Becoming the Monster

[cartejos]

I'm looking for ways, other than directly applying templates, to make a more monstrous PC.

Currently I can only think of two for sure. The first being the Dragon Disciple. The second being the illithid exteaction line/flayerspawn psychic.

Maybe dragonwrought kobold counts, but that feels too simple, and I'm leaning more towards no. However Dragon Wings/Breath/other things that emulate being a dragon feels pretty good.

How many am I missing?
Disregard totemist.

[Biggus]

There are several other transformational prestige classes which change your type and/or give you a template, usually at 10th level. Acolyte of the Skin (CArc), Elemental Savant (CArc), Oozemaster (MotW), Verdant Lord (MotW), Green Star Adept (CArc), Alienist (CArc), Fang of Lolth (S&S) and probably a few more I've forgotten.

Note that Oozemaster, Verdant Lord and Fang of Lolth are all 3.0, and that Green Star Adept is widely regarded as one of the worst prestige classes in the whole of 3E.

Edit: quite a few more, it turns out: https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?553245-Ways-to-change-your-Type

[pabelfly]

I'm looking for ways, other than directly applying templates, to make a more monstrous PC.

Currently I can only think of two for sure. The first being the Dragon Disciple. The second being the illithid exteaction line/flayerspawn psychic.

Maybe dragonwrought kobold counts, but that feels too simple, and I'm leaning more towards no. However Dragon Wings/Breath/other things that emulate being a dragon feels pretty good.

How many am I missing?
Disregard totemist.

Do you want to start off with a monster PC? Although they're typically underpowered for their LA, you can totally do it.

This is a good starting handbook: https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?207928-Urpriest-s-Monstrous-Monster-Handbook

[Rebel7284]

How about grafts?

Does shape-changing count? Master of Many Forms comes to mind.

Symbiants are like grafts but creepier.

Geomancer drifts make you extra weird looking as well.

Edit: of course as pointed out above, there are a ton of reasonably playable to great monstrous races if you dig deep enough.

[Fizban]

You've mentioned the flayerspawn feats (which have all kinds of editing problems), but the Aberrant Blood feats can also give you tentacles, as well as (bad) flight or swimming. You mention dragon breath and Dragonwrought Kobolds, but not Dragonborn from the same book, which is the only real source of non-class breath weapon. Or there's two classes with breath weapons.

Question too vague. What is "monstrous?" Why not just play a monster? Why not Totemist? What about one of the many homebrews for various monster concepts?

The Races of the Dragon Web Enhancement has kobolds with claws and bite. Darfellan from Stormwrack are just about the only PC aimed LA 0 race (that's not loldragon) with a natural bite, and it's a hefty full d6 too. From Planar Handbook, Neraphim have the toad-person look (Slaad blood) and a unique and useful dex denial ability, or the Lesser Bauriar is a mini-centaur.


Acolyte of the Skin (CArc). . . Green Star Adept is widely regarded as one of the worst prestige classes in the whole of 3E.
Which is funny, 'cause I'd take GSA over Acolyte of the Skin any day. At least GSA does something permanent for its loss of casting, where AoS gets a couple bad SLAs. People hate on GSA because (aside from caster-only mindset) it removes Con, but in a game without inflated ability scores, the loss is not nearly as great and could even be a boon, if you dared make a Raistlin. Or you can just not take the 10th level. Or make a magic item that boosts hit points for constructs. Or apply a one-sentence fix to whichever parts you find most offensive.

Acolyte of the Skin? Doesn't make you a half-fiend, random smattering of daily abilities, doesn't even have full caster level. Even Blood Magus beats it after the update, and updated Blood Magus is still terrible. Where GSA has a couple specific problems, AoS lacks any fundamental structure, you can't fix it without building a new structure to put the name on.

[Anthrowhale]

...
GSA fully advances caster level, so it's a reasonable post-9ths class amongst all caster-advancing prestige classes, not just transformational ones.

[Inevitability]

A few Spelltouched (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/buildingCharacters/spelltouchedFeats.htm) feats would count! Stench of the Dead, Photosynthetic Skin, and Bladeproof Skin come to mind, and something like Controlled Immolation might count as well.

[Anthrowhale]

One other thing: you might be interested in the 'sculpt self' feat in Dragon #304. It essentially allows you to pay XP for graft-like benefits.

[Maat Mons]

Does Bone Knight count? You fuse your body to undead bits such that you die if they're removed.

