Succubus race 3.5e

[2903jb]

Hey Guys

Some friends and I, are starting a D&D 3.5e campaign soon, and i figured, i'd really like to try and play a succubus, but there are a few problems, firstly we're gonna start at level 5, and seeing as a succubus is ECL 12 that's already a problem in itself, second is i really don't wanna play something with RHD, my plan is to play a succubus rogue.
The thing I'd like help with is to reduce the power of the succubus race so that it's be of acceptable power to 1 rdh creature with an LA of +3, and this is where i'm hoping to be able to get some help, i am very new to d&d and wouldn't know where to start or what would seem reasonable, i have yet to talk to my DM about the idea, but i figured that the chances of him liking the idea is if i've done most of the work to reduce the power of the race.
There are a few things i'd really like to keep on the succubus as is, that being change shape, as this is probably the most important ability to my concept, the second one being energy drain, but other than those i am up for reducing it's power so it is reasonable for an LA 3 race.

This is, as far as i've gathered what the succubus race looks like, stat wise from the monster manual, you can correct me if i'm wrong, or missed something.

Succubus
6d8 RHD (Outsider)
+2 str, +2 dex, +2 con, +6 int, +4 wis, +16 cha
+9 Natural Armor Class
Damage Reduction 10/cold iron or good
Darkvision 60 ft
Immunity to Electricity and poison
Resistance 10 to acid, cold and fire
SR 18
Telepathy 100 ft
Tongues(SU)
Energy drain(SU) (DC 21 with another DC 21 for a second drain)
At will, charm monster (DC 22), Detect Good, Detect Thoughts(DC 20) Ethereal jaunt (self plus 50 pounds of objects), suggestion (DC 21), Greater Teleport (self plus 50 pounds of objects)
Summon Demon, vrock at 30% success 1/day caster level 3
Change Shape(SU) any small or medium humanoid
Racial bonus of +8 to listen and spot, +10 circumstance bonus to disguise checks when using change shape
LA +6
ECL 12

A Second Question i have about the succubus is about her change shape, i've read somewhere that she keeps her shape changed even if she dies, but i can't seem to find where i read that again, is that true? also i know demons don't have to sleep, but they can if they so chose, if she did, would it cancel her change shape.

Third, what bonus languages does outsider, or rather demons have. i know she has the tongues ability, but should she for some reason enter an antimagic field, i am guessing her tongues ability would be unusable in there aswell.

I know i could probably just chose another race and add some class levels of certain classes or what not, but that's not really what i want.

Thanks in advance.
~JB

[Skrobo]

First things first: Why do you want to play a Succubi, if you don't want to actually be a Succubus? Is it just the looks you are after?

I ask because if you want it dumped down to 1 RHD and 3LA, it will lose almost every single one of those fancy abilities.

[BowStreetRunner]

Page 195 of Savage Species has the Monster Class entry for Succubus/Incubus. Have you looked at that?

[Yora]

One option would be to play an Alu-fiend, the half-human daughter of a succubus. It's just a human with the half-fiend template that comes with only a Level Adjustment of +4.

Alternatively, a Fey'ri, which is a special kind of tiefling born from elves and succubuses. They are in Monsters of Faerûn and Races of Faerûn.

[Petrocorus]

Or you can play a Fey'Ri from Races of Faerun.
It's basically a sun elf with demon ancestors.
Alter self at will, Outsider type, extraordinary fly (40 feet, poor), some SLA.
1 HD LA +2 or +3 depending on the SLA you chose.
The succubus could be your grandmother.

EDIT: ninja'd.

[2903jb]

First things first: Why do you want to play a Succubi, if you don't want to actually be a Succubus? Is it just the looks you are after?

I ask because if you want it dumped down to 1 RHD and 3LA, it will lose almost every single one of those fancy abilities.

Well mostly for the looks, personaly i don't see many of those abilities as being essential for being a succubus, to me it's the looks, the draining poor souls of their lifeforce, all the teleport, ethereal jaunt, and so are just fluff, to me at least, i know i'd lose a lot of the abilities, and it's not really a bother to be honest. as people mentioned i could just make another race, or take the succubus as a class from Savage species. all i want to know is what it'd looks like with 1 RDH and 3la, if it's not viable, then it's fine, i'll think of another concept :)

[Craft (Cheese)]

The thing I'd like help with is to reduce the power of the succubus race so that it's be of acceptable power to 1 rdh creature with an LA of +3, and this is where i'm hoping to be able to get some help, i am very new to d&d and wouldn't know where to start or what would seem reasonable, i have yet to talk to my DM about the idea, but i figured that the chances of him liking the idea is if i've done most of the work to reduce the power of the race.
There are a few things i'd really like to keep on the succubus as is, that being change shape, as this is probably the most important ability to my concept, the second one being energy drain, but other than those i am up for reducing it's power so it is reasonable for an LA 3 race.

I assume a monster class is off the table since you want to start the game already having rogue levels.

Well, the first thing you need to ask yourself is what parts of the race you want for your character, and what parts are extraneous and can be safely removed: For example, if you don't particularly care about that at-will Greater Teleport ability, you can dump it and shave off a lot of LA.

