Feat to allow Druid to wild shape into Owlbear

[Jay R]

I'm running a 3.5 game for the first time, having played original D&D, AD&D 1e & 2e, and 3.5e, and having run original and AD&D 2e. My players have all been playing D&D since at least AD&D 1e. [Three of them played original D&D.]

So they are not new role-players, but they are certainly new to 3.5e.

The druid player saw the movie, and thinks it would be cool to be able to become an owlbear. She understands that it's not allowed in the rules, and is not upset by that.

But I'd like to give it to her if I reasonably can.

So my plan is to design a feat that lets a druid wildshape into a single magical beast.

What should be the pre-requisites for this feat? Level?

[JNAProductions]

Does an owlbear have any abilities that make it notably strong for its HD, or otherwise would be difficult to access for a Druid without?
Because, correct me if I'm wrong, its statblock is basically just like a normal animal's. It just happens to be a crossbreed.

I'd err on the side of "Just make the owlbear an animal instead of a monstrous beast," and not charge a feat for flavor.

[Twurps]

For owlbear specifically, I'd have to second JNAProductions.

In general: there's the 'exalted wild shape' feat from BoeD. It gives some specific forms, and magical beasts 'at the DM's discretion'. The feat also gives both the (ex) and (su) abilities of those forms, so it can make for some interesting forms/abilities.

[Morphic tide]

So my plan is to design a feat that lets a druid wildshape into a single magical beast.

What should be the pre-requisites for this feat? Level?
Honestly, given the existence of Aberration Wild Shape under a "is humanoid" prerequisite feat and "has wild shape" for the feat itself, you could probably get away with "Magical Beast Wild Shape" as a general thing with some mild prerequisite like Knowledge (Arcana) ranks to unlock all Magical Beasts. They're much more penned in than the nonsense with Aberrations.

[tyckspoon]

If they very specifically want to have Owlbear as an option, I would suggest reskinning whatever grade of normal Bear the druid can currently access. They're functionally identical in almost every aspect - same attack routines, same special abilities - the only thing that's particularly special about the Owlbear is it is size Large at lower HD than the related normal bear would be.. but the Druid can't do Large creatures normally until level 8 anyways, at which point they can become an Owlish-looking Polar Bear.

[Jay R]

Thank you all. It's clear that this is not a gamebreaker, and doesn't even deserve to cost her a Feat. I'll be giving her the ability as a side effect of a magic item they've already picked up.

[She's 8th level now, so she can already turn into a Large creature.]

[tyckspoon]

Thank you all. It's clear that this is not a gamebreaker, and doesn't even deserve to cost her a Feat. I'll be giving her the ability as a side effect of a magic item they've already picked up.

[She's 8th level now, so she can already turn into a Large creature.]

Probably worth noting that in 3.5 using the specific Owlbear statblock is actually a downgrade - it's weaker than the Brown Bear and especially weaker than the Polar Bear, which are the other options an 8th level druid would have to Wildshape into a big bear thing. Magical Beast is a better Type and has better HD than Animal, but it's not so much better that it makes up for the Owlbear having fewer HD and lower stats.

(This is different in 5e, which the Honor Among Thieves movie is loosely based on - Owlbears there are notably more dangerous than similar normal bears and most Druids would -never- be able to turn into something of that challenge rating at all. Being able to turn into an Owlbear is a much Bigger Deal in that system.)

[Doctor Despair]

Not that you have to make her wait for this, but Planar Shepherd can wild shape into owl bears at class level 3 (as early as ECL8) if they chose a plane that has owl bears native to it.

[Biggus]

Honestly, given the existence of Aberration Wild Shape under a "is humanoid" prerequisite feat and "has wild shape" for the feat itself, you could probably get away with "Magical Beast Wild Shape" as a general thing with some mild prerequisite like Knowledge (Arcana) ranks to unlock all Magical Beasts. They're much more penned in than the nonsense with Aberrations.

I'm more seeing an argument to make Aberration WS into an epic feat than Magical Beast WS into a nonepic feat here...

