[DF/MH] Anyone Interested in Monster Levels?

[scc]

It's a classic scenario of a Monster Hunters party, the villain, a master vampire, has kidnapped one of them, turned them and is forcing his allies to fight their friend. Then they manage to kill him without killing their friend and everything goes back to normal.

Well apart from the fact that their friend is now a vampire and what sort of GM just hands a PC a 200 point racial template for free?

So I'm wondering if anyone would be interested in a book for GURPS that's something like Savage Species was for D&D? Allowing PCs to purchase 'levels' in being a member of a monster race. So in the above example the 'turned' PC would only get 25 or 50 points in Vampire abilities, and that's before mandatory Disadvantages.

This would only cover DF and MH, mainly because you need an explanation for the 'level' thing and it's possible to do that with those two game lines

[Peter Knutsen]

It does sound as if it could be useful. Not for monsters in general, but for the kind of monsters that you can become. Weres, and various sentient Undead including Vampires and Liches.

I'm thinking there'd be a first Initial Template, which is the basic "becoming", containing a lot of traits, but often Limited, and with fairly weak mental and physical/metaphysicsal disads, and then a series of numbered Lenses representing the character gradually becoming more Vampire-like. The basic campiric advantages get stronger, new ones are added, additional disads are added and existing ones are made worse, with the highest level templates representing a particularly powerful specimen, e.g. the equivalent of a Vampire Prince in Sagatafl/Ärth, rather than just "now you have become fully vampiric, and have all the traits and drawbacks that one would expect from a vampire".

The Template would be fairly costly, I'm thinking perhaps 100 points or so, which is expensive (point debt!) but probably necessary to make the newly changed character actually feel changed, and then something like 40 points per "level" Lens. Or it could vary from monster type to monster type.

But yes, I think that'd be useful for a lot of MH and DF GMs and players.

[Imion]

I'm not sure where the use would be since the GM can always just break apart the underlying template himself relatively easily and hand out the pieces as he thinks appropriate without a publication telling him in which order to do so.

Savage Species was interesting since at that time you did not have a viable method to play a monster race in a group with a level smaller than that monster's ECL. GURPS does not have that problem.

[ArchonShiva]

If the initial chunk is too big, you can probably stick a number of Newly Changed transitional disadvantages on them, such as shakes, flashbacks, vulnerabilities, attribute penalties, etc.

[Peter Knutsen]

I don't find the "relatively easy" claim convincing.

[Imion]

Well, if you are familiar with the system, that is.

Took me about 20 minutes to come up with the following:

Catfolk [40]
ST-1; Combat Reflexes. 5 points.
Per+1. 5 points.
Striking ST 2; Impulsiveness (15). 5 points.
Catfall; Impulsiveness (15->9). 5 points.
DX+1; Laziness. 10 points.
Claws (Sharp). 5 points.
Fur; Night Vision 5; Teeth (Sharp); Phobia (Entering Water). 5 points.

Coleopteran [75]
Peripheral Vision; Unattractive. 11 points.
Vibration Sense (Air). 10 points.
Per +1; Peripheral Vision -> 360° Vision; Unattractive -> Ugly. 11 points.
HT+1; Damage Resistance 3; Ugly -> Hideous. 11 points.
Extra Arms 2; Teeth (Sharp); Disturbing Voice. 11 points
ST+1. 10 points.
IQ-1; Extra Attack 1; Damage Resistance 3 -> 5. 11 points.

Demon [200]
ST+1; DX+1; one racial package; Frightens Animals; Weakness (1d/5min). 40 points.
ST+1; DX+1; High Pain Threshold; Vow. 39 points.
ST+2; HT+1; Per+1; Language (Demontongue). 41 points.
ST+1; Will+1; HT+1; one racial package; Weakness (1d/5min -> 1d/min). 40 points.
Per+1; Claws (Hooves); DR 4 (Tough Skin); Immunity to Metabolic Hazards; one racial package; Appearance (Monstrous); Social Stigma (Monster). 40 points.

[scc]

Originally Posted by Imion

Well, if you are familiar with the system, that is.

Took me about 20 minutes to come up with the following:

Catfolk [40]
ST-1; Combat Reflexes. 5 points.
Per+1. 5 points.
Striking ST 2; Impulsiveness (15). 5 points.
Catfall; Impulsiveness (15->9). 5 points.
DX+1; Laziness. 10 points.
Claws (Sharp). 5 points.
Fur; Night Vision 5; Teeth (Sharp); Phobia (Entering Water). 5 points.

Coleopteran [75]
Peripheral Vision; Unattractive. 11 points.
Vibration Sense (Air). 10 points.
Per +1; Peripheral Vision -> 360° Vision; Unattractive -> Ugly. 11 points.
HT+1; Damage Resistance 3; Ugly -> Hideous. 11 points.
Extra Arms 2; Teeth (Sharp); Disturbing Voice. 11 points
ST+1. 10 points.
IQ-1; Extra Attack 1; Damage Resistance 3 -> 5. 11 points.

Demon [200]
ST+1; DX+1; one racial package; Frightens Animals; Weakness (1d/5min). 40 points.
ST+1; DX+1; High Pain Threshold; Vow. 39 points.
ST+2; HT+1; Per+1; Language (Demontongue). 41 points.
ST+1; Will+1; HT+1; one racial package; Weakness (1d/5min -> 1d/min). 40 points.
Per+1; Claws (Hooves); DR 4 (Tough Skin); Immunity to Metabolic Hazards; one racial package; Appearance (Monstrous); Social Stigma (Monster). 40 points.

Two problems: 1) These are all transformitive, which is good if the character starts out as human and turns into something else, but in such cases the race should have either Dominance or Infectious Attack, or even something else as long as it has the effect of turning people into their race. 2) DF uses 50 point levels, so any levels for monster for it should do the same

[Phantasm]

One thing I've done is let the player go into "point debt", where the player's earned XP goes towards paying off the upgrade, which means that while he's initially now 200 points above the rest of the party, he's not going to grow as a character while the rest of the party catches up to him.

YMMV, of course.

[scc]

Originally Posted by tbrock1031

One thing I've done is let the player go into "point debt", where the player's earned XP goes towards paying off the upgrade, which means that while he's initially now 200 points above the rest of the party, he's not going to grow as a character while the rest of the party catches up to him.

YMMV, of course.

If a PC get's bitten by a werewolf they do NOT pay template costs,it's in Basic somewhere

[RogerWilco]

Originally Posted by Imion

I'm not sure where the use would be since the GM can always just break apart the underlying template himself relatively easily and hand out the pieces as he thinks appropriate without a publication telling him in which order to do so.

Savage Species was interesting since at that time you did not have a viable method to play a monster race in a group with a level smaller than that monster's ECL. GURPS does not have that problem.

GURPS does have that problem. You can easily have a racial template that's more points than a character's starting points.

I do agree that it's something the GM and player can probably easily solve themselves. alternatively you go into point debt until the template is paid for.

How much points the template is worth also depends on the GMs setting. The vampire template on B262 can become fairly impractical for a PC very quickly.

Originally Posted by scc

If a PC get's bitten by a werewolf they do NOT pay template costs,it's in Basic somewhere

I think Infectious Attack sort of says the opposite:

Originally Posted by B140

To prevent PCs with this trait from turning their friends into powerful monsters for free, the GM should consider making infected PCs pay points for supernatural racial templates gained this way. If they cannot afford such a template, the GM is free to balance its point cost with supernatural drawbacks such as Cursed, Dread, Revulsion, and Weakness.