Talk:Shadow Grafted (3.5e Template)

Clean Up

Cleaned up the language a bit, linkified it. --Calidore Chase 03:39, 18 January 2007 (MST)

Look better, thanks for doing that. Also, you should look at D&D Wiki:Items to be added and possibly help around a bit. --Green Dragon 21:07, 18 January 2007 (MST)

I dunno...the level adjustment seems a bit low. I'd still put it at a LA +1, just because it seems kind of, well, undeveloped. I mean, the backstory you've written doesn't really go into detail of what makes the people so vulnerable to magical light...and I don't understand why the +2 dexterity bonus. Anyways, I'll go into detail about why this doesn't make sense to me.

Why do they only take damage from light-effects spells within a 5-foot radius? daylight, for example, states that it casts light in a 60-foot radius. The light doesn't get dimmer after 5 feet...even the basic light spell creates light within a 20-foot radius. I'd suggest reconsidering the distances.

Also, 4+1d4 damage is a lot for a level 1 character. Many towns in the world of D&D employ everburning torches and other magical lights. This character would be effectively barred from entering any town. Or even being in a group with more than say, 10 people. Hanging out with other adventurers is even more deadly. What happens if he is resting with his adventuring party on the side of the road, and another adventuring party happens to walk up, one of them with an everburning torch? The character would likely take more than one round to get out of his bed/tent/sleepingbag or whatever and flee, or attack. This is very pronounced at low levels, like, below 10. Does the character get a save vs damage from the light, or does it bypass armour and all saves? Also, does damage from multiple sources stack? A "shadow grafted" 4 character level would be easy killed by even a level 1 wizard. If no save is allowed, the bonus would be especially bad for non-spellcasters.

Also, I can't see "light" being a form of punishment for "shadow grafted". Light-effect spells only function half as well within the Plane of Shadows (if the plane is similar to Faerun's Plane of Shadows). Light spells are even weaker on the shadow plane than on regular Faerun. I would think the "shadowy overlords" (that you spoke of in the flavour) would more effective methods of punishment. Within the shadow plane, casting a light-descriptor spell has really, no effect. I can't see the overlords going out of their way to use ineffective magic to punish their subjects. In fact, many creatures of shadow are actually more resistant to light spells than non-shadow creatures - consider shadow petitioners from the Player's Guide to Faerun. They have a special ability that allows them to meld with shadow in all but the most bright light. Even continual flame and light do not negate this ability. True bright light does make some creatures lose some abilities, but I've never heard of it hurting someone. And it especially doesn't make sense for it to be used as a form of punishment by shadow creatures against non-shadow creatures.

Could you go into a bit more detail regarding how these creatures are "grafted?" Grafting to me seems like something very fleshy, something very non-shadowy. Either way it'd be nice to see more detail on what "grafting" entails. You mention it in the title, but then never again.

From what I've read, shadowy templates don't generally grant a Move Silently bonus, usually just a Hide bonus, and it's usually a penalty in brightly illuminated areas.

Type/Template

The way this is set up, with the ability score modifiers, it kind of seems like it's more supposed to a type, and not a template. Anybody have any ideas? Coaldstone (talk) 15:21, 5 March 2019 (MST)