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What was the out-of-game reasoning behind the design decision that lead to this unnecessary restriction? What in the in-game mythos allows a druid to turn into a bear, but not a polar bear?
If you know the answer, please share. If you THINK you might know the reasons behind it, please join the discussion and share your thoughts.
Unless otherwise noted, polymorph spells cannot be used to change into specific individuals. Although many of the fine details can be controlled, your appearance is always that of a generic member of that creature's type. Polymorph spells cannot be used to assume the form of a creature with a template or an advanced version of a creature.
Sadly, polar bears are templated bears, and terror birds and megarapters are advanced creatures (not to be confused with the advanced template). These are merely the three examples that I chose. There are lots of other sensible forms that are right out for no other reason than the game designers chose to use space-saving shorthand for some of their stat blocks.
EDIT: Other forms that you'd think they'd be able to use, but can't, are as follows:
- anaconda
- black bear
- chimpanzee
- great white shark
- hammerhead shark
- heavy horse
- king cobra
- megaraptor
- orangutan
- plesiosaurus
- polar bear
- terror bird
- tiger shark
- velociraptor
- woolly mammoth
If you expand the polymorph restriction list to include things like vermin, for characters such as spellcasters using the vermin shape spells, you will find that more than half of the available vermin forms out there are illegal!
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A GM can easily house rule specific cases.
The general restriction against templates is one I agree with, for game balance purposes. The templates often REQUIRE GM adjudication to make them work, applied without supervision they can easily yield poor results.
There are enough legal overpowered choices as is, Ivshudder to see that list expanded with young advanced creatures
A GM can easily house rule specific cases.
The general restriction against templates is one I agree with, for game balance purposes. The templates often REQUIRE GN adjudication to make them work, applied without supervision they can easily yield poor results.
There are enough legal overpowered choices as is, Ivshudder to see that list expanded with young advanced creatures
A lot of good house ruling does for those poor souls stuck in Pathfinder Society. It also does nothing to fix the underlying problem of an arbitrary restriction with no in- or out-of game rational supporting it.
I agree that things like half-dragon tigers shouldn't be permitted, but these are basic animals. There is no real reason to restrict them. It's definitely not a balance issue; the polymorph rules and spells are already internally balanced, limiting you in what you can get from any given form.
Polar Bears are alternate bears, not templated.
Semantics. The rules are clear. A polar bear is a bear with a template, and templated creatures are not allowed in polymorph effects.
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Polar Bears are alternate bears, not templated.
"To generate stats for a smaller bear (like a black bear), you can apply the young simple template to the grizzly bear's stat block. To generate stats for a larger grizzly or a polar bear, apply the advanced simple template to the grizzly's stats."
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Polar Bears are alternate bears, not templated."To generate stats for a smaller bear (like a black bear), you can apply the young simple template to the grizzly bear's stat block. To generate stats for a larger grizzly or a polar bear, apply the advanced simple template to the grizzly's stats."
Polar Bear was added as a stand alone creature in Bestiary 5, no Templates or alternating required.
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Out of game, they probably didn't want druids to find an animal with the best abilities then fine tune the size. For example there are very few huge creatures with pounce or good fly speeds, but a young roc or giant dire tiger could work just fine. Also probably wanted to avoid celestial/fiendish shifting for DR and resistances.
Polar Bear was added as a stand alone creature in Bestiary 5, no Templates or alternating required.Polar Bears are alternate bears, not templated."To generate stats for a smaller bear (like a black bear), you can apply the young simple template to the grizzly bear's stat block. To generate stats for a larger grizzly or a polar bear, apply the advanced simple template to the grizzly's stats."
LOL Then your last post should have said that then since the linked bear in the OP's post has that quote about templates. Normal animals are one of those things that doesn't stand out for me in the bestiaries.
I do find it curious that new and old polar bears don't match though. So 2 official versions I guess.
