Half-Dragon + Feral Templates

[Dragonwriter]

First off, welcome to EnWorld.

Now, I don't have Savage Species, so I don't know a thing about Feral, but I do know about Half-dragon. It is a very cool template, but can be a major pain. To make the best use of the abilities, you should have Races of the Dragon. There are feats in there that will give a Medium half-dragon wings and a fly speed and a standard dragon's breath weapon (evry 1d4 rounds, instead of 1/day). But, odds are it will make you more vulnerable.

For one thing, the big scary half-dragon almost always becomes a target, because he is big and scary. Your natural armor can protect you, but it only goes so far. And touch spells will hurt... HARD. And, the lack of HP (from around 3 lost levels...) will make an impact on your survival. I currently play a half-dragon in a 13/14th level campaign and I've had a tough time staying out of dangerous territory. If I was in melee more, I'd probably be very dead.

And this is especially true at lower levels. In a different low-level campaign, one of the players is a half-dragon... And he gets thrown into dying almost every combat. The only reason he's not dead is my Dragon Shaman's healing aura.

So, if you play a Half-dragon, make sure to have easy healing at hand, at all times. It can be very cool and fun, and I would say it's totally worth it, but be careful, and don't be a jerk about you're powerful bloodline.

 

[Aeolius]

On a side note, I have a society simply known as "The Fishermen" in my game. They feed exclusively on the flesh of dire animals, in this case dire sharks, barracuda, eels, and so on. Over time, the consumption of dire animal flesh bestows the feral template.

 

[Runestar]

The half-dragon's breath weapon is a little overrated, IMO. The breath weapon's DC scales off racial HD, not class lvs, so for most PCs, your DC is a crappy 10+con mod. Hardly worth using, unless you just plan to quicken it at the start of each fight.

 

[pawsplay]

Because both races grant natural weapons, see if your DM can lower the LA by 1

*cough* I certainly hope not. For anything with more than a level or two LA, bite and claws are just flavor anyway, since wielded weapons are generally going to be better.

 

[Celestiale]

*cough* I certainly hope not. For anything with more than a level or two LA, bite and claws are just flavor anyway, since wielded weapons are generally going to be better.

I have to quite disagree with this. Last night, I managed to have a talk with a friend and my brother (who'se the DM about my idea)

I basicly want to create with few different things Ayla from Chrono Trigger SNES game (in my opinion on the top 5 best games on SNES). I started with the fact she live in prehistoric age and fight with her fists and bite. Also the fact that she have cat-like traits which is the reason I was looking for the catfolk race. The Template Feral suit her perfectly because she lives like a savage and Feral gains decent abilities into natural weapon fight style. Also the claws does do 1D8 for a Medium Create which is 1D4 usually.

Where is I twink my character is the Half-Dragon. I mainly took it for the bonus Strenght and Intellect (since I lose 4 from Feral) and the bite attack.

My DM created a house rule which all characters that's getting create start with 84 Ability points. A normal human usually have 10 in all stats (14 to all stats with my DM's house rules), he made this rule so nobody would get an unfair disadvantage rolling low on the ability points. Also, one character may only put 1 18 one 1 stat then after must put a maximum of 17. The fact he said is what benifit us, benifit the enemies he decide to put.

With this rule + the abilities modifiers that I get from my 2 templates (+7 LA)
I get :
30 Str
12 Dex
20 Con
8 Int
18 Wis
12 Cha

During the talk, we ended up confirming that i actually created a really strong character if I level (and I will) as a Monk.

The Monk main attacks are his fists (or, where it's become dreadful, his/her elbows, knees, and feet).

With an actually +10 Attack Bonus and Damage from my 30 Strenght, as a level 1 Monk I have 5 attacks (or 7 attacks if I pick the race Skarns that win 2 natural attacks with spines on their arms (1D6)).

The fact is I can use all my natural attacks during the same turn and using the Monk fists (since they are consider as natural and manufactured weapons for the purpose of spells).

If my base race is a Skarn, on a single full attack I can :

Kick: 1D6
Kick: 1D6
Bite: 1D6
Spine: 1D6
Spine: 1D6
Claw: 1D8
Claw: 1D8


Flurry of Blow actually give me 2 attacks as a lvl 1 Monk and will give more attacks since at lvl 20, I'll be lvl 13 Monk with 4 attacks (Kick left, Kick right, Elbow right, Elbow left) that will do 2D6.