Those ability score mods are insanely high: I'd change them to: +4 INT, +2 WIS, +6 CHA. Still great and matches what the succubus is supposed to be flavor-wise, but no longer at the insane level of +16.

The natural armor bonus can be dumped: Every monster that's not described as wearing armor gets this crazy huge natural armor bonus just to keep their AC up to par with PC attack bonuses. Maybe keep a +1 or +2 bonus.

Her resistances, immunities, and spell resistances are nice, but not particularly game-breaking: They can be kept safely, with the SR scaling as 12+HD. Her DR, however, I'd either remove entirely or scale down to DR 5/Magic.

Telepathy and Tongues are mostly flavor. Keep 'em.

For Change Shape, it depends on what you actually want to do with it: Do you want to be a doppelganger and be able to freely disguise yourself with the ability, or do you just want the ability to walk around in town without people running and screaming? If the latter, this is easy: Just say that her Change Shape ability only lets her switch back and forth between a single humanoid form, who is clearly recognizable as her (think Sabine's "human" form vs. her succubus form). I don't even think that's powerful enough to warrant a level adjustment.

If you want to use her Change Shape as a way to make disguises to infiltrate, that's quite a bit more powerful (but not overly so, you can mostly emulate that with a Hat of Disguise).

The toughest part is her Energy Drain and SLAs. Also don't forget she gets a fly speed of 50 feet (average maneuverability): At mid levels this is not particularly impressive but at low levels it's stupid powerful. I think the best solution for all three is to start out weak, then have them upgrade as she gains hit dice (similar to how the half-fiend template works). Just eyeballing it:

1-2 HD - 1/day Dimension Door, 1/day Charm Person, at-will Detect Good
3-4 HD - 3/day Charm Person, Fly speed of 20 ft. (Clumsy)
5-6 HD - 1/day Suggestion, Fly speed of 50 ft. (Average)
7-8 HD - 3/day Suggestion, at-will Charm Person
9-10 HD - 1/day Greater Teleport (replaces Dimension Door), self + 50 lbs. of objects only.
11-12 HD - at-will Suggestion, 1/day Ethereal Jaunt
13-14 HD - at-will Greater Teleport, 3/day Ethereal Jaunt
15-16 HD - at-will Ethereal Jaunt

With Energy Drain I'd use a similar progression: At 1 HD she doesn't get the automatic Suggestion to get the victim to stop resisting, and the target gets a will save to resist getting the negative level (and still gets the fortitude save to remove it). At 5 HD the suggestion kicks back in. At 9 HD, it works as it would for a normal succubus. If you feel this is too fast or too slow then change the HD values.


A Second Question i have about the succubus is about her change shape, i've read somewhere that she keeps her shape changed even if she dies, but i can't seem to find where i read that again, is that true? also i know demons don't have to sleep, but they can if they so chose, if she did, would it cancel her change shape.

Here: (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#changeShape)


A creature using change shape reverts to its natural form when killed, but separated body parts retain their shape.

I don't see why she'd revert to her natural form if she decided to sleep, though.


Third, what bonus languages does outsider, or rather demons have. i know she has the tongues ability, but should she for some reason enter an antimagic field, i am guessing her tongues ability would be unusable in there aswell.

It's a supernatural ability, so yes, it'd turn off in an antimagic field. I'm not sure if there's any specific rule for this, but if it ever came up I'd say she gets Common and Abyssal, and additional bonus languages of your choice equal to her intelligence modifier.

[2903jb]

:snipe:

Thanks a lot mate, this actually seems like quite a good idea, a few questions though, the HD advancement, is that ment as taking levels in outsider, or would that be, as i gain levels in rogue? so for instance at rogue 3 or 4 she'd fain fly 20ft (clumsy), and 3/day charm person?

the change shape is only to disguise herself from Towns people, meaning she'd change into the same person every time, never ment for infiltrating.

Her DR i could easily remove, it's not a huge deal to me, all in all it seems like a good idea, and the ability bonuses looks a lot less insane

If say i reduced the At will greater teleport to a 2-3/day greater teleport at level 13-14 and removed the ethereal jaunt all together, how much do you think i could save off of the LA?

~JB

[Skrobo]

Cheese's idea appears to me as incredibly unfair for the rest of the group. You get 3/4th of the savage species progression, and instead of outsider HD you receive rogue levels. You might have a very hard time persuading your DM into letting you fly with that, unless all the players choose something similar.

I am suggesting a more straight forward option, represented bellow as a "new" race. Fluff it as you wish.

Native Outsider
+4 Charisma
Darkvision 60ft, can see in magical darkness
Damage reduction 5/magic (or Cold iron?)
+4 Spot, +4 Listen, +4 disguise
1/day Detect thoughts
1/day Charm person

One of the following 3 options:
3/day Etheral jaunt
Fly 40ft, Average
SR 11+HD

Those things are in additional to the 1 outsider HD you will get (id est, 8 hit points, +2 on all saves, +1 BAB, (8+int)x4 skill points). The native outside is because the Outsider type give you some sweet benefits.


