D&D 3E/3.5 [3.5e] New rules from Savage Species

[shilsen]

Savage Species is supposed to be compatible with the revised version, and I wanted to collect all the rule changes anyone noticed in the book. Here are a few I can think of:

1) Monsters receive skills based on Int score and HD, just like PCs.

2) Wilderness Lore is now Survival.

3) Alchemy is Craft (Alchemy)

4) Monsters receive feats as characters do - 1 at 1st, one at 3rd, 6th, etc.

5) Beasts are gone, and all former beasts are animals or magical beast now.

6) Shapechanger is now a subtype, instead of a type, e.g. a doppelganger is now a monstrous humanoid, with subtype shapechanger.

7) Face is now always a square (5 ft, 10 ft, 15 ft, etc.).

8) Fire and Cold subtypes now provide immunity to the given type and a -10 penalty on saves against the opposed element. If there is no save allowed, take double damage.

9) Energy drain (as possessed by wights and spectres) allows a Fort save to avoid taking negative levels.

So which ones have I missed (I'm sure there are a lot)?

P.S. Can we just get information here and no "I hate/love 3.5e" arguments? Thanks.

 

[Darklone]

Waaaaaaaaaaah, they screwed the energy drain! WAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!

 

[The Little Raven]

7) Face is now always a square (5 ft, 10 ft, 15 ft, etc.).

I just wanted to jump in and add a note to this. The reason they elected to change the facing rules to make all faces a square is primarily because of long creatures. If a creature is 5x10 and only controls an area 5x10 (let's say facing east), if the creature wants to turn north, this would be considered a five-foot step. However, a 5x5 creature doing the same thing would not have to make a step. This gave square facing creatures an unfair disadvantage.

 

[Dr. NRG]

8) Fire and Cold subtypes now provide immunity to the given type and a -10 penalty on saves against the opposed element. If there is no save allowed, take double damage.

Looks like there may finally be a good reason to take Ice Storm again...

NRG

 

[Pagan priest]

7) Face is now always a square (5 ft, 10 ft, 15 ft, etc.).

So now what happens when the heavy cavalry is lined up stirrup to stirrup, preparing to charge? How does this effect Large (Tall) creatures like an ogre?

I don't have Savage Species yet, (but my natal anniversary is the 17th, so I am hoping) but this stricks me as fixing a problem by creating another. Oh well, just have to wait for July.

 

[Hypersmurf]

Re: Re: [3.5e] New rules from Savage Species

How does this effect Large (Tall) creatures like an ogre?

It doesn't.

-Hyp.

 

[AuraSeer]

Re: Re: [3.5e] New rules from Savage Species

So now what happens when the heavy cavalry is lined up stirrup to stirrup, preparing to charge?

Probably the same thing that happens when two Medium-size creatures try to occupy a single 5' square during combat. Either they'll include a rule for having your Face area interfered with, or (as happens now) the DM will have to wing it.

Either way, it's a special case that doesn't come up very often. D&D combat is intended for skirmishes and individual combat; it's not designed to deal with armies in formation. The change may generate some confusion in a rare case (the cavalry formation), but it will surely clear up a lot of weirdness in the common case (asymmetric creatures outside formation), and AFAIC that can only be a positive exchange.

 

[The Souljourner]

I really like the square facing rule. It makes so much more sense. Supposedly there's no facing in D&D and yet you had these creatures that obviously had to be facing one way or another. And just exactly how do they turn around?

This is so much better. It's not like they're saying they take up that much space, but if they're spinning around all claws and teeth, that's how much space they're going to tear to shreds.

I like it.

-The Souljourner

 

[dcollins]

I guess I'll chime in and say I don't like the sound of the all-square-facing rule.
- It conflicts with the standard cavalry formation, as above.
- It conflicts with the actual shape of one's standard horse miniature.
- Now I suppose the rider is considered to be on the crosshair at the center (or something?), which opens up its own set of ambiguous rulings to be hashed out all over again...

 

[Destil]

I guess I'll chime in and say I don't like the sound of the all-square-facing rule.
- It conflicts with the standard cavalry formation, as above.
- It conflicts with the actual shape of one's standard horse miniature.
- Now I suppose the rider is considered to be on the crosshair at the center (or something?), which opens up its own set of ambiguous rulings to be hashed out all over again...

But at the same time (long) sized creatures never fit well within the faceless 3E framework (having faces and all). I'd say wait and see how this will be delt with in the complete rules...

Of course, there's also the beholder issue to clear up (also having a face, since it has the anti-magic cone and all), though that's not as big a deal. Since they have all arround vision it really won't matter if you can pick out a face.