Special Conversion Thread: Lycanthropes and their ilk

[Cleon]

Sounds good on the physical ability scores. I await your write up!

Let's see…

Abilities: A weredragon's mental ability scores improve according to its kind. These adjustments are equal to the base dragon's normal ability scores –10 or –11 or +2 Intelligence, +2 Wisdom and +2 Charisma, whichever is higher.

When it assumes dragon form, a weredragon's physical ability scores also improve. The base adjustments are equal to the base dragon's wyrmling ability scores –10 or –11 plus, if the dragon form is larger than the base creature, the weredragon's Strength and Constitution increase according to the Table: Changes to Statistics by Size. If the ability improvement would be less than +8 Strength and +2 Constitution, the weredragon gains those adjustments instead. A weredragon in hybrid form modifies its physical ability scores by the same amount.

Table: Changes to Statistics by Size

Base Creature Size​	Size of Dragon & Hybrid Form​	Strength​	Constitution
Fine	Diminutive​	Same​	Same​
Diminutive	Tiny​	+2​	Same​
Tiny	Small​	+4​	+2​
Small	Medium​	+4​	+4​
Medium	Large​	+8​	+4​
Large	Huge​	+8​	+4​
Huge	Gargantuan​	+8​	+4​
Gargantuan	Colossal​	+8​	+4​

Repeat the adjustment if the creature moves up more than one size.

In addition, a weredragon may also gain ability scores increases by virtue of its extra Hit Dice.

 

[freyar]

That table's the usual monster advancement table in the SRD, right? Why not just refer to that? But I can go for this. It's a reasonable approach.

Shall we take a similar approach to AC?

 

[Cleon]

That table's the usual monster advancement table in the SRD, right? Why not just refer to that?

If we just used that table the Weredragon would get a Dexterity and natural armour adjustment from it too, while we're just applying the Strength- and Constitution adjustments.

Shall we take a similar approach to AC?

I'd like to run a couple of thought-experiments for sample humanoid and giant weredragons before deciding that.

A size-based progression would likely end up with the larger sizes having WAY lower ACs than the equivalent sized True Dragon unless we artificially inflate the size adjustment to AC, but that risks creating the reverse problem of making the little weredragons have too high an AC.

 

[freyar]

Hmmm, we could say just to use the Con and Str adjustments from the SRD table to save room. But ok.

Actually, before moving on to AC/NA: I'm not clear what the above text means for ability scores when the weredragon has advanced by dragon HD to a new age category. Just the ability bonus from adding HD, or do we also adjust again on that table for the new size? We should be clear.

 

[Cleon]

Hmmm, we could say just to use the Con and Str adjustments from the SRD table to save room. But ok.

Updating the Weredragon (True Drakanthrope) Working Draft.

Actually, before moving on to AC/NA: I'm not clear what the above text means for ability scores when the weredragon has advanced by dragon HD to a new age category. Just the ability bonus from adding HD, or do we also adjust again on that table for the new size? We should be clear.

Well that's one reason I wanted to run some test cases before we sign off on this section.

The current rough draft just copies the Lycanthrope template's "may also gain ability scores increases by virtue of its extra Hit Dice".

If we have ability scores based on age categories we'll want to drop that, although I still think we might want to add some sort of size adjustment.

As mentioned previously, my main worry is Giant Weredragons would get extreme stats if we used the standard stat -10/-11 approach:

Human* Wyrmling Red Weredragon: Str 21**, Dex 11, Con 16, Int 12, Wis 11, Cha 10
Human* Adult Red Weredragon: Str 24, Dex 11, Con 22, Int 16, Wis 17, Cha 14
Human* Great Wyrm Red Weredragon: Str 47, Dex 11, Con 32, Int 26, Wis 25, Cha 24

Fire Giant Wyrmling Red Weredragon: Str 39**, Dex 9, Con 27, Int 12, Wis 16, Cha 13
Fire Giant Adult Red Weredragon: Str 53, Dex 9, Con 31, Int 16, Wis 23, Cha 17
Fire Giant Great Wyrm Red Weredragon: Str 65, Dex 9, Con 41, Int 26, Wis 31, Cha 27

*Uses standard Human Warrior base abilities of Str 13, Dex 11, Con 12, Int 10, Wis 9, Cha 8.
*Uses Weredragon's minimum +8 Strength adjustment instead of Wyrmling Red Dragon's +6 adjustment.

Hmm, perhaps we could use the Lycanthrope template's -10/11 approach but place a cap on the age category equal derived from the base dragon's Level Adjustment?

For example, a Black Dragon has Level Adjustment: Wyrmling +3; very young +3; young +3; juvenile +4; others — meaning a Black Dragon PC cannot advance beyond Juvenile.

So perhaps a Black Weredragon's base dragon can only go up to Juvenile as well. A Juvenile Black Dragon is Str 17, Dex 10, Con 15, Int 10, Wis 11, Cha 10, giving the Drakanthrope ability modifiers of Str +8*, Dex +0, Don +4, Int +2*, Wis +2*, Cha +2* allowing for the Weredragon template's minimums.

Compariwise, a Gold Dragon has LA Wyrmling +4; very young +5; young +6; others — and a Young Gold Dragon is Str 25, Dex 10, Con 17, Int 16, Wis 17, Cha 16, so a Gold Weredragon would top off at Str +14, Dex +0, Con +6, Int +6, Wis +6, Cha +6 if we adopt that approach.

