[Spoilers] Utterly destroy the leader of Geb... In three easy steps


Lost Omens Campaign Setting General Discussion


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Ok. This is a just for fun thread. It's not really about rules per se, just a discussion about a weird idea that occurred to me under the right circumstances and would probably totally work.

Primer on Geb here.

The idea is partially based on a PFS module called "You Only Die Twice". I was thinking of including a spoiler, but there isn't much to spoil. I will discuss nothing in the module and the concept is explained in the blurb, which is this:

The Pathfinder Society sends you into the undead-ruled nation of Geb for an undercover mission, not disguised as undead, but temporarily transformed into a shambling, zombie version of yourself.

The second piece is from Seekers of Secrets.

There is an item in Seeks of Secrets called "Blade of the Willing Martyr". A name that is quite appropriate for this purpose. Here is the crucial part of the description:

The blade of the willing martyr is a +3 keen vicious dagger, but its greatest power can only be invoked outside of battle. To activate this power you must spill your blood on your target, an object belonging to the target, or a physical token of the target’s body (such as a few strands of hair). Your target gets a DC 23 Will save (using the same saving throw modifiers as the scrying spell for the owner’s knowledge and connection to the victim) to avoid the effect, which forges a link between you and the target.

Once you forge a link, your soul and the target’s soul are intertwined. Should you die, your target dies, suffering the same apparent injuries and symptoms; likewise, you die if your target dies. The link may only be severed by break enchantment or remove curse.

So, here is how this would go down.

We would take our willing participant, and we:

1. We turn him into an intelligent undead.

2. We preform the ritual with one of Geb's belongings(probably acquired without too much difficulty).

3. Teleport the participant to the positive energy plane.

Poof.

The only problems I see with this are these:

-Geb is an EXTREMELY powerful ghost. He would probably make the save.
-Also, killing him this way would likely not stop him from coming back, even though it would destroy him utterly, due to the nature of ghosts:

Rejuvenation (Su)

In most cases, it's difficult to destroy a ghost through simple combat: the “destroyed” spirit restores itself in 2d4 days. Even the most powerful spells are usually only temporary solutions. The only way to permanently destroy a ghost is to determine the reason for its existence and set right whatever prevents it from resting in peace. The exact means varies with each spirit and may require a good deal of research, and should be created specifically for each different ghost by the GM.

However, this may be the exception, because of the way the blade links the two people. They are linked in soul, not just body. Not sure how that would pan out.

Even if it couldn't kill Geb, we could use this strategy to kill Arazni, to the immense relief of the Knights of Ozem. In fact, killing Arazni this way would be really easy, because they still have some of her mummified organs to use as the object and likely dozens volunteers to be the "Willing Martyr".

Basically the point of this thread is to point out the fact that the Blade, as OP as it is by itself, can also be used to kill completely ethereal creatures if my system works.

Any thoughts or comments? Is there anything wrong with my reasoning?


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People notice when magic forces them to make a save. Now of course he won't know what it is without a some divination spells so I would suggest doing this quickly. In addition I am sure he can easily make a 23 will save. The other issue is that he is a ghost so it may not matter, but you already know that.

As for the lich, Arazni has a phylactery, and while your souls are linked the item does not destroy her soul. Nothing in the item says it dies any special way. It just says the target dies so there is no reason she won't be back and highly upset in 1d10 days, assuming the save is failed.

In either case you have two mythic level characters after you because I am sure they have a way to get to the participant's soul, and then they go after whoever came up with the idea, so yes you can kill them with a lot of luck, but I don't see it as perma-death.

Yes I know the souls are linked, but it never says they have the exact same status all the time. It only says that if one creature dies the other one dies.

PS: Upon returning to life/undeath they break the enchantment, and then go after whoever did did it. If it can be stopped by a simple remove curse I don't think it is all that powerful. Also--> Even if they make the save they go after whoever did it.

This is your evil entity known as Wraithstrike advising you to never use this item against him. :)


Should you die, your target dies, suffering the same apparent injuries and symptoms; likewise, you die if your target dies. The link may only be severed by break enchantment or remove curse.

Undead are already dead. It doesn't say much about "be destroyed". A technicality, perhaps, but this is ALL ABOUT the technicalities. It isn't that hard to make an argument it just doesn't work on an undead.

Ignoring that, Wraithstrike covered all the ways your example targets just "bounce back" from getting kacked and even a living person can be resurrected. A more interesting question is, if the rules somehow allowed you to ride the Lich's respawn ability back into the land of the living, could you use that as a poor man's phylactery? It wouldn't be particularly powerful, but it would be amusing.

Since you have literally NO way of being certain it worked or not, you have to cut yourself 20 times, hope the law of averages (which isn't actually a law) means the target rolled a fail, and take the plunge sight-unseen. And after the first two or three times this happened, any decent-level power would have contingencies to instantly scry anyone trying it on them and would be able to strike back while you were still cutting yourself over a photograph like some emokid.

That's all I got so far, but I'm sure there's more.

I could swear there are other "death curse from afar" magic effects/items out there, since it's a fairly common fantasy trope, and most of the time you don't even have to die to fire it off. It's not exactly ideal for PCs or plots, since it makes the whole thing a bit boring, but it works for a villain and a plot.

