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View Full Version : Pathfinder Hear me out, a pearl-sized ostrich.



Uhtred
2019-09-03, 12:38 PM
Long ago, a player taking down loot misheard “Ostrich egg-sized pearl,” a sort of throwaway chunk of loot from a shipwreck, and wrote “Pearl-Sized Ostrich,” speaking into canon a tiny, adorable member of their ship’s crew forevermore. It was determined that the PSO is a guard aboard the ship, completing a circuit of the ship’s perimeter railings every few days. They feed it and make sure it gets a cut of loot, as well. It’s a proper part of the crew, despite being ridiculous.
Well now we’re going into the Talk Like a Pirate Day session, and the sundry creatures and curiosities they’ve acquired aboard their ship are getting an adventure. Most of the Auxiliary Crew, as they are known, already have stats, given that they are former PC’s or hostages suffering majorly from Stockholm Syndrome at this point. Their character sheets are going into identical folders and the Players are going to pick them at random. All the Auxiliary Crew are being leveled to 20 for purposes of the one-off, and Rule of Funny apples.
To that end, the PSO is getting a legitimate character sheet. I want to roll for stats and give it character levels, Sorcerer, Arcane Bloodline, to be precise.
So what sort of stat bonuses/penalties does an awakened fine-sized ostrich have? I have stats for a regular PF Ostrich, But have never reduced anything that small before.

Castilonium
2019-09-03, 02:18 PM
Take an ostrich (https://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/animals/birds/ostrich/), adjust its stats from Awaken, make it fine sized, give it -6 strength and +6 dexterity according to the Ability Adjustments from Size Changes table (https://www.d20pfsrd.com/Magic/#TOC-Transmutation), add sorcerer levels, and you're done.

Silvercrys
2019-09-03, 02:22 PM
Well, if you need a reason/rules loophole for it to exist, you can say the Ostrich was flesh-to-stoned into a statue, then permanent shrink itemed, then stone-to-fleshed back to an Ostrich. Shrink Item reduces size by up to 4 categories so a Medium Ostrich can get to Fine that way.

As far as statistics, you can probably just take the Ostrich stats, apply the effects of Awaken (roll 3d6 for Int, add 1d3 Charisma, add 2 animal HD), and then apply the size adjustment from the Advancing Monsters section of the Bestiary (-10 Strength, +8 Dex, -2 Con, +8 size to AC and Attack Bonus, -8 size to CMB/CMD, +8 Fly, +16 Stealth).

Alternatively, roll it up as a human sorcerer or something that is under the effects of a permanent Reduce Person and Baleful Polymorph, just following the rules for those two spells and say it was cursed by a Deity so it can't just Dispel Magic itself (and so you can ignore the size restriction on Baleful Polymorph).

If you go with the actual Awakened Ostrich thing, you'll end up with an ECL 20 Ostrich with 19 Sorcerer levels and 4 Animal Hit Dice, I believe, since adding 2 HD probably increases the Ostrich's CR to 2. Might want to just give it the max Charisma from Awaken, too, it'll still only start with a Cha of 14.