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First a bit of back story: My fiance loves to play PnP games but we can never get a group to stay together long for various reasons. As you can imagine that would bum her out a bit.
Her birthday is a week away and I want to surprise her with an campaign for just me and her. She already has a character created from the last group that never got off the ground so that isn't a worry.
She is using a whip wielding cleric of Calistria and wants to get animal hybrid followers later on (hello vivisectionist).
I plan on using three DMPC characters to fill out the group:
The first is a vivisectionist who will be played like Dr. Frankenstein.
The second is a kobold (yet to be named) that she refers to as the Librarian. (A barbarian who has skills in comedy, oratory, and scribe. I plan to play him as a person who collects stories but has a bad temper. May take levels in bard later)
And for the third character I want to create a traveling chef who is on a personal quest to create the ultimate dish. Now taking into consideration that she likes to have her characters eat the flesh of her fallen foes I want this chef to be something similar to Yoshi if possible.
Here is where I have my problem. I have access to the advanced races guide and thought the lizard man race might be suitable (having a bite attack and all) but I want to find a way for the chef to momentarily grow large enough to swallow some enemies whole or at the least take a really nasty chunk out of them.
I looked at the magic item creation rules and was pretty confused as a result. I was thinking about a command word activated object that creates the effects of an enlarge person spell.
In short: I want to give my lizard chef some way to effectively turn into a T-rex long enough to make a swallow whole or a bite action then go back to normal sized. Any Idea how I could do this?
You can describe Bite attacks as taking a big chunk of someone's flesh if you want, and not blink an eye.
Fun fact: There is no Beast Shape spell that grants Swallow Whole, as far as I can tell.
Of course, you are the DM. You could totally make it up.
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A Druid of high enough level could do it. Saurian Shaman Archetype FTW.
As for "Swallow Whole" just rule that if the bite kills, he swallows. Though that's not much cookin.
Voice: The Swedish Chef.
That is very true. However I would like to keep it as close to the RAW as possible. If at all possible.
If nothing else I want to find a way for the chef to grow without having to keep casting enlarge person or waiting until I get to be a lvl 6 druid. Does anybody know of anything similar to those reserve spell feats from 3.5? I don't care what system it's from I just want something to work off of.
Pretty sure that even Wildshape won't work, since I don't think that the Beast Shape spells give Swallow Whole (which is what Wildshape uses).
If need be I don't really care about the swallow whole. Like A man in black said I'm the dm I could just house rule it. My main concern right now is how would I go about duplicating the enlarge person effect and have it last for all of 30 seconds?
Well, if you get to level 10 as a witch you can take:
Cook People (Su): The witch can create fabulous spells by cooking an intelligent humanoid creature in her cauldron, either alive or dead. Using this hex creates one meal or serving of food of the witch’s choice, typically a delicious stew or a dough suitable for cookies, pastries, or other desserts. Cooking the victim takes 1 hour. Eating the food provides one of the following benefits for 1 hour: age resistance, bear’s endurance, bull’s strength, cat’s grace, eagle’s splendor, fox’s cunning, neutralize poison (instantaneous), owl’s wisdom, remove disease (instantaneous). Alternatively, the witch can shape the dough into a Small, human-like creature, animating it as a homunculus for 1 hour. The witch must have the cauldron hex to select this hex. Using this hex or knowingly eating its food is an evil act. Source: Ultimate Magic
Okay. So now I'm going to have to find a way to make this lizard a witch. I'm okay with that.
Bard. And he sings a little song while he cooks them.
"Fresh Meat!"
The Butcher of Diablo I.
I remember the first time I saw him. I ran so fast I was embarrassed, and no one was watching.
Why not have her run 2 or more characters. From what you mentioned she sounds to have experience with the games. It will make it easier on you and give her a bit more action. Heck if she controls the entire party it really makes the gold distribution easy. It all goes into a fund for the whole party Ala most console RPGs.
