So I player of mine, wants to have a mechanic that allows them to convert entities into a hive mind. Now I am initially opposed to this as it essentially creates new player characters for social interactions and specifically in combat. The party size is currently 6 players... Adding 2-3 other NPCs could draw out or make combat encounters seem useless. He brings up spells such as Animate Dead or Create Undead and I've thought of it as something similar to the Druids - Circle of Spores - Fungal Infestation. So I wanted to share some ideas I had and was hoping you all could help me figure out how to balance this or if it is possible to balance a mechanic like this
So there are clearly mechanics designed to give players "minions" but all of these minions expire or have a limit of the amount you can control (yes, I know, you can kinda cheese Create Undead to get a small army). Where this wouldn't have this limitation, they would remain apart of the Hive Mind as long as they are living.
So I started to try to think of mechanics to implement this design, I want it to be kinda of hard to convert a living human being into the hive mind, so it would basically require the target to fail three saving throws.
One of Us: one of use is an ability you recieve at third level when choose this subclass. It allows you to convert another creature into the hive mind. To do this you must succeed a Grappling check. Once the creature is grappled they have to make a Constitution Saving Throw with a DC equal to (8 + Strength Modifier + Proficiency Bonus), if the target succeeds they instead take 1d6 poison damage. Lastly the target must make an intelligence saving throw with a DC equal to (8 + Intelligence Modifier + Proficiency Bonus), if the target has an intelligence score of 9 or higher they recieve advantage on this check. If a target fails all three checks their mind has joined the hive mind and are now One of Us
The idea behind having multiple skill checks is because this power can basically be used against any living creature, its a very powerful feature that basically allows you to create an army. So having to fail 3 skill checks seems reasonable. I also want to apply other limitations, For example, to discourage the player from creating just an army of minions using this ability I wanted them to share stats, mostly mental stats such as "Wisdom, Intelligence and Charisma" But I also wanted to have them share a pool of health. Either one of the two following ways:
The player gives up a portion of their health to the new creature added to the hive. For example, if the player has 30 health, they can choose to give the creature 15 health, only leaving 15 for himself, however, if the hive mind creature dies, the player does not gain the ability to restore his maximum hit points until he finishes a full rest. This would help limit the number of hive mind creatures you can have by restricting how much health the player has to give away.
The next method I thought of was, instead of giving away health, they share health, meaning any damage dealt to one creature in the hive mind is felt by all creatures in the hive mind.
EDIT: I also liked the idea of adding a limit of creatures able to be controlled by the hive mind Equal to your Intelligence score modifier, to try and prevent the characters from just converting everyone.
Similar to Animate Dead you would have to use your bonus action to give the creatures a command, you can one or all hive mind creatures a single command.
As for the creature stats, they would retain their physical stats. I would also suggest that they lose all ability for spell casting if they have any. Basically you're still physically what you were, you are just no longer or your own control of your mental abilities.
As for higher level features, I haven't thought of them. This is a pretty powerful core ability and if I was to expand on it, I would want it to be a trade off. For example, the player could buff a hive mind's physical trait by giving up their own. for every two points you take to a physical ability a single hive mind creature receives 1 bonus point to that same ability.
My first thought is this is off the charts evil. Not that its disqualifying, but just to put that out there.
I like the fail three saves, and I also like spreading them around across different abilities so the creature targeted has a good chance of coming across a save they are good at. As for the grapple check, what if someone else is doing the grappling. Like the fighter holds the target still while the hive minder does its thing. Would that still work? Or if the target was chained up?
Just spitballing, but you could make players use their action, rather than a bonus action if you really want to tamp down chances for abuse. You could also use familiar rules, if you are seeing through their eyes, you can't see through your own (a mind can only take so much sensory input, and having it come from multiple sources would drive you crazy), but you do get benefit of the creature's senses and movement (darkvision, tremorsense, flight, etc.)
I could see a shared hit point pool. I would fear for the amount of bookkeeping, but that would be on the player to track. I'd even think you could add them all together, then if it hits the number for one of the creatures, that one drops. So something like, Player has 30 HP, goblin he took over has 10. Together they have 40. But if either the player or the goblin takes 10, the goblin drops, so the other creatures almost act as walking pools of temp HP for the character. But since it was so hard for the player to get a minion, they'll really want to avoid that damage. Could be an interesting tactical decision for the party to choose to heal the hive mind and stop the goblin from dropping, or heal the barbarian.
I don't know if it needs higher level abilities. Were you thinking to make this a class? Or just have it be a feat maybe?
Or for the simplest way, maybe just use something like animate dead, or the ranger's companion, and re-skin it.
My first thought is this is off the charts evil. Not that its disqualifying, but just to put that out there.
I like the fail three saves, and I also like spreading them around across different abilities so the creature targeted has a good chance of coming across a save they are good at. As for the grapple check, what if someone else is doing the grappling. Like the fighter holds the target still while the hive minder does its thing. Would that still work? Or if the target was chained up?
Just spitballing, but you could make players use their action, rather than a bonus action if you really want to tamp down chances for abuse. You could also use familiar rules, if you are seeing through their eyes, you can't see through your own (a mind can only take so much sensory input, and having it come from multiple sources would drive you crazy), but you do get benefit of the creature's senses and movement (darkvision, tremorsense, flight, etc.)
I could see a shared hit point pool. I would fear for the amount of bookkeeping, but that would be on the player to track. I'd even think you could add them all together, then if it hits the number for one of the creatures, that one drops. So something like, Player has 30 HP, goblin he took over has 10. Together they have 40. But if either the player or the goblin takes 10, the goblin drops, so the other creatures almost act as walking pools of temp HP for the character. But since it was so hard for the player to get a minion, they'll really want to avoid that damage. Could be an interesting tactical decision for the party to choose to heal the hive mind and stop the goblin from dropping, or heal the barbarian.
I don't know if it needs higher level abilities. Were you thinking to make this a class? Or just have it be a feat maybe?
Or for the simplest way, maybe just use something like animate dead, or the ranger's companion, and re-skin it.
I also agree that this could be evil off the charts... It's why I tried to open the idea from humanoid to creature. This way maybe they could make a hivemind of animals, such as wolves, bears and things of the assort... Slightly less evil.
Yeah, I really like the idea of the skill challenge, it makes it not so easy to aquire hive mind creatures. I would personally rule the restrained check would only apply if the creature is in active combat, outside of combat, I would most likely allow another member of the party to attempt to restrain. You could also rule that the grapple check is less about restraining them and more about forcing the larva down their throat.
The Constitution check is meant for the battle between the larva your immune system not attempting to destroy it, it was also an attempt to give creatures a wide range of things, so that it has a chance of hitting something it is favorable in. I also like the idea of allowing a small amount of damage, to at least make the players turn not feel wasted on a failed attempt.
