Community Based Monster Classes VI

[Lizard Lord]

Reply to Hyudra's critique:

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Hooded Pupil
[list][*]Just a heads up, I reviewed this Hooded Pupil. I think you may have posted it twice, see my post a half page up about reposting monsters. In any case, edit the first post rather than resubmitting, please.

Yea, not really sure how the repost happened, but I deleted the duplicate. The one you linked here should be the original.

[*]Prerequisites are a little dry. Consider that prereqs are the group's first exposure/introduction to the monster class. You don't want it to be, like:

Player A: "Woah, you're a hooded pupil. When did that happen?"
Player B: "Meh. I sorta knew some general stuff.

Even something like a ritual to enter would be flavorful, and ideally would involve some challenge or investment on the part of the player. What is a hooded pupil, why would someone be taking a level in it? Try to create a flavorful parallel to the adoption of the template.

I suppose I should have added a prerequite requiring that the hooded pupil entered an apprentice ship with an intelligent undead.

[*]"Skills Points at 1rst Level:" - should be Skill points at first level.

Fixed.

Class skills seem alright. Use rope seems a little weird, but I can let that slide.

Don't know where my head was at when I included use rope, so it is removed

[*]"Proficiencies: The Hooded Pupil gains proficiency with the following Simple and Martial Weapons and light armor." - reword to 'The Hooded Pupil is proficient with simple weapons, martial weapons and light armor.

Fixed

[*]I went to look & noticed it was absent. I stress that you should state the source of the monster clearly on the entry. I tend to prefer:

Monster Name
[Picture]
|Picture|
[Picture]
Monster Class (or 'Template/Monster Prestige Class')
Sourcebook (ie. 'Heroes of Horror')

[spoilered class features]

Fixed

[*]Ability Score Increases: Try to cut it down to just two ability scores. We don't tend to go beyond that, especially for monsters that can wear armor, speak, cast spells, etc. (Stuff like griffons might get the two ability scores, but something like Githzerai wouldn't)

I can remove the strength bonus.

[*]Clutch of Orcus: It looks as though you more or less copied the ability from the spell text. Only it doesn't paralyze. This, I believe, goes against forum rules, at least in spirit. I'll clarify what I said before: I would recommend coming up with an ability that does something similar, with its own mechanics, or find something appropriate in non-copyrighted material. You could, if you wished to preserve flavor, give an option, like:

Heart Clutch: You may focus on your opponents, causing them harm as you manipulate their blood against them. Pick one of the following:

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• You Gain Clutch of Orcus (Libris Mortis, p.63) as a spell like ability, castable once a day per two HD.
• Blood Font: You may concentrate your malign will on a foe, causing them to sweat blood and their wounds to bleed profusely. While you concentrate, your target foe is slowed as per the spell by the agony of the ordeal, and takes 1d3 damage for every two HD you have. Foes who are already damaged (that is, not at full health or over max health by way of temporary hp) take 1d6 damage per two HD for each round you concentrate, instead. Foes below half health take 1d8 damage per two HD each round you concentrate. Foes get a saving throw (DC 10 + ½ Hooded Pupil HD + Hooded Pupil wisdom mod or Hooded Pupil charisma mod, whichever is higher) each time the Hooded Pupil initiates this effect, and if they succeed, they become immune to further attempts for 1 hour.

This looks good to me. Would you be offended if I used this example?

[*]Drink Blood: I'd remove the 'special:' and just make the "This ability may only be used..." part a part of the ability text. It's kind of underwhelming and needs to scale. What if any ability damage you dealt translated to self healing and/or removal of ability damage you've taken?

Fixed. I'll have to think of how exactly the healing and removal of ability damage will work later.

[*]Add a spoiler box for comments and for changelog?

I'm confused. The version you linked already had both of those things.

Playability|Playable, sure, just not sure exactly what sort of monster I would apply this template to. I'm lost as to the role it would take in a group, as well.

This might be where my lack of ability stops me in my tracks, as I don't know how to resolve this.

And Changelog with updates: Changelog:

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Feb 25 2011:

• Made the Hooded Pupil a level 1 class
• Got rid of Bonus Skills and Bonus Feats

Feb 26 2011

• Clarified text for Drink Blood.
• Made Clutch of Orcus 1/day per 2 HD.
• Removed Evil alignment from the prerequisites
• Added 4 HD to the Prerequisites.
• Fixed Clutch of Orcus so that you don't need the Libris Mortis and made it add HD to damage.

Feb 27 2011

• Removed Strength bonus.
• Added prerequisite requiring the Hooded Pupil is taught by an intelligent undead.
• Fixed typo with skills.
• Removed Use Rope from skill list.

[Hyudra]

Yea, not really sure how the repost happened, but I deleted the duplicate. The one you linked here should be the original.

Good, good. We've had chaos in the past over that, so just want to hammer it in. Wondering where I can stick posting guidelines where people will come across it.

I suppose I should have added a prerequite requiring that the hooded pupil entered an apprentice ship with an intelligent undead.

That would be an interesting one. The trick would be adding some mechanical basis around it.

Don't know where my head was at when I included use rope, so it is removed

Hangman's nooses? Dunno.

This looks good to me. Would you be offended if I used this example?

I would not. You may want to give it uses per day though (though, see the points at the bottom of the page - you might also want to tweak it to make it more of a general/easy use tool like eldritch blast).

Fixed. I'll have to think of how exactly the healing and removal of ability damage will work later.

Alright. In that case, let me know when you've worked it out. I'll postpone critiquing until you have a more or less finished product.

I'm confused. The version you linked already had both of those things.

Ah, it may be that you copied Chumplump's template for monster classes. It's outdated and a little messy, and hides the changelog/comments in the spoiler. I must've missed it that way. I recently replaced the link to that template with a fresher one, because of that issue & others.

This might be where my lack of ability stops me in my tracks, as I don't know how to resolve this.

Good question. Hmm.

Ok. Well, a few ways to go about this. It largely involves mental exercises:

• What I did with the basilisk was write a short story (not terribly well, but I wrote it) featuring the basilisk as part of an adventuring party. The idea here was to try and figure out a group dynamic and flavor that would fit the Basilisk interacting alongside others in combat, etc. Once I had that, I worked out the Basilisk to fit the role I'd envisioned.
• You could also relate/compare the monster to another class. Is it roguish? More like a caster? Or a warlock? My inclination with the Hooded Pupil is that it's similar to a warlock, but it lacks the options. You take Hooded Pupil and get the equivalent of a channeled eldritch blast (clutch of orcus or blood font) and you get a preselected minor invocation (spider climb). You've got less skills, but (IIRC) more raw toughness by way of HD and natural armor. In general, you're maybe a little subpar to the warlock, given the lack of options, the lack of optimization tools (your abilities don't have feats & items that could modify/buff them like the warlock can pick up for eldritch blast) and the lack of further progression (you're always a 1 level dip prestige class/template).

So, with the above in mind, what can the Hooded Pupil offer to a group, in terms of damage, defenses, offensive tools, tactics, yadda, yadda, yadda, that I wouldn't pretty much get for taking a 1 level dip in warlock? I think that's where the role is lacking.

[Scio]

Oh, ok. I just thought that no one noticed. That tends to happen to me quite a bit, y'see. ('O_O)

[mootoall]

I'm working on the Unbodied, and I was wondering the following:

Its fluff says that it assumes various different apparent forms. So my question is whether or not I should give it a preset list of forms it can take (brain, glowing light, regal human, etc.) and various bonii it gains in those forms, or just allow it to take any form and not gain any mechanical bonii from that.

