DM depressed about Shapechange

[FrankinLondon]

You said that the pit fiend was the big baddie of the last game was he a common everyday pit fiend or something more unique? If in the case of the latter he can't become a pit fiend because shapechange states otherwise.

Bog standard Pitfiend I'm afraid.

Frank

 

[FrankinLondon]

I don't think that should have worked. First, blasphemy works its nasty stuff on nonevil creatures; as a demon, you have the [Evil] descriptor (but this is debatable). Second, the banishment works only on extraplanar creatures. Even if you were a demon, shapechanging shouldn't give you the extraplanar tag. The banishment should only work if you were from another plane to start with.

Hong

As you state, Pitfiends have the Evil sub-type, but Shapechange says nothing about gaining the sub-type, simply the type (in this case Outsider). The character retains his original alignment which is definitely non-evil.

Also much of the module takes place off the Material Plane. Hence the shapechanged creature will be extraplanar. Of course the caster needs to be on his "home" plane, but I am happy ruling that this is the plane they live on rather than the plane they were born on (my home is in London, not Reading).

Of course with an SR of 32 and a Will save, I'll probably have to throw quite a few of the damned things to get one through, but I'll persevere.

Anyone REALLY disagree with this as a semi-reasonable-only-slightly-stretching-the-interpretation-of-the-rules tactic ?

 

[FrankinLondon]

been reading throuth this thread.

First I have no problem with all 9th level spells having minor drawbacks to the caster (ala wish).

Second, the pit fiends fear aura is at will. So he can turn it off. this allows the party to walk with him, but also allows creatures to attack him. Not many people seem to have realised that.

Good point Batman !

This simply makes him less likely to catch the party though. If I were him, at the start of each combat I would simply teleport to an area where I would catch most baddies and no party members and switch the fear aura on as a free action. After all, at A/C 54, 200hp, DR15, SR32 and a multitude of get out quickly spells/shapechanges what has he got to lose ?

Frank

 

[FrankinLondon]

Good luck making the transition!

<snip>

I would tend to avoid banning things like Shapechange entirely, that would merely be taking the easy way out instead of flexing your creative muscles and making the world interesting without chapping your players. They come up with a way to be UBER you gotta roll with it just like you expect them to roll with whatever you throw at them. And they are the ones with the limits on what they can do, so be fair.

Gwarok

Thanks for the sound advice. I absolutely agree that banning the spell (which would require a majority vote in my DM heavy rpg group) is not the way forward. Having got over the shock of A/C 54, 200hp, DR15, SR32 party members, I am warming to the challenge. You are right in that it means a radical re-write of the dungeon but it should be fun. I'm not sure the other members of the party are going to appreciate facing monsters who can hit A/C 54, but they can take on the cannon fodder while the Sorcerer steps up to the plate (evil grin).

Frank

 

[Saeviomagy]

Saeviomagy: I understand the mistake that I made with posion use, but I don't see any other instance where I've made any false assumptions. I would like to know if I have made any though. My understanding of the rules is nowhere near as complete as I'd like it to be.

I'm sorry campbell, but I made the statement a little bit ago. I'm not sure why I wrote it that way, and I can't immediately find any reason why I thought you'd repeatedly messed up when rerferring to the RAW. For now - assume I made a misphrasing and was simply referring to the poison use thing. If I do remember or find anything else, then I'll be sure to tell you.

 

[Saeviomagy]

Personally I like the flavor, too, like the silver dragon polymorphed into a halfling - it seems like a halfling in every way, except its a halfling that can cloudwalk and use potent spell-like abilities. An interesting mystery for the players...

My point on them is:
1. He removes a great deal of the flexibility of the spells by splitting them up into different types.

2. He removes a lot of abilities for a not very good reason - specifically he doesn't like giving people turned into poisonous animals a poison attack, based on the idea that there's a 4th level spell that gives a single poison attack. I'd just leave it in - he's neglected to note that the 'poison' spell is a touch spell (when almost all poison delivering creatures require a full attack roll), and that the poison spell has a high damage and save for such a spell.

3. He removes damage resistance, despite the fact that there are non-magical forms of damage resistance (and the fact that he allows energy resistance and immunity, which have a lot less of a physical dependancy IMHO). I've no problem with someone who turns into an iron golem getting DR/adamantine. I'd probably disallow all other forms of DR though.

He bans assuming templates, but then allows people to turn into skeletal and zombified creatures.

