Fleshgrafting Index & General Discussion

[Stratovarius]

The material is complete and playable, minus a few feats. That being said, there are still some balance issues that are likely to arise, as abilities are still being actively tuned.

I've begun work on transferring all of the Fleshgrafting content into Vivisection and Resurrection. Very slight updates to base classes and races. As per usual, PDF version trumps forum version where differences exist.

Rules
Fleshgrafting

Base Classes
Vivisector

Prestige Classes
Casglwyr Abomination
Chirurgeon
Flesh Brute
Mad Scientist
Multifarious
Necrotic Scholar

Undead Grafts
Undead Grafts

Feats
Feats

Races - Created by VennDygrem
Casglwyr

Magic Items & Artefacts
None

Monsters & Templates
None

Other
None

(click to show/hide)

Undead grafts exist in Libris Mortis, and I grabbed a few to help Venn improve a race he's building for Necromantic Magic. He suggested I use it for the Vivisector base class, which I didn't have a clue what to do with yet, and now Nanshork wants to play one. So here we are, bouncing ideas around.

Current basics:
4 levels of grafts (Minor, Lesser, Major, Apex aka 1-5, 6-10, 11-15, 16-20).
Goal is to not use gold, but base more off WoL system - Trade-off focused. Possibility of having a series of penalties that can be chosen when picking a graft of a certain level. If so, no repeat picks on penalties to create dump stats.

Types of grafts:
Brute, Sneak, Caster (Undead SLAs like Bodak Eye, etc), and maybe another one that's just weird stuff like the Aberration grafts.

Things to solve:
Actual mechanics
How to apply them to other people
Creating actual grafts, since the list in LM is very small

[phaedrusxy]

A few months back a PbP game died in utero that would have used a lot of grafts with a new "system". I cannot vouch for its balance (or anything else...) but thought I'd drop a link here.

[Stratovarius]

A few months back a PbP game died in utero that would have used a lot of grafts with a new "system". I cannot vouch for its balance (or anything else...) but thought I'd drop a link here.

It'll probably end up somewhat similar to that, in as much as I expect to be doing a lot of trolling through monsters and grabbing abilities off and turning them into grafts. Just that their level/corresponding penalties will be set more or less in advance. Which means I need to go read WoL, the one "magic" system I never really got my head around.

[VennDygrem]

To be honest, it could also work somewhat similar to Incarnum, with a list of a variety of grafts that have a basic function by default, but increase in power when you invest them with grave tokens or graft points or whatever. Applying a graft to someone else could give them the basic graft and maybe one grave token/graft point that can only be spent to improve that graft, and from there the recipient can improve by way of feats or taking levels in Vivisector or some Graft - related prestige class.

[Stratovarius]

So, something like this:

Weakening Arm
Lesser Graft
Benefit: A weakening arm is a skeletal forelimb that grants a +4 inherent bonus to the grafted creature’s Strength. Twice per day, the grafted creature can use a weakening touch. A living creature touched takes 1d6 points of Strength damage. A touch that misses does not count against the daily limit.
Desecration: For each corpuscle invested in this graft, the grafted creature can use the weakening touch ability one more time per day. For every two corpuscles, he receives an additional +2 bonus to Strength.

If so, that's easy enough to do. Although I'd still keep the penalties as a way of paying for the basic graft. The next question, though, is do we want to keep grave tokens separate from grafting or no?

Edit: Going to vote no on using grave tokens. So have replaced with another term. I like this one.

[Stratovarius]

Put up Flesh Grafting Rules. Making the mechanics generic so they can be used for non-Undead ones eventually. Let me know what you think.

[VennDygrem]

Will the Grafting rules require a feat,  as with Graft Flesh?

[Stratovarius]

Probably. Haven't really decided the absolute final rules.

More likely it'll be Graft Undead Flesh, with 1 feat needed per graft "tree". Not that there's going to be anything beyond Undead for a while.

[Nanshork]

Should the Undead Concurrence feat require Undead Attunement?