[dsmiles]

Despite the rudeness displayed earlier, I have updated the Psurlon (yet again).

[Gorgondantess]

Well, I apologize if I appeared rude. Though I'm still waiting for an answer to my question.

[dsmiles]

Well, I apologize if I appeared rude. Though I'm still waiting for an answer to my question.

I'm not one to hold a grudge, but yes, it was rather harsh. No hard feelings?

At the time, yes, it was the most current version. It has since been updated, as you were the only one to look at it, at the time.

[Gorgondantess]

I'm not one to hold a grudge, but yes, it was rather harsh. No hard feelings?

At the time, yes, it was the most current version. It has since been updated, as you were the only one to look at it, at the time.

...Ah. I could've sworn Hyudra's reviewed it.

[dsmiles]

...Ah. I could've sworn Hyudra's reviewed it.

Not a thorough review as yet. Hyudra glanced at it. The only ones that really looked at it, prior to you, were (Phrenic Half-Swordsage) Frog Dragon, Kyuubi (once), and I think DiBastet looked at it...that's pretty much it. Then everybody started ranting about dragons and the ragewalker for a couple of pages.

[The-Mage-King]

I'm working on the Unbodied, and I was wondering the following:

Its fluff says that it assumes various different apparent forms. So my question is whether or not I should give it a preset list of forms it can take (brain, glowing light, regal human, etc.) and various bonii it gains in those forms, or just allow it to take any form and not gain any mechanical bonii from that.

I would say the latter, because, well, that's how it's ability seems to read.

[Necroticplague]

Phantom
Prestige/Template Monster Class
Monster Manual 5

Phantom:

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Phantom Prerequisites
Race:Must not already be incorporeal
Special: Must have at least 6 HD
Special: Must undergo a ritual involving failing a Fort save to hunger, and then giving up that night's sleep in favor of trancing for 10 uninterrupted hours. This has none of the normal effects of sleep.

HD: D6
{table=head]Level|Bab|Fort|Reflex|Will|Feature
1|+0|+0|+2|+2|Phantom Body,Weakness,Incorporeal Movement,Phantom Defense
2|+1|+0|+3|+3|Phantom Strike,Incorporeal Juant
[/table]

Skill Points:4+int per level
Class Skills: Hide,Move Silently, Tumble, Balance,Search,Spot,Listen,Open Lock, Disable Device, Escape Artist

Phantom Body:Unlike most monster classes, a character that takes a level in phantom does not lose their racial traits. Their type remains unchanged, unless they are animals or vermin, in which case they become Magical Beast (Augmented Animal) or Magical Beast (Augmented Vermin), respectively. They also gain a deflection to their AC equal to their Charisma modifier or +1, whichever is higher.

Weakness (Ex):A phantom creature has a body that partially exists both corporeally, and incorporeally. As a result, weapons that can strike both its corporeal body and it's incorporeal body essentially hit a phantom's body twice. A phantom takes 50% extra damage from all attacks with the ghost touch enchantment.

Incorporeal Movement(Su):A phantom becomes capable of temporarily leaving his physical form behind while he moves in an ghostly form.While this ability is active, a phantom becomes incorporeal when moving as a move action.A phantom's equipment does not turn incorporeal with it. Completely mundane items cannot even be held by the phantom, and fall to the ground. Magic items can be held while incorporeal, but prevent the phantom from going through objects. They become corporeal again at the end of their move, and so must end their movement in a space they could legally occupy when corporeal.A phantom taking a double move must end each move action in a legal space, becoming briefly corporeal before beginning their second move action. A phantom may suppress or resume this ability at any time. Doing so is a move action that does not provoke Attacks of Opportunity. Incorporeal Movement does not apply to any movement except that from using the phantom's own move actions. A phantom does not become incorporeal during other actions that include movement, or during movement caused by an outside effect. If a phantom has the ability to take another kind of action during or in the middle of its move action, it remains incorporeal while taking that action.

Phantom Defense (Su):As a result of it's own incorporeal nature, a phantom becomes better at defending itself from attacks of other incorporeal creatures. A phantom’s armor bonus, deflection bonus, natural armor bonus, and shield bonus count toward its Armor Class, whether its attackers are incorporeal or not.

Phantom Strike (Ex): A phantom keeps a faint link to the physical world that allows it to still act when it keeps it's own body insubstantial. As a result, a phantom does not lose it's strength score while it is incorporeal, and can attack corporeal creatures as normal while incorporeal. It cannot however, initiate any of the following successfully, or use any abilities based of them:Trip,Bull-Rush,Disarm,Sunder,Sleight of hand Checks to steal items or move creatures. If a phantom has some other method of acting corporeally on the world normally (such as smearing its hand in ghostwall shellac, or having a ghost touch weapon) allows them to perform these actions as normal.

Incorporeal Jaunt (Su):At the pinnacle of it's transformation, a phantom becomes capable of moving between its corporeal and incorporeal self with but a moment's thought. A phantom can become incorporeal as a swift action. It can become corporeal again as a swift action or a standard action. A phantom's equipment does not turn incorporeal with it.Completely mundane items cannot even be held by the phantom, and fall to the ground. Magic items can be held while incorporeal, but prevent the phantom from going through objects.This ability can be used a number of minutes per day equal to half the phantom's highest base stat modifier (modifier without any any bonuses from magic items or enhancements). This time increases to base stat modifier at 11 HD, and the time limit is removed at 14 HD

Comments:

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I meant this to just be class that made a character more useful while incorporeal, as opposed to being mostly unable to act upon the world at all. Incorporeability at-will is a relatively powerful ability, and this class gets it at 8hd. I figured it didn't really need any other abilities, considering all the benefits of being continuously incorporeal (invisible,inaudible,no track, no scent, phase through objects, 50% miss chance),combined with the ability to become corporeal if they need to.

Changelog:

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February 28-March 1: Fixed some spelling and grammar errors, almost completely reworded Phantom Strike. Added more class skills, increased skill points per level. Added fluff to some of the abilities, and moved the deflection AC bonus to Phantom Body.

March 2:Made changes to and added fluff for Incorporeal Movement. Thanks goes to Psyborg. Added fluffy special requirement.

March 3:Went back and added fluff to the abilities I hadn't done so to already.

March 8: Made Incorporeal Jaunt scale with level and stats, so that Incorporeal Movement stays relevant for a little while. Also specified that equipment does not turn incorporeal with them under both Incorporeal Movement and Incorporeal Jaunt.

March 18:Lessened scaling of Incorporeal Jaunt, and specified what happened to equipment you couldn't carry while incorporeal.

[Scio]

Phantom looks pretty cool, but that line about it being "Corporeal and incorporeal" made my brain hurt.

[mootoall]

I would say the latter, because, well, that's how it's ability seems to read.

Okay. However, it will be an effective size category change, if they so choose, for space, AC and AB, though not for grapple, trip, etc. checks.

