Kyton (Chain Devil) question

[Quirinus_Obsidian]

Okay. We are currently in an extremely high level campaign. I have an idea regarding expanding on the Kyton monster class in the Planar Handbook. Currently, it is listed as an 8 hit dice creature, with a +6 LA. LE alignment, blah blah, Take that out of the equation. One is going to be progressed to 23 hit dice by taking class levels. how does one modify the # of attacks that this character gets; does he add Racial BAB (which is as Fighter, 1 per HD increase) to his class BAB, and secondly, does he get multiple attacks as his BAB is going to be at +23 @ 23 Hit Dice?

[Quirinus_Obsidian]

The entry in the Planar Handbook is exactly that as it is listed in the SRD: http://systemreferencedocuments.org/...ml#chain-devil

[Bears With Lasers]

...the Kyton adds Outsider hit dice. They have certain qualities--BAB, saves, et cetera. His BAB improves. BAB grants iterative attacks (although no more than four).

Why on earth wouldn't the BAB he gets from outsider HD "stack" with that gained from class levels? Why wouldn't it give iterative attacks? The rules are pretty clear here.
Is it the Epic AB rules you're worried about?

[oriong]

I think this will answer your question...

Racial HD and class HD combine for purposes of determining when you are 'epic level'. Therefore once the kyton hits epic (21 HD) his BAB stops progressing, instead he gains an attack bonus like a normal epic level character.

So, a 23rd level kyton would have a BAB of +20 (for 4 iterative attacks) and an epic attack bonus of +2, granting him a total modifier of +22 before anything else is added in, however since epic attack bonus is not base attack bonus it will never give you iterative attacks.

Some creatures with more than 20 racial HD do seem to ignore this, but typically their LA is so high as to make it a non-issue.

[PhoeKun]

I have to ask: where in the name of waffles is this "Racial HD and Class levels stack for the purposes of switching to Epic progressions" thing from? I have never read anywhere that racial HD were part of that equation.

[Quirinus_Obsidian]

From what I understand from the text here and the entries for this in the SRD and Planar Handbook; the creature at 8 HD has 2 natural attacks at +10 AB. It's full attack listing remains 2 attacks at +10. The thing that concerns me the most is that he considers 2 chains as being a natural attack. Since they are natural attacks, do those not typically have seperate atack bonuses from say for example, a longsword that he wields?

[Bears With Lasers]

That just means normal chain devils don't use weapons besides the chains. If you were to, say, use a longsword, you would get your iterative attacks, PLUS two (secondary, thus at -5) natural attacks with your chains, as part of a full attack.

[NEO|Phyte]

I have to ask: where in the name of waffles is this "Racial HD and Class levels stack for the purposes of switching to Epic progressions" thing come from? I have never read anywhere that racial HD were part of that equation.

You are deemed Epic at Character Level 21. According to the SRD,

"Character level" is a character’s total number of levels. It is used to determine when feats and ability score boosts are gained.

and using the Doppelganger as an example,

Racial Hit Dice: A doppelganger begins with four levels of monstrous humanoid, which provide 4d8 Hit Dice, a base attack bonus of +4, and base saving throw bonuses of Fort +1, Ref +4, and Will +4.

Hence, racial HD are factored into when you hit Epic.

[Quirinus_Obsidian]

That just means normal chain devils don't use weapons besides the chains. If you were to, say, use a longsword, you would get your iterative attacks, PLUS two (secondary, thus at -5) natural attacks with your chains, as part of a full attack.

This is what I am thinking too; Now this is where it gets interesting. He is going to have as his primary melee weapon (if you can call it that) a barbed chain from Savage Species. Can he attack with this weapon at his normal attack bonus (+30/+25/+20/+15) and still get 2 natual attacks (+30/+30)? Per the text in the Planar Handbook; he treats "spiked chains" as "primary natural attacks". If I had a standard everyday spiked chain, I could only get 2 attacks with said chain. If I used say, a barbed chain as above, or if I want to get really nasty, a Drow Razor chain, would that constitute being a seperate set of attacks as if he was using a longsword as above?

I also appreciate the input very much, and quick!!

[oriong]

I believe the only way that he could use the spiked chains in conjunction with a normal attack series is to make them a secondary attack, but I could be wrong about that.

[PhoeKun]

You are deemed Epic at Character Level 21. According to the SRD,

and using the Doppelganger as an example,


Hence, racial HD are factored into when you hit Epic.

...Huh. See, that's weird, because everything I've read (most importantly, the Epic Level Handbook) specifically says racial HD don't count for that stuff.

edit: Oriong, that is correct.

[oriong]

If you're actually reading the epic level handbook then you're using 3.0 material, I believe in 3.0 you didn't even count racial HD as a part of the ECL

[PhoeKun]

No, they still counted. 3.0's level adjustment system just gave you the amalgam of what is now LA and Racial HD as your total LA. Which sounds kind of clunky, but it really isn't.

[AtomicKitKat]

Your natural attacks would be at -5.

So you'd have:

Main weapon: X/X-5/X-10/X-15
Off-hand(if TWF): X/X-5/X-10/X-15
Natural Attacks: X-5(2 of these)

Note that X is BAB(which, if they're all Outsider or full-BAB class, are equal to your total HD)+Str-whatever penalties(-2 each for TWFing or low-level Flurry).

Note also that while Epic AB does not give you iterative attacks(Should just say it counts for everything, but you can never have more than 4 iterative attacks with each hand through BAB+EAB, but I digress), it does count when looking at pre-requisites(eg. Blood-scaled Fury in Draconomicon requires "BAB: 23").

[Thomas]

...Huh. See, that's weird, because everything I've read (most importantly, the Epic Level Handbook) specifically says racial HD don't count for that stuff.

The ELH is sort of outdated by now. The first pages of the FAQ, however, spend a lot of time dwelling on the issues of LA, ECL, HD, and epic levels, and this question is covered there. HD = character level, so at 21 HD your character is epic. (Racial hit dice do cause problems, though, because you never go into epic attack or save progressions on racial hit dice... alone, anyway. So how they stack with BAB and saves from class levels isn't simple.)

[Quirinus_Obsidian]

Thanks again everyone, I appreciate the input!! =_)