Dragon and the Phoenix

[Fieari]

INTRODUCTION--- (you can skip this bit if you want and look down towards the initial stats I had in mind if you like)


Before I played Dungeons and Dragons, and even during, I played Freeform Online role playing games. When I find partners to play with that are skilled at the game, freeform roleplaying can be considerably more satisfying that games with a DM, because not only do you write your own stories, but you can write STORIES... using all kinds of literary sorts of things. It's not balanced or precise by any means, but if you can find the right person to play it with... well, it's amazing.

The neat thing about D&D though, is that it's a system of describing things in very small peices. What's neat about that is in order to understand something deeper, it helps to break it down into very small peices. This means that translating various things into D&D terms is helpful towards comprehension. It also gives a sense of scale, and a benchmark for describing exactly what you are talking about.

For lack of people to play with (to my satisfaction) nowadays, I've occasionally tried switiching to straight novel writting. But I think that my lack of precision is hindering me here. So I wish to translate my characters into D&D terms, and for that, I hope to enlist aid here at ENWorld. At the same time, I still play D&D (as a DM) and would love to put these characters in as NPCs somewhere.


So. The BASIC concept is a race of Phoenii (phoenixes?)... but at the same time, not actually phoenii, in the strict avian sence. They appear human, at any rate. I've drawn from all kinds of sources to construct this race... immortal beings created by the Creator (the original) for the purpose of, well... plane maintenence. When a plane is destroyed, they're supposed to pick up the peices and reassemble them into a new world... that is to say, when a world dies, they make it reborn from its own ashes. World Phoenix, if you will.

There are a LOT of specifics I have in mind, and will be posting them for critique as I go along, but for right now, I just wanted to establish a good stat progression. I'm using Gold Dragons as a balance comparision... my Phoenii are expected to reach a considerably older age than dragons, in fact, they're considered merely "Adult" when dragons become Elder Wyrms. However, I matched up the progression level with Dragons such before Adulthood, a Phoenix is WEAKER than a Dragon of the same age catagory (not same age)... and after adulthood, is STRONGER than a Dragon of the same age catagory.

So, with that in mind, what do you think of the following:

Age		Size	Age?	Age	Fly?	HD		Natural AC	
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Extremely Young	T	1	1	NO	1d12		8* 
Very Young	D	4	5	NO	2d12		18 
Young		S	8	20	NO	4d12+20		20
Juvenile	M	12	50	CLMSY	8d12+70		23
Young Adult	M	16	100	POOR	16d12+120	25
Adult		M	20	1000	AVG	32d12+170	30
Mature Adult	M	30	5K	GOOD	40d12+220	35
Old		M	40	10K	PRFCT	50d12+270	40
Very Old	M	55	50K	PRFCT	60d12+320	45
Ancient		M	70	100K	PRFCT	70d12+370	50
High		M	85	500K	PRFCT	90d12+420	55
Great		M	Any	1M	PRFCT	100d12+500	60


Age	Attack	Fort	Ref	Will	Elem Wing**	Caster	Spell
	Bonus	Save	Save	Save	 (DC)		Level	Resistance
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
E.Young	-10	-10	-10	+9	0d0(0)		0	0
V.Young	-5	-5	-5	+12	0d0(0)		0	0
Young	+0	+0	+0	+15	0d0(0)		1	0
Juvin	+10	+5	+10	+18	1d10(10)	5	10
Y.Adult	+20	+10	+15	+21	2d10(15)	11	15
Adult	+30	+20	+20	+24	4d10(20)	17	20
M.Adult	+35	+25	+25	+27	8d10(25)	23	25
Old	+40	+30	+30	+30	12d10(30)	26	30
V.Old	+45	+35	+35	+33	16d10(35)	29	35
Ancient	+50	+40	+40	+36	20d10(40)	32	40
High	+55	+45	+45	+39	24d10(45)	35	45
Great	+60	+50	+50	+42	28d10(50)	40	50

Age		Speed		Str Dex Con Int Wis Cha
---------------------------------------------------------
Extremely Young	0ft		1   1   10  2   2   5
Very Young	5ft		5   10  10  8   10  10
Young		10ft		6   15  12  10  10  15
Juvinile	30ft, fly 60ft	10  18  15  14  14  17
Young Adult	30ft, fly 90ft	10  20  15  15  15  20
Adult		30ft, fly 120ft	10  22  17  16  16  23
Mature Adult	30ft, fly 150ft	10  22  17  16  17  26
Old		30ft, fly 170ft	10  21  17  17  18  29
Very Old	30ft, fly 200ft	10  20  17  17  19  32
Ancient		30ft, fly 230ft	10  19  17  18  20  35
High		30ft, fly 260ft	10  18  17  18  21  37
Great		30ft, fly 300ft	10  25  20  20  22  40

* Newborns are newborns... but even as babes in arms, they posess certain inherant traits... one of which is profound luck which protects them to a degree. The +8 AC for the infant is due to Deus Ex Machina.

