User talk:Daniel Draco/wip

Stuck

Alright, I'm in a bit of a...stuck spot. Shæné are usually sorcerers, but I'm not sure how to show that as far as attacks. Is it a special ability, special quality, attack, what? All the humanoid creatures I've seen in the wiki are warriors. Suddenly realizing that is an NPC class, I looked for an arcane spellcasting NPC class. Not a one off of which to base it. What are the standards (if any) for spellcasting attacks and defense in creatures? --Daniel Draco 16:08, 7 May 2007 (MDT)

Spells, powers, spell-like abilities, and psi-like abilities are always (as far as I've seen) listed as special attacks (see aboleth mage).

As far as what class to represent the creature as, standard practice is to create an entry as a 1st-level warrior using the following ability score array (before racial adjustments): 13, 12, 11, 10, 9, 8. The entry should note which abilities had which scores before racial adjustments. Most of this I suspect you've already figured out.

If you want to showcase their sorcerous abilities, create a second entry with levels in sorcerer using the elite ability score array instead: 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8. —Sledged (talk) 10:19, 10 May 2007 (MDT)

Alright, still having trouble...I don't know how to find the various numbers, HP and the like. I'd abandon this project, but shæné would never be used in any campaign without a creature entry for NPC combat. I'll just leave it as it is and open it to anyone who wants to to work on it. That or if someone can help me with how to find numbers. --Daniel Draco 15:35, 10 May 2007 (MDT)

Hit points are determined by racial HD and class levels. I'm looking at the shæné race page, and it's a bit confusing. The section following the part that reads "Shæné have all the same traits and features as a native outsider, with the following exceptions:" suggest that they have more than one racial HD, but it's not clear whether or not that's the case. Do shæné have 2 or more racial HD? —Sledged (talk) 19:16, 10 May 2007 (MDT)

Looking back at it, I suppose it is confusing. What it's saying is that they don't get any racial bonuses or penalties to hit dice. --Daniel Draco 20:06, 10 May 2007 (MDT)

That doesn't really answer my question. Do shæné (what's the plural for "shæné?" "Shæné?" "Shæni?" "Shænés?") have more than one racial HD like lizardfolk? Or do they have one or less racial HD like kobolds (and subsequently have that HD replaced with a class level)? —Sledged (talk) 10:48, 14 May 2007 (MDT)

Alright, I suppose I'm not sure what racial hit dice are. I thought HD type were determined by class? (The plural is shæné) --Daniel Draco 11:48, 14 May 2007 (MDT)

That's one of the factors. The others are the creature's race, type, and sometimes subtype. In fact, many times class is not a factor. The majority of creatures in the SRD have no class levels at all.

Let's take your standard troll for example. A typical troll has no class levels and 6 racial HD. Why 6? Because that's how many the WotC development team decided to give them. There's no hard rule for determining the number of racial HD when you create a race/creature. It's your creature so you can give them as many as you want. Next, we note that the troll uses d8s for its HD. Why d8s? Because its type is giant, and the rules say giants typically d8s for their racial HD. Now if the troll's type were to change to something else, like undead via the skeleton template, it's HD type would change to its new type's HD (d12 for undead; see the troll skeleton). And still it has no class levels.

So let's go back to our typical troll and add some class levels. For convenience (because such a troll already exists in the SRD, see the troll hunter), we'll give him six levels of ranger. For brevity, I'll just say adding class levels on top of racial HD works like multiclassing where racial HD are always a favored "class." The troll gains HD, skill points, feats, ability score increases, class features, BAB, and BSBs all according to the ranger class, which is all in addition to the HD, skill points, racial and type traits, BAB, and BSBs for being both a troll and of the giant type.

One exception of note, is giving a 1-HD (or less) creature class levels, such as kobolds, orcs, aasimar, etc, and the standard races (dwarves, humans, elves, gnomes, halflings, half-elves, and half-orcs). A 1-HD creature replaces its 1 HD with a class level and loses all the features (but not traits) for its type (BAB, BSBs, skill points, and HD size). It instead determines all that stuff by what class in which it took a level.

Other exceptions exist, but I think this enough to digest for now. —Sledged (talk) 13:20, 14 May 2007 (MDT)