the single most unique template in all of D&D in that it applies not to a creature (or even two creatures, in Tauric's case), but to a spell, changing them into an amorphous creature that applies the spell effect on each of its attacks. The concept is wild and the monsters created are original and quite varied despite the simplistic design. As such, living spells have more support than most anything else in this book, notably the coolest prestige class in all of d&d 3.5, the Spell Sovereign from Dragon #357. They were initially printed in Eberron Campaign Setting, reprinted in MM3 and expanded on in Eberron: Five Nations, and even in 4th edition, with Dungeon magazine #175, and recently 5th edition gave us a few, including a living Create Demiplane, which is as terrifying as it is tame, only trapping its enemies for a little while in an extradimensional space. 
Living spells are oozes in 3e, aberrations in 4e and constructs in 5e, but they are invariably created when too much magical energy is concentrated in a corrupted place, generally the Mournland in Eberron.

_I like to think that visiting the Mournland looks just like that, with so many living spells that you can't walk a mile without qualifying for every spelltouched feat in existence. 
From left to right, we have a Shroud of Death and Despair (living crushing despair/finger of death), a Withering Grasp (living Evard's black tentacle/ray of enfeeblement), a chillspark (two 4e spells), a Glitterfire (living fireball/glitterdust), a living Cloud of Knives, a living Entangle, a living Flaming Sphere (supposedly) familiar, a living Blasphemy, and two more unidentified living spells_

Now, living spells are supposed to be only applicable to spells with an Effect or Area line but no Target line. Of course, even in 3e, that rule was already broken with the Shroud of Death and Despair being a half-living Finger of Death, which is definitely a targeted spell. The point is, there can be living spells for any spell, even if we restrict the caster level to the minimum needed to cast a spell. You can't assign an LA that will fit all spells. That's why we will only review here the example living spells in MM3: the Glitterfire, the Chilling Fog (living cone of cold), and the living Blasphemy/Dictum/Holy Word/Word of Chaos. But if you have other ideas of fun living spells, I'd like to hear them!


I'm going to consider here that reducing the RHD of a living spell doesn't affect its caster level. Thing is, the caster level of a living spell affects everything from its ability scores to its AC, size and even SR. If I considered that all living spells have caster level equal to their RHD, then most living spells would become 1 RHD Medium oozes and one or two CL 1 spell effects. Not that original or interesting. Living spells are already ooze type, are mindless, and have only one ability, which is to apply an area-of-effect or ray spell to a single target at melee range. That's not good. Not good at all. No need to reduce the spell's power level further.

*General stats*
- The ability scores of a living spell are 10+SL/7+SL/10+SL/_/7+SL/10+SL (total 5*SL-16, round to the lower multiple of 2, with SL being the spell level of the living spell). That's generally low, but not unexpected from oozes.
- They get SR 10+CL, which translates here to SR 10+HD, average but always appreciated. They also have Deflection bonus equal to their spell level and DR 10/Magic, which is honestly pretty good for oozes, who are used to have 1 Dex and no natural armor or DR.
- They have Engulf as a Gelatinous Cube, and otherwise use their single slam to apply their spell effect.
- As all oozes, 60ft blindsight and mind-affecting immunity.

*Chilling Fog, living Cone of Cold*, CL 9, Large, 20ft movement speed: Cone of Cold is one of the worst level 5 spells, being both uninteresting and plagued by Cold spells being generally overleveled for their effect. The Chilling Fog has no interesting ability except dealing 9d6 damage with its slam, which isn't even that easy considering its 20ft movement speed, and is generally worse than the Gelatinous Cube's paralysis (and will become even worse at higher levels). Its non-intelligence stats are more balanced and generally better than GC except Con (+4/+2/+4/-8/+2/+4) and having 5 deflection is decent. All in all, I guess the high damage output and decent stats are enough for *3 RHD*, *DLA-4*, but it will probably be very strong at ECL 3 and very weak when 9d6 doesn't one-shot anything anymore.

Edit: Considering the immediate power of the chilling fog at ECL 3, *4 RHD* may be better, but do not hesitate to reduce that number if your campaign starts at higher level.

*Glitterfire, living Fireball/Glitterdust*, CL 5, Medium, 40ft movement speed: Lower damage and slightly lower overall ability scores than Chilling Fog, but twice as fast, a save-or-suck as a rider and Medium size (probably better than non-reach Large on a creature with only marginal grappling focus). Seems once again like a solid *3 RHD*, *DLA-1*.

*Living Blasphemy/Holy Word/Word of Chaos/Dictum*, CL 13, Huge, 20ft movement speed: Fun fact, the template doesn't actually give the monster any subtype, which means that the Evil/Good/Lawful/Chaotic subtype is specific to the living Blasphemy and its brethrens. The living spell's ability scores are pretty good for a lower-level creature (+6/+4/+6/-8/+4/+6), and its spell effect is monstrously effective at low level, but doesn't work on creatures of the same alignment and will progressively become inexorably weaker as you level up. Interestingly, Blasphemy is the only one with the potential to stunlock an opponent. If you stumble upon a non-evil creature with 13 HD or less, you can walk up to them, and hit them with a pseudopod. No save, they are dazed for a round. Then, you engulf them. Each turn, the guy is engulfed, and gets dazed. No save. No way for you to run out of spells. The guy is just boned except if they have SR. Word of Chaos does the same, but only up to 12 RHD (but might actually be better since there are many more Evil creatures than chaotic ones), and the paladin alignments require the opponent to have at most 8 RHD. No-save-just lose is not something I'd like to include at low level, regardless of the other drawbacks of the creature. It's a one-trick pony, but a one-trick pony who might one-shot bosses up until mid-level. I think *7 RHD* is fair for Blasphemy and Word of Chaos, since it is a level where basically all CR-appropriate encounters have more than 8 HD and a decent portion have more than 13. Holy Word and Dictum are weaker, and I suggest *6 RHD*. In both cases, *DLA-5* seems reasonable to give them the ability to actually hit people when reaching melee range.


I love the flavor from 4e for living spells. They're incomplete spells with everything set in stone except the target area or creature. They feel this absence as a flaw and try to fill this gap by blindly attacking any creature in sight. I would have liked to see a harmless living spell like a living Stabilize just going around and engulfing harmed creatures like a gooey healing pod. I guess a living Dispel Magic would also be really interesting. What would you like to see/use in your campaigns as a living spell? I personally used a living Tasha's Hideous Laughter in one of my campaigns as a sentry ooze in a prison, making prisoners laugh so much that they could be brought back in their cells with no problem, and creating a great creepy ambience for the PCs. Next time, we will have the one guy you will never win a staring contest against, it's the Lurking Strangler!

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## PoeticallyPsyco

> What would you like to see/use in your campaigns as a living spell?


For sheer flavor, I feel like it has to be _necrotic skull bomb_. "You find yourselves beset by a living necrotic skull bomb!" "Come again?"

The _spell matrix_ line would make great assistant mages. Cast your spells into them, and they regurgitate them back for you on command.

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## remetagross

Yeah, living spells are awesome. What sets their speed? It seems to vary from one to the other. But their lack of any path for progression really hampers them, except if they're based on non-CL dependant effects (like, a living Avasculate?). Though they have mental stats way higher than what oozes regularly get, which is nice. This means martial initiators (most likely crusaders) are on the table. 

The chilling fog hits like a ton of bricks for 3 RHDs. It will one-shot anything. I'd go with 5 RHD, when one considers the usefulness of ooze immunities and blindsight.
The glitterfire...same, dishing out 5d6 damage at 3 RHDs, + a rider, is kinda nuts. But okay, the ability scores are lower...why not.
Good assessment for the living other stuff. Man, that ability for an auto-lose for the living Blasphemy is the darndest thing.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> For sheer flavor, I feel like it has to be _necrotic skull bomb_. "You find yourselves beset by a living necrotic skull bomb!" "Come again?"
> 
> The _spell matrix_ line would make great assistant mages. Cast your spells into them, and they regurgitate them back for you on command.


Nice ones! Particularly the spell matrix could make for a great wizard, a spell sovereign that just surrounds themselves with awakened living spell matrixes, and gets buffed as hell immediately when needed. I can see the necrotic bomb just being a black ooze with bubbles erupting that take the form of a skull and spell matrix just being a bunch of geometric shapes constantly changing form (like that)




> Yeah, living spells are awesome. What sets their speed? It seems to vary from one to the other. But their lack of any path for progression really hampers them, except if they're based on non-CL dependant effects (like, a living Avasculate?). Though they have mental stats way higher than what oozes regularly get, which is nice. This means martial initiators (most likely crusaders) are on the table. 
> 
> The chilling fog hits like a ton of bricks for 3 RHDs. It will one-shot anything. I'd go with 5 RHD, when one considers the usefulness of ooze immunities and blindsight.
> The glitterfire...same, dishing out 5d6 damage at 3 RHDs, + a rider, is kinda nuts. But okay, the ability scores are lower...why not.
> Good assessment for the living other stuff. Man, that ability for an auto-lose for the living Blasphemy is the darndest thing.


The speed of a living spell is determined by the lowest range among the spell that compose it. Close means 20ft speed, Medium means 40ft speed, and Long means 60ft speed. Other fixed ranges make the living spell's speed 20ft.


I think you're overestimating 10d6 damage. Even at level 3, you'll routinely find CR 5 monsters, who basically all have more than 35 HP. A polar bear is CR 4 and has 68 HP. According to here, the average number of HP for CR 4 monsters is 48, and 56 for CR 5 monsters. And it being tied to an attack roll and a Reflex for half means you won't deal 35 damage per round. Now, I'm not saying 10d6 is low. It's still very much a lot of damage for level 3, and if there was some sort of LA-buyoff for RHDR, I would have given the cloud more RHD. That's why I said it is very strong at ECL 3 (but then again, not overwhelmingly so either, a raging barbarian 3 orc deals 2d6+18 when power attacking with its greatsword, or 25 points of damage, which is in the same ballpark, with no reflex save for half. It's the same as what the living spell deals if the opponent makes their save (point-buy 18 Str, no Power Attack, 1d6+6+9d6/2=25). Of course, the living spell can also go barbarian and power attack, but will get less advantage out of it, and will not be able to make iteratives later. But I'm taking into account the advancement here. You can't use items, you can't speak, you have no skills, and your main ability doesn't scale _at all_. You can't even increase your CL since these are not technically SLAs. 10d6 is impressive at ECL 3, but quickly falls out of relevance, and having to pay 5 RHD for it around ECL 8 or 9 would be way too many. And finally, you can compare it to a gelatinous cube (praise be to the cubic measurement stick!). It has lower stats, but paralysis never falls out of relevance, its DC scales with Constitution _and_ number of HD, and you get a chance to just be invisible against any opponent with low ranks in Spot. At the same level, if you asked me if I wanted to play a Chilling Fog or a Gelatinous Cube, I would say the Gelatinous Cube without much hesitation. This is why I think the Chilling Fog should be playable at a lower ECL than GC, hence 3. But as always, if you accept a player using monstrous characters in your game, feel free to increase that number of RHD, but I think in that case you should find a way to mitigate the lack of advancement.

----------


## GreatWyrmGold

> What would you like to see/use in your campaigns as a living spell?


Ignoring the stated requirements, it depends on what I want to use 'em for. Something like a Living Animate Dead or Living Awaken could make a pretty good adventure hook, the former making zombies out of any corpses it touches and the latter making a bunch of intelligent but battered animals. Living Animate Objects could make for a fun gimmick encounter, animating players' armor and magic items as the fight goes on. Living Plane Shift works for a total party screw-you. Living Gate would be nuts. I don't know what something like a Living Fabricate or Living Sending would do, but I bet I could make it fun.

For the kinds of spells _intended_ to be turned into living spells? _Prismatic spray,_ probably.

----------


## Tusen

I'd be leaning towards the weak 4 RHD side of things rather than strong 3 RHD, but once we get into oozes with their severe limitations but also drastic benefits from their type/body we end up in the realm of campaigns being able to swing it either way to greater degrees. If we are assuming a 'typical' campaign with some politics and urban shenanigans along with some dungeon delving style stuff I'd go towards 4 RHD, if we are talking murderhobo simulator versus enemies that don't know about you in advance/don't have adaptability in their prep. Back to the suggested 3 if you live in an area where cold creatures are somewhat common, so you will encounter resistances more. The damage is nice, but I really really wish it could be delivered with a touch rather than relying on a slam attack. Once we get to the realm of resistances being more on demand it becomes a bigger issue, not only are you dealing a lower % of HP but enemies are able to make your damage drop to almost 0 most of the time in the end. You can burn more of their resources by using party synergy, but that can be said of anything. 

So I'm on the borderline between strong RHD 3 and weak RHD 4, with gelatinous cube being on the strong RHD 4 side of things. A 3.8 vs a 4.6 if you will.

EDIT: Edited to fix up the usual tiredness malarkey

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Ignoring the stated requirements, it depends on what I want to use 'em for. Something like a Living Animate Dead or Living Awaken could make a pretty good adventure hook, the former making zombies out of any corpses it touches and the latter making a bunch of intelligent but battered animals. Living Animate Objects could make for a fun gimmick encounter, animating players' armor and magic items as the fight goes on. Living Plane Shift works for a total party screw-you. Living Gate would be nuts. I don't know what something like a Living Fabricate or Living Sending would do, but I bet I could make it fun.
> 
> For the kinds of spells _intended_ to be turned into living spells? _Prismatic spray,_ probably.


Spells with costly components and spells that don't account for being mobile make for scary living spells. Like, circle of death is just "kill 11d4 HD of creatures per slam". I think the worst of all is living Precipitate Complete Breach. It just opens a planar breach to a random plane wherever it goes. It would probably end up stranded somewhere in the multiverse after going through one of its own breaches, but before that it would create an absolutely hellish environment with dozens of planar breaches everywhere, interacting with each other, burning, drowning, healing and killing people all at once while creatures from dozens of planes wage war against each other in the middle of the material plane. The rifts themselves won't last too long, but the effects will probably warp the environment forever. Living Astral Hospice is the much tamer version. If the spell touches you, you are warped to a demiplane that immediately closes, leaving you in the middle of the Astral Plane with no way to come back.
I'd say Living Animate Dead and Animate Objects (warning: doesn't work on items worn, I don't think being living changes that) would work similarly to the Ravid's ability. Objects just animate left and right and defend the living spell, but it can't control them beyond that. You'd just have a tornado of random items all around. 
Living Fabricate would be wild. You can imagine a crawling mass of goo turning everything it touches into spikes or other ferrofluid-like shapes. It goes through walls by just continuously changing their shape. If you try to hit it, your sword is now an unuseable scrap of metal. If it engulfs you, your armor pierces through your skin, your shield warps around your arm and your helmet starts suffocating you. The only way to kill it would be to launch an arrow or a metal ball covered with sovereign glue. The missile would be engulfed, stay perfectly stuck to the living spell, and continuously change forms, destroying it from the inside.




> I'd be leaning towards the weak 4 RHD side of things rather than strong 3 RHD, but once we get into oozes with their severe limitations but also drastic benefits from their type/body we end up in the realm of campaigns being able to swing it either way to greater degrees. If we are assuming a 'typical' campaign with some politics and urban shenanigans along with some dungeon delving style stuff I'd go towards 4 RHD, if we are talking murderhobo simulator versus enemies that don't know about you in advance/don't have prep time then 3RHD. Back to 4 if you live in an area where cold creatures are somewhat common, so you will encounter resistances more. The damage is nice, but I really really wish it could be delivered with a touch rather than relying on a slam attack. Once we get to the realm of resistances being more on demand it becomes a bigger issue, not only are you dealing a lower % of HP but enemies are able to make your damage drop to almost 0 most of the time in the end. You can burn more of their resources by using party synergy, but that can be said of anything. 
> 
> So I'm on the borderline between strong RHD 3 and weak RHD 4, with gelatinous cube being on the strong RHD 4 side of things. A 3.8 vs a 4.6 if you will.


I'm not sure if I understand what you're saying. Your advice is to _increase_ the number of RHD in the case the Chilling Fog encounters a lot of Cold creatures? And to reduce it in a campaign where the Fog will get the most out of its ability? The point of reducing RHD is to reduce the ECL (Equivalent Class Level) at which the monster would theoretically be playable. If the Chilling Fog is estimated with 3 RHD, it will face creatures around CR 3, and around CR 4 if it is estimated as worth 4 RHD. Reducing the number of RHD actually makes the monster stronger since they can be replaced with class levels. Increasing the number of RHD in the case of a campaign where the monster will already be weaker than normal makes no sense.
I'm inclined to agree with the crowd if they think 4 RHD is better for Chilling Fog, but I'd like to make sure you understand what what you're saying entails. If you already knew that and I just misunderstood, then I'm sorry and could you please explain your reasoning.


Fun fact by the way: this mistake that increasing RHD without reducing LA actually reduces a monster's power is not that uncommon. Actually that's exactly what WotC did once. In a document about _presenting their process of designing monsters_ (dowload link) (supposedly showing how they always do it), they create an hypothetical monster, the Imago, a hornet-like humanoid. It initially has 2 RHD and they estimate its LA to be +2 (already stupidly high for what it brings, but I digress). To check their LA (at least they try to check), they compare the Imago against a human rogue. First, they _forget about the rogue's class features_, including sneak attack and just compare HP, AC and damage per round of each (already infuriating), and even then they find that the Imago is no match compared to a 4th level rogue. So what, now they reduce their estimated LA, right? NO. They increase its number of RHD from 2 to 3. Without reducing LA. While it has humanoid RHD, one of the single worst kinds of RHD. 

*Spoiler: Please appreciate that great insight in the mind of WotC design process*
Show

Even assuming that an imago character would have equipment equivalent to that of any other 4th-level character, it seemed clearly inferior in most ways to a standard-race character of that level. The following options for bringing it into balance occurred to me.
 Raise its Hit Dice. One more Hit Die would improve its BAB and its non-good saving throws, in addition to increasing its hit points. Because of rounding, the poisons Fortitude save DC would be unaffected. That additional Hit Die would also provide another skill point, but it would not provide
another feat.
 Increase the racial bonus to Dexterity. This option would improve the creatures ranged attack rolls and Reflex save. If I made Weapon Finesse (stinger) its racial bonus feat, that attack roll would also improve.
 Add other ability bonuses, or remove the penalty to Intelligence or Charisma. A bonus to Strength would improve melee attacks, a bonus to Constitution would improve hit points, Fortitude save, and the poisons Fortitude save DC. A bonus to Intelligence would increase skill points, and a
bonus to Wisdom would increase the Will saving throw bonus and the racial bonuses on Listen
and Spot.
 In the end I decided on a combination of increasing the Hit Dice and adding a +2 racial bonus to
Wisdom. The resulting comparison was close enough to be worth the +2 level adjustment and the
starting ECL of 4.


