Giant Owl as PC

[BootStrapTommy]

Giant Owl is a 1/4 CR creature. So if a player wished to play one, would it be roughly equivalent to their first level party members?

How about an Awaken CR 1/8 of some kind? Like an eagle or blood hawk?

[Gritmonger]

Giant Owl is a 1/4 CR creature. So if a player wished to play one, would it be roughly equivalent to their first level party members?

How about an Awaken CR 1/8 of some kind? Like an eagle or blood hawk?

First thing is: where does the flight go? If you go the Aarakocra route (see two relevant threads) you might go for the grappling rules, but you've got a bigger minus of "can't hold weapons and walk" that might make up for it. Nevermind that most raptors are rather rubbish at trudging in any case, what with perching/grasping claws rather than walking claws. You could probably swing a 40' flight/20' walk and still have it manageable.

[mephnick]

http://i471.photobucket.com/albums/rr75/head635/Virgil_Mighty_Max.png

[archaeo]

Giant Owl is a 1/4 CR creature. So if a player wished to play one, would it be roughly equivalent to their first level party members?

How about an Awaken CR 1/8 of some kind? Like an eagle or blood hawk?

It really isn't equivalent at all, roughly or otherwise. Level 1 PCs have a sort of ridiculous number of things the owl doesn't have. You could build out the owl, giving it class levels and whatnot, but then I suspect that, as it grows alongside the party, it will end up being outright better, as the "giant owl template" is an extremely good base race if you treat it like one.

What you decide to do should be based on how much longevity the character is supposed to have. If the player wants to just be an owl for a session or two, whatever, go wild. Otherwise, I would suggest working with the player to design a new race based on owls. Flight is a very powerful thing to have, however, as WotC notes for the Aarakocra in the new Elemental Evil Player's Companion handbook (http://media.wizards.com/2015/downloads/dnd/EE_PlayersCompanion.pdf), so you'll have to be sure to keep it in mind if you decide to homebrew some kind of owl race.

[SharkForce]

individual flight isn't that powerful. annoying for a DM to design around, sure, but not really all that powerful.

flight where you can carry other PCs (especially if the whole party can be transported) is more of a problem. so be careful of the giant owl with gnomes and halflings to fill out the rest of the party :P

[BootStrapTommy]

The Owl was on example, but their leaning toward awakened blood hawk.

It is a CR 1/8. My thoughts are that the player's first level would be as a blood hawk. They get all its features (proficiency perception, advantage on sight perception, Pack Advantage, 2d6 HP, flight, a language, etc.). Their Int must be a 10 (because Awaken) but they can roll the others. They get a background with Acrobatics maybe and another skill they can convince me of. A feature they can convince me of. They get two tool proficiencies if they think they can convince me of them, or languages if not. 5d4 starting gold. No weapon or armor proficiencies. d4 natural weapon.

When they first level, they take a class level. But they must follow the multiclassing rules (meaning no wizard).

Sound good?

[Gritmonger]

The Owl was on example, but their leaning toward awakened blood hawk.

It is a CR 1/8. My thoughts are that the player's first level would be as a blood hawk. They get all its features (proficiency perception, advantage on sight perception, Pack Advantage, 2d6 HP, flight, a language, etc.). Their Int must be a 10 (because Awaken) but they can roll the others. They get a background with Acrobatics maybe and another skill they can convince me of. A feature they can convince me of. They get two tool proficiencies if they think they can convince me of them, or languages if not. 5d4 starting gold. No weapon or armor proficiencies.

When they first level, they take a class level. But they must follow the multiclassing rules (meaning no wizard).

Sound good?

Watch out for Rogue Bloodhawks, since I think the beak would have to be a finesse weapon to get +2 damage on a 6 Str creature... and if they get advantage plus any ally is within five, they always have advantage on sneak attacks due to ally being nearby.

...plus any chance it'll take a medium-sized party member as its mount...

