Schattenbach
2017-05-29, 04:08 PM
To be more exact, DnD 3.5 monsters that could - without somewhat more extreme modifications like rewritting most of the stat block or adding/getting ride of tons of SLA and such or getting ride of the buckload of flavour-specific supernatural abilities - be used as base for the creation of some new creature like archfey/powerful spiritarchfiend/powerful mythological monster. Its best if the creature in question already has some pre-set CR, listed ECL as well as powerful inherent spellcasting capabilities so that by simply changing the type to a better or worse one and adjusting its stats to balance the advantages/disadvantages - that are there due to the new type - out.
One of the few noteable creatures I found that fit the bill thus far is the Ha-Naga (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/monsters/haNaga.htm) (CR22 with 20 HD and ECL26) which has quite decent stats, decent flight capabilities (too bad its SU, though) and general purpose SU abilities without any SLAs (which are hard to evaluate, anyway) as well as extremly powerful spellcasting capabilities (its more or less a much more powerful and evil Couatl with some twists to it and less extra capabilities besides its huge stat boni and spellcasting) with Sorcerer Spellcasting with access to Cleric spells and Chaos and Evil spells (which could be adjusted to suite the creature itself, I guess).
I guess one could keep it mostly as as is and create some snake-like creature (changing the sting to some kind of bite attack) and such ... hm? I guess it also serves fine as base for some mythological beasts and such like some Kirin that's actually decent stat-wise. Or one could size it down to medium humanoid shaped (so it actually has hands and such and isn't to big to fit through things), remove most of the tail based stuff (though if its something with tails, like plenty of archfiends, the sting could simply be changed to be a tail sting, I guess?), maybe change the type to something less horrible (expect for the case of worse BAB, even Fey is better after all) and use it as decent base for magic-based creatures?
Sized down to medium size, it would end up with something along the lines of:
str. +(16 - 24 = -8), dex. +(28 + 2 + 2 + 2 + 2 = 36), con. +(22 - 4 - 4 - 4 - 4 = 6),
Natural armor: +(24 - 5 - 4 - 3 - 2 = 10)
Int. +24, Wis. +20, Cha. +26
Overall +88 to stats (while ignoring the changes due to being Colossal-sized)
The mental stat boost (Int in particular ... it makes it arguably hard to use because its higher than that of pretty much most other creatures, incuding plenty of high-class archfey/archfiends/magical beasts/etc. ... I guess one could change at least some of that into CHA?) and (to some degree) Dex could be adjusted down quite a bit (to increase STR and/or CHA/as compensation for some better creature type/to add some generic but reasonably useful Su or Ex capabilities like - in case of some fey-like creature - Unearthly Grace and/or Wild Empathy/etc.).
If this section of the forum isn't well suited for this kind of topic (I don't know, it's somewhat hard to tell), it might be better to move it to Homebrew, though.
Thanks in advance.
One of the few noteable creatures I found that fit the bill thus far is the Ha-Naga (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/monsters/haNaga.htm) (CR22 with 20 HD and ECL26) which has quite decent stats, decent flight capabilities (too bad its SU, though) and general purpose SU abilities without any SLAs (which are hard to evaluate, anyway) as well as extremly powerful spellcasting capabilities (its more or less a much more powerful and evil Couatl with some twists to it and less extra capabilities besides its huge stat boni and spellcasting) with Sorcerer Spellcasting with access to Cleric spells and Chaos and Evil spells (which could be adjusted to suite the creature itself, I guess).
I guess one could keep it mostly as as is and create some snake-like creature (changing the sting to some kind of bite attack) and such ... hm? I guess it also serves fine as base for some mythological beasts and such like some Kirin that's actually decent stat-wise. Or one could size it down to medium humanoid shaped (so it actually has hands and such and isn't to big to fit through things), remove most of the tail based stuff (though if its something with tails, like plenty of archfiends, the sting could simply be changed to be a tail sting, I guess?), maybe change the type to something less horrible (expect for the case of worse BAB, even Fey is better after all) and use it as decent base for magic-based creatures?
Sized down to medium size, it would end up with something along the lines of:
str. +(16 - 24 = -8), dex. +(28 + 2 + 2 + 2 + 2 = 36), con. +(22 - 4 - 4 - 4 - 4 = 6),
Natural armor: +(24 - 5 - 4 - 3 - 2 = 10)
Int. +24, Wis. +20, Cha. +26
Overall +88 to stats (while ignoring the changes due to being Colossal-sized)
The mental stat boost (Int in particular ... it makes it arguably hard to use because its higher than that of pretty much most other creatures, incuding plenty of high-class archfey/archfiends/magical beasts/etc. ... I guess one could change at least some of that into CHA?) and (to some degree) Dex could be adjusted down quite a bit (to increase STR and/or CHA/as compensation for some better creature type/to add some generic but reasonably useful Su or Ex capabilities like - in case of some fey-like creature - Unearthly Grace and/or Wild Empathy/etc.).
If this section of the forum isn't well suited for this kind of topic (I don't know, it's somewhat hard to tell), it might be better to move it to Homebrew, though.
Thanks in advance.