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| #1ReshySep 27, 2014 13:11:41 | I'm just wondering, but why doesn't Wizards create monster races for all the 'popular' monster classes? I know in 3.0 they had a book called 'Savage Species' which kinda laid out the ground rules for such a thing, but it was pretty much just rules for homebrewing your own monster classes. Not actual monster classes that players could actually play. It seems a point of contention that players want to be able to play monsters. I mean we have classes and spells devoted to this aspect, however they're usually limited in such a way that you can't really get anything meaningful, or way too powerful or versitile. The 3rd edition also had issues with a system called 'Level Adjustment' which crippled most players that would want to play as a monster without adqeuate reason. The system itself never made a lot of sense because either one of two things happened: The DM would outright refuse any monster classes, or the DM will have or waive some of the level adjustment. Either way, a player has to show the DM what they're playing; if the DM thinks it'd be too powerful or wouldn't fit the setting they have full right to veto it. But on the flip side, why not include actual offical WOTC progressions for popular monsters so that there's less issues with for 'legal' it is to play a monster.
The game's still new, and much is still yet to be determined. I think that WOTC should at least consider adding in some monster classes. I'm sure you've run into the player that's wanted to play a dragon before, I know I have. Yet, as we know from 3.5e there's no real good way to do it without relying on homebrew in some manner. An offical solution that doesn't rely on 'build it yourself' features I think would be great. Perhaps a book called 'Savage Champions' or something that has monster classes and a full 20 level progression for said monsters, even above and beyond that of where normal monsters may 'cap out'. They should be reasonably faithful to the actual monster, in my opinion. Because again it comes down to the DM's approval. If the DM doesn't want you to play that you can't really argue with him or her on that matter. So the individual balance seems like it would be less of an issue because you have to get your DM to agree with you to play it. Instead of normal player classes which are generally allowed unless otherwise specificied.
I know that I myself have spent a lot of time making monster classes for homebrew stuff and regularly make new ones on a whim. But of course, my word and what i percieve as balanced differs vastly from what Wizards likely knows about their own system considering they've made it themselves. But what i do know is that there's certainly an opportunity to create books that follow behind the standard monster manual which can add a good amount of content for players if such an option were explored. I know in D&D 3.5e we'd occasionally get such a thing like with the Thri-Kreen Racial Class that did basically what I'm talking about. It was by no means perfect and had a lot of dead levels, but I don't see a reason why WOTC couldn't do something similar for the popular monsters of D&D.
Another advantage of such a system would be better advancement rules for non-dragon monsters. Instead of adding more hit dice, you could potentionally see more abilities and features to play around with as a DM. |
| #2HebitsuikazaSep 27, 2014 14:36:01 | Monster.... class?... So I can be a human Displacer Beast level 6?...
I think maybe you mean monster races, not classes.
Okay, 3.5e handled this by "well, the creature is whatever it says in the monster manual and you start taking classes from that and it has an ECL which is meant to encapsulate how much power your starting stuff is worth in levels." 4E had a pretty standard system for races. I think all races got two +2s attributes, two improved skills and a single racial power. I might be misremembering it, but I think that's about right.
There were issues with each....
Okay, in the case of 3.5e's ECLs there were three issues. The first is the belief that what is presented in the monster manual is really the baseline, untrained version of the race. Like they just have precisely those stats the moment they become an adult without any training. But frankly a lot of the humanoid entries in those books are the level they are in those books not because you need them to be that level in order to accurately represent their physical and mystical advantages conceptually, but simply so that there will be humanoids of all various levels. One could easily represent them at a lower level as one that had just received adulthood and hadn't yet been trained and molded the way the standard soldier in their armies are. The second issue was the fact that the value of the ECL levels was vastly overinflated compared to the abilities one would actually pick up by taking levels. So one would be significantly underpowered compared to a characterof their supposed ECL. The third issue was spellcasting... frankly even if the ECL levels did remotely match up to what levels a character could take, they started with an awful lot of "fighter" levels and even if they started with a number of spells, they couldn't pick up their spell progression from where they were. So races who were conceptually wizards, clerics or psions would not function very well as those things, particularly if they had high ECL.
They then tried to turn the races so that one started off as a level 1 character and had to earn "racial levels" which, because of the above problem, tended to be sparse offering little of value to a progressing character and started characters off far too weak to convey their supposed concept. This was continued in 4E but the gaining racial class levels was removed and instead everyone was made from a base template. With 4E's inflated power of racial entries, it wasn't AS badm but still... The most key issue though was that the amount of power contained in the advantages one gets from being a dwarf or an elf don't do very well to really encapsulate the concept. I don't really buy your level 1 character as an Ogre or a Minotaur when my human fighter level 1 is as strong or stronger than them and has more hit points to boot. And if your character only has one Psionic power for use once an encounter, then I don't know that I buy the character as an Ilithid or Githzerai.
