Basically a fight was going on between celestials and Fiends, but it was odd. The 'rules' that I observed there I have no idea how to translate into a game (the most basic rule was this: 'the more powerful you are than your enemies, the less you are allowed to go at your full speed; so the humanoid arch-fiend who's face is literally unseeable (seriously, I tried looking at it's face like 2 or three times, it was either covered in clouds or was more than one face put together or it was a blank face made of moving bugs) wielding an amalgam between a trident and a bunch of jellyfish moves at a leisurely pace while lower ranked fiends moved at faster speeds and tried to corral celestials into getting within range of his weapon).
In any case it gave me an idea for running a game (or introducing) celestials as a race that's also a class. At least the way that I saw them.
Basically Celestials came in two forms, Celestials and Arch-Celestials.
Arch-Celestials are verboten to normal play (I saw one made and... seriously, no one expected that what led up to it's creation was the only way that they're created) unless the characters/players perform the right action [I'll PM people who want to know what it is, it's seriously bad for gameplay for it to happen].
Celestials are 'made' by getting a pair of mortal souls of different species and making a new creature out of them. Most of them are intelligent humanoid with an Int of 3+ and an animal/magical beast/constructs with an Int score of 1 or more.
Mechanically, all Celestials get two bonus Celesital feats; one that shows that their humanoid species was X and one that shows that their non-humanoid species was Y.
[So... you they get 2 bonus feats one of which will be from a list of [Celestial Humanoid] and one which will be from the [Celestial Non-Humanoid] list; I have to work on both such lists].
Celestials are then further subdivided into champions or theurgists.
I haven't really done anything for theurgists, but the champion class is seriously just a laundry list of abilities that they get to pick either every level or every other level.
Stuff like:
Level 1-5
-+4 Dodge bonus to AC
-+4 Sacred Bonus to Natural Armour
-+30' Insight Bonus to speed
-DR (lvl+2)/Magic
-Melee Attacks deal +2 damage/Class lvl
-You have wings, hover on a plane or descend only
-Detect Evil always on; deal +1d4 damage every 2 lvls vs evil targets
6-10
-2 abilities from the 1-5 list
-+4 deflection bonus to AC
-+30' Competence Bonus to speed
-Wings (Fly at ground speed, avg maneuverability); if you already had wings you have good maneuverability and +30' more speed when flying
-DR (lvl+5)/ Iron or Silver (?)
-SR (lvl+5) (?)
-All of your attacks with weapons deal +2 damage/Class lvl
Basically a laundry list of 'special' powers the way the Dungenomicon monk has.
I figure one such power every other level with attribute bonuses handed out every non-ability level.
I'll post more in a bit.
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I posted this on the WoTC boards to give an example of a 1/2 Celestial that is reasonable. I put it here b/c 1/2 Celestials would work with Immortals (as would 1/2 Fiends).
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Pretty Rough Half-Celestial "Template"; you have to pay 1 HD to be one, the mods are lower, but a +0 LA seems fine.
Creating A Half-Celestial
"Half-celestial" is an inherited template that can be added to any living, corporeal creature with an Intelligence score of 4 or higher and nonevil alignment (referred to hereafter as the base creature).
A half-celestial uses all the base creature’s statistics and special abilities except as noted here.
Size and Type
The creature’s type changes to outsider. The Bse creature gains its first hit dice as an outsider; gaining a d8 Hit Dice, +1 Bab, All three saves are good for this level, light armour and simple weapon proficiency and 8 + int mod skill points. This hit dice replaces the creature's first hit dice and cannot be replaced with class levels. Do not recalculate the creature’s other Hit Dice, base attack bonus, or saves. Size is unchanged. Half-celestials are normally native outsiders.
Speed
A half-celestial has feathered wings and can fly at the base creature’s base land speed (poor maneuverability). If the base creature has a fly speed, use that instead.
Armor Class
Natural armor improves by +1 (this stacks with any natural armor bonus the base creature has).
Special Attacks
A half-celestial retains all the special attacks of the base creature and also gains the following special abilities.
Daylight (Su)
Half-celestials can use a daylight effect (as the spell) at will.
Smite Evil (Su)
Once per five (5) Hit Dice a half-celestial can make a normal melee attack to deal extra damage equal to its HD (maximum of +20) against an evil foe.
If using Iaimeki's Paladin of Kantian Philosophy in your game, you instead smite evil as if you were a a Paladin of half your level. This bonus stacks if you are a Paladin, thus giving a Half-Celestial Paladin 1.5 Paladin levels.
Spell-Like Abilities
A half-celestial has all the special qualities of the base creature, plus the following special qualities.
* Darkvision out to 60 feet.
* Immunity to disease.
* A half-celestial’s natural weapons are treated as magic weapons for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction.
* Spell resistance equal to creature’s HD + 5 (maximum 35) If the Character has an other source of Spell Resistance, this adds +2 to that value, unless this is greater.
* +4 racial bonus on Fortitude saves against poison.
Abilities
Str or Con or Dex: +2, Int or Wisdom or Cha +2
Hit Dice
A Half Celestial must start with one Outsider Hitdice (as listed above in their Type). This hit dice cannot be traded out for a class level and is their first hit Dice and prelaces the first racial hit dice that the creature starts with. They gain a d8 Hit Dice, all good saves, 8 + int Modifier skill points to spend amoung the base creature's skills, and proficientcy with all simple weapons, light armour and any weapons, armour and sheilds that their Outsider Parent is normally equipped with.