[Stratovarius]

Yes, it's supposed to. Forgot to add it.

[Stratovarius]

So, there needs to be a limit of grafts a single person can take. Currently thinking of having it as 1 per point of constitution modifier. And for classes that grant extra grafts, add those totals to the Con modifier. Sound reasonable?

Don't forget that grafts will get limited after a certain point by the number of arms, legs, and so on a person can reasonably manage as well.

[Nanshork]

That sounds reasonable. 

Do the extra (whatever) feats open up new graft slots?

Here are the graft rules for the system I linked earlier so you can scavenge if you want.

Harvest Material (Ex): As a trained xenoalchemist you can quickly identify, catalogue and remove for future use the pieces of monsters which make them so dangerous. Harvesting remains requires two minutes of work with a helpless creature or recently dead (within one hour) corpse. It requires two skill checks.

First, you must make a Knowledge check relating to the monster's type. The relevant Knowledge skill required is described under the uses of Knowledge, but since that's kind of obscure I'll just list them here for you. It's worth noting that if you don't know what type the monster was you can simply attempt a broad Knowledge check and the DM will choose the appropriate skill for you.

Knowledge Skill   Monster Types
Knowledge (arcana)   Constructs, dragons, magical beasts
Knowledge (dungeoneering)   Aberrations, oozes
Knowledge (local)   Humanoids
Knowledge (nature)   Animals, fey, giants, monstrous humanoids, plants, vermin
Knowledge (religion)   Undead
Knowledge (the Planes)   Outsiders, elementals

The DC for the Knowledge check is equal to 10 + the monster's HD. You can always attempt these checks, even untrained thanks to your broad training in general monstrous physiology.

If the Knowledge check is successful, the DM shall describe to you the pieces available for harvest. In general, this consists of informing you about supernatural and extraordinary abilities, breath weapons, natural weapons, movement modes, and so on. This might seem a little vague, but you can always request particular information about an aspect of the monster. If there is a piece of the monster you wish to harvest for one of your grafts, you can move on to the second skill check. You can only harvest material if it's appropriate for a graft you currently have access to.

Once you decide which piece of the monster you want (each graft has a particular requirement in the original monster and you can harvest one graft's worth of material from any given monster) you make a Heal check at the same DC. If successful you manage to procure the material needed for the chosen graft. The material is usable for about three days. If it's not used before then it begins to go rancid and becomes unusable unless you store it in a freezing environment (time spent in such a state effectively pauses the time limit).

If the Heal check is unsuccessful you cannot try again to harvest that material from the monster, but you can attempt additional pieces that you find useful. If you successfuly harvest one, however, the rest of the monster becomes contaminated and unusable.

You can store as many of these monster pieces as you want, but the DM should decide on their weight and the space required to store them based on the monster they came from.

Xenoalchemy (Ex): Here's what you showed up for. As a xenoalchemist you know how to chop things up and stick them onto other things. Once you've harvested a piece of a monster as described above, you can attach it to a living being. The target must either be willing or helpless for the duration of the procedure in order to perform the graft. The procedure requires 1d3 hours + 1/2 hour per graft level. You can attach a graft to yourself, but you must make a DC 20 Concentration check to endure operating on your own body. If you fail this skill check the time for the operation is wasted but your monstrous material is not.

You only have access to level 1 grafts at 1st level, but at 5th level and every four levels thereafter you gain access to an additional level of grafts. Grafts have body slots, but they do not stop someone from wearing a magic item in the same slot. You cannot, however, have two grafts in the same body slot. Furthermore, a creature can only have at any one time a number of grafts equal to 1 + their Constitution modifier (minimum 1). If a creature's Constitution is reduced so that they can no longer hold their current grafts the grafts are rejected, starting with the most recently acquired. Rejected grafts are destroyed, and all benefits they confer are lost. A creature can only have a single 5th level graft at a time.

A xenoalchemist can remove a graft at a later point, either to replace it with a mundane body part (treated as a level 0 graft) or to make way for a different graft. This may or may not impose a penalty (see the Graft Rejection section below for more information on empty body slots).

