Coming Soon: Discussion Thread (2017)

[Cubicle]

Thx Dedude!

[dedude]

Thx Dedude!

And thank you for creating those UD "horses" and merchants!

[ValerieJean]

Wait UD's is in?

[dedude]

As of last update.

[Nachti]

Weapons
Orginally I had planned to allow characters to continue their weapons in polymorphed forms but that wasnt possible. So I made choices with different weapons.

[Nemni]

Design Philosophy

School of Transmutation:
Of all schools the school of transmutation has propably the most roleplay potential - through shapeshifting you can alter almost any player-player or player-dm interaction into a way that wouldnt have been possible.

Your friend has been kidnapped by a band of goblins? Transform into an goblin and infiltrate a goblin cave.
You want to raid a caravan, hide yourself and blame the local orcs? Transform your group into orcs and go on.

Polymorph
First, Polymorph has been designed with the "roleplay spirit" in mind. Most of the new forms are capable of speech and thus allow the player to interrogate with other players in a friendly manner.
Second, Polymorph has also been rebalanced to be actually useful in combat. The goal: "polymorph shapes should be viable, but not be stronger than an EK build in natural form."

Shapechange:
Shapechange focuses mainly on combat. The spell has gone through a few mechanical changes to make sure it becomes a viable level 9th "combat pick" but not be overpowered with certain class/spell combos.

Mechanical Changes:

• Monk AC is disabled during wildshape, polymorph and shapechange.
• Natural AC from Palemaster, Frostmage and Dragon Disciple is disabled during polymorph and shapechange.
• Summons and Dominate Monster will not work during Shapechange.
• Cohorts, Familiars or Animal companions dont require concentration and thus still work.
• 100% spell failure is added to polymorph effects, preventing exploiting.
• Spellslot loss should be fixed.

• Shapechange duration continues to be 1 min/level.
• BAB during shapechange continues to work like it is now.
• A new feat has been added that raises caster's BAB to medium during polymorph/shapechange.
• Weapon enchantments carries over to creatures who use weapons.
• Similiar to Conjuration, Transmutation focus grant +1/+2/+4/+1 AC to all forms.
• Damage Reduction derived from Shapechange now works.

Creature stats have been balanced.

New Forms:

Polymorph:

• Kobold
• Goblin
• Gnoll
• Orc
• Troglodyte
• Minotaur
• Troll
• Ogre
• Yeti (S only)
• Gargoyle
• Gloura
• Drider
• Kenku (S only)
• Human
• Elf
• Dwarf
• Drow
• Duergar
• Sahuagin
• Hook Horror (UD only)
• Worg

Shapechange:

• Hill Giant (S only)
• Fire Giant
• Frost Giant (S only)
• Maur (UD only)
• Werwolf Lord
• Mind Flayer
• Clay Golem
• Red Dragon
• Black Dragon
• Blue Dragon
• Bronze Dragon
• Mist Dragon
• Nightwalker
• Skeleton
• Zombie
• Hydra
• Planetar
• Moon Dog
• Arboreal Fey
• Marut
• Slaad
• Erinye
• Cornugon
• Palrethee
• Hezrou
• Bebilith

Augment Form
Type of Feat: General
Prerequisite: Spellfocus Transmutation.
Specifics: The character becomes skilled with spells and abilities that allow him to assume another form. For the duration, the character’s base attack bonus becomes medium (unless its already higher) but cannot exceed the character’s HD.
Affected Spells and Abilities: Polymorph, Tenser’s Transformation, Shapechange, Spider Shape, Spider Form and Shifter’s Forms.

I love the fact that these spells are being expanded But are their new stats really good enough to justify this significant duration nerf? Could you post the stats too please?

[Steve]

I'd like to ask about two things:

1. Natural Spell feat~
Will this be applicable for Druids casting Shapechange? If not, is the argument against it because Shapechange is a spell from the Weave and thus NOT natural? Are the Druids spells, in general, not a natural?

Because, there is this:

...in actuality, druids received their power directly from their patron deities, they often thought of this power as coming through nature. Only deities with a direct tie to nature could provide spell power to druids.

