What would be the cost of this magic item?

[Artoomis]

ECL adjustment for reincarnation:

What have you been smoking?

A character reincarnated recalls the majority of his former life and form. He retains his Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma scores, as well as any class abilities or skills he formerly possessed. His class, base attack bonus, base save bonuses, and hit points are unchanged. Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution scores depend partly on his new body. First eliminate the character’s racial adjustments (since he is no longer of his previous race) and then apply the adjustments found below. The character’s level is reduced by 1. (If the character was 1st level, his new Constitution score is reduced by 1.)

Them's the rules. No adjustment of class level(s) except to move down by one.

This does bring up something interesting. If you were a race that had an ECL adjustment, you WILL lose power with reincarnation. You'll lose your racial adjustments that caused the ECL adjustment, but not gain anything it their place. Such is life (and death). Yet another reason not to choose one of those high-powered ECL +1 or higher races.

One more point on reincarnation:

The new incarnation is determined on the following table or by DM choice.

I recommend DM choice, and thus duck around all the problems of getting an owl or a wolverine to play as a PC. While they CAN make effective PCs, it's pretty tough and should only be done by DM chouce (with player input, perhaps), rather than just by random choice.

You don't really want a reincarnated human barbarian to be a Centaur, do you? Or a brown bear?

Unless you CHOOSE for that to happen. It can throw a serious wrench in the works to suddenly grant that much extra power. Or upset a player to suddenly remove his spellcasting ability for good.

 

[kreynolds]

Artoomis, I realize you don't adjust the class levels, except for dropping them by 1. But ECL has nothing to do with class levels. It's a measurement of how powerful you are before class levels are even considered. It would be rediculous not to apply an ECL modifier to someone who was reincarnated from a gnome into a Black Bear.

 

[francom13]

Well reincarnation is a gamble if your not willing to take the risk refuse to accept the spell.

I wanted to continue with my character and all I had for an option was reincarnation for cost reasons.


What I was wondering what would be a good form to be polymorphed into so I can walk into towns without being killed on site and that would give good physical attributes?

And does Polymorphing change your ECL?

-Matt

P.S.
As for ECL all I know is that there is no way in hell a brown bear gives a Mage an ECL of +10. My reasons for this are compare it to the templates that give you huge abilities for an ECL of +4. Look at the Half Dragon templates and others.

Another point would be to place my character against a 13th level character and see who would win.

It would always be the other character. Why?

Because my hitpoints would be "27" if I can use the con from the bear if not "14".

Any one swing could kill me at that level but I could not kill anyone with one swing. DND is all about Balance now and I view it as the DM has to realize when using an ECL race certain classes are weakend not strengthen by it.

 

[Artoomis]

Artoomis, I realize you don't adjust the class levels, except for dropping them by 1. But ECL has nothing to do with class levels. It's a measurement of how powerful you are before class levels are even considered. It would be rediculous not to apply an ECL modifier to someone who was reincarnated from a gnome into a Black Bear.

It would also be ridiculuous to apply ECL adjustments. They work well during character creation, not so well if applied later.

What happens?

A wizard get more str, dex and con and can't cast spells or level up for another 3 or for levels or more? Surely that does not seem right to you. That's quite a penalty for being reincarnated. What is supposed to happen is that the wizard may have to take another class -surely enough of a penalty for reincarnation as to not slap an ECL adjustment on top of that.

I'd say the down-side of being an animal should be enough to off-set any bonuses. Besides - don't let the dice rule your game. CHOOSE what the reincarnation does, limiting your self to humanoids expect for your truly superior players who can really handle running an animal PC. It's pretty tough to suddenly not be able to communicate effectively, and not be able to have interactions with NPCs at all, pretty much.

Actually, for best gaming and least arguments about ECLs and such, I'd say it would be best to only allow ECL 0 characers and control your reincarnations closely. A bit of a trade-off in player choice, but reincarnations play hell with ECLs.

 

[kreynolds]

And does Polymorphing change your ECL?

No. You gain very few abilities from it, i.e. no spell-like or supernatural, and those are usually the really cool ones.

 

[kreynolds]

Actually, for best gaming and least arguments about ECLs and such, I'd say it would be best to only allow ECL 0 characers and control your reincarnations closely. A bit of a trade-off in player choice, but reincarnations play hell with ECLs.

I completely agree with this. However, in the case of a wizard that is reincarnated as a brown bear, you bet your @$$ I'd slap an ECL on him. First of all, it wasn't my decision for him to be reincarnated. He wanted to do it. Secondly, it doesn't matter if he can cast spells or not, as he still gets save increases, ability increases from leveling, keeps his feats (some may suck but some may still be good), keeps his BAB (which does kind of suck but is better than nothing, especially when considering a brown bear), keeps his skill ranks (which can be nice for a brown bear). All of that just further empowers a bear.

What I should probably add is that I would not reincarnate a wizard as a brown bear, simply because that is not appropriate for a wizard, nor would it be any fun for the player, losing all of their spells and all.

 

[Artoomis]

What I should probably add is that I would not reincarnate a wizard as a brown bear, simply because that is not appropriate for a wizard, nor would it be any fun for the player, losing all of their spells and all.

Yep. That's the best answer.