The final creature has 3 RHD and LA+2. Not only did they choose the abolute worst way to buff their monster, they don't even understand their own system and somehow believed that this would keep the monster at ECL 4. I am speechless. This level of incompetence is really something to behold.

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## Tusen

> Fun fact by the way: this mistake that increasing RHD without reducing LA actually reduces a monster's power is not that uncommon.


Nah that's just me being tired. I did this in the houserules thread as well, I tend to swap numbers when tired. I said 1gp = 2p when I meant 1p = 2gp in there, and here I meant I'd be leaning towards low 4 RHD in normal and 3 in cold areas. I'll fix it with an edit.

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Lurking Strangler*


_Look at them. Look at these eyes and tell me this expression doesn't mean that the only way to help them is to put an end to their miserable, painful life._

*Spoiler: If you really want to play a lurking strangler, then you have to understand what it really means to be a lurking strangler*
Show

The Lurking Strangler is a disgusting monster composed of only two eyes linked by a strand of muscles. The eyes have no eyelids, but they do have eyelashes, long eyelashes that seem to just grow out of the transition between the sclera and the muscles. That must be one of the saddest monsters there is. An eye so big without lids will get dry very quick, have dust get stuck inside, and have its lashes eventually detach and lay on the eye itself, causing intense and constant pain. Its art represents it coiling and almost making a knot out of itself, while its description says that it is in "fear, tension or disagreement" when it does so. Because yeah, that's the only way it has to communicate, since it has no mouth. Now, can I point you to the monster manual, and a little-known but quite crucial part of the type description page: "Aberrations eat, breathe and sleep". Eat and breath with what? Its pupils!? The description says a Lurking Strangler will always try to strangle people to death, but why? It can't eat them, it can't do anything except making people feel the same pain it does, the same pain that is multiplied everytime it tries to sleep and slowly falls to the ground until its eyes grind against the hard floor and it wakes up, ever hungrier, evermore tired, evermore envious of everything it could have had, of the rest it can give to anybody else with its SLA, but will never taste itself, of the ability for others to let go, to simply close their eyes and let the pain disappear, once, and for all.

And the best worst part of it? That's by design. The lurking stranglers were purposefully created by Daelkyrs (basically, think of them as aberration Sarrukhs, who used to have Quickened Polymorph Any Object as an SLA. Yep, that's a 12th level spell.) because they were _bored_! I mean, the guys already created the freaking beholders and the absolute nightmares that are the dolgaunts and the dolgrims, it shouldn't surprise me that they created a creature constantly in pain and starving, forced to eat (probably) through their pupils, _without the ability to even scream in pain_, just as a hobby. And obviously, beholders are using stranglers as familiars, because, really, the perfect fit for sadistic, mysanthrope, racist, prideful aberrations like them is seeing something slightly similar to themselves but much weaker be constantly squirming in pain without distractingly screaming.


Between Living Spell and Lurking Strangler, that part of MM3 was really determined to point out the shortcomings of the LA assignment thread. To this day, I still think the asterisk was not necessary. The Lurking Strangler is a Tiny aberration with 2 RHD and great caster stats (-6 Str, +8 Dex, +2 Con, -6 Int). It even gets Alertness, all-around vision (obviously), the ability to strangle helpless people, killing them in 3 rounds (obviously), and a permanent Feather Fall as well as 20ft (good) flying (less obviously, but makes sense considering they're mini-beholders). The only real problem is the body shape. Beyond the obvious problems with excruciating pain, the lurking strangler cannot talk, cannot manipulate items basically ever, most probably cannot wear armor, and lacks more than two-thirds of item slots (it can probably still wear rings, bracelets, amulets, and of course spectacles). This would just be another -0 monster if the daelkyrs didn't push the irony to the point of giving them beholder-like eye rays, Cause Fear and Sleep. Two very strong SoL for their level, but with a hard cap on the number of RHD they can affect (4 for Sleep, 6 for Cause Fear). This means that the lurking strangler is _significantly_ stronger at ECL 2 or 3, and completely useless starting at ECL 5. If you're playing at very low level, LA+0 is probably fine. If not... Well, that's why we're here. At ECL 4+, the body slots become a real issue, on top of the already crippling absence of hands. The high Dex is pretty good, and flying is all-important, even this slow. But the low Int and the absence of useful attacks make me think that it's not significantly stronger than a standard humanoid race. *1 RHD**, *DLA-2** seems acceptable.


And after one of the most complicated monsters, here comes one of the simplest ones. Next ones, we will review the Mastodon.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Mastodon*
That's an elephant. That's literally just an elephant with +2 Str, +2 Con, -2 Cha, and +1 Natural armor. Slightly stronger, but not enough for one more RHD. *7 RHD*, *DLA-5*.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Mindshredders*

Mindshredders: the four pages that could have been used for Modrons.

Mindshredders are a disappointment in basically all ways imaginable. WotC obviously wanted them to be important, maybe even to rival mind flayers in iconic-ness. They gave the mindshredders four pages of the manual, a very detailed life cycle, a society that was probably meant for campaign-wide enemies, with main colonies surrounded by satellite colonies, all in a very organized and hierarchical fashion. The problem? Mindshredders are just not interesting as enemies. They're intelligent enough that their ant-like society doesn't make much sense, they don't really have a leader since any warrior can become a zenthal, their main way of feeding is Wis damage, which means they should just enslave animals and have an endless supply of food, since ability damage heals naturally 1/day. The main problem in my opinion is their lack of goal. Demons want to kill everyone because it makes more of them in the Abyss. Aboleths want to enslave creatures and live like kings under the sea. Illithids want to control the world because they feel like it's their destiny, and experiment on new ways to propagate ceremorphosis. Mindshredders only want to feed and breed, and there's no reason an intelligent species would only want that. Disappointing lore, and their mechanical stats are not much more interesting. In the end, they were an ambitious new direction for aberrations, but simply weren't given anything in the right directions. 


*Larva*, 2 RHD: All mindshredders are basically the same: quadruped, no hand but 2 natural weapons that deal ridiculously low wisdom damage on top of regular damage and can be used as touch attacks instead (only Wis damage). They also have Thought Sense, basically blindsense but only against creatures with minds. Not extremely useful, but may be interesting against invisible creatures. The larva's Thought Sense is only 20ft. The larva has +2 Dex, +4 Con, -6 Int, +2 Wis, -6 Cha, +2 natural armor, and two tentacles dealing 1 point of wisdom damage. The -6 Int hurts a lot, as well as the lack of hands. Being able to make touch attacks is good for maneuvers and sneak attacks who deal additional damage, and the stats apart from intelligence are not bad, but it will be completely useless without class levels, and even then, no manipulators and no skills will be hard to overcome. *1 RHD*, *DLA-1* (even going Ur-priest isn't easy with so few skill points).

*Warrior*, 7 RHD: The adult form of the mindshredders is Large, with decent physical stats (+10 Str, +6 Con) and low mental stats (-6 Int, +2 Wis, -6 Cha). You also have a pretty good +10 natural armor. The natural attacks are now claws (the only real different is that you can't take Extended Reach) and deal 1d2 Wis (wooo). Your Thought Sense is now 40ft (woohoo.) Also, you have a +20 to Jump checks, which heavily favors going Swordsage for Tiger Claw maneuvers and maybe Assassin's Stance (you already auto-succeed on most Jump checks, and a lot of Tiger Claw maneuvers make the opponent flat-footed against you, which means sneak attack is possible, and makes your touch attack viable against foes with very high natural armor). No hands and low int are still bad, but I think I'd play that with *4 RHD*. To note is that you and the larva can't speak, but can understand languages. Also, *DLA-2* is fine.

*Zenthal*, 13 RHD: Somehow, the third form is smaller than the second one, and dumps all its strength to get actual mental stats. Obviously nothing appropriate for its initial number of RHD (-2 Str, +6 Dex, +4 Con, +2 Int, +2 Wis, +8 Cha). Its tentacles deal 1d4 Wis, but considering its strength, you're probably not using it much. 8 Natural armor and an innate +4 shield bonus to AC (doesn't apply to touch attacks despite being force) make for an AC worthy of a creature with ~10 HD. It also gets Confusion and Hypnotic Pattern as 3/day SLAs. Confusion is not a bad SLA to have, but that's basically your only ability, and you're completely useless against Mind-affecting-immune opponents. The larva's and fighter's main strategy is unavailable to you because of your low strength except if you pay a feat for Weapon Finesse, and you still don't have hands. I'm really not sure the Zenthal is that much stronger than the warrior, but a 4th level spell as an SLA remains pretty good, and your high Charisma opens a lot of classes to you, notably Warlock. I suggest *5 RHD* and *DLA-5*.


Have any of you used mindshredders as opponents in your games? In what circumstances? Next time, we will continue with the current streak of -0 creatures, and what a -0 it is! See you then for the Mivilorn!

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## remetagross

Yeah, the Mastodon sucks. There's only so much you can do with "slight variations of existing animals", ie the Ironclad Mauler. It's a bit of a waste of book space, really.

I had never ever heard about Mindshredders. I can fathom the larva with 1 RHD, since that HD would then be swapped with your first class level HD. The warriors only have that +20 to Jump going for them, so I guess 4 RHD is good enough. The Znethal is incredibly weak for that number of RHDs. I'm fine with 5 RHDs, but the DLA should be even lower in my opinion. DLA -6 allows one to nab 7th-level spells by ECL 20 if going for a prepared class, or 5th-level spells if going Bard.

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## GreatWyrmGold

> 8 Natural armor and an innate +4 shield bonus to AC (doesn't apply to touch attacks despite being force)


If touch spells work through a steel breastplate, why not through a magical force field?




> Mindshredders are a disappointment in basically all ways imaginable. WotC obviously wanted them to be important, maybe even to rival mind flayers in iconic-ness. They gave the mindshredders four pages of the manual, a very detailed life cycle, a society that was probably meant for campaign-wide enemies, with main colonies surrounded by satellite colonies, all in a very organized and hierarchical fashion. The problem? Mindshredders are just not interesting as enemies.


About all mindshredders have going for them is three neat designs. They look like three separate species from the same taxonomic class rather than life stages of the same organism, but still.

The lack of motivation is a bad thing, but also none of the detail provided is very interesting. Larvae turn into warriors, warriors turn into zenthals, zenthals make larvae. If mindshredders had a more elaborate life cyclelike the graboids from _Tremors_ (which produce a bunch of shrieker offspring, which gorge themselves and replicate themselves, before transforming into ass-blasters which mate and lay graboid eggs)or something else interesting going on, the fact that they aren't psychologically interesting wouldn't matter any more than it did for _Tremors_.


If I was going to make better mindshredder lore, I'd probably put them somewhere between WH40k's tyranids and Worm's [spoiler]. They absorb mind-energy as larvae, and then metamorphose into different forms based on what mind-energy they absorb. If the larva absorbs most of its mind-energy from animals, it turns into something like the mindshredder warriorbig, tough, but not especially bright. But if it absorbs its mind-energy from intelligent creatures, it turns into something more intelligent and magical. (With space to expand to extra monsters, for mindshredders which absorb mind-energy from archmages, assassins, dragons, fiends, and other high-level or powerful creatures.)

The adult mindshredders need to feed on mind-energy of the same sort that they fed upon as larvae; a mindshredder adult that matured after eating mind-energy from a couple of unhoused peasants could eat their cow's mind-energy, but eating _only_ that would be about as healthy as an all-butter diet would be to humans. And the mind-energy isn't just used to make new mindshredders, it's part of their metabolic needs. So just to survive, a group of mature humanoid-feeding mindshredders would need to attack or capture a fair number of people, enough that they could regain mind-energy as fast as the mindshredders consumed it (or so the humanoids could be replaced). And of course, sticking intelligent or powerful creatures in the nursery means those larvae are more likely to mature into more intelligent/powerful forms.

If that's not enough, the intelligent adult mindshredders are acutely aware that their "minds" are just shreds of other creatures' minds woven into something less than the sum of its parts. They're driven to try and find some sense of personal identity, but can't think of any way to do that except to take mind-energy from people who have something they think they're missing. But they're still just copying bits of other people without any ability to _understand_ what they took, to synthesize those fragments into something new, something unique, identifying. Something to give them an identity.

You know, an easily-grokked alien psychological trait, one which can be extrapolated into both actionable goals that inspire plot hooks _and_ a broadly alien (yet comprehensible) psychology. The kind of thing a would-be iconic aberration should have.

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## AsuraKyoko

> If touch spells work through a steel breastplate, why not through a magical force field?
> 
> 
> About all mindshredders have going for them is three neat designs. They look like three separate species from the same taxonomic class rather than life stages of the same organism, but still.
> 
> The lack of motivation is a bad thing, but also none of the detail provided is very interesting. Larvae turn into warriors, warriors turn into zenthals, zenthals make larvae. If mindshredders had a more elaborate life cyclelike the graboids from _Tremors_ (which produce a bunch of shrieker offspring, which gorge themselves and replicate themselves, before transforming into ass-blasters which mate and lay graboid eggs)or something else interesting going on, the fact that they aren't psychologically interesting wouldn't matter any more than it did for _Tremors_.
> 
> 
> If I was going to make better mindshredder lore, I'd probably put them somewhere between WH40k's tyranids and Worm's [spoiler]. They absorb mind-energy as larvae, and then metamorphose into different forms based on what mind-energy they absorb. If the larva absorbs most of its mind-energy from animals, it turns into something like the mindshredder warriorbig, tough, but not especially bright. But if it absorbs its mind-energy from intelligent creatures, it turns into something more intelligent and magical. (With space to expand to extra monsters, for mindshredders which absorb mind-energy from archmages, assassins, dragons, fiends, and other high-level or powerful creatures.)
> ...


Now _that_ is some cool lore! And I can definitely appreciate the Worm inspirations, too.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> If touch spells work through a steel breastplate, why not through a magical force field?


Because I was thinking of Mage Armor, which applies to incorporeal touch, but yeah, it doesn't apply to other forms of touch attacks. 




> About all mindshredders have going for them is three neat designs. They look like three separate species from the same taxonomic class rather than life stages of the same organism, but still.


That's part of the problem in my opinion. The zenthals just aren't special enough. Having a boss makes for a more engaging narrative, but if any warrior can turn into a zenthal (it's not even that hard), it defeats the point of killing one.




> They absorb mind-energy as larvae, and then metamorphose into different forms based on what mind-energy they absorb. 
> If that's not enough, the intelligent adult mindshredders are acutely aware that their "minds" are just shreds of other creatures' minds woven into something less than the sum of its parts.
> You know, an easily-grokked alien psychological trait, one which can be extrapolated into both actionable goals that inspire plot hooks _and_ a broadly alien (yet comprehensible) psychology. The kind of thing a would-be iconic aberration should have.


That's really great, and could allow for xenomorph-like variant mindshredders. A mindshredder larva feeding only on other mindshredders could become something like a neothelid, just a bigger larva with no mind of its own, that can be enslaved but not really gain sentience and are used as fodder by the mindshredder army (maybe with an area Wis drain effect). A mindshredder eating only dragons would gain some characteristics of the dragon mind, maybe a sense of individuality and sorcerer levels. One who ate too many angels becomes lawful good, but mostly becomes mad because it is forced to do evil and eat people's minds to survive, which goes against the very basis of their mind. These mindshredders generally planeshift to Evil aligned Planes, so that they can inflict suffering on evil creatures at least, but often end up with a scrambled mind of absolutely good and absolutely evil outsiders, making them feral, planeshifting mindshredders addicted to outsider mind, and promptly getting them killed.

----------


## remetagross

This starts to look like something workable!

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## GreatWyrmGold

PC Mindshredders with less RHD or Mindshredders with actual motivations?

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Mivilorn*

"What's that you said? You love slight variations of existing animals and only having a regular animal but bigger makes for a very interesting and engaging monster? Great! Have an-elephant-sized doggo!"

Mivilorns are one of the worst example of RHD bloat we've seen so far, with a CR of 11 for 24 RHD. They just don't have any ability that would warrant their play at high level, and only exist as beatsticks to slow the PCs down while the real threats (demons train them as mounts and fodders). They live in Pandemonium, where they are supposedly the demonic version of a normal dog.

- Huge Magical Beast, Chaotic subtype. About expected.
- +20 Str, +2 Dex, +16 Con, -6 Int, +4 Wis, +0 Cha, +12 NA. Completely expected.
- A bite dealing over average damage (4d6+2d4 acid), improved grab, swallow whole. Everything according to expectations.
- Scent, low-light, negligible SR (RHD-7). Is there anything not completely standard with this monster?
- Charging Bite (adds a Reflex save or being swallowed whole to its charge attack, as if the regular swallow whole wasn't enough), free action breath weapon (actually interesting, but the damage is pitiful, only 5d4 acid, and the duration not being in rounds means you can't add Metabreath to it)

The Mivilorns can spit out the opponents they swallowed whole to see if they're dead, presumably to remove their armor and eat them then. Is this something all creatures with Swallow Whole can do? The use case is limited, but it sparked my attention.

Anyway, Mivilorns can be compared, and not all that favorably, to bulettes. They have slightly better stats, Improved Grab and that free action breath weapon, but lack the all-important burrowing speed and especially don't have claws. While the bulette could wield a Mouthpick weapon and still attack with all four claws using its ability, the mivilorn cannot make iteratives at all if it wants to keep its improved grab. Honestly, I think *8 RHD* would make for a pretty strong Mivilorn, and let it take something like totemist or monk levels to gain actual attacks. The DLA version has 6 more feats and epic BAB, but all in all is just the same. Maybe *DLA-11*? Being only one level late in initiator level should make up for the lack of limbs and attack at higher levels. Also, its SR is still crap, even like that, how is it even possible?

*Mivilorn War Mount*: A Mivilorn with the warbeast template and a few more RHD. *9 RHD*, *DLA-15*.


Had enough of unnecessary big monsters with unnecessary high number of RHD? Because I haven't! Next time, the Necronaut!

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## GreatWyrmGold

The Mivilorn isn't _just_ a big (sorta-)demon doggo. It's a big demon doggo with a really, really big mouth. In fact, I'm not sure it has a stomachthe description of its Swallow Whole ability mentions the mivilorn "chewing on an opponent," and that opponent takes bite damage every round. For all we know, its throat dumps food straight into its intestines.

I kinda wish the design leaned into that more, though. If the mivilorn was a giant head on legs, seventy percent maw, and not just a snub-nosed hound with no neck, it might have had a memorably weird visual design. (I _do_ like the detail that only the mivilorn's mouth has damage reduction, though!)

Interestingly, the mivilorn seems to be able to bite and breath-weapon while chewing on an opponent. Perhaps it has secondary jaws to hold its victims in place?


...biology aside, the most interesting feature of the mivilorn is its unique swallow whole ability. When it charges, it can skip past the intermediate grappling stage and just skip to chewing. Also, by RAW, there is no limit on the number of creatures a mivilorn can swallowonly the number it can swallow _at once_ with Charging Bite. Even if the DM houserules a chewing limit, though, some ubercharger shenanigans would make the mivilorn _very_ good at taking enemies out of combat for a bit (while continuing to snap at other enemies).

