Awakened PC

[Delcor]

So I've been interested in playing a character as an awakened animal, mainly an ape. It would most likely be a wizard, but I'm very confused on a lot of the rules surrounding awakened animals and how they advance or affect character level.

So I guess what I'm really asking for is general help/ something to go off of, I hope this makes sense :smalleek:

Not much to go off of, but you guys ARE the playground and all :smallwink:

[Urpriest]

There aren't any rules for Awakened PCs. You'll need to homebrew something.

Edit: In general, playing a monster requires knowing how monsters work. Look at the guide in my sig for info if you're weak on that area of knowledge.

[Greenish]

Awakened animals have no LA, so they're not intended for player races. Nothing's stopping you and your DM from homebrewing them one, though (I recommend 0, since animal HD are pretty poor, and there isn't usually anything fancier than maybe a pounce).

After that hurdle has been passed, you play it like any other race with RHD and LA: ECL = RHD+LA+class level(s).

[TurtleKing]

Wait a minute nothing in the rulings of how to make one? What about Savage Species. Yes I did just ignore what edition it is in as to whether it is 3.0 or 3.5. Um yea Savage Species is your best bet other than homebrew. The Anthromorphic animal is probably what you want.

[Coidzor]

As is, with an Ape, you'd have 6 RHD, 4 from Ape (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/ape.htm)and 2 from awaken (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/awaken.htm).

So even with LA of 0, you'd only get up to 7th level spells at ECL 19. And you'd be an ECL 7 character with your first level of Wizard.

Although, I guess since you'd probably want to make use of that +10 strength, you'd qualify for several of them on the BAB front fairly quickly. Instantly in terms of BAB if the DM was being generous with the whole magical beast thing from awaken.

Between Spellsword, Abjurant Champion, and Dragonslayer, that's 7 levels of full casting, full-BAB gish PrC you can get in. Throw in a second level of wizard for the BAB and that's 8 levels + 6 RHD for a 14th level character that's casting like a cohort's cohort's cohort. Considering that most of the good gish spells are between 2nd and 5th level from what I recall, this isn't too bad for you, all things considered.

I'd see what I could do to get the +2 RHD from awaken taken off at the very least though.

What level of game would you be starting at?

[hex0]

...except awakened animals have magical beast hit die instead of animal. d10 hp, two nice saves, and full BAB.

level adjusment calculator (http://personal.nbnet.nb.ca/shadows/Handbook/ECLcalc.html) wit average awaken dice rolls on an Ape gives a total ECL of 7. So your level adjustment would be plus 1 wit six racial hit die

ECL 7 isnt too nice for a spell caster. You are getting at least 3 ECL for paying an awakened animal...

[Coidzor]

...except awakened animals have magical beast hit die instead of animal. d10 hp, two nice saves, and full BAB.

Well, that's part of the issue really. They're made into Magical Beast (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/typesSubtypes.htm#magicalBeastType) (Augmented (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/typesSubtypes.htm#augmentedSubtype) Animal (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/typesSubtypes.htm#animalType)), with no further commentary as to how exactly to treat them.


Augmented Subtype

A creature receives this subtype whenever something happens to change its original type. Some creatures (those with an inherited template) are born with this subtype; others acquire it when they take on an acquired template. The augmented subtype is always paired with the creature’s original type. A creature with the augmented subtype usually has the traits of its current type, but the features of its original type.


Features
An animal has the following features (unless otherwise noted in a creature’s entry).


8-sided Hit Dice.
Base attack bonus equal to ¾ total Hit Dice (as cleric).
Good Fortitude and Reflex saves (certain animals have different good saves, for instance dire animals have good Fortitude, Reflex, and Will saves).
Skill points equal to (2 + Int modifier, minimum 1) per Hit Die, with quadruple skill points for the first Hit Die.




Traits
A magical beast possesses the following traits (unless otherwise noted in a creature’s entry).

Darkvision out to 60 feet and low-light vision.
Proficient with its natural weapons only.
Proficient with no armor.
Magical beasts eat, sleep, and breathe.



