Planar Shepherd Worth It with DM restrictions

[Aelar]

Hello,
Im currently a 8th level Druid and I’m planning on becoming a Planar Shepherd at Level 10. I thought about taking Lamannia as my plane however currently my DM suggested I should take Beastlands as this is where the campaign is going through right now. I know that the Beastlands has no planar traits but as I worship Ehlonna and it says in the Planar Handbook that she has the ability to change the traits according to her wishes, so I was thinking that maybe I can convince him that after some prayers or something, it would get the same traits as Lamannia. What do you think?

The real problem is that my DM has banned me from wild shaping to any non animal looking things. So even if something’s an outsider, if it resembles a human, he says he won’t allow it. Also, all wish granting creatures are not allowed

At this point, I’m not sure if it’s even worth it to become a Planar Shepherd since i would probably be limited to mostly Celestial versions of animals based on the list of inhabitants of Lamannia or the Beastlands. What should I do?

Thanks

[lord_khaine]

Thats honestly already more than a bit spoiled?
Druid is an extremely potent class.
Planar Sheepheard then adds to that power without giving anything meaningfull up.
And your still unhappy..???

[Psyren]

Could you clarify what setting you're using Planar Shepherd in? It's an Eberron PrC and you mentioned Lamannia (an Eberron plane), but then you started talking about Ehlonna and Beastlands from Greyhawk, so it's a bit confusing. Knowing where you are will help us determine what creatures and traits should be available to you.

[Aelar]

Thats honestly already more than a bit spoiled?
Druid is an extremely potent class.
Planar Sheepheard then adds to that power without giving anything meaningfull up.
And your still unhappy..???

It’s not that, I know that PC is something that maximizes an already powerful class. Everyone else in the group was taking different PCs and they wanted me to take one too. There really aren’t any good ones except for Planar Shepherd...

[Aelar]

Could you clarify what setting you're using Planar Shepherd in? It's an Eberron PrC and you mentioned Lamannia (an Eberron plane), but then you started talking about Ehlonna and Beastlands from Greyhawk, so it's a bit confusing. Knowing where you are will help us determine what creatures and traits should be available to you.

We’re in a non Eberronian setting (we were traveling from the material plane to Sigil and then we got to the Beastlands).
Since the prestige class is Eberronian, the DM was more or less okay with an Eberronian plane.

[Piggy Knowles]

Even with these restrictions, Planar Shepherd sounds like a good option. You still progress everything that matters and you get a few nice boons, even if they're less than what a Planar Shepherd would usually get. There's really no other prestige class that would do that for you. I'd go with it.

[Psyren]

It’s not that, I know that PC is something that maximizes an already powerful class. Everyone else in the group was taking different PCs and they wanted me to take one too. There really aren’t any good ones except for Planar Shepherd...

Druid 20 is fine too for the record.


We’re in a non Eberronian setting (we were traveling from the material plane to Sigil and then we got to the Beastlands).
Since the prestige class is Eberronian, the DM was more or less okay with an Eberronian plane.

Wait, wasn't your DM the one telling you to pick Beastlands instead? I'm still confused :smallconfused:

But to answer your questions:

1) Shapes - Beastlands has a bunch of magical beasts that could be useful, as well as angels and eladrin. The biggest issue though is that as written, Planar Shepherds only gain the SLAs and special qualities of outsider or elemental forms, many of which are now off limits due to your DM's "no humanoid shape" restriction. So you can turn into a Unicorn for example, but you won't get most of their abilities as written.

2) Planar Bubble - Ehlonna can shape the Beastlands but you're not her. This ability isn't too useful except to give you a Normal Magic area somewhere, e.g. a wild magic or impeded magic zone. (Dead magic obviously wouldn't work, because then you couldn't activate this ability, though you could use a variation of the tinfoil hat trick to pull that off.)

[Falontani]

Iirc, isn't there a huge problem with killing animals within the beastlands?

[Psyren]

Iirc, isn't there a huge problem with killing animals within the beastlands?

Not that I can see. MotP states that predator/prey relationships continue to exist there, and hunters from other planes also show up (though they are often out of their league.) Other than the animals themselves potentially taking you out, it doesn't seem that there is any hard (or soft) restriction on killing there.

