The Abomination, v0.5! (Patreon)

Check out the newest version of the Abomination class! Substantial changes here, including a major rework to the class's frenzy economy.

For the uninitiated, Frenzy is the abomination's basic resource (like Ki for a monk).

An untransformed abomination would build it up by being in and around combat, and could spend it either to boost their allies (via Sinister Influence) or to transform.

A transformed abomination built it by hurting things, basically, and could spend it on Unleashed Strike, a pseudo-smite ability. (It had a couple other spenders, but they were much more situational.)

You get two obvious issues here. The first is that an untransformed abomination has a ton of tension between spending frenzy to be more effective vs. banking it up for a better transformation. In theory this tension is fun; I think I would enjoy playing it. But in practice, it mostly resulted in players hoarding frenzy and feeling bad about weak untransformed play. One of the classic "players will optimize the fun out of it" issues.

The second issue is that a transformed abomination didn't do a whole lot with additional frenzy. It turned directly into more damage output, which is cool, but not interesting.

So! Three big changes are coming to our core loop. First, Sinister Influence now generates frenzy instead of spending it. It's lost all of its powered-up features, though, because those have been replaced with Channeled Curse. This is completely new, and lets the abomination grant an extra attack to an ally, which is able to apply special effects when frenzy is spent. The aim is something like a debuff-support approach. These effects are situationally powerful, so in the situations where they're good, they should feel worth spending frenzy on. Our third change is to Fearsome Transformation itself: it now costs frenzy to keep it up. I'm really excited about this solution. It's a little extra bookkeeping, but it makes all our frenzy play more interesting, and truer to our fantasy. If you bank your frenzy up for a big transformation, it'll have a higher maintenance cost, too; a 6-point transformation costs 3 points every turn. You'll probably be earning that, but you're not guaranteed to be.

Those aren't all our changes, not by a long shot, but they're the big headline. Check it out! And let me know what you think.

PDF: https://www.somanyrobots.com/s/Class-Abomination.pdf

GMBinder: https://www.gmbinder.com/share/-OaIBtALWJfcfEV3_vcb

v0.5 changelog

Added an additional ASI at level 14

Changed hit die to a d10

Reworked Sinister Influence: now generates frenzy instead of spending it

Monstrous Transformation now costs frenzy to maintain

You can generate this frenzy with Sacrificial Frenzy, if needed

Added Channeled Curse (renamed from Sinister Assault)

This is an untransformed support action that buffs an ally's attack, and can spend frenzy to apply control effects

Moved Abominable Power from 11th to 5th

Added a second rung of scaling

Moved Eerie Resilience from 7th to 11th

Converted Unnatural Recovery from a frenzy cost to 1/rest

Invincible Awakening bypasses transformation's new frenzy maintenance

Mutations

Added Unlearned Skill

Added Destructive Curse

Beast

Dreadful Pounce: Channeled Curse grants bonus movement.

Hunter's Venom: Damage reduced from 1d4/hit to 1d6/turn.

Added attack no longer costs frenzy; hitting with multiple attacks generates it

Flame

Flaming Frenzy: gain 1 frenzy when you deal fire damage

Cauterizing Heat: transformed effect changed

Krampus: gain 1 frenzy if you start next to a controlled enemy

Art: Flameheart Werewolf, by Winona Nelson © Wizards of the Coast. Original art for the abomination is in the works!