My player has a good character concept, he wants to play as a rat for our next campaign. We've been playing 2014 rules for the past 5 years, so we are very comfortable with them, the classes, races etc. We are now switching to 2024 rules, and I'm keen on sticking to official WOTC rules only, very limited homebrew, we have a handful of pre agreed houserules (death saves are meaningless RAW?).
So to get my player as a rat, are there any clever ideas you guys have without resorting to homebrew 'species' as they are now referred to, preferably sticking as close as possible to RAW.
First idea was play a moon druid, use wildshape to be a rat, then when he's back to basic form, he's a bit grumpy and miserable because it's "not his true self". This is limiting though as he wishes to play a healer, so although he can heal during wildshape, some other benefits like using a medicine kit will be limiting there.
Second idea, he's a Warlock and his familiar is a rat. Although he is actually a rat warlock with a human familiar, so it's purely a RP tone without affecting rules. One big drawback to this is that we already have a warlock being created for the campaign, and might end up with 2 rangers too (party of 5).
I'll also add here, this is not a party of power gamers or min maxers. One player will be a Goliath rogue, playing the typical stealth thief archetype
If the player truly want to play a small Rat, i'd reflavor a 2 ft. Halfling Monk and houserule Unarmed Strike as piercing damage for its Bite. Patient Defense can mimic the Agile trait pretty well the only thing missing would be Darkvision. Another solution instead to also get it would be to go with Dwarf and houserule it to Small size.
The shifter species might work. It doesn’t have anything specifically that screams rat, but it’s got the part-animal thing going, and you can always re-flavor the appearance to be more rat-like. Then say the character was the familiar of a wizard who tried to change him into a human, but didn’t quite get there. (Kind of a Frankenstein situation) What happened to the wizard can be an open question. This allows the character to play whatever class they like, though the above suggestions are pretty good for letting the character become a rat sometimes.
My player has a good character concept, he wants to play as a rat for our next campaign. We've been playing 2014 rules for the past 5 years, so we are very comfortable with them, the classes, races etc. We are now switching to 2024 rules, and I'm keen on sticking to official WOTC rules only, very limited homebrew, we have a handful of pre agreed houserules (death saves are meaningless RAW?).
So to get my player as a rat, are there any clever ideas you guys have without resorting to homebrew 'species' as they are now referred to, preferably sticking as close as possible to RAW.
First idea was play a moon druid, use wildshape to be a rat, then when he's back to basic form, he's a bit grumpy and miserable because it's "not his true self". This is limiting though as he wishes to play a healer, so although he can heal during wildshape, some other benefits like using a medicine kit will be limiting there.
Second idea, he's a Warlock and his familiar is a rat. Although he is actually a rat warlock with a human familiar, so it's purely a RP tone without affecting rules. One big drawback to this is that we already have a warlock being created for the campaign, and might end up with 2 rangers too (party of 5).
I'll also add here, this is not a party of power gamers or min maxers. One player will be a Goliath rogue, playing the typical stealth thief archetype
If the player truly want to play a small Rat, i'd reflavor a 2 ft. Halfling Monk and houserule Unarmed Strike as piercing damage for its Bite. Patient Defense can mimic the Agile trait pretty well the only thing missing would be Darkvision. Another solution instead to also get it would be to go with Dwarf and houserule it to Small size.
You could go Beast Barbarian and be a rat man, though i realize that's not a rat and doesn't heal.
The shifter species might work. It doesn’t have anything specifically that screams rat, but it’s got the part-animal thing going, and you can always re-flavor the appearance to be more rat-like. Then say the character was the familiar of a wizard who tried to change him into a human, but didn’t quite get there. (Kind of a Frankenstein situation) What happened to the wizard can be an open question. This allows the character to play whatever class they like, though the above suggestions are pretty good for letting the character become a rat sometimes.
make him a wererat sort of