[ShurikVch]

Also, [Abyssal Heritor] (Fiendish Codex I), [Devil-Touched] (Fiendish Codex II), and "Tomb-..." (Libris Mortis) feat lines

And various "Bloodline" feats from Dragon magazines ##311 and 325 - they, besides the mechanical benefits, also specifying appearance (such as descendant of Titans is a head taller than the rest of their race)


If we mentioned "Bloodline" feats - then Bloodlines (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/races/bloodlines.htm) from Unearthed Arcana deserved mentioning too

https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/sfery/images/5/5c/Rodowody.jpg/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/250?cb=20140309124737

[Biggus]

Which is funny, 'cause I'd take GSA over Acolyte of the Skin any day. At least GSA does something permanent for its loss of casting, where AoS gets a couple bad SLAs. People hate on GSA because (aside from caster-only mindset) it removes Con, but in a game without inflated ability scores, the loss is not nearly as great and could even be a boon, if you dared make a Raistlin.


Not sure what you mean by "make a Raistlin", but at high levels the loss of Con would be pretty painful in any game I've played in. By level 14 there are plenty of sources of "inflated ability scores". Do you play in a game where they've been houseruled away or something?

I will agree that Acolyte of the Skin is also terrible though.

[Anthrowhale]

... at high levels the loss of Con would be pretty painful in any game I've played in.

Faerie Mysteries Initiate is freakish but it's a reasonable choice for any wizard in a game where it's allowed. As a side effect, it makes the loss of Con from GSA 10 irrelevant. So, Wizard 15/Green Star Adept 10 with FMI is fairly good---20th level spell access, caster level 25, with 15d4+10d8+20+Int bonus*25 hit points, and a boatload of immunities.

[Jack_Simth]

If Pathfinder is on the table, a Synthesist Summoner is pretty much built for "playing the monster" from level 1.

[cartejos]

.

Edit: quite a few more, it turns out: https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?553245-Ways-to-change-your-Type

This is basically what I was looking for, thank you.

[Fizban]

Not sure what you mean by "make a Raistlin", but at high levels the loss of Con would be pretty painful in any game I've played in. By level 14 there are plenty of sources of "inflated ability scores". Do you play in a game where they've been houseruled away or something?
Raistlin is a party wizard from the Dragonlance books (in the party of the original three, also appearing in spinoffs and with a trilogy centered around a plot of his), a series of novels based on a DnD campaign. IIRC, it was originally played with pre-constructed characters, and in 2e to boot, though there are 3.x versions available. Aside from being a bastard, his big character trait is that he was "cursed" with frailty as part of his test, an explanation for his oh so unoptimized 8 Con.

At 15th a low (8) Con character should most likely have a +4 item, sure, but +6 is still not guaranteed. With +4, their total modifier is +1, which at 15th level is worth 15 hit points. Finishing Green Star Adept removes that +1 and replaces it with a flat +20 hit points: a net increase which cannot be removed, letting you sell or give away your Con item. If you had a +6 Con item, you lose 10 hit points- and gain either 18,000 or 36,000 worth of items. I can play the "there's plenty of bonuses" game too, because I'm pretty sure there's a published item that will give you +10 hp for less than those costs. Heck, for 18,000 you could buy five Amulets of Tears to cycle, worth up to 120-180hp per day and some change left over. Even if you can't use a Wish for base hp, or just make an incredibly simple homebrew item, or make an incredibly simple change to the class, or just not take the 10th level if you don't want to give up your Con, as already stated.

A review of previous threads about ability scores should suffice to explain our differing expectations are.

[Drelua]

Sorry if I'm going off on a tangent that's kinda not the point of the thread, but Green Star Adept seems decent to me, for certain builds. If your CON's low the immunities might be worth the HP, even if Faerie Mysteries Initiate isn't allowed. The low BAB is at least partly offset by the strength boost, and the natural attack could be nice for melee builds if you can get a few more. Maybe throw in some War Hulk if you can count as Large.

It's definitely not as good as just staying with wizard, but it could be fun in a gestalt game, maybe with Duskblade on the other side. Even if it's not gestalt, all you need is 1 caster level so you could dip a casting class. It's not great, but I'm sure much worse exists. I'd rather have one of these on my team than a frenzied berserker.

[Biggus]

Raistlin is a party wizard from the Dragonlance books (in the party of the original three, also appearing in spinoffs and with a trilogy centered around a plot of his), a series of novels based on a DnD campaign. IIRC, it was originally played with pre-constructed characters, and in 2e to boot, though there are 3.x versions available. Aside from being a bastard, his big character trait is that he was "cursed" with frailty as part of his test, an explanation for his oh so unoptimized 8 Con.