 

[Saeviomagy]

Gwarok

Thanks for the sound advice. I absolutely agree that banning the spell (which would require a majority vote in my DM heavy rpg group) is not the way forward. Having got over the shock of A/C 54, 200hp, DR15, SR32 party members, I am warming to the challenge. You are right in that it means a radical re-write of the dungeon but it should be fun. I'm not sure the other members of the party are going to appreciate facing monsters who can hit A/C 54, but they can take on the cannon fodder while the Sorcerer steps up to the plate (evil grin).

Frank

Yerch. That's also not the way to go.

How do your party deal with high-ac monsters? Touch attacks.
Trip, grapple, spells and the like. Use something that takes away HIS advantage, not something that is so powerful that his advantage means nothing.

 

[Urbanmech]

I am a shapechange/wild shape/polymorph junkie so take what I say with a grain of salt. I think shapechange is fine for a 9th lv spell. There are pleanty of ways to ruin a shapechanged sorcerers day.

Sure the pit fiend is attractive, but wait till you are hit with multiple touch attack spells. Sure you are immune to fire and resistant to a lot of energy attacks but that doesn't stop you from still hurting from CR 20 dragon's breath weapons. Spells may have a hard time effecting the character but look to supernatural abilities to ruin his day. All of a beholders eye rays are SU and so is it's antimagic field. Bye bye magic, all the beholder needs is a few Cloud or Storm giant allies to squish the mage.

If you are running Bastion of Broken Souls then you probably alreay have to do a good amount of changing to convert it to 3.5. I remember the positive material plane critters as being rather nasty with some touch attack powers. I think they will give the sorcerer (and the party) a hard time. Good luck and embrace your parties high level abilities (and remember what is good for the pc's is sometimes better for the NPC's).

 

[Hypersmurf]

The save DC against the fear aura still uses the sorceror's original charisma. The DC for the save aura is therefore:

19+sorceror's charisma bonus

I don't agree.

Special Attacks and Special Qualities
Many creatures have unusual abilities. A monster entry breaks these abilities into special attacks and special qualities. The latter category includes defenses, vulnerabilities, and other special abilities that are not modes of attack. A special ability is either extraordinary (Ex), spell-like (Sp), or supernatural (Su). Additional information (when needed) is provided in the creature’s descriptive text.

When a special ability allows a saving throw, the kind of save and the save DC is noted in the descriptive text. Most saving throws against special abilities have DCs calculated as follows: 10 + 1/2 the attacker’s racial Hit Dice + the relevant ability modifier. The save DC is given in the creature’s description along with the ability on which the DC is based.

The DC for the fear aura is 10 + half the sorcerer's racial hit dice + the sorcerer's Charisma bonus.

His hit points don't change, per the spell... so he has 18 class levels, and no racial hit dice.

With a Cha of, say, 22, then, his Save DC is 10 + 0 + 6, or 16.

If he were an 11th level Rakshasa sorcerer (whose 7 levels of sorcerer spellcasting ability stack with his class levels), then when he Shapechanges, his Save DC would be 10 + 3 (half of his 7 racial hit dice) + Cha modifier. (Of course, that's an ECL 25 character.)

-Hyp.

 

[Saeviomagy]

I don't agree.

Special Attacks and Special Qualities
Many creatures have unusual abilities. A monster entry breaks these abilities into special attacks and special qualities. The latter category includes defenses, vulnerabilities, and other special abilities that are not modes of attack. A special ability is either extraordinary (Ex), spell-like (Sp), or supernatural (Su). Additional information (when needed) is provided in the creature’s descriptive text.

When a special ability allows a saving throw, the kind of save and the save DC is noted in the descriptive text. Most saving throws against special abilities have DCs calculated as follows: 10 + 1/2 the attacker’s racial Hit Dice + the relevant ability modifier. The save DC is given in the creature’s description along with the ability on which the DC is based.

The DC for the fear aura is 10 + half the sorcerer's racial hit dice + the sorcerer's Charisma bonus.

His hit points don't change, per the spell... so he has 18 class levels, and no racial hit dice.

With a Cha of, say, 22, then, his Save DC is 10 + 0 + 6, or 16.

If he were an 11th level Rakshasa sorcerer (whose 7 levels of sorcerer spellcasting ability stack with his class levels), then when he Shapechanges, his Save DC would be 10 + 3 (half of his 7 racial hit dice) + Cha modifier. (Of course, that's an ECL 25 character.)

-Hyp.

Ahhh, interesting. I missed the key word 'racial' in the section on determining the save DC.

So indeed, the save DC for the ability is a lot lower than I first thought.