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Polar Bear was added as a stand alone creature in Bestiary 5, no Templates or alternating required.Polar Bears are alternate bears, not templated."To generate stats for a smaller bear (like a black bear), you can apply the young simple template to the grizzly bear's stat block. To generate stats for a larger grizzly or a polar bear, apply the advanced simple template to the grizzly's stats."LOL Then your last post should have said that then since the linked bear in the OP's post has that quote about templates. Normal animals are one of those things that doesn't stand out for me in the bestiaries.
I do find it curious that new and old polar bears don't match though. So 2 official versions I guess.
The links weren't up when I originally posted.
I didn't know about the advancement thing either originally, I just searched for "Polar Bear" and found it in my Bestiary 5. And they presumably added the PB in 5 specifically so Druids could turn into them finally.
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Does the Bestiary 5 polar bear conform to the same stats as a bear with the advanced template? If so, it might still be considered illegal by some GMs.
If the stats are wholly different, however, then one must wonder why there are two different types of polar bears in the world.
EDIT: It totally does! lol.
EDIT: Though I guess it gained a swim speed as well.
EDIT: I could see some players and GMs arguing that this is evidence that RAI polymorph should allow for variant animals.
I'm assuming the original was just a hold over from 3.5, and for the 5th bestiary the staff realized "Hey! Druids can't be Polar Bears, that's stupid, let's fix it."
If that is the case, should we then assume that the other variant animals should be allowed as well?
Sure.
As soon as they put them in Bestiary 6. ;)
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I'v created a FAQ thread in the Rules forum. Please click the FAQ button there if you wish to gain an answer to this mystery as well.
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> What in the in-game mythos allows a druid to turn into a bear, but not a polar bear?
Well this is easy. It's because of something called midichlorians, you see...
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It's a combination of limiting the power of druids and laziness. Well, space-saving laziness, but still cutting corners. The "no templates" thing is just so players don't go bestiary diving for whatever perfect combination of templates gives them what they want. The fact that most variant monsters are just templated regular monsters is because they didn't want to remake statblocks for basically identical monsters.
Probably the whole thing would be solved by including a line somewhere to the effect of "this does not count as a templated monster for polymorph purposes, we're simply leaving out the statblock to save on page count".
This is exactly it. If a player could generate their own advanced, templated version of whatever animal they wanted to turn into, wouldn't that get a little ridiculous?
But I agree that if Paizo releases it as its own "stand-alone" animal, regardless of being built by those rules, that it's fair game for wild shape.
But even that would require something written into the stat blocks, as there will be unique, templated animals with stat blocks that are not appropriate for players.
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>This is exactly it. If a player could generate their own advanced, templated version of whatever animal they wanted to turn into, wouldn't that get a little ridiculous?
Why not allow that? Give a limit on the number of templates per polymorph spell, like 1/5 levels or something. That way at lv1-5 you could only turn into untemplated versions, at 5-10 ones with a single template, and at 15-20 you could have three whole templates hanging on your spell.
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The reason is to put some limitations on the druid so things dont get too far out of hand.
Rules Aside-->If PF provides actual stats(such as the polar bear in bestiary 5) then I would allow it.
Maybe a list of allowed templates should be introduced. Young, Advanced, and Giant are examples of templates that do not introduce anything to the creature that is not already covered by the polymorph spells.
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I believe the intent was probably that if they specifically indicate an otherwise normal creature creature, such as a polar bear, is stated by using a template then you can wild shape into it as long as it would still be valid even though it has a template. That is certainly how I would run it in my games. Likely that won't work for PFS.
What you can't do is 'make up your own' for example, I'll be an advanced wolf or something similar.
As for the 'in game mythos' obviously there isn't one. It is an artifact of the designers using templates as a shortcut to build otherwise mundane creatures, and a rule that you can't use templates so people don't make up their own stuff breaking the game.