** This is to match the Dragon's breath weapon, to a degree. Instead of being a breath weapon though, these are the Phoenix's wings, which don't actually enable the "bird" to fly, but are mostly for show. Mostly. Since these wings are made up of an element (element determined by birth) they can be used as an attack... an attack which more or less matches a dragon's breath attack.


Comments? Suggestions? Questions? Request for me to stop right here and not post the rest as I work it out from my notes?

 

[the Jester]

Did you want help making these guys follow the standard 3.5 dnd monster rules? Or just feedback on the ideas?

I like the basic idea of the world-phoenix, that's cool.

 

[Fieari]

I'm actually not really familiar with 3.5... I actually just switched to 3.0 from 2e a few months ago, and have no 3.5 resources whatsoever. Comments on this subject would be appreciated.

As to what I was looking for with the above was BALANCE comments. As I said, I'm trying to balance this race with respect to Dragons.

What I'm really stuck on is exactly what ABILITIES to give these guys, and when. Don't worry about the world ressurrection skills, I'm handling those (since those rules are REALLY involved and complicated and will require lots of custom things)... but on the other hand, these guys have lots of little things they can do over the years they spend with people.

First thing I'm going to add, for all levels--

Additional Pheonix Traits

Diet: A phoenix is an auto-emotovore (auto-psychovore?)... which means that it feeds off of emotions, but its OWN emotions instead of other creature's emotions. As long as the phoenix is reasonably content, has something to love, and is mentally stable, the phoenix does not require any other physical needs such as food or water.

Pure Being: Refined and pure creatures, phoenii are vulnerable to certain words alone. If it hears foul language (such as found on docks or amongst soldiers) the phoenix must save vs. fort (DC20-age level) or take 1d4 damage.

As for abilities. Here are some general guidelines I'm trying to work with...

Healing/Mental Skills go to Water and Earth
Movement/Time Skills go to Water and Air
Forging/Creating Skills go to Fire and Earth
Manipulating/Morphing/Illusion Skills go to Fire and Air

Class Name	Composition	Aura Color
------------------------------------------
Fire		Fire + Fire	Red
Earth		Earth + Earth	Green
Air		Air + Air	Light Blue
Water		Water + Water	Blue
Lightning	Fire + Air	White
Lava(Molten)	Fire + Earth	Orange
Storm		Fire + Water	Grey
Cloud		Water + Air	Silver
River		Water + Earth	Cyan
Comet(Star)	Air + Earth	Yellow

Which leads to ten different "classes" I need to work out, preferably seperately. I'm having trouble here beyond these general guidelines. Obviously, the "dedicated" elemental phoenii should be stronger in their domains than the dual-elementals.

I know I want to give Slow, Haste, Time Stop to the "Time" catagory... Earth is going to need a bunch of druidic abilities (mostly plant related)...

Here's where I'm REALLY looking for hints and suggestions. Anyone have any proposals?

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Some notes on their relations with Dragons... I'm borrowing a concept from Mike Oakley's wonderful work "Thieves and Kings"... an excerpt goes as follows:

Nove was the sort of land which grew. It grew outward from the middle, spreading out larger and larger and wider until, if left alone, it would eventually crumble and fall to peices.

Rather like a cookie. --A small cookie, you can pick up and hold quite nicely, but a cookie the size of, say, a table top, would just break to pieces if you tried to lift it. Nove was the same way, just on a larger scale. Except when a land like Nove gets too big and starts to break apart, it means having earthquakes and volcanoes going off, and everyone getting dashed to a terrible end. And so it was the dragon's charge to make certain this terrible disaster never befell their world.

Ever since the beginning of time, the dragons stomped and curled around the edges of Nove, eating and munching old hills and mountains and dead forests and used up fields so that things stayed their proper size. It was a very important job and dragons took it very seriously.