The breath weapon is also neatfree action AoE!but _strongly_ limited daily use means this is more of a backup option for swarms and other weird enemies than a core part of the mivilorn arsenal. Also worth pointing out that, like all quadruped, equipment is gonna be a problemwith the additional complication that if you pick up a mouthpick weapon, you negate the whole point of _playing_ a mivilorn. (Though the mental image of a mivilorn forgetting about its weapon and swallowing it along with a couple of goblins _is_ pretty funny.)

For a big over-RHD'd bruiser, the mivilorn has a surprisingly interesting playstyle.

----------


## remetagross

Yeah, 8 RHD seem about right. For the DLA, don't forget the Huge size. It's a big asset to martials, I think that warrants being not one but two initiator levels behind a pure initiator class. So DLA-10?

Anyway, I'm sure there must be ways to do funny stuff with that insta swallow whole ability. Like, what if the Mivilorn has swallowed a portable hole, and then swallows a foe carrying a bag of holding? Maybe because the rogue of the party has used Sleight of Hand to actually equip the foe with said bag of holding? Yes, that means the bag of holding, the portable hole (portable whole? Ha!) and all it contains are now "lost in the void forever". Bye bye BBEG of up to Large size.

----------


## GreatWyrmGold

That _does_ require the BBEG to be carrying his bag of holding when swallowed, though. Plus, I don't want to _imagine_ the gastrointestinal (esophagointestinal?) problems a mivilorn would get from having an astral rift in its guts...

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Necronaut*



One man once said "Necronauts feel like a set-piece monster, like something you'd see dragging itself across the battlefield when the gate to the Abyss is opened and the heroes are called upon to defend the Shining City. ". And honestly, that might be the most accurate description of the Necronaut. They're not as much meant for an interesting fight than just to set an atmosphere.

Necronauts (necro-juggernauts, they have nothing to do with sailing) are supposed to be enormous bruisers with more HP than most CR 18-20 monsters. Sadly, they're also undead, and as such, despite having a massive 41 Str, have a lower to-hit bonus than a human warrior of its number of HD. It's not even close.


- Gargantuan (!) 32 RHD (ouch!) Undead (ouch!!!) [Chaotic, Evil, Extraplanar] (adequate but nothing game-changing.)
- +30 Str, -2 Dex, _ Con, -4 Int, +4 Wis, +6 Cha. I'm having Dusk Giant flashbacks. With fewer SLAs.
- 4 slams with reach, and 50ft speed. Should allow you to make a decent battlefield control fighter, or at least to easily be able to position yourself for full attacks. Also the damage die is one higher than normal for a Gargantuan slam (the statblock makes it 4d6 only because of Improved Natural Attack, it should be 2d8. Still, going from 2d8 to 4d6 makes you gain 5 damage per slam on average, which is not half bad). It's even able to wield two-handed weapons while still having two free hands. That's great, and probably the best part of the monster.
- DR 15/Lawful and Magic, SR 25 (or HD-7), Unholy Toughness, 20 natural armor. That's actually decent defense (except the SR), especially with Undead immunities to most nonstandard offenses.
- Trample (sure, 50ft speed, Garg size and high damage slams might make it worth it once in a while), Assimilate (you can heal by taking one minute to assimilate an opponent's corpse into your giant skeleton mess of a body, probably irrelevant at this level). Also you're damaged when people try to animate your body into undead, which is probably something someone tried to do sometime.

Overall, the Necronaut is an attempt to create an undead bruiser. They did a pretty good job at it, all in all, but half-BAB will always cripple that kind of character, and the utter lack of combat abilities is crushing. They even lack Improved Grab! Why? That seemed like an obvious ability for a creature litterally grappling a humanoid in its art. Also, I'm assuming here that the person playing this doesn't go Hulking Hurler. No matter the number of RHD, a creature with hands, that size and that strength would break the game immediately (as a reminder, a necronaut with two levels of Hulking Hurler can throw 10-ton boulders for 101d6 damage. With one hand. With 2 hands -or if it somehow finds a 5ft wide spiked ball-, it reaches 199d6, enough to one-shot most Great Wyrms). Still, I wouldn't want the necronaut to be able to cast 9th level maneuvers. Or 8th, really. Taking a level of Barbarian or a few feats for Improved Grab-adjacent abilities is a must, with your BAB+27 bonus to grapple. There's potential for something good here. I guess I'll go with *11 RHD* and *DLA-15* (only one level below full BAB and initiator level, but 17 levels without class features). 
For comparison, this thing with DLA-16 is very close to a necropolitan fighter 16 (only 5 bonus feats instead of 8 compared to its ECL, but more skills and very much more HP), only it has full initiator levels, incredible strength, 4 slams and Garg size. Straight Fighter is obviously very underpowered, and the definition of a class lagging behind as the exponential growth starts to kick in, but with all the other bonuses, I feel like it balances it out and then some.


It has been said before, but I still find it hilarious that a Chaotic Evil Undead constructed by demons in the Abyss doesn't speak Abyssal, but only Infernal. I can't help but imagine that they would just go around in the Blood War insulting devils in Infernal as their only hobby. Next time, we will slightly increase the CR-to-RHD ratio (the necronaut had one of the worst difference between CR and number of RHD, up there with Colossal Vermin and the Tarasque), it will be the Needletooth Swarm!

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## GreatWyrmGold

> *Necronaut*
> Necronauts (necro-juggernauts, they have nothing to do with sailing)


I assumed it was necro-dreadnought. Still naval, and I just realized it's spelled differently and you're probably right, but steam instead of sailor.




> Assimilate (you can heal by taking one minute to assimilate an opponent's corpse into your giant skeleton mess of a body, probably irrelevant at this level).


If you're the only undead in the party and couldn't convince anyone else to pick up some infinite source of negative energy "damage," it might be handy.




> Also you're damaged when people try to animate your body into undead, which is probably something someone tried to do sometime.


This feels like a flavor ability (well, weakness). I guess the idea is that the necronaut isn't as tightly bound to itself as most corporeal undead are? Maybe?




> Also, I'm assuming here that the person playing this doesn't go Hulking Hurler. No matter the number of RHD, a creature with hands, that size and that strength would break the game immediately (as a reminder, a necronaut with two levels of Hulking Hurler can throw 10-ton boulders for 101d6 damage. With one hand. With 2 hands -or if it somehow finds a 5ft wide spiked ball-, it reaches 199d6, enough to one-shot most Great Wyrms).


That's fair. Feels like assuming grisgols don't pick the most busted SLA at each level.

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## remetagross

This monster is annoying. I wouldn't let a PC play a Gargantuan creature in most cases, as this is so unbelievably unwieldy for the player to pilot around. I don't quite know what to make of such a creature. I guess no one should ever play that monster at ECL 32 anyway, so DLA doesn't matter much, but for RHDs, this level of defense will be all but impassable for a lot of foes. That +20 to NA in particular. I guess 1 RHD is good enough.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Needletooth Swarm*



Playing one dinosaur isn't cool enough? How about three bazillions of them! Or, you know, 300, since they're Tiny.

Needletooth swarms are remarkably weak. Tiny size, so no weapon immunity. No flying, basically no ability except Wounding and the regular Distraction, and pretty bad ability scores (-8 Str, +10 Dex, +4 Con, -9 Int, +2 Wis, -8 Cha). Still better than a rat swarm in most ways, notably the 40ft speed, but definitely worse than the bat swarm, despite the better stats. Seems like a weak *3 RHD*, *DLA-6*. There is also a poisonous version, with a swarm attack dealing an additional 1d3 Dex/1d3 Dex poison. Negligible improvement, at least not enough for one more RHD.

Yeah, this one is not worth much more than the JoJo reference. One of the few creatures where googling its name in french doesn't give even one result related to d&d. I advise to skip. Next one is much more interesting, but maybe even harder to play, it's the Night Twist!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Night Twist*


Does it twist in the night, does it twist the night, or is it a plot twist during the night? All of the above!

The night twist is... Surprisingly strong for a creature of the Material Plane. With the exception of dragons and constructs, most creatures above CR 12 are Extraplanar. And the night twist has nothing special about it. It's just a naturally occuring species that just happens to be an immortal singing and talking animate tree which could kill three ogres in the span of 6 seconds and charm people in a half-mile radius. It's a good thing they dwell in "the most inhospitable marshes", because they could decimate whole villages by just using their despair song and killing the villagers one by one.

The night twist is a monster designed for battlefield control, and it does its job well. Despair Song prevents any who hear from doing anything, even eat or sleep, except approaching blindly the night twist, on top of inflicting a Crushing Despair. Considering it hunts like that, it is most probable that victims don't stop until they are adjacent to the tree. However, the night twist has several abilities that prevent its opponents from approaching, blocking them in their tranced state. As a free action(!), the night twist can create an omnidirectional Gust of Wind using its own DC instead of the regular Severe Winds DC. Basically all Medium or smaller creatures cannot approach closer. Large creatures and those who made their saving throws are met with its Entangle SLA, which prevent them from approaching closer. And if even then they can reach the night twist, there's always the 20ft reach. As a monster, that means a free attack of opportunity with your slam which breaks the Despair Song (the song is specifically said to stop working only on creatures attacked by the night twist's slam). As a PC, that means you can attack with Totemist-accessed natural weapons, use Large and in Charge to prevent them from reaching you even more easily, or have your allies attack them while they're "charmed". 
The problem? Al of that is subordinated to your ability to use Despair Song. And Despair Song is... Unwieldy. It's only useable during the evening, it's mind affecting (worse than that, it doesn't even affect creatures with less than 6 Int), and it's a HUGE radius that is unfriendly to basically everyone. If you're using it in town, you'll have hundreds of citizen coming to you begging for you to slam them, which will not only disturb your fight, but probably kill them all afterwards, since your strength is so damn high. Even if there's nobody less than 700ft away from you and the big bad, your party will be affected too, and you'll have to slam them to snap them out of it. And even around level 14, a 2d8+18 (considering you put all your points in strength) slam is nothing to sneeze at, and will be felt by the target, even nonlethal. Even your wind blast affects everyone in a 120ft radius, including your allies. 

Without Despair Song, the night twist is mostly a beatstick with SLAs, with classic but still really high beatstick-with-SLAs stats. Large size, +28 Str, -4 Dex, +18 Con, +2 Int, +4 Wis, +10 Cha. Obviously the strength is stellar, but the Charisma is also great, considering the night twist has Unholy Grace (Cha to AC and saves), and it makes even its low-level SLAs have DCs equivalent to pretty high-level ones. Yes, I'm talking about Entangle. And Fear. But mostly Entangle. All in all, its combat abilities are lower Necronaut's, with lower strength, a lower number of attacks despite higher BAB, no ability to wield weapons, and overall equivalent defensive abilities (equivalent +20 natural armor for both considering Unholy Grace, but putting points in Charisma may improve the night twist's; no SR and lower DR for the night twist, but DR/slashing is much more useful than DR/Lawful or magic; and undead immunities are better than plants immunities). The real problem is the low speed. At these levels, it's not too hard to find ways to gain fixed fly speed or something, but it's still a problem. Overall, I still think the night twist is better than the Necronaut in most ways, but the lower physical offense means it's just slightly better overall. Pretty strong *12 RHD*, *DLA-2*. In a mega-dungeon, or otherwise very combat-centric campaign, you might want to increase it to 13RHD, DLA-1 to account for Despair Song being actually useful with not many innocent casualties.


*Ancient night twist*, 25 RHD: The night twist cannot die of old age, and continues growing for its whole life, similarly to sequoias and other trees. After a few millenia, that's what you get. This advanced night twist is one size category bigger with regular stat increases, the elite array, and 6 slams instead of three. The slams are still dealing damage three categories bigger than normal, for a very respectable 4d6+Str per hit. Now we're talking! It also has much, much better SLAs, with notably Weird 1/day for mass murder and stunning, and CL 20 Circle of Death if you absolutely want to delete a 45 HD enemy beatstick. This kind of SLAs was what the night twist wanted all its life. I think it's good enough for a weak *16 RHD*, and *DLA-7*. The lack of SR is still disturbing, but that's what you get for being a lowly Material being.


The night twist seems to be as much a plot device as it is a monster, and all its abilities reflect that, from the "ominous wind" coming from the tree, to the whole city disappearing in the sewers to get eaten by a mysterious tree, and even its death throes are interesting. I didn't talk about it, because it shouldn't come up, but it inflicts a permanent Nightmare effect on whoever kills it, which is great with its focus on night and dusk.
Next time, we will have one of my favourite monsters, and one I feel was done the dirtiest both by the number of RHD, and by the LA-assignment thread. See you then for the Odopi!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Odopi*

*Spoiler: Quotes that make me sad*
Show




> -0 at ECL 20, not even close. This is flat out bad. Ugh.





> -0 no contest. I wish there was more to be said, but this one is just bleh.





> LA -0 for both, there is nothing to salvage here as a PC.





> Ewwwwwww. An aberration without even the natural weapons for Rapidstrike? EWWWWWWWWWWW.





> Give me a monk instead, and keep that thing away from character sheets for the love of everything.





The odopi. That's a monster that deserved to exist for more than one edition. Wonderfully weird, absolutely unique in its concept and as far as I know original to D&D and not cribbed off of a myth or legend from a remote part of the real world, the odopi would not have been out of place in the OD&D Monstrous Manual. It is linked to the Planes, its anatomy is simple yet engaging, and players know immediately what its deal is. Sadly, where WotC does well in lore and design, they fail spectacularly in terms of mechanical relevance. The Odopi has almost nothing for it that makes it even remotely challenging even as a CR 14 encounter, let alone against ECL 20 opponents. An aberration with average physical stats, woefully inadequate SLAs, and the whole "abilities that stopped being useful about 5 to 10 levels ago" package, with Improved Grab, Trample and Swallow Whole. Almost sad. I feel like the reason the odopi wasn't reprinted later was because they didn't know how to improve on it. It's a rolling tumbleweed of death, and that's all. 

And the playground doesn't like creatures with 20 RHD and no meaningful ability. So they went, assigned -0, spewed a few insults at the thing (as you do), even compared it to a monk (the poor thing didn't deserve to fall that low), and moved on. And I would have wholeheartedly agreed with them, but I feel like they glossed over a tiny detail. Now, I don't blame them, it's very subtle. But if you look closely at the art for the creature:



Can you see it? Yeah. That thing has ARMS. Arms for days? Arms for days. The odopi has arms with hands attached. About 50 of them, if I'm to believe the art. And although it can't use them for natural attacks and it can't wield weapons, 3.5 is a system with so many things that players could do that there is always a way to use them. 
These arms are the defining feature of the odopi, and the very difference between a player and a monster is that the player can choose what feats they choose. The odopi can explicitly use all its arms to manipulate thrown weapons ("Although its hands are dexterous enough to grasp, move, and throw objects, an odopi cannot wield melee or ranged weapons other than those that can be thrown."). Even if we're disregarding Throwing weapons and the fact that RAW, an odopi can wield a 8-handed Throwing masterwork longsword (using the Savage Species rules) and deal 4d6+31 with each hit (before point-buy. 4d6+49 if you assign an 18 to Str), that means that the odopi can take Multiweapon Fighting and throw 40 shurikens in a round. With Brutal Throw, that is a lot of damage. Or you could go even further and just take Multitasking. It requires you to boost your intelligence and has a three-feat tax, but it allows you to make 20 standard actions in a round. Even the very basic "I attack with my claw" action is broken when repeated 20 times, but there's no reason to think you couldn't use it with maneuvers. Every other round, you can spend one swift action on an "End of Turn" boost, then expand all your standard action maneuvers on the enemies. Next round, use your swift and one of your standard actions to recover all your maneuvers, then rinse and repeat. This kind of abuse is what I would have expected to at least be brought up in the original thread.

The odopi is pretty fast, with a 60ft speed, and its decent Dex, Will and Con mean it is quite hard to take out, and if you allow it to get 20 standard actions or to throw dozens of shurikens, it may be really good. Good enough for ECL 20? Sadly, even with that kind of favorable ruling, I don't think so. It needs at least a level of warblade to truly use its abilities, or one of monk to make unarmed strikes, and even if it would be a beast in combat, it does next to nothing against an opponent that it cannot beat up. High DR shuts it down, as do a lot of spells, and its innate SR is quite low (2+RHD), even if its other defensive abilities are average for such a monster (+14 NA, DR 10/Good, Fast Healing 7, all-around vision). Still, the sheer absurdity of so many attacks and/or actions per round is a good part of what makes the Hecatoncheires one of the scariest monsters in the game (that and the ridiculous defenses of the Hecatoncheires which makes them quite unbreakable except through sheer damage, but we're not asking the odopi to be CR 57), and I feel like allowing it, even on the weaker odopi chassis, is good enough to warrant paying *17 RHD* for it. And *DLA-3*. Either way, the odopi gets three levels to round up its arsenal before epic levels.


*Elder Odopi*, 30 RHD: The same, but bigger. The added strength is nice if you go the 8-handed sword route, but otherwise a painfully weak improvement. Not even better SLAs. *19 RHD*, *DLA-9*

*Spoiler: A saner, more boring DM's approach*
Show

You could say that since the odopi can only throw 4 rocks in a round, only 4 arms are useable for anything. In that case, the odopi just becomes a weak beatstick with only one standard action attack. Improved Grab is still decent (especially with the odopi ability to move while grappling without a grapple check, dealing Trample damage on the way), but it won't make you good. Your stats are balanced, but -4 Int always hurts, and 5ft reach is ludicrously low if you can't efficiently move across the battlefield. In that case, classes that improve your thrown weapons, like Bloodstorm Blade, are probably the way to go.  In that case, I suggest allowing the odopi with *9 RHD*, where its defensive abilities, as well as that big meaty claw will really shine. That way, it can take one initiator level, then finish Bloodstorm Blade. The chassis is so much worse than the kraken's that it isn't even funny, and the odopi can't even talk. With 20 RHD, *DLA-8* should be good. It needs the BAB, and it allows it to nab 9th-level maneuvers. The elder odopi is little more than an odopi advanced to Gargantuan size and 30 RHD, having its two ability score increases in Dexterity, and still probably worse than a kraken. *11 RHD*, *DLA-14*.



Odopi could have been so much more, but it is now condemned to oblivion by weird design. You can act against it. Use odopi in your games, if not as a PC, at least as a monster of the week. You too can do your part!
It's interesting to have these eyes in the palm of each hand. I personally imagine that these are not hands, but "baby odopi". There's no organ in the center of an odopi, only a stomach with not even a mouth, a glorified bag filled with acid. My guess is that the odopi is only a symbiotic creature between the "hands"  slug-like creatures with a functioning eye, body, organs and a mouth at the shoulder-equivalent , and the "stomach", a creature who evolved to not be able to move on its own, and to which the "hands" attach themselves to act as one big creature.