I actually didn't even think about looking though it's eyes, that should totally be an action, the bonus action was more for in combat and giving orders. I do agree something like looking through its eyes or using its special movement as an action though. Thanks for the suggestion, I actually love that idea.
My current idea for hitpoints I am leaning on is, each creature keeps it's hitpoints, however all damage dealt to a hive mind creature is also dealt to the hive mind controller as psychic damage. If the hive mind creature loses consciousness, the creatures being controlled by the hive mind parish. Basically if you managed to mind control a giant with 80 hitpoints, its not weaker simply because it joined the hive mind, however, your not mentally capable of taking that much pain. Not sure how I feel about this yet.
The idea was to make it a subclass for something like the fighter, so I wanted to have additional features to be in line with those mechanics. It might be better to make this more of a race. But I think if this was a racial or even a feat ability it would have to come with a pretty serious drawback, as this doesn't include all the abilities a class includes.
I do think you can't cast spells if you have this ability period... If this was a racial class feature and you could than choose wizard, this would be so strong. lol
Personally, I've run into no end of trouble in allowing my players to have mechanics that aren't in the game.D Doyourself a favour, and take a firm stance that if it isn't in a sourcebook, it's not allowed. I'm looking forward to the end of this campaign so I can implement this rule for the next batch of characters. No homebrew.
That being said, if a player wants to take a mechanic and re-skin it, that's perfectly fine. I would allow your player to use the appropriate class spells that can summon and/or control minions, using the mechanics as written, but allow them to pick a creature type that is suitable for their character (summon lesser elemental could become summon lesser beast, control undead could become control humanoid).
If they want it to look like they are taking control of NPCs, create an NPC on the spot when they cast the spell that actually was there the whole time that the player has now just controlled. (Mechanically it's a lesser summon, in-game it's a hivemind control ability). That way they aren't messing with important story NPCs or tipping balance by stealing monsters from the existing enemy team.
You don't have to create new rules to implement something different, and you'll save yourself and your players a lot of unbalanced, not very satisfying encounters.
I've created lots of homebrew mechanics before, I like when players thing of creative ideas. And I 100% agree with you, I've run into tons of issues doing it. It's why I tell them over and over, I reserve the right to change or drop this mechanic at anytime. If you don't like that, then play a standard thing or walk away from my table.
Trust me I've had some issues where players talked me into doing something that sounded cool, and I tried my best to let them keep it, but if I find it to be something to powerful they refused to leave the game if I didn't let them keep it. I am lucky enough where I have more players who want to play than I do seats at my table. I am happy to let an unhappy combative player walk away because I worked with the to create a interesting mechanic which ended up being to strong. Yeah it sounds mean, but I like the challenge, which is why I always try to ask other DMs how they would work with something like this.
I am starting off by applying a lot of chances for failure,
a three check skill challenge is no easy feat to accomplish,
any damage done to a creature is done to the controller
Removed any ability to spell cast from the player and any controlled creatures
Controlled creatures die if the controller falls unconscious
Though you do bring up an interesting issue, I would prefer if this was not used in combat, maybe it takes 1 hour before the creature is fully integrated into the hive, at that point any damage that creature takes during that time allows it to make another intelligence check to resist conversion to the hive. I also do have to talk with them or make it so I fudge the dice that important NPC basically always save.
But as I said, I understand where you are coming from, I've had many players break or attempt to break the system, I've probably been that character once or twice. I also understand it's hard to ask a player to change once they've gotten attached, I just wont let a homebrew mechanic break the game, I'll just remove it and/or the player based on their reaction.
The easiest thing is to make it exactly equivalent to an existing spell. For example, we take Animate Dead and make the following changes:
Instead of targeting a corpse, it targets an unconscious humanoid of not more than CR 1/4.
Instead of creating a skeleton or zombie, it charms and controls the target.
Higher CR targets count as (CR*4) total targets, both for casting and maintaining.
It's got a bit more flexibility and subtlety than animate dead, but it requires you to actually find appropriate CR humanoids, and it is vulnerable to Dispel Magic.
I think the argument to be made is that you need to be very careful about the balance of your Homebrew mechanics. Don't let your Players build them for you, and build the mechanics carefully.
The 5e rules aren't able to cover all situations - there's going to come a time where you need to pull an impromptu mechanic out of the air. I don't think it's possible to say "if it's not in the book, it can't be done" ( well, you can say it, but you might have a hard time justifying why the Players can't do something that makes complete sense "in world", just because of GM meta-gaming and an unwillingness to evaluate and vet mechanics properly ).
I like the evaluation strategy that Angry GM recently wrote about: Verisimilitude, Tone, and Balance. Does the mechanic make sense from the perspective of the in-world setting? Does the mechanic fit in with the kind of Player experience you're trying to provide? Can you structure this mechanic so that a) it doesn't over-ride other vanilla mechanics ( i.e. you can answer why would the Players ever do anything other than this new mechanic approach ), and b) It can be reversed onto the Party without them feeling hosed ( improperly implemented "instant kill called shots" are an example of this; would your Players feel comfortable with their Characters being one-shot-killed by enemies?).
I think your approach probably passes Verisimilitude - although only you can judge that as I don't know your setting. It can't be a very common thing to be able to do - but an argument can be made that since Animate Dead is a thing, that something like this might exist.
Does it pass Tone? That's up to you. Again - I don't know your game.
Balance is the tricky one here! And I think you're really trying to keep in balanced. I like the "you have to succeed in multiple skill rolls" to even be able to attempt to do this. It keeps the Player from spamming out this ability all the time. I also very much like the "you gain a benefit, but you pay a cost for it" approach: either the "you semi-permanently lose max HPs" or "You take collateral damage when your other selves are damaged". This prevents the Character from making armies of minions. I also think that structuring it so that they can't take over enemies in the middle of combat, and use them against their former allies is a wise choice.
Where I get a bit iffy on the balance issue is that adding what are essentially free ally NPCs to the Party is going to really inflate their "wealth" in the action economy. You'll have to account for that ( or the bad guys will ... ).
It's an interesting idea, which I don't think would fit the Tone of any game I'm likely to run - but I think you've got a level headed approach to keeping your mechanics balanced.
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OMG you should have seen the homebrew he had, basically he could have 4 minions by level 5 and all they had to do was fail one grapple check. Then he could spend 50gp and +2 to the AC and more health. His creatures used a specific stat block and didn't care what the creature was before, but the starting AC was 15 with like 10 health. Meaning at level 5 I think he would have had 4 minions with an AC 17 and 20 HP a piece. at level 10 they got more AC and more health...
