Saint Template

[Bizzuga]

Hello all. I'm DMing the Shackled City Adventure Path and I have a player who wants to acquire the Saint Template from the Book of Exalted Deeds (BoED). I don't have any experience with it and I'm looking to see if it is game-breaking or unbalanced.

The player is running a Cleric 9/Kensai 3 and would be eligible to apply the template in 3 levels. He is not looking to power-game and the template makes good sense character-wise. Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks all.

Bizzuga

 

[IcyCool]

Well, first thing I'd do is up the Level Adjustment on the Saint template by a lot. Unless you think the whole "balancing mechanics with role-playing" is a good thing. I think I saw it mentioned here that the Saint template be somewhere between 5-8 LA.

 

[Sejs]

The saint as listed is -very- unbalanced.

I would not allow it as printed. If it's appropriate (and something that has been earned in-game, not just magically applied out of nowhere) then I would suggest working with your player to come up with a toned down version that you're both comfortable with.

 

[Crothian]

Yay, either up the LA or tone down that abilities.

 

[Bizzuga]

Thanks for the advice. As it said in the book, it is an artificially low +2 LA but the immunities and the special abilities really made me worry about it.

Bizzuga

 

[Fieari]

Note that if you use U_K's ECL calculator to objectively determine how powerful it it (sans roleplaying restrictions and prereqs), it comes out to a +10 LA template.

Of course, no one would take a +10 LA template, but the same calculator has a recommendation that seems to work out pretty well. Make half the LA hitdice instead. If the saint template included 5 HD and +5 LA, it would be much more balanced and reasonable for people to take.

I'd say it'd be okay to lower it to a 4 HD +4 LA with the roleplaying restrictions.

 

[IanB]

I'd eyeball it at about a +5, unobjectively. Most LA calculators err too far on the side of level cost, although in the case of the saint you aren't burdened with stuff like incredibly suboptimal levels of giant or humanoid.

+5 is still wide enough that I have a hard time seeing anyone choosing it in a campaign at conventional power levels.

Maybe turning it into a prestige class is actually the best route, though.

 

[moritheil]

The thing is, the roleplay restrictions are meant to be the meat of the matter. It's also really hard to quantify them, since they vary so much by DM.

 

[Quartz]

The Saint template is one of those templates that's very iffy. If you were generating a character that already had the template at the start of play, you might well want to go with the higher LA cost, but during the course of play is a different matter entirely. The thing is that the LA for a Saint isn't equivalent to the LA for a template applied to a 0 XP creature. The Saint template is earned.

But first of all, you need to ask yourself if the character is deserving of the template. Since the character must be truy exemplary, in most cases the answer is, 'No.'

 

[the_mighty_agrippa]

Broken. I've been in a high-powered game with a saint character and NOTHING could stop him.