Ways to add templates smoothly in play?

[WarKitty]

I'm looking at ways to possibly level a housecat up during play. Are there any smooth ways to add templates, given that class levels don't seem quite suitable here?

[Aegis013]

You could make a Savage Species-esque progression, where each LA they gain some of the benefits of the template. I know there are progressions for leveling into monsters with LA and RHD, but I'm not sure if there are ones in that book for templates.

[TypoNinja]

Is a template a must? You can just keep adding Animal HD to make it the biggest baddest little kitty ever.

If you don't want to build a template 'class' to work through the two easiest options are to either take the template right away, then just wait for your XP to catch up while you are temporarily higher level than the rest of the party, or save up enough XP/levels without advancing until you can take the template.

I've done both in games, the downsides are pretty obvious, for the first option you are suddenly stronger, possibly a lot stronger, this could be unbalancing. The second option has the opposite problem, you stop advancing for a while and fall behind.

Both options tend to be kind of boring from a PC perspective unless the template is only one or two levels, you spend a long time getting no new goodies to play with.

You could also have a Druid cast Awaken on the thing, then it gains sentience and qualifies for class levels.

[Xefas]

Well, you could kill the cat, and then cast Create Undead on the corpse (which doesn't specify that the target needs to be a humanoid corpse), to raise it as a mummy.

Mummy Cat!

[Feytalist]

A thought: you could use the druid's animal companion table as a sort of a "class" analogue. The animal then gets extra HD and ability increases every couple of "levels" (using the druid levels as a guideline), and a few extra abilities.

Could be worth a try.