Then he had a mechanic that reads:
You now have the ability to build a base for the hive. You can now create a Hive Base which can create Hive Drones. Each drone gives you a spell that you can cast. Your hive base generates 1 new drone every hour. If the hive base dies the drones all die, so keep it safe. Your hive base can maintain a max of 5 drones. You need all 5 drones to use the tool. The drones need to be within 15 ft of the base. The base is a 5x5ft of hive material which the drones can live in. The base can be moved but cant move by itself, the drones are able to pick up and move the base, requiring at least 3 drones to move it.
Provided no details on the limitation of the spell or tools... Like I think he has an idea of what he wants to do but didn't try to account for numbers or anything like that.
So I fully understand why you don't let players design mechanics. The idea above is what I came up with after figuring out what he wanted to do. I also make it clear to every player who wants to try a homebrew mechanic, class, race, or feature that I reserve the right to change it or remove it at any point. I am more than happy to work with players to create new and cool things in D&D, I mean its Fantasy, why can't you have an alien race that infects and converts other beings into a hive mind mentality? However, I do always think its best to get more feedback from other seasoned DM's on how to best balance things, hence this thread.
I actually never heard of this Verisimilitude, Tone, and Balance thing from Angry GM. I'll have to look it up.
Does the mechanic make sense from the perspective of the in-world setting? It's a new campaign, only one session, I am happy to work this into the world as I am building it, I even already thought of and started writing a story arc around this idea. So yeah I can make it fit into the world.
Does the mechanic fit in with the kind of Player experience you're trying to provide? This is a much tougher question to answer, this character is currently planning to play a necromancer, so I believe they were already going down the road to having minions apart of the team. This mechanic would actually do a better job at limiting this players ability to have minions in the game, as its limited to a total of 5 creatures as the max intelligence bonus is a + 5, where you can start to get pretty crazy with necromancy around level 10 or 11. So yes, it fits with how the player wants to play and shouldn't effect my game to an extreme standard.
Can you structure this mechanic so that
it doesn't over-ride other vanilla mechanics ( i.e. you can answer why would the Players ever do anything other than this new mechanic approach ) Not going to lie, this whole mechanic is build around the idea of Animate Dead, but on living creatures with more steps. I think the fact the mechanic relies on so many factors it is actually a more complicated and most likely less rewarding system than Animate Dead. The fact you have to be a very specific race also limits how you gain access to this feature. I will argue this is similar to existing mechanics, but with another changes to make it an option but something everyone would want.
It can be reversed onto the Party without them feeling hosed ( improperly implemented "instant kill called shots" are an example of this; would your Players feel comfortable with their Characters being one-shot-killed by enemies?). I fully plan on adding NPCs of this race to the game world that can and will attempt to use this feature on my Players. So the other players will have to be informed of this mechanic and realize their players could be killed due to this action.
Balance is the biggest issue I have so far. I am trying to add so many controlling factors, such as the multiple skill checks (The fact that the feature requires Str, Con and Int to pull off means a character needs high stats in three things to improve their odds), the limit of control based off the players intelligence so they can't convert all the NPC's in the world into the hive mind, and the health limitation to make it a risky choice instead of a rewarding choice.
I was even thinking of making it so each hive minion you have decreases your maximum intelligence by two as long as that minion is connected to the hive mind. Basically making it harder and harder for the hive controller to gain control of new minions. But I am starting to feel like that might be to many limitations on the ability. However, I do think I am going to add text that says it takes 1 hour for a creature who has failed these checks to be added to the Hive Minds Collective, this would essentially take a combatant out of the combat, but wouldn't allow them to use it to turn that NPC in the middle of combat.
To your point about action economy, this was my biggest worry, but to be honest, how does Animate Dead not do the same thing? I've actually never played with a necromancer in the party before, but looking at the spells Create Undead and Animate Dead they are able to create quite a few minions and increase their action economy by a lot.
I think you're right that there are many other - perfectly vanilla/RAW - elements of the game which already strain the action economy. Animate Dead is certainly one. High level Druids can bring whole Zoos worth of creatures to the fight. However such allies are either temporary, or require continuous upkeep of the bond ( re-casting the spell, in the case of Animate Dead ).
How I would handle the action economy is not to handle it as a GM at all. I agree with the idea that "the world doesn't scale with the Players", but the situations that the Player Characters are able to handle - and are called upon to handle - certainly do. The minions of the BBEG might not have any clue that they are facing "the hive" and get wiped out in the first encounter. There's nothing wrong with throwing the Players an easy victory from time-to-time; makes 'em feel powerful. However, subsequent encounters, they know what they're dealing with, and will at least try to account for the threat they now know they are dealing with.
I do like the idea of a limiting mechanics, but I'm not sure reducing Intelligence is the way I'd go. I agree that this would likely require effort to keep "the hive" together, so I'm wondering if a Constitution save to avoid acquiring a point of exhaustion might me an alternative? Say - once every 24 hours, with the DC dependent on the number of creatures controlled?
Which brings up an interesting question - can controlled creatures resist? Are they trying to break free? What of the host survives ( Stargate SG-1 reference there )? Can they break free? Perhaps the hive controller needs to constantly expend effort or resources to keep the hive under control.That would definitely keep the ability in line with Animate Dead or summoned creatures, where constant expenditure of spell resources is required to retain your allies. If a controlled creature breaks free, then what? I know that if someone did that to me, I'd be cranky about it :p In a D&D setting world, I'd probably try and kill the controlling Necromancer to ensure that never happened again!
If maintaining the hive requires effort/resources expended, can the hive controller voluntarily release drones?
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Yeah, I think the action economy I am just going to let it be what it is.
What if instead of reducing the actual intelligence of the player what if the DC was something like DC Intelligence Saving throwing (8 + Intelligence Modifier + Proficiency Bonus - Number of Hive Minions) So even if you have a high intelligence the first few creatures will be easy to bring into the hive, but each creature into the hive makes it harder for you to maintain control.
The problem here is thematically we have it written where once the creature fails all three saves, the creatures taking over your mind essentially work themselves into the mind. Basically if they were to break free, they would essentially be brain dead. So I am not sure if its worth writing a mechanic that would for maintaining control. But I am not going to lie, one of the things I like about Animate Dead is that it forced the player to keep using spell slots to maintain control where this feature requires no upkeep once you achieve control. However this ability requires more work to get control... Does that balance it? I am just not sure yet.
This doesn’t help with the game mechanics, but I just had a thought that you could have a hive of hives. That maybe one person can only have 3-4 under direct control, but their thralls can make thralls of their own, like an evil Ponzi scheme. And this guy can only do it because he’s got some ancient artifact. Then the players can figure out the only way to truly defeat them is to take out the guy at the top of the pyramid, and smash the artifact. Might not work as a BBEG for the campaign, but could make an interesting villain for a side quest story arc.
It might be balanced with animate dead. And you could make it hard to keep the thralls alive, so the player isn’t using them too much in combat. Like don’t give them death saves, and/or make them resistant to healing magic.