Of course I'm just throwing out ideas. But remember you would be controlling 3 characters + running any foes they encounter that means she might have to wait for her turn for a time.
Of course with everything YMMV. Either way best of luck.
You could also use the Feral Gnasher goblin barbarian archetype. This does not solve the size issues (you actually get smaller) but you gain one real sweet bite attack, and the ability to latch on with your bite, eating every turn. Instead of one big bite, you take lots of smaller ones. On a plus side, a goblin with a tail, oversized jaw, and really scrawny arms looks just like Yoshi! Also wasnt it Kirby that did the eating and cooking people?
Wait,you wanna Quina Quinn from Ff9?! Wears a chef hat,use battle forks,eats everything and absorbs magic depending on who/what it ate?lu
Having gotten a decent night of sleep I decided just to whip up a custom race. It's basically a lizard man with the at-will use of enlarge person.
However when it uses the enlarge person it takes on a quadrupedal shape and gains the swallow whole attack.
Did I dip around the racial construction rules in the Advanced races guide? Yes.
Does it have the potential to be overpowered? Yes.
Is it exactly what I was looking for? Absolutely.
Thanks for everybody's help.
Elegant solution... I am interested to see a full break down of the race.
Even still I advise against controlling most of the adventuring party. If you want you can build and maintain the characters and let them run them in them during combat.
Either way I wish you best of luck on this endeavour comrade.
make him a spriggan, they can change their size more or less at will, pair that with a fleshwarping poison of swallow whole, bam, done
make him a spriggan, they can change their size more or less at will, pair that with a fleshwarping poison of swallow whole, bam, done
Drop racial hit die. Make it based purely on Class levels and it would be good. Maybe make it to where he was cursed to be able to swallow whole and can never satisfy his hunger?
It probably wont be the greatest but it works well for what I wanted. Everything was created under the advanced points and traits except for enlarge person at will. Came out to 20 points exactly.
Dragon - 60ft darkvision, low light vision, immune to magical sleep effects and paralysis.(It fit the image I had in mind)
+2 str & con, -2 dex (He's big and hardy but kinda fat)
Knows common and draconic (Dragons should be able to speak dragon)
Can cast enlarge person at will (I used the monstrous trait for a spell at will)
Bite 1d6 upgraded to 1d8 (This is supposed to be his main weapon so why not make it a little stronger?)
Two 1d4 claw attacks (The big scaly lizard would be odd without claws)
Natural armor +1 (Scales should be kinda tough)
Vestigial wings (He's too fat to fly but humanoid dragons should have wings.)
I have it fluffed in my head that when the chef uses the enlarge person ability his arms thicken and become legs causing him to fall forward and his throat lengthens granting him the swallow whole ability.
As a side note: I usually run multiple dmpcs to fill in the gaps in party composition. Well that and the fact that if I spend 20+ hours making an adventure you bet I'm gonna wanna play it too!
What I normally do is have the dmpcs kinda fade into the background unless combat rolls around.
I've been playing (forever DMing) Pen and paper games since I picked up AD&D umpteen years ago so I think I should be able to run this smoothly. Well I hope anyway. I would go with the option of letting my fiance run a second character but she is still learning the basics of the game and I don't want to overwhelm her.
Ah I see... yikes... Either way you made an excellent race there comrade. I love the vestigial wings. Permission to 'borrow' them? For my PC race based on the concept of 4e Dragonborn. As I hate 3.5 Dragonborn.
Hmm maybe make racial feat that allows him to fly while enlarged?
Permission granted.
Perhaps when in the enlarged state the wings allow for a clumsy flying?
To keep this guy from being a bit overpowered at low levels I'm gonna make him a witch and have him carry around a cauldron. Hey, the guy's gotta cook in something.
Edit: I'm happy that my first attempt at a homebrewed race wasn't instantly met with a "Boo! you stink!" comment.
Well Heck it works wonderful for a monstrous race. And yeah clumsy flight would work. Also it would require a feat.