After this "Interesting Monster" intermission, we will now go back to our regularly scheduled "MM1 monster with more RHD". See you soon for the Skullcrusher ogre.

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## GreatWyrmGold

> Even the very basic "I attack with my claw" action is broken when repeated 20 times, but there's no reason to think you couldn't use it with maneuvers.


Am I missing something? The odopi's stat block only lists one claw under Full Attack, none of its special abilities seem to grant it additional attacks, and the errata only corrects the elder odopi's grapple bonus.

I can definitely see the sheer number of arms being a huge boost, especially if the DM lets you take Multitasking. But that turns this into a grisgol kind of situation, where a monster is broken if you lean into its broken mechanics and disappointing if you don't. I'm glad you added alternate judgements for if you don't allow that abuse, even if hiding them in a spoiler is kinda weird.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Am I missing something? The odopi's stat block only lists one claw under Full Attack, none of its special abilities seem to grant it additional attacks, and the errata only corrects the elder odopi's grapple bonus.
> 
> I can definitely see the sheer number of arms being a huge boost, especially if the DM lets you take Multitasking. But that turns this into a grisgol kind of situation, where a monster is broken if you lean into its broken mechanics and disappointing if you don't. I'm glad you added alternate judgements for if you don't allow that abuse, even if hiding them in a spoiler is kinda weird.


I was speaking about using Multitasking to get 20 standard actions and using them all to just make one claw attack each time. Nothing about full attacking. But full attacking with all arms can absolutely be done, only with thrown weapons and not with your claw. Also I'm not sure how that would interact with monks. Monks can do off-hand attacks during a full action, would a monk odopi make an off-hand attack with each of its arms if it had Improved Unarmed Strike?

I feel like that's different from the grisgol in that the grisgol gets to use its main feature, even prohibiting what is already pointed out by the book as substantially increasing its power. On the other hand (haha.), the odopi just uses its body shape the way every other monster with several arms does: by taking the Multiweapon Fighting line. It's much more immediate, and I feel like that's the difference between using a broken ability and abusing a theoretically non-broken one. I guess most of my complaints come from the fact that the whole point of the monster is that it has so many arms, and I'm disappointed that using these arms wasn't even mentioned in the original LA thread, despite the Playground's reputation to always look for the most nitpicky way to use everything in the game. That's just a waste of monster design!

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## GreatWyrmGold

> I was speaking about using Multitasking to get 20 standard actions and using them all to just make one claw attack each time. Nothing about full attacking.


_rechecks the Multitasking feat_
Huh. I feel like making separate attacks with all your arms should have been forbidden by the feat, and the feat text seems to imply that you need to take _different_ actions, but nothing in the rules actually forbids repeating the same action 20 times. Huh.




> I guess most of my complaints come from the fact that the whole point of the monster is that it has so many arms, and I'm disappointed that using these arms wasn't even mentioned in the original LA thread, despite the Playground's reputation to always look for the most nitpicky way to use everything in the game. That's just a waste of monster design!


I blame how the odopi tries to specifically prevent the obvious cheese you could do with a zillion arms. It doesn't do a very thorough job of it, but it can be hard to notice. And the only reason this works at all (unless you count throwing four weapons at different targets) is a specific 3.0 feat that I'd never heard of before you mentioned it.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> _rechecks the Multitasking feat_
> Huh. I feel like making separate attacks with all your arms should have been forbidden by the feat, and the feat text seems to imply that you need to take _different_ actions, but nothing in the rules actually forbids repeating the same action 20 times. Huh.
> I blame how the odopi tries to specifically prevent the obvious cheese you could do with a zillion arms. It doesn't do a very thorough job of it, but it can be hard to notice. And the only reason this works at all (unless you count throwing four weapons at different targets) is a specific 3.0 feat that I'd never heard of before you mentioned it.


Yeah, Multitasking is the obviously broken one, but by the rules, Multiweapon Fighting is enough to allow you to use all your arms, since the odopi only says it can only throw four _rocks_. As I said, you ca just throw 50 shurikens, or 50 knives with Quick Draw (you might want to get a gantlet of Infinite Blades). I mean, theoretically you don't even need MWF, but you'd take heavy penalties. Alternatively, since we're playing with the LA-assignment thread, why not become a skeleton? One claw per hand, available at your local dollar store! And who could forget about Fuse Arms, for a truly staggering +100 Str!!! Even Thor would shake in his boots before that... thing. (Here represented with the Girallon Arms soulmeld and a coat. Because you can be a freak of nature and still be stylish.) Or that one rule in Sword&Fist saying you can grapple with more than two arms to get a +4 bonus each time? Give me one monster that wouldn't get grappled by that! 

There has to be more, it's 3.5 after all. The point is, they didn't think that players could transform into an odopi, and that's honestly great! Not only for us freaks that assign LAs to the weirdest things, but because it makes for such original monsters. Most monsters have to take into account that the wizard could cast polymorph and take their shape, or that the druid may take Aberration Wild Shape, or even that the cleric could Planar Ally them. That is such a weight on game design that it shaped all of 3.5. There are so very few monsters with low HD and very high CR because of that. And when you ignore that, you get things like the odopi, or the ethergaunt, or the living spells, or the ravid. They are broken when full casters abuse them, but make for great puzzle or surprise encounters. The ability to change into and otherwise use monsters as allies is both the thing I hate most and love most in 3.5. It gives the system _so_ much personality, and makes high-level characters so unique, but they inflict such a stranglehold on game design that I've come to wish they would have implemented the Polymorph ban way earlier during the edition.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Skullcrusher Ogre*

Seriously? Monster Manual 1 already gave us regular ogre, two-headed ogre, aberration three-armed ogre, and magical flying ogre, and we only now get "ogre but slightly more intelligent and strong"? Who thought this was an interesting variation? 
The skullcrusher ogres are basically ogres sergeants, made and designed to be a low-level boss monster leading a few ogres in battle against the PCs. They are exactly what you'd expect.

- 8 Giant RHD, Large size with reach
- +14 Str, +6 Con, -2 Cha. Compared to a regular ogre, +4 Str, +2 Dex, +2 Con, +4 Int, +2 Cha. Nice to have no Int penalty, but nothing stellar, especially with so many RHD. Also +2 NA, or three less than the regular ogre. What? Who's the genius who gave their evolved ogre lower defense than the regular version?
- Rock throwing. Sure. 
- Two-Weapon Fighting and Improved Grapple. Where are you going with that?


*Spoiler: Why the skullcrusher ogre has one of the worst statblocks of the book*
Show

My Gruumsh that statblock is painful to read. The thing is, WotC wanted the Skullcrusher to *look* more intimidating than a regular ogre, but to actually not be. At all. The skullcrusher will appear in full-plate and with a shield! But we'll reduce its natural armor so that an ogre-fighting party could still hit it. It will make more attacks than a regular ogre! Except these attacks won't hit, and won't do much damage even if they do. WotC really wanted the skullcrusher to fight with a shield it seems. They gave it Imroved Shield Bash and TWF for that. But for a monster with such strength and no bonus damage, TWF is woefully inadequate. If you just compare it to a regular ogre, its morningstar as a standard action does _less_ damage if it hits (2d6+7 compared to 2d8+7). And if you allow it to make a full-round action to attack, it's even worse. The attack with the spiked shield deals an average of 7 damage and reduces its attack bonus with the morningstar, removing most of the advantage of full attacking in the first place. Because it doesn't even use a light shield, but a _one-handed_ one! And that's not even considering that great piece of text:
"Skullcrusher sergeants are canny fighters. Even when confronted by a well-armored foe, a sergeant will often use its
Power Attack feat, taking a 4 penalty on attack rolls to gain a +4 bonus on damage."
That's not being canny. That's being completely dumb. The skullcrusher ogre is using Power Attack while TWFing with a one-handed shield. Aaaaaaargh. Considering a "well-armored foe" has 19 AC (full plate, 12 Dex, absolutely not rare at CR 8), making a single attack with a morningstar deals 9.8 DPR, and doing the same with 4 points of PA deals 9 DPR. First, that's the damage output of a raging 2rd-level orc with no feats, but mostly that's _less than without using PA_. And full attacking makes it worse. +8/+3 (2d6+7), +8 (1d8+3) deals 14.25 DPR (just giving the Skullcrusher one of its subordinates greatclub would increase it to 21.85 DPR, more than a 50% improvement), but full-attacking with Power Attack (+4/-1 (2d6+11), +4 (1d8+7)) deals 9.75 damage per round. That's *less than a standard action attack with the morningstar and no Power Attack*! That's almost upsetting. No. No, there it is, that's upsetting. I'm upset. Set that was previously down is now up.

Point is, don't use a shield as a skullcrusher ogre. Don't use TWF with one-handed weapons in your off-hand. Don't use Power Attack with one-handed weapons. Don't use freaking Power Attack against heavily-armored opponents! I dislike that monster very much. And the fact that on top of all of this it has Improved Grapple as a bonus but no free hand to use it is only part of my exasperation. It's basically the definition of what you should never do as a player, and it's almost fascinating for it.


The Skullcrusher Ogre has hands, so that's not too bad, but overall it only brings to the balance its goodish stats, its abysmal natural armor and its Large size, since you're probably never going to use either TWF or Improved Grapple. I guess that's enough for *6 RHD*, *DLA-1*.


And because sometimes you just want to be everything, and a bit of the rest, next time we will review the Omnimental!

----------


## Morphic tide

Important note: As it's described with Full Plate and a Heavy Shield, and is a Giant, it's Proficient with all Simple and Martial weapons, all typical armor, and non-tower shields, plus having two albeit-in-tension bonus feats _and no Intelligence penalty_. I would strongly suggest 6 RHD/DLA -1 instead.

Playing along with its original setup, we have ourselves a perfect user for Blood-Spiked Charger. Because 2d8+5.5xStr on a Charge is a fine-enough pseudo-Pounce starting point, its requirement of an empty hand lets you use Improved Grapple with the benefits of being Large, you can get a net +1 to attack and AC if you have Combat Expertise, and you get a 2d8+3xStr Full-Round Action single swing for some rather severe demands of Improved TWF when you want to wreck one target next to you. Oh, and _you can actually have Combat Expertise_ to qualify for Improved Trip, which TWF attack volume is applicable to for all everyone obsesses over Spiked Chain Combat Reflexes setups.

Edit: Can also just be a Spiked Chain Tripper with Improved Grapple "wasted", but I figured I may as well mention the direction that gives you 70 average damage Charges (2d8+2+6xStr, with +10 mod from 16 assigned+14 racial) off a single Spiked Shield hit. If you go Psychic Warrior, you lose a bunch of its versatility for the privilege of 1pp for Huge and being able to be Gargantuan. Which means you can _try_ to Grapple the Tarrasque with that free hand, for all I'm fairly certain you need +100 Grapple to do that.

----------


## GreatWyrmGold

> *Skullcrusher Ogre*
> 
> Seriously? Monster Manual 1 already gave us regular ogre, two-headed ogre, aberration three-armed ogre, and magical flying ogre, and we only now get "ogre but slightly more intelligent and strong"? Who thought this was an interesting variation?


Technically, only one and a half of those are ogres. The problem isn't that there are too many kinds of ogres, it's that there are too many monsters in the ogre's niche.

Trolls deserve the love they get in the MM3, because A. D&D found something interesting to add to the legendary template and B. the MM3 found interesting ways to add to the basic D&D troll. The skullcrusher ogre doesn't have either of those things going for it; the ogre is just another big dumb bruiser, the skullcrusher ogre doesn't add anything to that except a whiff of eugenics and some questionable build choices. (The TWF heavy spiked shield was brought to you by the same brilliant minds whose druid threw scimitars and never wild shaped.)

If I was going to yes-and this into something better, I'd go one of two directions.

Option one, lean into the eugenics. The skullcrusher ogre has giant-like rock throwing? Yes, because it's the result of breeding ogres and giants, to make a soldier as strong as a giant but more pliable. They failed on both these accounts, and now skullcrushers are using their clear strengths to rally rival tribes of ogres to their banners, taking revenge on those who abused them and their forebears.
Crushing the eugenicsy mages is probably a good thing, but once they're done a massive ogre army in the middle of "civilized" territory will be looking for a place to call home. Balancing the "ogres have legitimate grievances with other races" angle with the "ogres are cannon fodder mooks" angle would be tricky, but it could be done.
(The lower natural armor might even be justifiable in this narrative, if a point is made that eugenics isn't effective. Sure, maybe the ogre/giant hybrid is liger-strong, but it's tigon-fragile.)

Option two, just make them ogres with class levels. They're not super-advanced ogres, they're just ogres who survived a bunch of battles and will survive many more. It's simpler, it's harder to make stupid errors like "the tougher ogre has barely any natural armor," and it uses the game's core mechanics instead of just juggling random numbers.

Anyways, I think Morphic Tide makes some interesting points. Not sure how important its armor proficiencies are when most classes who'd use such armor are proficient with the best armor that doesn't block their class abilities, but it's certainly not _nothing_.

----------


## Morphic tide

> Option one, lean into the eugenics.


I'd have the issues be a matter of not being able to select the _exact_ trait set due to the limits of the method in use, and the skewed priorities trying to force stuff that doesn't quite work that way and leaving issues for "post-production" solutions. Actually fits well with their statblock, very significantly more Intelligence and Strength, _slightly_ more Constitution and Dexterity, in exchange for less Natural Armor. AC is very cheap, ability scores are _very_ expensive. A Headband of Intellect +4 is 16,000 GP, while Fabricating Full Plate is 500 GP and livable rations are measured in single-digit CP per day. It is _not_ hard to justify some long-term villains deciding to spend a few centuries making subordinates to meet their demands, because multiple generations of selective breeding is still vastly cheaper than making up that Intelligence disadvantage with magic items.

Hell, D&D's actually gone at exactly this sort of thing on a variety of occasions with stuff like the Mul (sterile Human/Dwarf hybrids that are popular slaves on Athas), Neo-Orog (Orc-Ogre cross breeds of Thay with fertility issues induced by the magical alterations), Dray (Athasian "dragonborn" made by one of the Dragon Kings in an attempt to escape from Lichdom into full Dragon), Xixchil (hyper-individualist mantis-people with a habit of fleshshaping and grafting metal into themselves) the assorted shenanigans the Zik'chil get up to with the Kreen races (_totally not_ just the Xixchil of Athas), the Elans (formerly-human Abberations with resurrective immortality sans memories)...

Poking at magic-as-transhumanism and people-as-resources crops up _a lot_ in D&D settings, but Wizards of the Coast started moving it into a closet some time during 4th edition and rarely touched the depths of TSR _Weird_.




> Not sure how important its armor proficiencies are when most classes who'd use such armor are proficient with the best armor that doesn't block their class abilities, but it's certainly not _nothing_.


There's niche cases where you can take just one level for skills to qualify for a PRC instead of needing another for a weapon or armor proficiency. Vengeance Knight, Knight of the Silver Pearl, Eldritch Knight, Knight Phantom, the Sword and Fist version of Cavalier, Sanctified Mind, Spellsword, it's edge-cases that are mostly Gish builds but they can matter. And fits in further with the "thoroughly specialized to Wizard Overlord attempt" direction, that they're well-situated to small bits of Wizard casting backing up drastic physical ability for _cheap_ overall value.

----------


## GreatWyrmGold

> Hell, D&D's actually gone at exactly this sort of thing on a variety of occasions with stuff like the Mul (sterile Human/Dwarf hybrids that are popular slaves on Athas), Neo-Orog (Orc-Ogre cross breeds of Thay with fertility issues induced by the magical alterations), Dray (Athasian "dragonborn" made by one of the Dragon Kings in an attempt to escape from Lichdom into full Dragon), Xixchil (hyper-individualist mantis-people with a habit of fleshshaping and grafting metal into themselves) the assorted shenanigans the Zik'chil get up to with the Kreen races (_totally not_ just the Xixchil of Athas), the Elans (formerly-human Abberations with resurrective immortality sans memories)...
> 
> Poking at magic-as-transhumanism and people-as-resources crops up _a lot_ in D&D settings, but Wizards of the Coast started moving it into a closet some time during 4th edition and rarely touched the depths of TSR _Weird_.


It's a little weird, but also, D&D has been criticized for how biologically essentialist its races are. High elves are smarter than half-orcs, that's an objectively true fact indicated by their Attribute bonuses, and this is just a fact of the world. {Scrubbed}

Having eugenics unambiguously _work_ just supports that bio-essentialism. {Scrubbed} 

Now, it's not hard to come up with an alternative to eugenics. D&D is a high fantasy-kitchen-sink setting, even if it only has one _kind_ of kitchen sink. You could have your super-soldier-making villains manufacture their soldiers by binding minor demons to them, or doing blood sacrifice to give one ogre the strength of ten of its relatives, or cut out the "mercy" part of their soul and replace it with some kind of power source. Hell, it could just be a spell! Most buffs can't be made permanent with _permanency_, but who cares? You're the game-writer, say that there's some lost ritual that lets evil wizards make them! And if you need to specifically combine two things for the concept to work, there's always surgery.

{Scrubbed}

Then again, WotC hasn't published _nearly_ as much for 5e as they did for 3.5. By Wikipedia's count, 5e has eight supplements and eight setting books (including three MtG settings and two podcast splatbooks), while 3.5 has 61 supplements, three compendia, and _Ghostwalk_, which is kinda a supplement but I'd argue more of a setting book. I didn't count 4e's books, but it looks like it has a bit fewer than 3.5, and like those sourcebooks are _much_ narrower in focus (_"Psionic Power - Options for Ardents, Battleminds, Monks and Psions,"_ for instance).

3.5 had a _lot_ more space for evil super-people-makers.

----------


## Morphic tide

> It's a little weird, but also, D&D has been criticized for how biologically essentialist its races are. {Scrub the post, scrub the quote}


{Scrubbed}

Allegory is Fantasy Worldbuilding 101, and narrative experimentation with unreal basis is Fantasy Worldbuilding 102. It has been long held as _intensely_ awful writing to insist on having no shred of support for disagreed with positions in literature, and archetypal fantasy is even more dependent on offering at least a toe-hold to the opposed opinion due to the extreme frequency of Literally Pure Evil as a physical force making terribly wrong things happen in thoroughly unnatural ways. Unless you _also_ want to finish the annihilation of the entire Great Wheel cosmology and afterlife system for moral ambiguity... There's Ebberon for that, let the grogs keep Faerun!

{Scrubbed}




> {Scrub the post, scrub the quote}


Because a good chunk of the business model is saving on development costs by leaving stuff to older works, so actively overturning a huge pile of it finishes losing them the nostalgia-driven section of their audience not _Incredibly Actively In Favor_ of having political shifts supersede the decades of convention said segment is here for going back to far more intricate work than WotC has ever done themselves. Any consideration of applying such to the Illithidae demands near-total decanonization of the Illithiad and massive changes to their _iconic_ biology, for example, and good luck getting anywhere with the dragons

Additionally, the business' best interest is maintaining homogeneity so that the play groups, and thus market, are fungible for wide ranges of products. Screwing this up is a major contributor to what killed TSR, they kept releasing incompatible campaign settings with different basic rules, so past successes did not lead to future ones. Wizards of the Coast has no way to do this directly, they can only design products and make public statements, and consequently their best choice is "nothing". Just take a look at how hard people complain about the recent Spelljammer!

