Additional Hit Dice gained from taking levels in a character class never affect a creature’s size like additional racial Hit Dice do.įeat Acquisition and Ability Score IncreasesĪ monster’s total Hit Dice, not its ECL, govern its acquisition of feats and ability score increases.
Playable monster races 5e plus#
The creature’s Hit Dice equal the number of class levels it has plus its racial Hit Dice.
Playable monster races 5e Pc#
If a monster has 2 or more Hit Dice, it can start with no class levels (though it can gain them later).Įven if the creature is of a kind that normally advances by Hit Dice rather than class levels a PC can gain class levels rather than Hit Dice. If a monster has 1 Hit Die or less, or if it is a template creature, it must start the game with one or more class levels, like a regular character. Monster characters treat skills mentioned in their monster entry as class skills. Also use ECL to determine starting wealth for a monster character. Use ECL instead of character level to determine how many experience points a monster character needs to reach its next level. To determine the effective character level (ECL) of a monster character, add its level adjustment to its racial Hit Dice and character class levels. Level Adjustment and Effective Character Level Instead, they have already received a feat for their first Hit Die because of race, and they have already multiplied their racial skill points for their first Hit Die by four. The monster loses the attack bonus, saving throw bonuses, skills, and feats granted by its 1 monster HD and gains the attack bonus, save bonuses, skills, feats, and other class abilities of a 1st-level character of the appropriate class.Ĭharacters with more than 1 Hit Die because of their race do not get a feat for their first class level as members of the common races do, and they do not multiply the skill points for their first class level by four.
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A creature’s “monster class” is always a favored class, and the creature never takes XP penalties for having it.Ĭreatures with 1 or less HD replace their monster levels with their character levels. Effectively, monsters with a level adjustment become multiclass character when they take class levels.
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Add a monster’s level adjustment to its Humanoids and Class Levels to get the creature’s effective character level, or ECL. Monsters suitable for play have a level adjustment given in their statistics. Some creatures have strange innate abilities or great physical power, and thus are questionable at best as characters (except in high-level campaigns). Creatures who have an Intelligence score of 2 or lower, who have no way to communicate, or who are so different from other PCs that they disrupt the campaign should not be used.
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While every monster has the statistics that a player would need to play the creature as a character, most monsters are not suitable as PCs.