Afflicted Lycanthropy - Level Adjustment

[Necrov]

So, as part of my campaign at the moment, my players are facing off against a group of lycanthropes.

One of my players has unwittingly contracted lycanthropy. Which I suspect they might want to keep. Should I feel bad about allowing one of the players to have a +2 LA template at level 4? The player in question is a rogue and they contracted it from a Wererat.

I'm aware the template itself isn't amazing, and probably not worth a +2 LA. I'm just wondering how some of you might handle it?

Note; I'm totally not against a Wererat Gnome Rogue, as part of me thinks it'd be a cool random development, just wanting to manage balance.

[TallerSpine]

So, as part of my campaign at the moment, my players are facing off against a group of lycanthropes.

One of my players has unwittingly contracted lycanthropy. Which I suspect they might want to keep. Should I feel bad about allowing one of the players to have a +2 LA template at level 4? The player in question is a rogue and they contracted it from a Wererat.

I'm aware the template itself isn't amazing, and probably not worth a +2 LA. I'm just wondering how some of you might handle it?

Note; I'm totally not against a Wererat Gnome Rogue, as part of me thinks it'd be a cool random development, just wanting to manage balance.

Allowing? They are gonna be pissed! You essentially gave them three levels. One racial HD (dire rat) and a +2 level adjustment. They get some nifty bonuses, like they have an alternate form (dire rat), and they gain DR in that form, but otherwise, pretty bad for them. If they keep the lycanthropy and decide not to search for a cure, I'd recommend letting them buy off the level adjustment. When they gain another level, they can spend 6k XP to reduce the level adjustment from a +2 to a +1. At 9 HD, they can buy off the last level adjustment.

[Malimar]

Well, houserule-wise, the rule I use in my games is "halve all LAs, unless the LA is already 1". So wererat's LA would go down to +1, is how I specifically would handle that aspect. (Inevitability concurs with a +1 for this particular template. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=21949747&postcount=133))

BUT notice that wererat also adds an animal racial hit die, so the total ECL is going up by an additional 1 on top of the LA either way.

As for your main question: basically, acquiring LA in-game delays the character's ability to take their next level for ages and ages (not only does a class level 4 character with an extra 1 RHD and +2 LA have to get from 6,000 XP to 21,000 XP before they reach their next class level, they have to do it while counting as higher level for XP purposes and thus getting fewer XP per encounter). Which sucks enough that I think it's fine and balanced, as long as the player's ok with it.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Give the player two choices:

1. They gain no benefit from it while in control of their character. When they unwillingly change the bonuses are applied, and they're not in control of their character when changed. They can gain xp but can't gain another character level until they get rid of it.

2. If they want to keep it, they'll need to gradually gain the template as they level up (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/arch/sp). They only gain the benefits of the levels they've spent on it while in control of their character.

[Necrov]

It's possible I'm being thick and missing the point somewhat. But reading through, is there any particular reason I couldn't just eschew the necessary (terrible) racial hit die?

Everyone seems to agree that +1 LA is probably more reasonable for an Afflicted Lycanthrope.

At that point, they're gaining iteratives, 5/Silver, form benefits (+6 Dex and +2 Con in Hybrid or Animal form), +2 Wisdom, +2 Natural Armour and some fairly terrible feats. At the cost of a slightly slowed level progression and being without a HD. (Because they count as a 4th level character with 3HD).

In a party made up of a Sorcerer, a Druid and a Bard; I don't feel too bad throwing the only class without spellcasting a bone.

[Uncle Pine]

It's possible I'm being thick and missing the point somewhat. But reading through, is there any particular reason I couldn't just eschew the necessary (terrible) racial hit die?

Rules technically support this, as long as a wight or another creature which can bestows negative levels is involved. There is no reason you as a DM can't decide to cut out the middleman.

[Mordaedil]

I dunno if this method is the preferred way of doing things, if it is the core way of doing things or what, but I like to simply "move" the xp requirement when it comes to level adjustment.

Let's say the player is level 5, they have 10,000xp and need 5,000 xp to level up to 6th level for a total of 15,000 xp. Gaining a level adjustment of +2 while 5th level, I simply add 1,000 xp per level adjustment to the required to level. So they still have 10,000 xp, but now they need 7,000 xp to level up to 6th level for a total of 17,000 xp. To get to level 7, they need 8,000 xp, thus a total xp of 25,000 xp.

I think it makes level adjustment a lot more invisible and it allows you to skip treating level adjustment for epic levels. It's still the same ordeal in leveling, but it just means he doesn't need to get 2 levels worth of xp to be at where he was before.

[JyP]

There's an article on wizard's archive site for this : Savage Progressions: Half-Dragon and Wererat Template Classes. Main idea is to apply template progressively instead of all at once.