The Gaming Den

I really can't explain why I have the following idea. It's based on a dream that I had last night.

Basically a fight was going on between celestials and Fiends, but it was odd. The 'rules' that I observed there I have no idea how to translate into a game (the most basic rule was this: 'the more powerful you are than your enemies, the less you are allowed to go at your full speed; so the humanoid arch-fiend who's face is literally unseeable (seriously, I tried looking at it's face like 2 or three times, it was either covered in clouds or was more than one face put together or it was a blank face made of moving bugs) wielding an amalgam between a trident and a bunch of jellyfish moves at a leisurely pace while lower ranked fiends moved at faster speeds and tried to corral celestials into getting within range of his weapon).

In any case it gave me an idea for running a game (or introducing) celestials as a race that's also a class. At least the way that I saw them.

Basically Celestials came in two forms, Celestials and Arch-Celestials.

Arch-Celestials are verboten to normal play (I saw one made and... seriously, no one expected that what led up to it's creation was the only way that they're created) unless the characters/players perform the right action [I'll PM people who want to know what it is, it's seriously bad for gameplay for it to happen].

Celestials are 'made' by getting a pair of mortal souls of different species and making a new creature out of them. Most of them are intelligent humanoid with an Int of 3+ and an animal/magical beast/constructs with an Int score of 1 or more.

Mechanically, all Celestials get two bonus Celesital feats; one that shows that their humanoid species was X and one that shows that their non-humanoid species was Y.

[So... you they get 2 bonus feats one of which will be from a list of [Celestial Humanoid] and one which will be from the [Celestial Non-Humanoid] list; I have to work on both such lists].


Celestials are then further subdivided into champions or theurgists.

I haven't really done anything for theurgists, but the champion class is seriously just a laundry list of abilities that they get to pick either every level or every other level.

Stuff like:

Level 1-5
-+4 Dodge bonus to AC
-+4 Sacred Bonus to Natural Armour
-+30' Insight Bonus to speed
-DR (lvl+2)/Magic
-Melee Attacks deal +2 damage/Class lvl
-You have wings, hover on a plane or descend only
-Detect Evil always on; deal +1d4 damage every 2 lvls vs evil targets

6-10
-2 abilities from the 1-5 list
-+4 deflection bonus to AC
-+30' Competence Bonus to speed
-Wings (Fly at ground speed, avg maneuverability); if you already had wings you have good maneuverability and +30' more speed when flying
-DR (lvl+5)/ Iron or Silver (?)
-SR (lvl+5) (?)
-All of your attacks with weapons deal +2 damage/Class lvl


Basically a laundry list of 'special' powers the way the Dungenomicon monk has.

I figure one such power every other level with attribute bonuses handed out every non-ability level.

I'll post more in a bit.


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I posted this on the WoTC boards to give an example of a 1/2 Celestial that is reasonable. I put it here b/c 1/2 Celestials would work with Immortals (as would 1/2 Fiends).
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Pretty Rough Half-Celestial "Template"; you have to pay 1 HD to be one, the mods are lower, but a +0 LA seems fine.

Creating A Half-Celestial

"Half-celestial" is an inherited template that can be added to any living, corporeal creature with an Intelligence score of 4 or higher and nonevil alignment (referred to hereafter as the base creature).

A half-celestial uses all the base creature’s statistics and special abilities except as noted here.
Size and Type

The creature’s type changes to outsider. The Bse creature gains its first hit dice as an outsider; gaining a d8 Hit Dice, +1 Bab, All three saves are good for this level, light armour and simple weapon proficiency and 8 + int mod skill points. This hit dice replaces the creature's first hit dice and cannot be replaced with class levels. Do not recalculate the creature’s other Hit Dice, base attack bonus, or saves. Size is unchanged. Half-celestials are normally native outsiders.

Speed
A half-celestial has feathered wings and can fly at the base creature’s base land speed (poor maneuverability). If the base creature has a fly speed, use that instead.

Armor Class
Natural armor improves by +1 (this stacks with any natural armor bonus the base creature has).

Special Attacks

A half-celestial retains all the special attacks of the base creature and also gains the following special abilities.

Daylight (Su)

Half-celestials can use a daylight effect (as the spell) at will.


