The LA-assignment Thread IV: Live Free or Hit Die Hard

[Inevitability]

Sorry for the slight delays: next entry should be up this evening (so in about 12 hours).

[GreatWyrmGold]

Hivenest, maybe? If you can get your DM to allow a Tiny swarm.

Like most creative uses of killer flowers, it makes a better antagonist than protagonist.

[Inevitability]

Drowned

As much as level 9 parties might fear this thing, its 20 RHD kind of ruin it for player use.

Let's take a closer look: undead, medium-sized, 25 strength and all other stats average, two 1d8 slams (but drowned can wield weapons so nobody cares), unholy toughness, fast healing 5, and a swim speed. None of these are bad traits, they're just spread quite thin.

The drowned's main attack is their Drowning Aura, which is admittedly pretty neat. It's free to use, affects everything that needs to breathe something other than water, and is resisted with a constitution check rather than a saving throw.

However, at ECL 20 the majority of monsters is either immune to drowning or in possession of heaps of constitution, making it quite hard to effectively use this ability. What's more: a drowned's allies aren't immune, and will probably have constitution scores below 30, causing them to die very easily if they get too close.

Considering this all, -0 is the only LA I could assign here. I'm sure nobody will disagree.

[Nifft]

Drowning Aura is a neat trick, but it's not worth 20 levels.

Verdict: LA -0, back to the water with you.

Next?

[Efrate]

Yep minus 0. Decent mid boss with a unique trick but 20hd kills any hopes for player characters.

[OgresAreCute]

I don't imagine anyone's going to argue 20 undead HD are worth anything more than -0. So yeah, -0.

[Covenant12]

Not sure anything could make up for 20 undead RHD. I mean, other than 20 caster levels or similar. Poor BAB and 1 good save, a drowned takes 1 class level in a party of 21st level characters, and what is he good at?

As you said, 30+ Con is going to be common at level 20, and if drowning aura doesn't contribute he's terrible at everything. A beatstick who doesn't have three attacks at level 20, and with epic rules will never get a third. 25 Str is nice, but he won't hit often and won't do meaningful damage when he does.

The polar opposite of epic-ready, -0 by a long shot.

[ViperMagnum357]

LA -0 and onward. For 20 Undead RHD, you had better be able to wrestle a Great Wyrm into submission through main strength, or match a full caster spell for spell/SLA/Su. This thing would be pretty bad around 8-9 RHD, let alone 20.

[ExLibrisMortis]

Pile on some more undead RHD, and we'll have ourselves a nice vehicle for Destruction Retribution. Yeah, definitely -0.

[Zaq]

This one isn’t even fun to make fun of. -0.

[Dimers]

You'll be drowning in replies that say "LA -0".

[javcs]

Concur, -0.


Unholy Toughness is a nice plus for an undead, though it doesn't have the Charisma to make use of it.


Maybe it wouldn't suck if it had about 15 fewer RHD. Still wouldn't be good, though.

[Remuko]

I kinda almost wish they just retconned all undead into having Unholy Toughness and then just removed the HD bloat that most undead suffer.

Def -0

[Blue Jay]

I had a DM who made us battle a Drowned alongside a group of advanced Desiccators. So, almost every round, we had to save against drowning and desiccating. Totally insidious!

It took us about 8 or 9 rounds to kill them all. If he hadn't house ruled the Drowning Aura to allow Fort saves instead of Con checks, it would have been fatal. As it was, it still managed to kill a couple of the wizard's summons.

Scary monster, but yeah, bad idea for a PC. LA -0.

[Efrate]

I just wish unholy toughness was a feat. It would help a lot of undead since 136 hp at 20hd is pretty abysmal. Im sure there are hoops a pc can jump through to get it, likely using candles.

[danielxcutter]

Undead HD are literally the worst type in the entire frigging game, except maybe Construct or Humanoid. LA -0, next please.

[javcs]

I kinda almost wish they just retconned all undead into having Unholy Toughness and then just removed the HD bloat that most undead suffer.

Def -0

I just wish unholy toughness was a feat. It would help a lot of undead since 136 hp at 20hd is pretty abysmal. Im sure there are hoops a pc can jump through to get it, likely using candles.

I generally houserule Unholy Toughness onto all intelligent/non-mindless undead. I'm not actually sure about obtaining Unholy Toughness.

If you took away the RHD inflation, you'd probably want to consider distributing Turn Resistance to make up for it.

I had a DM who made us battle a Drowned alongside a group of advanced Desiccators. So, almost every round, we had to save against drowning and desiccating. Totally insidious!