[Falontani]

Not that I can see. MotP states that predator/prey relationships continue to exist there, and hunters from other planes also show up (though they are often out of their league.) Other than the animals themselves potentially taking you out, it doesn't seem that there is any hard (or soft) restriction on killing there.

Nope I somehow made something up in my head; but remember showing it to a player. So it might be a thing in an obscure area, or I could be making the whole thing up! But it was that if you killed an animal on the beastlands then you would turn into said animal. Instantaneous, only a wish/miracle could revert the process.

[Bronk]

I think that even with your DM's nerfs, at least 3, maybe 4 levels of Planar Shepherd would still be useful. At level three, the ability to change into magical beasts includes the ability to change into templated creatures... and not only are there a lot of templates out there, the Beastlands is where they can all be found, natively, somewhere. Celestial bears who are also magebred warbeasts and the like are available. If you play to high enough level, you could be a celestial titanic creature, or a kaiju.

The fourth level that grants plane shift is basically an extra escape clause, which could be useful.

As for the nerfs, maybe since outsiders are off the table, they would allow you to get the supernatural abilities of magical beasts instead. Probably worth a shot!

[Psyren]

Nope I somehow made something up in my head; but remember showing it to a player. So it might be a thing in an obscure area, or I could be making the whole thing up! But it was that if you killed an animal on the beastlands then you would turn into said animal. Instantaneous, only a wish/miracle could revert the process.

That sounds like it might be a different (but thematically similar) plane entirely.

While I was checking on your question though I did come across something disturbing:



Celestial creatures in the Beastlands, in addition to the other traits provided by the celestial template, have their Intelligence raised to 3 and can speak Celestial. This increased Intelligence score does little to dull their natural tendencies, and the deadly dance between predator and prey continues even in this extraplanar arena. The increased Intelligence lets the prey try to bargain its way out of danger, just as it enables more effective communication within a pack of predators.

Great, the plane makes some prey sentient (while still leaving them as prey) and now they have to try and plead for their afterlives. Some retirement!

[Aelar]

Wait, wasn't your DM the one telling you to pick Beastlands instead? I'm still confused :smallconfused:

I told him I wanted Lamannia before we got to the Beastlands, then he suggested it.



But to answer your questions:

1) Shapes - Beastlands has a bunch of magical beasts that could be useful, as well as angels and eladrin. The biggest issue though is that as written, Planar Shepherds only gain the SLAs and special qualities of outsider or elemental forms, many of which are now off limits due to your DM's "no humanoid shape" restriction. So you can turn into a Unicorn for example, but you won't get most of their abilities as written.

2) Planar Bubble - Ehlonna can shape the Beastlands but you're not her. This ability isn't too useful except to give you a Normal Magic area somewhere, e.g. a wild magic or impeded magic zone. (Dead magic obviously wouldn't work, because then you couldn't activate this ability, though you could use a variation of the tinfoil hat trick to pull that off.)

1) I haven’t Wild shaped into any creature with SLAs before, I thought that’s its only the Su and Ex abilities that aren’t usable. Is that the case?
2) I haven’t thought of that, in a previous campaign, we were in a magical city with wild magic and I couldn’t summon any creatures, which sucked, and this would’ve totally negated that :)

[Aelar]

I think that even with your DM's nerfs, at least 3, maybe 4 levels of Planar Shepherd would still be useful. At level three, the ability to change into magical beasts includes the ability to change into templated creatures... and not only are there a lot of templates out there, the Beastlands is where they can all be found, natively, somewhere. Celestial bears who are also magebred warbeasts and the like are available. If you play to high enough level, you could be a celestial titanic creature, or a kaiju.

The fourth level that grants plane shift is basically an extra escape clause, which could be useful.


A celestial magebred warbeast would be pretty awesome! Btw, do you know if I can combine templates? Because the Beastlands has both Celestial and Woodling templates if I’m not mistaken



As for the nerfs, maybe since outsiders are off the table, they would allow you to get the supernatural abilities of magical beasts instead. Probably worth a shot!

That’s a great suggestion, I’ll be sure to ask him.

[Psyren]

I told him I wanted Lamannia before we got to the Beastlands, then he suggested it.

Right, soooo.... which is it? I'm not trying to be difficult, they have different planar traits so this detail does matter.