At 15th a low (8) Con character should most likely have a +4 item, sure, but +6 is still not guaranteed. With +4, their total modifier is +1, which at 15th level is worth 15 hit points. Finishing Green Star Adept removes that +1 and replaces it with a flat +20 hit points: a net increase which cannot be removed, letting you sell or give away your Con item. If you had a +6 Con item, you lose 10 hit points- and gain either 18,000 or 36,000 worth of items. I can play the "there's plenty of bonuses" game too, because I'm pretty sure there's a published item that will give you +10 hp for less than those costs. Heck, for 18,000 you could buy five Amulets of Tears to cycle, worth up to 120-180hp per day and some change left over. Even if you can't use a Wish for base hp, or just make an incredibly simple homebrew item, or make an incredibly simple change to the class, or just not take the 10th level if you don't want to give up your Con, as already stated.

A review of previous threads about ability scores should suffice to explain our differing expectations are.

The fact that GSA is so widely considered a bad class suggests that very few people want to play a mage (or any other class for that matter) with 8 Con. I'm sure some people do, and some of them even make it to high levels, but you're talking about a pretty unusual situation here.

[Anthrowhale]

This is basically what I was looking for, thank you.

Depending on your application, it may be important that Undead, Fey, Elemental, Outsider, Plant, Ooze, Construct, [air], [earth], [fire], [water], [spirit], reptilian animals, spiders, telthors, spirit folk, and astral projectors can all be controlled via command undead, domain power command, planar binding, or spirit binding with no save or an interplanar save which may be nigh impossible to discover the source of.

It may also be relevant that some of the savage progression template classes like half-fiend (https://web.archive.org/web/20161101073937/http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/sp/20031010a) or ghost (https://web.archive.org/web/20201111213120/http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/sp/20040117a) provide a type change in a class format. Also, the Otherworldly feat provides a type change (to outsider) and the human heritage feat provides a type change (to humanoid).

[Jack_Simth]

Depending on your application, it may be important that Undead, Fey, Elemental, Outsider, Plant, Ooze, [air], [earth], [fire], [water], [spirit], reptilian animals, spiders, telthors, spirit folk, and astral projectors can all be no-save controlled via command undead, domain power command, planar binding, or spirit binding.

It may also be relevant that some of the savage progression template classes like half-fiend (https://web.archive.org/web/20161101073937/http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/sp/20031010a) or ghost (https://web.archive.org/web/20201111213120/http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/sp/20040117a) provide a type change in a class format. Also, the Otherworldly feat provides a type change (to outsider) and the human heritage feat provides a type change (to humanoid).

Technically planar binding and spirit binding permit a save, but the caster can be a very long ways away, so reprisals (or even figuring out who's doing it) may not be feasible - so they can try again until you fail. Keeping a pair of Dimensional Shackles handy might be advisable for certain types.

Oh, and I may not be remembering things correctly, but I think the Warforged domain adds some constructs to that list

[Anthrowhale]

...

Thanks, updated.

[Drelua]

The fact that GSA is so widely considered a bad class suggests that very few people want to play a mage (or any other class for that matter) with 8 Con. I'm sure some people do, and some of them even make it to high levels, but you're talking about a pretty unusual situation here.

I agree that very, very few players are going to give their wizard 8 con, but an elf wizard with a lowish point buy likely only has a 12, so at level 15 with a con belt they'd be losing 25 or 40 hp counting the 20 they gain back.

And if faerie mysteries initiate is allowed, they're just gaining 20 and they can buy a str or dex item instead. If not, just don't take the 10th level, or maybe the 9th, and you've gained a bunch of resistances, some immunities, DR, natural armour, and 50-75% fortification.

You'd still be better off with 2-3 more spell levels, but there's much worse prestige classes out there. I probably wouldn't take it for a straight wizard, but I might consider it for a gish build.

[JyP]

There are some rituals described in Savage Species to transform a PC into a monster also (Chapter 11: Becoming a Monster)

[YellowJohn]

Faerie Mysteries Initiate is freakish but it's a reasonable choice for any wizard in a game where it's allowed. As a side effect, it makes the loss of Con from GSA 10 irrelevant. So, Wizard 15/Green Star Adept 10 with FMI is fairly good---20th level spell access, caster level 25, with 15d4+10d8+20+Int bonus*25 hit points, and a boatload of immunities.