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

I feel that one of the thing that makes people tick is the naming of the different species as races. No one would tick if I said that "on average, humans are more intelligent than dogs", whatever your definition of intelligence is. Most people would not react if I also said that the difference between humans and dogs is mostly one of degree, and not of fundamental nature. These two statements imply that there might exist species that are, on average, more intelligent than dogs and less intelligent than humans. Illithids have extraordinary memory and ability to understand the world around them (higher Intelligence and Wisdom in game terms), and they are described as an available "race", a monstrous race. 
The second thing is the fact that, by magic, you can combine characteristics of various species. That is something upon which the D&D universe is based from the start. From owlbears to half-dragons and all the "wizard did it" in-between, changing that would require reworking the whole universe, and as Morphic Tide said, that would make a lot of players turn tail (honestly, including myself. I despised the upending of most of the lore in 4e and much prefer how 5e mostly came back to something consistent with earlier editions). It would also greatly reduce the design possibilities from WotC that would have to make a lot of monsters independant from each other and delete most templates.

"Eugenics work in D&D world" is mainly a byproduct of these two facts. It would be weird to have half-dragons be stronger than regular creatures, and not have wizards be able to breed creatures to improve their abilities. But I feel like one problem seems to be specifically increased intelligence as a result of selective breeding. The thing is, Intelligence as one of the ability scores is how the game works, and having ways to modify it by the same way you can increase other ability scores, both as a player and in the lore, is really the only way the world works consistently. The only way different races can not have different average intelligence (once again, specific half-orcs can very well be much more intelligent than most sun elves) and hence, not validate "racism beliefs" would be to completely remove Intelligence as an ability score, and by extension all mental ability scores, which would, I'm sure everyone would agree, remove a lot of the charm and complexity of the game.





> Anyways, I think Morphic Tide makes some interesting points. Not sure how important its armor proficiencies are when most classes who'd use such armor are proficient with the best armor that doesn't block their class abilities, but it's certainly not _nothing_.





> There's niche cases where you can take just one level for skills to qualify for a PRC instead of needing another for a weapon or armor proficiency.


I'm not absolutely convinced, considering the situationality of gaining racial weapon proficiencies and TWF on a Str-based monster, but I'll yield to the majority. Changed to *6 RHD*, *DLA-1*.

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## GreatWyrmGold

> {Scrub the post, scrub the quote}
> 
> [...]
> 
> {Scrub the post, scrub the quote}


Oh my god, there's so much to unpack here, and it's all off-topic.

Let's start with the easy stuff!
{Scrubbed}

Human societies force wildly divergent environmental conditions on different segments of the population. {Scrubbed}

Suffice to say, there are tons of studies on how personal beliefs can be shaped by the media we consume. Not all studies demonstrate a link between media X and belief Y (for instance, Call of Duty and violence), but those studies should not be taken as evidence against the idea that media _can_ affect people, especially when there are academic studies demonstrating that cultivation theory is, often, a thing.

{Scrubbed}

My understanding of the academic consensus is that media is bad at getting you to do specific actions, but good at shaping values and worldview. That's why morality tales have been a thing as long as humanity has told tales; stories are good at communicating worldviews and value systems.

{Scrubbed}

Tolkien didn't write _The Lord of the Rings_ as an allegory for anything, but that doesn't mean he didn't inject his beliefs about how the world worked into his books. Even a superficial reading of the series reveals themes about the devastation of war and nature, pride and courage, and the nature of good and evil. 

{Scrubbed}

And games have a unique power to portray this kind of stuff. TRPGs usually don't have preset characters or plotlines, but they _do_ describe how the world works, in quite overt and literal ways. This is less true of narrativist games, whose mechanics are explicitly framed as being tools for collective story-telling, but D&D is definitely on the simulationist side of the curve. It portrays a fantasy world, yes, but one that implicitly functions like ours in many ways. In particular, while its people might have gray skin or pointy ears, they are still _people_. They look like people, they act like people, and you are encouraged to treat them like people (or at least like certain archetypes treat certain categories of people).

{Scrubbed}

*TL;DR: It's more complicated than that, and those complications matter.*




> {Scrub the post, scrub the quote}
> 
> Allegory is Fantasy Worldbuilding 101, and narrative experimentation with unreal basis is Fantasy Worldbuilding 102. It has been long held as intensely awful writing to insist on having no shred of support for disagreed with positions in literature, and archetypal fantasy is even more dependent on offering at least a toe-hold to the opposed opinion due to the extreme frequency of Literally Pure Evil as a physical force making terribly wrong things happen in thoroughly unnatural ways. Unless you also want to finish the annihilation of the entire Great Wheel cosmology and afterlife system for moral ambiguity... There's Ebberon for that, let the grogs keep Faerun!


I didn't say any of that! 

{Scrubbed}

First off: I don't think this thread should try to fix WotC's mistakes, except the ones related to level adjustment. Duh. I just think WotC should fix WotC's mistakes.

{Scrubbed}

Third, I don't think D&D 6e should get rid of the concept of race. I just think it should be handled a bit differently. If I had to summarize what I'd want, I'd say to put less emphasis on it and more on background. I'd probably design it so that race set a few basic statistics about how you move in the world (like size and speed) and gave a few fun flavorful abilities, with backgrounds being where you get your build-defining stat boosts and powers, but I'd settle for the two being more equitable. Getting +1 Intelligence from being a high elf wouldn't stand out as much if you got +2 Intelligence from being a scholar.

The key word here is "framing". And I'm going to go outside the realm of gaming for a moment, because I have a really clear example that I just thought of and which only takes a couple minutes to experience. "Door-Fighter!!" and "Wigglesticks" are both short songs released by Gavin Dunne in 2012, both make fun of repetitive mechanics used by then-relevant games to spice up their action scenes. Yet they are _not_ saying the same thing. One of them is actively criticizing the use of that mechanic, the other is playfully roasting it, and I don't think I need to tell you which is which. Why?

Well, one song focuses on what the player does, the other on what the player _character_ does, indicating different levels of immersion or investment. One has a plodding, simplistic melody, indicating that the mechanic is boring and simple; the other has an energetic, fast-paced melody, indicating that the mechanic is _exciting_. And of course, there are the lyrics. The difference between calling the main character thick and calling him a door-fighter(!!) is a bit subtle; both are making fun of that character. But it's obvious that one line is laughing _at_ the main character and one is laughing _with_ him.

Now, you could argue that the difference between "I hate wooden ****!" and "His spatial awareness is that of a brick" rises to the level of text, rather than framing. {Scrubbed}

Fourth, I don't think D&D _needs_ race, except insofar as it needs to look like previous editions of D&D, but that's an argument that can be levied against _any_ change. The existence of the Race space is not a sacred cow. Some fantasy characters are defined by their race (Constable Carrot being a prominent example in my mind), but more are defined by their backgroundthe proud prince, the humble farmer, the stoic hunter. Race is usually irrelevant.

I'd go so far as to argue that race is irrelevant for the non-human members of the Fellowship of the Ringthe hobbits uniquely suited to bear the One Ring, and the progenitor of every dwarf/elf rivalry in modern fantasy. The hobbits don't resist the allure of the Ring better than Gandalf because they are hobbits and he is a wizard; they resist it because they grew up in a humble rustic village and he grew up as an angel walking among mere mortals. It's not their genes that matter, but their backgrounds.
Likewise, Legolas and Gimli don't fight because elves and dwarves are incompatible the way cats and dogs are; the whole point of their rivalry is that they can grow past it. They fight at first because of how they were raisedbecause of the longstanding rivalry between elves and dwarves, because of their fathers' conflict, because they see the differences between them and not the similarities.

_Not a single thing_ about D&D (except the art) would have to change if every humanoid race was replaced by humans. You have the warlike Plainsmen, the magocratic Thayans, the rustic Ffolk, and so on. I don't understand why anyone could consider race to be _that_ important.

*TL;DR: I never said any of the things you say I said. Also, it's weird that you think races being fundamentally different is a central pillar of D&D.*





> Because a good chunk of the business model is saving on development costs by leaving stuff to older works, so actively overturning a huge pile of it finishes losing them the nostalgia-driven section of their audience not _Incredibly Actively In Favor_ of having political shifts supersede the decades of convention said segment is here for going back to far more intricate work than WotC has ever done themselves. Any consideration of applying such to the Illithidae demands near-total decanonization of the Illithiad and massive changes to their _iconic_ biology, for example, and good luck getting anywhere with the dragons
> 
> Additionally, the business' best interest is maintaining homogeneity so that the play groups, and thus market, are fungible for wide ranges of products. Screwing this up is a major contributor to what killed TSR, they kept releasing incompatible campaign settings with different basic rules, so past successes did not lead to future ones. Wizards of the Coast has no way to do this directly, they can only design products and make public statements, and consequently their best choice is "nothing". Just take a look at how hard people complain about the recent Spelljammer!


I'd like to start by reminding you that I _never_ said anything about getting rid of intelligent monsters. 
{Scrubbed}

(Plus, illithids and dragons are alien enough that the same rules don't apply. They have radically different natures _and_ radically different nurtures; with the vague lore D&D tends towards, whether monsters seem dominated by nature or nurture has more to do with the context they're embedded in than it does the monsters themselves.)
{Scrubbed} I see two core arguments here. One is philosophical, the other economical.

The philosophical argument is, charitably, that D&D should avoid changing too much to avoid keep it _like D&D_. This is another one of those things where I agree with the principle but not the conclusion. D&D _should_ take care to keep itself like D&D. But in that form, that argument is an argument against ever changing _anything_ about D&D, which is obviously absurd. For all my 3.5 nostalgia, I have to admit that both 5e and PF2 made big improvements on it, albeit in very different directions. (And that's not getting into the editions that came before the first one I played, which I think are as needlessly obtuse as everyone thinks the editions of D&D before their first are.)

So while this argument has merit, it needs to be refined. We need to establish what things make D&D feel like D&D, and avoid changing those. For instance: I despise Vancian magic with every fiber of my being, from both a worldbuilding and mechanical perspective, but I acknowledge that it's part of what makes D&D feel like D&D. A rigid class/level system is core to D&D feeling like D&D. {Scrubbed}  The importance of d20's is core to D&D feeling like D&D. The importance of race is _not_.

And yeah, that's ultimately subjective. But I could make solid arguments for the first four things being core to D&D, arguments that I don't think anyone would have an issue with (beyond "Why are you arguing this point?") But I don't think there's any solid argument for why race needs to be the second-most-important line on your character sheetahead of alignment, of traits and flaws, of bonds, of background. Only "Race has always been important".

It's also worth pointing out that race has gotten _dramatically_ less important over time. Originally, Dwarf and Elf were _classes_. (And classes were a lot more rigid in AD&D than they are in 5e.) Then the class/race system was implemented, but the classes each (non-human) race could select from were sharply limited. Then any race _could_ pick any class, but some had ability penalties or negative racial features that made certain classes nonviable. Then ability penalties were removed; while some races are better wizards, none are _incompetent_ wizards. At no point did devaluing the importance of race make D&D stop feeling like D&D, the way removing Vancian casting did.

{Scrubbed}

I imagine your next argument would be that removing or reducing the bioessentialism of D&D wouldn't attract _that_ many players. First off, I don't think that's true; 5e's PHB made some really basic moves towards trans acceptance, and now trans people playing D&D is...a thing? I don't want to be more specific than that because I'm too cis to understand how _significant_ of a thing it is, but in terms of player volume, it's a good number.

More importantly, though? _Almost nobody would be driven out._ {Scrubbed} The overwhelming majority of WotC's customers would react to this sort of change somewhere between "Huh, that's nice" and "Huh, that's weird," before continuing to play D&D anyways. But even if I'm wrong, if hundreds of thousands of grognards flee the hobby {Scrubbed}, that is a good thing! I would rather welcome one La'Ron Readus into the community than a dozen Sargons of Akkad.

*TL;DR: One argument is insufficient to demonstrate what you need it to demonstrate. The other is focused on business rather than ethics, and also based on faulty assumptions. Finally: Stop putting words in my mouth! Illithids are rad!*





> The second thing is the fact that, by magic, you can combine characteristics of various species. That is something upon which the D&D universe is based from the start. From owlbears to half-dragons and all the "wizard did it" in-between, changing that would require reworking the whole universe, and as Morphic Tide said, that would make a lot of players turn tail (honestly, including myself. I despised the upending of most of the lore in 4e and much prefer how 5e mostly came back to something consistent with earlier editions). It would also greatly reduce the design possibilities from WotC that would have to make a lot of monsters independant from each other and delete most templates.


If I said the things Morphic tide said I said, this would be a good argument. But I don't think wizards shouldn't combine different creatures in magical experiments. In fact, I supported the idea of wizards doing experiments in the very post! I just think the emphasis should be on the "wizard experiment" part, not the "crossbreed" part.

Also, the skullcrusher ogre isn't even the result of sinister magical experiments. It's not half-ogre, half-rhino or something. It's just the result of mundane eugenics. I feel like that's enough reason for me not to have mentioned other kinds of magical experiment in my previous post.

----------


## truemane

*Metamagic Mod*: Stay away from, real-world political topics, please. Even if someone else starts it. We depend on everyone to keep their eyes on their own work and stay as far away from all this sort of things as possible.

----------


## Beni-Kujaku

*Omnimental*
_Water.
Earth
Fire.
Air.
Long ago, the Inner Planes lived together in harmony. Then, everything changed when the Fire Elementals attacked.
Only the Omnimental, master of all four elements, could bring peace back to the multiverse. But when the Planes needed him most, he went feral. 
Eons passed, and the descendants of the Omnimental are now available as PC races. And although their number of RHD is much too high, I believe omnimentals_ can _become playable!_


During the war between the four Elemental Planes, as in every war, some of the soldiers wanted nothing more than to see peace restored. But how can you negociate when even touching an enemy can extinguish you, vaporize you, crush you or blow you away? Four Huge elementals, one of each element, met in secret. They needed a herald, powerful enough that even the Elder elementals could do nothing but hear them out, and who could travel the four planes without being utterly destroyed by the planar weather. After much deliberations, they finally resolved to sacrifice everything for their cause. In a powerful ritual, they fused their body in one. The first Omnimental was born.
The Omnimental was designed to sustain any elemental environment, using each of its four parts as the outer layer to protect the other three, and to be able to move anywhere, be it water, fire or air. And not earth, because they forgot to give it a freaking *burrow speed*! That would have been so cool to have exactly 4 movement modes. As it is, it's just an emissary for three elements... Still better than the Tempest having only a Fly speed.
Unfortunately, having four conflicting personalities does not a stable mind make, and the Omnimental started fighting in the war they swore to end. Even today, omnimentals continue fighting things anywhere, but are mostly found in the Elemental Plane of Fire, where their abilities are ironically the least destructive.

Elementals double in number of RHD each time they gain a size category, but WotC quickly saw that going above Huge would make for way too many HD, and went for Elder and Greater elementals instead. The Omnimental is the embodiment of "what if we didn't stop there?".

 It is Gargantuan, and expectedly has 32 RHD (which, if you read the first few posts of this thread, you know we will greatly reduce this number). 
Its ability scores are close to those of an Elder Earth Elemental, with +2 Str, +2 Dex, a weird +8 Con, and +11 NA to fit its CR (total +24 Str, +0 Dex, +18 Con, +0 Int, Wis and Cha, +26 NA). The natural armor is completely out of line with the other abilities, and is honestly really good.
Its attacks are based on an Elder Fire Elemental's, only with a size increase and an additional 1d8 electricity. It can also throw a part of itself up to 100ft dealing slightly less damage than a slam, but with no iterative, using its lower Dex, and dealing 10 damage to itself (a formality, considering your ginormous HP pool). I mean, it cannot use a bow like the giants can, so its a little more useful, but still not game-changing.
Its speed is a rough average of Air, Fire and Water, with 50ft land, swim and flying (perfect). Always good, but if you're not going to give it a burrow speed, might as well just give it Air's flying speed. It would have been better.
DR 10/-, immunity to fire and vulnerability to cold are expected, and immunity to electricity is welcome. 
Sadly, no Elemental Mastery and no whirlwind transformation, but the Omnimental has blindsight 120ft instead. That is... Good. Out of the blue and without explanation, but good.
And finally, Death Birth. When it reaches 0 HP (not necessarily when it dies), its component elementals separate, and it changes into four Huge elementals. This would prevent any resurrection even if being an elemental didn't already make that difficult, since you're not actually dead. That's one of the best Death Throes in the entire game, but there's no real way to abuse it, as even Jade Phoenix Mage's Emerald Immolation doesn't reduce your HP. At least your party might still win a fight even if you die in it, but it's still probably better to disregard it.


All in all, you're quite a bit stronger than an Elder Earth elemental, but the absence of Earth Glide really hurts, even though the flying speed compensates. I think *11 RHD* is an okay estimation, mostly because of the natural armor. 32 RHD give it so many feats and BAB that the party's fighter would be jealous if he didn't prestige class out about 8 to 10 levels earlier to get actual class features. All in all, at this level, these 22 additional RHD are probably worth 5 or 6 ECL. I'll go with *DLA-15* for now.


After the ogre and the elementals, the Otyughs are the next ones to get revisited in MM3. See you next time for the Lifeleech Otyugh!

Also, first time one of my threads got moderated. Such emotion  :Small Cool: !

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## GreatWyrmGold

Whoo. Moderation. I'd complain about how GitP has never clarified the line between political and apolitical, but if scrubbing the "everything is political" paragraph is any indication, discussions about what counts as "political" are, themselves, political.

Maybe I just need to stop expressing opinions so nobody can drag me into a political argument by saying my opinions are stupid. (Which they aren't.)
Omnielementals are...um...big. Many people consider "all-your-powers-combined" sorts of monsters to be interesting and exciting. Omnielementals represent this concept applied to elementals. They have some abilities in common with other elementals and some which are not. This sounded like a funny joke when I started typing it but I am rapidly running out of material.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Lifeleech Otyugh*

As Halloween approaches, we're still four monsters away from any Undead. No matter, we still have a kind of vampire, but one that sucks Conjuration (Healing) spells instead of blood. 

