What monsters would you reall like to play?

[Felon]

Every since Savage Species came out, I've been fascinated with the idea of playing a monstrous adventurer. I even ran a campaign for a couple of years with a lot of monstrous PC's.

The biggest problem for me is that monster classes aren't OGL, and support from WotC has been spotty at best. Libris Mortis offered some undead monstrous classes, but there was no such attempt for Lords of Madness so I have to wonder if we can expect such content in the upcoming fiends books. For a very brief time Paizo was committing to providing one new playable race a month with their Winning Races articles, which provided a spark of hope, but that line of articles was dropped.

I've been considering writing up some new monstrous classes and perhaps submitting them to Paizo (don't know if there's any real interest) or even posting them on a web page. Of those of you out there to whom the idea of playing a monstrous character has appeal, what sort of monster would you be interested in playing? What sort of critter seems like it would make for an intriguing and viable party member?

 

[SpiralBound]

Some type of non-vermin monsterous spider equivalent.
Inspirational source: "Castle Roogna" by Piers Anthony

Just the sheer alien aspect of their mind and body would be cool to explore in terns of a character personality. your body has an exoskeleton, your species lays eggs in great quantities, "child raising" is an odd alien concept, right up their with "mom and dad" as loving parental role models, your senses are very different, your body is totall non-humanoid, you have extra abilities (bite, webs, etc), your prefered diet is somewhat horrific to others (by contrast, most races spend inordinate amounts of time "playing with their food")

 

[Stormrunner]

The only other sympathetic spider-character I can recall offhand was in an old shared-world series called The Dungeon, where the characters are essentially trying to survive/explore/escape from a multi-planar labyrinth. One of the party was a female spider-creature called "Shriek", whom I liked a lot.

As you might guess from my icon, I really like centaurs. Lizardfolk can also be fun, again from the "alien mindset" approach. The RAW tends to treat them like alligators (tough and strong, but slow and stupid) - I prefer to play them like Jurassic Park velociraptors (c.f. the "don't go into the tall grass" scene). Gnolls and merfolk also make my list for similar reasons (study up on real-life hyenas and you see how many opportunities were overlooked in the "standard" gnoll writeup...)

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

A thri-kreen. I have thri-kreen of Athas and love their mindset (except the way they shop). I'd like to play a ranger (not monk!), and I'd avoid fighting with four weapons (I'm not trying to break the system) and would rather go for the five natural attack routine (which is still pretty cool).

 

[demiurge1138]

Thri-kreen, definately. I played one briefly for a one-shot dungeon crawl, and it was a lot of fun. I'd do it again.

Do kenku count as monsters? Probably not for the purposes of this thread, because they have no LA or racial hit dice, but they're also a lot of fun. I think I like them more than halflings for the purposes of "rogue archetype", actually.

Demiurge out.

 

[Pants]

I wanna play a fricken' Gnoll. I don't know why, but I've always liked gnolls, moreso than goblinoids and orcoids.

I'd play a Kenku in a heartbeat.

An ogre mage could be fun too.

 

[elforcelf]

Flumph!

 

[elforcelf]

Gnoll would be my second choice.

 

[Odhanan]

I'm currently playing a horned devil in an APL 12 at the moment, devil which is based on the horned demon of the Compleat Encounter I: Dark Elf Sanctum of Paizo Publishing, and I'm having great fun with it.

I wouldn't want to play orcs, hobgoblins and trolls again. Not because these aren't cool, but because I've done it already and like to try something else.

Playing a celestial would be just as cool to me as a fiend, really. Playing a Doppelganger I always thought was great for the many roleplaying possibilities and changes of pace, but that's a bit of a "classic" in the gaming groups I've been with. I'd like to play some kind of golem sometime (besides warforged I mean). Playing an illithid would be great too.

But as I'm playing a devil now, I'm thinking my next character will be more straightforward, archetypal. I'd probably play a straight fighter, cleric, knight or beguiler, depending on the inclination of the group.

 

[Odhanan]

What sort of critter seems like it would make for an intriguing and viable party member?

Oops. I haven't seen that question. I have two sets of critters based on:
1/ how the character appeals to me
2/ how it completes the group of PCs

I like active characters, not really passive ones. Which makes me like focussed character classes and types, like fighters and wizards, rather than say, bards and rogues.

If I select a monstrous character, this will have to be a monstrous race that is good at something in the game, not just flavorful, even though this is a requirement. And this monstrous type good-at-something character will complete the group, filling the slot we'd think is lacking for the PCs party to survive.

That's how I selected my present character. Most of the characters in the PCs group aren't particularly focussed but for a Totem Warrior specialized in ranged combat, very strong skill monkeys/rogue types (assassin and unfettered) and descent spellcasters (mage blade and winter witch). To complete the group, I could choose to be an excellent spellcaster (magister or wizard for the most adaptability) or an excellent power attack/hit points tank (to help the unfettered and rogue in melee combat). I created at first a tiefling magister, and changed at the last minute for the power-attacking tank in the form of the horned devil. That was fitting my thirst for an active tactical role in the game and a more free-style role-playing. The RP elements were plugged-in to that concept and for the moment this is working out perfectly.