Are lycanthropes overpowered?

[CrazyCrab]

Hi everyone,
we're starting a new campaign at level 11 and the DM said that we can have a (gameplay) quirk or a characteristic that will make us stand out, since a lot of things are bound to happen before you hit level 11. For example, the ranger has a dire wolf as a companion instead of a wolf, different and bonus spells, etc.

I've been thinking of cool aspects I could give to my 'Witch Hunter' (paladin (V) 5 - assassin 6) and I realized that something that goes nicely with a 'knight in sour armor'' is a reason to hate/fear himself above everything else, while doing his very best to actually be good, despite the circumstances. So, seeing that you've probably seen the title, I would like to make him a natural born werewolf, its chaotic evil alignment contrasting with his actual chaotic good alignment. With his background as an urchin / adopted member of a knightly order I figure that the werewolf powers activated themselves at an inopportune moment during his puberty, possibly making him kill a person very important to him and forced him to run away from his adopted family. Like most innate lycanthropes he can control these skills at will nowadays, but the only way to remove the curse is a wish spell, giving him a good reason to adventure - find someone willing to cast the spell, especially given the 33% chance of never being able to cast the spell again. Naturally as long as the curse is present it affects the way he behaves, with fits of rage, weird eating habits and other things, naturally followed by penance. Over and over.

So, with the background in place will this be mechanically overpowered? I had a look at the benefits and I don't think it will improve my character much, especially seeing how I will try to not reveal myself to the rest of the party. Here's more or less what I will get: (page 207, MM)
- better STR but I use DEX anyway, as a rogue,
- +1 AC when in hybrid form,
- natural attacks + shape-shifting (but I can't use that without the party turning on me, heh),
- better hearing and smelling,
- the only real bonus is immunity to nonmagical weapons, but I don't want that, it's straight up waaay overpowered.

Now, on the disadvanatge side it is mainly role-play stuff (as an innate lycanthrope and not merely infected) - animals are bound to be scared of me, with violent tendencies I will probably attack more than a few people, etc. Also, if the party finds out they will probably abandon me or kill me, unless I kill them first. Naturally as a paladin I don't want to do it, so I'll do my damn best to not be discovered.

Do you feel like this will be overpowered when compared with other gimmicks? Is there something I'm missing?

[georgie_leech]

Worth noting you don't have to actually use DEX when you wield a Finesse weapon. You're free to pump STR and still get sneak attack by stabbing with daggers or whatever. You just stab very hard instead of very carefully.

[RickAllison]

At lower levels, lycanthropes are insanely OP. Getting to shrug off the majority of attacks makes for a beast. At later levels, there are plenty of ways to get around it, so they lose their primary OP thing.

[MintyNinja]

I'm not as well versed in balancing and such, but if the damage immunity only applies in hybrid form would that feel balanced? So you're really only overpowered when you're not you. Right?

[RickAllison]

I'm not as well versed in balancing and such, but if the damage immunity only applies in hybrid form would that feel balanced? So you're really only overpowered when you're not you. Right?

That could work if you have a world that discriminates against them (like the OP's). If not, there is little reason why someone wouldn't fight in hybrid form anyway.

[GlenSmash!]

If you're going to exploit it the free 15 Strength +1 AC and Damage immunity is quite a lot to add to a pc. Werebears are even worse. If you came to me as a DM asking for your 8 Strength rogue to be a werewolf, i would wonder if you were munchkining. If you came to me as a DM and ask for you 14 Strength rogue to be a werewolf, I would be more lenient.

As a side note, have you considered the Shifter race from the Eberron Unearthed arcana? Shifters are basically lite-lycanthropes.

[RickAllison]

If you're going to exploit it the free 15 Strength +1 AC and Damage immunity is quite a lot to add to a pc. Werebears are even worse. If you came to me as a DM asking for your 8 Strength rogue to be a werewolf, i would wonder if you were munchkining. If you came to me as a DM and ask for you 14 Strength rogue to be a werewolf, I would be more lenient.

As a side note, have you considered the Shifter race from the Eberron Unearthed arcana? Shifters are basically lite-lycanthropes.

Good point. I have a wizard who is a wereraven (natural-born), though he hasn't done much with it. Between Mage Armor and his cleric dip, he had no reason to use the natural armor, he already had 14 Dex but was actually Str-focused, and has only used his immunity to ignore the wolves of our mind-controlled Druid. He has only used his animal forms to observe the party before he joined. This was at level 10.

The shifter doesn't really fit, unfortunately. Shifters aren't humanoids plagued to become a beast, they just have an animalistic side to them.

[georgie_leech]

The shifter doesn't really fit, unfortunately. Shifters aren't humanoids plagued to become a beast, they just have an animalistic side to them.

See: Cornell from Legacy of Darkness vs. Cornell from Judgement.

