If you are playing a character who is practically blind, such as an oracle with the blind curse, how do you get by in an adventuring party, both in and out of game?
I once had just such an oracle, and every time something dangerous beyond 60 feet appeared, I was wholly reliant on the party to alert me to the threat. If I was alone or if they failed to fill me in on what was going on, I would often find myself completely helpless, or close to it.
At one point, the other characters played a joke on my character by crying out "DRAGON! DRAGON IN THE SKY!" then laughing uproariously as my character freaked out and dove under a large log.
How do you keep such a character form being all but crippled in anything, but the close range, indoor encounters?
I'm just about to join a campaign playing a seer oracle and I've been wondering this.
Telepathic bond seems like a good idea to make permanent, but I've no idea how to do it. True sight extends to 120 feat so my DM ruled she can use that to extend her magic. She uses a lot of divination magic in theory which helps with surprise. Also (she says starting at 10, not a good idea in my opinion but I have a bajillion character ideas so hey ho) Temporal clarity helps that.
EDIT: oooo totally forgot about sound based perception.
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If you have a familiar who is not blind then you have a trustworthy set of eyes to warn you about dragons & to help you navigate. In-combat summons might work similarly.
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Allow me to quote you when someone asks this question:
Congratulations for a highly unoriginal concept. I pray it will be a great deal of fun for you, and will not cause your fellow players a great deal of headache.
I shall give you the same advice I have given the last umpteenth or so blind adventurers:
Ravingdork wrote:
Ever read The Dark Elf Trilogy? Montolio DeBrouchee is an excellent example of how to fight blind, even with ranged weapons.
Montolio was a blind archer ranger who would send his animal companion (a falcon) flying over his enemies' heads. The bird of prey would then call out to its master so Montolio always knew precisely where to shoot his arrows.
I can totally imagine a blind ranger doing this quite well with greater blind-fight, a flying animal companion, and full attacks.
Maybe you could emulate something similar with a Zen Archer monk archetype?
Malag wrote:
Try talking with your GM about giving you Blindsight or Blindsense instead of feat or something like that. This is the easiest way of creating such character.
People who are blind for a long time don't get free benefits (or rather, they shouldn't). They "adapt" by taking appropriate feats/skills (the APG blind-fight line and the Racial Heritage/Keen Scent feats along with Perception) and adopting appropriate mannerisms (like folding money and having round buttons on all your red clothes and square buttons on all your blue clothes).
Roleplayers playing a "blind swordsman" only to get something BETTER THAN SIGHT such as blindsight FOR FREE is a BIG pet peeve of mine.
If you want to be blind REALLY be blind. Being blind is a handicap. Make it as such.
Allow me to help with a few suggestions:
Step 1) Declare that your character is blind. This means he will suffer the following penalties: You cannot see. You take a –2 penalty to Armor Class, lose your Dexterity bonus to AC (if any), and take a –4 penalty on most Strength- and Dexterity-based skill checks and on opposed Perception skill checks. All checks and activities that rely on vision (such as reading and Perception checks based on sight) automatically fail. All opponents are considered to have total concealment (50% miss chance) against you. You must make a DC 10 Acrobatics skill check to move faster than half your speed. If you fail this fail this check you fall prone. If your character has remained blind for a long time grow accustomed to these drawbacks and can overcome some of them (by getting a walking stick, by folding your bills, and training with feats and skills, NOT be getting blindsense or blindsight for free).
Step 2) Mitigate the penalties as much as you can. Start with a high Wisdom score, max out your ranks in Perception, and take feats such as Alertness, Blind-Fight, Greater Blind-Fight, Improved Blind-Fight, and Skill Focus (Perception). This will allow you to better "hear" where the enemy is at and allow you to avoid ranged attacks coming out of the darkness.
Step 3) Play the character and understand that no matter what you do, he is handicapped. Playing such a difficult challenge will be a lot of fun if your GM cooperates a little.
Blind people feel the shape of the buttons on their clothes. The shapes correspond with the colors of their clothes. That way a blind person can match his clothes and look nice. They also fold their money different ways so they can tell which bills are which. If you do a bit of research, you will find that there are tons of neat little tricks that blind people use to get by in every day life--adapting after years of being blind.
What the book refers to when it says "Characters who remain blinded for a long time grow accustomed to these drawbacks and can overcome some of them" is not a mystical higher sense thing, but more of a learned skill thing.
