Vampires and Liches and Werewolves oh my...

D&D 3E

10th-Mar-2004 12:39 pm

Okay, not arguing the ethics of using evil characters like vampires and werewolves and such in a campaign, I want to talk about ECL and experience after character creation.

A vampire is a +8 level adjustment, as it should be. This means in a ninth level party a vampire can start with one character level. Fine.

If however, a character is infected with vampirism later, this modulates their level then. Say this happened to a character with 13 character levels, as it did. This would bump the character up to an epic level character, or 21st level. Fine. Now, would their experience point total jump up to the minimum experience neccessary for a 21st level character, or do they have to make up the debt?

Crossposted to d20 games

Mood:rushed

Comments

10th-Mar-2004 09:42 am (UTC)

wyrdo

I'd freeze their level then and there until they made up the difference. Then once they had enough XP for 22nd level, let them start counting at 14.

That's just what I'd do though. There's reasons why they don't make rules for this sort of thing; use whichever suits the group and gaming style best.

10th-Mar-2004 10:19 am (UTC) - ... penalties / costs

karlthepagan

Well... considering that your character is now a blood hungry, friend-killing, sun hating, undead menace I think they may find "encounters" and challenges places other characters don't.

Assign a challange rating for not killing his friends, being able to fool/hide ones nature from people the rest of the party deals with, remembering to do all the vampir-y things he needs to do to keep himself alive. The challenges a vampire has trying to lead a normal life certainly will take a long time to adapt to and he's going to spend a while focusing his attention on that.

By all means if your campaign is pure hack and slash then be a sticker for the rules, but if you can in any way turn this into a deffinate obstacle/tragedy/valuable plot device then find ways to reward the player for their suffering.

If the character gets any additional hit dice don't forget that those count as monster progression for feats & skills. (someone with a rulebook... is this applicable?)

10th-Mar-2004 10:06 am (UTC)

quix

It's a tough call. It really depends on how you view XP. If it's Experience in the true sense of the word, then they technically still have a 13th level world experience, while their stats may be at a 21st level.

I'd say read it as you would any other + modifier. The actual item it modifies is still technically what it was, but you just make the stat modifiers as a +8 level suggests. Which is to say, leave his XP where it is, just modify the stats of the character to function at a +8 level.

*Note: This means that when the character levels from 13 to 14, he's actually leveling from 21 to 22.

10th-Mar-2004 10:12 am (UTC)

highbulp

I think the sudden gain in effectively 8 levels of power would unbalance the game, no matter how fast they gained levels after that. As such, I would suggest using a template.

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/sp/20030824a for more information. Scroll down to the bottom and it has stuff on vampire.

(Deleted comment)

10th-Mar-2004 10:42 am (UTC)

tomcat5453

Personally I don't like the whole "slowly become a vampire" thing. It seems more like a disease or something. AND if you want that its cool.

I reccomend just making the amount of XP required for the following levels just be more. Example.

It takes 1000 xp to go from level 1 to 2.

it takes 5000 xp to go from level 5 to 6.

It takes 13000 xp to go from 13 to 14

so instead of needing 13000 xp he'll need 21000 xp to go up a level. Yes, it will be over powered and determinign CR will have to be done using his present ECL, but its a little extra math that I think adds a sense of getting the immidiate vampirism into the game.

10th-Mar-2004 11:03 am (UTC)

planesdragon

I say he has to make up the debt--same as if you started a +1 ECL character with a 1st level party.

Also, IMO, it'd be fair to either just take away eight levels when a PC becomes a vampire, to impose eight "negative levels" that have to be bought off.

10th-Mar-2004 01:57 pm (UTC)

retch

yeah, he has to make up the XP debt before he starts going up, if you are keeping him with the other players. That or instead of having him become a vampire use the appropriate level advancement version where he slowly grows into the vampire powers and just require him to take levels in it as frequently as you deem appropriate.

10th-Mar-2004 02:03 pm (UTC) - By the book...

emagius

He has to make up the debt. You don't automatically gain XP when you gain a template in-game.

10th-Mar-2004 05:33 pm (UTC)

joelie

Im pretty sure that there is a level progession for vampires in Savage species, you could use that

10th-Mar-2004 08:14 pm (UTC)

_rejected_

adding a template in game, such as the vampire template, causes an ECL jump, but yr xp stays the same. You don't level/gain feats/etc. until you've reached the xp needed to make up the ecl jump debt.

11th-Mar-2004 09:37 am (UTC)

foxsable

Thanks for your insight everyone. My DM did it through my making up the debt, and I have now finally reached level 22 and can once again gain feats and skills and abilities. Excellent.

11th-Mar-2004 10:43 pm (UTC)

retch

You made up the XP debt in one night????

12th-Mar-2004 08:46 pm (UTC)

nviiibrown

I had a character who got turned into a Shadow, but we used Emancipated Spawn form Savage Species, I still had to gain like 8 level before I would keep oging though, and only having 19hp sucked bad.

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