Negative LA-Assignment : Resurrection, but no diamond here

[PoeticallyPsyco]

I'll comment mainly on the Kraken, as Grapplers have a startlingly intense frontloading and fairly limited ability to gain advantage over monsters like the Kraken. Basically, after PsyWar 3/Totemist 2/Barbarian 1 (plus Practiced Manifester and Open Chakra (Arms)), you've gotten the vast majority of non-PRC Grapple output, and the PRCs are being very harshly shamed by your +24 Strength, Gargantuan size, eight Improved Grab triggers, and Natural Attack derived Constrict.

Looking over a Grappling handbook, a Dragonborn Azurin Totem Rager Black Blood Cultist, one of the more extreme Grapple pushes in the game, caps at +63. With Rage, an assigned 18, a +5 Tome, and +6 belt, it has only 6 more strength than your base statblock, ends up with 5 less BAB, gets +8 from feats you have zero complications taking, and +12 from a single Soulmeld.

A PC Kraken with no items or class levels can readily compare to this rather heavily optimized and kitted out PC grappler, by assigning an 18 to Strength, getting Improved Grapple, then Shape Soulmeld (Girallon Arms) and acquiring 4 Essentia from Bonus Essentia and two +1 Essentia feats, for +60 to Grapple checks. And can make twice as many per round. If you let this thing have 9 levels or more, it will defile the game with Black Blood Cultist 8 making every successful Grapple check set off every Natural Attack you have. All 10-12 of them. Of which 6-8 instigate Grapple checks when used as attacks (depending on if the Claws overlap your Arms or not).

I suggest 12 RHD, giving access to 3rd-level PsyWar powers and Totem Rager 5's duration extension while making Black Blood Cultist 8 nearly squaring your damage potential be your entry to Epic, and agree with not giving it a direct negative level adjustment because Legendary Wrestler is a +10 and, as demonstrated above, it's actually a well above-curve Grappler with optimized PCs just by making it a PC, even if it gets to do literally nothing but Grapple. Being that it's Gargantuan with eight limbs, this is a quite possible winning strategy as far as beatsticks go, even if your raw damage potential isn't as dumb as an Ubercharger.

I hadn't actually given much thought to the Kraken as a grappler (which seems weird, but I'm not used to thinking of grappling as a strong strategy once you get to high level), but it actually sidesteps one of the big problems (can only grapple up to one size above your own) and really benefits from of a few of the weirder grappling tricks.

Scorpion's Grasp - at first glance, this is redundant with Improved Grab, but unlike IG it doesn't drag the target into your space. Instead it moves you into theirs, which is a frankly fantastic boost to mobility on the Kraken (also working on a full-attack, no less). Also unlike IG, works on any natural attack, including the Kraken's beak and any natural weapons granted by Totemist.

One limbed grappling - When grappled, you lose your Dex bonus versus anyone that you're not grappling (so, everyone but the person that grappled you) and your reach becomes zero. However, if you have Improved Grab or Scorpion's Grasp, you can conduct a grapple started with that ability using only one hand. You take a -20 penalty (mitigatable with the (Improved) Multigrab feat pair), but don't count as grappled yourself. So you get to keep your reach, letting you grapple as many opponents as you have limbs. For most creatures (including the Kraken), this only works on opponents smaller than you, but for the Kraken that's barely a problem, and the extra limbs mean you can lock down the whole battlefield.

Sneak Attack - So that mention of Dex above wasn't an idle comment. One-limbed grapple someone, and all your attacks against them start benefiting from Sneak Attack.


Being so many HD behind is really going to hurt your essentia and chakra binds if you go that route (ironically, the grappling soulmeld this will likely affect most is Kraken Mantle). You also still lack any way to deal with magic like dimension jumper and freedom of movement... though I guess not being as dependent on magic for your grappling means you could just travel in an antimagic field.