Researching and utilizing a lot of these tricks should help make for a much better roleplaying experience.
I hope that helps.
Hope that helps.
Ha!
Still, I'd be most interested in hearing some of the thoughts and ideas of others.
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If you are playing a character who is practically blind, such as an oracle with the blind curse, how do you get by in an adventuring party, both in and out of game?
I once had just such an oracle, and every time something dangerous beyond 60 feet appeared, I was wholly reliant on the party to alert me to the threat. If I was alone or if they failed to fill me in on what was going on, I would often find myself completely helpless, or close to it.
At one point, the other characters played a joke on my character by crying out "DRAGON! DRAGON IN THE SKY!" then laughing uproariously as my character freaked out and dove under a large log.
How do you keep such a character form being all but crippled in anything, but the close range, indoor encounters?
I used to be a reader and guide for a blind person. Welcome to their world.
If you are playing a character who is practically blind, such as an oracle with the blind curse, how do you get by in an adventuring party, both in and out of game?
I once had just such an oracle, and every time something dangerous beyond 60 feet appeared, I was wholly reliant on the party to alert me to the threat. If I was alone or if they failed to fill me in on what was going on, I would often find myself completely helpless, or close to it.
At one point, the other characters played a joke on my character by crying out "DRAGON! DRAGON IN THE SKY!" then laughing uproariously as my character freaked out and dove under a large log.
How do you keep such a character form being all but crippled in anything, but the close range, indoor encounters?
Have friends who aren't dicks, for one thing.
I've got an oracle with the Clouded Vision curse. Yeah, I can't see very far. It does mean I'm obviously not going to use a lot of ranged spells, and certain situations can be quite problematic, but I'm still not sure how I'm 'all but crippled.' Stick close to your group, follow major paths, and you should be good. It's essentially like being in darkness with a torch 24-7.
Using Status can be quite handy in these situations to keep track of allies if you often spread out. And you may be blind, but you can still hear large, obvious things coming.
Could just be that this particular curse isn't suited for a very outdoor exploration focused game, the same way that a bloodthirsty beserker character who wears the skins of animals he's killed is probably unsuited for an urban intrigue character.
I had this thought recently: would Spy Eyes work for someone who can't see normally? I guess it depends on how one reads "as if that eye were her own." As if her own, and in place of her own; or as if her own, and subject to the same limits.
"When activated, each comes to life and blinks, transforming into an eyeball. When pressed against an inanimate surface (such as a wall or article of clothing), the eyeball absorbs into it, leaving a magical sensor of the same size on the surface. Anyone holding an eye from a particular cluster of spy eyes can share the view from any other eye in the cluster as if that eye were her own, provided she is within 10 miles of that sensor. To recover a sensor, she can press a spy eye she holds from the same cluster against the one that's in sensor form to make the sensor emerge and return to marble form."
When I played a Clouded Vision oracle I built for reach combat, and devoted my spells to buffing and summoning. So if there's nothing close enough to see so I can walk up and whack it, I buffed my friends or summoned something until I was pointed in the right direction or something got close enough to whack.
Basically have something productive to do when all you can see is the rest of your party, and when they go charging off after something follow them.
1) Be Orc; take Keen Scent feat. Be Oracle/Life; take Life Sense at level 11, House rule it to be 60 feet.
2) A creative interpretation of Aura Sight + Permanency.
My first character was a clouded vision life oracle, and that limited vision actually fed into her backstory - her and my husband's fighter had come to where we started together because she needed to travel and he agreed to stay with her and be her eyes as they went. I got through by relying on party members to let me know what was happening further off, and later by buying a pair of Kinsight Goggles that let me see through said fighter's eyes, used mostly out of combat for travel/exploration. I'd walk next to him to minimize the disorientation of the weird viewpoint, and it actually turned out to be a benefit for him too since he could use my darkvision. It was a dungeon delve and we were a melee-heavy group, so I could usually get by fine in a fight on my own vision, and I had Life Link to be able to do some healing even if I couldn't see them.
Mostly, I'm going to echo Trigger Loaded - talk with your friends about not being dicks. The dragon joke is one thing, but your party intentionally not passing along warnings about what's happening is very out-of-spirit in a cooperative game. And ultimately puts them at risk, too, since then you can't do your job, whatever that may be. If they refuse to make any effort to include you, then a blind character's not the one this time - talk to the GM about changing things up. Not every character is a fit in every party.