So, I'm thinking to apply this concept to PLANES, instead of just a single world. And in this manner, if dragons are the ones eating the edges, phoenii are the ones making it grow. There's... obviously going to be some conflicts of interest going on. Quite frankly, the two races HATE each other, perhaps irrationally. It doesn't matter what the alignment... Lawful Good Phoenii hate Gold Dragons as much as Red Dragons, and vise versa... either side would likely go out of the way to kill the other given half an opportunity.

 

[the Jester]

First, I just want to say that you've obviously given this a lot of thought and I think the background you've come up with is fantastic.

Now, from what I'm gathering, I think the phoenixes- hm, no, I think I like phoenices - could be approached as either classes or as monster types. I like the monster approach.

Now, you're clearly approaching them from the story end of things, which is good- you know where the story's going, and unlike a dnd game, a story needs a lot of direction. I, on the other hand, don't know much about the story to be told, so I'll approach it from a dm's perspective.

Unless you prefer to approach these as classes, I propose to give 'em a monster-style treatment. Since you have them currently split up by age (to parallel dragons) it seems more logical.

Couple of questions here- you say they're humanoid, but how big are they? And do they have an avian form? Again, if so how big? And what do their elemental wings look like?

Right now you have the younguns being much less powerful than an equivalent gold dragon and the old ones being twice as powerful (in HD)- is that about the way you want it?

As for the powers, I'll start mulling over ideas and will get back to you on it...

 

[the Jester]

First, I just want to say that you've obviously given this a lot of thought and I think the background you've come up with is fantastic.

Now, from what I'm gathering, I think the phoenixes- hm, no, I think I like phoenices - could be approached as either classes or as monster types. I like the monster approach.

Now, you're clearly approaching them from the story end of things, which is good- you know where the story's going, and unlike a dnd game, a story needs a lot of direction. I, on the other hand, don't know much about the story to be told, so I'll approach it from a dm's perspective.

Unless you prefer to approach these as classes, I propose to give 'em a monster-style treatment. Since you have them currently split up by age (to parallel dragons) it seems more logical.

Couple of questions here- you say they're humanoid, but how big are they? And do they have an avian form? Again, if so how big? And what do their elemental wings look like?

Right now you have the younguns being much less powerful than an equivalent gold dragon and the old ones being twice as powerful (in HD)- is that about the way you want it?

As for the powers, I'll start mulling over ideas and will get back to you on it...

 

[Fieari]

Phoenix Physiology-

A phoenix has four natural forms.

The first form, into which it is hatched or born (either case may occur, but in either case the result is the same) externally appears entirely human. The real only differences between a human being and a phoenix in this form is the blood (phoenix blood is inherantly magical, as it must be in order to transform emotion into energy) and the fact that even in this form, the phoenix's bones are hollow and slightly stronger than a humans. This makes them considerably lighter than a human being of the same size.

(A quick web search reveals that the human skeleton, on average, accounts for 15% of weight, so I'd suggest that a phoenix weighs 10% less than a human of the same size)

The second form is likewise, except that elemental wings seem to sprout from the phoenix's back (or merely hover behind his/her back). These wings are generally considered works of art amongst the species, esspecially as they are formed mentally and are not actually required for flight. As mentioned before, these elemental wings may be used as a weapon, comparable to a dragon's breath attack.

The third form is where the phoenix transforms his/her entire flesh into his/her element. While this occasionally has advantages, and can provide a small boost in magical abilities while in this form, it is usally not intentional to enter this state. Instead, it is a side effect of the phoenix's metabolism being given too much energy.. a state that generally occurs when they consume various forms of sucrose (while a phoenix doesn't have to eat, he/she CAN eat if he/she wishes).

The fourth form is avian in nature. The bird in question may or may not be composed entirely on the element of the phoenix. If not, he/she will appear as a medium to large sized raptor (such as a falcon or hawk) with elongated feathers the color of his/her aura. This form is only available after the phoenix has grown wings (the 2nd form).



The HD level seems about right, I think...

A note on "Caster Level" as well. A phoenix is not neccessarily able to cast any given spell of its level or lower like a dragon is. I included the "caster" level for purposes of saving throws and such, since the saving throw for a spell is generally linked to the caster level. In the stories I've written so far, a water phoenix is able to cast "Teleport (with error)" when 12 (actual) years old (she looks 9ish). This spell would of course not be available to any spell caster at 1st level, but for bookkeeping purposes, she casts it as a 1st level mage.

Does that sound reasonable, or should I phrase it differently, or...?