So the default assumption seems to be that they'd be animals that get... Darkvision 60' and non-combative herbivores no longer treat their natural weapons as secondary ones automatically.



level adjusment calculator (http://personal.nbnet.nb.ca/shadows/Handbook/ECLcalc.html)

...Strange, the guidelines that explain it no longer seem to exist. :smallconfused:

[Greenish]

...except awakened animals have magical beast hit die instead of animal.That would be nice, yes, but do pay mind to the rules concerning the [Augmented Animal] subtype.

[Edit]: Swordsage'd. :smallannoyed:

[Delcor]

There aren't any rules for Awakened PCs. You'll need to homebrew something.

Edit: In general, playing a monster requires knowing how monsters work. Look at the guide in my sig for info if you're weak on that area of knowledge.

I'm fully aware of monster rules, just making sure they worked at least close to the rules of awakened animals :smalltongue:


As is, with an Ape, you'd have 6 RHD,

So even with LA of 0, you'd only get up to 7th level spells at ECL 19. And you'd be an ECL 7 character with your first level of Wizard.



That just about seals it in stone, considering we're only allowed ECL < 5 thanks though for all your input:smallsmile:

[Tetsubo 57]

I think you could argue that an awakened ape is approximately an orc. Just change the descriptive text. Or maybe use a half-giant.

[Hiro Protagonest]

I think you could argue that an awakened ape is approximately an orc. Just change the descriptive text. Or maybe use a half-giant.

So his natural weapons, racial hit die, climb speed, and basic creature type all disappear? Awakened apes aren't orcs.

[Tetsubo 57]

So his natural weapons, racial hit die, climb speed, and basic creature type all disappear? Awakened apes aren't orcs.

Since humans are apes and can interbreed with orcs, orcs are apes as well. Lose the racial HD, keep the climb speed. If you think the natural weapons are a game breaker give it a +1 LA.

[Coidzor]

So his natural weapons, racial hit die, climb speed, and basic creature type all disappear? Awakened apes aren't orcs.

I believe the suggestion was to have something that could plausibly be refluffed. :smalltongue:

[Xtomjames]

Okay it seems we are forgetting to separate ECL from Actual Level. Unless you're in a non-xp game ECL really doesn't matter much other than it slows your XP gain. So animal HD realy isn't much of a problem. If we follow the Savage Species method of determining LA and taking into account the Awakened Template I'd argue that an awakened Ape would have an LA of 2 and you can ignore the ECL. If you only take two HD then it wouldn't even necessarily affect your ECL anyways and you'd still gain the Ape abilities.

However I think a more effective method would just to make an Ape Hengeyokai.
Take on the racial traits of the Hengeyokai, drop the alternate form in exchange for the +10 strength and climb abilities. You only have an LA of +1 and no longer have to worry about ECL. You can also create the character straight up rather than having to figure out how to shift the ape and template into a normal character.

[subject42]

So I've been interested in playing a character as an awakened animal, mainly an ape. It would most likely be a wizard, but I'm very confused on a lot of the rules surrounding awakened animals and how they advance or affect character level.

So I guess what I'm really asking for is general help/ something to go off of, I hope this makes sense :smalleek:

Not much to go off of, but you guys ARE the playground and all :smallwink:

If you just go on racial hit die (which I would suggest), an awakened Ape would would make for a passable Tome of Battle Character. One half of the racial Hit die would go toward initiator level, so they wouldn't be a total loss.

Failing that, isn't there a 0LA race in Stormwrack that's basically a large chimpanzee/small gorilla?

[Coidzor]

Failing that, isn't there a 0LA race in Stormwrack that's basically a large chimpanzee/small gorilla?

Hadozee! More of a flying-squirrel-monkey-gorilla, IIRC.

[Cog]

If you only take two HD then it wouldn't even necessarily affect your ECL anyways and you'd still gain the Ape abilities.
Unless you're engaging in wight-boxing shenanigans, you don't get to simply choose how many HD you take, and you can't arbitrarily decide to disregard your character's ECL - and this goes double when the OP gave us a specific ECL limit.

[Rannath]

EDIT: Greenish pointed out that my post was... slightly confusing, so I'm cleaning it up and adding a broader overview of my system.

The Goal: you want an ECL1 monster so you can start at level 1 (and swap out the useless HD).

First step: You need 1HD and LA0 to meet the goal.

HD is not a problem. Find the statline (HD, saves, BAB. skills) for your race and build it like you'd build any new character (it's faster that way). Of course this is done for you if that monster only has 1 HD.

LA is a where the work goes in this system.

Finding LA: assuming that the LA is not listed you can use two methods:

The correct way is to compare to other monsters and find out just how powerful your monster is.
The quick way that introduces some error, but only takes a few minutes is to make your monster CR <1 & HD1.


LA from CR:
LA from CR is never a precise method, but in most cases if you make a monster that's in the right ballpark. Be careful with large/small monsters they need some extra fiddling usually.

For Delcor's awakened ape here's how we could proceed:
Here's the stuff for an ape PC (ignore int/wis because of awaken):

Str +10, Dex +4, Con +4 Cha -2 (7 + 1d3: 8-10) (effects CR +1)
+8 to climb, always take 10
Large (Tall) (10ft space/10ft reach) -1AC -1 attack (effects CR +1)
30ft walk/climb
+3 natural armour (effects CR +1)
natural attacks:

primary claw 1d6
secondary teeth 1d6



DM FIAT: ignore the 2HD from awaken

Awaken adds ~1CR for CR3, we need to trim these stats down to <1CR,


Drop 3HD -1CR (2CR and the ape has 1HD)
add -4 -4 -2 -2 0 +2 to your stats, the opposite of using the elite array -1CR (1CR)
remove natural armour -1CR (<1CR)


Here's where I would normally end for a one-off quest or with my non-twinkers.

Reducing LA:
If your monster seems right you're done otherwise:

Greenish pointed out that the above monster would still have LA (~3 using a more in depth method)
Here's some quick things you can use to reduce LA.

reducing reach (reduce size or make it count at large(long), size does not effect LA, but reach does (and size effects reach))
remove/limit climb speed (climb in trees only)
alter/reduce stats (total -8 in mental stats)


here's what you could use, it's not perfectly balance, but its not horribly broken either:

Str +6, Con +2 (total -8 in int/wis/cha)
+8 to climb, always take 10
Large (long) (10ft space/5ft reach) -1AC -1 attack
30ft walk 30ft climb(trees)
natural attacks:

primary claw 1d6
secondary teeth 1d6



NB: If you see a problem, let me know.

[Greenish]

You could have your DM make you an HD1/cr <1 ape. Use that as a base. Why? because if you have 1HD you can swap it directly for a PC level.Awaken gives you two HD more, so no dice.

Also, CR has preciously little to do with ECL. Large size alone pretty much means 2+ LA.

[Rannath]

Awaken gives you two HD more, so no dice.

Also, CR has preciously little to do with ECL. Large size alone pretty much means 2+ LA.

I'll make this perfectly clear, since I didn't before. Have your DM break the standard rules in a way that's comfortable to him. In my case an Awakened PC would not have those two extra HD so they could play at 1st level. (Lesser awaken: as awaken, no +2HD, 150XP, hurrah for DM fiat) My post was a playability suggestion, not a rule-lawyer suggestion.

Actually its reach that increases LA. +1LA per 5 feet reach. Will fix the post.

as for CR vs ECL I wasn't actually comparing them. I had them both as requirements. (What I actually said, in a round about way, was HD=1 CR<1 LA=0) What I should have said instead of HD was ECL. Your DM would have to make a cr<1/ECL1 ape under my system.

[Urpriest]

Okay it seems we are forgetting to separate ECL from Actual Level. Unless you're in a non-xp game ECL really doesn't matter much other than it slows your XP gain. So animal HD realy isn't much of a problem. If we follow the Savage Species method of determining LA and taking into account the Awakened Template I'd argue that an awakened Ape would have an LA of 2 and you can ignore the ECL. If you only take two HD then it wouldn't even necessarily affect your ECL anyways and you'd still gain the Ape abilities.



It didn't work like that in Savage Species and it doesn't work like that now. Read my Monster Guide.

[Greenish]

I'll make this perfectly clear, since I didn't before. Have your DM break the standard rules in a way that's comfortable to him. In my case an Awakened PC would not have those two extra HD so they could play at 1st level.Should've said that. Just having 1 HD ape doesn't cut it.


Large = +2 LA I'd definitely disagree on.Feel free to.


A template that does nothing but make you large would be a rip off at +1 LAI'd call it a bargain. Normally you'd need to grab 2 or more LA with more or less questionable stats to gain Large size. Well, or use Dragon Magazine templates generally agreed to be too strong for many games.


as for CR vs ECL I wasn't actually comparing them. I had them both as requirements. (What I actually said, in a round about way, was HD=1 CR<1 LA=0) What I should have said instead of HD was ECL. Your DM would have to make a cr<1/ECL1 ape under my system.I can't make heads nor tails out of your "formula". I don't even know why you're bringing CR up, since it has nothing to do with anything.

[Rannath]

I can't make heads nor tails out of your "formula". I don't even know why you're bringing CR up, since it has nothing to do with anything.

Its more or less a habit when working with monsters. The only two easy things to judge a monster on are ECL and CR after all.

EDIT: my "formula" (which is actually a pair of requirements) is:
<1CR/ECL1
and is read as:
less than one challenge rating and/or effective character level of 1

[Jayh]

Id love to play a house cat wizard...

[Getsugaru]

Just play an Anthropomorphic Animal from Savage Species. In the case of an ape, it works out perfectly.

[Greenish]

my "formula" (which is actually a pair of requirements) is:
<1CR/ECL1
and is read as:
less than one challenge rating and/or effective character level of 1Okay, and what does that mean? :smallconfused:

[Hiro Protagonest]

Id love to play a house cat wizard...

Play a house cat warlock! Lazor kitteh! Take Fell Flight, and you can be the terror of the skies!

[Rannath]

Okay, and what does that mean? :smallconfused:

I'm trying (and apparenly failing) to writing this for both DMs and PCs. You can freely ignore CR if you wish.

[Jayh]

Play a house cat warlock! Lazor kitteh! Take Fell Flight, and you can be the terror of the skies!

xD That sounds so awesome

[Coidzor]

Play a house cat warlock! Lazor kitteh! Take Fell Flight, and you can be the terror of the skies!

Or a Tibbit, even. Popular with both Warlock and Dragonfire Adept.

[Delcor]

Lol I probably should have mentioned this earlier:

no sourcebooks are allowed, it an only core campaign

Resume arguments

[Coidzor]

Lol I probably should have mentioned this earlier:

no sourcebooks are allowed, it an only core campaign

Resume arguments

Then you can't have anything along the lines that you want. Simple as that.

It's the nature of core-only campaigns, ain't no body happy.

[Delcor]

Then you can't have anything along the lines that you want. Simple as that.

It's the nature of core-only campaigns, ain't no body happy.

False ^

I could easily see this being a possibility, but I have yet to play in a campaign outside of core where every single member of the party, fighter, wizard, rogue, cleric has equally contributed and and had a fulfilling, happy, and fun time.

[Greenish]

Lol I probably should have mentioned this earlier:

no sourcebooks are allowed, it an only core campaign

Resume argumentsPHB, DMG and MM are all sourcebooks. Do you mean you play freeform?

[Delcor]

PHB, DMG and MM are all sourcebooks. Do you mean you play freeform?

I meant extra sourcebooks outside core, oops, should have clarified.

So: PHB, DMG, MM, and MM2 are the only books allowed.