Another mechanic I wanted to throw out there is exhaustion. Maybe make the player make a save if they want to try to control, say 2 or more at a time and if they fail they get a level of exhaustion. And increase the save DC for each extra creature. So they can actively control one as a freebie, similar to a ranger companion, but more than that starts to get taxing. They might have 3 or 4 built up, but most of them just shuffle along in the back while the player manipulates only 1 at a time.
IMHO a higher initial cost does not equate with an ongoing cost - or more specifically, there comes a time where there is a "break-even point", past which its a net gain to the hive controller: If it cost 50 "units" to take someone over, or 5 "units" a week to control them, then past 10 weeks, it's a net gain for the controller. For that to work, the initial cost would need to be damn high. Essentially you want the up-front cost for the creation of the drone to cover the maintenance cost of the drone for a long time.
Personally, I'd keep it as an ongoing cost - even if the controlled individual is not fighting them, and can't break free. From my perspective, just controlling another body would be taxing. Maybe that's a risk of exhaustion. Maybe that's an increasing penalty to ability checks related to Intelligence or Wisdom - scaling with the number of creatures controlled. Maybe that's a constant amount of damage suffered from maintaining the link.
Giving them an "all or nothing" minion just seems too powerful. They can just keep trying until they eventually get another minion. You need to have something in the mechanic that keeps them from just spamming the "I try and take over another drone" button until they get what they want. If that's not an ongoing cost, then - as I said - keep the initial high enough to be significant to the Character, and I'd impose a pretty severe penalty for failing . If the difficulty of adding new drones scales with the size of the existing hive ( as you suggested ), and if they try and add a drone and fail, then maybe they lose control of the entire hive, and the previously controlled drones become hostile undead attacking the Necromancer.
However, if you go the ongoing cost route, then I think the controller needs the ability to voluntarily relinquish control, and free themselves from that ongoing cost. However, I wouldn't make dropping control without consequence either - it's a damn violent and evil act to enslave a drone, and IMHO it should have consequences. If the person controlled is essentially dead ( nothing of the host survives ), then I'd still have them animate as a hostile undead .
It's a high value reward - you want the cost and/or risk to be commensurately high, IMHO.
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It might be balanced with animate dead. And you could make it hard to keep the thralls alive, so the player isn’t using them too much in combat. Like don’t give them death saves, and/or make them resistant to healing magic.
I like that idea. That's another approach: if drones aren't super hard to make, or maintain, then reduce their overall effectiveness, and/or make them temporary acquisitions as they "wear out". Don't raise the risk/cost - lower the reward.
This just keeps getting more and more evil :p
I think the actions of the Player Necromancer would eventually attract the ire of a Party of Heroes bent on stopping them. Maybe you end up with a BBGG not and BBEG in this campaign
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To be honest, the party is actually based around necromancy, which is kinda perfect because the campaign is designed around an NPC that is trying to bring her love back to life and what she has to do is kinda messed up.
The party so far seems to have evil powers but for good, I am curious to see if they team up with the BBEG or Work against them. lol
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Another thought about how to balance with animate dead is to make them all the same. When you cast animate dead, it doesn't matter if the dead creature was a commoner or a 10th level wizard, or a human or a dwarf, they turn into a skeleton or a zombie and end up with the same stats. I know the ideas batting around have been to let the thralls keep some of their natural abilities, but they could always not. You could build a stat block for them and say whoever the player controls turns into this new creature with these stats.
I agree that flattening out the creature stats and making a drone it's own kind of creature is a way of controlling the level of reward ( and thus keeping it mechanically on par with the level of risk/cost ) - but are we not just reinventing some version of Animate Dead, at that point - even if it's a higher level & more powerful version of the spell?
IMHO - a new mechanic should describe a distinct practice apart from the other methods of doing something similar. It should have unique benefits, and have unique risks/costs as well - and they need to be balanced. If it just has unique benefits, with no commensurate increased risks - it's just the Player trying to get a mechanical advantage in the game. If it's just got added risk, with no additional benefits - why would the Player use it, other than purely for flavor/story/RP uses ( which is a totally legitimate purpose, if that is an emphasis in the game you're trying to run )? If it has neither - then it's just a re-skin of an existing mechanic, so you don't need to worry about balance - you just need to describe Animate Dead with different prose, and you're done.
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The reason I want to avoid using a basic stat block similar to the spell Animate Dead is because, then this isn't really a new mechanic, its just a themed version of the Animate Dead spell. Which would technically work but lets be honest would be less cool than actually taking over creatures and making them all a collective of a hive mind.
As for the rest of things, I wanted to share the start of the race I created to see if I have my wording right and if this seems like the right path to start creating a balanced version of these features. You can check it out here The Hive Race.
I will admit there are a few things I still need to work out, for example, I think I want to make a intelligence check after a long rest that will basically reassert your control over the hive mind creatures. The DC will be equal to (8 + The Number of Hive Minions) and failing the DC will not cause you to lose control of the Hive creatures but will force you to take 1 level of Exhaustion, this Exhaustion applies to all of your Hive Minions as well.
Let me know if there is anything else you guys think might need to be added to help keep this race as balanced as it can be.
I think it could end up making the resulting character pretty MAD. Since they can't cast spells, that basically leaves them with a fighter, barbarian or rogue (or a ****** paladin). All of which use INT as a dump stat. And INT will be important in both creating thralls and in maintaining them, if you implement the long rest save you talk about in the last post. Really, with as much as the resulting thralls seem to be kind of not superpowered, I don't see why it would be a problem for the main host to be a caster. If they are using their action to control a thrall, either they're casting a spell, or using the hive mind ability, so it shouldn't really be an action economy issue. And it would create some interesting tactical choices, like do they leave the thrall standing there limp in the middle of a bunch of enemies so they can cast fireball, or should they get it out of the way first? Honestly, I would imagine not using them much in combat at all, but more in exploration, to have them go set off traps or scout around corners. Though if the host is a caster, and he can use the thralls as meat shields, that could really make sense. I agree with any minions taken over losing their casting ability -- which is all the more reason for the host to be able to be a caster, since it would be more useful for him to take over someone with melee abilities he can use than to take over a caster since a wizard without spells would be pointless.
You also should say specifically what the minion can do in a fight and out of combat. Is it proficient in whatever weapons and armor it had? If it was a 5th level fighter, does it still get two attacks? Can a barbarian rage? Does it have the same skill proficiencies? If it was an armorsmith, is it still just a skilled at creating armor as it had been, or does that go away since it takes on your INT and WIS? Does it (or the collective, I suppose) retain its memories? (So when they decide to bodysnatch the local baron, do they know who he knew, and the political situation, and where the secret cache of jewels is hidden, and what his private nickname was for his daughter, and other things that might give him away.) Also there should be a range for how far away from the minion the main host can be. And specify what a thrall does when its not being actively controlled.