Have a series of weird mystery murders where a villain is killing people she can control in order to kill people far away that she can't. Throwing down a surprise plot twist where she links herself to multiple important people, possibly including the PCs, and "holds them hostage". Even if the PCs have several Break Enchantments or Remove Curses, they can't get 50 people immediately, and so stopping her without killing her becomes harder.

Sovereign Court

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I'm pretty sure that if Geb can't manage to kill himself, this won't succeed in bypassing his Rejuvenation ability either.

I'm not really seeing why the martyr needs to be undead, by the way.


Undead have a better chance to get close? Zombie servant shuffling about wouldn't be as suspicous.


My plot to kill Geb has always been to find some remains of Nex and just pop in on him one day, make him fully realize that Nex is well and truly dead.

Thought about making it a plot point in an adventure where the PC's have to prevent the "BBEG" from doing that and entirely destabilizing the largest conglomeration of Undead in the world.

And then make them decide if they want to destroy/hide or reveal the remains anyway, for their own reasons.

I will agree though, that item would not be enough to kill either of them. Mainly focusing on keywords: "die" and "apparent injuries". As this does not include soul-destruction, it likely would do nothing to them.


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boring7 wrote:
A more interesting question is, if the rules somehow allowed you to ride the Lich's respawn ability back into the land of the living, could you use that as a poor man's phylactery? It wouldn't be particularly powerful, but it would be amusing.

From a story point of view this is interesting. This is going outside of the rules, but the lich/ghost could use this to keep you alive forever, which seems like a good thing, but then you have the immortality is a curse trope. He might even create a personal curse that enforces the one from the item. He could kill himself at random times, just to mess with you. Dealing with that for eternity would be a terrible thing.


Shindalm wrote:

My plot to kill Geb has always been to find some remains of Nex and just pop in on him one day, make him fully realize that Nex is well and truly dead.

Thought about making it a plot point in an adventure where the PC's have to prevent the "BBEG" from doing that and entirely destabilizing the largest conglomeration of Undead in the world.

And then make them decide if they want to destroy/hide or reveal the remains anyway, for their own reasons.

I will agree though, that item would not be enough to kill either of them. Mainly focusing on keywords: "die" and "apparent injuries". As this does not include soul-destruction, it likely would do nothing to them.

I think that would work, but IMO Nex is alive, so that means you have to find him and kill him which is the more difficult of the two propositions.


I'm fairly sure I read somewhere in the lore that Nex in fact died during their war, but Geb couldn't accept that fact without solid proof. I'll have to do some hunting when I get home. Otherwise I'd assume the same as you.

Sovereign Court

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Laying a ghost to rest is certainly an original villainous plan. I like that.

RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32

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Shindalm wrote:
I'm fairly sure I read somewhere in the lore that Nex in fact died during their war, but Geb couldn't accept that fact without solid proof. I'll have to do some hunting when I get home. Otherwise I'd assume the same as you.

Nex disappeared into a private demiplane and vanished. He may have been mortally wounded. He may have ceased to exist when the demiplane disappeared. He may have escaped, but aged to death in the intervening centuries. He may be trapped in another universe. He may be biding his time until he returns.

Because if you accidentally prove to Geb that Nex is still alive, then he would return to the world full-time and get back to the work of killing Nex.


Which would be quite interesting in it's own way. :)

Silver Crusade

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Pathfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
Ross Byers wrote:
Shindalm wrote:
I'm fairly sure I read somewhere in the lore that Nex in fact died during their war, but Geb couldn't accept that fact without solid proof. I'll have to do some hunting when I get home. Otherwise I'd assume the same as you.

Nex disappeared into a private demiplane and vanished. He may have been mortally wounded. He may have ceased to exist when the demiplane disappeared. He may have escaped, but aged to death in the intervening centuries. He may be trapped in another universe. He may be biding his time until he returns.

Because if you accidentally prove to Geb that Nex is still alive, then he would return to the world full-time and get back to the work of killing Nex.

Everybody needs a hobby.


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Ascalaphus wrote:

I'm pretty sure that if Geb can't manage to kill himself, this won't succeed in bypassing his Rejuvenation ability either.

I'm not really seeing why the martyr needs to be undead, by the way.

They need to be undead because typical ways of injuring a living person wouldn't work on undead, especially incorporeal undead. Positive energy kills all undead, so death by positive energy *should* kill ghosts as well. If we killed the volunteer with swords, for example, nothing would happen to ghosts, or it would result in superficial injuries. Despite the link caused by the blade, it is literally impossible to kill incorporeal creatures that way.

I guess the question I didn't consider is whether the method of killing actually matters, or if it's only the resulting injuries...

However, I do think the fact that it links the soul *is* relevant. Based on the discussion so far, it appears to be implied that the soul itself must be destroyed though, and that is not easily done. From my perspective, the physical injuries matter the most because those are the results of the link that we can actually see, but I think that if any damage was done to the soul, that would carry as well; we just wouldn't be able to see it. Not 100% sure though. This is pure speculation.

wraithstrike wrote:
People notice when magic forces them to make a save. Now of course he won't know what it is without a some divination spells so I would suggest doing this quickly.