Performing xenoalchemy requires access to basic medical equipment (which might include things like bandages, knives, electroshock therapy, and so on at the player's discretion). If you would also like to make a loud ka-chunk sound effect as you perform the operation you may do so as you see fit.

[Stratovarius]

Yes, they do. Hence the purpose of those feats.

[Leviathan]

Two questions about the feats:

1) If you take Extra Arm twice, do you get another +2 to Strength-based checks and grapple checks (total +4 from the feat) or just the extra arm listed on the "Special" line? A similar question applies for the Extra Leg and Extra Head feats.

2) For the Undead Attunement and Undead Concurrence feats, when (if ever) does your pool of penalty-free rounds refill?

[Stratovarius]

1) Yes, the benefits stack.

2) Daily.

I'll adjust the feats.

[Nanshork]

Grafts from Libris Mortis (I'm using traditional item slots)

Bonemail
xxx Graft
Required Level: xxx
Grafting DC: xxx
Slot: Body
Benefit: The grafted creature gains a +2 natural armor bonus
Penalty: -xxx
Desecration: For every two corpuscles, the natural armor bonus increases by one.

Bodak's Eye
xxx Graft
Required Level: xxx
Grafting DC: xxx
Slot: Face
Benefit: The grafted creature gains a xxx
Penalty: -xxx
Desecration: For every two corpuscles,  xxx Scrapped, too imbalanced

Enervating Arm
xxx Graft
Required Level: xxx
Grafting DC: xxx
Slot: One arm
Benefit: The grafted creature gains a +2 to strength and some sort of negative level touch attack?
Penalty: -xxx
Desecration: For every two corpuscles, the touch attack gets better?

Eye of Flame
xxx Graft
Required Level: xxx
Grafting DC: xxx
Slot: Face
Benefit: The grafted creature gains xxx
Penalty: -xxx
Desecration: For every two corpuscles, xxx  Wow this graft sucks.

Paralyzing Arm
xxx Graft
Required Level: xxx
Grafting DC: xxx
Slot: One arm
Benefit: The grafted creature gains a +2 to strength and some kind of paralyzing attack?
Penalty: -xxx
Desecration: For every two corpuscles, the DC gets better or something?

Undead Skin
xxx Graft
Required Level: xxx
Grafting DC: xxx
Slot: Body
Benefit: The grafted creature gains a 10% chance to negate critical hits and precision damage (such as sneak attack)
Penalty: -xxx
Desecration: For every two corpuscles, the chance to negate critical hits / precision damage goes up by 10%

Vampiric Fangs
xxx Graft
Required Level: xxx
Grafting DC: xxx
Slot: Face
Benefit: The grafted creature gains Con drain and maybe a bite attack (yes, I know Vampires don't get a bite attack).
Penalty: -xxx
Desecration: For every two corpuscles, things get better.



At least this is something you can work with.

[Stratovarius]

Don't worry too much about balance - I can just adjust the required level higher. After all, a Bodak Eye might be cheesy at low level, but at ~13 or so, when Finger of Death is around, it's fine.

[VennDygrem]

Well, the main thing about basic it on Incarnum is the baseline effect can be relatively tame, while the full effect doesn't come online until you can invest enough resources into it. Maybe the Bodak eye at default can Slow an enemy, or cause them to be sickened or paralyzed or what have you, once a day or so. Each corpuscle lets you do it one more time per day, and at a certain number of corpuscles, you gain the death-eye effect.

[Stratovarius]

So far we've gone with having the baseline effect just be the effect, and controlling based on level, which Incarnum doesn't. The corpuscles just boost the effect strength or number of uses. Which seems closer to it being a graft, rather than entirely magical.

[Nanshork]

I'm iffy about the current corpsucle cap, mainly because it is a soft cap.

How about changing it to/adding a maximum of 1/2 ECL rounded up?

This might be unnecessary but it's my kneejerk reaction.