Polymorph Any Object as Ridiculous as it Sounds?

[DreadArchon]

Title. By the description of PAO, you can do things like "I turn myself into a human with 90 in all three physical stats and Dragon Disciple wings. Permanently."

Neither I nor anyone in my group would be dumb enough to try or allow that. I'm not complaining or looking for loopholes. I actually like open-ended DM-discretion spells like that as a general rule, and I want to make sure it actually works like that before I have NPC's use it in my campaign (e.g. a high-level wizard who sells permanent base-race changes, in case Mialee wants to become Liamee without using the rebuild rules).

I'm fairly new at this and my PC's aren't, so I want to make sure I don't get called on this if I plan it as a story mechanic. I'm under the impression that it's rather rude to put one's PC's in a situation where they ought to call the DM on his mistakes.

 

[EyeontheMountain]

Most spells like that change you into an average member of the other race. Going from Conan to an average joe is not fun. But yes, under the most lenient reading of the rules, it is massively powerful.

 

[hong]

As a rule of thumb, don't pull tricks (meaning rules exploits) with your NPCs that you wouldn't want your PCs to emulate. Keeps you out of a lot of trouble.

 

[pawsplay]

"I turn myself into a human with 90 in all three physical stats and Dragon Disciple wings. Permanently."

There has to be such a person to turn into.

 

[Piratecat]

There has to be such a person to turn into.

Because the spell gives you the average stats for a particular race, you'd need a race with absurdly overpowered stats in order to turn into one; you couldn't just turn into "a really strong human."

 

[pawsplay]

Because the spell gives you the average stats for a particular race, you'd need a race with absurdly overpowered stats in order to turn into one; you couldn't just turn into "a really strong human."

Welllll... only shapechange says you can't turn into a unique creature. You could polymoprh yourself into Drizzt.

 

[hong]

You could polymoprh yourself into Drizzt.

BANNED!

 

[pawsplay]

ohnoes!

 

[schporto]

Because the spell gives you the average stats for a particular race, you'd need a race with absurdly overpowered stats in order to turn into one; you couldn't just turn into "a really strong human."

Ugh. No. it doesn't. I swear it used to. I thought it still did. Someone please tell me that it's been erratted. Somewhere. In my game were currently having issues with PaO as it is. I really don't want to add this extra complication.
I mean I'd assume you go to average stats. But - it's not written.
-cpd

 

[Sound of Azure]

Ugh. No. it doesn't. I swear it used to. I thought it still did. Someone please tell me that it's been erratted. Somewhere. In my game were currently having issues with PaO as it is. I really don't want to add this extra complication.
I mean I'd assume you go to average stats. But - it's not written.
-cpd

Isn't that implied by the reference to polymorph? Or has that changed with errata?