Inhabiting Swarm

[Acksiom]

Class Skills

Skills Points at Each Level: 4 + INT

Hit Dice: d8



Level

BAB

Fort

Ref

Will

Special




1st
+0
+2
+2
+2
Inhabitation, Share Abilities, Swarm Improvement



2nd
+1
+3
+3
+3
Swarm Improvement



3rd
+2
+3
+3
+3
Extra Type



4th
+3
+4
+4
+4
Swarm Improvement, Type Improvement Rank 2



5th
+3
+4
+4
+4
Extra Type



6th
+4
+5
+5
+5
Swarm Improvement



7th
+5
+5
+5
+5
Extra Type, Type Improvement Rank 3



8th
+6/+1
+6
+6
+6
Swarm Improvement



9th
+6/+1
+6
+6
+6
Extra Type



10th
+7/+2
+7
+7
+7
Swarm Improvement, Type Improvement Rank 4



11th
+8/+3
+7
+7
+7
Extra Type



12th
+9/+4
+8
+8
+8
Swarm Improvement



13th
+9/+4
+8
+8
+8
Extra Type, Type Improvement Rank 5



14th
+10/+5
+9
+9
+9
Swarm Improvement



15th
+11/+6/+1
+9
+9
+9
Extra Type



16th
+12/+7/+2
+10
+10
+10
Swarm Improvement, Type Improvement Rank 6



17th
+12/+7/+2
+10
+10
+10
Extra Type



18th
+13/+8/+3
+11
+11
+11
Swarm Improvement



19th
+14/+9/+4
+12
+12
+12
Extra Type



20th
+15//+10/+5
+12
+12
+12
Swarm Improvement






Class Features:


10 rounds to change Inhabitation at Level 1, -1 round/Level
Spider silk Natural Armor increase for bodies/Level
Increased types of creatures/multiple Levels: Rank 1 - Animal > Rank 2 - Fey, Plant, or Vermin > Rank 3 - Monstrous Humanoid or Undead > Rank 4 - Giant, Humanoid, or Magical Beast > Rank 5 - Aberration, Dragon, or Ooze > Rank 6 - Construct, Outsider, or Elemental
Crawlmeleon Hide/Move Silently bonus, Pictorial imaging (faces, maps, text, etc.)
Spot Bonus


Weapon and Armor Proficiency: Inhabiting swarms are only proficient with their own swarm attacks and the natural weapons of their Inhabitations.

Inhabitations: Inhabiting swarms can possess and thereby control the bodies of basic animals. As the swarm increases in level, its Inhabitation ability expands to include other types of creatures. Each Inhabitation must first be prepared through a cocooning and alteration process that requires 1 day/HD of the subject creature. Later Swarm Improvement class advances can reduce the time necessary for preparation. The Swarm begins play with one already prepared Inhabitation selected from the Druid Animal Companion list. The swarm can only possess creatures of their own HD+1 and can only have as many Inhabitations simultaneously prepared as their HD/2. Swarm Improvement class advances can increase the limit on the number of simultaneously prepared Inhabitations. Multiple Inhabitations up to the available limit can be undergoing cocooning and preparation simultaneously.

Share Skills: Swarm racial bonuses to skills may be shared with Inhabitations and stack with Inhabitation racial bonuses. [Expiating Arachneae Inhabitations gain the swarm's +4 racial bonus on Hide and Spot checks and a +8 racial bonus on Climb checks. Expiating Arachneae Inhabitations use the Inhabitation's Dexterity or Strength modifier for Climb checks at Expiating Arachneae's discretion. Expiating Arachneae Inhabitations can always choose to take 10 on a climb check, even if rushed or threatened.]

Substitute Feats: Swarm Improvements may be substituted for the 1st-level Character Creation feat and subsequent normal progression Feats (3rd, 6th, 9th, etc.) Feats gained through levels in other classes (Fighter Bonus Feats, etc.) may not be substituted.

Swarm Improvements: At 1st and 2nd Level and at every 2nd Level after that (4th, 6th, 8th) etc., Inhabiting Swarms gain Swarm Improvements as per the Swarm Improvements Chart.