Anyway, various people have been working on Monster racial entries you can find on Enworld for now: |
| #3IllithidbixSep 27, 2014 15:26:51 | Nope Hebitsuikaza in Savage Species (which was in 3E but never updated AFAIK to 3.5E there was the concept of Monster Classes. It turned up again in the 3.5E Libris Mortis.
They were an alternative to using the normal ECL system.
The idea was that the attribute bonuses, abilities and hitdice of the monster were accured over levels, which matched. So you started play as a 1st level ghoul with HD of 1D12, but you were only as powerful as a Monster Manual Ghoul ghoul when you got the 8th level (but only had 4D12 HD)
They did cut down on a little bit of sillyness by stating you couldn't multiclass out of the class until you've finished it. And of course you had to be the relevant race to well... be that class.
As for the question: Time Will Tell. Personally I'm not sure it's really the theme that they want for 5E, which is more going back to basics compared to the thousands of pages of funky stuff that ended up in 3/3.5E, but we'll see. |
| #4TimboramaSep 27, 2014 15:45:20 | This edition could very well do so, and it'd be easy to implement so you could be something like a Deva 4/Paladin 16. Deva class would scale, giving you a basic HD or so, and give you special abilities and maybe ability scores along the way.
But! This edition also wants to try and streamline things to keep them simple...
I really hope they just make a splatbook with nothing but those options. If you don't want it, don't buy it. But I will! |
| #5ReshySep 27, 2014 17:59:52 |
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| #6OraibiSep 27, 2014 18:02:47 | Oh god, I sure hope they don't do monster classes.
D&D isn't a game of playing monsters, it's a game of playing adventurers fighting monsters.
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| #7pukunuiSep 27, 2014 18:06:03 | I think we will see at least one example of playing a monstrous race in the DMG, but I don't know that we'll ever see a book dedicated to such a thing. |
| #8MechaPilotSep 27, 2014 18:13:50 |
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| #9Chiisai_UsagiSep 27, 2014 19:05:47 |
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| #10Luis_CarlosSep 27, 2014 21:59:24 | I love the monster classes. Why? Because it is fun, like wearing a Halloween costume.
I like the concept of racial classes from the Complete Psionic Handbook. Other idea is a "nerferd" PC race with the option to add levels of racial parangon classes (from 3.5 Unearthed Arcana).
Would you like a "Councyl of Wyrns" whith dragons PCs? And I mean all dragon monster classes, not only core (chromatic and metallic) but the rest (gem, oriental lungs, planar...).
* I could bet we will see a module about training "collectable monsters", the D&D version of Pokemon, Digimon, Invizimals, Spyro: skylanders..
* I have thought the idea a module about subclasses with "monster points", something like points of mutation from d20 Future, where PC could "buy" monster traits like wings or natural weapons.
For example to fly:
- a point. weak Wings: Prequesite: spread out wings. Str check to avoid tired condiction, if it is sucesfful, a feather fall or a jump bonus.
- two points: wings and glide flying.
- three points: strong wings. Prequisite: minium level, only light load. normal fly movement.
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| #11MechaPilotSep 27, 2014 22:49:22 |
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| #12MecheonSep 28, 2014 6:10:52 |
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| (Reply to #11)Reshy |
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| #14melloredSep 28, 2014 10:04:28 | It's a possiblitily.
But remember, they havn't even relases all the core 3 books yet. So.... it might be a while. |
| #15MechaPilotSep 28, 2014 13:33:15 |
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| #16rampantSep 29, 2014 7:55:57 | No go.
The problem with a powerful race is that it's getting an advantage over a standard one. LA tried to address this in 3e by costing class levels but due to a combination of poor LA assignment and the way the game was structured around HD and class levels made LA pretty heinous.
An exp debt does't work either, it means that for level 1 you're OP, and once you start advancing again you will be become more powerful than other PCs of your level.
Ok sure maybe it works as long as everyone in the party has the exact same exp total, but what happens when you hit level 20? or people miss/gain story EXP. I mean I try to keep everyone within a level or two sure but as you level up EXP comes in bigger and bigger chunks. 900 is a lot at level 1-3 but not near as much at levels 12-15. Presumably your powerful race is stronger than a normal PC of the same level which is a problem because your exp penalty doesn't scale, doesn't continue to create a cost to offset it's enhanced abilities.
