The LA-assignment thread VIII: Way Too Much For Vampirism

[Thurbane]

Mark me down for LA -0 unless anyone makes a compelling argument otherwise.

Just out of interest, did any oozes get marked as anything other than LA -0? From memory, Summoning Ooze came closest.

[Bavarian itP]

Mark me down for LA -0 unless anyone makes a compelling argument otherwise.

Just out of interest, did any oozes get marked as anything other than LA -0? From memory, Summoning Ooze came closest.

Yes ... I think. Now I'm gonna check the archive. It's almost as if that's why it's there

edit: The Gelatinous Cube got a +0. Yay!

[liquidformat]

Mark me down for LA -0 unless anyone makes a compelling argument otherwise.

Just out of interest, did any oozes get marked as anything other than LA -0? From memory, Summoning Ooze came closest.

If we are counting ooze type then yes living spells have a number of +0 to potentially +1 oozes depending on how you abuse your spells...

Anyways Ethereal Ooze is a clear cut -0, slash about 6 to 8 rhd off it before it can come close to +0...

[ViperMagnum357]

Mark me down for LA -0 unless anyone makes a compelling argument otherwise.

There we go.

[Efrate]

-0. ooze hd yuck.

[danielxcutter]

*trombones intensely*

LA -0. On to the Ethergaunts!

[Sutr]

-0, just wondering about what the debate looks like for the etherguants.

[ZamielVanWeber]

I found the ethergaunts, particularly white and black, were playable at their LAs, so I am curious too.

[Zancloufer]

Don't think this ting is worth any LA, so LA +0 at best. Probably -0.

Also worth noting reading the stat block it appears a mistake was made. The Ethereal Ooze can Engulf/Etheralize MULTIPLE FOES with one action. Pretty much anything that is large or smaller that fit;s within it's 15x15x10 square can be eaten up.

It's not much, but IMHO there is a huge difference between SoL for one foe and SoL for 9 or more foes.

[jindra34]

It's not much, but IMHO there is a huge difference between SoL for one foe and SoL for 9 or more foes.

Except its nowhere near a SoL from your perspective. Engulf doesn't fully disable, which means every foe you drag there is one you have to kill, potentially on your own. And you'll be less protected against them than if you didn't use it.

[Debatra]

Well you could just strand them on the ethereal. Still, it's a bit gimmicky for twelve crap RHD.

Easy -0.

[Malabolg]

A quick question: do you guys take requests? Dragon #343 has a couple of nifty dragons I'm interested in, primarily because they actually get significant casting ability (One even manages to have as many sorcerer casting levels as its HD! ... well, as a wyrmling, anyway), and they're trapped in my head between "the wyrmling is clearly better than a sorcerer of its HD, so needs LA" and "its ONLY hope of contributing is as a caster, if it loses caster levels it can't do its job". I can provide full info on them if you're interested.

[danielxcutter]

A quick question: do you guys take requests? Dragon #343 has a couple of nifty dragons I'm interested in, primarily because they actually get significant casting ability (One even manages to have as many sorcerer casting levels as its HD! ... well, as a wyrmling, anyway), and they're trapped in my head between "the wyrmling is clearly better than a sorcerer of its HD, so needs LA" and "its ONLY hope of contributing is as a caster, if it loses caster levels it can't do its job". I can provide full info on them if you're interested.

We're going through one book at a time, sorry. We're doing Fiend Folio now.

[PoeticallyPsyco]

A quick question: do you guys take requests? Dragon #343 has a couple of nifty dragons I'm interested in, primarily because they actually get significant casting ability (One even manages to have as many sorcerer casting levels as its HD! ... well, as a wyrmling, anyway), and they're trapped in my head between "the wyrmling is clearly better than a sorcerer of its HD, so needs LA" and "its ONLY hope of contributing is as a caster, if it loses caster levels it can't do its job". I can provide full info on them if you're interested.

We're going through one book at a time, sorry. We're doing Fiend Folio now.

You can of course stick around until we finish the book, and then throw in a vote for what get's done next (Though I believe Inevitability still has the final say).

[Inevitability]

Ethergaunt

Ethergaunts: eldritch abominations from the ethereal plane, best known for their horrifying abilities and innate casting. They come in three colors, presented here in ascending level of power for convenience.

