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#1 necrohem Apr 18, 2007 17:21:49

Hello Everyone, The turn undead rules issue has been a problem for a long time. My gaming group has had a large focus on undead encounters lately, and we decided that a functional and balanced rules revision was in order. After a few months of ideas and testing we have come up with this house rule to turning and rebuking undead. Not all of these ideas by themselves are completely original (Turning as damage has been around for a long time), but we believe the full implementation as a whole to be original and usable. We focused on four major ideas when designing these rules: 1) We wanted turning/rebuking to be strong, with each turn attempt pushing an equal challenge rating undead approximately 1/4 of the way to defeat. 2) We wanted Turning/rebuking to work along side of other character's efforts in defeating an undead encounter. 3) We wanted it to be simple and functional. 4) We never wanted turning/rebuking to be completely useless in any situation (although its effectiveness should be allowed to fluctuate). The turning rules as they currently stand require a bit of revision to be more in line with the rest of the game. These are the proposed alterations to the system: First, a few definitions: A cleric who channels positive energy: Turning: A cleric is able to deal damage to undead foes in the form of a burst of positive energy. The cleric makes a turning check. If that check is equal to or greater than the Difficulty Value of the undead, the undead is affected by the turn and takes damage. Undead with turn resistance lower the damage they take by 5 points per point of turn resistance. This is a burst effect with a radius equal to 5 ft. per turning level. Some undead in the area may not be affected. The cleric affects a number of undead equal to his turning check divided by 4, rounded down (minimum 1). The undead with the lowest difficulty values are affected first. The cleric may reduce his turning level to affect a smaller radius and do less damage (As if he was a lower level cleric). A cleric may turn undead 3 + Charisma bonus times per day (Certain feats may increase this amount). Example 1: Edgar, a 7th level cleric with a charisma of 18 is trying to turn a 6th level Vampire with a 14 charisma and 4 turn resistance. Edgar rolls his turning check (1d20 + 4) and scores a 17. The Vampire has a Difficulty Value of (10 + 2 + 4 turn resistance) = 16. Edgar’s turn check beats the vampire’s DC and the Vampire takes 7d6+4 points of positive energy damage, minus 20 for his turn resistance. Example 2: Edgar, from the above example, is now trying to turn an 8HD mummy king and his 7 3HD mummy servants. Edgar rolls his turning check and scores a 14. The mummy king has a DV of 15 and is unaffected, but the servants only have a DV of 13, so they are all subject to the check. Only 3 mummy servants are affected (14 / 4, rounded down is 3) however. Looks like Edgar has some more work to do! Effects that reduce or protect against positive energy damage function against the damage dealt by a turning check. Like all positive energy effects, Incorporeal undead do not enjoy the 50% miss chance against the turning effects. Turning undead is a supernatural ability that provokes and attack of opportunity (Though, unlike a spell, turning may not be disrupted) and is subject to spell resistance (Both are exceptions to the normal rules for supernatural abilities). To overcome a creature’s spell resistance, the cleric must make a caster level check (Caster level equal to Cleric’s turning level). If the cleric fails to overcome the SR of the undead, the undead is unaffected by the turning attempt and is ignored as if it was out of the area of effect when determining the effect of the turn. Turning is treated as a spell of (1/2 cleric’s turning level) for purposes of magic that grants immunity to spells and spell-like effects (However turning is not subject to dispel magic as an instantaneous effect and may not be counterspelled in any way). Adjustments to current abilities: The basic idea is that any ability with currently increases the turn damage increases the number of undead affected instead. Adjust other abilities based on these adjustments below: Greater Turning: Those characters with access to greater turning (such as through the sun domain) perform turn checks as normal, but increase the damage dice to a d12 instead of a d6. They are still limited to their normal uses per day with this ability. Empower Turning: The number of undead affected by the turn is increased by 50%. Glory Domain: Grants 1d6 to damage (or 1d12 in the case of a greater turn) and a +2 on the turning check Exalted Turning: The 3d6 damage from the feat is not increased by a greater turn to 3d12. You may also want to tone this damage down, depending on your campaign. Heighten Turning: Grants a +1 bonus on the turning check for every one less die of damage dealt. Bolster Undead: A cleric may bolster undead, making them resistant to destruction and turning checks. He expends one use of his turning ability and makes a turning check and then gives undead Temporary hit points equal to (2 x Cleric Level). He also grants the undead a profane bonus to its Difficulty Value equal to the cleric’s Charisma Bonus (Minimum 0). The number of undead affected is determined the same as for turning undead. The temporary hit points and profane bonus last for 1 minute per cleric level. Rebuke Undead: Evil clerics are not able to destroy undead as good clerics can, however they can cause undead to become inert for a time. The cleric makes a check just as if he was