Smite Evil (Su)

Once per five (5) Hit Dice a half-celestial can make a normal melee attack to deal extra damage equal to its HD (maximum of +20) against an evil foe.

If using Iaimeki's Paladin of Kantian Philosophy in your game, you instead smite evil as if you were a a Paladin of half your level. This bonus stacks if you are a Paladin, thus giving a Half-Celestial Paladin 1.5 Paladin levels.


Spell-Like Abilities

A half-celestial has all the special qualities of the base creature, plus the following special qualities.

* Darkvision out to 60 feet.
* Immunity to disease.
* A half-celestial’s natural weapons are treated as magic weapons for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction.
* Spell resistance equal to creature’s HD + 5 (maximum 35) If the Character has an other source of Spell Resistance, this adds +2 to that value, unless this is greater.
* +4 racial bonus on Fortitude saves against poison.

Abilities
Str or Con or Dex: +2, Int or Wisdom or Cha +2


Hit Dice

A Half Celestial must start with one Outsider Hitdice (as listed above in their Type). This hit dice cannot be traded out for a class level and is their first hit Dice and prelaces the first racial hit dice that the creature starts with. They gain a d8 Hit Dice, all good saves, 8 + int Modifier skill points to spend amoung the base creature's skills, and proficientcy with all simple weapons, light armour and any weapons, armour and sheilds that their Outsider Parent is normally equipped with.

Skills

A half-celestial gains skill points as an outsider and has skill points equal to (8 + Int modifier) × (HD +3). Do not include Hit Dice from class levels in this calculation—the half-celestial gains outsider skill points only for its racial Hit Dice, and gains the normal amount of skill points for its class levels. Treat skills from the base creature’s list as class skills, and other skills as cross-class.

Challenge Rating: +1

Alignment

Good or Evil (any) (the Good/Evil axis part of alignment must reflect the creature's outsider progenitor; so a Half-Celestial of an Achon parent would be Good (any), while a Half-Celestial with an Erineyes parent would have would be Evil (any))

Level Adjustment

LA +0

Favored Class: Half-Celestials have Paladin and Cleric as favored classes.


Half-Celestial Paragon

Pre-Req: Must be a Half Celestial

Class Features

HD: d8

BaB: Full (1/1) Saves: Fortitude (Good); Reflex (Good); Will (Good)

Skills: Any previous Racial or Class skills
Skill Points: 8 + int modifier

1. 
   
2. Resistances 5, Healing Psalms
   
3. Flying 1.5x Speed (Average), Damage Reduction (5)
   
4. Resistances 10, Blessing Psalms
   
5. Flying 2x Speed (Good); Spell Resistance HD + 10; Damage Reduction (10)
   

Proficientcies: The Half Celestial Paragon gains one armour proficiency feat that they qualify for, one sheild proficiency feat that they qualify for and one weapon proficiency feat that they qualify for.

Resistances: At 1st level the Half-Celestial Pagagon gains energy Resitance 5 against Acid, Cold and Electricity. This improves at level 3 to 10.

Healing Psalms: The Half Celestial Gains access to serveral spell like abilities via the non-evil version of Spheres; Psalms. In this case the Healing collection of Psalms.

Flying: At second level, the Half-Celestial's Flying improves to one and a half times their land speed and average manueverability. This improves to double their creature's land speed and Good manueverability at level 5.

Damage Reduction: At third level, the Half-Celestial gains damage reduction at a rate of 1 per hit dice that they have, that is negated by magic and has a maximum cap of DR 5/Magic (5). At 5th level this maximum increases to 10 and is negated only by magic weapons that are evily aligned; thus a maximum of DR 10/Evil and Magic.

Blessing Psalms: The Half Celestial Gains access to serveral spell like abilities via the non-evil version of Spheres; Psalms. In this case the Blessing collection of Psalms.


Spell Resistance:At fifth level, the Half-Celestials Spell resistance increases to their HD + 10 (maximum of 35). This can be added to any existing spell resistance and instead adds +3 to the existing spell resistance if it is greater than this provided Spell Resistance.


Psalms

Psalms are the non-evil equivalent of Sphere [scroll down to half-way down the post]

The Spheres/Psalms

Celestials (and some of their minions and associates) cast magic primarily through spell-like abilities. While many signature Celestials have arbitrary lists of spell-like abilities.