An Otyugh is a weird three-legged creature with grappling tentacles, a big scary mouth, a flexible eyed antenna and horrendously low ability scores for its number of RHD. A lifeleech otyugh is a weird three-legged creature with grappling tentacles, a big scary mouth, a flexible eyed antenna and... ability scores ranging from pretty good to excellent. +16 Str, +6 Dex, +12 Con, -4 Int, +8 Wis, -2 Cha, or a total of +36. 
It also has the ability to be considered a target of all Conjuration (Healing) spells and SLAs cast in a 60ft-radius from it. Yes that includes normally touch and personal spells. And if it is already full life (which it always is between fights with its Fast Healing 5), it gains that many HP as temporary HP. Amusingly, while the regular otyugh transmits a disease (the filth fever), the lifeleech basks in so much healing that it is perfectly sane and safe to be bitten by one (if you don't mind the teeth ripping through your flesh, of course). As a PC, that means you will most probably use a mouthpick weapon, since there's nothing you really lose (the bite itself dealing pitiful damage). The lifeleech otyugh is very well equipped defensively (5 natural armor, 4 deflection to AC, +12 Con, Fast Healing 5 and Lifeleech Aura), and very decently offensively (Large size, +16 Str (!), 40ft speed and 20ft climb, and 4 tentacles with Improved Grab and 15ft reach). 
The only reasons why the lifeleech otyugh ended up in the Negative LA thread is because it can't natively use most items, has -4 Int, and because it's not quite sure where to go from there. That +8 Wis seems promising, but there's not that many casting prestige classes using this stat. Two levels of Unarmed Swordsage and one of barbarian would probably be good to give it more AC and build to its strengths without needing mouthpick weapons, then you go Champion of Gwynharwyf or another full BAB Wisdom-based Prestige Class to gain a few spells while keeping the ability to reach +16 BAB eventually. Runescarred Berserker might be good, since you just heal immediately your scars, and its spell list is absolutely awesome, even though it costs a lot of money.

All in all, there's a lot to love here, and I think *8 RHD* is fair. Maybe someone will find a way to make Lifeleech Aura broken someday, but I really don't see it. *DLA-1*.


There was a bit of a debate about whether or not the lifeleech otyugh could be resurrected if someone cast resurrection in a 60ft radius. I... don't think I've ever seen a situation where a party resurrects several of its members at the same time. Anyway, next time, we will have creatures that are sure to be resurrected after death, but would maybe prefer not to, that is the Phoelarch! And the Phoera.

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## GreatWyrmGold

Lifeleech Aura is a wasted ability on any creature with native fast healing. It's a _cool_ wasted ability, but that's about it. IIRC, Lifeleech lets your party get double the benefit of any healing spells cast...but in-combat healing is rarely a good use of your actions, and fast healing covers out-of-combat healing 99% of the time. I guess it's handy if your opponents use heal spells when you're low on hit points, but that's pretty niche.

Autohealing damage from runescars is neat, but they last indefinitely and the main limiting factor is the cost. I suppose the gold doesn't matter as much when you can't use most items, but the XP still hurts. I don't think it's that much of a hack. Swordsage/Champion of Gwynharwyf looks good, too, though I'd probably try to get the rage class feature from a source other than Barbarian...mostly because the class description claims you need to be a barbarian and I'm contrarian that way.

Just going straight unarmed swordsage might not be a bad idea. Four Improved Grab tentacles ain't half bad, especially if you can get your Grapple bonus high enough that you can take the -20 penalty to just hold some enemies (especially small, squishy ones) in the tentacle while attacking other folks.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Phoera, Phoelarch, Vazalka, Vazalkyon*
For the day of the dead, we have undying phoenixes. Or at least humanoid descendants of the phoenix, which asks a lot of questions about phoenix reproduction. And like the phoenix from MM2, they have absolutely sh** stats and AC, but make up for that with their spell-like and other supernatural abilities. And of course, when they die, they explode, and leave an egg that hatches into a little bird. Yes, even when the original is a feathered humanoid. Of course, like the phoenix, the new creature doesn't have the memories of the previous one, it's a whole new creature. This means that this ability is useless for PCs beyond Death Throes (an impressively strong 10d6 Fire in a 20ft radius which might just kill your friends more than anything else) and completely prevents resurrection. 

Phoelarchs are described as all having wanderlust and spending their lives wandering the land, meeting new people and fighting injustice. That's a nice way to say "these are just random encounters". At least they're not unnecessarily Evil, which is kind of an upgrade in this book. 

- Medium Monstrous Humanoid (Fire), 7 RHD. At least it's full BAB, and immunity to Fire is good, but that's nothing impressive
- +4 Str, +6 Dex, +4 Con, +0 Int, +2 Wis, +6 Cha. That's just not that good. the Charisma bonus is interesting, but that's a bit too average and doesn't focus on anything. Also +2 NA is really low.
- Fire-focused SLAs, including at-will scorching ray and 1/day Fire Shield. 1d6 Heat to each attack with a metal weapon. 
- SR 11+HD, Heals from Fire. These are really great abilities. Nice SR, and healing from fire with an at-will fire SLA means you're starting every fight with full life. Sad that the rest of the chassis is so... generic.
- bonus feats Great Fortitude and Alertness. Immunity to poison and disease. Not game-changing, but nice to have once in a while. 
- Death Throes, Rise from the Ashes. Basically irrelevant.

The phoelarch just has average everything except for its infinite out-of-combat healing and its SR. And obviously, that's not good enough at ECL 7. That said, the stats and SLAs may not be too bad with *5 RHD*. But I'm honestly not sure where to go from there. Not enough attacks for rogue, not enough strength for barbarian. Maybe some sort of incarnum user? Or eldritch glaive warlock, to really use both that BAB and Cha bonus (maybe the glaive can even conduct Heat). Probably *DLA-1*, but it might be pretty weak.


*Phoera*
The bird that comes out of the egg left after a Phoelarch dies. Only hatches if undamaged for 24h (unlikely even if you're facing opponents with animal intelligence, who will probably just eat the egg, and intelligent enemies will notice the egg and destroy it, so a Phoera probably only hatches when the Phoelarch's death throes have obliterated any hostile creature in the vicinity).
The phoera is a 3 RHD Medium Magical Beast with comparable stats to the phoelarch (+2 Str, +6 Dex, +2 Con, +2 Wis, +4 Cha), except with a -8 to Int, a surprisingly better natural armor with +3, and the ability to fly (60ft good). No hands is obviously bad, but it has a claw/claw/bite routine that works pretty well with its 1d6 Heat and that put enemies on fire if they hit, and an impressive breath weapon for its HD dealing 5d4 3/day in a 30ft line. It also still heals from fire. That's basically the very best you can ask for on a magical beast chassis of this level, with both defensive and offensive abilities, and an infinite healing trick just waiting to happen. I'm not comfortable allowing this at ECL 2, so even if it will have a bit of a hard time advancing to mid and high-levels, I'll say *3 RHD*, *DLA-0*.

*Cold variants*
Vazalkyons are just cold-based Phoelarchs, and Vazalkas are cold-based Phoera. Assuming the conversion is made properly (any instance of fire becomes cold, Vazalkyons create Vazalkas upon death, and the SLAs are replaced with equivalent cold-based ones), then no change is necessary. If we only follow the book, the Vazalkyons heal from cold but are still using fire-based SLAs, which hampers its infinite healing trick. In that case, *5 RHD*, *DLA-2*.


Phoelarchs and Phoeras are pretty boring if you don't work for it, despite having an interesting concept that could have yielded something good. Next time, we will have a deliciously silly monster whose concept could never have yielded anything better, the Plague Brush!

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## GreatWyrmGold

> And of course, when they die, they explode, and leave an egg that hatches into a little bird. Yes, even when the original is a flying humanoid. Of course, like the phoenix, the new creature doesn't have the memories of the previous one, it's a whole new creature. This means that this ability is useless for PCs beyond Death Throes (an impressively strong 10d6 Fire in a 20ft radius which might just kill your friends more than anything else) and completely prevents resurrection.


Point 1: Maybe this is just my love of complicated life cycles talking, but I like the idea that phoelarches are reborn as more phoenix-like creatures. It's like their mortal flesh burns away, leaving only the living flame.

Point 2: I also like the idea of the party having a pet fire bird to remember their old party member by. It feels like the kind of thing you'd see in a fantasy adventure serial. Party members come and go, but they're never forgotten.

Now, neither of these should affect ECL, but that doesn't mean they don't matter _at all_.

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## Morphic tide

Given that True Resurrection, which does not need the body, is not on the whitelist of functional revival methods, it seems the in-universe obstacle is that the soul is in the succeeding Phoera/Vazaalka, and thus you engage in the same "magical fuzzy-logic guarantees your replacement indistinguishable" system as a Globe of Annihilation, and unlike most such mechanics the problem is that the soul has a _different_ life. Which implies the possibility of manufacturing new candidate souls from Miracle creating a replacement that has the Jade Phoenix Mage levels, and any such Phoera would appear to be a valid candidate. You could have a high-level party with at least one other Jade Phoenix Mage easily justify a Phoera "line" that keeps recalling who they were via Rite of Awakening, thus remaining the same PC because of RAW-compatible reincarnation stacking in horrible abuse of what's supposed to be campaign-guiding fluff text rather than a serious character mechanic, in a cost-saving that's not the _worst_ way to spend three levels.

Stats-wise, we have -14 Str, +8 Dex, -6 Con, -2 Int, -4 Wis, and +4 Cha relative to a Treant for the Phoelarch, for a net -14, having an at-will Standard Action two 4d6 Fire damage Ranged Touch Attacks with 50 ft. range plus a 1/day 10-minute Produce Flame for 1d6+5 attacks, up to 10 of which COULD be 120 ft. range if a solid 10 rounds of back-to-back use, and basically free Flaming Weapon on melee damage... Versus a Twinned 6th-level spell at will which makes more of their base statblock, nominally CR 8 creatures. To say nothing of the advantages of being Huge in the Big Dumb Beater niche, which the Phoelark is near-certainly stuck in because 7 RHD. If we're comparing other monsters, I can easily see this being debated as a choice at 5 RHD _and_ DLA -2 against the stand-outs down at ECL 5.

For the Phoera, however, I'm mystified at it being classed -0 the first time, because "oh, you can't source Fire damage yourself" means nothing when you can just _sit on a torch_. Fire is _extremely_ easy to get ahold of. Always-on +1d6 damage from any damage source available to it, with a not-trash Natural Attack routine to start off with, a good _spread_ of ability bonuses that work well for anything it _can_ do with the absence of hands, Natural flight's still a decent advantage this low...

Oh, and the Cold "equivalent" can easily turn obnoxious because that's a Con-based Fortitude save vs. Shaken on Bite and Claw attacks. One may at first think that's just three shots a basic -2 to some stuff, but no, it may in fact be seven, because Girallon Arms bound to Totem does not sanity-check against "didn't you already have Claws?" by RAW and is a physically different body part from the ones giving Claws here, and _you can stack Fear with it_, which forces rounds wasted running away on just two failed saves.

So I'll suggest LA +0 on the Phoera because it's _at least_ fine for a range of classes, and LA +1 on the Vazalka just to curb the trivial Fear stacking issue.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Point 1: Maybe this is just my love of complicated life cycles talking, but I like the idea that phoelarches are reborn as more phoenix-like creatures. It's like their mortal flesh burns away, leaving only the living flame.
> 
> Point 2: I also like the idea of the party having a pet fire bird to remember their old party member by. It feels like the kind of thing you'd see in a fantasy adventure serial. Party members come and go, but they're never forgotten.
> 
> Now, neither of these should affect ECL, but that doesn't mean they don't matter _at all_.


Completely agreed. Fluff abilities absolutely matter, and make the monster what it is, I was only talking about actual impact on the power level of a theoretical Phoelarch PC. The fact that only the "phoenix part" of the phoelarch is resurrected is nice flavor, especially when the phoera itself can resurrect fully upon death. It also begs the question of whether or not the phoera can reproduce by itself, or only through the death of a phoera. 

A dead phoelarch could make for a good Improved Familiar, maybe with the Complete Warrior iteration of the feat, requiring both 7th CL and BAB +7, to mirror the phoelarch itself having +7 BAB and high CL SLAs.




> Given that True Resurrection, which does not need the body, is not on the whitelist of functional revival methods, it seems the in-universe obstacle is that the soul is in the succeeding Phoera/Vazaalka, and thus you engage in the same "magical fuzzy-logic guarantees your replacement indistinguishable" system as a Globe of Annihilation, and unlike most such mechanics the problem is that the soul has a _different_ life. Which implies the possibility of manufacturing new candidate souls from Miracle creating a replacement that has the Jade Phoenix Mage levels, and any such Phoera would appear to be a valid candidate. You could have a high-level party with at least one other Jade Phoenix Mage easily justify a Phoera "line" that keeps recalling who they were via Rite of Awakening, thus remaining the same PC because of RAW-compatible reincarnation stacking in horrible abuse of what's supposed to be campaign-guiding fluff text rather than a serious character mechanic, in a cost-saving that's not the _worst_ way to spend three levels.


That would be interesting. You'd need the phoelarch to already be a JPM, since the Rite of Waking only works on "reincarnated spirits of one of the thirteen ancient masters" and you would have been detected in your previous life if you were one. In that case, you could use the Emancipated Spawn way to recall all your class levels, feats and skills and jump back to the ECL you left when you died. 

Soul-destroying or -transferring magic is inconsistent in that way. The Harvester of Souls feat says that Miracle works, as does the Reincarnate spell, the Phoera's ability and the Barghest's Feed. On the other hand, the Sphere of Annihilation, Necrotic Termination, and using a Trapped soul as a spell component completely prevent resurrection, even from Wish. 
I believe those are two very different effects. When Wish works, the soul still exists in a way. In a new body, as the life force of a barghest or combined to the Harvester and used as temporary hit points. In all these cases, the soul is transformed, now simply consumed. I very much believe that even Miracle cannot create a soul, and that "resurrecting" the previous phoelarch is just bringing back the phoera to its previous body, with its previous memories, killing the new creature in the process, in a manner similar to undoing Reincarnate. On the contrary, when Miracle doesn't work, when nothing a mortal can do to bring back the creature works, the soul is completely destroyed. Out of the Multiverse, digested by the necrotic cyst for no purpose other than destroying a creature for good (the skulking cyst is just the cyst getting animated, it doesn't use the soul for that nor is it stronger than the one created by Necrotic Burst), or simply drained of all the lifeforce that defines it for the sole purpose of slightly improving a spell, the soul doesn't exist anymore, and there's nothing you can do against this.
Unname is a special case. The thing is, it doesn't destroy the soul, nor even kills the subject. It just removes any reference to it in the universe's programming. That's a variable somewhere with no definition and nothing pointing to it. It's reversible the exact same way, by just adding a "define SOUL as in_universe_being;" at the beginning of your code.




> Stats-wise, we have -14 Str, +8 Dex, -6 Con, -2 Int, -4 Wis, and +4 Cha relative to a Treant for the Phoelarch, for a net -14, having an at-will Standard Action two 4d6 Fire damage Ranged Touch Attacks with 50 ft. range plus a 1/day 10-minute Produce Flame for 1d6+5 attacks, up to 10 of which COULD be 120 ft. range if a solid 10 rounds of back-to-back use, and basically free Flaming Weapon on melee damage... Versus a Twinned 6th-level spell at will which makes more of their base statblock, nominally CR 8 creatures. To say nothing of the advantages of being Huge in the Big Dumb Beater niche, which the Phoelark is near-certainly stuck in because 7 RHD. If we're comparing other monsters, I can easily see this being debated as a choice at 5 RHD _and_ DLA -2 against the stand-outs down at ECL 5.


I'm of the opinion that the treant is one creature that was sorely underestimated in the original thread, just because of its enormous stats bonus (+36 at ECL 7, seriously) and ability to create minions by a standard action (ExLibrisMortis, one of the ardent defenders of LA+0, thought it kept the 10min casting time despite being an SLA). It was also at the time where basically everything was compared to a full caster or an übercharger (there were several mentions of polymorphing into a treant to be better than a treant), and I think comparing the treant with a martial initiator would have yielded at least LA+1 (it was already pretty close in the original thread between +0 and +1). Also, the Phoelarch's SR 11+HD is absolutely not to be overstated. It's a great ability and having the equivalent of a second save against most spells is invaluable. 




> Oh, and the Cold "equivalent" can easily turn obnoxious because that's a Con-based Fortitude save vs. Shaken on Bite and Claw attacks. One may at first think that's just three shots a basic -2 to some stuff, but no, it may in fact be seven, because Girallon Arms bound to Totem does not sanity-check against "didn't you already have Claws?" by RAW and is a physically different body part from the ones giving Claws here, and _you can stack Fear with it_, which forces rounds wasted running away on just two failed saves.
> 
> So I'll suggest LA +0 on the Phoera because it's _at least_ fine for a range of classes, and LA +1 on the Vazalka just to curb the trivial Fear stacking issue.


Yeah, shaken is generally better than put on fire, but Cold is harder to come by than Fire, and the Vazalka cannot heal itself with just a torch. Also, fear stacks, but not from the same source. Shivering Strike can only make someone shaken for a few rounds. Of course, you can then take a level of bard and Inspire Awe them to frightened, but you have to work for it.

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## GreatWyrmGold

> Given that True Resurrection, which does not need the body, is not on the whitelist of functional revival methods, it seems the in-universe obstacle is that the soul is in the succeeding Phoera/Vazaalka, and thus you engage in the same "magical fuzzy-logic guarantees your replacement indistinguishable" system as a Globe of Annihilation, and unlike most such mechanics the problem is that the soul has a _different_ life. Which implies the possibility of manufacturing new candidate souls from Miracle creating a replacement that has the Jade Phoenix Mage levels, and any such Phoera would appear to be a valid candidate. You could have a high-level party with at least one other Jade Phoenix Mage easily justify a Phoera "line" that keeps recalling who they were via Rite of Awakening, thus remaining the same PC because of RAW-compatible reincarnation stacking in horrible abuse of what's supposed to be campaign-guiding fluff text rather than a serious character mechanic, in a cost-saving that's not the _worst_ way to spend three levels.


I feel like I've missed some implicit assumption here, because I'm confused about both how this works and what the mechanical implications are supposed to be. But it seems thematically appropriate.




> Oh, and the Cold "equivalent" can easily turn obnoxious because that's a Con-based Fortitude save vs. Shaken on Bite and Claw attacks. One may at first think that's just three shots a basic -2 to some stuff, but no, it may in fact be seven, because Girallon Arms bound to Totem does not sanity-check against "didn't you already have Claws?" by RAW and is a physically different body part from the ones giving Claws here, and _you can stack Fear with it_, which forces rounds wasted running away on just two failed saves.


Isn't it weird that shivering is represented mechanically with a fear effect? Props on reusing an existing mechanic instead of chucking a new one-off status effect into the game, but that's maybe not the first choice I'd have picked.





> Unname is a special case. The thing is, it doesn't destroy the soul, nor even kills the subject. It just removes any reference to it in the universe's programming. That's a variable somewhere with no definition and nothing pointing to it. It's reversible the exact same way, by just adding a "define SOUL as in_universe_being;" at the beginning of your code.


I like this analogy, except for the part where it's _just_ wrong enough that it bugs me. You're almost but not quite describing a pointer, which is a pretty good analogy for that kind of unmaking.