Powerful or complex races must be handled delicately and intelligently in order to prevent LA or the 4e vampire.
Now there are a couple of options looking at the 5e set-up as it stands.
1.) Feats - Each race has a a basic form that is balanced with the standard run but gains access to upper tier abilities via racial feats, this works great for things like the minotaur's charge attack which don't appeal to a variety of builds and classes.
2.) Racial class progressions - I'm thinking a combination of the 3e monster classes, race as class from the old school games, and paragon classes from 3e's UA. Basically th race has a basic form that is balanced with the standard races but you gain access to the upper tier powers via taking levels in a class that progresses your "racial" abilities. THis is really good for powerful and specialized creatures like the mind-flayer whose abilities and powers are a bit complex for feats and who would gain extensive powers from their heritage. Now the goal wouldn't be to mimic the monster manual entry, but to create the exemplar of that race so a Drider class would have appropriate spellcasting built in not suddenly cut at 6th level casting. MIndflayers would have a specialized form of psionic advancement, and you could make versions for the other races so you could have an elf class with spells bows and blades, while the dwarf class mixed fighter, bard, bard and cleric type abilities.
3.) General powerup - BAsically every character gets a little something extra, and if you wanna play a powerful race you cash that little something extra in. THis would be like themes when introduced in 4e a sort of third pillar of character creation. This choice would have lasting and scaling effects on your abilities through your advancement. This works great for 'races' that work by adding to existing races half-xxxx's, elemental versions, undead that reproduce via spawn creation like vampires, the various were-beasts, etc. Non-race optons might be becoming a chosen one, a soul bonded advancing magic item, a special companion creature, godlike luck, being the vessel of a sealed monster, being the reincarnation of someone important etc.
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| #17GrazelSep 29, 2014 17:56:01 | A few things to keep in mind when converting a monster to a PC race:
1) Totally ignore HD. These are essentially the monster class levels (think of T, S, M, L, H, G as the classes as those determine HD type just as a PC class does). For the reasoning behind this look at an NPC human mage or human knight. They have d8 for their HD not d6 (PC wizard) or d10 (PC fighter) which indicates the monsters don't work on PC class rules so you can think of the monster as being a class and a race as presented in the stat blocks.
2) Guage the ability score modifiers based on the monster stat's two highest scores as those are likely their "focus" abilities. The higher (or more lore-fitting most used in case of a tie) should get +2 and the other can get +1 or +2 depending on other racial features.
3) For any monster over CR 1, think of them as an experienced levelled up character so some of their abilities will be from levelling (like class features) and if they were a level 1 PC they likely wouldn't have those (and not get them since the PC went a different route in life than the typical monster version). Pick the monster features that best fit the monster's lore, and strip away any scores on it that are tied to an ability score modifier or that is likely scaled up for CR (level).
Overall you'll need to compare them to the existing PC races to try to guage some things but these three items should simplify the job. The biggest thing is to keep in mind that a monster stat block other than say a dragon wyrmling isn't for a fresh, inexperienced member of the creature in the stat block so can't be taken literally as a template for making it a PC race as it is in the MM. |
| #18ReshyOct 05, 2014 23:41:20 | Honestly, it doesn't matter how much more powerful the monsters as PC's would be because if the DM decides the answer is no, the answer is no. Trying to (badly) balance it in all the wrong ways is what made them useless in 3.5e. |
| #19Brock_LandersOct 06, 2014 7:36:31 | I would like a cleaned up 5th Ed Savage Species.
Treant monks rock. |
| #20MechatarrasqueOct 06, 2014 8:01:53 | I know this will be the least popular suggestion, but just in case....
1) Play as a dirt farmer race for a couple of levels.
2) When the PC level is roughly where the monster level is, macguffin a transformation into the monster of choice.
3) Accept that the new body's balance/chi/even connection to magic feels "off", so you need to retrain in your class (or a new class).
4) At the next level, you are a monster with 1 class level in the new/old class of your choice.
5) Proceed normally. |
| #21rampantOct 06, 2014 11:44:03 | Monster levels don't equate nicely to pc levels, also becoming copies of the mm entries never ends well. |
| #22GrazelOct 06, 2014 21:00:06 |
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| #23rampantOct 06, 2014 22:18:05 | For good reason, the simple fact is that monsters are not generally built to the same requirements as PCs or the reverse. There's a very different set of parameters on their respective designs, abilities that make for great monster fights, powerful every turn bonus actions, at-will or rapidly recharging area affect powers, lots of resistances, high regen rates, and stuff like that are not things PCs should get. |