Go back in time and don't allow that crap.
Or to be helpful, do you mean 'how do I manipulate the rules to kill this PC in a 'fair' way?' or 'how do I tell my player to stop playing what I allowed him to play?'?
Just say no to gargoyle PCs. Why did you let him play a gargoyle anyway? The things not meant to be played by PCs in a normal game.
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Do gargoyles make particularly good Oracles, or is it just the fact that one of your players is a gargoyle in the first place?
Gargoyles are CR4, so according to the "monsters as PCs" section of the Bestiary, he should be starting four levels lower than any character playing a core race. Is he?
Also gargoyles are nocturnal by nature. Do all the PCs sleep during the day along with him?
No seriously, why would you allow a race that PCs aren't even supposed to touch in the first place?
I'm assuming you are using these stats for Gargoyle, which makes it a 36 RP race. Not sure why being an Oracle would matter at all (-2 to Cha hurts too) at this point as it's a melee beast pretty much without class features. +2 Str, +4 Con, + 5 Natural Armor, 10 DR/Magic, 50 Fly, and 4 Primary Natural attacks. Wow.
Unless the rest of the party is some sort of advanced race, I don't see why you allowed this either. I'd suggest telling the player you made a mistake allowing it and ask him to politely to rewrite, or work with him to nerf the racials; maybe give them back as he levels.
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What world and type of area does your campaign take place? Also does he RP the Gargoyle oracle well?
For future reference when this occurs again, and I know it will hehe, tell the player if he wants to be such an odd race he or she needs to come up with a awe inspiring background why they are that race on the current setting. It weeds out a lot of Drisst fan boys and joke characters out right away.
What world and type of area does your campaign take place? Also does he RP the Gargoyle oracle well?
For future reference when this occurs again, and I know it will hehe, tell the player if he wants to be such an odd race he or she needs to come up with a awe inspiring background why they are that race on the current setting. It weeds out a lot of Drisst fan boys and joke characters out right away.
No need to mistreat the players character, or at least not without telling them upfront about it. Deal with it out of character if its an out of character problem.
Its easy to make a backstory for a good dark elf. You see I was once royalty, but I was special and turned my ways on my people. You can find the full story in this book... Wait, does plagiarism count?
To a lot of us it is easy to make background, but in my experience the ones that want to make Drow and gargoyles give up when you ask for a compelling background of that character. Also your the judge, so if it's a lame rip off then shoot it down.
I'm not big on generalizing. In my experience people who bring ridiculous characters tend to bring just as ridiculous backstories, not just leave. Asking for a backstory and not really wanting the character isn't a fix, its an excuse. Talk about it. If you really don't want a 30+ RP character blowing things up, just say so. Its completely within reason in most games.
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I played a gargoyle fighter in a planescape game for a while. He was a professional door guard. Lots of fun to play. I've also played a pseudodragon bard. And an ogre-magi samurai. And a Kyton Paladin.
None of these characters were disruptive to the game.
In my experience, characters are rarely the problem. Players are the problem. Until the issue of what makes this particular player disruptive is dealt with, I'd guess every character they make is going to cause a problem.
Having a PC that is better than an equivalent PC of a standard PC race is inherently disruptive to the game.
No other race can really match what this particular one gives.
He's got:
DR 10/Magic
50 ft. Fly
+2 Str and +4 Con (but -2 to all mental stats)
2 claws, a bite, AND a gore
+5 Natural Armor
Darkvision
+2 Stealth
If he were specced as a melee brute it would be extremely disruptive.
As-is he's "just" got a spellcaster with about 4 more AC than he should have, 4 attacks, tons of HP (augmented by his DR/Magic), and the ability to fly.
Unless everyone else was a monstrous race there's no way not to make that disruptive. Unless having one character be the "main" character who's inherently better and everyone else being his supporting cast isn't considered disruptive to you.
It's the same issue that came up in a thread a while back about the Lycanthrope (Dire Wereboar) PC. But at least HE wanted to nerf HIMSELF.
RPG Superstar 2014 Top 4
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No seriously, why would you allow a race that PCs aren't even supposed to touch in the first place?The player never really asked. She was kind of like "I'm playing an oracle... who happens to be a gargoyle."
