Aegis - Aberrant from DSP's Psionics: Tentacles too strong?

[AstralFire]

Tentacle

The aberrant grows a tentacle and gains a secondary natural attack with the tentacle that deals 1d4 points of damage. The aberrant also gains the grab ability and gets a +2 bonus to grab for every tentacle beyond the first he has. This customization can be selected up to 4 times; its benefits stack.

At level 2? This is a lot of tentacle. When you add my player's two claw attacks, it's a full-round action for six strikes. This seems patently absurd. Am I missing something, or would it be best to put some sort of level requirement for each add'l tentacle?

[Kantolin]

Each of those attacks will be at a -5, if you're not factoring that in.

Still, that /does/ seem a bit strong to me too, mostly due to the levels where it's available. To run some quick numbers...

18 str barbarian, rages for 22str, does 2d6+9(16) damage with a swing
18 str aegis, does 4d4+8(18) damage with tentacles, presuming they all hit

You know, while that is more, it relies on all four tentacles hitting to break even with the greatsword, and you have to full attack with it. Now, you still do have your regular attack to go with it, but that's actually not as tremendous as I was figuring.

Still, that is a lot of hits indeed, so I dunno.

[AstralFire]

Multi-attack feat makes it an easy -2. And you're getting free grabs at uber bonus too. And it's in addition to your primary weapon attacks. :smalleek:

[Kantolin]

Well yes, but while you're taking feats to reduce penalties to achieve parity, the barbarian is taking feats to move down a now-slightly lengthier feat chain, and he doesn't have to full attack yet. :smalltongue:

[AstralFire]

True, very true. I had a feeling part of my discomfort may have sprung from the encounter design, which allowed the Aegis to get a lot of one-on-one encounters at short range. I'm still tempted to make it so the second pair have to come later though.

[The Glyphstone]

It's an extremely good low-level build - as mentioned, pacing well against a raging Barbarian with greatsword, and a very capable grappler. But unlike the barbarian, it's also extremely frontloaded...once you've got 4 tentacles and Multiattack, you've basically capped your damage output minus Strength/enchantment increases. The greatsword is going to multiply your total damage every 5 levels from the iteratives you're missing out on, so if you're planning on level 6+ for the game, the Abberant is going to fall behind.

[AstralFire]

Not worried about the long run. I'm just considering, say, limiting the Aberrant to a number of tentacles equal to his Aegis level, max 4. Reasonable? Not?

[The Glyphstone]

It's a nerf, but it's not a crippling one. Certainly better than just banning it outright because it's too powerful.

[JusticeZero]

The tentacle monster loadout also devotes a lot of resources to being able to do it; as such, the Greatsword Barbarian is a good comparison to check parity against, and as noted, it's only going to be in the lead against the Barbarian briefly and situationally. Aberrants are already focusing mainly on DPS at the expense of defenses, much like the Barbarian. That seems like balance to me.

The Aberrant doesn't completely fall behind later on, as there are some other natural weapon enhancements they can take.

[Slithery D]

Low damage, the grab only works if you're bigger than your target which takes more resource investment. It looks scary at first but it's not that big of a deal. You can't get pounce from class features so full attack isn't that great.