By the way, I also have quite a number of campaign ideas that revolve around these guys, and even one or two that would involve one (or the entire party) as PCs.

 

[Fieari]

I'm bumping this up mostly as a place to keep posting info as I generate it, and as always, to request comments.

First of all, I wanted a quick population run down... how many phoenii of each type? And so I whipped together some quick genetics to get some numbers.


Pheonix Genetics

The phoenix's element is determined by genetics. More specifically, there are TWO gene pairs which combine in order to determine the actual element of the hatchling.

The four basic genes are air, water, fire, and earth. For recessive genes, we will use the lower case a w f e and for dominant genes, A W F E.

Each gene has both a dominant and a recessive form, however, the dominant and recessive forms never meet in the same gene pair. The possible genes in each pair are as follows:

PAIR1	PAIR2
AEwf	aeWF

The interesting thing to note is that the combination of two dominants or two recessives in a single pair will produce an entirely different elemental outcome.

AE = Water
ae = Fire
WF = Air
wf = Earth

The genes themselves do not alter, and so even though a phoenix with the genes ae+AE will appear to be a Storm phoenix, with both Fire and Water elements, he or she will not pass on either the Fire or Water gene to his/her offspring.


Probability (and distribution)

There are 9 combinations possible for each gene pair.

Pair1 possibilities:
AA - Air
AE - Water
Aw - Air
Af - Air	4/9 Earth
EE - Earth	3/9 Air
Ew - Earth	2/9 Water
Ef - Earth	1/9 Fire
ww - Water
wf - Earth
ff - Fire


Pair2 possibilities:
aa - Air
ae - Fire
aW - Water
aF - Fire	4/9 Fire
ee - Earth	3/9 Water
eW - Water	2/9 Air
eF - Fire	1/9 Earth
WW - Water
WF - Air
FF - Fire

Class Name	Composition	Probability
-------------------------------------------
Fire		Fire + Fire	(1/9)  * (4/9)  =  (4/81) = 04.93%
Earth		Earth + Earth	(4/9)  * (1/9)  =  (4/81) = 04.93%
Air		Air + Air	(3/9)  * (2/9)  =  (6/81) = 07.40%
Water		Water + Water	(2/9)  * (3/9)  =  (6/81) = 07.40%
Lightning	Fire + Air	(4/81) + (6/1)  = (10/81) = 12.32%
Lava(Molten)	Fire + Earth	(4/81) + (4/81) =  (8/81) = 09.88%
Storm		Fire + Water	(4/81) + (6/81) = (10/81) = 12.32%
Cloud		Water + Air	(6/81) + (6/81) = (12/81) = 14.81%
River		Water + Earth	(6/81) + (4/81) = (10/81) = 12.32%
Comet(Star)	Air + Earth	(6/81) + (4/81) = (10/81) = 12.32%

Now then, onto some workings for individual phoenix types... I started with the Air element. Why? Because I already had some stories involving a Wind Phoenix... the story of a 1000 year old phoenix in the equivelent of military service, sent to fight and destroy an Ancient Dark Phoenix-- more or less a suicide mission. But through perseverance and sheer will, manages to survive and trap the Dark Phoenix onto a single plane, and powerless for a time through the use of a Time Loop...

The details of this story were long and involved, and if requested I might post in the story hour forum-- but at any rate, I extrapolated from the literary realm of "Do whatever seems like a good idea" towards something a little more concrete.


Phoenix of the Air

Also known as Wind Phoenix, Phoenix of the air account for between 7 and 8 percent of phoenix population. Strongest when it comes to the movement through and manipulation of time, they make (literally!) unstoppable warriors against purely temporal creatures, and are a force to be reckoned with against all others.

Apart from their obvious affinity with gasses (and thus the construction of atmospheres), wind phoenii set to the world-ressurection task are employed mostly with the concern of temporal topography. A world does not automatically have a timeline, and causality does not necessarily exist. As with all phoenii, artistry is highly valued, and when it comes to creating the 4-dimensional plane, there is considerably room for creativity-- creating phenominon such as wormholes. Even the overall temporal topography of the plane has a number of options... at the most basic level, different worlds can be set to travel through varying periods of time when compared to other worlds. At more complex levels, natural time travel may be available to any being on that plane.

See: Which 4-manifold do we live in


Changes to Base Phoenix: Add 25% to flight speed for each level.

