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Varnithis
2007-07-31, 03:37 AM
I have a question for my fellow D&D players.

What exactly would you rule Alphonse Elric from Full Metal Alchemist to be? The lazy answer is an Iron Golem... but that isn't what he is. Is there any legal way for a character with a soul to be destroyed, and have their soul transfered to an animated object (In this case a suit of armor) to save their memory and still be within D&D rules?

Would that be an Awakened animated object or Iron Golem?

Just to be safe i'm spoilering this just in case anyone thinks it's giving something away (although it isn't a hidden detail in the series):
In Full Metal Alchemist this is exactly what happens to the boy. In an attempt to raise their mother form the dead, he is consumed in the transmutation, and his brother fixes his soul to a suit of armor with a blood seal.

Townopolis
2007-07-31, 03:44 AM
Iron Golem has all sorts of mechanical/magical gizmo whatnot. Not what Al does.

My best guess would be an awakened animated suit of full plate with levels in sorcerer or artificer.

AslanCross
2007-07-31, 03:56 AM
It is possible for a construct to have a personality. The Nimblewright in Monster Manual II has a non-Neutral alignment and has decent INT, high WIS and high CHA.

That said, an Awakened Suit of full plate (or heavier--maybe Dwarven Mountain Plate from Races of Stone) would fit the bill.

Ramza00
2007-07-31, 04:10 AM
for simplicity sake make him a warforged, if you don't you open up a huge can of worms balance wise.

Full Metal Alchemist Transmutation can be easily simulated by psionics, especially the energy related psychokinesis, metacreativity, and to a lesser extent psychometabolism (any form of healing or biological creation) and telepathy (switching bodies is practically identical to mind switch true).

The only thing that doesn't fit is the need for transmutation circles but this can be easily added as a flavor addition/change to the psionic rules.

Edward is easily a normal psion, but Al may be an Ardent due to the fact he seems to have a high wisdom instead of intelligence.

Varnithis
2007-07-31, 04:14 AM
The reason I ask is a player of mine wants to know if he can have a legal character, or at least a feasable one, that is similar to that. IE: He was killed in some freak accident, but his mentor bound his soul to a suit of armor to save him. (He is a Wizard)

I don't allow for resurrection short of Miracle, or direct divine intervention because it makes it too hard to keep a resourceful bad guy dead, so this was the way around it. I ended up liking the idea and was thinking of having a few of these object bound souls in my campaign.

Should I just make up a spell for it?

Varnithis
2007-07-31, 04:17 AM
for simplicity sake make him a warforged, if you don't you open up a huge can of worms balance wise.

Full Metal Alchemist Transmutation can be easily simulated by psionics, especially the energy related psychokinesis, metacreativity, and to a lesser extent psychometabolism (any form of healing or biological creation) and telepathy (switching bodies is practically identical to mind switch true).

The only thing that doesn't fit is the need for transmutation circles but this can be easily added as a flavor addition/change to the psionic rules.

Edward is easily a normal psion, but Al may be an Ardent due to the fact he seems to have a high wisdom instead of intelligence.

I thought of that. I don't actually have access to the Eberron Campaign setting... actually I only have the Core books + FR (Which I stopped using).

That probably is the smartest way to do it since otherwise you'd have balance issues coming out the wazoo.

Xuincherguixe
2007-07-31, 04:42 AM
Iron Golem seems like it doesn't quite work. Which is kind of silly when you think about it, because it's so close to what Al should be.

Living suits of armor are hardly anything new, so you'd think there would be rules on it.

I don't have any Ebberon books, but it sounds like Warforged also contain organic material, not what you're looking for. But it might work mechanically. Technically. an Al inspired character should not have a constitution score, but that might poses problems itself.

You also might want to stick to classes without arcane spell failure, since those are likely to cause the least trouble.


Easy way out? Do the character as normal. But say he doesn't have a body. Yet everything still works the same. Disadvantage of that is that healing spells get confusing. But hey, Hitpoints are already confusing ('only the last few represent wounds, the rest are the ability to avoid damage. Heal spells recover... your damage avoidance?! What?!')

Or you could just roll up stats, have 0 constitution, and give the guy Construct traits. Say the character is always assumed to be in armor (probably full plate)

Kizara
2007-07-31, 05:11 AM
Warforged are also in the MM 3.

Almost exactly what you're looking for IMO.