Red Ethergaunt

Red Ethergaunts have a mere 5 RHD. Their ability scores are interesting: everything gets a low +2/+4 bonus, except for intelligence which instead enjoys a +12 modifier. Many of their special abilities are shared with the other ethergaunts, so this is not a bad moment to go over those.

Firstly, there's Enslave: a 3/day Dominate Monster spell that can indefinitely enslave creatures (albeit with a new saving throw every day). The effect is also broken if the ethergaunt travels more than one mile away from its slave. Ethergaunts can have a number of enslaved creatures equal to their charisma bonus, meaning that the average NPC red can only have one, but a PC might obtain many more.

Stupefying Gaze is a gaze attack that deals 1d4 damage to all mental ability scores, with the ability to turn it on and off as a free action. It's not friendly, but positioning yourself 30 ft. away from your friends isn't too hard, and if you can't they're not hurt by it.

Immunity to Spells gives ethergaunts infinite spell resistance versus a number of arcane spells, depending on their rank. A red ethergaunt is immune to everything from 2nd level or lower, which isn't too impressive but not useless either. Note that it doesn't work versus divine magic.

All ethergaunts get EWP with the Etherblade, which is kind of like a greatsword except it has no expanded crit range and can shoot laser beams. The beams are unimpressive (1d6 damage, 40 ft. range increment, 50 unrestorable charges per weapon), but might be relevant in one or two situations.

Total Vision gives the ethergaunt some kind of not-quite-blindsight in a 40 ft. radius, which functions regardless of facial coverings and bypasses effects like stealth (even darkstalker stealth) and invisibility.

Finally, there's Material Jaunt, which allows an ethereal ethergaunt to shift to the material plane for 1 round/HD every hour. Most PCs will presumably be on the material by default, making this ability mostly useless.

On top of this, the red ethergaunt gets the casting ability of a 9th-level wizard (yes, you read that right).

What to rate a creature like this? The casting ability combined with the various useful traits (most notably Enslave) makes me suspect that +4 would still be too little: four levels of a prestige class, 1-2 more feats, and a familiar shouldn't outweigh great perception, 3/day Dominate Person, a much better casting stat, and immunity to some low-level magic. In the end, I'll go all the way up to +7: the giant bonuses simply require it.

Because many of the features introduced here are found again in the other ethergaunt subraces, I'll stop here for now and then do the white and black 'gaunts in a double update. Before rating those, I'm interested in seeing the community opinions here.

[danielxcutter]

On the one hand, red ethergaunts are going to be annoyingly squishy, and a serious weakness to HD-based abilities such as Holy Word. On the other hand, the d8s and the Con bonus might make up for that, and they are quite good at casting.

The LA...? Well, having to devote slightly more resources for HP at lower levels is offset considerably by being capable of needing to allocate less resources into boosting your casting stat. You're probably going to have a much higher Int than most other PCs even without items, and you've got a few other things to utilize as well, if rather minor... so I think I'm okay with Inevitability's LA +5 for now.

Honestly, if even the mooks of their race tend to be such powerful Wizards, it's not hard to see why they see Material Plane races as so inferior. I don't think there are any mortal races at all with even remotely such high Intelligence bonuses; even the red ones are smarter than most dragons. The problem with dealing ethergaunts isn't going to be about dealing with the archmage-tier elites, it's that even their mooks are mid-level Wizards as well!

Of course, being smart and innate Wizard casting are really the only things they have going for them; dragons might not be as smart but they're more clever and have better social skills, plus they're capable of simply tearing ethergaunts into tiny aberrant shreds. Which can honestly be said about a general adventurer party, come to think of it.

[Sutr]

I'm going to counter at +6 and I know that may seem high, but it has a ninth level spell equivalent 3/day. Anyone saying +5 is saying that +10 to intelligence is only worth one level adjustment on a full caster.* Now having that hit die so low is a problem for me as spell can affect it more easily, but the senses, immunity to some spells, other stats, along with dominate seem to say not +5.

For reference with the intelligence we moving the dc of its lowest level spells to the dc of the highest level the compared wizard can cast.

*With the and hit die it should be down 2 level up ability raises.