Abilities Gained by Age:

Extremely Young - Learns Manipulate Air (improves with age)
Very Young 	- Learns Haste, Slow as a Spell-like ability, at will.
Young		- Learns Teleport as a Spell-like ability, at will.
Juvinile	- Learns Time Stop as a Spell-like ability, 1/day.
Young Adult	- Learns Lesser Time Travel, Plane Shift as a spell like ability, at will.
Adult		- Learns Time Travel at will
Mature Adult	- Learns Time Loop
Old		- Learns Manipulate Local Time
Very Old	- Learns Manipulate Time
Ancient		- Learns ???
High		- Learns ???
Great		- Learns ???

DETAILED ABILITY DESCRIPTIONS--

Lesser Time Travel
------------------
Transmutation [Teleportation]
Level: ???
Componants: S
Casting Time: Instant
Range: Personal and touch
Target: You and touched objects or other touched creatures weighing up to 50 pounds/level
Duration: Concentration
Saving Throw: None and Will negates (object)
Spell Resistance: No and Yes (object)

This spell allows the caster to travel through time at a maximum rate of one minute per percieved minute per caster level in either the past or the future. Cast by a 30th level caster, for example, will enable the caster to travel at a rate of 30 minutes per percievd minute.

While traveling through time, the caster and anything else brought along will still be subject to gravity, and as such will not be flung into space as the planet moves along in space.

This spell can mimic the effects of Time Stop. Similarly, it can mimic haste by travelling forewards at a rate slower than 1 minute per minute (30 seconds per minute, for example, would double your speed as observed by outsiders).

==============================================

Time Travel
------------------
Transmutation [Teleportation]
Level: ???
Componants: S
Casting Time: Instant
Range: Personal and touch
Target: You and touched objects or other touched creatures weighing up to 50 pounds/level
Duration: Concentration
Saving Throw: None
Spell Resistance: No

As Lesser Time Travel, except that the maximum rate through time is now 1 Year per percieved minute per caster level.

==============================================

Time Loop
------------------
Conjuration |Creation|
Level:Sor/Wiz 9, Trickery 9
Components: V, S
Range: Medium
Casting Time: 1 round
Duration: Concentration
Saving Throw: Reflex for nullification (avoid area "looped")
Spell Resistance: None

Time is twisted in an maximum area of 10ft^2 per caster level, such that creatures outside the area affected view creatures and objects inside the area as motionless. Anything entering this area will also be rendered motionless. When the caster's concentration is broken or ceases, motion within the area resumes. From the point of view of creatures and objects within the effected, they appear to have jumped in time from the point they entered until the point the area is dispelled.

If the caster is currently under the effect of a Time Travel spell, anything within the area will still exit at the point the caster stops concentrating. If the caster has traveled back in time from whence he first cast the spell, then creatures and objects within the time loop will also have traveled back in time.

Verbal component is a specific song which must be learned. This song may be played on a musical instrument instead of sung if so desired.

===============================================

Manipulate Local Time
------------------
Conjuration |Creation|
Level:???
Components: V, S
Range: Self
Casting Time: 1 round
Duration: Concentration
Saving Throw: None
Spell Resistance: None

As the spell Time Travel, except affecting an area around the caster of up to 100ft per level.

Verbal component is a specific song which must be learned. This song may be played on a musical instrument instead of sung if so desired.

===============================================

Manipulate Time
------------------
Conjuration |Creation|
Level:???
Components: V, S
Range: Unlimited (single plane)
Casting Time: ???
Duration: Permanent
Saving Throw: None
Spell Resistance: None

As the spell Manipulate Local Time, except the phoenix is able to cast it at an unlimited distance, and with an unlimited area. Casting it to engulf the entire plane will cause the flow of time to differ only in comparison to other planes.

Verbal component is a specific song which must be learned. This song may be played on a musical instrument instead of sung if so desired.





Question marks indicate areas I'm really not sure about.

Comments? Comming up next: Fire Phoenix, which work with space in the same way a Wind Phoenix works with time.

I think I may have to add some custom rules dealing with dragons to make it so dragons can possibly withstand these guys... something like dragons of equivelent age level can unravel/be immune to any "special" work caused by a phoenix...

 

[Andrew D. Gable]

River

I just got this. A River Phoenix.

That said, this is very very vaguely reminiscent of my ideas on phoenixes, giving them a dragon-like age table. There's also an enmity IMC between phoenixes and dragons, although there it's due to the phoenixes having been actually used as weapons and fighting against the dragons.