3.5 are there options for extra (functioning) arms?

[Skygrassface]

One of my characters is a 1 monk/7 crusader.

He's a goliath who inadvertently got a buff to his body which made him have checks not one, like a typical goliath, but two size categories larger.

He hits hard and his crusader spells make him hit even harder.

The rest of the party is all either full on spell casters, or prestiging into powerful classes.

The thought occurred to me, what if he could attack with multiple arms? would be be able to multi-attack? could he get strength bonuses? Could he get them to appear with a command word instead of being permanently attached?

Any and all help or comments are appreciated.

Thanks.

[Darrin]

The thought occurred to me, what if he could attack with multiple arms?


TWF OffHandbook: Section IV (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=15034748&postcount=12) covers most of the common methods for acquiring additional arms.

Outside of carrying a two-handed weapon, shield, and a torch/wand/whatever all at the same time, having multiple arms doesn't do all that much without investing some feats into it. You'll want to start with Multi-Weapon Fighting in the Monster Manual. It's TWF for multi-armed creatures.

There are feats for Improved Multi-Weapon Fighting and Greater Multi-Weapon Fighting in Savage Species, but the prereqs weren't updated properly, and they aren't identical to Improved/Greater TWF. It's not clear if the designers intended for the BAB and Dex requirements to be higher than their TWF counterparts.

The MWF feats work pretty much like the TWF feats, in that you have a primary weapon and then two or more offhand weapons. If all your offhand weapons are light, then your MWF penalties are -2 primary/-2 offhand. Otherwise the penalties are -4 primary/-4 offhand.



would be be able to multi-attack?


Multi-Attack is a separate feat, and is not related to TWF/MWF. It's used for secondary natural attacks, which normally have a -5 attack penalty. Multi-Attack reduces this penalty to -2. Improved Multi-Attack (also in Savage Species) reduces this penalty to zero.

If you have natural weapons on your arms, such as claws, then Multi-Attack is definitely a possibility. However, if you're attacking with your claws, you couldn't wield weapons in those appendages. But as a monk, you can use Improved Unarmed Strike as your primary or offhand weapon, then add your claws as secondary natural attacks.



could he get strength bonuses?


From just having extra arms? No, unless he's attaching grafts with inherent Strength bonuses, such as the Zombie Arm (25000 GP, Libris Mortis).



Could he get them to appear with a command word instead of being permanently attached?


A command-word item of girallon's blessing (Spell Compendium) would cost about 27000 GP, based on the guidelines in the DMG. The Phylactery of Change (11200 GP, A&EG) or Fleshshifter Armor (13160 GP, BoVD) are both cheaper, and both last pretty much all day. However, with both items you'd have to pick a specific creature with multiple arms, rather than just be yourself with extra arms.

[Necroticplague]

One of my characters is a 1 monk/7 crusader.

He's a goliath who inadvertently got a buff to his body which made him have checks not one, like a typical goliath, but two size categories larger.

He hits hard and his crusader spells make him hit even harder. Nitpick: Crusaders initiate maneuvers, not cast spells.


The rest of the party is all either full on spell casters, or prestiging into powerful classes.

The thought occurred to me, what if he could attack with multiple arms? would be be able to multi-attack? could he get strength bonuses? Could he get them to appear with a command word instead of being permanently attached?

Any and all help or comments are appreciated.

Thanks.
1. Depends on what you mean by 'multi-attack', so you might wanna be more precise in your language. No, you don't inherently have more attacks for having more arms. However, if you are holding more weapons, you can use Multiweapon Fighting, which is mechanically identical to two-weapon fighting, but there aren't as many feats for it.
2.Again, your word salad questions make it hard to determine what you want. Yes, additional arms beyond two still have the same STR as the original set. However, having extra arms doesn't intrinsically raise your stregnth (which makes sense, otherwise getting more arms would make you better at jumping). However, Savage Species contains rules for weapons that use more than two hands, which increases your STR modifier to damage for each extra hand, and the modification is free if the weapon is masterwork (up to 4.5*STR modifier to damage for 8-handed weapons).
3.Possible, if he's using a Prestige Race or custom magic item that'a command word of a spell that gives extra arms (First one that comes to mind is Girralion's Blessing).

[Gildedragon]

You can always fuse the arms and get a boost that way

[Zanos]

There are rules in Savage Species for using more than two hands on a weapon. Each additional hand gives .5 str mod to damage.