[3.5] Natural Weapon Advice

[Oh My God]

I'm creating a hilariously high level gestalt character that has natural weapons on account of being a Slaad, and I'm really attracted by the idea of using them as my principal means of hurting things. I've spent the past couple of hours reading threads, and staring at rules, and even then my understanding of the rules is far from complete, but I can't find any good way of bringing natural attacks up to par with weapons, particularly in regards to number of attacks.

A Death Slaad has three natural attacks, two claws and a bite. To the best of my understanding, I'm not able to get more attacks than that even if my BAB is +20/+15/+10/+5. Almost all of the material I can find about Natural Weapons are ways of slapping them on races that aren't meant to have them, or ways to break Wild Shape, and the like.

What I'm after isn't optimization, really. What I'm really after is making sure I actually understand how natural weapons work, and make sure I'm not making an obvious mistake.

[Tief]

I'm sure somebody will correct me if I'm wrong, but from what I have read I believe you are correct.
You can only gain more natural attacks by gaining more natural weapons, or through abilitys/spells that would give you more.

[JadePhoenix]

Draconomicon has Rapidstrike and Improved Rapid Strike. Both increase your number of attacks with a natural weapon. Slaad don't qualify, though.
Thayan Gladiator has Natural Weapon Focus. It also increases your number of attacks with a natural weapon.
Haste helps natural weapon fighters as much as any other fighter.
If you can get Beast Strike, Snap Kick becomes an option as well.

[Keld Denar]

I'm on my phone, so its hard to hyperlink stuff, but if you Google my guide, "Natural Weapons and you, a Miniguide", there is a lot of information in there about how they work.

Basically, if you aren't using a manufactured weapon or Unarmed Strike, you don't get your iterative attacks. You don't even qualify for Rapid Strike as an Outsider. Your best bet is probably to ignore your claws and just attack with a manufactured weapon plus your bite is most cases. You still have your claws if you need them, but most of the time you won't use them.

[Darrin]

A Death Slaad has three natural attacks, two claws and a bite. To the best of my understanding, I'm not able to get more attacks than that even if my BAB is +20/+15/+10/+5. Almost all of the material I can find about Natural Weapons are ways of slapping them on races that aren't meant to have them, or ways to break Wild Shape, and the like.


First, choose a primary weapon. This can be one of your natural attacks, a manufactured weapon, or an unarmed strike (particularly if you've taken Improved Unarmed Strike... and if you intend to tear things apart with natural weapons, you should do so, and follow up with Superior Unarmed Strike so the damage scales up somewhat).

You get your iterative attacks with your primary manufactured weapon or unarmed strike: +20/+15/+10/+5. All of your natural weapons are added as secondary attacks with a -5 attack penalty and 1/2 Str bonus on damage. If you took Improved Unarmed Strike, then you get four iterative unarmed strikes, then bite +15, claw +15, claw +15. You can reduce the -5 penalty by taking the Multiattack feat, or eliminate the penalty entirely with the Improved Multiattack feat.

Note: if you're using a manufactured weapon, such as a sword, for your primary iterative attacks, then you most likely can't attack with the claw holding the sword.

You generally can't attack more than once with your bite or claw, although there may be some ways around that... or there are ways to increase the damage of your bite/claws. What exactly did you want to do with you rnatural attacks?

[Keld Denar]

Actually, a Death Slaad's primary natural attack is its claws. That is the weapon that they make single attacks with, and is listed first in their full attack. It is ALWAYS the primary natural weapon, EXCEPT when a manufactured weapon or Unarmed Strike is used.

If no stat block is given, a character can generally choose which natural weapon is primary. When its given in a stat block, however, its pretty much RAW which weapon is primary. Upright creatures generally have claws as primary weapons, such as lizardfolk, trolls, and troglodytes. Quadrapeds tend to have primary bites, such as leopards, although there are exceptions like lions and bears.

So no, he doesn't get to pick a natural weapon. It's either primary claws with a secondary bite or unarmed strikes and secondary claws and bite or manufactured weapon(s) with secondary bite and possibly a claw depending on free hands.

[The Crash Man]

Superior Unarmed Strike, Improved Natural Weapon, Amulet of Mighty Fists, and Monks' Belt are your friends. Those four are often the bread-and-butter of any natural attack focused build. Suddenly those three natural attacks explode into 7.