Creature Types/Subtypes & Classification

[Verequus]

Types
Just a quick glance reveals that the types and sub types are all over the place without any real thought or theme. Most of it has been fudged together and clouded further as time has passed

Currently types serve little purpose. They have a few rules attached which tend to be ignored in both common play and official supplements. And yet most loathe to use sub-types for various reasons. Most player races end up with the humanoid subtype when other types seem to fit far better

A better system would seem to have far fewer Types and give most monsters a sub-type or two. Even player races would benefit.

Very convincing.

The problem is similar with the "elements" in D&D
We have : Lightning, Fire, Cold, Air, Acid, Sonic, Earth, Water
and possibly even others like wood
There wouldn't be a problem if D&D didn't try and make itself inherently elemental but it has and as such it is a mess

It would need a great deal of work to sort out. ButI remain hopeful that fourth edition will really trim back some of the dead wood and try things afresh

Don't get me wrong, I love D&D. I've yet to find another system which approaches the high-quality inherent in 3.5e. It is just that the whole element and type system makes less sense than the way pokemon handles it

I don't understand the bold-faced text. What is an elemental D&D exactly? For the elements, I have already a solution - Elements of Magic Revised. With 22 elements it covers all end everything, what you will find in D&D. But that is more a minor aspect, because EoMR is a balanced replacement to the core magic rules, and thus it needs for example the element Space for teleportation. Read some reviews for more information, but beware, that the bookmark issue has been already solved and a major update to the rules is on the way. A half year of public playtesting showed some gaps and errors, which will be closed. I have to update my own review sometime.

 

[Tonguez]

If it was my choice

I'd have the following types

Aberration*
BEAST
Construct
Dragon
ENTITY
Humanoid*
Outsider
Plant
Undead

*but altered as follows

BEAST subtypes include Animal, Vermin and Magical

ENTITY is for 'energy creatures' usually with an energy subtype including Elementals (eg Fire Entity), Willowisps (Native Entity). Modern creatures like sentient AI and Energy beings would fit here and its possible that creatures like Nightshades (Evil, Negative, Entity) would fit here too (since they aren't really undead)

Abberration I'd limit this to 'things with tentacles' (Otyugh, Beholders (yes eyestalks are enough like tentacles) etc) and Oozey-things with an Int score (eg gibbering mouthers, worm that walks). Things like Destrachan and Catelopas (even Delvers) I'd move to 'Beast' and WilloWisps would go to the new 'ENTITY' Type

Fey I'd make this a Fey template that can be added to other creatures

Humanoid Expanded to include every living creature with sentience and a generally human shape (well upper torso anyway) subtypes include Giant and Beastial types (eg Avian, Insectoid, Reptilian, Mammalian)
*I'd use Mammalian to cover all Humanoid quadrapeds like Centaurs, Lamia etc. I wouldn't bother with going as specific as Equine, Bovine (eg Minotaur), Leonid, Canid etc
We also need a humanoid template that can be added to other creatures to turn them into sentient bipeds with fine manipulators (hands, pinchers, tentacles)


Ooze Not sure whether to keep or make an Aberration subtype

Dragon I'd leave as is. yeah there's a case for a subtype of Beast but Dragons are iconic

and yeah give Undead Positive and Negative subtypes

 

[BigRedRod]

I don't understand the bold-faced text. What is an elemental D&D exactly?

You seem to have misunderstood, D&D is inherently Elemental in it's makeup and yet it manages to deal with the elements themselves in such a half-arsed way

The standard D&D cosmology sets up a simple system of elements
Fire, Water, Air, and Earth
The monsters and spells however do not fit this pattern in any way, shape or form and yet D&D tries. The results of this are truely horrible to look at, yet look at pretty much any creature or spell which is elemental but not fire based and you see them

 

[Verequus]

I'm impressed - that is the most far reaching attempt so far.

Humanoid Expanded to include every living creature with sentience and a generally human shape (well upper torso anyway) subtypes include Giant and Beastial types (eg Avian, Insectoid, Reptilian, Mammalian)
*I'd use Mammalian to cover all Humanoid quadrapeds like Centaurs, Lamia etc. I wouldn't bother with going as specific as Equine, Bovine (eg Minotaur), Leonid, Canid etc
We also need a humanoid template that can be added to other creatures to turn them into sentient bipeds with fine manipulators (hands, pinchers, tentacles)

Equine or not equine... At least under your attempt it seems out place. How would you place the Gynosphinx? Still as a magical beast? To the Humanoid template: Isn't there such a template in Savage Species? Can we create one of our own without violating the copyright law?