Do you intend for the host to be able to turn into a swarm of beetles at will? Because I'd use that pretty much anytime I wanted to go under a locked door or in a window with bars on it and just let the party in from the inside. I don't think its really OP, just making sure you realize it. And if that happens, would swarm rules (resistance to non AoE effects) apply if they are attacked? And would they be able to control a minion while in swarm form? can they send off one beetle just to look around a corner, familiar-style? Also, you should clarify how long it takes. I'd say 1 minute (both to unform and reform) unless you want them to be able to do it in a fight.
I would also see this race as being absolutely hated by everyone else, attacked on sight in civilized areas, and actively hunted by both good and evil forces. Maybe that questing Paladin Vedexent was talking about is part of an order dedicated to hunting the creatures.
I think making this an entire race opens up a whole other can of worms ( or in this case, beetles ), insofar as your campaign setting is concerned. It opens up the possibility that other Characters could decide they want to do this as well - which isn't a problem if/when you've got all the bugs ( again ... beetles ... ) worked out of the mechanics - but until you do, you probably don't want this to be replicated.
I think the only way to make sure your mechanics aren't going to get away from you is to play-test them.
Until they're well play-tested, I would hold this to being an ability that is extremely rare, at least for now. I understand that you expressed some interest in having there be NPC hive mind controllers that the Party may need to contend with ( or I'd have said keep this Necromancer/Hive-mind-controller unique ) but you could make the circumstances around the origin of these controllers be so rare and/or improbable that there are very few of them, for now.
Who knows - maybe one of the elements that evolves out of the campaign could be the genesis of this species - but by then, you'll have your experimentation, play-testing, and revisions in place to make sure that it's all balanced.
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So I player of mine, wants to have a mechanic that allows them to convert entities into a hive mind. Now I am initially opposed to this as it essentially creates new player characters for social interactions and specifically in combat. The party size is currently 6 players... Adding 2-3 other NPCs could draw out or make combat encounters seem useless. He brings up spells such as Animate Dead or Create Undead and I've thought of it as something similar to the Druids - Circle of Spores - Fungal Infestation. So I wanted to share some ideas I had and was hoping you all could help me figure out how to balance this or if it is possible to balance a mechanic like this
So there are clearly mechanics designed to give players "minions" but all of these minions expire or have a limit of the amount you can control (yes, I know, you can kinda cheese Create Undead to get a small army). Where this wouldn't have this limitation, they would remain apart of the Hive Mind as long as they are living.
So I started to try to think of mechanics to implement this design, I want it to be kinda of hard to convert a living human being into the hive mind, so it would basically require the target to fail three saving throws.
One of Us: one of use is an ability you recieve at third level when choose this subclass. It allows you to convert another creature into the hive mind. To do this you must succeed a Grappling check. Once the creature is grappled they have to make a Constitution Saving Throw with a DC equal to (8 + Strength Modifier + Proficiency Bonus), if the target succeeds they instead take 1d6 poison damage. Lastly the target must make an intelligence saving throw with a DC equal to (8 + Intelligence Modifier + Proficiency Bonus), if the target has an intelligence score of 9 or higher they recieve advantage on this check. If a target fails all three checks their mind has joined the hive mind and are now One of Us
The idea behind having multiple skill checks is because this power can basically be used against any living creature, its a very powerful feature that basically allows you to create an army. So having to fail 3 skill checks seems reasonable. I also want to apply other limitations, For example, to discourage the player from creating just an army of minions using this ability I wanted them to share stats, mostly mental stats such as "Wisdom, Intelligence and Charisma" But I also wanted to have them share a pool of health. Either one of the two following ways:
EDIT: I also liked the idea of adding a limit of creatures able to be controlled by the hive mind Equal to your Intelligence score modifier, to try and prevent the characters from just converting everyone.
Similar to Animate Dead you would have to use your bonus action to give the creatures a command, you can one or all hive mind creatures a single command.
As for the creature stats, they would retain their physical stats. I would also suggest that they lose all ability for spell casting if they have any. Basically you're still physically what you were, you are just no longer or your own control of your mental abilities.
As for higher level features, I haven't thought of them. This is a pretty powerful core ability and if I was to expand on it, I would want it to be a trade off. For example, the player could buff a hive mind's physical trait by giving up their own. for every two points you take to a physical ability a single hive mind creature receives 1 bonus point to that same ability.
My first thought is this is off the charts evil. Not that its disqualifying, but just to put that out there.
I like the fail three saves, and I also like spreading them around across different abilities so the creature targeted has a good chance of coming across a save they are good at. As for the grapple check, what if someone else is doing the grappling. Like the fighter holds the target still while the hive minder does its thing. Would that still work? Or if the target was chained up?
Just spitballing, but you could make players use their action, rather than a bonus action if you really want to tamp down chances for abuse. You could also use familiar rules, if you are seeing through their eyes, you can't see through your own (a mind can only take so much sensory input, and having it come from multiple sources would drive you crazy), but you do get benefit of the creature's senses and movement (darkvision, tremorsense, flight, etc.)
I could see a shared hit point pool. I would fear for the amount of bookkeeping, but that would be on the player to track. I'd even think you could add them all together, then if it hits the number for one of the creatures, that one drops. So something like, Player has 30 HP, goblin he took over has 10. Together they have 40. But if either the player or the goblin takes 10, the goblin drops, so the other creatures almost act as walking pools of temp HP for the character. But since it was so hard for the player to get a minion, they'll really want to avoid that damage. Could be an interesting tactical decision for the party to choose to heal the hive mind and stop the goblin from dropping, or heal the barbarian.
I don't know if it needs higher level abilities. Were you thinking to make this a class? Or just have it be a feat maybe?
Or for the simplest way, maybe just use something like animate dead, or the ranger's companion, and re-skin it.
I also agree that this could be evil off the charts... It's why I tried to open the idea from humanoid to creature. This way maybe they could make a hivemind of animals, such as wolves, bears and things of the assort... Slightly less evil.
Yeah, I really like the idea of the skill challenge, it makes it not so easy to aquire hive mind creatures. I would personally rule the restrained check would only apply if the creature is in active combat, outside of combat, I would most likely allow another member of the party to attempt to restrain. You could also rule that the grapple check is less about restraining them and more about forcing the larva down their throat.
The Constitution check is meant for the battle between the larva your immune system not attempting to destroy it, it was also an attempt to give creatures a wide range of things, so that it has a chance of hitting something it is favorable in. I also like the idea of allowing a small amount of damage, to at least make the players turn not feel wasted on a failed attempt.