1) I haven’t Wild shaped into any creature with SLAs before, I thought that’s its only the Su and Ex abilities that aren’t usable. Is that the case?
2) I haven’t thought of that, in a previous campaign, we were in a magical city with wild magic and I couldn’t summon any creatures, which sucked, and this would’ve totally negated that :)

1) Wild Shape inherits from Alternate Form, which only gets you Extraordinary Special Attacks of the chosen form; everything else (Ex special qualities, Su abilities and Sp abilities) stay the same. Planar Shepherd then has an additional specific clause that says if you turn into an outsider or elemental, you get basically everything. Because it calls those two out explicitly, it doesn't include magical beasts.

2) See initial response, the traits matter :smallsmile:


A celestial magebred warbeast would be pretty awesome! Btw, do you know if I can combine templates? Because the Beastlands has both Celestial and Woodling templates if I’m not mistaken.

As written it's not totally clear, but I'd say no. The exact text is:


At 3rd level, you are able to use wild shape to change into a magical beast native to your chosen plane, with the same size restrictions as for animal forms. For example, if you chose the plane of Fernia, you could become a zezir (Monster Manual III 205). This includes creatures whose type changes to magical beast as the result of applying a template (such as celestial or fiendish).

The way I read bold is that you can pick a templated creature as long as that template is what turned them into a magical beast; moreover, you can only pick one such template ("a template"), so no stacking. You'll want to run that by your GM, but given the other restrictions I wouldn't get too hopeful.

[Aelar]

Right, soooo.... which is it? I'm not trying to be difficult, they have different planar traits so this detail does matter.

Sorry for not being clear, I originally wanted Lamannia but since the campaign is now in the Beastlands, the DM reasoned that I should choose this plane. Now because this plane has no traits for Druids, I thought I could convince him to make it the same as Lamannia’s i.e. extended Druid spells, since Lamannia is clearly the better plane.



The way I read bold is that you can pick a templated creature as long as that template is what turned them into a magical beast; moreover, you can only pick one such template ("a template"), so no stacking. You'll want to run that by your GM, but given the other restrictions I wouldn't get too hopeful.
That’s what I figured, there’s no way he’ll let me do that, he nerfed the Enhance Wild Shape spell so that it gives only one Su or Ex abilities.

Thanks a lot for you help

[Falontani]

See about using a template to turn a unicorn or a Pegasus into an outsider? Like through half celestial

[Psyren]

The only section of the ability that mentions a template is the magical beast part, so I'm not sure you could use that with an outsider also. Worth a shot though possibly.

[lord_khaine]

1) Shapes - Beastlands has a bunch of magical beasts that could be useful, as well as angels and eladrin. The biggest issue though is that as written, Planar Shepherds only gain the SLAs and special qualities of outsider or elemental forms, many of which are now off limits due to your DM's "no humanoid shape" restriction. So you can turn into a Unicorn for example, but you won't get most of their abilities as written.

He could try and use the no-Humanoids rule as basis for why he should also get supernatural abilities from magical beasts as well.
It does to start with sound weird only getting them from outsiders. And it is a bit of a nerf being limited in outsider shapes.

[eggynack]

There really aren’t any good ones except for Planar Shepherd...
Gotta point out that this isn't particularly true. Yeah, there aren't precisely any that offer essentially no downsides coupled with several incredibly broken abilities, but you can get some meaningful upgrades. There's a bunch of good ones that give you domains off of a dip, with something like holt warden or earthshaker granting the extra spells/day with weak spells and something like contemplative letting you stick better domain spells in those slots. Lion of talisid offers something pretty close to standard druid with some reasonably interesting changes. Moonspeaker is very different from the standard druid, and the overall shifter setup is in some regards superior. Hathran is insanely broken in a manner distinct from planar shepherd, and spelldancer is also pretty borked but kinda expensive. I guess all I'm saying is, ya got options if you don't want to set the game on fire, and you even have a couple of options if you still want to do so.

[Anteros]

I feel like I have to point out that it seems obvious that your DM is intentionally trying to keep your character from becoming too powerful, probably to keep you from outshining the rest of the group, and you're looking for ways around that. At the end of the day, he's just going to impose more restrictions or not allow things that let you get around what he wants. Just talk to them about what their goals are and come to a compromise instead of looking for obscure workarounds.