In reality though, even at the most restrictive this really isn't that big of a deal. Mechanically probably most of those options aren't better than existing ones, so you aren't really losing anything from that perspective. If you are in a game (including PFS) where the GM is extremely restrictive on this then just put on you big girl panties and deal.
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How could it get too far out of hand exactly? The advanced template only adds ability bonuses and natural armor, which you won't benefit from with a polymorph effect, since you use those given by the spell or effect instead. Adding giant template, on the other hand, would be inherently balanced by requiring a higher level spell. Creatures with advanced hit dice wouldn't make much difference either, since none of the things hit dice increases is given by the polymorph rules--you simply use your own hit dice.
(FYI, I'm inclined to agree that you can't just mix and match in order to make up your ideal form; it needs to exist somewhere in the rules.)
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For the same reason you can't have a LARGE bear as a companion, but a large wolf or large dog is apparently 'totes legit'.
Chicanery.
The POLAR BEAR from B5 was re-nerfed down to the same itty-bitty bear you could always have.
No large bears.
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For the same reason you can't have a LARGE bear as a companion, but a large wolf or large dog is apparently 'totes legit'.
Chicanery.
The POLAR BEAR from B5 was re-nerfed down to the same itty-bitty bear you could always have.
No large bears.
The oddball nature of the animal companion rules are a whole 'nother beast entirely. Feel free to tackle that one in a different thread if you wish.
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How could it get too far out of hand exactly? The advanced template only adds ability bonuses and natural armor, which you won't benefit from with a polymorph effect, since you use those given by the spell or effect instead. Adding giant template, on the other hand, would be inherently balanced by requiring a higher level spell. Creatures with advanced hit dice wouldn't make much difference either, since none of the things hit dice increases is given by the polymorph rules--you simply use your own hit dice.
(FYI, I'm inclined to agree that you can't just mix and match in order to make up your ideal form; it needs to exist somewhere in the rules.)
I don't think it will normally be an issue, but the one thing I can see is GM's not liking is the players always taking the advanced version for purely mechanical reasons. To some that is "out of hand", but I would not care as long as PF created stats for it. I don't want players just stacking templates because Paizo printed a name in a book with no actual stats though.
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The oddball nature of the animal companion rules are a whole 'nother beast entirely. Feel free to tackle that one in a different thread if you wish.
Actually it is a debate that is known to be 'personality driven', somebody (who shall remain nameless) loves cats and hates bears... so no Polar bears for your Druid.
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If a character was Wild Shaping into a Fiendish animal, wouldn't he still only receive the base abilities provided by the spell?
This spell functions as beast shape II, except that it also allows you to assume the form of a Diminutive or Huge creature of the animal type. This spell also allows you to take on the form of a Small or Medium creature of the magical beast type. If the form you assume has any of the following abilities, you gain the listed ability:
burrow 30 feet, climb 90 feet, fly 90 feet (good maneuverability), swim 90 feet, blindsense 30 feet, darkvision 60 feet, low-light vision, scent, constrict, ferocity, grab, jet, poison, pounce, rake, trample, trip, and web.
The only thing they could possibly gain from that would be the Darkvision. Im not saying this should be allowed, but there are several animals in the bestiaries that, in fact, have darkvision in real life but are limited to Low-Light Vision.
People get bent around the rules and freak out about things, that are restricted by the RAW, that really don't hurt the balance in any way...
Wild Shape says you can become any animal you are familiar with. Lets go with the Constrictor Snake... it basically represents your average python. What about the Anaconda? Would the GM use the advanced versions for higher level characters? That makes them real in the game does it not? The Constrictor Snake can be enlarged to a Large or Huge creature resembling an Anaconda. How does this break the balance of the game when a character could also turn into an Allosaurus(Huge)that gains Pounce, Grab and Rake!?
On the other hand, people talk of the Huge Tiger thing...
Realistically, there has NEVER been an Elephant sized(Huge) tiger... the great thing about this game is that they can exist if a GM wants a species of elephant sized tigers! Or any other animal the GM wants to exist in HIS world.
Player: "Hey GM, in this game are there Large and Huge Anacondas? Im playing a Serpent Shaman and there is nothing left that fits my specific abilities and theme beyond the Emperor Cobra?"
GM: "Of course there are. You guys will be in swamps most of the campaign."
Player: "So could I Wild Shape into those creatures when Im able to, if Im familiar with them, even though they aren't in the bestiary?"
Gm: "That rule is stupid. There is an exception for the Eagle Shaman turning into a freakin Roc so Im OK with that."
Player: :D
....problem solved. When it comes down to it, the game is about having fun people. Bend the rules to your will, drive them before you and hear the lamentations of their women!
Just be any bear and call it a Polar Bear....it is just a Skin...wild shape gives all the stats you get anyway. Pretty much any animal exception can just be a skin on something else, PFs or non PFS...as long as the stat works I can't see why a GM would say no.
Just be any bear and call it a Polar Bear....it is just a Skin...wild shape gives all the stats you get anyway. Pretty much any animal exception can just be a skin on something else, PFs or non PFS...as long as the stat works I can't see why a GM would say no.
And yet they still do.
I've even heard there are specific rules in PFS prohibiting players from changing flavor. If a magic hat says its purple, than its purple! *rolls eyes*
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For the same reason you can't have a LARGE bear as a companion, but a large wolf or large dog is apparently 'totes legit'.
At first level, no allowed animal companion is any larger than Medium.
Just be any bear and call it a Polar Bear....it is just a Skin...wild shape gives all the stats you get anyway. Pretty much any animal exception can just be a skin on something else, PFs or non PFS...as long as the stat works I can't see why a GM would say no.And yet they still do.
I've even heard there are specific rules in PFS prohibiting players from changing flavor. If a magic hat says its purple, than its purple! *rolls eyes*
PFS bars flavor because players try to claim flavor changes that are actual severe physical ones. Putting a tassel on your katana is flavor... claiming it's a bastard sword, or the other way around, is an overreach.
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I would rule that if the druid had never seen a polar bear, terror bird, or megaraptor he couldn't change into one. Now if the druid was from a region where these existed, they'd definitely be on the list. It's a houserule, but one I stick by.
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PFS bars flavor because players try to claim flavor changes that are actual severe physical ones. Putting a tassel on your katana is flavor... claiming it's a bastard sword, or the other way around, is an overreach.
I can see why they might want to avoid the confusion in that particular instance, but if they aren't applying bastard sword rules and abilities towards it, why does it really matter?
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Just be any bear and call it a Polar Bear....it is just a Skin...wild shape gives all the stats you get anyway. Pretty much any animal exception can just be a skin on something else, PFs or non PFS...as long as the stat works I can't see why a GM would say no.And yet they still do.
I've even heard there are specific rules in PFS prohibiting players from changing flavor. If a magic hat says its purple, than its purple! *rolls eyes*
In PFS you can can't represent one item or race as another.
As an example you can't say your longbow is a repeating crossbow, but if the crossbow is said to be red then you can say its blue.| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
PFS bars flavor because players try to claim flavor changes that are actual severe physical ones. Putting a tassel on your katana is flavor... claiming it's a bastard sword, or the other way around, is an overreach.I can see why they might want to avoid the confusion in that particular instance, but if they aren't applying bastard sword rules and abilities towards it, why does it really matter?
Sometimes these cosmetic changes matter for story reasons, and the idea is for them(flavor changes) to have impact the story.
As an example if wizard wants to say his cat familiar is really a tiger cub, and they go into some place that does not allow wild animals, even baby animals it now has a mechanical impact.
I know such things are not likely but it can happen so they just make sure it doesnt happen by not allowing it.
In a home game it is a non-issue, but in PFS everyone is supposed to have teh same experience.
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That's not a mechanical impact. That's a narrative impact.