Faerie Mysteries Initiate lets you use your Int instead of your Con for hit points. Great for a typical wizard, but not a Green Star Adept - you have no Con bonus to use your Int instead of.

[Anthrowhale]

Faerie Mysteries Initiate lets you use your Int instead of your Con for hit points. Great for a typical wizard, but not a Green Star Adept - you have no Con bonus to use your Int instead of.

Looking here (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#nonabilities)

The modifier for a nonability is +0.
so GSA 10 implies a constitution modifier of +0.

FMI says:
...use your Intelligence modifier instead of your Constitution modifier to determine bonus hit points.

So, nonabilities have ability modifiers (of +0) and FMI swaps ability modifiers (not bonuses).

[RaiKirah]

The various Anthropomorphic Animal races in Savage Species could definitely be the basis for a monstrous character. A bipedal octopus with hands on 6 tentacles sounds kinda horrifying before you start adding prestige classes and other things.

Not sure if anyone mentioned them yet, but you can dramatically change your character's form with both the Abyssal Heritor and Deformity lines of feats.

[Curbludgeon]

I've been thinking about a houseruled Divine Minion Master of Many Forms with Metamorphic Transfer, as compared to straight caster builds, and reckon that if Effective Wild Shape level was limited to 2 X Hit Dice or so that it wouldn't ever really overpower.

[Anthrowhale]

A bipedal octopus with hands on 6 tentacles sounds kinda horrifying before you start adding prestige classes and other things.
Minor aside, but you may only end up with only 2 of the tentacles functioning as hands.
The operative bits are:

An anthropomorphic animal has the natural attack of the base creature, but it can also use weapons if it did not have hands already.
and

If the base creature has more than 2 limbs, the anthropomorphic animal has the same number, but two of them become feet. Thus, an octopus man, for example, would have only 6 natural attacks rather than 8.
All that it says about weapon use is that it can "use weapons". Plausibly that means at least 2 hands or other dextrous equivalents. More than 2 is consistent with the rules, but I don't see anything preferring an interpretation that there are 6 hand equivalents. The rules appear underspecified.

(Note though that at high levels you could get some gloves of man.)

[RaiKirah]

Fair enough - it's been a while since I actually read the anthropomorphic animals rules. I will maintain that they make excellent monstrous characters however :)

[Particle_Man]

Do undead count as monsters? Because necropolitans are a thing.

[loky1109]

Do undead count as monsters? Because necropolitans are a thing.
Elves are in the Monster Manual, too.

[Particle_Man]

Elves are in the Monster Manual, too.

Running with that, play a Drow, fail Lolth, become a Drider!

[TristanS]

You've mentioned the flayerspawn feats (which have all kinds of editing problems), but the Aberrant Blood feats can also give you tentacles, as well as (bad) flight or swimming. You mention dragon breath and Dragonwrought Kobolds, but not Dragonborn from the same book, which is the only real source of non-class breath weapon. Or there's two classes with breath weapons.

Question too vague. What is "monstrous?" Why not just play a monster? Why not Totemist? What about one of the many homebrews for various monster concepts?

The Races of the Dragon Web Enhancement has kobolds with claws and bite. Darfellan from Stormwrack are just about the only PC aimed LA 0 race (that's not loldragon) with a natural bite, and it's a hefty full d6 too. From Planar Handbook, Neraphim have the toad-person look (Slaad blood) and a unique and useful dex denial ability, or the Lesser Bauriar is a mini-centaur.


Which is funny, 'cause I'd take GSA over Acolyte of the Skin any day. At least GSA does something permanent for its loss of casting, where AoS gets a couple bad SLAs. People hate on GSA because (aside from caster-only mindset) it removes Con, but in a game without inflated ability scores, the loss is not nearly as great and could even be a boon, if you dared make a Raistlin. Or you can just not take the 10th level. Or make a magic item that boosts hit points for constructs. Or apply a one-sentence fix to whichever parts you find most offensive.

Acolyte of the Skin? Doesn't make you a half-fiend, random smattering of daily abilities, doesn't even have full caster level. Even Blood Magus beats it after the update, and updated Blood Magus is still terrible. Where GSA has a couple specific problems, AoS lacks any fundamental structure, you can't fix it without building a new structure to put the name on.

Darfellan is a good choice ... Funny thing I was just looking at Stormwrack for it ... Says over 6 feet but the table shows 4'5" +2d4 ... I'm guessing it should be one of the 4'10"+2d10m ... A lot less monstrous at sub-5 feet