Tome of Prowess (3.5e Sourcebook)/Transformation

Disguise

Key Attribute: Charisma

The disguise skill is an applied skill that allows you to change appearances and form. With it you can change your features, change the appearance of others, and even operate in places you normally couldn’t. Return to Top

Check Modifiers

Condition	Example	Check Modifier
Disguising Type	Humanoid attempting to appear as undead.	-51
Disguising Subtype	Human attempting to appear elven.	-21
Disguising Gender	Male attempting to appear female.	-21
These penalties do not stack. Apply only the most severe at any one time. These penalties only apply to disguises that lack a costume component.

Untrained Uses

None. Sorry, you actually can’t do real disguise stuff without a bit of training. You can cut or dye your hair, put on a wig, change your clothes, and do other extremely superficial changes, but these generally do not hold up to close scrutiny unless you’re also a very good actor.

Rank 1 Uses

Craft Disguise

With a bit of putty and some makeup, you can hide or alter physical features. You may disguise yourself or otherwise alter your appearance such that you do not appear to be yourself, but you can not disguise yourself as a particular person with this level of skill. If the disguise includes an outfit, you can even use it to actually alter your height by +15% or -10% and your weight by +25% or -15%. It takes at least 1d6 minutes to craft a full facial disguise, though any height or weight adjustment and other particularly complicated facial disguises take up to 30 minutes. You must have a disguise kit as well as whatever clothing is required to even attempt this creation. You can, however, prepare disguises well in advance. Applying a prepared disguise only takes 1 minute for simple pieces, and just 10 for the most complex ones. If you have someone to assist you, you can reduce these times to 1/4th of the listed values.

Your disguise check is made when you put the disguise on. The result, subject to modifiers in the table above, determines how good your disguise is and thus how difficult it is for others to see through it. Most people won’t look closely, but anyone who becomes suspicious of you is allowed to make a perception check. If their check exceeds your disguise check, they realize you are disguised and are free to act appropriately.

Base DC: None
Check Result: Your check result sets the DC to detect your disguise with a perception check.

Rank 4 Uses

Cunning Disguise

Putty and makeup are quite familiar to you, and you can work them into many forms. You can even use them to imitate the appearance of a specific person, though people who are familiar with the individual will have an easier time finding your flaws. Any disguise to mimic a specific person is considered a complicated disguise and takes the better part of 30 minutes. These disguises are also generally made for a specific individual to wear, and it takes 2d3 additional minutes to apply a disguise not specifically made for you. Otherwise, the same rules for preparing, applying, and piercing a disguise apply as above.

Base DC: None
Check Result: Your check result sets the DC to detect your disguise with a perception check.

Rank 6 Uses

Masterful Disguise

You are truly a master of humanoid imitation, and have learned skills that let you imitate a wider variety of people. When crafting a disguise, you may incorporate elements to exceed the general +15% or -10% of height and +75% or -15% of weight alterations limit. For each additional step change (or fraction thereof), you suffer a -1 penalty to your check result. You may add up to 5 steps in total to height or weight, for a change of up to +75% or -50% in height and up to +300% or -60% in weight. When mking alterations to both, use only the larger penalty rather than adding them together.

Base DC: None
Check Result: Your check result sets the DC to detect your disguise with a perception check.

Rank 8 Uses

Fire Retardant Face Paint

Some people look very similar to you, but live in the frozen north and are blue. You can disguise yourself as one of them now as well, even gaining minor resistances to help you pull it off. You can craft colored ointments that provide acid, cold, electricity, or fire resistance of 6 in any color of the rainbow. These ointments require 5 minutes to apply, in addition to the regular disguise application period, but last for 24 hours once put on. Aside from this bonus resistance, you use the regular rules to disguise yourself as another creature but no longer suffer a penalty for substantially different skin color.

These ointments are made in batches of 5 uses, and require either a complete day of work or 5 days of minor adjustments to complete. Yes, this means that as long as your cover isn’t blown and you can get away for an hour a day you can keep yourself in fire retardant face paint indefinitely. And if you can’t get away for an hour a day you can just bring a large stockpile with you; a batch will keep indefinitely as long as it is sealed.

Extraordinary Costumes

The best sahuagin disguise in the world won’t fool anyone if you can’t also breathe under water. Similarly, some roles may require that you brave temperatures or climates you couldn’t normally survive in, be taller or smaller than normal members of your species, or even fly. You can craft and operate costumes that incorporate technical elements and allow you to overcome these obstacles. Extraordinary costumes require clothing or coverings of some sort to build the other effects upon. You can’t even attempt this check without a full body suit of some type, for reasons that should be obvious shortly.

Extraordinary costumes are complicated pieces of gear, requiring time to construct and maintain. There are numerous options that you can build into one, but the more complicated they become the harder they are to operate and the longer they take to don. It takes 1 day to create an extraordinary costume per 2 selections. It takes 1 day to repair a costume if it has suffered damage or if some options are no longer functional. It takes 15 minutes plus 5 minutes per 2 selections to don one of these costumes. It takes 10 minutes to remove yourself from one. The time to don or remove a costume can be cut to 1/4th standard if someone is available to assist you.