[Hyudra]

Briarvex

• "Skills Points at 1rst Level:" -> Skill Points at 1st Level or Skill Points at First Level: (Second is preferred).
• Skill list, you do Skill (stat), Skill (stat), Skill (stat), then comes 'Knowledge (Natue)'. This is wrong because it's not listing a stat in the same format as the others, and because nature is misspelled.
• "The Brairvex gains proficiency with ... "it's own Spiked Fist" -> its.
• Taking 50% extra damage from the most common elemental damage type in the game is... pretty brutal. Sadly, it's not a good balancing point, because, in the same vein of favored enemies (though this is more 'unfavored enemies'), it leaves you powerful against some encoutners and vulnerable in others.
• It might be a good idea to copy-paste text from the SRD about Unarmed Strike and Unarmed Strike progression into a spoiler for easy access.
• It strikes me that you never really detail the Briarvex's fists. It's implied, but never stated outright. By which I mean that in Spiked Fist, you detail that it gets improved unarmed strike, and go into that, and then thorn burrow says that everything depends on you dealing damage with your spiked fist, which kind of refers to the above ability, but you never outright say "The Briarvex has spiked fists." I just go from one ability to the next and find myself feeling like there's missing text that should be drawing it all together.
• And in the same/related vein, there's no flavor text beyond the bare minimum essentials. The class would feel a lot more whole if there was a sentence at the beginning of each ability describing what's going on. Again, implied, we can draw conclusions, but it would add a chunk of flavor text and make it more exciting to play.
• Thorn burrow: I think it should allow some other way to remove thorns, because only 1 in 20 monsters you run up against are going to have Heal.
• "When the Briarvex reaches 2nd level he may animate the plant life around." - there's a word missing at the end of that sentence. "He may animate the plant life around him"?
• "This includes the air above him and the land beneath him" - I... don't get how this works. I'm a briarvex, there's a dragon flying at the same height as the rooftops of 5 story buildings, directly above me. I use entangle as a full round action, it reaches that high... dragon is entangled. What just happened? Again, this is where flavor text would help. That, or tweaking the ability.
• Also, I note the very short duration. 1 round, unscaling. Is this intentional?
• Can I not do a 'jack and the beanstalk' and climb into the sky by repeatedly using Entangle, creating the necessary vegetation 60' above me, climbing, repeating the process every round?
• Powerful Build: According to the official FAQ, powerful build won't advance your unarmed strike. This hurts the Briarvex. It still progresses, mind you, but it's worth noting. It also makes level 3 kind of unexciting, in terms of advancement.
• Powerful build: should state it's gained at 3rd.
• Call Army: I tend to take issue with abilities that are environment specific. This is one capstone ability that simply doesn't offer anything if your campaign happens to involve a long stretch in a labyrinth, a dungeon, a jail, desert (no, not all deserts have cacti, many have little more than the occasional patch of moss no bigger than your palm) or winterlands.
• And just too many uses. You'll literally have an army. Consider:
  
  At level 6, you'll have 6HD. That's 24 uses a day. Each use offers six small, three medium or one large & 2 small/1 medium. With 24 uses a day, and 4 encounters a day, you've got enough to use the ability every round for 6 rounds in each combat.
  
  At 12HD, you've got 48 uses a day. Each use grants 12 smalls, 6 mediums, 3 larges or 1 huge and 1 large. You've got enough uses that you can easily afford to, at any moment that danger might feasibly occur, pre-emptively cast animate objects.
  
  Consider, also, a Briarvex who is using call army (Swift action - 2 small or 1 medium creature a round) and entangle (move action) every round. Enemies have to deal with both entangle and the presence of your minions, and your minion's threat ranges. Your minions, all the while, are easily capable of providing flanking bonuses. It's ridiculous battlefield control, especially considering you're not even using a standard action.
  
  Heck, you can even do this in areas with no vegetation by using entangle to create vegetation (standard action) and animating that vegetation. Even if it only lasts 1 round, you're still entangling every foe and offering the impact of [your HD] allies on the battlefield, giving flanking bonuses, making attacks of opportunity, obstructing charges, yadda yadda.
  It's too much. Needs to be scaled way way way back.
• {table=Head]Category|Score
  Originality|High marks. It fits, thorn burrow is interesting, it's a fitting plant thing.
  Playability|I have to wonder. It's overpowered in forests and weaksauce in many other environments. This is pretty polarizing, playabilitywise. Add fire vulnerability and you can potentially get mauled.
  Power|Passable, but see Playability. Also, call army is over the top, and
  Elegance|Some inelegant bits here. Lack of clarity/elaboration in some abilities, some abuse potential.[/table]

Pandorym

• The more I think on it, the more I feel the limited magic item slots really, really hold you back. It's a pretty huge portion of your power at high levels. Can I get a response/justification on the subject?
• Skills look better.
• "in whitch case you become native..." -> Spelling error, which. I do believe I pointed this one out before.
• "increase your movement speeds by 10ft for every extra 1 power points expended" -> power point. No s.
• "Oncer per day per 3 HD" -> spelling error, oncer. That's spelling error #2. I really did urge you to spellcheck. I'm going to make this a three strike thing, just to be nice.
• @ Incorporeality - I have to wonder, isn't this gamebreaking? What's to stop you from acquiring some extrasensory means of detecting foes and then lurking beneath the floor or inside a wall/object, for all combats? I mean, even if you're only half-submerged into the floor/wall, you've got a 50% miss chance (incorporeality) and a 20% miss chance (concealment). Do this on the ceiling, and you're impossible to reach without flight or ranged weapons, and you've still got only a 40% chance to be hit.
• 2nd facet of the mind should scale.
• Considering that it's the only thing you really get that level, the first half of moderate sign of binding is a bit underwhelming. I mean, consider how often you're in combat against summoned creatures. Now take into account how long combat tends to last... 3, 4 rounds at most? Summoned creatures have durations of 1 round per caster level... so at a minimum, 11 rounds. It's never going to come up in a game, barring really unusual circumstances. The second effect is ok, but again, it's fairly niche - how often are you up against a divine caster? Depends on the campaign, but... Once every level? Once every other level?
• Psionic Leech - DC is too easy to beat, given it's a skill check and (I do believe) every character you'd want to use it against has concentration as a class skill.
• On the flip side of the coin, Psionic Leech seems kinda powerful. I mean, double PP costs... what would your feeling be if you were a regular elf Psion in a level 13 adventuring party (consisting of swordsage, you, factotum and cleric) and I pit you against a BBEG with 15 levels in Pandorym, fourth encounter of the day?
• Continual intellect fortress. This seems... rather potent. I mean, it's an 8th level defensive ability meant to last 1 round, and you have it 24/7. I point you again to the question above - are you ok with this, going against a Pandorym as a boss monster, playing as a psion?
• What kind of action is binding hex?
• "useable once per day per 8HD, with a Will DC equal to 10 + Cha Mod + HD/2. " -> Try not to use HD/2. Also, spelling error -> usable. I really, really wish you'd spellcheck.
• Anathematic Sorcery: "[DC = 10 + HD/2 + Cha Mod)" -> don't use brackets, and especially don't use two different types of bracket to open/close.
• "Cha Mod times per day, wheyou manifest a Psionic power" -> ok. Stopping here. This, and the bracket thing in anathemactic sorcery are along the lines of stuff that one should be able to catch just rereading their entry. I don't want to be offensive, but if you can't be bothered to check over your own work, I don't know why I should be.