I actually didn't even think about looking though it's eyes, that should totally be an action, the bonus action was more for in combat and giving orders. I do agree something like looking through its eyes or using its special movement as an action though. Thanks for the suggestion, I actually love that idea.
My current idea for hitpoints I am leaning on is, each creature keeps it's hitpoints, however all damage dealt to a hive mind creature is also dealt to the hive mind controller as psychic damage. If the hive mind creature loses consciousness, the creatures being controlled by the hive mind parish. Basically if you managed to mind control a giant with 80 hitpoints, its not weaker simply because it joined the hive mind, however, your not mentally capable of taking that much pain. Not sure how I feel about this yet.
The idea was to make it a subclass for something like the fighter, so I wanted to have additional features to be in line with those mechanics. It might be better to make this more of a race. But I think if this was a racial or even a feat ability it would have to come with a pretty serious drawback, as this doesn't include all the abilities a class includes.
I do think you can't cast spells if you have this ability period... If this was a racial class feature and you could than choose wizard, this would be so strong. lol
Personally, I've run into no end of trouble in allowing my players to have mechanics that aren't in the game.D Doyourself a favour, and take a firm stance that if it isn't in a sourcebook, it's not allowed. I'm looking forward to the end of this campaign so I can implement this rule for the next batch of characters. No homebrew.
That being said, if a player wants to take a mechanic and re-skin it, that's perfectly fine. I would allow your player to use the appropriate class spells that can summon and/or control minions, using the mechanics as written, but allow them to pick a creature type that is suitable for their character (summon lesser elemental could become summon lesser beast, control undead could become control humanoid).
If they want it to look like they are taking control of NPCs, create an NPC on the spot when they cast the spell that actually was there the whole time that the player has now just controlled. (Mechanically it's a lesser summon, in-game it's a hivemind control ability). That way they aren't messing with important story NPCs or tipping balance by stealing monsters from the existing enemy team.
You don't have to create new rules to implement something different, and you'll save yourself and your players a lot of unbalanced, not very satisfying encounters.
I've created lots of homebrew mechanics before, I like when players thing of creative ideas. And I 100% agree with you, I've run into tons of issues doing it. It's why I tell them over and over, I reserve the right to change or drop this mechanic at anytime. If you don't like that, then play a standard thing or walk away from my table.
Trust me I've had some issues where players talked me into doing something that sounded cool, and I tried my best to let them keep it, but if I find it to be something to powerful they refused to leave the game if I didn't let them keep it. I am lucky enough where I have more players who want to play than I do seats at my table. I am happy to let an unhappy combative player walk away because I worked with the to create a interesting mechanic which ended up being to strong. Yeah it sounds mean, but I like the challenge, which is why I always try to ask other DMs how they would work with something like this.
I am starting off by applying a lot of chances for failure,
Though you do bring up an interesting issue, I would prefer if this was not used in combat, maybe it takes 1 hour before the creature is fully integrated into the hive, at that point any damage that creature takes during that time allows it to make another intelligence check to resist conversion to the hive. I also do have to talk with them or make it so I fudge the dice that important NPC basically always save.
But as I said, I understand where you are coming from, I've had many players break or attempt to break the system, I've probably been that character once or twice. I also understand it's hard to ask a player to change once they've gotten attached, I just wont let a homebrew mechanic break the game, I'll just remove it and/or the player based on their reaction.
The easiest thing is to make it exactly equivalent to an existing spell. For example, we take Animate Dead and make the following changes:
It's got a bit more flexibility and subtlety than animate dead, but it requires you to actually find appropriate CR humanoids, and it is vulnerable to Dispel Magic.
I think the argument to be made is that you need to be very careful about the balance of your Homebrew mechanics. Don't let your Players build them for you, and build the mechanics carefully.
The 5e rules aren't able to cover all situations - there's going to come a time where you need to pull an impromptu mechanic out of the air. I don't think it's possible to say "if it's not in the book, it can't be done" ( well, you can say it, but you might have a hard time justifying why the Players can't do something that makes complete sense "in world", just because of GM meta-gaming and an unwillingness to evaluate and vet mechanics properly ).
I like the evaluation strategy that Angry GM recently wrote about: Verisimilitude, Tone, and Balance. Does the mechanic make sense from the perspective of the in-world setting? Does the mechanic fit in with the kind of Player experience you're trying to provide? Can you structure this mechanic so that a) it doesn't over-ride other vanilla mechanics ( i.e. you can answer why would the Players ever do anything other than this new mechanic approach ), and b) It can be reversed onto the Party without them feeling hosed ( improperly implemented "instant kill called shots" are an example of this; would your Players feel comfortable with their Characters being one-shot-killed by enemies?).
I think your approach probably passes Verisimilitude - although only you can judge that as I don't know your setting. It can't be a very common thing to be able to do - but an argument can be made that since Animate Dead is a thing, that something like this might exist.
Does it pass Tone? That's up to you. Again - I don't know your game.
Balance is the tricky one here! And I think you're really trying to keep in balanced. I like the "you have to succeed in multiple skill rolls" to even be able to attempt to do this. It keeps the Player from spamming out this ability all the time. I also very much like the "you gain a benefit, but you pay a cost for it" approach: either the "you semi-permanently lose max HPs" or "You take collateral damage when your other selves are damaged". This prevents the Character from making armies of minions. I also think that structuring it so that they can't take over enemies in the middle of combat, and use them against their former allies is a wise choice.
Where I get a bit iffy on the balance issue is that adding what are essentially free ally NPCs to the Party is going to really inflate their "wealth" in the action economy. You'll have to account for that ( or the bad guys will ... ).
It's an interesting idea, which I don't think would fit the Tone of any game I'm likely to run - but I think you've got a level headed approach to keeping your mechanics balanced.
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
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OMG you should have seen the homebrew he had, basically he could have 4 minions by level 5 and all they had to do was fail one grapple check. Then he could spend 50gp and +2 to the AC and more health. His creatures used a specific stat block and didn't care what the creature was before, but the starting AC was 15 with like 10 health. Meaning at level 5 I think he would have had 4 minions with an AC 17 and 20 HP a piece. at level 10 they got more AC and more health...
Then he had a mechanic that reads:
Provided no details on the limitation of the spell or tools... Like I think he has an idea of what he wants to do but didn't try to account for numbers or anything like that.
So I fully understand why you don't let players design mechanics. The idea above is what I came up with after figuring out what he wanted to do. I also make it clear to every player who wants to try a homebrew mechanic, class, race, or feature that I reserve the right to change it or remove it at any point. I am more than happy to work with players to create new and cool things in D&D, I mean its Fantasy, why can't you have an alien race that infects and converts other beings into a hive mind mentality? However, I do always think its best to get more feedback from other seasoned DM's on how to best balance things, hence this thread.
I actually never heard of this Verisimilitude, Tone, and Balance thing from Angry GM. I'll have to look it up.