Class Level

Inhabitations

Crawlmeleons

Silkweaves



1st-2nd


+2 Skill Bonus to Climb/Hide/Move Silently

Natural Armor +1, Parachuting (Feather Fall)



3rd-4th

Reduce Preparation Time, Spider Climb

Hynoptic Pattern




5th-6th






7th-8th

Increased Inhabitations


Fly



9th-10th






11th-12th






13th-14th






15th-16th






17th-18th






19th-20th







Natural Armor: The Silkweave Natural Armor bonus to Inhabitations can never exceed 1/2 the

Improved Poison, Split Swarm, Reduce Preparation Time, Increase Inhabitation Limit, Crawlmeleons, Silkweaves

Crawlmeleons: Climb Bonus, Hide Bonus, Move Silently Bonus, Hypnotic Pattern (EX: Fascinate), Somatic Components, Spider Climb

Silkweaves: Natural Armor, Throw Web, Tripwire, Cocoon, Feather Fall, Fly

[bekeleven]

Seemed more appropriate to have this conversation in this thread.


I don't know why you think it's still Mindless; I can't find that anywhere in the write up so far. Did I miss something?

Did you do a race writeup? If not, did you state a reason that mindless creatures can take class levels? Failing that, did you specify anywhere that swarms are not mindless? Because you wrote "spider swarm" on the character sheet. Spider swarms, you guessed it, are mindless.

I sort of like the idea you're shooting for. Unfortunately, you haven't written a race (much less an LA+0 with no RHD race), you've just written a class with 9 named class abilities, only one of which is explained at all, a second of which might be explained under the wrong name possibly? and a third of which is sitting on a word salad stub.

Of the two abilities that have explanations, you don't explain what is meant by "one inhabitation" - is it a creature you can inhabit? When you have 4 "inhabitations prepared" as an 8th level inhabiting swarm, do you have 4 mind-controlled animals following you? Or are you in one and you leave 3 in your basement in cocoons? You don't explain what infestation means, mechanically. Does it mean that you share the creature's space and control its actions? Is the "Swarm" even visible or is it under the skin? With no way of communicating and no opposable thumbs, even in this form, how do you meet minimum PC race qualifications even if you could think?

Share Skills, which I assume is Share Abilities from the class table even though skills and abilities are rather different things in D&D, also leaves some questions. If it's "Racial bonuses stack when inhabiting a creature," just say that. I don't know what Expiating Arachneae Inhabitations are, since you never even defined or mentioned them outside of this paragraph, but you seem awful insistent to mention them (nm, just found it was your character name. So that makes sense to people that are in that PbP campaign at least...). You say "can use the host's stats" - does that mean if I don't invoke that I use my own? Every sentence here just raises more questions than it answers.

You have, at the start, a brief teaser for your plans on the rest of the class features. 10 rounds to change habitation - does that mean if you're in a dog and you walk up to a bear, you can become the bear in 10 rounds? Does the bear have to already be one of your prepared inhabitations? If so, can it move? If not, what if you try this when you have max inhabitations prepared? What does inhabitation entail?

The teaser also implies something about natural armor improvement, but I'll be damned if there's any mechanics for how it works or what benefits it grants. Once you have numbers, can I transfer them to other creatures when I swap inhabitation? Do I have to redo them? What's going on? Who am I?

Is inhabitation limited by anything other than HD? Size? Can you inhabit something colossal? What about something that resists? Can you walk up to elminster and inhabit him once you unlock humanoids? Is it a touch attack? Do you have to kill him and inhabit his husk? What if the target has class levels? Do you gain class features? Does your effective type change, granting you (for instance) martial weapon proficiency when inhabiting an archon? Can you inhabit something aquatic and not breathe air? Or a construct and not have to breathe at all?

What is a crawlmeleon and pictoral imaging?

There are other qustions. Can you multiclass? Can a swarm take levels in wizard? Furthermore, can a human take levels in inhabiting swarm? Nothing here is defined, it's all just in your head somewhere, presumably the same place that says what your LA+0 swarm stats are, as those aren't on your character sheet, on this page, or in the PbP thread, linked in your signature, or anywhere in your last week of posting history.

So, you asked for class feedback, and I'd love to give you any if there were enough of anything here to really qualify as a class. As is, you've made a 20-level stub that can't be taken by any legal player race, can only be taken by a nebulous undefined race that you're playing while not knowing what it is, doesn't explain half its powers and doesn't make sense when explaining the other half. Besides "finish you class and race," I don't think there's any feedback that can be fairly given.

[Acksiom]

I'm not sure what you mean by all that. Could you go into more detail about what you think I should do first?