When you put on an extraordinary costume, you make disguise checks to operate them and keep them in good order in addition to using your check result as the base DC to notice that you aren’t what you appear to be. The base DC for this check is 20, +2 per selection from the list of options, and your result determines how long your costume functions before another check is required.

Extraordinary costumes don’t hold up as well as regular disguises do to abuse. The costume suffers each point of damage that you do. If it suffers total damage equal to half your hit points, whether over the course of a week or all at once, you suffer a -5 penalty to your disguise checks to use or maintain it. A day of repair will restore the suit to full working order, at least until it gets beaten up again. If the costume suffers damage equal to your hit points, it is destroyed and non-functional. It can be rebuilt in half the time it would take to create a new one, but it provides no benefit until that is done. You can climb out of a destroyed costume as a full round action. The costume can also be made functional with repair spells, and using these spells to bring a costume back under

The following list provides the most common items added to an extraordinary costume:

• Height change of up to +75% or -35% and weight changes up to +300% or -65%. This may be selected twice to achieve a height change of up to +125% or -50% and a weight change of up to +500% or -80%. If selected twice, you have changed size categories one step and gain all appropriate bonuses.
• Energy Resistance 10, for one type of energy. This may be selected additional times to either increase an existing energy resistance by 10 points or add a new energy resistance at 10 points. You may not exceed 30 points of resistance.
• Natural Armor bonus of +4. This may be selected once more to bring the total up to +8, though this reduces your maximum dexterity bonus to +3.
• Water Breathing
• Climbing base movement rate equal to half your base move. This may be selected twice to gain your full base move.
• Fly base movement rate equal to half your base move with clumsy maneuverability. This may be selected again to gain your full base move or to increase your maneuverability by one step, though you may not gain better than average.
• Swimming base movement rate equal to half your base move. This may be selected twice to gain your full base move.
• Gain physical natural weapons, either hands, feet, or bite appropriate for your final size (this may be modified by height and weight selections). This may be selected multiple times to gain multiple sets of natural attacks. At your DM’s discretion, this may also be selected to gain special attack actions (such as rend or pounce) with physical attacks you have already added to the costume.
• Gain partially functional appendages, such as one set of additional arms, a tail, etc. This may be selected multiple times to gain further sets of appendages. These appendages may not make additional attacks, activate items, exert strong forces, and so on; but they can grasp and hold objects.
• Add additional resilience and theatrics to the costume, so that it doesn’t suffer the damaged condition until it takes damage equal to your hit point total. The costume is not destroyed until 20 points of damage after that, and will likely outlast you.

Additional options may be available at your DM’s discretion, and may include mimicking other (Ex) abilities from a creature. These options may have limited charges.

Base DC: 20, +2 for each selection
Check Result: Your check result determines the DC to notice you aren’t what you appear to be, as well as the length of time your costume is active without an additional check.

• DC+10 and above: Your costume functions without need for further check for the next 24 hours. I hope it’s a comfortable costume if you plan on staying in it the whole time.
• DC+5 to DC+9: Your costume functions without the need for further checks for 4 hours. Just long enough to attend the Demon’s Gala and get what you need.
• DC+0 to DC+4: Your costume functions without the need for further checks for 1 hour.
• DC-1 to DC-5: Something is wrong with your costume. It will function for the next hour normally, and then one of your selections will randomly fail (this may cause others to fail as well if they are dependent upon it). Continued operation of the costume after this failure does not bring a decreased operation DC, but does lower your DC for others to notice the costume.
• DC-6 and below: Your costume is failing, and a random selection immediately ceases to operate. The costume itself will become non-functional in 15 minutes. It's time to make some excuses to get away from those you're trying to fool.

Rank 10 Uses

Fantastic Costumes

You can imitate a bulette adolescent if you want, but there are probably more useful things out there. When you make a costume, you ignore the first 2 selections when determining the operate DC.

• Height change of up to +200% or -60% and weight change of up to +800% or -85%. This counts as 3 selections of height and weight change and also pushes you into a one step size category change. You gain all appropriate bonuses.
• A burrowing speed equal to one quarter of your base speed. This may be selected again to bring your burrowing speed up to half of your base speed, but may not be advanced
• Additional flight maneuverability. You may now add enough selections to improve a flight maneuverability up to Good.
• Darkvision to 60’.

This otherwise functions as the Extraordinary Costumes ability.

Rank 12 Uses

Mythic Costumes

You could probably imitate a Cornugon if you felt like it. When you make a costume, you ignore the first 4 selections when determining the operate DC.

You also add the following effects to your list of selections:

• Energy Immunity. This counts as 4 selections of a type of energy resistance.

• Reach of 5’ with your primary appendages. This may be selected again to increase your reach to 10’.
• Darkvision may be selected twice to give you a range of 120’.
• Gain full function from one set of added appendages. This may be selected again for each set of appendages that you have added.
• You movement limits are equal to twice your base speed (or four times your base speed for flight), but you must still pay for these speeds with the appropriate ability selections.
• Additional flight maneuverability. Each additional selection will improve your flight maneuverability by one grade, up to Perfect.

This otherwise functions as the Extraordinary Costumes ability.