> Also, fear stacks, but not from the same source. Shivering Strike can only make someone shaken for a few rounds.


Some exploits are obvious enough that even WotC noticed them ahead of time.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Plague Brush*




Gardening in Carceri is _weird_.

The plague brush is basically what it says on the tin: a big ball of thorny vines wandering Carceri while spreading its "plague", its spores which act like one of the very strongest poisons in the game. It's an inhaled poison (the strongest kind), dealing 2d6 Str and 1d4 Con for both initial and secondary damage. And when I say a big ball of vines, I mean reaaaaaally big. Colossal size, +24 Str, +16 Con. 60ft movement speed, +19 NA and one slam with 30ft reach. It also has the ability that should have been given to the Odopi, from one tumbleweed of doom to another: Scoop. Basically Improved Grab for Trample, obviously not needing a limb, since the Plague Brush doesn't have limbs. Not very strong by itself, but at least interesting and flavorful for a ball of hands as well as a ball of thorns. 

Sadly, apart from these abilities and a weird but unimpressive miss chance for piercing weapons, the plague brush has nothing. No hands, no abilities, no unique immunities, no SLAs, no other ability score bonus, and no intelligence. Boy the brush is bad. And of course it has 31 Plant RHD. Because obviously it has.


The thing is, the poison is so good, and the brush's speed is so fast --enough to be able to deliver the poison to most opponents without them being able to flee-- that even with nothing else, I would not give it less than 6 RHD. You're basically a swarm, who can kill people simply by existing close to them for a few rounds. And Colossal size and +24 Str is far from nothing else. If the brush has hands, it would be a scary Hulking Hurler, but it feels quite wasted as it is. There has to be something interesting to do with a Colossal sized creature and a poison covering so much ground with each movement, but even just Scooping enemies mindlessly makes me want to assign *10 RHD*, and *DLA-15* (the DC for the inhaled poison becomes incredibly good to the point of being irresistible at this point, but so many things are immune to poison that this shouldn't be a problem in the long run).

I'm really not sure how to advance the Plague Brush. What do you think?
Sometimes your bush is spreading the Plague, ans sometimes your giant neighbour is the one spreading the Plague. Next time, we review one of the strongest mindless undead, the Plague Spewer!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Plague Spewer*

Plague Spewers are notable as being the fourth most powerful mindless undead in the whole game, with CR 10, only beaten by the Charnel Hound (CR 13) we saw earlier, the Charnel Custodian (CR 11) which is a great animated graveyard from Dr#352 who throws tombstones at you, and the Death Tyrant (PGtF, CR 13), who really shouldn't be mindless in the first time (nor be CR 13, in my opinion, but I digress). I guess they wanted a zombie beholder with only one partial action per turn and didn't think it was possible without it being mindless, but a creature with antimagic field, with 10 different SLAs and all the strategy involved really shouldn't be mindless at all. They even added a footnote with "Though it is a mindless undead, it still fights as if it had intelligence, using its eyes as effectively as possible.". Basically the same thing as the Knell Beetle, but while I think they changed the knell beetle to mindless pretty late, I think they always envisioned the Death Tyrant as mindless, but only later figured all the problems and inconsistencies it created.

The plague spewer is then is the awkward position of a CR 10 monster that can be defeated with no save by a level 2 spell, Command Undead, thereby giving the caster an extremely strong servant, and is actually one of the very best bang for your necromancer's buck in that regard. To make up for that, they carry a really strong disease (2d4 Con and 2d4 Dex) that may be crippling for PCs with no access to Remove Disease (and even then, since it spreads by contact, it may simply pass to the cleric who tries to remove it), but is utterly useless in combat when the Spewer is on the PCs side, since it has a 1 minute incubation period (still better than most disease, but no incubation period would so so much better). It also carries inside it hordes of rats, which it can spew (I suppose in an adjacent square) 4/day by a full round action. Since the rat swarm "seeks and attacks any warm-blooded prey", it will not attack the Spewer but might go for its teammates. Suffice to say, this does not bode well for its viability as a PC. 

Of course, every cloud has a silver lining, and the Plague Spewer, when controlled by a PC, would be intelligent enough to know it can spread its disease with a touch attack, and not only with its slam. Cold comfort, since you still have to contend with the 1 minute-incubation time, but you take what you can. You also have hands, a mouth, and all the humanoid premium (except hair. You don't have hair.)


- 16 Undead RHD, waaaay too many. Huge size is good for bruisers, and 15ft reach can make a tripper fighter all on its own. The lost BAB will hurt you your whole career, though.
- +20 Str, -2 Dex, _ Con, -8 Int (mindless), +2 Wis, +6 Cha, total +18. Ouch. Not good. At least you have +16 NA, which is pretty high for the ECL we will put it at, and DR 10/slashing, which is probably the worst DR after /magic, but still worth mentioning.
- Two average to weak slams, transmitting Plague.
- Plague and Vomit Rat Swarm, decent abilities but hard to efficiently use in combat without harming your party. Note that Plague transforms any Huge creature into another Plague Spewer in 1d4 days if they die from it (which is not that hard, considering 2d4 Con damage can be quite itchy).


You know what? I think that would make a great Dread Necromancer. No, really! Dread Necro just walks directly into Abjurant Champion, getting one martial weapon proficiency and Undetectable Alignment as an Abjuration spell, gets Charnel Touch for unlimited out-of-combat healing, gets you some touch spells to improve on your Plague (notably Ghoul and Shivering Touch, the latter through Expanded Knowledge, which can outright paralyze your enemies while your Plague transforms them into more Spewers), and gives you Command Undead to take control of your "spawn" as soon as they animate. You have to keep Huge corpses with you for a pretty long time, but you have 31 Str, you can do that before your breakfast. Still, the build is pretty slow and won't outperform persistomancy gishes or other high-performing characters. Also, BoED doesn't specifically say that nongood characters can't cast Sanctified spells, only that evil characters can't. Having a neutral Huge undead spewing rats and transmitting disease, but protected by a sacred armor is as ridiculous as it is hilarious. I'm going to say this a weakish *8 RHD*, and should get *DLA-6*. What do you think?


As often, the Eberron lore is slightly more interesting, but the difference is really minor. In Faerun, it seems like Plague Spewers just exist, since there's nothing hinting to how they're created except a "there are rumors of a plague cult", while in Eberron, it was a powerful curse by a necromancer dragon. I'm honestly not sure which is better. What I know is that the Plague Spewer is implied to be so full of rats that they crawl under its skin and Spew Rats is just some of them getting out to kill more people, which could make for a great Death Throes if you rewrote the monster, or even an interesting character is a Plague Spewer was inhabited by intelligent Moon Rats instead, who could manipulate the undead body to their bidding. 
Anyway, skipping the Protean Scourge (thank you for that +0, nobody wants to rate _that_ mess), we will turn our eyes to the Quaraphon, which is... Probably more than one person in a single body. Covered with blue paint. See you then!

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## GreatWyrmGold

> I guess they wanted a zombie beholder with only one partial action per turn and didn't think it was possible without it being mindless, but a creature with antimagic field, with 10 different SLAs and all the strategy involved really shouldn't be mindless at all. They even added a footnote with "Though it is a mindless undead, it still fights as if it had intelligence, using its eyes as effectively as possible.". Basically the same thing as the Knell Beetle, but while I think they changed the knell beetle to mindless pretty late, I think they always envisioned the Death Tyrant as mindless, but only later figured all the problems and inconsistencies it created.


Bad call, I say. A mindless zombie beholder which uses its eye rays randomly and fires a quarter of them into its antimagic zone every turn sounds like it would be _much_ more entertaining.




> It also carries inside it hordes of rats, which it can spew (I suppose in an adjacent square) 4/day by a full round action. Since the rat swarm "seeks and attacks any warm-blooded prey", it will not attack the Spewer but might go for its teammates. Suffice to say, this does not bode well for its viability as a PC.


It's slightly more viable in a party of kobolds, warforged, and eldritch monsters which man was not meant to know. But not _much_ more viableswarms can be tricky, but this is a swarm meant to be a fair challenge against 2nd-level PCs. A chimera (CR 7) could squish a rat swarm in one round, without even using its breath weapon.


It's remarkable how many mediocre monsters there are in this manual. They're overshadowed by the handful with cool art or concepts.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> Bad call, I say. A mindless zombie beholder which uses its eye rays randomly and fires a quarter of them into its antimagic zone every turn sounds like it would be _much_ more entertaining.


You could make some sort of Prismatic spray-like effect. After determining the direction of the antimagic field (basically the direction the beholder attacks with its bite), everyone outside it rolls a d12 to see which rays affects them. 11 and 12 mean the guy is targeted by two rays (reroll twice, discard any 11 or 12), and discard any result already rolled, or corresponding to the 1d4 missing eyestalks.




> It's slightly more viable in a party of kobolds, warforged, and eldritch monsters which man was not meant to know.


"Actually, when active, exothermic organisms like lizards have comparable body temperature as..."
"I DINNAE WANT A SCIENCE LESSON RIGHT NOW!"
I was dumbfounded to find that kobolds are cold-blooded. For a subterranean race, isn't that basically a death sentence? Are dragonwrought kobolds warm-blooded then?





> It's remarkable how many mediocre monsters there are in this manual. They're overshadowed by the handful with cool art or concepts.


That's still one of the better books of the edition. The monsters are definitely hit or miss, but there are hits in every corner and for every type, which makes it a book I really like, even just reading it on its own.

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## GreatWyrmGold

> I was dumbfounded to find that kobolds are cold-blooded. For a subterranean race, isn't that basically a death sentence? Are dragonwrought kobolds warm-blooded then?


A subterranean race in our caves, sure, but that's just because there aren't any natural sources of heat in them. The Underdark is full of lava flows, magical crystals, inexplicably warm fungus, etc.

It _is_ weird that kobolds are cold-blooded when dragons are warm-blooded. Basically all 3.5 sources agree that kobolds have dragon blood running through their veins, and some add that those veins are also made of dragon blood. You'd expect their metabolism to resemble a young dragon's more than a lizard's.




> That's still one of the better books of the edition. The monsters are definitely hit or miss, but there are hits in every corner and for every type, which makes it a book I really like, even just reading it on its own.


Yeah. If there's one thing these level-reassignment projects have done, they've validated my nostalgia for this specific book.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Quaraphon*

Hey, this one actually has an official level adjustment! *sees it's +5* Nevermind...

As Inevitability said, 



> A disappointing -0 LA overall. With like... four or five hit dice trimmed this might've been a decent playable monster.


The quaraphons are blue centaur-like creatures with two mouths and four eyes. They are strictly an alternative to orcs as "that one primitive tribe living in the outlands". Their description is so full of plothooks that it's almost funny. Their deafening bellow can be heard across the plains to attract the PCs attention, and a lot of wandering patrols specifically looking for trouble (that is, looking for strong opponents in the same area as the PCs) if they don't investigate. They have a disliked leader for them to overthrow, wise elder females to talk to, they have "hermeets" every 10 years with all the tribes where anything can happen (*wink* introduction of a villain stealing the tribe's prized possessions *wink*), and their members befriending the party any spellcaster get exiled, which can very easily lead to a quest to gain acceptance of the tribe. And on top of that, they have a built-in way to make plot-relevant quaraphons more memorable: each of them has differently placed eyes and mouths. The exilee might be "that one quaraphon with all eyes vertically aligned", the leader would be "the big quaraphon with eyes between his two mouths". They are designed as flavourful and memorable background characters, and it shows.

On the other hand, to allow DMs to make really unique quaraphons of any class, the base creature has basically nothing except numbers for it. Deafening Bellow is its only ability and is a ridiculously weak AoE on a large zone dealing 2d6 damage and deafening people. Apart from that, it's just a Large aberration with 9 RHD, regular beatstick stats (+10 Str, +12 Con, -4 Int, +4 Wis, +7 NA), and a few natural attacks crucially not necessitating hands (one bite, two hooves). Sadly, that's all. I think I will agree with Inevitability and say *4 RHD*, *DLA-3*, this to minimize the loss of BAB. It might even be a bit too strong at 4 RHD, but losing 2 BAB on top of 5 levels of class features would be too high a price in my opinion.


That's all for today! Until next time, where we will review the Rage Drake --another very beatsticky monster-- I hope you will try to use the quaraphon in one of your games, maybe in a one-shot? They're sure to surprise all players except the most savvy ones in the art of 3.5!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Rage Drake*

"Drakes claim to be dragons, until the dragons show up." - Snapping Drake, Magic the Gathering

A rage drake is what you send to fight your players when an actual Young Adult red dragon would be too much, and they don't want to fight children, even dragon children. It's also much easier to run in combat, since it doesn't have spells, doesn't have a breath weapon, and doesn't fly. This might have been by design, and some people think that mages created the rage drakes to be able to use thephysical abilities of a dragon without its pride and intelligence. Of course, this failed, since while they don't have the greed and cunning of a red dragon, they are just as evil and cannot be tamed except by the most powerful individuals.

- 14 Dragon RHD is typical of a Large creature, and just a bit much for what it offers.
- +16 Str, +6 Dex, +12 Con, -6 Int, +2 Wis, +0 Cha, +8 NA, total +30. These are pretty expected stats for its CR, even a bit low. Would be nice if it wasn't that dumb.
- Two claws, one bite. Standard issue package. Sad that you don't have hands (especially with all the riders on its bite).
- Rage, Pounce, rake (claw), improved grab (bite), Worry, 60ft movement speed. Wow. That's actually a really good routine. High strength, rage and five attacks can deal a lot of damage, and 60ft movement speed means absolutely nothing can escape it on the ground. Rake triggers both on a charge and on a successful grappling bite. And Worry means creatures get stunned for 1 round each time you grab them, to add even disagreement for the target.

So, what is this great attack routine worth? Quite a lot, actually. Especially considering the full BAB, and the fact that Rage is a prerequisite for many feats and prestige classes. In fact, a rage drake can enter immediately into Bear Warrior, for example. For all of this, and despite that abysmal intelligence, I think the rage drake would be a strong *8 RHD*. And giving it 14 BAB and much more HP would probably be worth a strong *DLA-3*.


Next time, we will review a combat-centered Fey, which is about as anthetical as a cunning Ooze, and which actually controls Oozes. See you then for the Ragewalker!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Ragewalker*
_"These are five hundred years of dead people's weapons that the ragewalker has gathered. After a while, he stopped actually killing people himself and started hanging around the battlefields, letting others do it for him."
"How many souls has he..."
"Forced to kill one another? Oh, two millions... -ish. He calls it his... *sigh* '#Lifehack'. "_ 
- One expert describing, from a safe distance, a ragewalker fanning the flames of conflict and slicing people in half.

The ragewalker embodies the primal rage of combat. As a Large Fey, he really can't fight by himself. Half BAB, d6 HD? Yeah right. On the other hand, it has a lot of abilities that make people just bash each other instead of him. 
First, its ability scores are extremely good. +8 Str, +14 Dex, +8 Con, +0 Int, +4 Wis, +14 Cha, total +48, no penalty. 
It goes well with its 50ft speed, two claws and GMW'd spiked chain to do some damage.
Then, it can rebuke and control Living Spells. That's probably the least useful rebuking pool I've seen. And it even uses only half of its HD as the ETL. 
Its much more interesting ability is Induce Rage Frenzy. When the ragewalker is closer than 10ft from you, you make a Will save or start attacking the closest person in melee, whoever that is, and lose the ability to speak, cast spells, and is "incoherent", which probably means they can't manifest powers or use spell-like either. That's pretty good, as it's basically a save-or-lose for everything that doesn't rely only on melee attacks. It's unclear how that ability interacts with maneuvers, but even if it prevents the use of maneuvers, its radius is so small that you'll probably get attacked first by the affected people. You might want to invest in Widen Supernatural ability.
It has some buffing and battlefield control abilty, with Wall of Fire, Wall of Blades and Greater Magic Weapon 3/day, all at CL20. GMW notably is pretty good, and having a free +5 on your weapon will come in handy.
And finally, it has good defense for ECL around 12-14: complete immunity to nonepic ranged weapons that even throws them back to their shooter, Grafted Armor and Natural Armor for a total of +12 AC, SR 4+HD, DR 10/cold iron, a cloud of weapons dealing 2d6 to anyone adjacent, and fast healing 5. Hanging around the battlefield, remember? I suppose that's why it has so many RHD too (22 of them), so that it doesn't go down easy.

The ragewalker is very very bad. Its main ability is borderline unuseable, and the rest is very unfocused. Still, the stats are good, the SLAs are good and the defense is varied at least. *12 RHD*, *DLA-7*. What do you think?


Since the LA-assignment just restarted after 3 weeks of hiatus, I too will pick up the pace. See you next time for Elder Redcap and Prismatic Roper.

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## Beni-Kujaku

Between the Ragewalker and the Redcap, there are the Rakshasas. And they divided the thread so much that Inevitability posted a poll to redefine the rules of LA-assigning. It's this poll who defined the target of the thread as "similar class to the monster's role in a party, but no less than Tier 4". It's honestly pretty interesting to read, and impressive that the LA-assignment thread went on for so long without having that kind of wake-up call earlier.

*Elder Redcap*



The elder redcap is a psychotic gnome sporting a red phrygian cap, a comically large scythe and thinly-veiled creepy Little Red Riding Hood/bogeyman vibes. Unfortunately, it also has 12 Fey RHD on a martial chassis, which doesn't do it any favor.

Regular redcaps (4 RHD) got a +0 in the original thread for their weird way of advancing. You see, their cap, like all French Revolution symbols, becomes more powerful the more blood flows around it. It absorbs some of the essence of creatures it is drenched with the blood of, and bestows it to the redcap, giving it +1 in all physical stats and +1/2 natural armor per HD, with no mention of not including class levels. It also means that young redcaps are basically always bloodthirsty, since killing literally makes them stronger, and groups of redcaps generally act as crazed murderous gangs. The only thing preventing them from slaughtering each other until there's only one left is the elder redcaps' (very relative) wisdom, who at least point them towards humanoids to kill. Also, if you wondered how there can be elders when they don't reproduce sexually, it's because they literally bud, bearing youngs as humps on their back until they are big enough to be "born" and live on their own. Maybe another reference to Grimm's tales, where witches are generally humped?

-Small Fey. Off to a bad start.
- +12 Str, +10 Dex, +12 Con, +2 Wis, +2 Cha, +5 Natural armor. Physical stats would be pretty good with a few HD less, natural armor is bad.
- Eldritch Stone give them +1 to hit and damage when using slings. Ok I guess. 
- Powerful Build. Very good. At least the redcap can wield a Medium scythe now. It's no guillotine but it will do.
- DR 10/Cold Iron. Expected. 

