Magical mutations

[Lombra]

Have you ever played a half-dragon or were-beast character? How did it happen in-character? Was it fun? Has it been a net improvement, or there have been some major trade-offs?

The Monster's manual provides the guidelines for both were-beast and half dragon characters, did/would you ever use these or did/would you homebrew the concept?

This is a question for DMs too: how did/would you implement such character mutations?

[Maxilian]

I had a player become a Were-Boar (he was a Cleric, so it was a huge improvement for him), i normally just take away the extra attack and, sometimes, take control of the character.

In the case of the Cleric, everytime he got knocked out, he transformed and attacked everyone around him (making it a huge problem some times, but the buff were also good enough to not completely hate it)

[Scathain]

Had a werewolf PC. It's a challenge to find creatures that don't focus on nonmagical damage at low levels, so I started the campaign at level 8. Higher tier monsters tend to have more options, and it makes you think outside the box to get past those immunities.

And that's the only "standard" magical mutation I've used from the MM. I've adapted Kaorti, vampires (from a DMSGuild supplement), and Half-Fiends/Celestials (from the Critter Compendium, another DMSGuild fave). I miss 3.5 template stacking, so I can't resist that kind of stuff.

As far as balancing? I run two groups, one of six and one of 3. I never allow these templates in the group of 6, but freely allow them to happen thematically in the group of 3. Reason? It's much easier to monitor the balance in a group if there's only a few of them, bigger groups get out of control.

[Rattigan]

Had a werewolf PC. It's a challenge to find creatures that don't focus on nonmagical damage at low levels, so I started the campaign at level 8. Higher tier monsters tend to have more options, and it makes you think outside the box to get past those immunities.

And that's the only "standard" magical mutation I've used from the MM. I've adapted Kaorti, vampires (from a DMSGuild supplement), and Half-Fiends/Celestials (from the Critter Compendium, another DMSGuild fave). I miss 3.5 template stacking, so I can't resist that kind of stuff.

As far as balancing? I run two groups, one of six and one of 3. I never allow these templates in the group of 6, but freely allow them to happen thematically in the group of 3. Reason? It's much easier to monitor the balance in a group if there's only a few of them, bigger groups get out of control.

You've adapted Kaorti? I'd be really interested to see how you adapted them. I used them a lot when we were in 3.5, but we've been in an arc that hasn't seen them since we moved to 5e, mostly because I've been putting off adapting them and the other Far Realm stuff I used.

Have a half-dragon PC at the moment and it's not been too bad. But that may just be because the other PCs have templates based on 3.5 ones. The gnome pyromancer wizard has become a fire gnome, so immune to fire and gained some fire related cantrips. The Shinomen Naga Druid got more snake related powers like being able to talk to reptiles, resistance to poison and poison spit. Finally the Ancients paladin has some celestial and fey abilities, like being able to summon a moonbow from a glowing tattoo on her hand and being able to summon a Pegasus with her Find Steed spell.
I'm doing something where they're all tied to different Planes, and essentially have Patrons that are working to save the Material Plane from the Far Realm. So far hasn't skewed the game too much, though I am assessing them as a level above for some fights due to a combination of there being more of them than a standard party and the templates.

On the whole, I don't think Half-Dragon adds too much and I haven't seen a massive change from before he had it to after, bar the occasional maneuvering to get a line of people with his lightning breath.

[Scathain]

You've adapted Kaorti? I'd be really interested to see how you adapted them. I used them a lot when we were in 3.5, but we've been in an arc that hasn't seen them since we moved to 5e, mostly because I've been putting off adapting them and the other Far Realm stuff I used.

Have a half-dragon PC at the moment and it's not been too bad. But that may just be because the other PCs have templates based on 3.5 ones. The gnome pyromancer wizard has become a fire gnome, so immune to fire and gained some fire related cantrips. The Shinomen Naga Druid got more snake related powers like being able to talk to reptiles, resistance to poison and poison spit. Finally the Ancients paladin has some celestial and fey abilities, like being able to summon a moonbow from a glowing tattoo on her hand and being able to summon a Pegasus with her Find Steed spell.
I'm doing something where they're all tied to different Planes, and essentially have Patrons that are working to save the Material Plane from the Far Realm. So far hasn't skewed the game too much, though I am assessing them as a level above for some fights due to a combination of there being more of them than a standard party and the templates.

On the whole, I don't think Half-Dragon adds too much and I haven't seen a massive change from before he had it to after, bar the occasional maneuvering to get a line of people with his lightning breath.

I forgot about half-Dragons, I have one of those in a campaign too! Half black dragon tabaxi monk, total predator type.

As for the Kaorti, I let the player use his vhuman stat increases, gave him proficiency in "resin suits" (started off slow, but worked its way to basically becoming Mithral Plate). Turned his Dagger of Venom into a ribbon dagger...of venom.
Adapted the resin use and transformation from a homebrew statblock online (google 5e Kaorti in images, first thing that pops up).

The resistances are too much for a player, but he was decked out in enough magic swag at this point to not even care/notice.


I know it doesn't port over PERFECTLY, but the level adjustment system of 3.5 was helpful for this kind of stuff. I do the same with magic items, I treat them as making the party a higher level than they are. And if you don't believe magic items can screw with CR, I once fought a death knight in a 6-man level 8 party where nobody died, simply because we were armed to the teeth with top-tier magic items.

...and that's got me thinking, maybe I SHOULD hand out templates to my big group, and just roll it with the magic item tables I'm using already?