turning the undead and deals damage as normal, however this rebuke damage is treated very similarly to non-lethal damage (this is a special exception that undead are normally immune to non-lethal damage). If the undead has more rebuke damage than current hit points the undead falls to the ground, and is treated as unconscious. The rebuke damage is removed after 10 minutes per turning level of the cleric at which time the undead becomes conscious and active again. The undead also becomes conscious if it is healed and the amount of rebuke damage no longer exceeds its current hit points. The cleric may also remove the damage at any time as a move action that does not provoke an attack of opportunity as long as the cleric has line of sight to the undead. Negative energy effects that heal undead (Such as inflict spells) also remove an equal amount of rebuke damage, however innate healing effects of the undead (such as fast healing and regeneration) do not remove rebuke damage. Additionally, rebuke damage is especially disruptive to undead and undead with 10 or more points of rebuke damage suffer a -2 penalty to attack rolls. Unconscious undead are still destroyed if they take lethal damage equal to their hit point total (i.e. rebuke damage does not prevent destruction of the undead). Command Undead: After an undead is unconscious due to rebuke damage, a cleric with a turning level greater than or equal to twice the undead’s hit dice may use a swift action to attempt to control the undead. The undead must make a will saving throw vs. the Cleric’s control DC or become permanently bound to the will of the Cleric. If the undead succeeds, the cleric may not try to command that particular undead again until the cleric deals more rebuke damage to the undead (such as by expending an additional rebuke check – See Rebuke Undead, Above) At any one time, the cleric may command undead whose total hit dice do not exceed his level. Optional Rule: Undead affected as a function of power level. It may be desirable to let a cleric affect less higher-power undead and more lower-power undead. This is easily changed through the use of the following chart. Higher power undead will count as more than one creature for the purposes of the turn check; a cleric without enough targets left will be unable to affect certain undead. Add the undead’s turn resistance to his HD for purposes of this chart, and the cleric’s level is actually his turning/rebuking level. Undead’s HD Counts as X Targets Greater than HD of cleric 2 Less than or equal to HD of cleric 1 Less than 1/2 HD of cleric 1/2 Less than 1/4 HD of cleric 1/4 For example: A cleric with a turning level of 10 is trying to turn a room full of undead. There are 8 2HD zombies, 3 4HD zombies, 1 6HD zombie, and a 10HD vampire (with +4 turn resistance). The cleric makes a turning check and rolls a 24. This is high enough to beat the DC value of all undead in the room. A roll of 24 also indicates 6 targets. The 10 2HD zombies count as 2.5 targets total (10 / 4), and are turned first, leaving the cleric with 3.5 targets left. The 3 4HD zombies count as 1.5 targets (3 / 2) total and are turned second, leaving the cleric with 2 targets left. The single 6HD zombie is turned next at a cost of 1 target. The 10HD vampire is the only target left, but counts as 2 targets by himself and is unaffected by the turn as the cleric only had a single target left. Justification and theory behind the rules: Damage was chosen as a simple alternative to causing panic in undead. It has the added bonus of stacking well with party member efforts. This added benefit is scaled back in power as turned undead are still quite functional (as opposed to running around for a minute, or cowering in a corner). The d6 damage comes from an average of 3.5 points vs the undead’s d12 HD which averages 6.5 points. On average, it takes 2d6 damage to ‘destroy’ one HD of undead. The initial turning check creates a base 50/50 chance on average of affecting an undead. This implies that, on average, 4 turn checks would be needed to turn an undead of equivalent power level. Also, turning is never rendered completely useless by an ultra high HD undead (but its overall effectiveness is decreased). Zombies and Skeletons with their previously impossible to turn HD have very low turning difficulty values which means that they are easy to affect with a turn and are also turned before more intelligent undead. Zombies and Skeletons have approximately twice the HD of their CR, which means that a cleric fighting one will have about 1/2 the turning level of the zombie/skeleton. The cleric must still make 4 checks on average to destroy an equal CR skeleton or zombie. The limit on the number of undead turned is to tone down the extreme numbers of undead that could otherwise be obliterated by a high level cleric. The average cleric will have a range of 1 -5 targets turned on any one roll. And undead ‘leaders can easily shield themselves from turning attempts with undead lackeys. This rule, while quick and simple, can be expanded using the optional rule provided to allow for a greater range of undead affected. Rebuke undead was formerly slightly better than turning undead (although destruction could never ensue directly). That is why we added in the attack penalty. It also had to be a status effect easily removed by the cleric for purposes of commanding. This added requirement unfortunately make rebuke damage a little more 'clunky' than we would have liked, but it still works well. Enjoy the rules, Try them out, and please let me know if you think of any better methods/additions to this system. :D --Necrohem and gaming group.