Learn to say "no." Seriously, it might suck at first, but it will be better for everyone in the long run.
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Rite Publishing has a .pdf called In the Company of Gargoyles available in the Paizo store for just a few bucks. It has a complete and balanced race and a 20-level paragon class for the race. And tons of flavor. A good read and it seems fairly balanced.
I recommend this .pdf for anyone who wants to play a gargoyle.'
The base race is pretty weak (for a gargoyle) but well-balanced by comparison to core races. The racial paragon class is where the gargoyle develops claws, wings, horns, flight, resitances, and other stuff as they level up.
Side note: Anyone can use the .pdf to be a really weak gargoyle and then play other classes (like Oracle, althought with a -2 CHA penalty, Oracle might not be the strongest choice). Or they could just level up in the Paragon class and/or multi-class however they like.
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There are two ways to deal with this, in game and out of game.
In game: given a few levels the DR/magic will only affect a few creatures that don’t have some form of magic weapon. 3rd level is not that high. There should be plenty of things later on which could squash this without any issues. It should not be all that powerful a spelcaster just tougher than normal.
Out of game: Talk to the player; they seem to understand balance and that it is powerful but explain it is overshadowing the other players. They may already be aware of the issue and looking to resolve it somehow.
Sic
I have done similar things like this running games for my wife in the past. It creates a big problem just taking the ability's away or asking them to restart. Try to come up with an in game curse or something of that nature to "Nerf" her and slowly give her those ability's back.
If she did not come up with a back story of her own then you can do it for her. I know next to nothing about gargoyles but maybe she committed a crime and she is found and punished further with magic. Maybe she is not a gargoyle at all but merely looks like one.
I feel like there could be some compromise in game here. Since she dropped some major ability's and did not make a fighter type it may be more of a role-playing choice then you think.
You could allow gargoyle as fluff but model the character on one of the allowable player character races in terms of abilities.
You could allow gargoyle as fluff but model the character on one of the allowable player character races in terms of abilities.
*gasp* Like the... oread?!
Rite Publishing has a .pdf called In the Company of Gargoyles available in the Paizo store for just a few bucks. It has a complete and balanced race and a 20-level paragon class for the race. And tons of flavor. A good read and it seems fairly balanced.
I recommend this .pdf for anyone who wants to play a gargoyle.'
The base race is pretty weak (for a gargoyle) but well-balanced by comparison to core races. The racial paragon class is where the gargoyle develops claws, wings, horns, flight, resitances, and other stuff as they level up.
Side note: Anyone can use the .pdf to be a really weak gargoyle and then play other classes (like Oracle, althought with a -2 CHA penalty, Oracle might not be the strongest choice). Or they could just level up in the Paragon class and/or multi-class however they like.
I was going to say the same..they are still a cool character, yet balanced well. I allow a lot of exotic races in my games, but only if there is a book like this.
Back in 3.5 there were "monster classes" which let you advance through a monster's racial hit dice, gaining powers as you go. Right now the PC would probably have 3 hit dice out of a normal gargoyle's 4d8 along with all of the typical abilities except DR10/magic. Maybe you'd give her DR5/magic for now instead. Next level she'd gain the the final d8 HD, and maybe at 5th level she wouldn't gain any HD but would get the DR10/magic. Then at 6th level she could start taking Oracle levels.
If you're not willing to mess with all that you might consider just telling the player that gargoyles aren't a permitted race. Sticking to "Core Races Only" can stop many problems before they start...of course you already have a ratfolk in the party...
The Pathfinder CR system is now essentially what the 3.5 Effective Character level system was trying to be. Pathfinder equalized CR and Level.
A gargoyle is a CR 5? That means that they are mechanically equivalent to a 5th level character.
That means that 5 of the character's levels are going into being a gargoyle
In a 6th level party, that character should take the stock Bestiary gargoyle and add one level of a PC class. They will be roughly equivalent to the rest of the group (probably a little weaker, actually)
In any game lower than 5th level, the player doesn't get to play a gargoyle unless the GM ok's something like the Young template to lower the CR.