When a Celestial has access to a sphere, she is able to use all of the abilities within that sphere up to her character level. If she gains more levels, more powers of the sphere become available. In this way the spell-like abilities of fiends created with the rules in this tome should always be aesthetically and level appropriate.

Basic Psalm Access: When a creature has basic access to a psalm, she can use any of the spells listed in the sphere may be used once per day (each) as spell-like abilities, provided that their listed level is equal or lower to the creature's character level.

Advanced Psalm Access: When a creature has advanced access to a psalm, she can use any of the spells listed in the psalm may be used 3 times per day (each) as spell-like abilities, provided that their listed level is equal or lower to the creature's character level.

Expert Psalms Access: When a creature has expert access to a psalms , any spells listed in the sphere may be used at will as spell-like abilities, provided that their listed level is equal or lower to the creature's character level.

Creating new spheres: The following list of psalms isn't intended to be comprehensive, and we fully expect that some players and DMs will want many more psalms than we have scribed. All new psalms must be approved of by the DM, and should represent some actual (caring or good) trait like "calm" or "bunnies" rather than a game mechanical notion like "kicking ass and being totally sweet" or something scornworthy like "greed". A good place to start is actually Domains, as these are already a source by which a character gain a spell at every odd-numbered

Spheres and Spell Levels: Spell-like abilities used out of spheres re considered to be cast as a spell level equal to half the minimum needed character level to use the ability (rounded up). The save DC of a spell-like ability granted through Sphere access is Charisma-based. Thus, the save DC for a spell-like ability which becomes available at character level 5 is 12 + Charisma bonus.

Blessing
Special: As a standard action you may invoke a divine blessing upon any target within close range; they gain a bonus to their next roll equal to half your hit dice[/b]
1 Bless
3 Prayer
5 Good Hope
7 Recitation
9 Holy Smite
11 Dispel Evil
13 Hallow
15 Summon Monster VIII (Outsiders of your alignment only)
17 Ressurection
19 Miracle (Non-xp costing miracles only


Healing
Special: As an immediate action you may channel positive energy on any target that you touch. You can heal and amount equal to your character level per use. This is a spell-like abilitiy and you may use it to harm undead, but they get to make a will save for half damage (the DC is based on 10+ 1/2 Hit Dice + Charisma Modifier)[/b]
1 Cure Light wounds
3 Delay Poison
5 Neutralize Poison
7 Remove Disease
9 Insignia of Healing [Maximized]
11 Heal
13 Mass Cure Critical Wounds
15 Mass Heal
17 True Ressurection
19 Miracle (May only be used to heal or revive a creature)

Judging__Eagle at [unixtime wrote:1190919136[/unixtime]]
Celestials are 'made' by getting a pair of mortal souls of different species and making a new creature out of them. Most of them are intelligent humanoid with an Int of 3+ and an animal/magical beast/constructs with an Int score of 1 or more.

Is this an attempt to suborn the furry discussion out of the charging thread?

If so, I approve.

So, amalgamating souls would be like the Potara earrings in DBZ?
The two beings become one single entity, with unified goals.
Any conflicting insterets meet some kind of grey area or maybe the being has an internal debate like any other.
One could simply state that the sentient soul dominates the animal one...

Hey, maybe all humans are like this all ready, given that we're a soul and a human mind, making us a little bit 'more' than the common animal.
Celestials and other beings like this could indeed just be the next step up, like 1 sentient soul +1 animal soul.

However much a fan of Descartes' Cartesian dualism I am, I'm still led to believe that spiritual entities are somehow a distillation rather than 'more'. A human is a material body, instinct, and mind, yet an angel is simply just mind (and whatever else animates the both of us).
There are many similarities between 'mortal' and 'spirit' beings yet these spirits have trememdous powers.
So maybe it's not that they are 'more' than us, as in multiple spirits combined into one, but that they are focused and exaggerated versions of the properties that form a spirit.

The appearance of a spirit is just fluff, after all. They can look like anything.
So my advice is to not use the combined-souls-make-Celestials idea, and do something more like
"The form of a Celestial represents their disposition and personality, matching physical creatures that are closest to their behavioral patterns. This leads to Celestials appearing as strange combinations of beings since sentient personalities are very complex."

