New Template: Shade Please comment on

[TheElfLord]

Hi everyone. I just made a template for an upcoming game of mine. I was trying to capture the flavor of shades from the Myth series of computer games. Comments on how to change the template to make it better or more workable are most welcome. In addition, I don't know how much this template should add to a creature's challenge rating. Thanks for all the help, here it is:

Template: Shade
Shades are the reanimated corpses of long dead fighting spell casters. Their eternal rest has been disturbed to provide a potent lieutenant to a powerful evil Cleric or Wizard. Shades often take the role of undead generals, commanding large forces, although they are personally quite powerful.
Creating a Shade:
“Shade” is a template that can be added to a humanoid creature (called the base creature) that meets the following requirements:
The creature must be dead
Base attack bonus +7
Proficient with all martial weapons
Able to cast 3rd level arcane spells
The character’s type changes to undead. It uses all the character’s statistics and special abilities except as noted here.
Hit Dice: Increase to d12
Speed: Shades naturally hover, with their feet floating from one to five feet off the ground. During their movement, a shade can make any vertical movement change it desires within this range as well as move 20 ft horizontally. Shades are considered to have a speed of fly 20 ft ().
AC: The shade has +3 natural armor, or the base creatures natural armor, whichever is greater
Special Attacks: The shade retains all of the base creature’s special attacks and in addition gains the following attacks. Saves have a DC of 10+ 1/2 the shade’s hit dice plus the shade’s intelligence modifier.
Dispersal Dream (Spell): Once a day a shade can cast a dispersal dream. The dream sets off a chain reaction in nearby targets. The dream deals 10d6 in a 5’ radius burst centered on the first target (reflex save for half). It then jumps to the next nearest creature if that creature is within ten feet of the first. It then deals 10d6 damage to that creature before moving on to another target. The dream continues until there are no eligible targets. A creature can only be targeted once by a single dream. The dream always jumps to the nearest available target, whether friend or foe of the caster. It is even possible for the caster to be caught in the chain reaction. A dispersal dream cannot be used if there is a visible enemy within ten feet of the caster. If the shade can already cast a dispersal dream, the number of times it can cast it a day goes up by one.
Spells: The shade can cast any spells it knew while alive.
Special Qualities: The shade retains all the character’s special qualities and those listed below, and gains the undead type.
Turn Resistance (Ex): A shade has +3 turn resistance
Damage Reduction (Su): A shade has damage reduction 12/magic
Immunities (Ex): A shade is immune to electricity and polymorph. When it has over half its hit points, it is also immune to mind affecting attacks. Unlike most undead when a shade has less than half its hit points, it loses its immunity to mind influencing effects.
Saves: Will save +2, otherwise same as the base creature
Abilities: Str +2 and Int +2, but being undead has no constitution score.
Skills:
Feats: Same as the character.
Alignment: any evil
CR: ??? I don’t know how much this should add, please make suggestions.

[vanyell]

this one's easy. LA: --

way too powerful. this will do up to 60 damage to everyhing around the thing. in a larger battle, it would be possible to wipe out the entire field, with a single move. I'd personally never let it into any of my games, and I'd slap anyone who tried to play one in any game I'd play

[deco]

Yeah, that Dispersal Dream is just asking for trouble. It's extremely powerful, and not having a limit on how many times the damage can hop around is extremely dangerous.

Also, by your wording you say that the caster can be caught in the chain reaction if he is the closest target within 10' of the original target. Problem is, the caster cannot cast the spell if there is an enemy within 10'. So unless he's casting it on an ally, it would never bounce back to hit him.

[TheElfLord]

Interesting insights.

I forgot to mention that this is only for npcs, pcs would not be able to take this template. The dream is designed to be able to kill most to any stock soldiers/nameless minions, while not causing a huge issue to player characters

As to how the caster could be caught, the dream always jumps to the nearest target whether friend or foe. If the dream is cast into the middle of a large melee it could easily start effecting the caster's own troops and jump back to him since his allies could be within ten feet.

[vanyell]

but no competent character would allow him/herself into that situation. since he had levels elsewhere, he could cast it then ue any travel spell to get out.

[Lord_Arkaine]

There actually already is a Shade template, but it's from Faerun book and it's for shadow people, not undead.

[TheElfLord]

but no competent character would allow him/herself into that situation. since he had levels elsewhere, he could cast it then ue any travel spell to get out.

He wouldn't be able to do both things in one round though. And while this ability is very powerful, it is only effective against large numbers of weak people. Since PC's are neither, the ability has more of a cinimatic effect.

But perhaps a limitless amount of targets is too powerful, what number of targets would be better?


Oh and i forgot to put the save in at first and have editied the first post to reflect it.

[psiryu]

Isn't there a spellcasting undead template in he MM2 or MM3? I think it's called spell snitched.

[Eighth_Seraph]

Large numbers of weak people?! first of all, dispersal dream is set as a spell. that makes it eligible to be enhanced and/or maximized. Even if that were made impossible, it is still very possible that a semi-epic arcane spellcaster can be incinerated with a single casting. The idea is good, but keep in mind that the average soldier is a level one fighter. so, what you need is something that needs to be cast from a certaing distance above the ground, strikes a single spot somewhere on a battle field, and makes some form of gigantic shockwave. Or something. this really is twelve different kinds of overpowered.

[kingofthemorning]

Isn't there a spellcasting undead template in he MM2 or MM3? I think it's called spell snitched.


If I know what your talking about, it's spell stitched, and it's not a true spellcaster, but is imbued with spell like abilities.

I like the shade idea, but to lower the power of the dispersal dream your could have the target personal, making it a last resourt self-destruct thing.

[Eighth_Seraph]

OOOOOH! I like that idea. that would make this ALOT more balanced, if not quite completely. Still pending on a LA

[kingofthemorning]

An LA wouldn't be needed if the template couldn't be applied to PC's would it?

[TheElfLord]

Thanks for all the coments. I'm not looking for a LA, i'm looking for a CR ajustment, so i can figure out the challenge rating of a creature with this template.

As to the dispersal dream, as I mentioned i'm going for something from the Myth series of games. In the game their major power is a chain raction or explosions. Its not an airbrust, or a self destruct. So i want to find a way to tweak it but keep the same flavor and idea.

For my campiagn haveing any enhancements placed on the spell won't be a problem. Its an ancient lost art that only a select few npcs will have. However, will changing it from a spell like ability to a supernatural ability negate the issues about it having metamagical stuff applied to it?

Hope to hear some more advance and thanks again.