[DeTess]

okay, let's compare this guy, to a 10th, 11th and 12th level wizard. For these, I'll assume that they have a base 16 intelligence that got bumped to 18 by racials for the non-ethergaunts, and a base 14 con and all stat increases from levels go to int.

	red ethergaunt	level 10 wizard	level 11 wizard	level 12 wizard
average HP	37	45	49	54
Skill points/max skill rank	88/8	88/13	95/14	102/15
max spell level	5th	5th	6th	6th
spellslots (0th/1st/2nd/3rd/4th/5th/6th)	4/7/6/5/4/3/0	4/6/5/4/4/3/0	4/6/5/5/4/3/1	4/6/5/5/4/4/2
spell save DC	19+spell level	15+spell level	15+spell level	15+spell level
feats/bonus feats from wizard level	2/0	3/2	3/2	4/2

I think these are the main comparable points, but the ethergaunt also gets the spell immunity, +4 natural armor, enslave and the vision mode.
Personally, I think +5 LA might be one point too little. The 10th level wizard gets more HP, higher skill caps and more feats, but gets fewer spell slots, significantly lower spell save DCs and none of the ethergaunts special defenses (not to mention the enslave ability). I'd put the red ethergaunt tentatively at +6 LA for now

[danielxcutter]

You know, the various abilities that ethergaunts could be compared to a prestige class... do we even know what a "common" PrC would even be? There are literally dozens, and that's just for cases obviously designed for Wizards!

[liquidformat]

After looking at DeTess' excellent chart +6 LA puts you ish on par with a tier 1 class based on casting and ability scores but doesn't take into account your other racial features. I think the Enslave ability is pretty comparable to Mindbender's enternal charm + Thral abilities which take loosing 5 caster levels and 10 levels of a prc to get a up to snuff. as a Red Ethergaunt I can easily have a small army of powerful minions at my beck and call with little effort compared to the hoops another pc has to jump through. I am going with +8 LA that seems fair for the insane package this thing gets.

[danielxcutter]

After looking at DeTess' excellent chart +6 LA puts you ish on par with a tier 1 class based on casting and ability scores but doesn't take into account your other racial features. I think the Enslave ability is pretty comparable to Mindbender's enternal charm + Thral abilities which take loosing 5 caster levels and 10 levels of a prc to get a up to snuff. as a Red Ethergaunt I can easily have a small army of powerful minions at my beck and call with little effort compared to the hoops another pc has to jump through. I am going with +8 LA that seems fair for the insane package this thing gets.

I love the Internet.
The number of minions is limited by your Charisma score, not to mention that it's only 3/day! Therefore you cannot get a "small army" as you say!

[remetagross]

Hmmm. First off, two notes.

1. The Ethergaunts' Immunity to Spells wording is different than the Immunity to Magic of Golems. Compare:

Ethergaunts may choose to ignore the effects of arcane spells, just as if the spellcaster had failed to overcome spell resistance.

and

A clay golem is immune to any spell or spell-like ability that allows spell resistance.

The first difference I notice is that the Ethergaunt's ability can be turned on and off at-will and as a free action, thus removing the most annoying drawback of SR on PCs.
The second one is that Immunity to Spells does not seem to be confined to spells that actually allow SR. Ethergaunts may choose to ignore the effects of arcane spells, period. Whether or not these spells do allow SR in the first place seems irrelevant here. The different wording of the Golems' ability, that puts a clear emphasis on the restriction of its extent to spells allowing SR only, comforts me in this interpretation.
What do you guys think, do you read it that way too? These two points brought together seem enough of a power up to Immunity to Spells (when compared to Immunity to Magic) to counteract the power down imposed by the restriction to arcane magic.

2. Having Exotic Weapon Proficiency (Etherblade) and Combat Casting as bonus feats allows any Ethergaunt to waltz into the Abjurant Champion PrC. It's not terribly useful for them, but it's there, especially if they make a detour by Wyrm Wizard to grab Divine Power.

that said, I think DeTess' excellent chart would gain to be enriched with data relative to AC and saves, since HP is not all that makes a character resistant. In addition, Red Ethergaunts gain Combat Casting as a bonus feat which, while being quite a crappy feat in and of itself, is a useful prereq for a number of other feats and PrCs such as Abjurant Champion, so it's not completely worthless.

	red ethergaunt	level 10 wizard	level 11 wizard	level 12 wizard
average HP	37	45	49	54
Skill points/max skill rank	88/8	88/13	95/14	102/15
max spell level	5th	5th	6th	6th
spellslots (0th/1st/2nd/3rd/4th/5th/6th)	4/7/6/5/4/3/0	4/6/5/4/4/3/0	4/6/5/5/4/3/1	4/6/5/5/4/4/2
spell save DC	19+spell level	15+spell level	15+spell level	15+spell level
feats/bonus feats from wizard level	2/1	3/2	3/2	4/2
AC bonus (Dex + NA)	+6	+0	+0	+0
Saves	+2/+3/+6	+3/+3/+7	+3/+3/+7	+4/+4/+8

