Special Conversion Thread: Lycanthropes and their ilk

Shade · Feb 21, 2011

As I started to rough out a draft, I've become convinced it would work better as a replacement to the standard lycanthrope template, rather than one the a modifies an existing lycanthrope.

For starters, it gets around the problem of the "animal can be any predator, scavenger, or omnivore whose size is within one size category of the base creature’s size", allowing for a Medium creature to assume the form of some of the Huge dire creatures.

Secondly, we won't have to worry about that whole "all good saves" mess Cleon described above. It would simply add the base save bonuses of the base animal to the base save bonuses of the base creature like the lycanthrope template. With that being the case, it's probably no longer necessary to borrow the "All lycanthropes gain +2 to Wisdom" from the standard lycanthrope template.

Thoughts?

Cleon · Feb 23, 2011

Shade said:
As I started to rough out a draft, I've become convinced it would work better as a replacement to the standard lycanthrope template, rather than one the a modifies an existing lycanthrope.

For starters, it gets around the problem of the "animal can be any predator, scavenger, or omnivore whose size is within one size category of the base creature’s size", allowing for a Medium creature to assume the form of some of the Huge dire creatures.

Secondly, we won't have to worry about that whole "all good saves" mess Cleon described above. It would simply add the base save bonuses of the base animal to the base save bonuses of the base creature like the lycanthrope template. With that being the case, it's probably no longer necessary to borrow the "All lycanthropes gain +2 to Wisdom" from the standard lycanthrope template.

Thoughts?

I don't mind making it a full template but would rather keep the +2 to Wisdom if we're using the "add the saves of base animal and base creature together approach" rather than a "convert base animal into all good saves and add to base creature's saves".

That reinforces my wish to change the name from "Dire Lycanthrope", since we're not restricting it to Dire Animals.

Horrid Lycanthrope? (inspired by Eberron's Horrid Animal template)

Dread Lycanthrope?

As for the "allowing for a Medium creature to assume the form of some of the Huge dire creatures" bit, I would be content with keeping the original's +1/-1 size limit.

I'm not sure I want to set a precedent for a halfling werewhale.

Shade · Feb 23, 2011

Whoa...wait a sec...why aren't we limiting it to dire animals?

freyar · Feb 25, 2011

Yes, I'm afraid I'm getting confused as to where we're going with this. Perhaps we should just make this a unique lycanthrope type, not based on the template, just so we can avoid having this discussion run away on us.

EDIT: If we're doing a full template, I'd say go with +/-2 on the sizes and stick to dire animals or critters with the dire SQ.

Shade · Feb 25, 2011

freyar said:
EDIT: If we're doing a full template, I'd say go with +/-2 on the sizes and stick to dire animals or critters with the dire SQ.

Perfect. I feel that's the approach we should take.

freyar · Feb 26, 2011

Shade said:
Perfect. I feel that's the approach we should take.

The other option would just to remove the base animal's special attacks from the hybrid form, like a regular lycanthrope, but I don't think we want to do that.

Cleon · Feb 28, 2011

freyar said:
EDIT: If we're doing a full template, I'd say go with +/-2 on the sizes and stick to dire animals or critters with the dire SQ.

The problem with that approach is the Frostburn Smilodon we're basing the Weresabre isn't Dire, so we wouldn't be able to use the template!

I think it's easier just doing it as a nonstandard Lycanthrope.

Shade · Feb 28, 2011

Cleon said:
The problem with that approach is the Frostburn Smilodon we're basing the Weresabre isn't Dire, so we wouldn't be able to use the template!

But it is! All the prehistoric creatures in Frostburn (Glyptodon, Megaloceros, Smilodon, Woolly Mammoth, Zeuglodon) are noted as being "dire", despite not having it in their names. And they all have good Will saves!

So let's not complicate matters further and allow non-dire creatures.

If you really want to spell it out, we can state "any dire animal or animal with good Will saves".

freyar · Mar 4, 2011

Ok, so are we going to make a dire lycanthrope template?

Cleon · Mar 7, 2011

Shade said:
But it is! All the prehistoric creatures in Frostburn (Glyptodon, Megaloceros, Smilodon, Woolly Mammoth, Zeuglodon) are noted as being "dire", despite not having it in their names. And they all have good Will saves!

So let's not complicate matters further and allow non-dire creatures.

If you really want to spell it out, we can state "any dire animal or animal with good Will saves".

Oops! How did I miss that. In that case I withdraw my objection.

Special Conversion Thread: Lycanthropes and their ilk

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Cleon

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