Monstrous humanoid

[Spacehamster]

Just got monster manual 3 and were looking at the sand giant, when it says it starts with 15 levels of monstrous humanoid and has a lvl adjustment of 4 does that mean you could only make a pc sand giant in a level 19 campaign or does it just mean you have to take your first 15 levels as monstrous humanoid? So for example if we start a game at level 8 and I got allowed to make a sand giant I would have a 4hd monstrous humanoid sand giant? and can only take monstrous humanoid levels for the coming 11 hd?

Spacehamster over and out

[DeltaEmil]

The Sand Giant has 15 giant hit die, not monstrous humanoid hit die. The Level Adjustment is added together to say what your "effective" character level is. In the case of the sand giant, that makes it a level 19 character, who is supposed to fit in with level 19 human wizards, 19 dwarven clerics, elven warblade 10 / eternal blade 9, and so on.

[Spacehamster]

The Sand Giant has 15 giant hit die, not monstrous humanoid hit die. The Level Adjustment is added together to say what your "effective" character level is. In the case of the sand giant, that makes it a level 19 character, who is supposed to fit in with level 19 human wizards, 19 dwarven clerics, elven warblade 10 / eternal blade 9, and so on.

But is the 15 giant hit die only for npc sand giants? Always been confused how to make PC´s of monster classes, I mean is it possible to make a pc sand giant with effective character level 8?

[DeltaEmil]

No, your sand giant character has to take the 15 giant hit die.

For an explanation how you play monster characters, follow Urpriest's guide.

Urpriest's Monstrous Monster Handbook (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=207928)

[Spacehamster]

Ah ok thanks, damn that makes most monster playable chars useless since mostly dont play that high levels. :(

[Darrin]

But is the 15 giant hit die only for npc sand giants? Always been confused how to make PC´s of monster classes, I mean is it possible to make a pc sand giant with effective character level 8?

ECL = HD + LA. So if you want a Sand Giant PC with an ECL of 8, you'd have to start play with 4 HD, which means you'd be four levels behind everyone else on HP and skill points, and you wouldn't get another HD until you earned enough XP to reach 9th level. You'd also likely be locked into gaining nothing but racial HD (no class abilities) for most of the rest of your career. So... Probably not worth it.

[Spacehamster]

ECL = HD + LA. So if you want a Sand Giant PC with an ECL of 8, you'd have to start play with 4 HD, which means you'd be four levels behind everyone else on HP and skill points, and you wouldn't get another HD until you earned enough XP to reach 9th level. You'd also likely be locked into gaining nothing but racial HD (no class abilities) for most of the rest of your career. So... Probably not worth it.

Always found it bit silly that you can´t just take class levels with a level adjustment for monsters, makes most of them bland unless they have a very low racial hd that you can start taking normal classes decently early. :(

[TuggyNE]

Always found it bit silly that you can´t just take class levels with a level adjustment for monsters, makes most of them bland unless they have a very low racial hd that you can start taking normal classes decently early. :(

For most such monsters, the LA is too low for the abilities gained to be workable without RHD; the sand giant probably grants Str bonuses of at least +16 as well as a lot of other stuff, which is not something to throw around with a level 5 party, even if you do only have one actual class level. Not to say that the current system is ideal, but it's better than most trivial alternatives.