Minor Draconic Form to Major Draconic Form missing level 2 polymorph?

When I was going through these feats while creating a character, I noticed the entire chain of feats is missing the level 2 polymorph spell-like ability.

Is this intended? If so it makes the minor form really weak until you can upgrade it to the major form at level 7.

It also makes it completely unusable by dragonkin (who need polymorph level II to cast on themselves)

It also makes it completely unusable by dragonkin (who need polymorph level II to cast on themselves)

That’s not true. They’re a valid target of Polymorph 1, it will just make them small or medium and change their type so that they lose access to any held/worn gear for the duration.

BigNorseWolf wrote:

It also makes it completely unusable by dragonkin (who need polymorph level II to cast on themselves)

That’s not true. They’re a valid target of Polymorph 1, it will just make them small or medium and change their type so that they lose access to any held/worn gear for the duration.

I think you are mixing up the spell polymorph with the spell-like ability granted by this feat, which only allows you to turn into a dragon-type. Since the dragonkin is already a dragon, this feat doesn't grant the bonus to sleep and paralysis. There are no other dragon races, and the only >CR1 dragon alien option is the Ravenous Drake, which the ONLY benefit is the acid resistance.

A dragonkin with this feat would have to waste a feat slot on the minor form with no real benefit and wait until lvl 7 when they can get the major form.

That is, of course, assuming that the missing lvl2 polymorph is intended. If they errata the minor form to match parity with the other feats in the chain, then the feat is fine.

Xenocrat wrote:

BigNorseWolf wrote:

It also makes it completely unusable by dragonkin (who need polymorph level II to cast on themselves)

That’s not true. They’re a valid target of Polymorph 1, it will just make them small or medium and change their type so that they lose access to any held/worn gear for the duration.

I think you are mixing up the spell polymorph with the spell-like ability granted by this feat, which only allows you to turn into a dragon-type. Since the dragonkin is already a dragon, this feat doesn't grant the bonus to sleep and paralysis. There are no other dragon races, and the only >CR1 dragon alien option is the Ravenous Drake, which the ONLY benefit is the acid resistance.

You can still make a custom/predetermined Polymorph 1 form with the normal granted ability (one, plus a free climb move speed and free natural weapon if you want) that has the dragon subtype instead of the normal humanoid or animal restriction. Which means a dragonkin would get to keep his gear since he doesn't change type. So you build in one of compression, trample, the bad breath weapon, the trivial resistance, or the low light vision options, among other things Polymorph 1 can do for you.

When you select polymorph (Alien Archive 2 145) as a spell known, you add dragon to the list of creature types you can select when designing polymorphed forms. Changing a target that isn’t a dragon into a dragon form grants them a +2 enhancement bonus to saving throws against paralysis and sleep effects.

In addition, you can cast polymorph on yourself once per day as a 1st-level spell-like ability, using your character level as your caster level. However, you can only use this spell-like ability to assume one predetermined form that has the dragon type.

This (1) adds dragon to your available types if using the spell, (2) gives a useless to Dragonkin type bonus when changing into it, and (3) forces you to choose a single predetermined form (rather than the usual four per spell level), and that one must have the dragon type, when using the 1/day SLA version of Polymorph it grants.

(3) is restrictive, but not so restrictive it doesn't allow you to make up a normal Polymorph 1 custom form with the usual total freedom of appearance and general Polymorph abilities that just happens to have the dragon type.

We can agree to disagree on the usefulness of the LvL1 polymorph ability, especially for dragonkin.

The main point of this thread is whether or not the missing lvl 2 ability is intended or not.

It’s more useful for Dragonkin (and Kobolds) than others - keeping your gear is better than getting some rarely applicable save bonuses. It’s the non dragons types who don’t get much out of this.

(Specific creature polymorph forms are bad and this doesn’t change when dragons are on the table. The limits on what you can take aren’t worth the extra ability you can choose.)

The feat is probably supposed to scale up at 5th level, or they might have thought that was too powerful for a feat granting a 1st level spell that you can take at 1st level. It’s better than the psychic and stage magic spell lines as is.