Now, in the fact that I'm creating Ayla, I can't really pick the race Skarn since they win the reptilian subtype and they are her enemies in the game, but I still get 5 attacks per round for a lvl 1 Monk (CR 8)

Now, if you add feats in this, I should pick Improved Natural Attack (Claw) since being Feral makes the Claws great.

Multiattack and Improved Multiattack will be a must for this kind of PC.

I am not sure about the feat Roundabout Kick if it's can apply more than 1 full attack, but in the case it does, my claws and my bite does count as an "unarmed attack", if any of all my attack deal a Critical hit, I get an extra attack based on my Attack roll crit.

To make the thing worst, I've looked at the Magic Item Compendium and will get a Belt of Growth to get the spell "Enlarge" for 10 minute once per day to increase all my natural attack dice. Plus, getting the size Large is actually extremely good for my character since I can grab opponents who are at less 1 size smaller than me with my claws as Feral. And higher level I get, if I hold an enemy with my claws, I get 2 rakes attacks (which does my current claw damage, so if I buff my claws, my rakes gets buff).

To the top of that, with the Feral Template, I get Pounce which allow me to make a Full Attack while I charge and if both my claws hits at the same time, the damage is doubled.

The breath weapon from my Half-Dragon is actually completly useless to use since it's eat my standar action. So if my calculations are correct (and correct me if I am wrong), if I take the race Skarn, as a Feral Half-Gold Dragon Half-Skarn of 13 levels of Monk who got 1 turn before the battle to use his/her belt to get the Spell Enlarge with the feat Improved Natural Attack (Claw). And of course, at this level, I picked Multiattack and Improved Multiattack to get no penalties on my second attacks) If I pounce an enemy I actually do :

Kick: 10 (Str) + 9 (BAB from monk) = 19 | Dmg: 2D8 + 10
Kick: 10 (Str) + 9 (BAB from monk) = 19 | Dmg: 2D8 + 10
Elbow: 10 (Str) + 9 (BAB from monk) = 19 | Dmg: 2D8 + 10
Elbow: 10 (Str) + 94(BAB from monk) = 19 | Dmg: 2D8 + 10
Bite: 10 (Str) + 9 (BAB from monk) = 19 | Dmg: 1D8 + 5
Spine: 10 (Str) + 9 (BAB from monk) = 19 | Dmg: 1D8 + 5
Spine: 10 (Str) + 9 (BAB from monk) = 19 | Dmg: 1D8 + 5
Claw: 10 (Str) + 9 (BAB from monk) = 19 | Dmg: 3D6 + 5
Claw: 10 (Str) + 9 (BAB from monk) = 19 | Dmg: 3D6 + 5
(Consider the fact if both Claws hit, I deal double damage and use double of my Strenght for my damage roll so most likely : 6D6 + 20 per claw)
(If I grab an enemy who'se Medium size or smaller)
Rake: 10 (Str) + 9 (BAB from monk) = 19 + Items to hit Dmg: 3D6 + 5
Rake: 10 (Str) + 9 (BAB from monk) = 19 + Items to hit Dmg: 3D6 + 5

With that, all the Monk Unarmed attacks are consider Magic and Lawful for the damage reduction.

This is base that my character is completely naked but at this point, I'd probably have items to increase my combat abilities.

Also, based from what i understand of the feat Roundabout Kick, whenever I critically hit with an unarmed attack, I can do 1 extra attack with the Attack Bonus of the Critical hit. I do realise if I ever grab the enemy and do my rakes, next rounds only my claws and rakes will do damage that is if my enemy actually survived. I didn't count that I could get 1 extra attack from a haste spell which I think 1 bracer give as a swift action 3 times/day.

I don't call myself an expert of DnD at all, maybe some things aren't actually correct about this and I would gladly take alll the corrections possible but basicly this current PC could actually do all this attacks during 1 standard action with the current rules. If what I think is correct, then my character actually worth her 7 LA.



This is what i get to be on holidays and have nothing better to do than wait college to start again I read for about 7 to 8 books to think of that.

 

[Celestiale]

As a side note, with my 7 LA, I do realise that my weak spot is my saves and I don't have anything much to protect myself agains't spellcasters. they just need the first turn, pick the initiative over me and lock me for the fight. I'll consider to take out my Half-Dragon template since in the end, it's only a bite and the +8 Strenght for taking a 3 LA.

not to say that my DM didn,t took a minute to figure that casters can't easily take me out.