Seeing this, I find that comparing an 11th level Wizard to the Red Ethergaunt, the 12 HPs the Wizard has in excess are somewhat counterbalanced by the nice +6 to AC the Red Ethergaunt boasts. In addition, a number of direct damage spells that don't care for AC are neutered by the Red Ethergaunt's spell immunity, like Scorching Ray. That being said, I find that what the Wizard has as an advantage: one 6th-level spell per day, 7 skill points (not of much consequence), the ability to change Combat Casting into some other feat, and then 2 additional feats after this, is inferior to the extra 1st-level and 2nd-level spells per day the Red Ethergaunt possesses, and more particularly the extra 4 points of DC to any spell he casts. In addition, the Red Ethergaunt's Enslave ability is much more powerful than any one 6th level spell the Wizard could muster, and the Ethergaunt gets this ability 3/day.
And in top of that one then adds Total Vision and Stupefying Gaze (which is a free action to use) and all the rest of Immunity to Spells. All in all, I find the Red Ethergaunt superior to the 11th-level Wizard. For this reason, I vote LA +7 for the Red Ethergaunt.

[DeTess]

Hmmm. I think DeTess' excellent chart would gain to be enriched with data relative to AC and saves, since HP is not all that makes a character resistant.

Well, let's see.

The Ethergaunt will have +6 AC over a wizard build using identical base stats, spells and armor (assuming no AC boosting from 6th level+ spells), as it has +4 dex and +4 natural AC, for a total of +6 AC.

Saves are a bit trickier. It has as base fort/ref/wil of +1/+1/+4, where the 10th, 11th and 12th level wizards would have 3/3/7, 3/3/7, and 4/4/8 respectively. The ethergaunt's stat boosts means that it has effectively +2/+3/+6 when compared to a wizard with identical base stats, which is a bit worse than the 10th and 11th, and more than a bit under the 12th level wizard. The differences aren't massive though.

[Efrate]

+6 though I am open to higher las. This is really, really good. How is spell immunity worded (including errata)? 3.0 colossus style spell immunity or unbeatable SR? That means a lot.

[DeTess]

+6 though I am open to higher las. This is really, really good. How is spell immunity worded (including errata)? 3.0 colossus style spell immunity or unbeatable SR? That means a lot.

I don't know about the errata, but the text itself says 'Ethergaunts may choose to ignore the effects of arcane spells, just as if the spellcaster has failed to overcome spell resistance', so I think any SR: no spells should probably still affect them.

[TotallyNotEvil]

Given the handy chart, I don't think I'd ever pick a Human or Grey Elf Wizard 10 over a Red Ethergaunt, at least when looking at the mechanical side. Ethergaunt has more spells and a whopping +4 Spell DC advantage. That's bonkers when you have the list with the all the best SoL in the game.

@edit: With the expansion for the table, I will have to agree with +7. Up to +6, I still go for Ethergaunt in my head. At +7, I could see myself going either way.

[remetagross]

I don't know about the errata, but the text itself says 'Ethergaunts may choose to ignore the effects of arcane spells, just as if the spellcaster has failed to overcome spell resistance', so I think any SR: no spells should probably still affect them.

Well, the Ethergaunt have not been affected by the errata. As to the interpretation of Immunity to Spells, see my post above (which I've been editing while you've posted) but I think SR: no spells cannot get through.

[Mike Miller]

Wow, this thing is 3.0 levels of silliness. I vote +7

[liquidformat]

I love the Internet.
The number of minions is limited by your Charisma score, not to mention that it's only 3/day! Therefore you cannot get a "small army" as you say!

with the ability bonuses the Red Ethergaunt has pumping Cha to have a bonus of +5 or +6 by around ECL 10 isn't particularly hard, and 3/day casting is moot since you are more likely looking for good monsters to cherry pick rather than getting them all at once and the daily wil save isn't affected by said 3/day limit. In comparison the Mindbender has to hit min level 15 and loose 5 caster levels for a comparable ability, so sorry not seeing much of an argument here...

[Efrate]

Thinking it over I will go with +7. Change my vote. Regardless of the spell immunity issue the 3.0 is strong with this one.