The main thing that I want out of any PC monster book is to not water down the monsters. There's a tendency to trim away monster abilities and scale everything down so they're tightly balanced and playable from 1st level, in the process taking away most of what makes the monster what it is, and it drives me nuts. Monster PCs should be treated as an advanced option with a little more leeway on balance, playable only at higher levels, and with appropriate "Use at your own risk!" warnings to DMs.
I think the place to start is with 3E. For all the bellyaching about ECL and level adjustments, 3E was actually a very good edition for monster PCs. The idea was sound: Assign a rough level equivalent to the monster, and then treat the monster as a class and use the multiclassing rules for advancement. Since 5E is going to use 3E-style multiclassing, this is a workable starting point, though it needs to be streamlined a bit and 3E's level adjustments were usually on the high side. Then there are two main issues to consider: Making sure multiclassing works with the monster "class," and how to handle powerful but non-scaling monster abilities.
Multiclassing and the Monster "Class"
A big part of the problem with 3E's ECL approach was simply that 3E multiclassing didn't work very well. In the areas where 3E multiclassing did work (namely, warrior-type classes that could stack hit points and BAB), you could build a pretty solid monster PC; a 3rd-level ogre fighter was roughly comparable to a 9th-level human fighter. But a 3rd-level satyr sorceror was far behind a 10th-level human sorceror, for the same reason that a 7th-level rogue/3rd-level sorceror was: Multiclassing didn't work for classes with non-stacking abilities. WotC used prestige classes to patch things for the rogue/sorceror, but there was no such patch for monsters.
Ideally, 5E would come up with a brilliant solution for multiclassing that would obviate this problem. However, from the sound of it, they're falling back on a 3E-style solution where you use a specialized subclass to make multiclassing work. Whether these subclasses will be compatible with monster "classes" is anyone's guess, but I hope they will give it a little consideration. (Not a lot, the focus should be on making multiclassing work for regular characters, but a little.)
Non-Scaling Monster Abilities
Let's consider the 3E pixie, a monster with an array of powerful abilities; permanent invisibility, a sleep attack, and a bunch of mid-level spells usable once per day. It has a +4 level adjustment, and well it should, you might think. Certainly a 3rd-level pixie is going to be quite competitive with a 7th-level human.
But wait a minute. How does a 16th-level pixie compare with a 20th-level human? The answer is "not well." By that point, effectively-permanent invisibility is easy to come by, the party wizard is casting mid-level spells to shave in the morning, and sleep attacks are a waste of time on most of the things you fight. Because the pixie's abilities don't scale, they become less and less of a factor, and eventually cease to justify the high LA.
When you get down to it, this is really just another version of the multiclassing problem. Just as the sorceror is a "non-stackable" class, the pixie is a "non-stackable" monster. To make this work, the pixie needs a PC writeup that improves its abilities as it levels up, so they continue to justify the levels sunk into Being A Pixie.
I think 5E shows a lot of promise where monster PCs are concerned. The pieces are in place to make it work very well. It's just a question of being willing to do it. I don't think they should aim to support monster PCs on release, however; save it for when they've got time to bang on it a bit and get it right.
I think the place to start is with 3E. For all the bellyaching about ECL and level adjustments, 3E was actually a very good edition for monster PCs. The idea was sound: Assign a rough level equivalent to the monster, and then treat the monster as a class and use the multiclassing rules for advancement. Since 5E is going to use 3E-style multiclassing, this is a workable starting point, though it needs to be streamlined a bit and 3E's level adjustments were usually on the high side. Then there are two main issues to consider: Making sure multiclassing works with the monster "class," and how to handle powerful but non-scaling monster abilities.
Multiclassing and the Monster "Class"
A big part of the problem with 3E's ECL approach was simply that 3E multiclassing didn't work very well. In the areas where 3E multiclassing did work (namely, warrior-type classes that could stack hit points and BAB), you could build a pretty solid monster PC; a 3rd-level ogre fighter was roughly comparable to a 9th-level human fighter. But a 3rd-level satyr sorceror was far behind a 10th-level human sorceror, for the same reason that a 7th-level rogue/3rd-level sorceror was: Multiclassing didn't work for classes with non-stacking abilities. WotC used prestige classes to patch things for the rogue/sorceror, but there was no such patch for monsters.
Ideally, 5E would come up with a brilliant solution for multiclassing that would obviate this problem. However, from the sound of it, they're falling back on a 3E-style solution where you use a specialized subclass to make multiclassing work. Whether these subclasses will be compatible with monster "classes" is anyone's guess, but I hope they will give it a little consideration. (Not a lot, the focus should be on making multiclassing work for regular characters, but a little.)
Non-Scaling Monster Abilities
Let's consider the 3E pixie, a monster with an array of powerful abilities; permanent invisibility, a sleep attack, and a bunch of mid-level spells usable once per day. It has a +4 level adjustment, and well it should, you might think. Certainly a 3rd-level pixie is going to be quite competitive with a 7th-level human.
But wait a minute. How does a 16th-level pixie compare with a 20th-level human? The answer is "not well." By that point, effectively-permanent invisibility is easy to come by, the party wizard is casting mid-level spells to shave in the morning, and sleep attacks are a waste of time on most of the things you fight. Because the pixie's abilities don't scale, they become less and less of a factor, and eventually cease to justify the high LA.
When you get down to it, this is really just another version of the multiclassing problem. Just as the sorceror is a "non-stackable" class, the pixie is a "non-stackable" monster. To make this work, the pixie needs a PC writeup that improves its abilities as it levels up, so they continue to justify the levels sunk into Being A Pixie.
I think 5E shows a lot of promise where monster PCs are concerned. The pieces are in place to make it work very well. It's just a question of being willing to do it. I don't think they should aim to support monster PCs on release, however; save it for when they've got time to bang on it a bit and get it right.
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