Jovoc

• Changelog is sparse. Are you deleting old info from the changelog every time you add something new?
• I see you're sticking with the 1st level, 2nd level bits. I don't know that I was clear when I brought it up last, but please change it. It's visually distracting and even if you like doing it to keep better track of your own work-in-progress, you can delete it when you're done.
• Cursed Wound is listed as such on the table, but is Cursed Wounds in the ability descriptions.
• Cursed wound: A daze? That's a not-insignificant condition. I mean, that's making enemies miss a turn, while doing what you'd be doing anyways, and at high HD, you'll have enough uses that it won't require any strategic decisions about whether to use it. Consider that the War Troll gets pretty much the same thing, except that for the war troll, it's a 10th level ability (minimum 5 levels of troll, then 5 levels of war troll, to acquire)... and even then, it's easier to waste (you have to declare it before hitting, where Jovoc phrasing implies you can call it afterwards). And War Troll is a kind of problematic class even so. Needs tweaking to tone it down. Maybe by making it nauseate at lower levels (daze at higher) and making it just a little slower to acquire at higher levels. Something like:
  
  • Cursed Wound: As a free action, you may charge your next claw attack with raw pain, to leave foes doubled over in agony. Should you hit, the foe must make a fortitude save (DC 10 + ½ Jovoc HD + Jovoc Cha) or be nauseated for one round. On a failed attack, the use is spent regardless. Cursed Wound may be used once a day per HD or a number of times a day equal to the Jovoc's Cha mod, whichever is less. At 8HD, it causes foes to be dazed. At 16HD, it causes them to be stunned.
• I note that there's no mention of growth anywhere. I remember it used to be in Jovoc body. Why the omission?
• Punishment Strike: I must say, I really dislike per encounter abilities. I take it the per-encounter is derivative of my comment about how it was too many uses... But now it's, at low levels, 1 use per encounter for 3-5 encounters a day (4, usually)... so 3-5 uses a day at 3rd-7th levels, and 2 uses per encounter at 8th-11th levels, or 6-10... so we haven't changed matters much.
• And the damage is still pretty damn high. 10th level, about 8 times a day, I can add 10 bonus damage to my attacks for one round. Assuming 2 attacks a round and the encounter setup I pose above, that's up to 200 bonus damage added on over the course of the adventuring day (2 attacks a round, 10 uses a day, 10 bonus damage on each hit).
  
  • Compare to the Paladin's smite, while not a great class feature, is just 3 uses a day at 10th level, granting ~10 bonus damage on 3 attacks only. That's a maximum of 30 bonus damage over the course of the day.
• "Your claws are stained red from blood, whether its your blood or the enemies' you dont recall" - would reword to "whether it's your blood or the blood of your enemies, you do not recall." (Fixing "its", lack of comma, awkward "the enemies' ", dont)
• And delete actually from the next sentence, it reads better.
• Much clearer on the flavor text of the "I throw my blood at you". Good.
• But delete the paragraph break between the end of the first sentence and "By sacrificing..." to make it one paragraph. It'll look neater.
• "(Fort reduces to sickened)" - dont' put this in brackets, and make it a full sentence.
• Retributive Aura: Beautiful. Much tidier, much more playable. Just beautiful.

Gargoyle

• Shrink pic. The new link on the first post has an Image FAQ. I detail an easy way to resize pictures there.
• That aside, I'll leave you to make the changes Gorgondantess recommended. Home stretch!

Vivisector

• Skill list looks less lopsided. Good.
• State sourcebook it is from. See how I did it with Troll, just below the pic? It's tidy, it's clear.
• I'd reword, just for clarity, under Scythe Hands, to "to ingest or regurgitate one or both rings requires a full round action."
• "'Anything with a skeletal system can be Vivisected for Bones, but all Undead can ONLY be Vivisected for Bones. Slime is specific to Oozes, and the only thing you can take from an Ooze. Construct Essence is the only thing that can be harvested from a Construct, and can only be harvested from a Construct. ' - I'd just note which applies to what on the actual list, so the text above is cleaner." -> suggestion from last critique.
  
  • Alternately, have categories on the actual organ list. Like...
    
    Spoiler

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    Any corporeal, non-undead, non-construct, non-ooze, non-elemental creature:
    

    Heart: They gain Fast Healing equal to their HD/4 (Minimum 1).
    Liver: They gain immunity to all poisons.
    Lungs: They are treated as having the Run and Endurance feats for the duration of the bonus.
    Spinal Cord: They gain Mage Hand as an SLA, useable once per round (Your Caster Level is equal to your HD).
    Muscle: They gain a bonus to all STR based skill rolls equal to their HD/4 (Minimum 1).
    Skin: They gain DR [Your HD/4]/Piercing
    Bone: They gain DR [Your HD/4]/Bludgeoning
    Blood: They can vomit up the blood as a 40ft breath weapon dealing 1d6 damage for every 2 HD the Vivisector has.
    Brains: They gain a +[HD/4] insight bonus to all Reflex rolls, and INT based checks.
    Feet: Their Land Speed increases by 30ft.
    Appendix: They gain a Flaw, chosen by the DM (But no bonus feat).
    Digestive Organs: The next bonus activated while this once is in effect lasts for twice as long as normal.
    Eyes: They gain their HD as a bonus to all Spot Checks.
    Hands: They gain Fine Manipulation.
    Teeth: They gain a Secondary Bite Attack dealing 1d8 damage. The Vivisector's poison (See Poison Claws ability) can also be transmitted by the Vivisector's bite attack, as if it were striking the target with its claw attacks.

    Corporeal Undead:
    

    Bone: They gain DR [Your HD/4]/Bludgeoning

    Ooze:
    

    Slime: They gain DR [Your HD/4]/Slashing

    Construct:
    

    Construct Essence: They gain SR 11+The Vivisector's HD
• On the organ list, you do the They/Your mixup. Also, don't use brackets. Web designers have stressed to me that, contrary to what you think, brackets don't make your work more readable or concise on the web, given how text tends to come together.
• "At 2nd level, by scouting out the enemies biological weaknesses for a short while, the Vivisector can dismantle them with ease.
  If a Vivisector" -> you've got an unnecessary new paragraph there.
• "as well as Flat-Footing them." -> needs rewording. Flat footing isn't a term I've ever seen before.
• "If the Vivisector gains the ability to make a death attack from another source
  (Such ass " -> again, an unnecessary new paragraph there.
• "(Such ass Assassin)" -> as.
• Otherwise ok.

Razor Boar

• Oink oink, sez the Razor Boar, Review me, Gorgon!

Remorhaz, Gray Jester, Flesh Golem, Hellfire Wyrm, Corrupted Creature

• Have not been updated since previous critique(s).
• Flesh Golem being moved to abandoned list, as it's been untouched for well over a month (and a month is the cutoff point). Don't know why I didn't move it earlier.

Medusa, Monstrous Spider, Goblins

• My own creatures.
• Have been updated to reflect Gorgon's latest critiques.
• Except Goblins, which I'm moving to the homebrew thread tomorrow (I was requested to leave them in place for Sunday, as someone expressed interest in testing them out in a game).

Black Dragon thru Phantom to come tomorrow.

[Mystic Muse]

Okay Gorgon, I took a look through Senor Saguaro, and here are the only two things I was able to pick out.

1,000 Needles: At 4th level, the Saguaro Sentinel may as a swift action violently rub its arms against each other in a scissoring motion, spraying thorns everywhere. This ability is usable only once per day per 2 HD the Saguaro Sentinel has (rounded down), and in doing so it deals half thorns damage to itself (reduced by DR normally) as it gouges into itself with its own thorns in the process. It may choose one of two options:

The Saguaro has DR x/piercing, and thorns deal piercing damage, so DR shouldn't apply here.

Now, for thorny grasp

take a penalty to dexterity equal to one half thorns damage (not to reduce the opponent to less than 1 dexterity)

I was under the impression ability penalties were not able to reduce an ability score to less than one by their very nature. If I'm wrong, this is fine, but if not, the note in parentheses is redundant.

Other than that, it seems fine to me. I'd certainly play one were I in a position to, and I didn't have about 7 other games I need to keep track of.

That's all I noticed right now. If you'll excuse me, I'm going to keep watching this show about how horrible people can be to each other that I have to do for school.

[Lizard Lord]

I've added Heart Clutch, making Blood Front 1/day per HD.

Been thinking about the Hooded Pupil's role, and I think I should give it spellcasting progression (thus making it's role as a spell caster with some warlock-ish abilities). Would a spellcaster be interested in the Hooded Pupil's abilities?