[Giant2005]

Lycanthropy is extremely powerful.
I once played in a ridiculous gestalt game where everyone was essentially two characters rolled into one. I talked to the DM an opted for a different route where my character wasn't a Gestalt, but was instead a Were-bear. He agreed to it but warned me that I was going to be far weaker than everyone else.
He was wrong. I was easily the most powerful character there by a significant margin. Although I made use of the Lycanthropy more than your character would, due to being a Warlock. Armor of Agathys is even more powerful when you aren't taking any damage upon being hit (I made sure my AC was as low as possible to get as many procs out of it as possible).

[RickAllison]

Lycanthropy is extremely powerful.
I once played in a ridiculous gestalt game where everyone was essentially two characters rolled into one. I talked to the DM an opted for a different route where my character wasn't a Gestalt, but was instead a Were-bear. He agreed to it but warned me that I was going to be far weaker than everyone else.
He was wrong. I was easily the most powerful character there by a significant margin. Although I made use of the Lycanthropy more than your character would, due to being a Warlock. Armor of Agathys is even more powerful when you aren't taking any damage upon being hit (I made sure my AC was as low as possible to get as many procs out of it as possible).

Werebears are a little more ridiculous than other lycanthropes. 19 Strength, Large size so you can wield weapons at double the damage dice, grapple-mania as Enlarged werebears get to grapple everyone, all on top of the normal lycanthropy chassis. Others get more minor bonuses, however. A wereraven gets Mimicry, a wererat gets darkvision, and a werewolf gets a 2d4 weapon. Weretigers and wereboars are a little better off, getting a prone rider with bonus action attack or extra damage respectively.

[CrazyCrab]

At lower levels, lycanthropes are insanely OP. Getting to shrug off the majority of attacks makes for a beast. At later levels, there are plenty of ways to get around it, so they lose their primary OP thing.

I totally agree, that's why I wrote that I don't want the immunity, I'm already quite competent when making my character (as a DM I know how to game the system at least a bit, I suppose) and the rest of the party is quite new so I'm bound to dominate the battlefield most of the time.

Honestly I am mainly looking at it from the role-playing aspect, as I think it is going to be quite fun, but I worry about the 'hidden' benefits. Do you think that things like natural weapons when disarmed or wolf form for running away is going to cause trouble? I mean the usual stuff is more or less useless to me (STR / 2d4 natural weapon? Thanks, I'll stick with my 20 DEX rapier and whip for sneak attacks), so I wonder if these little bonuses outweigh the nastier aspects.

[xanderh]

I'm playing a werewolf in a campaign. I got cursed at level 5, and embraced it immediately.
As a tank, it definitely improved my effectiveness, and my DM has had to tailor some of the encounters to me, but the benefits have definitely started to fall off by now, and we've just reached level 11.

It is worth noting that no encounters were won because I had the immunity. It helped conserve spell slots that would have been spent on Shield, but didn't actually turn a loss into a win.

And if you don't have the immunity and you avoid shape-shifting in combat, it's definitely not going to have a major effect on balance. The natural weapon is comparable to a standard one-handed or versatile weapon, the only benefit is being able to access it anywhere you are for the cost of one action. The eldritch knight gets something similar, costing him a bonus action instead, so this is not a major game-changer since you want to avoid shape-shifting in front of your party.

Overall, if you don't have immunity and you avoid shape-shifting, the benefits are going to be very minimal, and even if you did have them, you're at the level where it gets less and less relevant.

[RickAllison]

I totally agree, that's why I wrote that I don't want the immunity, I'm already quite competent when making my character (as a DM I know how to game the system at least a bit, I suppose) and the rest of the party is quite new so I'm bound to dominate the battlefield most of the time.

Honestly I am mainly looking at it from the role-playing aspect, as I think it is going to be quite fun, but I worry about the 'hidden' benefits. Do you think that things like natural weapons when disarmed or wolf form for running away is going to cause trouble? I mean the usual stuff is more or less useless to me (STR / 2d4 natural weapon? Thanks, I'll stick with my 20 DEX rapier and whip for sneak attacks), so I wonder if these little bonuses outweigh the nastier aspects.

No, werewolf form is IMO one of the weakest of the lycanthropes. You will not be breaking anything.

[GlenSmash!]

The shifter doesn't really fit, unfortunately. Shifters aren't humanoids plagued to become a beast, they just have an animalistic side to them.

To each his own, but that sounds like easily changeable fluff to me.

[MaxWilson]

Werebears are a little more ridiculous than other lycanthropes. 19 Strength, Large size so you can wield weapons at double the damage dice, grapple-mania as Enlarged werebears get to grapple everyone, all on top of the normal lycanthropy chassis. Others get more minor bonuses, however. A wereraven gets Mimicry, a wererat gets darkvision, and a werewolf gets a 2d4 weapon. Weretigers and wereboars are a little better off, getting a prone rider with bonus action attack or extra damage respectively.

Note that any high-level wizard can make himself a werebear body via True Polymorph (to create a werebear) and Magic Jar (to take possession of the body).

If you have a suitable target, you don't have to wait for True Polymorph to make this work.