You have weird but interesting dreams. I guess you'll do something like True Fiend for Theurgic Celestials?

clikml at [unixtime wrote:1190924976[/unixtime]]

Judging__Eagle at [unixtime wrote:1190919136[/unixtime]]
Celestials are 'made' by getting a pair of mortal souls of different species and making a new creature out of them. Most of them are intelligent humanoid with an Int of 3+ and an animal/magical beast/constructs with an Int score of 1 or more.

Is this an attempt to suborn the furry discussion out of the charging thread?

If so, I approve.

No, the celestials in the dream made reference to the fact that they are made of different souls. Some were more animal than non-animal (the animal soul was in charge I guess? I dunno).

More powerful ones are either made from more souls or the most powerful souls.

Of course, if you're a Freudian you'd say that yes, my subconscious mind wanted to do this so it gave me the dream.

In any case, it's just given me more stuff that I won't have time to draw except as gesture drawings or gesture constructs.

sigma999 at [unixtime wrote:1190927006[/unixtime]]So, amalgamating souls would be like the Potara earrings in DBZ?
The two beings become one single entity, with unified goals.
Any conflicting insterets meet some kind of grey area or maybe the being has an internal debate like any other.
One could simply state that the sentient soul dominates the animal one...

Honestly, it wasn't explained, so I have to come up with something myself.

Celestials are made of souls of those allowed to rise above the rank of Petitioner ('mortals' who have passed on also fight alongside Celestials and Fiends, they have less innate power, but more options since they can take normal classes).

So, you take a bunch of souls that have abilities that you want in them, and put them together and you've got a new Celestial.

The more powerful Celestials have either either incorporated the souls of mortals into themselves or come about when Celestials choose to combine themselves and become a new creature.

Note: this completely throws all existing D&D cosmology as all 'gods' are essentially a bunch of like-minded Celestials that decided that they were best off losing all of what makes themselves them self and become a new creature.

Fiends do this by beating each other up and having a fiend absorb the souls of an other fiend of roughly the same power; so very powerful fiends tend to keep their distance for fear of being absorbed by their peers, while any single god is only willing to accept only creatures that have as much purity of purpose as themselves.

Fiends at the lowest end don't absorb each other to become more powerful b/c if they do one of their sergeants will simply absorb them right away.

Hey, maybe all humans are like this all ready, given that we're a soul and a human mind, making us a little bit 'more' than the common animal.
Celestials and other beings like this could indeed just be the next step up, like 1 sentient soul +1 animal soul.

However much a fan of Descartes' Cartesian dualism I am, I'm still led to believe that spiritual entities are somehow a distillation rather than 'more'. A human is a material body, instinct, and mind, yet an angel is simply just mind (and whatever else animates the both of us).
There are many similarities between 'mortal' and 'spirit' beings yet these spirits have trememdous powers.
So maybe it's not that they are 'more' than us, as in multiple spirits combined into one, but that they are focused and exaggerated versions of the properties that form a spirit.

The appearance of a spirit is just fluff, after all. They can look like anything.
So my advice is to not use the combined-souls-make-Celestials idea, and do something more like
"The form of a Celestial represents their disposition and personality, matching physical creatures that are closest to their behavioral patterns. This leads to Celestials appearing as strange combinations of beings since sentient personalities are very complex."

Interesting ideas.

shirak at [unixtime wrote:1190927213[/unixtime]]You have weird but interesting dreams. I guess you'll do something like True Fiend for Theurgic Celestials?

Probably. ...D:<

Yeah, it was nuts.

There was this 9 or 12 foot tall Aurochean humanoid (think a minotaur, but with longer and straigher horns) swinging a massive falchion and basically 'waiting' for little fiends to get within range of his swings.

Oh and he (it) wore what could best be described as a ancient Egyptian linen kilt/skirt with a blue and gold belt.

The only actual thing that could best resemble an 'angel' with a face of white fire and a blade of actual 'red' fire (not yellow-orange the way fire normally is) was sort of 'stuck' in the sky pointing it's blade at the fiends menacingly.