[Frog Dragon]

Critique for the Phantom.

Spoiler

Show

Phantom What book is this critter from? In addition, there's a template for monsters in this project. Please use it. Also, the monster name should be big.

Centering is unnecessary. Again, template.
Prerequisites
Race:Must not already be incorporeal
Special: Must have at least 6 HD Level-wise, this should be ok, since the base Ghost Template can be taken in a level 6 game. However, how do you become a phantom, RP-wise? As is, you're all "I want to be a ghost-thingy", and boom, now you are. There should be something more. As a sidenote, the template includes bolding and other similar formatting, which makes things much easier to read.

HD: D6
{table=head]Level|Bab|Fort|Reflex|Will|Feature
1|+0|+0|+1|+1|Phantom Body,Weakness,Incorporeal Movement,Phantom Defense
2|+1|+1|+2|+2|Phantom Strike,Incorporeal Juant
[/table] What's with the saves? None of them make sense for either one of the progressions. Furthermore, it can't even be the medium progression sometimes used (which I don't think we want here), because the Fort saves are different from the other two, but it's still not a proper poor save. Just use the normal saves.

Skill Points:2+int per level
Class Skills: Hide,Move Silently, Tumble, Balance Only 4 class skills? I don't like this. Even a moderate Int score, or just a base race of human forces you to cross-class.

Phantom Body:Unlike most monster classes, a character that takes a level in phantom does not lose their racial traits. Their type remains unchanged, unless they are animals or vermin, in which case they become Magical Beast (Augmented Animal) or Magical Beast (Augmented Vermin), respectively. I don't know if there's a precedent for Magical Beast or Humanoid ghost-thingies, because I don't even know where the original template is from, but I'm pretty sure this thing should be undead.

Weakness (Ex):A phantom takes 50% extra damage from all attacks with the ghost touch enchantment. What is the reasoning behind this?

Incorporeal Movement(Su):When a phantom uses a move action to move , the phantom become incorporeal during the movement. However, the phantom becomes material after each move. Thus, if the phantom performs a double move, the phantom must end their first move in a space where they can re-manifest their physical body before becoming incorporeal again for the second part of your move.This ability can be activated or suppressed as a move action. The wording is awkward. Again, bold the ability names.

Phantom Defense (Su): A phantom’s armor bonus, deflection bonus, natural armor bonus, and shield bonus count toward its Armor Class, whether it or its attackers are incorporeal or corporeal. Poorly worded again. It should be "whether or not its attackers are incorporeal."

Phantom Strike (Ex): For the purpose of resolving spells, melee attacks, ranged attacks, and other attacks that require only momentary contact to deal damage or have their effects, a phantom is considered to be both incorporeal and corporeal when it is incorporeal. Thus, the phantom receives its normal Strength bonus on attack rolls and damage rolls, and it can use material components to cast its spells. The phantom cannot use abilities that require extended contact with the target and so cannot perform any of the following combat actions against corporeal targets while incorporeal (additional actions the phantom may not be able take are up to DM,):
Grapple
Trip
Bull-Rush
Sleight of Hand
Swallow Whole
Constrict For starters, you need to establish a clearer rule of thumb for what works and what does. As is, it's kind of "Meh, I'll let the players figure it out". There needs to be clear RAW, especially when the stuff left for the DM isn't probably going be very rare in-game.

Incorporeal Jaunt (Su): A phantom can become incorporeal as a swift action. It can become corporeal again as a swift action or a standard action. Faster incorporeality. Yay.

In general, this thing is just a mess of defensive/mobility abilities, and not very interesting ones at that. In addition, it needs to be better formatted, and Cthulhu still demands spellcheck. There is no mention anywhere about the original critter or its source, which left me kinda stumped reviewing. I had no clue where the original was from. Wherever it is from, I get the feeling you just slapped in some abilities from there and then tacked on incorporeal move, and generally just adapted the gross qualities of the creature, which is really not how we do things here. Finally, I can't see who'd want this. It has two good saves, and some decent mobility abilities, but godawful skills, making it bad for rogues, while warriors take a BAB and HP hit. Casters and manifesters get no casting from this. In general, I recommend you analyze the newer monsters in the approved list, like the Basilisk by Hyudra (remember, Oslecamo era critters are not models for good design).

Edit: About the Black Dragon. I've considered going VIVA LA REVOLUCIÓN and revamping the whole thing out of Oslecamo's template. I'm not really sure if I should do this, and even if I do, I will not be making similar versions of any of the older dragons, because I still have yugoloths. Yay or Nay?

[mootoall]

I don't really think it's worth it to gain essentially a (weak) damage dealing spell and spiderclimb for a loss in caster level. A warlock, though, might appreciate it.

[The Winter King]

Responses in Blue

Jovoc

• Changelog is sparse. Are you deleting old info from the changelog every time you add something new?
• I see you're sticking with the 1st level, 2nd level bits. I don't know that I was clear when I brought it up last, but please change it. It's visually distracting and even if you like doing it to keep better track of your own work-in-progress, you can delete it when you're done.
  Ok done
  
• Cursed Wound is listed as such on the table, but is Cursed Wounds in the ability descriptions.
  Oops...
  
• Cursed wound: A daze? That's a not-insignificant condition. I mean, that's making enemies miss a turn, while doing what you'd be doing anyways, and at high HD, you'll have enough uses that it won't require any strategic decisions about whether to use it. Consider that the War Troll gets pretty much the same thing, except that for the war troll, it's a 10th level ability (minimum 5 levels of troll, then 5 levels of war troll, to acquire)... and even then, it's easier to waste (you have to declare it before hitting, where Jovoc phrasing implies you can call it afterwards). And War Troll is a kind of problematic class even so. Needs tweaking to tone it down. Maybe by making it nauseate at lower levels (daze at higher) and making it just a little slower to acquire at higher levels. Something like:
  
  • Cursed Wound: As a free action, you may charge your next claw attack with raw pain, to leave foes doubled over in agony. Should you hit, the foe must make a fortitude save (DC 10 + ½ Jovoc HD + Jovoc Cha) or be nauseated for one round. On a failed attack, the use is spent regardless. Cursed Wound may be used once a day per HD or a number of times a day equal to the Jovoc's Cha mod, whichever is less. At 8HD, it causes foes to be dazed. At 16HD, it causes them to be stunned.
  
  I don't understand your problem with this ability. The Monk, a class often called the worst class, gets the ability to stun people in much the same matter, with the same number of uses per day. Also Stun is better than Daze, and the Monk's Stunning Fist has more support in feats and items. But I like what you did with the ability so I am gonna use it minus the charisma limiter.
  
• I note that there's no mention of growth anywhere. I remember it used to be in Jovoc body. Why the omission?
  I didnt really see a point to it, It is more beneficial to stay Small
  
• Punishment Strike: I must say, I really dislike per encounter abilities. I take it the per-encounter is derivative of my comment about how it was too many uses... But now it's, at low levels, 1 use per encounter for 3-5 encounters a day (4, usually)... so 3-5 uses a day at 3rd-7th levels, and 2 uses per encounter at 8th-11th levels, or 6-10... so we haven't changed matters much.
  Honestly, That was the idea
  
• And the damage is still pretty damn high. 10th level, about 8 times a day, I can add 10 bonus damage to my attacks for one round. Assuming 2 attacks a round and the encounter setup I pose above, that's up to 200 bonus damage added on over the course of the adventuring day (2 attacks a round, 10 uses a day, 10 bonus damage on each hit).
  