2. Unarmed Feat line~
Will Focus/Specialization/Master Unarmed be applicable to shapes from Shapechange, as they are applicable to shapes from Wild Shape?

Cheers.

[aaron22]

could human and elf be added to the poly line?

[spyvsspy]

Is it possible to use creature's special ability while polymorphed? ie: Mind Flayer - Mind Blast

[mrm3ntalist]

.

[Lyna]

I love the fact that these spells are being expanded But are their new stats really good enough to justify this significant duration nerf? Could you post the stats too please?

Between the spell focus change and weapon effects carrying over your looking at a increase of 9 AB, 4 AC and 5 damage with just GMW. That alone i think would be enough to warrant the duration decrease.

[Tsidkenu]

Will this functionality be added to the Disguise/Disguise Other line of spells as well? Would prove an amazing boon to Disguise RP if so!

[Tekill]

This change to shapechange looks like an attempt to make the spell viable to mage builds that previously had low AB. If they study a bunch of these spells and rest a lot they can solo grind a bit better now. Previously I found this spell was useless to my pureish mage as his ab was so low.

It is a of a nurf to my druid who could grind fairly well in devil form. He is hard kill in this form but his ab and damage as a devil was just so so. The buffs fix that a bit. But no more grinding with this spell. But I may still keep one handy so he can hulk out once in awhile.

Duration nurf is too harsh though. ÷10!?
For a lvl 30 that's 30 rds instead of 300.
For on thing, with all these new shapes it does not give any time to rp in them.
Please keep an open mind about increasing duration again in the future. I betcha 2 or 3 rounds per level would end up being more balanced.

[Steve]

Hidden: show

This change to shapechange looks like an attempt to make the spell viable to mage builds that previously had low AB. If they study a bunch of these spells and rest a lot they can solo grind a bit better now. Previously I found this spell was useless to my pureish mage as his ab was so low.

It is a of a nurf to my druid who could grind fairly well in devil form. He is hard kill in this form but his ab and damage as a devil was just so so. The buffs fix that a bit. But no more grinding with this spell. But I may still keep one handy so he can hulk out once in awhile.

Duration nurf is too harsh though. ÷10!?
For a lvl 30 that's 30 rds instead of 300.
For on thing, with all these new shapes it does not give any time to rp in them.
Please keep an open mind about increasing duration again in the future. I betcha 2 or 3 rounds per level would end up being more balanced.

Responding to Tekill's assumptions, BAB will still matter, here. Sure, one can spend 3 Feats for +4 AB and +4 AC, top that off with GMW, and you'll do much better as a low AB mage. But if you put together a BAB 22 build, you'll still hit better than the typical 17 AB mage...plus these Focus Feats, and you are doing very well in the Shapechange form. But what you won't do is much good at anything else, I imagine. But I'm open to being proved wrong, is someone wants to post a build or stasts that say otherwise!!!

If these changes don't effect already existing builds made to utilize Shapechange, then great ...everything besides the Duration change, I'm guessing...but we don't know the new stats yet for the Shapes.

But what some of these changes do is, in order to become a "master" of Shapechange/Tenser's, is dictating the taking in your build of either Archmage 8 or Hierophatn 8. 3 minutes of Shapechange is very short...VERY short. Imagine utilizing Shapechange in a DM Event! lol.

[Sun Wukong]

Currently, my character vault does have a "Sorcerer 7/Fighter 3/Eldritch Knight 10/Arcane Scholar 10" with high base constitution to open up the Fast Healing feats for that total of +6 points of regeneration. Will there be any change to how these Fast Healing feats work with the Shapechange Overhaul? Just bringing it up because a Fast Healing sorcerer is kind of a build only someone like me would come up with... and I would not want to go through an RCR.

As for the reduction of duration, I have previously used Polymorph/Shapechange together with spells such as Death Armor and Elemental Shield, which has meant that I have had to shed the shape in order to rebuff with those two spells. But I have also teamed up with other people, which has removed the need to recast those two spells for damage output and the long duration is actually a good thing to have. Now, I have not seen the stats of these new shapes - but based on the current status quo the shapechange spells already have duration of 1 to 2 round per caster level - and I am not sure if the duration reduction is truly needed here.

Anyhow, got to go.