Help Me With My Harpy Template!

[VirgilCaine]

I had the idea to make a Harpy template that changed birds into harpy-esque blends of humanoid form and the natural bird form.
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Harpy Template
by VirgilCaine

The magical tampering that produces these horrible creations usually gives them surly, bitter dispositions. Exceptions are possible, however.

This is a template that can be applied to any avian creature of the Beast or Animal types, hereafter referred to as the "base creature." Its type changes to "Monstrous Humanoid."

HD: +2 HD (Monstrous Humanoid Hit Die)
Size: Increase one size.
Speed: As base.
AC: As base creature.
Attacks: As base creature.
Special Attacks:
Captivating Song: The base creature gains the "captivating song" ability of the harpy, except that the range in 20' per Hit Die, and the DC is Charisma based (10 + Charisma modifier + Hit Die = DC).
Special Qualities: Gains the ability to speak in Common, plus one other language per point of Intelligence bonus.

Skills: Perform +4 *
Feats: As base creature.
Saves: As base creature.
Abilities: +6 Intelligence, or the base creatures Intelligence score, whichever is higher, +4 Cha

Climate/Terrain: As base creature.
Organization: As base creature.
CR: +3
Treasure: As base creature.
AL: Usually Chaotic Evil
Advancement: As base creature.

* This is a racial bonus to Perform checks.


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I am thinking about adding various effects, not just captivation--like a Dove-Harpy would have a "Calm Emotions" type song, or you could have a stunning or damage-dealing song or a nauseating song. I also don't know how you would determine which powers for which creatures...

Problems? Comments? Concerns? Ideas?

 

[EldonG]

I had the idea to make a Harpy template that changed birds into harpy-esque blends of humanoid form and the natural bird form.
______________________________________________________
Harpy Template
by VirgilCaine

The magical tampering that produces these horrible creations usually gives them surly, bitter dispositions. Exceptions are possible, however.

This is a template that can be applied to any avian creature of the Beast or Animal types, hereafter referred to as the "base creature." Its type changes to "Monstrous Humanoid."

HD: As base creature.
Size: Increase one size.
Speed: As base.
AC: As base creature.
Attacks: As base creature.
Special Attacks:
Captivating Song: The base creature gains the "captivating song" ability of the harpy, except that the range in 20' per Hit Die, and the DC is Charisma based (10 + Charisma modifier + Hit Die = DC).
Special Qualities: Gains the ability to speak in Common, plus one other language per point of Intelligence modifier.

Skills: Perform +4 *
Feats: As base creature.
Saves: As base creature.
Abilities: +2 Cha

Climate/Terrain: As base creature.
Organization: As base creature.
CR: +2
Treasure: As base creature.
AL: Usually Chaotic Evil
Advancement: As base creature.

* This is an inherent bonus.


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I am thinking about adding various effects, not just captivation--like a Dove-Harpy would have a "Calm Emotions" type song, or you could have a stunning or damage-dealing song or a nauseating song. I also don't know how you would determine which powers for which creatures...

Problems? Comments? Concerns? Ideas?

It looks like an interesting idea...I do have one question. Why the size increase? Harpies are med size, right?

I'll be interested in seeing how it turns out!

 

[VirgilCaine]

It's just hard for me to think of a Tiny sized Harpy-esqe Dove or Pigeon Harpy, I guess.

 

[robjh]

I had the idea to make a Harpy template that changed birds into harpy-esque blends of humanoid form and the natural bird form.
______________________________________________________
Harpy Template
Special Qualities: Gains the ability to speak in Common, plus one other language per point of Intelligence bonus.
Abilities: +2 Cha
Problems? Comments? Concerns? Ideas?

It's a nice idea. The one problem I see is that most animals have an intelligence of 2, whereas a Harpy is 7. Probably most Beasts have a modest Int as well, although I haven't checked them all. But you'd have to worry about the case where a beast has a relatively high Int, so you probably couldn't just do a +5 Int, for example. Perhaps say: +5 Int only if base creature is Int 2 or less.

Just a suggestion anyway.

 

[VirgilCaine]

When I get a chance (e.g. in a few days to a week), I'll have to work on the alternate song rules.
This template just seems too bland. Right now, it's not universal enough to make any creature interesting, like the Two-Headed or Multiheaded or the Animental templates, and doesn't have any pizazz...

 

[Knight Otu]

Virgil, you want the template to use non-revised rules as far as I see?

I agree with robjh, give a bonus to Intelligence, or maybe a fixed Int Score (7 or the base creature's Int, whichever is higher). You might also want to up the Charisma bonus - most animals have a Charisma of 6 or less.

The bonus to Perform checks might be better if it was racial, but that is mostly semantics.

To go along with the size increase, how about an increase in Hit Dice, say +4 (4 HD for those creatures with 1/2 or fewer HDs)?

 

[VirgilCaine]

This is what I was looking for...

Virgil, you want the template to use non-revised rules as far as I see?

What have I done that should be done differently?

Racial is what I meant. Doh!

To go along with the size increase, how about an increase in Hit Dice, say +4 (4 HD for those creatures with 1/2 or fewer HDs)?

I dunno...I wanted to keep it pretty low CR. Maybe 2-3 HD increase?

I have incorporated the suggested changes. Thanks for the help so far.

 

[Knight Otu]

What have I done that should be done differently?

In the revised rules, the beast type no longer exists. Most beasts became magical beasts, others became animals. The roc, for example, became an animal.
Templates also often use the Augmented subtype to note that a creature has a new type, but uses the features (save and base attack progressions, for exmaple) of the old type. Other templates change these features and do not use the augmented subtype.

AC: As base creature.

That should propably be adjusted for the new size.

Captivating Song: The base creature gains the "captivating song" ability of the harpy, except that the range in 20' per Hit Die, and the DC is Charisma based (10 + Charisma modifier + Hit Die = DC).

The normal formula for the DC of Supernatural abilties is 10 + Ability modifier (Cha, in this case) +1/2 Hit Dice. You could, however, add a racial bonus to the DC, or give the feat Ability Focus (Song) as a bonus feat, increasing the DC by 2.

I am thinking about adding various effects, not just captivation--like a Dove-Harpy would have a "Calm Emotions" type song, or you could have a stunning or damage-dealing song or a nauseating song. I also don't know how you would determine which powers for which creatures...

I like the idea of having multiple types of song abilities. In some cases, you might also have a more powerful ability that notes "This song ability increases the Harpy's CR by a further +1."
On the other hand, I would not worry about creating a system to determine which harpy gets which song. Just mention to use the one that fits best to the perceived nature of the bird, and you should be save.

 

[the Jester]

This is another really cool one that I found while working on the index...

Virgil, have you ever done anything with alternate songs for this template? Did you ever work on it again?

I like it!