Also, I don't see anything in there about the Stats issue, which is the only thing I specifically asked for help with.

[bekeleven]

I can't tell you a balanced way to do point buy until I know what you're playing.

I can't know what you're playing until you know what you're playing.

You clearly do not.

For the record: If you did awaken a spider swarm (which is impossible, as they are vermin and not animals, and can't be targeted by awakening since they're not a single creature), they would gain 2 HD for a total of 4.

If you're asking me how to balance the point buy of a 4 HD creature in a level 1 game, I'd say you can't, and the best you could do would be massive penalties to every stat. But you're not asking that. So what are you asking?

If you're making a custom race, then post that, and I'll try to help balance it. I can't balance "it's like a swarm but changes in a couple ways like maybe the size is different, they have 1 HD, they can think, they still have some swarm immunities maybe, and other ones that have half." My response to that would be: They can't speak, they're not a player race. But, also, define all those terms.

[Hanuman]

Here's how we resolved inhabiting creatures using the ozodrin, feel free to use our brew for some reference datapoints.

Keep in mind that a puppet functions somewhat like a dismembered hand, so a puppet is actually somewhere between a body part and a summon.

Note the mechanical changes between a Hellwasp Swarm (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/vermin/swarm-hellwasp) and the inhabit augment, and that the inhabited creature functions more like the player than it's original self:

Ozodrin Puppet Draft 8/12/2014 (To be Implemented in Ozodrin Remix Version 2.3)

Puppet
Appearance
This feature creates what looks like a medium humanoid creature of your design, even though it's just a hollow shell and has no actual body parts.
Benefits

Puppets are created with their own pool of 5 Hit Points.
Puppets occupy squares, are detected, targeted and lose hitpoints as if they were a seperate creature, though they are features and use your actions normally.
Effects other than the damage they cause effect you normally.
You may add and remove features onto your puppet as you would onto your self.
Puppets may not attack if more than 100' away from you, and are removed beyond 1000'.
When a puppet reaches 0 Hit Points it is removed along with any feature placed on it.
You or any creature your puppet is carrying may not make a full attack if the puppet moves more than 5' in the same round.

Special

At any time you may sacrifice a number of hitpoints to prevent your puppet from losing an equal amount of hitpoints.
As a Free Action once per round your puppet may move up to your land, swim, burrow, climb or fly speed, otherwise it cannot move.
Effect targeting the puppet that physically force movement (such as Bull Rush) or that inhibit it (such as the grappled condition) only apply to the puppet, the rest of the ozodrin moves normally.


Complete Augments, the rest are WiP



Augment
Benefit
Requires
Maximum


Spellward
Spell Protection
Puppet
Once


Inhabit
Control Creature/Corpse
Puppet
Once / Feature


Ghost
Ethereal
Puppet
Once / Feature



Spellward

Whenever a spell, power, spell-like ability or psi-like ability effecting your puppet requires a save you may consider the save automatically successful by lowering the puppet's hitpoints by 2 per spell or power level. Puppets who reach 0 maximum hitpoints are removed.
As an Immediate Action you may consider yourself to have a +4 bonus to all saves and touch AC versus spells, spell-like effects, powers and psi-like effects, you may add this bonus after you fail a save or after being hit with a touch attack. By using this effect you destroy your puppet.


Inhabit

As a Full Round Action that provokes an attack of opportunity you may move your puppet inside a helpless creature or corpse.
As a Move Action you may remove your puppet from the creature or corpse.
Puppets are considered part of your body... so it's your actions as if the puppet was a tentacle that has hp and is detected and moves as it's own creature.
When a puppet enters a living host the host is considered to be under the effects of a Dominate Monster spell with a caster level equal to your Ozodrin level.
While a puppet is inside a host it's maximum hitpoints improve by 1 per hit die of the inhabited creature or corpse.
If a puppet reaches 0 hitpoints it destroys the body it is inhabiting.
An inhabited creature uses it's puppet's checks, rolls, saves, AC and hitpoints in place of it's own.
A puppet inside of a living creature is considered an infestation for the purposes of forcibly removing it.


Ghost

Your puppet becomes Ethereal (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/special-abilities#TOC-Ethereal) with the exception that it remains visible and may use Gaze Special Attacks as normal.
You gain a persistent mundane Unseen Servant (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/u/unseen-servant) effect which is always considered in the same square as your puppet.