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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Willie the Duck" data-source="post: 8638602" data-attributes="member: 6799660">My group has had (over almost 40 years and massively multiple editions) characters who have become lycanthropes, vampires, liches, talking skeletons (misworded wish to get back ally turned undead), sentient animals (reincarnation), a displacer beast, a frail caster permanently taken over a muscle bound enemy's body using magic jar, and IIRC a treent character who met their demise in a sawmill becoming a sentient sailing vessel. I would have no issue with a character picking up (non-game-breaking) powers as the story presents itself.That said, none of this has changed or been affected by the new books using 'spell-like abilities.' I agree with Umbran that these are gaming conventions and you have to decide on a case by case basis what they represent and how one might obtain those abilities.Yeah. In my mind, those are spell-casters, and there's already multiple PC-facing methods for picking up spellcasting -- classes, feats, archetype choices, etc. I don't know if the new implementation moving even more away from PC-monster symmetry will be an improvement or not, but I get the reasoning and in my mind a MM mage is still a mage, etc.'Run into a mage and decide to start learning magic' is more consistent, but I'd say that  biological abilities makes for a more interesting story. Think about all the superhero origins that come from 'ran into a _____ and gained ____-like powers' (or, as mentioned in the She-Hulk thread, get a blood transfusion).The #1 thing I think Boons have going for them is that they are explicitly at the DM's discretion*. That makes it easier to say no to that one spell that will be disruptive but yes to the other spell (maybe of the same level and class list) that is just plain fun and in no way disruptive.*yes, all things are DM-gated in theory.There was a PrC like that at the cusp of 3.0 and 3.5 (Illithid Savant, from Savage Species). I think the issue with such codification was that not all abilities are equal in power, so the effort to balance such a class is pretty much impossible (especially the instant your DM uses any third-party monsters).</blockquote>

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