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Ryan Naylor
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Re:

Post by Ryan Naylor »

Jasper wrote:I would use the basic werebear stats (though pandas are more related to racoons)
Pedantic note:

No they're not. Giant pandas are bears. Their closest relative is the spectacled bear. Red pandas, however, are reasonably closely related to raccoons.

Game note:

If you're coming across a werepanda in an Eastern styled campaign, you've effectively given it no weapon resistance at all. I'd give it DR 5/bamboo instead.
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Re: werepanda

Post by ewancummins »

Van Richten isn't the Dungeon Master, so his ideas about lycanthropy don't necessarily have to be 100% correct in the OP's game. Indeed, Van Richten would no doubt caution us not to assume his guides are truly comprehensive. :azalin: There are many mysteries, many strange things out there.

A number of lycanthrope types are based on critters that rarely attack human beings: ravens, fruit bats (you know the werebat in question! muauaahwhwahahaha), toads, etc.

I like the idea of the were-panda! :)

I'd start the stats with a look at the werebear. You can modify those.
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Re: werepanda

Post by Rotipher of the FoS »

Making it a straight-up werebear is probably the best way to go. Just describe it as having a distinctive coat pattern, and a bit on the small side (assuming the witnesses have ever seen a regular werebear to compare it to). Hit points on the low end of the range, and maybe dock its Strength a little. Behaviorally, it might be a bit more sluggish than a typical member of its phenotype: more inclined to sit there and munch on its first kill than chase after another one.

Other types of werebears would probably beat it up on sight, for being puny and not smelling quite right.
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Re: werepanda

Post by Trike »

New Special Ability:

(Su) Water Reaction: Whenever the werepanda is struck with cold water (in this case the water must be at least 20 degrees cooler than the ambient temperature), the creature must make a Will Save (DC 15) in order to avoid an involuntary change into its hybrid form.


Heh, it's never too late for a Ranma reference.
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Re: werepanda

Post by A G Thing »

Sign Language(Su): At will Werepandas automatically gain the magical ability to produce signs written in their native tongue to communicate with while in hybrid or panda form. These signs form in the pandas hands and are solid as long as the panda remains holding them but disappear one round after they are thrown or dropped. The signs have the statistics of a light mace for the purposes of combat.

Why stop with just one? :P
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Re: werepanda

Post by HuManBing »

Wrath of the Raging Panda (Su): a ranged grapple attack, this may be used only at night, or during solar eclipses during the day. The panda spends one Concentrate maneuver reared up on one leg in the crane stance, then blinks towards its victim, up to a distance of 10 yards. The victim must beat the Raging Panda's next initiative roll or be seized by the ranged grapple - the margin is modified by -1 for each yard under the maximum (so if the Panda Demon were 1 yard away, the initiative roll is at a -9).

Seizure means the Panda Demon discharges its cosmic yin-yang energy of Manichean moral balance into the victim. Actual damage is left up to the GM - the further a PC's alignment rests along the "good" or "evil" axis, the more damage is inflicted. PCs with Mind Blank or other similar spiritual disciplines may be able to avoid most damage. Thai dictators get no save and suffer maximum damage regardless of dice rolls.

Additionally the skies will flicker in the agonized transfixed discharge of godly power as blood red lightning marks the calligraphic icons 神熊 meaning God Bear.
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Re: werepanda

Post by HuManBing »

Rotipher of the FoS wrote:Making it a straight-up werebear is probably the best way to go. Just describe it as having a distinctive coat pattern, and a bit on the small side (assuming the witnesses have ever seen a regular werebear to compare it to). Hit points on the low end of the range, and maybe dock its Strength a little. Behaviorally, it might be a bit more sluggish than a typical member of its phenotype: more inclined to sit there and munch on its first kill than chase after another one.

Other types of werebears would probably beat it up on sight, for being puny and not smelling quite right.
If you're less wedded to realworld biology and more willing to inject some local folklore into the mix (perhaps a fairly reasonable proposal when discussing werebeasts) it may be worth counteracting the lower physical attributes with higher mental ones. Pandas in Chinese folklore tend to be characterized as playful, brave, loyal, and intelligent... possibly because their skull structure is both higher-domed and broader-cheeked, traits which are both found in great apes. (And incidentally for much the same reasons: the panda's vegetable diet means it needs a broad and high skull to anchor its jaw muscles for repeated clenching on fibrous material, rather than delivering a short, sharp series of deadly bites as for most carnivores.) Thus, where a werebear might usually emphasize strength and brute force, a werepanda might show cunning, evasiveness, and surprising mobility with its climbing ability.
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Re: werepanda

Post by HuManBing »

Pandas: transcending racial tensions since the Late Pliocene.

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Re: werepanda

Post by High Priest Mikhal »

DR 5/Bamboo works, but bamboo is what pandas eat almost exclusively. Maybe DR 5/Jade is a better idea? What their allergen would be I don't know. I'm not that educated on pandas.

I'd add more, but Mists of Pandaria doesn't come out for another month. No, I'm not making a pandaren, but I am making a monk (tomorrow is the rumored day that Patch 5.0 comes out, changing the system from the ground up more than 4.0 did; I may be too busy relearning how to play the classes and earning JPs for a few weeks; they just couldn't leave well enough alone :mad:).
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Re: werepanda

Post by HuManBing »

Jade is a health-preserving mineral which wards off putrefaction and disease according to Chinese folklore, so it is not clear how it would be symbolically significant against pandas.

One Tibetan or Chinese legend about pandas concerns funereal ashes and how they got their coloration. So maybe they have DR {whatever}/ soot-charred weapons.

It's worth noting that the Chinese have a long history of trapping, killing, and eating most parts of all animals they have - either for nutritional value, or for Chinese medicinal purposes. Pandas are a notable exception - they were evidently valued highly enough that the local Chinese had no particular interest in killing them and eating them. (And Chinese will eat bears: bear-paws were long considered a delicacy meat for hunters.)

Perhaps the anthropomorphic appearance of their skull shape made pandas that much more likable, and therefore harder for a human to kill (culturally speaking).

Again, if you wanted to go ahead with making it a shape-changing monster, I'd suggest going with either preternatural cunning or supernatural powers. A monster based on a creature that lies around eating bamboo all day probably isn't going to be very compelling otherwise.
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Re: werepanda

Post by High Priest Mikhal »

The DR jade thing isn't related to TCM lore about the mineral, just a material that fits with the area pandas are from. A lot like how a werelion would be DR X/Gold (maybe not the best example since that's straight out of African folklore, but you get the idea).

Agreed, pandas can be vicious if threatened but are otherwise too closely associated with being innocuous in popular culture to be as scary as shapeshifters who turn into wolves, bears, or big cats without something that makes them truly dangerous. Even wererats, with the fact that rats are plague-carrying vermin, needed to be made more intelligent and malicious to be as terrifying as werewolves.
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Re: werepanda

Post by Trike »

You could still make a good case for werepandas in Ravenloft even if they aren't as dangerous as other therianthropes. There are other examples of beneficial shapeshifters in the canon. The werepandas could fulfill the same roll in Asian themed settings.
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