Skills
A half-celestial gains skill points as an outsider and has skill points equal to (8 + Int modifier) × (HD +3). Do not include Hit Dice from class levels in this calculation—the half-celestial gains outsider skill points only for its racial Hit Dice, and gains the normal amount of skill points for its class levels. Treat skills from the base creature’s list as class skills, and other skills as cross-class.
Challenge Rating: +1
Alignment
Good or Evil (any) (the Good/Evil axis part of alignment must reflect the creature's outsider progenitor; so a Half-Celestial of an Achon parent would be Good (any), while a Half-Celestial with an Erineyes parent would have would be Evil (any))
Level Adjustment
LA +0
Favored Class: Half-Celestials have Paladin and Cleric as favored classes.
Half-Celestial Paragon
Pre-Req: Must be a Half Celestial
Class Features
HD: d8
BaB: Full (1/1) Saves: Fortitude (Good); Reflex (Good); Will (Good)
Skills: Any previous Racial or Class skills
Skill Points: 8 + int modifier
- Resistances 5, Healing Psalms
- Flying 1.5x Speed (Average), Damage Reduction (5)
- Resistances 10, Blessing Psalms
- Flying 2x Speed (Good); Spell Resistance HD + 10; Damage Reduction (10)
Proficientcies: The Half Celestial Paragon gains one armour proficiency feat that they qualify for, one sheild proficiency feat that they qualify for and one weapon proficiency feat that they qualify for.
Resistances: At 1st level the Half-Celestial Pagagon gains energy Resitance 5 against Acid, Cold and Electricity. This improves at level 3 to 10.
Healing Psalms: The Half Celestial Gains access to serveral spell like abilities via the non-evil version of Spheres; Psalms. In this case the Healing collection of Psalms.
Flying: At second level, the Half-Celestial's Flying improves to one and a half times their land speed and average manueverability. This improves to double their creature's land speed and Good manueverability at level 5.
Damage Reduction: At third level, the Half-Celestial gains damage reduction at a rate of 1 per hit dice that they have, that is negated by magic and has a maximum cap of DR 5/Magic (5). At 5th level this maximum increases to 10 and is negated only by magic weapons that are evily aligned; thus a maximum of DR 10/Evil and Magic.
Blessing Psalms: The Half Celestial Gains access to serveral spell like abilities via the non-evil version of Spheres; Psalms. In this case the Blessing collection of Psalms.
Spell Resistance:At fifth level, the Half-Celestials Spell resistance increases to their HD + 10 (maximum of 35). This can be added to any existing spell resistance and instead adds +3 to the existing spell resistance if it is greater than this provided Spell Resistance.
Psalms
Psalms are the non-evil equivalent of Sphere [scroll down to half-way down the post]
The Spheres/Psalms
Celestials (and some of their minions and associates) cast magic primarily through spell-like abilities. While many signature Celestials have arbitrary lists of spell-like abilities.
When a Celestial has access to a sphere, she is able to use all of the abilities within that sphere up to her character level. If she gains more levels, more powers of the sphere become available. In this way the spell-like abilities of fiends created with the rules in this tome should always be aesthetically and level appropriate.
Basic Psalm Access: When a creature has basic access to a psalm, she can use any of the spells listed in the sphere may be used once per day (each) as spell-like abilities, provided that their listed level is equal or lower to the creature's character level.
Advanced Psalm Access: When a creature has advanced access to a psalm, she can use any of the spells listed in the psalm may be used 3 times per day (each) as spell-like abilities, provided that their listed level is equal or lower to the creature's character level.
Expert Psalms Access: When a creature has expert access to a psalms , any spells listed in the sphere may be used at will as spell-like abilities, provided that their listed level is equal or lower to the creature's character level.
Creating new spheres: The following list of psalms isn't intended to be comprehensive, and we fully expect that some players and DMs will want many more psalms than we have scribed. All new psalms must be approved of by the DM, and should represent some actual (caring or good) trait like "calm" or "bunnies" rather than a game mechanical notion like "kicking ass and being totally sweet" or something scornworthy like "greed". A good place to start is actually Domains, as these are already a source by which a character gain a spell at every odd-numbered
Spheres and Spell Levels: Spell-like abilities used out of spheres re considered to be cast as a spell level equal to half the minimum needed character level to use the ability (rounded up). The save DC of a spell-like ability granted through Sphere access is Charisma-based. Thus, the save DC for a spell-like ability which becomes available at character level 5 is 12 + Charisma bonus.
Blessing
Special: As a standard action you may invoke a divine blessing upon any target within close range; they gain a bonus to their next roll equal to half your hit dice[/b]
1 Bless
3 Prayer
5 Good Hope
7 Recitation
9 Holy Smite
11 Dispel Evil
13 Hallow
15 Summon Monster VIII (Outsiders of your alignment only)
17 Ressurection
19 Miracle (Non-xp costing miracles only
Healing
Special: As an immediate action you may channel positive energy on any target that you touch. You can heal and amount equal to your character level per use. This is a spell-like abilitiy and you may use it to harm undead, but they get to make a will save for half damage (the DC is based on 10+ 1/2 Hit Dice + Charisma Modifier)[/b]
1 Cure Light wounds
3 Delay Poison
5 Neutralize Poison
7 Remove Disease
9 Insignia of Healing [Maximized]
11 Heal
13 Mass Cure Critical Wounds
15 Mass Heal
17 True Ressurection
19 Miracle (May only be used to heal or revive a creature)