[BootStrapTommy]

Watch out for Rogue Bloodhawks, since I think the beak would have to be a finesse weapon to get +2 damage on a 6 Str creature... and if they get advantage plus any ally is within five, they always have advantage on sneak attacks due to ally being nearby. The beak is d4 + 2. So it is finesse. But that's optimization I'd be willing to accept, since it is at the cost of one level, a skill, and all of the annoyances I'd impose with regards to armor and weaponry.

[Gritmonger]

The beak is d4 + 2. So it is finesse. But that's optimization I'd be willing to accept, since it is at the cost of one level, a skill, and all of the annoyances I'd impose with regards to armor and weaponry (resize rule).

Hmm... what are the rules on poisoning your own beak?

[BootStrapTommy]

Hmm... what are the rules on poisoning your own beak?
You'd have to make a save. But if you succeed, so would those you attack!

I was thinking a ban on heavy armor, reduced flight by 10ft in medium. All armors are subject to serious resizing costs.

Walk speed is 10ft. Reduced to 5ft with a weapon. 0ft with two weapon fighting. Small character (which a blood hawk is) weapon limitations. Or perhaps a ban on two weapon fighting and two handed weapons and a refitting cost for modification of weapon for beak wielding.

[archaeo]

Sound good?

I suppose, but it seems likely to lead to endless headaches for very little real advantage over simply building a "hawk" race of some kind. Refluffing and playing around with the Aarakocra from the pdf I linked upthread will almost certainly result in a better play experience and save you a lot of trouble.

Edited to add: that said, if you're having fun homebrewing it, and your player ends up having fun playing it, no harm, no foul. I suspect that it might feel balanced at early levels and get more and more unbalanced as the players advance in levels, but if you're willing to treat it as a bit of a pet project, you can enjoy yourself.

[BootStrapTommy]

I suppose, but it seems likely to lead to endless headaches for very little real advantage over simply building a "hawk" race of some kind. Refluffing and playing around with the Aarakocra from the pdf I linked upthread will almost certainly result in a better play experience and save you a lot of trouble. The flavor on being a small smack talking bird is priceless through.


Flight is a very powerful thing to have, however, as WotC notes for the Aarakocra in the new Elemental Evil Player's Companion handbook (http://media.wizards.com/2015/downloads/dnd/EE_PlayersCompanion.pdf), so you'll have to be sure to keep it in mind if you decide to homebrew some kind of owl race. Out of curiosity, has WotC released any other supplementary material like this?

[Draken]

The flavor on being a small smack talking bird is priceless through.

Out of curiosity, has WotC released any other supplementary material like this?

Just the "Unearthed Arcana" pdfs which are more or less a preview of essentially unfinished material.

As for your blood hawk pc. You could probably go with these stats without much issue.

Small
Dex +2, Wis +2, Str -2, Cha -2
Speed 10 (fly 60)
Perception Proficiency
Beak (1d4 finesse weapon)
Pack Tactics (as written)
Keen Sight (as written)

Things to consider:

This is a very specialized race, by that I mean this player will probably go either go rogue or monk, maybe cleric or druid as well, but honestly it is specialized enough that I don't find it needed to add the aarakocra's armor limitation (the Str penalty probably does the trick). Archer fighter is also a possibility.

Also, I am assuming this particular blood hawk has received an Awaken spell offscreen.

I considered adding a whole paragraph on not having hands and needing to use the talons to wield weapons and shields but honestly I very quickly decided it was not worth the effort since it would change all of nothing of how the character would end up being used. His legs are where his arms would be on a Halfling and vice-versa, nothing else needs to be said.

[archaeo]

The flavor on being a small smack talking bird is priceless through.

I totally agree, but I don't think you need to hand a player a monster stat block to accomplish that.

I'd go with Draken's general idea, but I'd make the stat boosts Dex +2, Wis +1 (or something to that effect, with no stat maluses), and remove Pack Tactics with aggressive prejudice. Pack Tactics is too good for something that can already fly 60 ft. per round at level 1. I'd be tempted to throw out Keen Sight as well. I'd also make them small-sized, with all that entails, but I wouldn't restrict them to unarmed strikes, or I would work with the player to eventually provide some magical weapons well-suited for hawks.

