Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Grim Hollow Campaign Guide - 3rd Party Review
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Sparky McDibben" data-source="post: 9131041" data-attributes="member: 7041430"><p>Alright friends, back again! Science experiment isn't going well, but I plan to bribe the teacher anyway, so it's all good.</p><p></p><p>Moving on to chapter 5: Transformations!! This is the real promise of this book for me: how do you offer lichdom, vampirehood, or lycanthropy as an option for your players? </p><p></p><p>Well, basically you do it as a weird prestige class from 3.5. </p><p></p><p>See, in <em>Grim Hollow,</em> you have six basic types of transformations. You can become an aberrant horror, a fiend, a lich, a lycanthrope, a seraph (angel), or a vampire. Each one has its own set of initial prerequisites; the vampire one says you have to have fallen victim to the Sanguine Curse and gives a number of options on how that could have happened. This is good work; it builds in flexibility so a DM doesn't have to railroad a player into making their arc happen. </p><p></p><p>Each transformation has 4 levels, and each has various triggers that could advance the transformation along it. This is also good - by not making it feat-dependent or based on class levels, you don't deter or sidetrack their class progression. However, this also means these characters will be by nature much harder to kill than standard characters! Offering these options means some degree of power creep is inevitable. </p><p></p><p>Examples of what could advance a transformation might be "killing or corrupting a Seraph (angel)" for the fiend transformation, or "acquiring the strength to give birth to a more powerful version of yourself, which then consumes your old self" for the aberrant transformation. So there are some really off-beat ideas given here, which I appreciate because I can come up with the baseline level stuff on my own. Good work!</p><p></p><p>So, each transformation gives you boons and flaws. Each level of the transformation gives you access to more boons, but each one comes with a sharper flaw. At the first (transformation) level, you get all the boons associated with that level, and the flaw. For each subsequent level, you get one boon, and one flaw. This lets the designers give you the essential toolkit for <em>being </em>that monster right up front. For example, the lycanthrope one gives you a hybrid form, and a boost to your Strength and Constitution scores, but you also get a powerful lust for the hunt. Past that, it's basically gravy! Except you also get much nastier flaws. That lycanthrope transformation, for example, includes vulnerability to silver weapons at transformation level 2, disadvantage to all Intelligence checks at transformation level 3, and some <em>insane</em> impulse control issues at transformation level 4. </p><p></p><p>So what do you get for all that? </p><p></p><p>Well, let's stay with the lycanthropes for a minute. At transformation level 2, you can choose to gain resistance to non-silver, non-magical weapon damage while in your hybrid form, or <em>hunter's mark</em> (reflavored, but it's <em>hunter's mark</em>) Str mod times per long rest while in hybrid form, or the ability to turn into a specific kind of animal form. And if you're thinking, "Wow, those all sound like class abilities!" Well, then, good sir or madam, you are quite correct!! </p><p></p><p>This trend continues onwards with the next levels of that specific transformation, but the general theme is that each boon past level 1 are mostly repackaged class abilities or feat benefits. This is both good, in the sense that the designers have not risked destroying game balance, but bad, in the sense that optimizers may have a ton of new ways to get that shiny new doodad that makes their build work. </p><p></p><p>Now, some of these abilities <em>are</em> actually nuts. For example, the lich transformation has one where you can concentrate on two spells at once for the cost of a level of exhaustion. It also has one where all undead you create are permanently under your control. I know which one I'm picking! (It's the undead one; I'm a sucker for <em>Army of Darkness</em>). </p><p></p><p>But for most of them, the boons after transformation level 1 aren't offering enough to offset the increased flaw. So I could totally see a player getting to vampire level 1, and just parking it there to avoid the problems later levels will cause. That's probably a niche case, though, and honestly what they've accomplished here is impressive enough all on its own. </p><p></p><p>This is probably the high point of the book for me! When we get back, we'll discuss Chapter 6: Advanced Backgrounds!</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Sparky McDibben, post: 9131041, member: 7041430"] Alright friends, back again! Science experiment isn't going well, but I plan to bribe the teacher anyway, so it's all good. Moving on to chapter 5: Transformations!! This is the real promise of this book for me: how do you offer lichdom, vampirehood, or lycanthropy as an option for your players? Well, basically you do it as a weird prestige class from 3.5. See, in [I]Grim Hollow,[/I] you have six basic types of transformations. You can become an aberrant horror, a fiend, a lich, a lycanthrope, a seraph (angel), or a vampire. Each one has its own set of initial prerequisites; the vampire one says you have to have fallen victim to the Sanguine Curse and gives a number of options on how that could have happened. This is good work; it builds in flexibility so a DM doesn't have to railroad a player into making their arc happen. Each transformation has 4 levels, and each has various triggers that could advance the transformation along it. This is also good - by not making it feat-dependent or based on class levels, you don't deter or sidetrack their class progression. However, this also means these characters will be by nature much harder to kill than standard characters! Offering these options means some degree of power creep is inevitable. Examples of what could advance a transformation might be "killing or corrupting a Seraph (angel)" for the fiend transformation, or "acquiring the strength to give birth to a more powerful version of yourself, which then consumes your old self" for the aberrant transformation. So there are some really off-beat ideas given here, which I appreciate because I can come up with the baseline level stuff on my own. Good work! So, each transformation gives you boons and flaws. Each level of the transformation gives you access to more boons, but each one comes with a sharper flaw. At the first (transformation) level, you get all the boons associated with that level, and the flaw. For each subsequent level, you get one boon, and one flaw. This lets the designers give you the essential toolkit for [I]being [/I]that monster right up front. For example, the lycanthrope one gives you a hybrid form, and a boost to your Strength and Constitution scores, but you also get a powerful lust for the hunt. Past that, it's basically gravy! Except you also get much nastier flaws. That lycanthrope transformation, for example, includes vulnerability to silver weapons at transformation level 2, disadvantage to all Intelligence checks at transformation level 3, and some [I]insane[/I] impulse control issues at transformation level 4. So what do you get for all that? Well, let's stay with the lycanthropes for a minute. At transformation level 2, you can choose to gain resistance to non-silver, non-magical weapon damage while in your hybrid form, or [I]hunter's mark[/I] (reflavored, but it's [I]hunter's mark[/I]) Str mod times per long rest while in hybrid form, or the ability to turn into a specific kind of animal form. And if you're thinking, "Wow, those all sound like class abilities!" Well, then, good sir or madam, you are quite correct!! This trend continues onwards with the next levels of that specific transformation, but the general theme is that each boon past level 1 are mostly repackaged class abilities or feat benefits. This is both good, in the sense that the designers have not risked destroying game balance, but bad, in the sense that optimizers may have a ton of new ways to get that shiny new doodad that makes their build work. Now, some of these abilities [I]are[/I] actually nuts. For example, the lich transformation has one where you can concentrate on two spells at once for the cost of a level of exhaustion. It also has one where all undead you create are permanently under your control. I know which one I'm picking! (It's the undead one; I'm a sucker for [I]Army of Darkness[/I]). But for most of them, the boons after transformation level 1 aren't offering enough to offset the increased flaw. So I could totally see a player getting to vampire level 1, and just parking it there to avoid the problems later levels will cause. That's probably a niche case, though, and honestly what they've accomplished here is impressive enough all on its own. This is probably the high point of the book for me! When we get back, we'll discuss Chapter 6: Advanced Backgrounds! [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Grim Hollow Campaign Guide - 3rd Party Review
Top