It took us about 8 or 9 rounds to kill them all. If he hadn't house ruled the Drowning Aura to allow Fort saves instead of Con checks, it would have been fatal. Add itwas, it managed to kill a couple of the wizard's summons.

Scary monster, but yeah, bad idea for a PC. LA -0.

Ouch. That's brutal.

[Remuko]

If you took away the RHD inflation, you'd probably want to consider distributing Turn Resistance to make up for it.

true, thats fair.

[liquidformat]

-0 LA seems about right for these.

Unholy Toughness + turn resistance + HD adjustment seems like quite a headache to get right. Especially since you would also have to be adjusting most of the sa/sla/ex so they function properly and figuring out where those ability score bonuses based on levels should be dropped...

[javcs]

-0 LA seems about right for these.

Unholy Toughness + turn resistance + HD adjustment seems like quite a headache to get right. Especially since you would also have to be adjusting most of the sa/sla/ex so they function properly and figuring out where those ability score bonuses based on levels should be dropped...

True. There'd be a lot of stuff to do if you wanted to fix RHD inflation. For any creature type - Undead are just worse, because of all the HD- dependent things related to them - Turn/Rebuke, necromancy in general, etc.

Though, it's not like just giving out Unholy Toughness, but not changing anything else would make Undead RHD particularly good.

[OgresAreCute]

Though, it's not like just giving out Unholy Toughness, but not changing anything else would make Undead RHD particularly good.

Especially considering the average undead mook has a -5 charisma mod.

[GreatWyrmGold]

I don't imagine anyone's going to argue 20 undead HD are worth anything more than -0. So yeah, -0.

It would only be possible if there were more undead which didn't have heaps of extra HD tacked on for turn resistance.

This one isn’t even fun to make fun of. -0.

You'll be drowning in replies that say "LA -0".

I'm glad that Zaq was proved wrong in the very next post...but wish I had thought of that line.

[Flickerdart]

If we were allowing negative LA, this thing would be like -10. So awful.

[Inevitability]

Dust Wight

More terrible, high-RHD undead!

The dust wight is awful. 16 undead RHD would ruin any monster, but even without most of those this thing would still be underwhelming.

20 strength and two 2d6 slams are awful at this level. DR 5/adamantine is useless when no monster ever feels the need to attack you. 20 ft. land speed is just insulting.

The special abilities are barely any better. Elemental Turning Vulnerability is a blatant weakness, and Crumbling Touch gives a bad power-up to the natural weapons you weren't going to use anyway.

The only mildly interesting ability is Petrifying Cloud, which is at its core a no-action save-or-die. I mean, it's going to have a low saving throw, only works at extremely close range, can only target someone once a day, and needs a turn to take effect, but it's probably the best reason to play a dust wight.

Note, however, that by adding a few RHD a dust wight can advance in size pretty quickly. One RHD makes it Large, with the corresponding +8 strength, -2 dexterity, and +1 natural armor, whereas another two RHD add the same stat adjustments again while boosting AC even further. A 19 RHD Huge creature with 36 strength may not be great, but it's definitely better than the standard dust wight.

Even with the fancy advancement shenanigans, I don't think dust wights are really playable. They struggle to get three attacks per turn (and are flat-out incapable of that if Huge), have terrible stats apart from strength, and their sole save-or-die is hard to protect your team from, very limited, and overly reliant on their low speed to actually get used. -0 LA.

[javcs]

Concur, -0.

[Zaq]

16 undead RHD

Next! Next, I say!

[GreatWyrmGold]

Someday, there will be an undead worth playing! Probably a template, maybe something which uses turn resistance instead of HD bloat.

[liquidformat]

Someday, there will be an undead worth playing! Probably a template, maybe something which uses turn resistance instead of HD bloat.

Everyone in the competition threads seems to go crazy for slaymate, but they seem more like primary cohort choice than playing yourself...

Anyways poor dusty suffers from severe bloating -0 LA for sure.

[OgresAreCute]

Someday, there will be an undead worth playing! Probably a template, maybe something which uses turn resistance instead of HD bloat.

Several templates and undead (mostly of the incorporeal, soul-sucking variety) have been given positive level adjustments in these threads. If we keep getting monsters like this, though, it'll be a while until the next.

-0.

[ViperMagnum357]

Dust Wight is LA -0, and roundly unworthy of serious discussion as a PC choice. There are definitely at least a few Undead with sufficient abilities to justify LA +0 or better in spite of their RHD, or at least prompt a serious discussion to that effect, but this is certainly not one of them.