  • Compare to the Paladin's smite, while not a great class feature, is just 3 uses a day at 10th level, granting ~10 bonus damage on 3 attacks only. That's a maximum of 30 bonus damage over the course of the day.
  
  True but note that you can only assume two, 3 with rapid strike, attacks because it can only be done with his claws. Oh I forgot to specify that, damn.
  
• "Your claws are stained red from blood, whether its your blood or the enemies' you dont recall" - would reword to "whether it's your blood or the blood of your enemies, you do not recall." (Fixing "its", lack of comma, awkward "the enemies' ", dont)
• And delete actually from the next sentence, it reads better.
  K
  
• Much clearer on the flavor text of the "I throw my blood at you". Good.
  Thanks
  
• But delete the paragraph break between the end of the first sentence and "By sacrificing..." to make it one paragraph. It'll look neater.
• "(Fort reduces to sickened)" - dont' put this in brackets, and make it a full sentence.
  K
• Retributive Aura: Beautiful. Much tidier, much more playable. Just beautiful.

And Thank you again

[Necroticplague]

Critique for the Phantom.

There is no mention anywhere about the original critter or its source, which left me kinda stumped reviewing. I had no clue where the original was from.

Based on the phantom template from monster manual 5.

[Frog Dragon]

Then my comment about creature type doesn't stand. Everything else does though.

[Hyudra]

I don't understand your problem with this ability. The Monk, a class often called the worst class, gets the ability to stun people in much the same matter, with the same number of uses per day. Also Stun is better than Daze, and the Monk's Stunning Fist has more support in feats and items. But I like what you did with the ability so I am gonna use it minus the charisma limiter.

The flaws of the monk class aren't to do with stunning fist, but just overall class anti-synergy and built in drawbacks. Monk is an attacker, but has less than full BAB. Monk class emphasizes mobility, but needs a full round action to do flurry of blows, which requires standing still. Monk class emphasizes fists and punching foes in the face, but fists are a pain in the arse to boost with magical enhancement and the like. The list goes on.

And there was the issue where the phrasing of the ability strongly implied that one could attack, see if it hit, and then force the saving throw thereafter. Which makes it considerably better than stunning fist (where attacks can be 'wasted', as it were) whether you've got 1 use a day or 15.

And just touching on Daze - while Stun is better from a debuff standpoint, daze is arguably more consistent. That is, RAW, it works against constructs, oozes, undead, and plants. (In fact, with this in mind, you may want to alter the text to say 'at 16HD, you may stun them instead'). That, and you've got it on the chassis of a monster class that can make two claw attacks at a time at early levels. 2nd level, you've saved both uses, you fight the end-of-story-arc-boss, charge in the first round, make two claw attacks, force two saves vs. daze. If you succeed, boss loses a turn. Encounter practically won.

But really, my complaint about the ability (and in the same vein, about Punishment Strike) wasn't so much that they were overpowered (I still think punishment strike is too many uses with too much of a damage bonus) as the fact that that, at mid levels, they're not really active abilities. Let me explain:

Active abilities are the ones you have to think about using. On a simpler level, they're abilities that you choose to use. Smite is an active ability. You declare, "I'm going to smite" and then smash a grave robber's face through the wall, say something about your god and righteousness and go on with your day.

Passive abilities are the ones that are always on. The Paladin's Aura of Courage is one such ability. You hit the required level, and you're never afraid again. No thinking necessary.

So, with that in mind, what is the following, do you think?

• Starting at sixth level, a number of times a day equal to her HD multiplied by her Str mod, the Ogre Mom may use Smother as a free action, augmenting her attack to deal 2d6 nonlethal damage in addition to any other damage dealt.

It looks sort of active, right? I mean, it's something you declare to the DM, right? But at the end of the day, assuming you've got a decent Str mod (which is implied) you've got so many uses that you probably won't run out if you tried, and it's a free action, so there's no thought process or "Will I use this or will I use that?" consideration going on. The end result is that the ability is passive. It might as well be a flat "You deal 2d6 nonlethal damage on every attack."

And if the action required a swift action rather than a free one, but the class had no other uses for swift actions, then it's still arguably a very passive ability, because again, there's no consideration of "Will I use this or will I use that?" -- That might change depending on what magic items or other class levels one took, but the general issue is still there.

So some of the complaint is along the lines of "At mid levels, it remains very passive as a class". Getting back to the monk comparison - that's ok for the monk with stunning fist, because the monk does have flurry of blows at low levels. For the Jovoc, there's still this underlying, passive, somewhat unexciting/nonstrategic playstyle. I think that's what's turning me off.

But ok. I won't push the issue, and you make a good point on monk's unarmed strike damage. Just give it some consideration.

[Lizard Lord]

I don't really think it's worth it to gain essentially a (weak) damage dealing spell and spiderclimb for a loss in caster level. A warlock, though, might appreciate it.

You must have misunderstood the question (and after rereading it, I don't blame you). I was thinking of making it so that a spellcaster wouldn't miss a spell progression with the Hooded Pupil and give the Hooded Pupil the role of a spellcaster. I would like to know if that would be worth it.

[mootoall]

You must have misunderstood the question (and after rereading it, I don't blame you). I was thinking of making it so that a spellcaster wouldn't miss a spell progression with the Hooded Pupil and give the Hooded Pupil the role of a spellcaster. I would like to know if that would be worth it.

Oh. No, I don't think that advancing spell progression is a very Hooded Pupil-ish ability. I mean, it's the pupil of an intelligent undead creature, and I'm not sure how many of those cast spells. Although it is a student of necromancy ... Perhaps you could give it different abilities base off what kind of undead it was tutored under? Fluffy, and a good active ability. Perhaps Clutch of Orcus (or whatever you have) could be just one of those?

[dsmiles]

Psurlon (v6.0)

Updated.

[mootoall]

Psurlon (v6.0)

Updated.

Why did you change it to seven levels? The CR of the Elder one is eight, and the average is five ...

[dsmiles]

Telekinetic Maneuver is kind of pivotal to the whole "Ginormous Telekinetic Worm" thing, and I was apprised that PLA's may only come at the same level a normal manifester would get them at. The choice was between a less than proficient telekinetic of 5 levels or a proficient telekinetic of 7 levels. Thus, 7 level Psurlon. I stand by my choice.

[Psyborg]

So I’ve been thinking, as much as I love the stuff that comes out of this project, I really ought to participate. So I started looking around for a low-CR creature or template for my first attempt. Being away from books the bulk of the time, I decided I should work on something that I can find online.

A couple hours of poking through Realms Help later, I came across a template I’ve used before (on a character’s mount, as it happened, which is probably the only reason it didn’t prove notably unbalancing): Greenbound Creature. And at a paltry CR +2, it monster-class-ifying it should be a fairly small, hopefully simple job, right?

Wrong.