Really, dreams are hit and miss; you have to be recording them for months before you get a decent one; I think it's been... 3 or more months since I last had a good idea from a dream.

The problem is that now I only get vague images and I have to re-construct stuff.

Nearly everything else I can't recall; I only really recall the Celestials as being distinct and having actual forms.

The Fiends were like little puffs of smoke on the ground that crawled around and every now and again a claw on a long arm or a tentacle with barbs would fly out to hit someone.

I smell a Bleach mention in there, with Fiends devouring each other, and that's fine by me >_<

D&D should have had that in the first place.

I've been using that concept of spirit cannibalism in my fiction for years, btw. It only seemed like a logical conclusion that one would resort to essence-vampirism as a fast track to power.
The other methods, much less offending to sentient beings, would be more like the Perserver of Dark Sun setting; they sit and they meditate, collecting ambient energy like a plant.
Slower, but won't ruin the live and memory of another being.

Had a dream where I was a large red Seraph, once.
6 black wings and a thick black mane like boar's hair or a hyena, gunmetal grey horns that curved like a ram but longer (less tight loops)
My face was very human (tho red), nothing at all monstrous about that. The shouts that could cause nuclear fission weren't so mundane, though.
I had peeled off my skin of a more humanoid form and that's what was under.
There's more but I don't want to reveal too much, it might end up in a story.
The most interesting part was that my skin texture was like feeling an inanimate object; no muscle beneath, or bone, but as if my limbs (and body) were sculpted out of one solid piece of material. It had the appearance of having skeletal structure and muscle but I felt that if I were injured it would be like piercing plastic or clay, although the bites of my enemies couldn't pierce the tough hide; just an injury, no layers of skin, no blood, no organs.
Maybe that's what Outsider 'flesh' is like?

Also, for Outsider mortality: whether or not one could argue the empyrical existence of the mortal soul is opinion (as far as we know) but for these ideas, would you consider a devoured mortal soul to 'die' and vanish, or simply reincarnate elsewhere, stripped of all previous memories and powers?

I find it damned hard imagining nonexistence, personally. I simply can't picture, from my viewpoint, not experiencing anything from my own viewpoint!
Not to get into a metaphysical debate, but it seems important that it's clarified before going any further into concepts of "absorbing souls".
Do the absorbed become the absorber? Do they experience everything the victor does, but without any free will, as if they were watching themselves act in a dream?
Is it a void?
Is not-existing a thing so abstract that language can't describe what one becomes?


Maybe we watch too many cartoons.

I think draining the soul of all power, having it evaporate into the background energy of the planes, and eventually reincarnate(or not), and simply absorbing the power and consciousness wholesale would be two separate and distinct processes.

I should also mention that, 'mortals' were running around with like... Uzis and swords and moving at their own speeds.....


Oh... I think I know how I should make it so that more "powerful" celestials/fiends want to move (or do move) slower) the more powerful they are.


Immortal Importance(Ex): Immortals are filled with the conviction that they are living embodiments of will. As such they tend to not hurry to achieve their goals. The most powerful Immortals seem to move at a snail's crawl, yet their progress is impossible to halt.

For every hit dice that an Immortal (Celestial or Fiend) has they may subtract 10 feet from their movement.

Every 10 feet so reduced adds +1 to all dice rolls made by that Immortal until the Immortals next round. This includes (but is not exclusive to) Attack rolls, Damage rolls, Saving Throws and Skill Checks.

In additions they gain DR 1/- per 10 feet sacrificed; this DR is added to any and all existing DR the character has.

If 100 feet of movement are sacrificed, then the bonus increases from +1 to +2 per 10 feet sacrificed.

If 200 feet of movement are sacrificed, then the bonus increases from +1 to +3 per 10 feet sacrificed..

No Immortal may subtract so much movement that they cannot move at least 10 feet that round. They do not have to move, but must be able to move a minimum of 10 feet.



So the biggest baddest immortals barely move, but they kill everything that gets near them. Smaller Immortals will move more to get into positions advantageous to them, but will not go into 'battleship' mode as often as a bigger one would.

I would make that per minute rather than per round, just to really give them the feel of being stuck in place.

So it's not just base movement?

You could stack Barbarian bonus (whatever that is) plus Expiditious Retreat plus Monk (also unknown type) plus item, and voila... DR +30/- or something.