 

[freyar]

And the other simple alternative would be +1 to one score per 4 HD advanced, which is roughly 1 per 2 age categories. That doesn't really seem enough, do you think?

So I'm happy enough to go with your suggestion: give the racial bonus for the base dragon at the appropriate age category, but allow advancement only for those age categories with a Level Adjustment (other than -). If the character needs to advance beyond that, they can just go via character class.

 

[Cleon]

And the other simple alternative would be +1 to one score per 4 HD advanced, which is roughly 1 per 2 age categories. That doesn't really seem enough, do you think?

That's just standard Advancement which is WAY slower than the base dragon age category advancements. which tend to be around +4 Str and +2 Con per age category.

Furthermore, each age category is usually a 3 HD step rather than 4 HD.

So I'm happy enough to go with your suggestion: give the racial bonus for the base dragon at the appropriate age category, but allow advancement only for those age categories with a Level Adjustment (other than -). If the character needs to advance beyond that, they can just go via character class.

Y'okay, let's go for that.

Let's see, what changes do we need to make…

Creating a Weredragon
"Weredragon" is a template that can be added to any humanoid or giant (referred to hereafter as the base creature). Becoming a drakanthrope is very much like multiclassing as a dragon and gaining the appropriate Hit Dice.

The weredragon takes on the characteristics of some type of creature of the dragon type (referred to hereafter as the base dragon). The base dragon must be a true dragon with a Level Adjustment. Drakanthropes based on normal monster dragons such as dragon turtles or wyverns use the Weredrake template instead.

All age categories with Level Adjustments are possible (e.g. a Red weredragon can use a Wyrmling (+4 LA), Very Young (+5 LA) or Young (+6 LA) Red Dragon as the base dragon, but not a juvenile or older Red Dragon. The vast majority of weredragons use wyrmling as the base dragon.

Size and Type: The base creature's type does not change, but the creature gains the shapechanger subtype plus any subtypes possessed by the base dragon.

The base creature must be within one size category of any size that the dragon can grow to, including sizes of age categories without Level Adjustments that cannot be used as the base dragon. For example, copper weredragons can be from Diminutive to Colossal in size, ranging from one size smaller than the Tiny copper wyrmling up to one size bigger than a Gargantuan wyrm or great wyrm copper dragon.​

We'll need to cut out a lot of references to "wyrmling" in the remaining text but it should be fairly straightforward.

Hopefully.

 

[freyar]

Yeah, I did mean that the other alternative was standard, which didn't seem appropriate. So this is the better choice.

For base creature size, would the ability adjustments work better if they need to be within a size category of the age category of the base dragon that they're using?

 

[Cleon]

Yeah, I did mean that the other alternative was standard, which didn't seem appropriate. So this is the better choice.

So we're OK with the "Creating a Weredragon" text but the Size & Type is still under review.

For base creature size, would the ability adjustments work better if they need to be within a size category of the age category of the base dragon that they're using?

The problem is that would drastically restrict what base creature options are possible.

If the Wyrmling it Tiny, then only Diminutive to Small humanoids and giants would be legal, meaning that a basic weredragon would have to be a halfling, gnome or the like.

I'd want standard Medium sized Humanoid weredragons (humans, half-orcs, elves etc) to use Wyrmling be default, and would prefer it to be an option for Giant weredragons.

Let's see, of the standard dragons with Level Adjustment, we've got the following sizes and LAs:

Tiny:
Black Wyrmling (+3);
Brass Wyrmling (+2);
Copper Wyrmling (+2);
White Wyrmling (+2).
Small:
Black Very Young (+3);
Blue Wyrmling (+4);
Brass Very Young (+3);
Bronze Wyrmling (+4);
Copper Very Young (+3);
Green Wyrmling (+5);
Silver Wyrmling (+4);
White Very Young (+3).
Medium:
Black Young (+3) & Juvenile (+4);
Blue Very Young (+4) & Young (+5);
Brass Young (+4) & Juvenile (+4);
Bronze Very Young (+4) & Young (+6);
Copper Young (+4) & Juvenile (+4);
Gold Wyrmling (+4);
Green Very Young (+5) & Young (+5);
Red Wyrmling (+4);
Silver Very Young (+4) & Young (+5);
White Young (+3) & Juvenile (+5).
Large:
Gold Very Young (+5) & Young (+6);
Green Young (+6);
Red Very Young (+5) & Young (+6).

If the "must be within 1 size" rule applied a Human could not be a Black, Brass, Copper or White Wyrmling Weredragons because all those dragons are Tiny, while at the other end a Cloud Giant or Storm Giant could only be a Gold, Green or Red dragon because those are the only Large base dragons with LAs.

So I think we're better either allowing either any size category the dragon can occupy OR within 1 size category the dragon can occupy.

Standard dragons go from Tiny to Gargantuan (little dragons), Small to Colossal (average dragons) and Medium to Colossal (big dragons), so if we use the within 1 step rule to those ranges it allows for, say, a Halfling Gold Weredragon (Small humanoid & Medium dragon) but if only the dragon size range applied a Halfling Weredragon would be impossible.

 

[freyar]

Sorry, I may have been getting confused about our proposal before. Or else I am now.

I am pretty happy with what you have in post 1397. But I still think I'd prefer the base dragon (including appropriate age category) to be within one size category of the base creature. I'm not too worried about wyrmling vs very young as long as we deal with CR appropriately. And there are still base dragons that work for all the SRD humanoids and giants. I'm not sure how to work the numbers quite otherwise.