Warshaper.

[Otherworld Odd]

This class confuses me but I really like it. e.e. I've wanted to play one but every place I go to read the mechanics at, they say it's something different. Could someone explain how it works?

[MeeposFire]

Which part exactly?

You use a changing form like effect (such as wild shape, a polymorph spell, etc) you get the bonuses.

The only part that has any questions as far as I know is morphic weapons. Unfortunately there is no single interpretation so your DM needs to make a call.

[Otherworld Odd]

Which part exactly?

You use a changing form like effect (such as wild shape, a polymorph spell, etc) you get the bonuses.

The only part that has any questions as far as I know is morphic weapons. Unfortunately there is no single interpretation so your DM needs to make a call.

Yeah, the morphic weapons part specifically. Sorry, forgot to mention it.

[Halae]

As a matter of fact, if we were to go straight RAW, there's two interpretations.

1. You can grow as many new weapons as you choose. Because of the wording of the ability, this one is the most likely to be true, but also quite insane, since a guy who goes through a few monster manuals can get upwards of thirty natural attacks. I put together a build a while back that made use of the morphic weapons ability of Warshaper to get 56 attacks in a single round

2. This one is the idea that Morphic Weapons gives you a single extra weapon that you wouldn't have had before, such as a tentacle, or a gore attack. This is the sane approach that, while less likely, most DMs use anyways for game balance reasons.

So either you become a walking abomination with an insane amount of natural weapons just hanging from you, or you get a single extra natural weapon, that you wouldn't have had (So you could get claws and a bite, sure, but that gore attack? that'll cost you extra.)

[Cog]

My reading of the ability:

1) When you want to activate the ability, choose a particular kind of natural weapon (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#naturalWeapons).
2a) If your form does not have a weapon of that kind, activate the ability to gain a weapon of that kind.
2b) If your form does have a weapon of that kind, increase the damage die one step.

The ability never says you can create a new instance of a particular weapon if you already have it, so you can't gain multiple claws/bites/etc by using it, and the size bonus wouldn't stack with itself either, so for any given choice of weapon you can only use 2a and 2b once each. Depending on how long you want to spend growing your attacks, you're limited to your forms base number of attacks plus one of each other named kind of natural attack.

Now, if you want to dig into all the various monster manuals, campaign books, and environment books, you'll probably at least double the list of attacks from what's given in the MM 1. You have to refer to the MM table for your damage die, though, so other kinds that aren't on that list presumably wouldn't be valid choices, leaving you a total of 8 kinds of attacks at most (and really six - slam/slap should be a single attack, and claw/talon as well).

[MeeposFire]

I always ran it using the "you can grow one extra natural weapon and can make any non-morphic weapon granted natural attacks one size larger". This way things don't get dumb. getting so many natural attacks slows the game to a painful pace and this benefit is very good and certainly worth a level of warshaper.

But in the end it is a DMs call as the ability is not clear. I will check the FAQ but I don't think it says anything pertinent.

[Hazzardevil]

I always read it as you can have 1 (or 1 set in the case of something like claws) of each type of natural weapon until it doesn't seem possible to fit any more on.

[MeeposFire]

I checked the FAQ and warshaper is not in there (at least as far as I can tell).

[Necroticplague]

The example has a creature growing multiple of the same natural weapon (2 gores), so you obviuosly limited 2 one of each type

Here is how I personally interpret it.

You may have one group of each type of natural weapons. You may have the maximum of each type that you can find a single creature actually has. If you want 12 slams, show me a creature that has 12 slams. If you want 10 tentacle attacks, show me a creature with 10 tentacle attacks. And so on, for each group of natural attacks. So for your max(this might go up as I learn new monster), you can have 24 bites, four claws, 12 slams, 10 tentacles,1 sting, 2 stomps,2 stamps,2 wing buffets,1 tail slap, 1 sting,2 talons, and 2 gores.

[Cog]

The example has a creature growing multiple of the same natural weapon (2 gores), so you obviuosly limited 2 one of each type.
This is doubly wrong. The example gains a single gore attack, and the example never says anything about the number it provides being a limit anyway.

[comicshorse]

My reading of the ability:

1) When you want to activate the ability, choose a particular kind of natural weapon (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#naturalWeapons).
2a) If your form does not have a weapon of that kind, activate the ability to gain a weapon of that kind.
2b) If your form does have a weapon of that kind, increase the damage die one step.

The ability never says you can create a new instance of a particular weapon if you already have it, so you can't gain multiple claws/bites/etc by using it, and the size bonus wouldn't stack with itself either, so for any given choice of weapon you can only use 2a and 2b once each. Depending on how long you want to spend growing your attacks, you're limited to your forms base number of attacks plus one of each other named kind of natural attack.

Now, if you want to dig into all the various monster manuals, campaign books, and environment books, you'll probably at least double the list of attacks from what's given in the MM 1. You have to refer to the MM table for your damage die, though, so other kinds that aren't on that list presumably wouldn't be valid choices, leaving you a total of 8 kinds of attacks at most (and really six - slam/slap should be a single attack, and claw/talon as well).

Thats how we run it to.
I've managed to get my Razorclaw Shifters claw damage up to quite respectable levels with this