Monk speed and expeditious retreat are both enhancement.

sigma999 at [unixtime wrote:1191107490[/unixtime]]So it's not just base movement?

You could stack Barbarian bonus (whatever that is) plus Expiditious Retreat plus Monk (also unknown type) plus item, and voila... DR +30/- or something.

I guess I wasn't clea enough when I said that Celestials come in two types.

What I meant was that Celestials and Fiends only have 2 classes they can ever advance in. So, you're either a Champion or a Theurge or a mix of the two.

Really, they're advancing in their 'race', but their race is a class since we understand that easiest.

The idea of giving lots of optional bonuses to speed arleady exist in the Champion class. Since I just lifted ideas from the Dungenomicon monk's list of fighting style options.

A champion that picked the lvl 1-5 +30 speed, lvl 1-5 Wings (Hover & Descend only), lvl 6-10 Wings and lvl 6-10 Speed could as low as lvl 8 have +60 ' of ground speed and +30' of flying speed; with a base of 30 feet for both, they could easily get their +16 to rolls and DR 16/- , but are moving at 10 feet a round (ground speed of 30 + 30 (lvl 1-5) + 30 (lvl 6-10) = 90 - 80), more than enough to be avoided.

As we all know, if you're a defensive bastard that monsters can't ever kill or you can't pose an actual threat that can't be avoided/ignored, then you're really not that impressive.

If you have an 8th lvl Celestial Champion that's hulking out, its for one of a few reasons:

1. He's facing a Fiendish Chamption of equal or greater power, so he needs the DR to soak hits and the damage to even have a chance of busting past his enemies DR.

2. It's a non-flyable, narrow corridor, the Champ takes point in a fight. Their team wins vs almost anything save swarms, AoEs and spells.

3. She's playing "guard the casters" in a battlefield situation and has to deal with a trio of zombie elephants and their mortal drivers.

4. The Champion is playing "I set off the traps, high saves > you."

The rest of the time, he's better off charging his enemies.

If the Champions huls out, then the enemies will scatter in their round to get away from him.....

Immortal Importance shouls have an other corrolary. You can't move at more than your now reduced speed (no charging, running, double moving etc.).

Really, a human barbarian with Whirlwind, Blitz and TWF is worse than this at lvl 8. Since at that point, the barb could have access to +1 Extending Chains, and threaten up to 10' away with a TWF=able double weapon or simply deal ricockulouis damage with a pair of morningstars, or something.

Well I still love the idea, and anything else resembling DBZ in a sane way
(which IMO it does!)

Compare to how Goku, just arrived on Namek from training on route, encounters the red and blue Ginyu members.
They fly circles around him, taunt, nag, and he ultimately stomps them with near minimal effort (and motion).
OK he did dodge faster than sight, but the effect was that there are many similar situations in Dragonball just like this, and recreating that kind of epic badassery in d20 without breaking the game is just awesome.

Somehow I have a feeling that it would be very hard to come up with a good game system that could do anything close to DBZ without being broken. The extreeme non linear progression works well in a story arc but not in a general campaign scenario world.

The real problem with this setting is that encounters are so evenly matched that either it's a stalemate or both sides die.

It's like having a pair of RoW barbarians duking it out. Either they can't hurt each other, or they kill each other or one kills the other b/c of luck.

Yep. Anything close to Dragonball doesn't have "adventuring" in a normal sense.
Quests maybe, but the heroes are introduced to Wish Economy fairly early (although most is spent on resurrecting heh) so the gaming sessions would mostly be centered around training, gathering info on an enemy (if the players are smart), trading quips with the foe, and finally the showdown with a high fatal risk.
Maybe the risk of death is because the warriors were equivalent of an entire party of the same class (Monk/Psions?) and nearly no one had SoDs or solid tactics, most combatants are all about strength and offense, almost everyone fights one at a time, and there was 1 healer (not counting beans).

I believe that if DBZ type warriors were compared to Wizards there wouldn't be much problem, and that most players would not make the blunders those DBZ characters made, it would work out fine.
Designing the powers, on the other hand, is a trick.
Probably just combat-oriented Monks with very little 'mystical' about them, Evocations, flight, and lots of strength.