Yes, the idea would be to put the pieces into place and then go through the process quickly. Each step shouldn't take more than about 7 minutes each if arranged beforehand and competently executed. However, if the process fails on Gebs end, it's not like there is anything for Geb to go after. The volunteer would be completely physically destroyed on another plane of existence.

wraithstrike wrote:
This is your evil entity known as Wraithstrike advising you to never use this item against him. :)

Hmmm... Or maybe you're just looking out for your own...? ':-/


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Hell, proof isn't THAT hard to fake. Sculpt corpse is a pretty cheap spell and a creative alternate clone spell shouldn't be that hard to fabricate with a large budget.

Getting a bluff check high enough, bribe a bunch of powerful outsiders to lie to him in his divinations, you could probably do it. It would surely take a mini-campaign (or full one) worth of gathering materials, threatening/bribing the right forces, and so on...

And then the question of what happens when the Harlot Queen becomes number one instead of number one and a half. Lots of material.

On the other hand, I seem to recall an adventure path called "Die Vecna, Die" which was...interesting, to say the least.

wraithstrike wrote:
boring7 wrote:
A more interesting question is, if the rules somehow allowed you to ride the Lich's respawn ability back into the land of the living, could you use that as a poor man's phylactery? It wouldn't be particularly powerful, but it would be amusing.
From a story point of view this is interesting. This is going outside of the rules, but the lich/ghost could use this to keep you alive forever, which seems like a good thing, but then you have the immortality is a curse trope. He might even create a personal curse that enforces the one from the item. He could kill himself at random times, just to mess with you. Dealing with that for eternity would be a terrible thing.

Indeed.

Hmm, here's a thought: You have your standard kingdom of light™ ruled by a wise and just paladin/champion type. He's chosen by the gods, totally cool, and so awesome he comes back from the dead. His counterpart is the standard evil death lord who keeps getting chased and defeated by the Lord of Light but keeps coming back. Problem is, champion-boy is getting old. His skills are fading, his stats are fading, and he's getting tired of living and fighting.

Enter standard campaign, up-and-coming adventurers prove themselves, get a royal sponsorship, foil pieces of the Lord of Darkness' evil plans and crawl up the level ladder to the halfway or 2/3rds mark and discover, dramatic plot twist, that the Lord of light and Lord of darkness are soul-bound to one another. His miraculous resurrections are because the Lord of Darkness doesn't want a different king or a different champion of the gods, he wants THIS one, with his lack of imagination and his decaying body and spirit, because as the king weakens but never truly dies the Lich dude starts winning.

From there you can branch, maybe the King just needs to die, maybe the king has the secret shame of almost destroying the lich's phylactery but faltering (to his shame) in the face of his own mortality. Maybe the king is too shamed to ever try again, or maybe he's still afraid of death.

And the question of what happens when the champion of light falls arises. All sorts of plays and tropes you can tinker with.

Lantern Lodge

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There is an much easier way to break Geb.

Its call a divorce.

Cos everyone knows that it is the Harlot Queen that does all the hard work in the kingdom.

Scarab Sages

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She would be entitled to half the Kingdom of Geb at the very least.


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I am now imagining someone arriving on the doorsteps to Golarion's Casanova equivalent and being told they have a very particular job for him.


boring7 wrote:
...bribe a bunch of powerful outsiders to...

hmmmm... I think we should assume that we DON'T have help from powerful outsiders, because if we do, well... All bets are off, pretty much.

boring7 wrote:

It would surely take a mini-campaign (or full one) worth of gathering materials, threatening/bribing the right forces, and so on...

And then the question of what happens when the Harlot Queen becomes number one instead of number one and a half. Lots of material.

Wow, its own campaign... That's an interesting idea. I didn't consider my plan worthy enough to be the center of a campaign, even a mini one. But yeah on reflection that sounds like it could be fun to write. It would have a really natural progression: Start as a low level Pathfinder doing jobs you know very little about... Gain more levels and prestige, get some big wigs to notice and find out a little more about what's going on... Get more powerful learn of the whole plan, learn about the blade, do the jobs first hand from the big wigs... Maybe throw in the "You Only Die Twice" module for one of the missions with some small changes to the goal, E.G. for information gathering or getting one of Gebs possessions... Obtain items, dungeon delve, high level monsters, a few role-playing missions for diplomacy on outside help, maybe some optional side missions to get items that aren't fully necessary but would raise the chance of success... High tier, do the plan, make some encounters for if it passes or it fails, maybe do some ghost-buster style soul catching, perhaps fight Geb himself...

All the while I can fill accidental lulls in activity with fighting Gebs henchmen, or a mission about getting the optimal volunteer...

Sounds totally doable. I'll put writing up a draft on my Pathfinder to-do list.

boring7 wrote:
threatening/bribing the right forces, and so on...

Um... You do realize that there are more ways to obtain services besides threats or bribes, right? You know, like diplomacy, exchange of services and/or favors, and legitimate, legal payment?

Casts Detect Alignment on boring

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