It’s CR +2, but it’s LA +8, which is a huge difference. And close examination showed it to be ridiculously overpowered for its CR. The Vorpal Tribble’s CR calculator (see spoiler in this post) works out as follows:

Spoiler

Show

#1: Has to do with hit points. It’s a template, so no hit points to evaluate.
#2: Add 1 for every 5 points above 10 that its AC is; subtract 1 for every 5 below.
Natural Armor +6: 1 point.
#3: Add 1 for every special attack (+2 to +5 or more if it got a decent number of spells in its spell-like abilities.
SLAs: entangle, pass without trace, speak with plants at-will; wall of thorns 1/day. +2 points (3).
#4: Add 1 for each quality it has, unless you deem it worthy of more. Add 1 for each resistance and 10 points of DR it has, and 2 for each immunity. Subtract 1 for each vulnerability.
DR 10/magic and slashing: +1 (4)
Natural weapons count as magic for overcoming damage reduction: +1 (5)
Fast Healing 3: +1 (6)
Grapple Bonus: +1 (7)
Resist Cold: +1 (8)
Resist Electricity: +1 (9)
Tremorsense: +2 (11)
plus Plant Type traits:
Low-Light Vision: +1 (12)
Immunity to Mind-Affecting: +2 (14)
Immunity to Crits & Precision Damage: +2 (16)
Immunity to Poison, Sleep, Paralysis, Polymorph, and Stunning: As these are relatively minor immunities compared to immunity to mind-affecting, crits, or an energy type, let’s call them +1 point each. +5 (21)
Sleepless: +1 (22)
plus Skill bonus:
+16 racial bonus on Hide and Move Silently in forested areas: As a _huge_ bonus to two very useful skills, even given the limited usage, I think this qualifies as a +2-point bonus. +2 (24).
#5: Add 1 for every two bonus feats it has. Which is none.
#6: Divide total by 3. This should be its rough CR.
24 / 3 = 8.

Coming up with a rough answer of CR +8. So- even not counting its total +16 of ability score adjustments or its natural attack, the Greenbound Creature template’s estimated “true” CR clocks in at about the same level as its given Level Adjustment.

Obviously, this was not going to be as simple as I’d hoped. On the other hand, I do like the template, and who doesn’t want to be able to play a walking shrubbery or a topiary golem? (Hmm, remind me to request “Half-Topiary Golem” over at the half-golem thread... )

So here’s what I’m doing: “Greenbound Creature” is going to be a two-level prestige monster class, aimed at natural monsters and nature-oriented characters of at least 5HD looking for increased survivability with only a slight delay in advancement of their primary focus. While the arrangement is still uncertain, I’m planning on giving 25% Fortification, immunity to enchantment spells and effects, Mettle, and resistance to one non-Fire energy type of their choice. All of which are passive abilities, I know, so here’s the other thing: They get to pick one of a short list of plant symbionts (Climbing Rose, Deadly Nightshade, Ivy, Oak, Sunflower, Moonflower, Hazel, and Mistletoe- possibly more if I get ideas for them, but I think eight choices is plenty to start off with, even if Sunflower and Moonflower are near-perfect opposites.) The symbiont gives them some active abilities and/or SLAs that scale with HD, plus speak with plants at-will. Characters are still likely to take this class for primarily defensive purposes, but the symbiont powers should add some useful utility effects to ensure the levels don’t end up feeling like a waste to the player.

The symbiont approach lets me include a greater breadth of plant-y abilities, without the class getting overpowered for a two-level dip. It’s also the key to the “second half” of the project- actually becoming a plant.

“Greenbound Paragon” is going to be a three-level prestige monster class for people who’ve completed Greenbound Creature and have minimum 12 HD. It adds some cool stuff to your symbiont abilities, and at the third and final level, your merge with your symbiont, gaining the Plant type and most of the goodies appertaining thereunto.

Sound good?

Oh yeah, and one more thing: I’m having serious difficulty locating images for these classes. College internet filtering makes image-searching a pain in the butt. Any help would be very much appreciated.

Classes to follow in my next post, sometime in the next...hour? EDIT: Day.

[Hyudra]

Black Dragon

• A proposal, partially in response to your PM. You try your hand at renovating the black dragon without Oslecamo's methodology, and I'll let grammar/spelling mistakes slide for the first few critiques (at least, until you and I decide we like your version and want to finish it), so you can focus on getting abilities on the page & getting a general kind of balance working. Sound good? Just experiment, be creative.

Aboleth

• I notice the "it's" errors still prevalent throughout. For your convenience, I've used the forum highlighter to highlight every instance of the word (and a half) "it's" in the text. Click the link at the top of this list to see, it makes it bold & brown. Every case except the one at the start of Aboleth Body, I do believe, is erroneous and should be its.
• Since I can only assume you're only partway through the changes, I'll postpone my critique of the Aboleth until next time. Keep it up.

Phase Wasp

• You've got an ability outside the spoiler there.
• I really like Killer Bee.
• That said, you've still got the issue of Phase Wasps at level 2 having huge hide checks (5 ranks, +8 for tiny size, +5 for dex = a +18 on hide), leaving it predominantly as an ambush based class, like practically every other tiny creature in this project. What if Killer Bee was a toggled ability or stance, with a built in drawback that the violently buzzing, darting insect can't hide?
• The 3HD benefit should probably be restricted to 5' of movement. If you feel it needs more gravy to make it appealing and interesting, consider allowing the bee to make two AoOs in the doing, provided it has the ability (ie. combat reflexes).
• You offer two benefits at 3HD, killer bee upgrade and phase powers upgrade. Consider spacing them out more, so PCs who've invested in the class see a more broad, general benefit (rather than a bunch of stuff at levels 1 & 2, two boosts at 3HD, then nothing until 16). You could give killer bee another upgrade, allowing it to move the full distance alongside enemies, at 10th or 12th, to just flesh it out a bit more.
• Buzz Song: "friendly creatures that can hear the Buzz Song gain a +1 morale bonus on skill checks, attack and damage rolls, and saving throws." Too many "and"s
• HP & AC. It's a little too tough (tougher than, say, a griffon), between d8 HD, natural armor from con and tiny size. Consider shrinking the HD, lowering the natural armor to 1 + 1 per 2 points of con mod and giving it another point of dex at 2nd level. So it's not quite so tough, hard to hit and brutish. It should still do quite nicely for AC and be hard to hit, but that's now more dependent on dexterity, and leaves it vulnerable when flatfooted.
• It works. It stands out, I really do like killer bee, and it's got a very solid identity as "harassment", just some tweaks to be made to deal with the still-present hide thing, the balance the smoothness of progression and the "I can't escape this damned bee that moves every time I do and that I can't hit!"

Violet Fungus

• Level one looks better.
• Poison looks borked though. It's not explained well enough, and RAW, you've got each Violet Fungus dealing 2 tentacle attacks, each delivering 1d4/1d6 Str damage and 1d3/1d4 Con damage a hit. That's... quite a lot.
• Given that you've got two tentacles that can hit each round, starting from level one, I'd suggest something like a:
  1d3/1d4
  1d4/1d4
  1d4/1d6
  1d6/1d6
  1d6/1d8
  1d8/1d8
  (And so on) kind of advancement, with less advancement for the con damage. It's not as much as the spider, but you're delivering two potential attacks a round, so enemies are going to suffer.
• Fungal Diversity:
  
  • "Creatures grappled by the Fungus have to save against the poison every two rounds." - clarify. Assuming I get your meaning, I'd reword to say you speed up the onset of secondary saves by a set number of rounds.
  • "When a living creature grappled by the Violet Fungus save against the poison, they have to make another Fortitude save, DC 10+1/2HD+Con, or take 1 Con damage on top of any poison damage, as the tentacles eat away at the creature." - bolded bit. It seems to imply that when they succeed on the save, they have to make an additional save. Why not just say you add +1 con damage to whatever initial damage your poison deals?
  • "heals the Fungus by an amount equal to its HD" - whose? The victims or the fungus'?
  • "If the Fungus has Rapid Poison, the period between the normal secondary damage and this new damage changes to the time between primary and secondary damage." - this is really confusing. It isn't intuitive in the slightest.
  • It's kind of inconvenient to stress how much the fungus has to do to survive. What if, instead of the Fungus player feeling like she's in constant peril of starvation, you just stressed the inherent benefits instead?
  • Tough Fungus requires itself.
  • Capturing Fungus is a bit too much. Consider that at 10th level you could be dealing 1d6 Str damage, 1d4 Dex damage and 1d4 Con damage, and then 1d8 Str, 1d6 Dex and 1d6 Con damage the very next round. That's an average of 8 Str damage, 6 Dex damage and 6 Con damage. A little over the top, when you're doing that with both tentacles.
  • Paralysed -> Paralyzed.
• Overall, much better at giving it a role (poisoner/debuffer), but a few tweaks still needed. Poison just seems to ramp up a touch too well, with the two types of ability damage together.