I think you could also easily just refluff an existing race and say that the bird, as a condition for being awakened, had its wings clipped. A major character motivation could be regaining the ability to fly, but until then, they could move as a normal PC.

[BootStrapTommy]

I considered adding a whole paragraph on not having hands and needing to use the talons to wield weapons and shields but honestly I very quickly decided it was not worth the effort since it would change all of nothing of how the character would end up being used. His legs are where his arms would be on a Halfling and vice-versa, nothing else needs to be said. My thought process is that any situation where they wouldn't be flying would be a situation where they wouldn't be able to walk either, making walking pointless, thus their lack of hands pointless.


I'd go with Draken's general idea, but I'd make the stat boosts Dex +2, Wis +1 (or something to that effect, with no stat maluses), and remove Pack Tactics with aggressive prejudice. Pack Tactics is too good for something that can already fly 60 ft. per round at level 1. I'd be tempted to throw out Keen Sight as well. I'd also make them small-sized, with all that entails, but I wouldn't restrict them to unarmed strikes, or I would work with the player to eventually provide some magical weapons well-suited for hawks. Bloodhawks are already Small. Which halves their carrying capacity.

Tactically, flight is useful. But flight on a Small character limits them in many ways from fly's "fly you companions places" advantage, which is what is broken.

[Gritmonger]

Bloodhawks are already Small. Which halves their carrying capacity.

Actually, according to the rules as they are, Small and Medium creatures have the same carrying capacity - it only halves when you get to "tiny"

[goto124]

May I ruffle your feathers please?

[Thrudd]

I would rule that "pack tactics" only apply to attacking with a pack of blood Hawks or other similar birds. Attacking alongside humanoids isn't really the same thing as a swarming flock of birds, which is what the hawk knows instinctually.

I would also rule that the hawk can basically not wield any normal (designed for humanoids) weapons or shields. It can carry things in its talons, but that is not the same as being able to use them in combat. They would need custom built beak and talon enhancements, probably made of special metal so as to be light enough to still allow normal flight but strong enough to actually make a difference in damage. Same with armor, it can only wear custom made light armor. If spells have somatic components, those would also be out of reach, assuming you even allowed it to have spell casting at all. You will need to evaluate every class feature of any class they would consider taking, and decide what is useable by a bird and what isn't. I feel that you may find some things which just can't be translated/don't make sense for a non-humanoid, and the player needs to know that beforehand.


Alternatively, just let them play the hawk, but it basically only ever advances in HD as a hawk, and uses its natural weapons. Like a familiar or animal companion to the party.

[aspekt]

http://i.imgur.com/dCRVwMS.jpg

[Rowan Wolf]

I would rule that "pack tactics" only apply to attacking with a pack of blood Hawks or other similar birds. Attacking alongside humanoids isn't really the same thing as a swarming flock of birds, which is what the hawk knows instinctually.

I would also rule that the hawk can basically not wield any normal (designed for humanoids) weapons or shields. It can carry things in its talons, but that is not the same as being able to use them in combat. They would need custom built beak and talon enhancements, probably made of special metal so as to be light enough to still allow normal flight but strong enough to actually make a difference in damage. Same with armor, it can only wear custom made light armor. If spells have somatic components, those would also be out of reach, assuming you even allowed it to have spell casting at all. You will need to evaluate every class feature of any class they would consider taking, and decide what is useable by a bird and what isn't. I feel that you may find some things which just can't be translated/don't make sense for a non-humanoid, and the player needs to know that beforehand.


Alternatively, just let them play the hawk, but it basically only ever advances in HD as a hawk, and uses its natural weapons. Like a familiar or animal companion to the party.

I can kind of picture the player dipping a few levels of ranger to get a hawk companion.

[BootStrapTommy]

I can kind of picture the player dipping a few levels of ranger to get a hawk companion.
This was proposed by another player. Followed by jokes about it being an easy way to get a wife...

[Mrmox42]

Giant Owl as PC

What a hoot! :smallbiggrin: