Help with level adjustment for homebrewed template Aspect of Natures Fury

[cassal]

I am DM a D&D 3.5 campaign. I would like to include in my world the ability for a PC to turn into an sort of aspect of nature based on one of several animals in my current campaign. I am using the transformation process for becoming a Dragonborn in Races of the Dragon as the basis for how the mechanics of the transformation would work. I just need a good template for what the race they turn into would be. I found the below homebrew class on DnD wiki and I think it has the right idea but is WAY too powerful. I'm looking for something with a +0 level adjustment.

Gorillafolk

Type: Monstrous Humanoid

Stat Bonuses: +8 Str, +4 Dex, +4 Con, -2 Int

Size: Large (-1 penalty to Armor Class, -1 penalty on attack rolls, -4 Hide checks, +4 bonus on grapple checks, lifting and carrying limits double those of Medium creatures)

Base Land Speed: 15ft or 45ft (see below), 30ft Climb

Racial Hit Dice : Gorillafolk start with 2 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.

Racial Skills: A gorillafolk's monstrous humanoid levels give it skill points equal to 7 x (2 + Int modifier, minimum 1). Its class skills are Listen, Spot and Climb.

Racial Feats: A gorillafolk's monstrous humanoid levels grant him two additional feats.

Darkvision out to 60ft.

Gorillafolk have a +4 Natural Armor bonus.

Varying Land Speed: Gorillafolk, like their animal counterparts, move most often on all fours which allows them a 45ft land speed. Unlike normal apes, they can wear shields or carry weapons. Gorillafolk wearing a shield, wielding a two-handed weapon or carrying an object requiring both hands can only move on their short legs, lessening their land speed by 30ft.

Natural Weapon: A gorillafolk has two rend attacks and a bite attack, the massive powerful hands being the primary weapon. When not fighting with weapons, he uses his natural weapons to tear opponents to shreds. Each attack has a damage value of 1d6.

Intimidator: A gorillafok's aggressiveness and impatience with strangers does not hurt his ability to intimidate would-be trespassers. If a gorillafolk has a negative Charisma modifier, roll his Intimidate checks without it.

Brachiation: A gorillafolk is treated as having the feat Brachiation even if he doesn't meet the requirements.

Gorillafolk have a +8 racial bonus on Climb checks and can always choose to take 10 on Climb checks, even if rushed or threatened.

Wild Empathy (ex) : Gorillafolk can use body language, vocalization and demeanor to improve the attitude of an animal This power works like the druid’s wild empathy class feature, except that the gorillafolk has a +4 racial bonus on the check..

Spell-Like Abilities: 1/day - speak with animals, detect snares and pits, detect animals or plants . Caster level 5.

Automatic Languages: Gora and Common. Bonus Language: Elven, Sylvan, Halfling, Gnome, Goblin, Giant and Orc.

Favored Class: Barbarian or Ranger


Here is what I've come up with so far:
Ability adjustments are +2 STR and -2 INT
Type is Animal instead of Monstrous Humanoid
Remove Racial Hit die, the associated skills points and feats
Remove the bonus to wild empathy, or perhaps the ability all together.
Remove Intimidator
Change Land Speed to 30 ft remove varying speed
Size category of the original creature retained as per the dragonborn transformation rules.

Any other suggestions to make this a +0 LA?

Any suggestions of other anthropomorphic animal races?

[rferries]

I think it would be easier to start from the ground up, rather than stripping abilities from the example template (especially if you want it to be LA+0).

Type should definitely NOT be animal if it's a PC race - dire animals are about as "magical" as animals ever get and they're still pretty non-supernatural, non-sentient etc.

What qualities are you looking for - presumably low-light vision, scent, natural armour, natural attacks, etc? A bestial PC should have Cha and Int penalties, the traditional +2 animal bonus to Wisdom, and a bonus to one or more physical ability scores. Simians in particular should get a bonus on Climb checks.