But for this celestials thing, as much as I see similarities in their abilities, both the story role and function will definitely differ. There's much more options here than in DBZ, but it just struck me as leading to that kind of encounter setup.

"Our punches had no effect! Go call for Uriel the Archangel, only he can save us!"

Except... The Archangel is literally unable to do anything 90% of the time.

Really, just ganging up on one enemy at a time will work well enough.

You should throw in some saving throw boosts while gaining DR, like +1 to all saves for every 10 points of speed lost.

Every 10 feet lost adds +2 to all dice rolls that the Immortal has to make. I specifically mentioned saving throws.

So, trying to make them do something that they don't want to is hard.

Woops, missed that, brain fart between "throw" and "roll" since it's called "saving throw" and almost never "save roll". Stupid mistake, sorry.

Now, how will you avoid the d20 WoD dilemna concerning extremely high bonuses at low levels?
Sure, all Celestials with Immortal Importance will get the bonuses, but I'm curious how encounter balance (if there ever was any) will work out against beings without it.

I should change it to a +1 per hit dice. [done]

I also fixed something that was bugging me. The fact that numbers have to increase on an arthimetical scale as levels go up.

It is all rolls after all.

Well, the max a bonus can ever be, is capped by your Hit Dice.

So, it doesn't matter if you have 60 speed at lvl 3, you're not getting above a +3.

Honestly, I'm in favour of Frank's porposition that giving PCs small amounts of large numbers that are obvious is better than to have them burrow in rulebooks for lots of small numbers that add up to big ones.

Because it means that people like me benefit, and people that I play with get the suck stick.

Then again, I'm a DM who gets happy when a tough monster is killed, by the PCs.


I think that I need to actually get on writing this class. I used a Minotaur of Legend NPC last session and I wanna replace him with an Aurochian Celestial champ.

If/when Brodgingnagian gets on here again, he can confirm that the Mino of legend was not planned on my part at all.

Heck, I asked him to roll the d% to see what type of encounter they got; I picked a MM at random (MM2 in this case) and checked what was in there as a CR 6 outsider (I actually didn't realize that the Of Legend template makes a creature an outsider until I was reading the entry and he was helping the PCs kill some undead; which definately clicked in my head after that).

Judging__Eagle at [unixtime wrote:1191976237[/unixtime]]
Honestly, I'm in favour of Frank's porposition that giving PCs small amounts of large numbers that are obvious is better than to have them burrow in rulebooks for lots of small numbers that add up to big ones.

Because it means that people like me benefit, and people that I play with get the suck stick.

Then again, I'm a DM who gets happy when a tough monster is killed, by the PCs.

Seconded then on that idea. Optimization shouldn't be restricted to those with the most books/organizational IQ/innate-gaming-cheese-instinct.
Still, I'd rather that both CharOp freaks and RPers can accomplish at least similar scope of power rather than taking from the former to give to the latter.

On Monster of Legend: I had a DM once allow me, as a treat for the "end of campaign climax", apply that template to my Barbarian Elf. He became the Legendary Super Elf.
The other players had a Nycaloth, a Fire Giant, and the party's fire immune Rogue riding a Huge Fire Elemental.
They were all about equal combat ability, given that they were melee tards, but in that devilish arena contesting for our very souls my LSE couldn't get to the Nycaloth when he flew away invisibly.
I had maxed my Listen (like.. godly) so I could pinpoint him with a lucky roll, and threw a rock for 1d4+13 damage from my flabbargastlingly high Strength (along with Fast Heal, I took the Cleric casting option of MoL for more Strength. hurrrrr...).
That match ended in stalemate, since I decided to say 'no' when the overlords told the LSE to finish his opponent off. (Lesson learned: pure warriors suck, even if they regenerate, have a base move of like 70, and Strength of at least 34.)

We defeated the devils in a Spartacus-like moment of rebellion, and 'won'.
Still stuck in hell though.
Tragedies are fun as a campaign-ender sometimes, as long as it's an EPIC TRAGEDY!

I'm itching to see how these mechanics of yours play out, though.
Will you post notes here if playtested?

Yeah, I always try to do so. I'm just really busy with classes... supposedly I have 36 hours of 'free' time a week. -_-