Balance is the biggest issue I have so far. I am trying to add so many controlling factors, such as the multiple skill checks (The fact that the feature requires Str, Con and Int to pull off means a character needs high stats in three things to improve their odds), the limit of control based off the players intelligence so they can't convert all the NPC's in the world into the hive mind, and the health limitation to make it a risky choice instead of a rewarding choice.
I was even thinking of making it so each hive minion you have decreases your maximum intelligence by two as long as that minion is connected to the hive mind. Basically making it harder and harder for the hive controller to gain control of new minions. But I am starting to feel like that might be to many limitations on the ability. However, I do think I am going to add text that says it takes 1 hour for a creature who has failed these checks to be added to the Hive Minds Collective, this would essentially take a combatant out of the combat, but wouldn't allow them to use it to turn that NPC in the middle of combat.
To your point about action economy, this was my biggest worry, but to be honest, how does Animate Dead not do the same thing? I've actually never played with a necromancer in the party before, but looking at the spells Create Undead and Animate Dead they are able to create quite a few minions and increase their action economy by a lot.
The Angry GM article can be found here. I’m Making This Up As I Go: When Rules Fail.
I think you're right that there are many other - perfectly vanilla/RAW - elements of the game which already strain the action economy. Animate Dead is certainly one. High level Druids can bring whole Zoos worth of creatures to the fight. However such allies are either temporary, or require continuous upkeep of the bond ( re-casting the spell, in the case of Animate Dead ).
How I would handle the action economy is not to handle it as a GM at all. I agree with the idea that "the world doesn't scale with the Players", but the situations that the Player Characters are able to handle - and are called upon to handle - certainly do. The minions of the BBEG might not have any clue that they are facing "the hive" and get wiped out in the first encounter. There's nothing wrong with throwing the Players an easy victory from time-to-time; makes 'em feel powerful. However, subsequent encounters, they know what they're dealing with, and will at least try to account for the threat they now know they are dealing with.
I do like the idea of a limiting mechanics, but I'm not sure reducing Intelligence is the way I'd go. I agree that this would likely require effort to keep "the hive" together, so I'm wondering if a Constitution save to avoid acquiring a point of exhaustion might me an alternative? Say - once every 24 hours, with the DC dependent on the number of creatures controlled?
Which brings up an interesting question - can controlled creatures resist? Are they trying to break free? What of the host survives ( Stargate SG-1 reference there )? Can they break free? Perhaps the hive controller needs to constantly expend effort or resources to keep the hive under control.That would definitely keep the ability in line with Animate Dead or summoned creatures, where constant expenditure of spell resources is required to retain your allies. If a controlled creature breaks free, then what? I know that if someone did that to me, I'd be cranky about it :p In a D&D setting world, I'd probably try and kill the controlling Necromancer to ensure that never happened again!
If maintaining the hive requires effort/resources expended, can the hive controller voluntarily release drones?
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
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Yeah, I think the action economy I am just going to let it be what it is.
What if instead of reducing the actual intelligence of the player what if the DC was something like DC Intelligence Saving throwing (8 + Intelligence Modifier + Proficiency Bonus - Number of Hive Minions) So even if you have a high intelligence the first few creatures will be easy to bring into the hive, but each creature into the hive makes it harder for you to maintain control.
The problem here is thematically we have it written where once the creature fails all three saves, the creatures taking over your mind essentially work themselves into the mind. Basically if they were to break free, they would essentially be brain dead. So I am not sure if its worth writing a mechanic that would for maintaining control. But I am not going to lie, one of the things I like about Animate Dead is that it forced the player to keep using spell slots to maintain control where this feature requires no upkeep once you achieve control. However this ability requires more work to get control... Does that balance it? I am just not sure yet.
This doesn’t help with the game mechanics, but I just had a thought that you could have a hive of hives. That maybe one person can only have 3-4 under direct control, but their thralls can make thralls of their own, like an evil Ponzi scheme. And this guy can only do it because he’s got some ancient artifact. Then the players can figure out the only way to truly defeat them is to take out the guy at the top of the pyramid, and smash the artifact. Might not work as a BBEG for the campaign, but could make an interesting villain for a side quest story arc.
It might be balanced with animate dead. And you could make it hard to keep the thralls alive, so the player isn’t using them too much in combat. Like don’t give them death saves, and/or make them resistant to healing magic.
Another mechanic I wanted to throw out there is exhaustion. Maybe make the player make a save if they want to try to control, say 2 or more at a time and if they fail they get a level of exhaustion. And increase the save DC for each extra creature. So they can actively control one as a freebie, similar to a ranger companion, but more than that starts to get taxing. They might have 3 or 4 built up, but most of them just shuffle along in the back while the player manipulates only 1 at a time.
IMHO a higher initial cost does not equate with an ongoing cost - or more specifically, there comes a time where there is a "break-even point", past which its a net gain to the hive controller: If it cost 50 "units" to take someone over, or 5 "units" a week to control them, then past 10 weeks, it's a net gain for the controller. For that to work, the initial cost would need to be damn high. Essentially you want the up-front cost for the creation of the drone to cover the maintenance cost of the drone for a long time.
Personally, I'd keep it as an ongoing cost - even if the controlled individual is not fighting them, and can't break free. From my perspective, just controlling another body would be taxing. Maybe that's a risk of exhaustion. Maybe that's an increasing penalty to ability checks related to Intelligence or Wisdom - scaling with the number of creatures controlled. Maybe that's a constant amount of damage suffered from maintaining the link.
Giving them an "all or nothing" minion just seems too powerful. They can just keep trying until they eventually get another minion. You need to have something in the mechanic that keeps them from just spamming the "I try and take over another drone" button until they get what they want. If that's not an ongoing cost, then - as I said - keep the initial high enough to be significant to the Character, and I'd impose a pretty severe penalty for failing . If the difficulty of adding new drones scales with the size of the existing hive ( as you suggested ), and if they try and add a drone and fail, then maybe they lose control of the entire hive, and the previously controlled drones become hostile undead attacking the Necromancer.
However, if you go the ongoing cost route, then I think the controller needs the ability to voluntarily relinquish control, and free themselves from that ongoing cost. However, I wouldn't make dropping control without consequence either - it's a damn violent and evil act to enslave a drone, and IMHO it should have consequences. If the person controlled is essentially dead ( nothing of the host survives ), then I'd still have them animate as a hostile undead .
It's a high value reward - you want the cost and/or risk to be commensurately high, IMHO.
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
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I like that idea. That's another approach: if drones aren't super hard to make, or maintain, then reduce their overall effectiveness, and/or make them temporary acquisitions as they "wear out". Don't raise the risk/cost - lower the reward.