Finally, I would suggest playing a "normal" race and just getting an item that has alter self at will.

[Craft (Cheese)]

Cheese's idea appears to me as incredibly unfair for the rest of the group. You get 3/4th of the savage species progression, and instead of outsider HD you receive rogue levels. You might have a very hard time persuading your DM into letting you fly with that, unless all the players choose something similar.

Considering what a caster is doing at these ECLs I think it's not at all unreasonable, then again a full caster may well be too high of a point to balance against. If the rest of the party is a monk, a paladin, and a truenamer, then yeah, my progression is way too fast.

You did point out, though, that I forgot all about Detect Thoughts and the skill bonuses. I'd lower those skill bonuses to +2 each, and have detect thoughts come online at 5 HD (ECL 8).


Thanks a lot mate, this actually seems like quite a good idea, a few questions though, the HD advancement, is that ment as taking levels in outsider, or would that be, as i gain levels in rogue? so for instance at rogue 3 or 4 she'd fain fly 20ft (clumsy), and 3/day charm person?

It's meant to work with 1 racial hit die and a +3 level adjustment, and yes, the rogue levels count toward your HD. So you'd get the 20 ft. fly speed starting at Rogue 2, or ECL 6.


If say i reduced the At will greater teleport to a 2-3/day greater teleport at level 13-14 and removed the ethereal jaunt all together, how much do you think i could save off of the LA?

Overall I'd still price it at LA +3, since those changes are very late in your level progression (you'd start with the at-will teleporting at ECL 16, long after the wizard can do it for the whole party).

[Petrocorus]

If i understand well, at-will teleport is not that a powerful thing in your mind?

[Craft (Cheese)]

If i understand well, at-will teleport is not that a powerful thing in your mind?

At ECL 5? It'll snap your game in half if the players are halfway intelligent about using it unless the DM goes out of their way to put dimensional locks everywhere the PCs go. At ECL 16? It's a neat trick, but I don't think it's overpowering at that power level.

[ArcturusV]

Hmm. If it were me, I'd go with the Demonblooded or Half-Demon template coming in at LA 2(3 if you want wings and natural flight). Nice template that does almost everything you want, looks wise, keeps your power in check. You gain more powers from it as you level up. So at ECL 3 (4 with flight) you wouldn't have too much "Demon" powers, other than a natural attack with your claws, and I think the ability to pop off Summon Monster I (Calling only Demonic critters) as a 1/day SLA. As you level up though you gain the DR, Natural Armor, Teleport, Telepathy, a better Summon, etc, so that you'll still have relevant abilities from it, so your Demonblooded nature is going to help you out from ECL 4 onwards, instead of being a big front loaded power spike and then useless later on.

[kreenlover]

I'd go with alu-fiend. There were alternate rules for an actual alu-fiend template in one of the later dragon magazines (340? 348? I shall check this later) that made it different than a regular half-fiend

EDIT: Yah, no, I can't find the exact dragon magazine

[Novawurmson]

Take a look at some of the Pathfinder tiefling (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/races/other-races/featured-races/arg-tiefling) alternate racial features.

[Craft (Cheese)]

I'd go with alu-fiend. There were alternate rules for an actual alu-fiend template in one of the later dragon magazines (340? 348? I shall check this later) that made it different than a regular half-fiend

EDIT: Yah, no, I can't find the exact dragon magazine

There was a web article (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/we/20060630x&page=3) with a half-succubus template, but it only has alternate SLAs listed up to 6 HD.

[Larkas]

Aside from the linked web enhancement, you can find an Alu-Demon template in Dragon Magazine 355, pg 10.

[kreenlover]

Aside from the linked web enhancement, you can find an Alu-Demon template in Dragon Magazine 355, pg 10.

THATS THE ONE! Ok, I knew it one was one of the later ones. Thanks Larkas!

[Larkas]

THATS THE ONE! Ok, I knew it one was one of the later ones. Thanks Larkas!

Any time. :smallsmile:

[Petrocorus]

Kreenlover, i have to say it, i friggin love your sig.

[Fyermind]

Changeling works pretty well. If you want SLAs take half Fey.

[kreenlover]

Kreenlover, i have to say it, i friggin love your sig.

Thanks :smallbiggrin:

[Gavinfoxx]

I strongly suggest you play a Lesser Fey'ri and use Level Adjustment Buyoff.

Read:

http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=6992.0

and

http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=2811

You can get that down to LA+0, eventually. That's a really big deal. Take Charm Person, Clairaudience/Clairvoyance, Detect Thoughts, and Suggestion, and the feat 'Magic in the Blood'.

[Fouredged Sword]

Yes, I am going to suggest a changling telepath. Viable from level 1, and with cool abilities as well.

[dantiesilva]

I don't know if this may help but in a game I am in at this moment I am playing a descendent of a succubus and My DM and myself worked out that I could have it a pure fluff thing and could change my appearance to a more demonic form if I got really angered like almost raging or really aroused. It does nothing else, no bonuses, no SLA, no anything. But if you just want the feel of the Succubus beauty and all you could ask your DM about it. Hope this helps.