Saguaro Sentinel

• Just a suggestion - it's kind of rude to link directly to someone else's image (I notice you just copied the URL directly from WotC's site) - I might suggest uploading on tinypic, imgshack or photobucket. Added benefit that you aren't as liable to have the image disappear abruptly (at least with Tinypic).
• Looks pretty good. Went over your changelog, checked the text, saw nothing worth typing up in this post. Adding to the list.

Chuul

• Comments: "Not Quite Finished." - delaying my critique til next time then.

Hooded Pupil

• After doing a whole bunch of classes with varying degrees of quality in this particular department, let me say I do like your changelog. I can't give it an A+ because it doesn't go into a lot of detail, but it's a definite B+. Very clear, very detailed.
• In the table, try to list the ability score bonuses last. It's how 95% of the monsters here do things. So it'd be "Hooded Body, Resistance to Cold, Spider Climb, Heart Clutch, Drink Blood, +1 Wisdom, +1 Charisma"
• Also, the list of abilities is a little long in the table. Consider folding several abilities into category. So you might have 'Dark Talents' as an ability containing both Drink Blood (always granted) and Heart Clutch (pick one of the two, or three, etc, if you decide to add more). Just to tidy things up and draw the class together in concept(s).
• Let it be said that I do really like Mootoall's suggestion regarding a list of abilities to represent talents granted from different undead masters. It's smart, it's flavorful, it's fitting and it helps you work through the role issues.
• Looking really good, just need to figure our way through the role thing, and maybe give it a little boost in power.. If asked, I can try to answer any questions or offer feedback on the subject (for now, just focusing on getting these critiques done).

Psurlon

• Alright. Let's see...
• CR doesn't match the max level in the class. This is curious, since standard policy is to match the two. To resolve this, I see two options:
  
  • Scaling benefits for telekinetic powers. That is, if you take the 5th level in the class, you get something like, "At 7HD, your telekinetic blast improves further, giving you the ability to deal splash damage" and so on.
  • Or just build the class as an elder Psurlon, so that those who want to be a regular psurlon just stop before taking the full set of levels, and those who want to be elder psurlons take the eight levels total.
• Can you perhaps crop the image to get rid of the crummy text at the bottom? If no, ask and I can do it.
• And as I said to Gorgondantess, above, it's bad manners to link directly to where images are hosted on others' sites. Consider uploading to tinypic, imgshack, photobucket (the first being my preference for the last year and a half).
• Why is Lords of Madness green on the source listing? It's kind of distracting, visually. (Are you maybe getting the impression I'm nitpicky?)
• As I said regarding the hooded pupil, in doing your table layout, stick attribute bonuses last in the order of things. No need for brackets. So it'd look like... (skipping saves, BAB, etc):
  
  {table=head]Level|

  Special

  
  1st|Worm Body, Inertial Armor, Immunities, , Telekinetic Blast, Telepathy, Cha +1
  2nd| Blindsight, Combat Manifestation, Int +1, Cha +1
  3rd| Damage Reduction, Psionics (Brain Lock, Cloud Mind, Read Thoughts), Int +1, Cha +1
  4th| Improved Telekinetic Blast, Power Resistance, Int +1, Cha +1
  5th| Telekinetic Thrust, Int +1, Cha +1
  6th| Narrow Mind, Int +1, Cha +1
  7th| Telekinetic Burst, Psionic Dimension Door, Telekinetic Maneuver[/table]
• Skills look good.
• Rather than a flat +4 to escape artist, consider a bonus equal to ½ the Psurlon's HD. Scaling.
• Immunities can be covered in Psurlon body in the same way that elf immunities are covered in the elf racial abilities.
• Telekinetic Blast: It seems like a shame to me that you've got something telekinetic, but no pushing/pulling/shoving going on. Just speaking for myself, I'd love to see an option where you'd do half the damage but move the enemy.
• Seems kinda confusing/roundabout to say, as you outline what powers are available, that it has uses equal to its manifester level, only to then state, a few lines down, that it has a manifester level equal to its HD. Why not say it can use the ability once a day per HD, or once a day per two HD?
• I'm afraid psionics tend to be outside of my purview. I've only played in a small handful of games with Psionics, and haven't DMed any, so my experience is limited to what my party members have done. That said, interpreting this class as though the psionic powers were equivalent level spells, it seems fairly solid. That said, my concerns are:
  
  • The fact that it counts its class levels as wilder levels for the purposes of powers known and max PP spent. If someone said to me, "This class gets a steady influx of SLAs, and if you take a level in wizard, it gets spells per day and spells known equal to its monster class levels + wizard levels", I'd raise an eyebrow at the degree of power we were talking about. Get what I mean? That said, I freely admit I may be interpreting that wrong.
  • The bonus PP and the augmenting of psionic powers. From what Gorgon said and from what I'm reading in the SRD, powers are automatically augmented. So the bonus PP you're getting are... to spend on the additional augmentations you list (or your telekinetic buffs/additional targets?) Is that right? Or are those artificially augmented as well? Clarify the matter (for me, if I'm being a dolt, and/or in the text, if it's just not clear).

Phantom

• Don't center the image. Looks really terribad on some monitor setups (mine included), and means the eye doesn't flow from text to image and back to the text.
• Convention is to spoiler everything below the image, to keep things tidy.
• In fact, I strongly, strongly recommend you check out this link, since it gives you a good way to format your post, and clues about our general goals, objectives, methods, etc.
• Prerequisites are really dull. Prereqs should be a player's introduction to the class, and should involve taking that step to adopting that template. So it shouldn't be:
  
  Player A: "Hey, you're incorporeal now. How'd that happen?"
  Player B: "Dunno, I got my 6th HD?"
  Try to come up with something creative, a little more challenging, etc.
• Skills: Undead never get class skills, in this project. The link I gave you, above, says why in 'design guidelines for monsters, a FAQ'
• In the ability descriptions, state what level the ability is gained. Like, "at third level, the Phantom gains the ability to..."
• The class is kind of boring. Everything has to do with incorporeality, and abilities overlap/overwrite one another. There's no active abilities, either.
• Plus incorporeality at 8HD is pretty powerful. Relatively few enemies have a built-in way of dealing with it, forcing a DM to make up challenges to deal with you.
• So that said, needs something more exciting and post format needs a lot of work (again, see link & look at the example monster there to see how it is laid out. Be sure to include & update a changelog as you make changes.
• Edit: Also, if Mootoall is right, and you copied text directly from existing material, consider rewriting it or changing the ability. Copying non-OGL stuff is a general no-no.

Previous batch critique(s).

@ Psyborg: Sounds interesting. Good luck. There's a lot of good potential images for such creatures on the web, so I'm interested to see what you scrounge up for use.

[mootoall]

Hyudra liked my suggestion! She really liked it! That being said, I'm nigh done with the Unbodied, and what I'm doing with its incorporeality is giving it a few uses per day (as defined by its limited PP) until 15 or 16 HD, when a Psion Uncarnate gets it. Also something to note, unless I'm mistaken the Phantom is getting the same Incorporeality text as (I believe) the Phase Cloak gets in MoI. Just something to note.