Ooze Not sure whether to keep or make an Aberration subtype

Dragon I'd leave as is. yeah there's a case for a subtype of Beast but Dragons are iconic

and yeah give Undead Positive and Negative subtypes

If you already include into the Aberration type oozey stuff, then Ooze could be easily a subtype.

Actually, I wouldn't mind so much, if Dragon would become a subtype, but the problem is, how are humanoid dragons treated? Half-Dragons or other races like Dracotaur or Dragon-Kin are more humanoid in shape. Where have those to be put then?

And you ignored all existing subtypes. Would you change something there?

 

[Tuzenbach]

Bring back the demihumans!



*hides*

 

[Knight Otu]

Bring back the demihumans!



*hides*

[off-topic]And you should better run, flee, hide, because I absolutely, truly, officially hate that term.[/off-topic]

I certainly see benefit in folding oozes into the aberration type, vermin into animal and dragon into magical beast. I'd propably at least think about using those. I must admit, though, that I'd be rather resistant to dropping the dragon type - it is by far the most iconic of the types.
I'd propably contemplate turning fey to entities, too.

 

[DMH]

Prey and Predator should be templates - the warbeast template would be better, if it had such a basis, because it can address some issues differently, if necessary.

So you would have only some lions as predators? Only some deer are prey?

I like the idea for the entity type and giant subtype, but rolling most (real) animals into beasts seems a bit much. Vermin should be very different from magical beasts IMO.

 

[Nellisir]

I'd go further, and essentially give all monsters classes seperate from their race -- brawler, runner, and spellcaster (Crummy names, I know). Warriors have d10 HD, 2+ skill points, and good Fort saves; Rogues have d8 HD and 4+ skill points, and good Ref saves; spellcasters have d6 HD, 6+ skill points, and good Will saves. Increases in skill points or hit points can be dealt with by Int or Con type modifiers -- all dragons get +2 Con, for example, which gives a automatic +1 hp/HD, which mimics the statistical increase from a d10 to a d12. Skills are a little trickier, since you'd need a +4 Int bonus to give +2 skill points, which seems a little excessive, but you can either settle for +1 skill points or give bonus points by type or race (all outsiders get +2 bonus skill points per HD). A feat that gives bonus skill points might not be bad either.

Each creature then has set qualities, attacks, ability modifiers, and the like, either broken down by HD advancement or with a recommended set HD.

A hill giant, for instance, would be a 12th level brawler; a cloud giant might be a 15th level brawler, 2nd level spellcaster; a beholder might be a 5th level spellcaster, 1st level brawler; and a bugbear might be a 2nd level brawler, 1st level runner.

Animals would be either brawlers (for aggressive animals) or runners (for non-agressive animals).

Just a thought for now,
Nell.

 

[Verequus]

So you would have only some lions as predators? Only some deer are prey?

I like the idea for the entity type and giant subtype, but rolling most (real) animals into beasts seems a bit much. Vermin should be very different from magical beasts IMO.

That kind of thing you get, if you stay awake too long. After rethinking, I actually mean something like Nellsir for Animals. You caught also that with the Vermins - I wanted to post that, too, but would have it forgotten by now...

Nellsir:
Your proposal is really progressive. I have to think about its ramifications, but it could be the solution. Someone else mentioned, that he dislikes, that bigger creatures hit better automatically. His idea has merit and Upper_Krust, whose design decisisions I can trust nearly blind, is his opinion. I'd like to use Upper_Krust's idea in the concept, that a creature has 1 racial hit die for every 2 ft. in height or width in the revision, too. Yes, humans would recieve then 2 or 3 hit dice, like other medium-sized creatures, but if we want to do it right, then we should do everything right.

 

[I'm A Banana]

I've definately applied a "kind" to magical beasts, monstrous humanoids, and animals, and it's really a useful categorization. I think the main reason it hasn't been implemented is because it doesn't affect mechanics that rigidly. Things that affect equines affect "equine animals," and so it's largely up to the DM to determine what qualifies, since certain "equines" could be more powerful than others, and there's no way for the designers to take every monster ever possible into account,really.