[Gnaeus]

I'm more seeing an argument to make Aberration WS into an epic feat than Magical Beast WS into a nonepic feat here...

Aberration WS is pretty broken. But rather than making either one epic, I'd be more inclined to select a limited number of forms you can take and just ban the most broken ones or level delay them.

[eggynack]

Honestly, given the existence of Aberration Wild Shape under a "is humanoid" prerequisite feat and "has wild shape" for the feat itself, you could probably get away with "Magical Beast Wild Shape" as a general thing with some mild prerequisite like Knowledge (Arcana) ranks to unlock all Magical Beasts. They're much more penned in than the nonsense with Aberrations.
Man, this is how you get aberration wild shape in the first place. You think that all the magical beasts are chill, but then it turns out that there's some wonky ass creature called The Squonkmaster in Oriental Adventures that gets wish as an extraordinary special attack. I don't even know what I'd do with this, but I have to imagine it's borked somehow. Or, rather, I don't even know what I'd do with this after using the hobgoblin warsoul and kuo-toa exalted whip to access 9th level wizard and 8th level cleric casting respectively, on creatures with only 10 HD at that. That sounds like a very funny thing to do. Also, as a sidenote, mourning mutate from dragon is an aberration blood alternative on non-humanoids. So that's nice.

[Gnaeus]

Man, this is how you get aberration wild shape in the first place. You think that all the magical beasts are chill, but then it turns out that there's some wonky ass creature called The Squonkmaster in Oriental Adventures that gets wish as an extraordinary special attack. I don't even know what I'd do with this, but I have to imagine it's borked somehow. Or, rather, I don't even know what I'd do with this after using the hobgoblin warsoul and kuo-toa exalted whip to access 9th level wizard and 8th level cleric casting respectively, on creatures with only 10 HD at that. That sounds like a very funny thing to do. Also, as a sidenote, mourning mutate from dragon is an aberration blood alternative on non-humanoids. So that's nice.

Agree completely, but it seems like the solution, again, is to say the feat grants level/3 forms and the DM has to approve them for balance. It's not as mechanically robust as it theoretically could be ("Here is a list of the allowable forms, from every source). But given that it is one person and one DM and the player is new, it seems like it wouldn't be to hard to make it useful but balanced to your party. Since the player is new, they could just ask the DM for some appropriate forms and he could find some he thought worked.

[eggynack]

Agree completely, but it seems like the solution, again, is to say the feat grants level/3 forms and the DM has to approve them for balance. It's not as mechanically robust as it theoretically could be ("Here is a list of the allowable forms, from every source). But given that it is one person and one DM and the player is new, it seems like it wouldn't be to hard to make it useful but balanced to your party. Since the player is new, they could just ask the DM for some appropriate forms and he could find some he thought worked.
I'd probably just go with Jay's apparent solution, which is, "Whatever, here's an owlbear. Through your kinship with owlbears, you have arbitrarily acquired the ability to be an owlbear." I guess it'd be a different matter if the player wanted more general magical beast stuff, but I don't see all that much issue with simply letting a player steal below average forms from the universe.

[Beni-Kujaku]

Agree completely, but it seems like the solution, again, is to say the feat grants level/3 forms and the DM has to approve them for balance. It's not as mechanically robust as it theoretically could be ("Here is a list of the allowable forms, from every source). But given that it is one person and one DM and the player is new, it seems like it wouldn't be to hard to make it useful but balanced to your party. Since the player is new, they could just ask the DM for some appropriate forms and he could find some he thought worked.

As someone who implemented this exact solution (well, level/4, but the idea is the same), having only 2 shapes is enough for a player who knows what they're doing. In general, you're not changing between dozens of different shapes, you have a favorite form that you focus on for most combat situations. Then again, greenlighting Beholder was probably a bad call on my end, considering how Antimagic Eye (Metamorphic Transfer) can work inside a party, but advising this to a new DM is just asking for a similar situation (you know Urophions and Carrion Crawlers.). Just wanted to say that the real restriction here is "and the DM has to approve them", not "level/3 forms".