Basically, that's just what a regular redcap becomes when it gains 8 more RHD using its cap's ability. Removing these bonuses as we reduce the RHD would not make sense (we'd just go back to regular redcap). We consider the elder redcap still has high physical score even if we reduce its RHD. 
Compared to a regular redcap, it gets +8 Str, Dex and Con, +4 natural armor and +5 DR. That's all. The stats are really good but gaining more Fey RHD is... less than ideal. Something like four more RHD? *8 RHD* as a conservative estimate. And since more Fey RHD doesn't help you, *DLA-3*. 

*Prismatic Roper*

Okay, I'm... 90% sure that's not what a roper looks like. Too many tendrils, no mouth, no eyes, and a decidedly un-stalagtite-like appearance. Still, the prismatic roper, like the roper, is an underground ambush predator, but uses magic to lure people in instead of just mimicking an inanimate object. They're also apparently used as guardians by various aberrations in Eberron.

- Large aberration with 9 RHD. Even with all the good here, it isn't worth as much as an ogre mage.
- +12 Str, +4 Dex, +6 Con, -6 Int, +2 Wis, +4 Cha, +11 Natural armor. Would be decent beatstick stats, but -6 Int is honestly crippling, and makes Combat Expertise difficult to attain. Unfortunate.
- 4 tendrils, 20ft reach, and poison (1d6 Dex/Paralysis, no listed duration, but will probably never come up). We'll make a battlefield controller of it yet! Sad that it only has...
- 10ft movement speed. That's a problem. A battlefield controller must absolutely be able to position themselves. 
- Color Spray 3/day. Would not even be good if it fully affected anyone above 5 HD
- Hypnotic Coloration: The Prismatic Roper can change its coloration to either match its surroundings (+20 to Hide in underground environments) or Fascinate people nearby (Will or must approach the roper until woken up by someone attacking). Honestly seems pretty good, but works weirdly with the rest of the abilities. 

The roper doesn't know if it wants to be a rogue using tendrils for sneak attacks or a battlefield controller tripping people around. And it sucks at both due to its low movement speed and intelligence. *6 RHD*, *DLA-2*.

What do you think of these guys? Next time, we will review the orcish butcher aberrations, the Rot Reavers!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Rot Reaver*



When others lick their blade to test its sharpness, the rot reaver tests it by licking the wounds it inflicts on its enemies. The rot reaver has exactly one interesting characteristic, it's that it's a living creature feeding on negative energy, and capable of opening conduits to the Negative Energy Plane to animate zombies around it. Having so much negative energy in it, it can unleash it to rebuke undead as a cleric of its HD without relying on a deity to do so. Weirdly, it cannot just feed directly on the NEP and has to create undead then eat them, which is... just necrophagy with extra steps. I wonder if you could Animate a corpse that you have swallowed somehow and still feed on it. 

This particular diet is likely the only reason why the rot reaver is an Aberration instead of a Monstrous Humanoid, but having a suboptimal type is just one more nail in the coffin of viability. The rot reaver is just disppointing all around. Medium Aberration with 10 RHD, ability scores worthy of a 4 RHD creature (+4 in all physical, -4 Int, +2 Wis, +4 Cha, +7 natural), can lick people for 1 Con damage, but only when it hits with its +1 handaxe, and can animate the dead but only control one time its HD instead of 4 times. It just tries to do what a cleric does, but not only does it fail to do so, it only does an extremely narrow part of what a cleric is capable of. At least it's only "Usually Neutral Evil", so a neutral rot reaver could take a level of cleric and get two pools for DMM and devotion feats, I guess. Taking 4 levels of dread necromancer allows you to bypass your limit on number of undead (with Command Undead spam) and gets you infinite out-of-combat healing. But then again, a dread necro of the same ECL would do the same, better. I guess the most interesting thing to do is rogue/swordsage, with Travel Devotion and/or Divine Might to use your Rebuke Attempts (can you use Divine Might on your tongue attack?) and using your weak zombies to flank and get Sneak Attacks. With that in mind, probably *6 RHD*, *DLA-3* would be good?

*Necrothane*: Just a big advanced rot reaver with no size increase, but actually decent stat increases, for a total of +6 Str, +4 Dex, +8 Con, +2 Int, +4 Wis, +8 Cha, but no change to its +7 natural armor. *9 RHD*, *DLA-8*.


And it doesn't even have a good name in french! It's just _putréfiant_, "putrefier/rotter". I'll admit I was initially intrigued by the whole negative energy thing, but it's kind of a surface level monster, all things considered. Next time will be quite short, we will review the goodest freak of nature there is, the Runehound!

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## Beni-Kujaku

It's been quite a while here with no comments, I'm just wondering if people are still reading and enjoying my rants. Is there something that makes my posts less enjoyable than before? Are the current monsters just that forgettable? Or was the concept flawed from the beginning and just petered out? 

Would anyone prefer that I don't give my own estimates and let other people discuss the negative LA, with the risk that no negative LA is assigned for a long time?

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## loky1109

I read, I just have nothing to say.

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## martixy

As one of the OG champions of the cause, I'm glad the effort is going live and well.

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## Metastachydium

No-no-no-no-no. Don't give up on it, unless you tire of the project! I'm reading it regularly (my currently somewhat impaired ability to focus on stuff permitting); it's a really neat thing (and you're doing swimmingly: I mean, you already outdid the three previous threads _combined_!); _MM3_, specifically, is a book that's dear to me; and I thoroughly enjoy your being sardonic at WotC's expense. It's just, well, the only kind of LA I really dare to regularly assign is the WotC-style one ("aim too high" is an easy rule to follow); even at the regular RLA thread, I really only chime in when something seems blatantly obvious to me and isn't voiced by anyone else or if I get some sort of sudden revelation and this is _harder_.

Also, don't worry. From among the regulars, Remetagross was busy with stuff recently (we are in a game together; that's how I know that), whereas the mighty Great Wyrm has a habit of popping in and out of the forum. I'm sure traffic will increase again.

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## LecternOfJasper

Your write-ups are thoroughly enjoyable, and you are a gentleman and a scholar. I don't get to play 3.5 enough to have an intuitive grasp of the balance of these things, but I'm learning that from these threads moreso than anything, so I appreciate the help!  :Biggrin:

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## PoeticallyPsyco

I still read whenever there's a new post, but I don't usually have much to contribute to the discussion.

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## Remuko

> I still read whenever there's a new post, but I don't usually have much to contribute to the discussion.


this. im doing the same

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## Beni-Kujaku

> As one of the OG champions of the cause, I'm glad the effort is going live and well.


And I am glad to see that people value this niche aspect of the game enough to have searched for new ways of doing it. The whole size adjustment thing you imagined was really quite an interesting idea, for example (if a bit unwieldy to use for actual rating) and an important part of monster advancement that often gets ignored. Hope you're enjoying the ride you started.




> No-no-no-no-no. Don't give up on it, unless you tire of the project! I'm reading it regularly (my currently somewhat impaired ability to focus on stuff permitting); it's a really neat thing (and you're doing swimmingly: I mean, you already outdid the three previous threads _combined_!); _MM3_, specifically, is a book that's dear to me; and I thoroughly enjoy your being sardonic at WotC's expense. It's just, well, the only kind of LA I really dare to regularly assign is the WotC-style one ("aim too high" is an easy rule to follow); even at the regular RLA thread, I really only chime in when something seems blatantly obvious to me and isn't voiced by anyone else or if I get some sort of sudden revelation and this is _harder_.
> 
> Also, don't worry. From among the regulars, Remetagross was busy with stuff recently (we are in a game together; that's how I know that), whereas the mighty Great Wyrm has a habit of popping in and out of the forum. I'm sure traffic will increase again.


Damn, I can't say no to such enthusiasm ^^ Don't worry, I didn't intend to stop this beautiful little project there, just to better understand the readers and what they thought of the thread lately. Thanks for the update on remetagross, tell him to hang in there, and that I wish him well (not only him, btw. Everyone here helps to shape the Playground into the great place that it is, and you all deserve the best IRL).




> Your write-ups are thoroughly enjoyable, and you are a gentleman and a scholar. I don't get to play 3.5 enough to have an intuitive grasp of the balance of these things, but I'm learning that from these threads moreso than anything, so I appreciate the help!


Thank you for these kind words. Happy to help! If even one person has a more enjoyable game because of this thread, then it will be a victory!




> I still read whenever there's a new post, but I don't usually have much to contribute to the discussion.





> this. im doing the same





> I read, I just have nothing to say.


Thank you for your trust, everyone. I mean it. Knowing there are people appreciating my work almost makes up for going through statblocks like the skullcrusher ogre :P

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Runehound*

"Go, my dog! Fetch the brain of my enemies! Fetch!"

The runehound is one of the coolest designs of the whole book. A blind dog, covered in rune, with its maw in the middle of its back, doesn't really appeal to me at first glance, but the whole thing is weirdly well put together, and feels like it "makes sense", both as an encounter and as a creature in the world. In Eberron, they act as the tracking hounds of various nefarious organizations, including but not limited to the daelkyrs' and the dolgaunts' armies. Never heard of the dolgaunts? Don't worry, I didn't neither. And after seeing what they look like, I can say I wish I still didn't. 

The runehounds are preternaturally good at tracking, to an exaggerated degree. They have Track as a bonus feat, +20 to Survival checks when tracking intelligent creatures, and an absolutely enormous 500ft Blind_sight_ to hunt down hiding fugitives. And if they try to run away? 50ft movement speed will probably be enough to not get left in the dust, and its ability to spew Web-like goo balls from up to 100ft away will slow the target down enough that the rest of the army can catch up. On top of that, it has Fast Healing 3, a 10ft reach with its weird serpent-like neck (Mouthpick? Mouthpick. At least if it doesn't prevent Vile Spew.), DR 5/Silver and pretty good physical stats for its RHD, despite the hit to Int (+10 Str, +4 Dex, +6 Con, -6 Int, +2 Wis, -2 Cha). This will help if it has to actually subdue an enemy in melee. 




> Is the runehound worthy of +0 LA? Barely not. If it had just one less HD it'd be a solid +0, but as it is now the lack of limbs, difficulty communicating, low BAB and lost class levels don't make up for the nice toys.





> I am leaning towards *LA -0*, though only just, probably 1 RHD too much for +0.





> I think if it had one less RHD, might be persuaded to give it a +0, but as is, I can't give it anything other than a -0.





> -0: 11 votes
> +0: 9 votes


At least the final rating is quite clear here. That's a clear *4 RHD*, *DLA-0*.


It's so focused in its abilities, the runehound definitely feels like an artificial lifeform created to serve as hounds, hence the runes symbolizing the dweomer used at its creation. But then, why do wild packs of those exist? How do they reproduce? Who created them in Faerun, where we can't blame every aberration on the daelkyr? The answer is we don't know. The statblock is absolutely barren when it comes to lore or origin of the runehound, and it's maybe the only complaint I have against what is otherwise a really enjoyable monster. As a person once said on RPGnet: "You cant just plop down a cool design and a statblock and expect people to use it. You need to explain how it fits into the world."
Next time, we will review the salt mummy. And considering how many RHD it has, it being salty doesn't really surprise me much.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Salt Mummy*

You really can never be sure to be safe with criminals in the D&D world. It's hard enough to kill them, since rogues all have high Dex and can go in hiding before you can catch them, or escape any nonmagical prison, but even if you succeed, you're far from done. If the corpse is left to rot, it becomes a Mohrg. If they are killed while planning a coup, they become Sepulchral Thieves, and even if you bury the corpse properly, there's a chance there just happens to be a salt vein nearby, and you'll have a Salt Mummy on the loose in no time. Of course, since it's so easy, some evil clerics intentionally bury criminals in a salt-filled coffin in the hope of creating a Salt Mummy. To these clerics, I have something to say: Are ya stupid? It costs about 1000 gp in fine salt to fill such a coffin, and all that for a glorified zombie only marginally better than a simple skeleton bear, and definitely more expensive, even not counting the investment to reach the 24 equivalent turning levels necessary to control it. And what do you get for your effort? A self-healing undead dealing a few dehydration damage on each hit, and with none of the mummies' abilities. 

- 12 Undead RHD, Medium size. Off to a great start. No reach, low BAB and middling HP are never good on a beatsticky monster.
- +16 Str, -2 Dex, no Con, -4 Int, +0 Wis, +6 Cha, total +16, +9 Natural armor. Wow, that's... Impressively bad. Similar or worse than a brown bear's stats (as a reminder, a 6 RHD animal rated here as worth 5 RHD). Strength doesn't do everything in a fight, and even less outside.
- Fast Healing 10, Unholy Toughness. That's actually good. These abilities give you some much needed durability.
- Dehydrating Impact (+4d6, Fort half, on each touch, including slam attacks). Just don't shake people's hand on the street.

The Salt Mummy doesn't have much going for it, especially not its type. I guess a Monk/Unarmed Swordsage could make it work, giving it 2 or 3 more attacks on which to put Dehydrating Impact. That said, this one ability will be useless if you use weapons, which is sad. *6 RHD*, with the Undead immunities making the difference with the brown bear despite the lower BAB. *DLA-4*. The Salt Mummy really needs more BAB than it has.


I want to see a Salt Mummy with a red Santa cap, employed to dry people coming back from ski with snow-soaked clothes. Speaking of water, our next monster is the Sea Tiger! See you next time, and merry christmas to all!

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## Frostmoon

From one very cool, almost usable-at-its-base-level critter (the Runehound) to one rather bland extra-dehydrated mummy...dang. XD The Runehound's a critter that could easily be used in the Monstrous Competition, and genuinely excites me to figure our what classes suit it. The mummy is, uh, well. Uhm. XD 6 HD sound okay, I think?

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## dhasenan

> I want to see a Salt Mummy with a red Santa cap, employed to dry people coming back from ski with snow-soaked clothes.


This is the kind of insight I follow this thread for.

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Sea Tiger*

This monster makes me _so_ irrationally mad. 

You see, in 3.0, there was that creature type called Beast. It was for not-quite animals but with no magical or supernatural abilities, and they all (except the gray render, which should probably have been a Monstrous Humanoid in the first place) had 2 Int. It was the realm of hippogriffs, dinosaurs, girallons... and sea lions. Sea lions are the 3e version of what will be later called sea cat in 3.5 (why change the name? Why not!). Now, they removed the type for 3.5, and changed basically all Beasts into Magical Beasts, except dinosaurs and the roc. Now, I have a lot to say about this (why only the roc? If you're going to include mythological animals, why not the sea cat, why not the hippogriff and why not the girallon?), but I could understand it as a will to balance the access of druids to powerful Animals, though these "Beasts" are really not that unbalanced with existing animals. What I cannot excuse, however, is that in the next book (remember, MM3 is the first Monster Manual published for 3.5), the sea tiger, described as a mammal "similar to the sea lion", clearly derived from it and designed as another variation of the sea cat, was classified as an Animal, completely breaking the link between the two before it even existed. The imaginary dinosaurs of the book (especially the infamous fleshraker) were also classified as Animals and threw the whole animal companion balance out the window, which makes it completely unjustifiable to have the sea lion and other previous Beasts as Magical Beasts. I don't mind questionable design choices, but I hate these kinds of inconsistencies.

At least it's an interesting monster with original abilities, huh? Well of course not, what did you expect? It's "just an animal" after all. Pitiful ability scores for a Huge creature with 10 RHD (+8 Str, +2 Dex, +6 Con, -8 Int, +4 Wis, -6 Cha, +10 Natural), standard claw-claw-bite routine (at least the bite deals decent damage, too bad you can't enjoy it since you'll be using a Mouthpick weapon instead), not even the aquatic subtype, and a blindsight worse than a porpoise's as its sole ability. And that's supposed to be the same CR as a baleen whale? *4 RHD*, a weak *DLA-4*, and be gone with it. Were it not Huge, it might have been even lower.


There's no need to put interesting lore on an animal, move along citizen. And since I don't have the courage to diss the art, you can go to the original thread, they did it very well for me. Next time, another thing that looks like a real-world animal, but this time with varied and interesting abilities, the Seryulin!

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## Beni-Kujaku

*Seryulin*


Look at that sahuagin! He looks so happy to do slug rodeo!

So, you want to play a sea slug faster than a heavy horse? It's more common than you think! The seryulin is a giant slug constantly oozing with a slimy goo (damn, lots of synonyms for sludge here). This gives it the ability to escape any way to entangle it, to entangle its opponents, and to somehow protect both it and its rider from paralysis. Yeah, I'm not sure how being covered with slug slobber makes you immune to Hold Monster, but it replicates all non-grappling applications of Freedom of Movement, so that's neat. That makes the seryulin an honestly great creature to ride. It is sentient (Int 8, racial mod -1) and can understand Aquan, so you don't need to command it in battle, and gives you a discount version of Freedom of Movement, as well as great mobility (50ft land and swim) and decent offense with two slams dealing 1d6 bonus damage and a bite (making it one of the six creatures currently covered by the LA thread with both several slams and other natural weaponry, all of them being in the MM3). 
Your slime even protects your rider from... Your slime. What? Anyway, the seryulin can 1/day spray a 20ft radius with its sticky substance, making them entangled (no save, casters must make DC 15 Concentration checks to cast spells), and immobilized (Ref negates) until they deal some damage to the goo with a slashing weapon, succeed on a pretty hard Str check, or 2d4 rounds have passed. Really a great ability to have, especially since it doesn't affect the rider (though it isn't otherwise friendly). 
You might want to act as a mount even when playing the seryulin as a PC, if one person in the party has some ranks in Ride, or even your cohort.

The only problem of the seryulin is the 10 Aberration RHD that it has, which its lowish stats (+10 Str, +2 Dex, +4 Con, -2 Int, +4 Wis, +2 Cha, total +20) and okay but disappointing defense (+10 NA, acid resistance 10, can't be tripped, DR 5/piercing or slashing, probably the single weakest kind of DR in the game) are definitely not worth. 

In the end, the seryulin is a very flavorful monster, with interesting abilities, not much lore but doesn't need much (we know it eats sharks and seals and loves the taste of sahuagins, which makes the creature's art that much more hilarious, considering the sahuagin is probably actually doing rodeo trying to avoid the slug putting him down and gobbling him up). It just needs a few RHD less to actually be playable. Maybe something like *5 RHD*, *DLA-4*? Yeah, that sounds fair. Maybe the -4 DNLA would be a bit strong. 


*Greater Seryulin*, 21 RHD: And then, there's the greater Seryulin. Gained 11 RHD, put the two stat increases in Dex, gained a size category and related ability scores. That's all. No, that doesn't make the Seryulin worth an epic character. *7 RHD*, *DLA-11*


I would very well see a Seryulin as a Sonic character. "Seryu the Slug" would continue the trend of unusually fast animals while still having some actual tricks up his... sleeves? Eyestalks. Tricks up his eyestalks. Next time, we will look at the unionization of the tiny Zelda feys against the exploitation of healing powers. See you then for the Shimmerling Swarm!

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## loky1109

It's a monstrous Onychophora.

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## Beni-Kujaku

> It's a monstrous Onychophora.


Is that a centipede earthworm with spiderman powers!? Lolth save us all!

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