This just keeps getting more and more evil :p
I think the actions of the Player Necromancer would eventually attract the ire of a Party of Heroes bent on stopping them. Maybe you end up with a BBGG not and BBEG in this campaign
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
Disclaimer: This signature is a badge of membership in the Forum Loudmouth Club. We are all friends. We are not attacking each other. We are engaging in spirited, friendly debate with one another. We may get snarky, but these are not attacks. Thank you for not reporting us.
To be honest, the party is actually based around necromancy, which is kinda perfect because the campaign is designed around an NPC that is trying to bring her love back to life and what she has to do is kinda messed up.
The party so far seems to have evil powers but for good, I am curious to see if they team up with the BBEG or Work against them. lol
In which case, I'd totally throw in a third party into the conflict which is trying to stop both the BBEG and the Party :D
Seems like a good quest for a Paladin and his retainers.
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
Disclaimer: This signature is a badge of membership in the Forum Loudmouth Club. We are all friends. We are not attacking each other. We are engaging in spirited, friendly debate with one another. We may get snarky, but these are not attacks. Thank you for not reporting us.
Another thought about how to balance with animate dead is to make them all the same. When you cast animate dead, it doesn't matter if the dead creature was a commoner or a 10th level wizard, or a human or a dwarf, they turn into a skeleton or a zombie and end up with the same stats. I know the ideas batting around have been to let the thralls keep some of their natural abilities, but they could always not. You could build a stat block for them and say whoever the player controls turns into this new creature with these stats.
I agree that flattening out the creature stats and making a drone it's own kind of creature is a way of controlling the level of reward ( and thus keeping it mechanically on par with the level of risk/cost ) - but are we not just reinventing some version of Animate Dead, at that point - even if it's a higher level & more powerful version of the spell?
IMHO - a new mechanic should describe a distinct practice apart from the other methods of doing something similar. It should have unique benefits, and have unique risks/costs as well - and they need to be balanced. If it just has unique benefits, with no commensurate increased risks - it's just the Player trying to get a mechanical advantage in the game. If it's just got added risk, with no additional benefits - why would the Player use it, other than purely for flavor/story/RP uses ( which is a totally legitimate purpose, if that is an emphasis in the game you're trying to run )? If it has neither - then it's just a re-skin of an existing mechanic, so you don't need to worry about balance - you just need to describe Animate Dead with different prose, and you're done.
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
Disclaimer: This signature is a badge of membership in the Forum Loudmouth Club. We are all friends. We are not attacking each other. We are engaging in spirited, friendly debate with one another. We may get snarky, but these are not attacks. Thank you for not reporting us.
The reason I want to avoid using a basic stat block similar to the spell Animate Dead is because, then this isn't really a new mechanic, its just a themed version of the Animate Dead spell. Which would technically work but lets be honest would be less cool than actually taking over creatures and making them all a collective of a hive mind.
As for the rest of things, I wanted to share the start of the race I created to see if I have my wording right and if this seems like the right path to start creating a balanced version of these features. You can check it out here The Hive Race.
I will admit there are a few things I still need to work out, for example, I think I want to make a intelligence check after a long rest that will basically reassert your control over the hive mind creatures. The DC will be equal to (8 + The Number of Hive Minions) and failing the DC will not cause you to lose control of the Hive creatures but will force you to take 1 level of Exhaustion, this Exhaustion applies to all of your Hive Minions as well.
Let me know if there is anything else you guys think might need to be added to help keep this race as balanced as it can be.
I think it could end up making the resulting character pretty MAD. Since they can't cast spells, that basically leaves them with a fighter, barbarian or rogue (or a ****** paladin). All of which use INT as a dump stat. And INT will be important in both creating thralls and in maintaining them, if you implement the long rest save you talk about in the last post. Really, with as much as the resulting thralls seem to be kind of not superpowered, I don't see why it would be a problem for the main host to be a caster. If they are using their action to control a thrall, either they're casting a spell, or using the hive mind ability, so it shouldn't really be an action economy issue. And it would create some interesting tactical choices, like do they leave the thrall standing there limp in the middle of a bunch of enemies so they can cast fireball, or should they get it out of the way first? Honestly, I would imagine not using them much in combat at all, but more in exploration, to have them go set off traps or scout around corners. Though if the host is a caster, and he can use the thralls as meat shields, that could really make sense. I agree with any minions taken over losing their casting ability -- which is all the more reason for the host to be able to be a caster, since it would be more useful for him to take over someone with melee abilities he can use than to take over a caster since a wizard without spells would be pointless.
You also should say specifically what the minion can do in a fight and out of combat. Is it proficient in whatever weapons and armor it had? If it was a 5th level fighter, does it still get two attacks? Can a barbarian rage? Does it have the same skill proficiencies? If it was an armorsmith, is it still just a skilled at creating armor as it had been, or does that go away since it takes on your INT and WIS? Does it (or the collective, I suppose) retain its memories? (So when they decide to bodysnatch the local baron, do they know who he knew, and the political situation, and where the secret cache of jewels is hidden, and what his private nickname was for his daughter, and other things that might give him away.) Also there should be a range for how far away from the minion the main host can be. And specify what a thrall does when its not being actively controlled.
Do you intend for the host to be able to turn into a swarm of beetles at will? Because I'd use that pretty much anytime I wanted to go under a locked door or in a window with bars on it and just let the party in from the inside. I don't think its really OP, just making sure you realize it. And if that happens, would swarm rules (resistance to non AoE effects) apply if they are attacked? And would they be able to control a minion while in swarm form? can they send off one beetle just to look around a corner, familiar-style? Also, you should clarify how long it takes. I'd say 1 minute (both to unform and reform) unless you want them to be able to do it in a fight.
I would also see this race as being absolutely hated by everyone else, attacked on sight in civilized areas, and actively hunted by both good and evil forces. Maybe that questing Paladin Vedexent was talking about is part of an order dedicated to hunting the creatures.
I think making this an entire race opens up a whole other can of worms ( or in this case, beetles ), insofar as your campaign setting is concerned. It opens up the possibility that other Characters could decide they want to do this as well - which isn't a problem if/when you've got all the bugs ( again ... beetles ... ) worked out of the mechanics - but until you do, you probably don't want this to be replicated.
I think the only way to make sure your mechanics aren't going to get away from you is to play-test them.
Until they're well play-tested, I would hold this to being an ability that is extremely rare, at least for now. I understand that you expressed some interest in having there be NPC hive mind controllers that the Party may need to contend with ( or I'd have said keep this Necromancer/Hive-mind-controller unique ) but you could make the circumstances around the origin of these controllers be so rare and/or improbable that there are very few of them, for now.
Who knows - maybe one of the elements that evolves out of the campaign could be the genesis of this species - but by then, you'll have your experimentation, play-testing, and revisions in place to make sure that it's all balanced.
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
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