A Tyrant in Pieces (Inactive)

Game Master leinathan

Alright, answering questions/concerns:

@Thron - Anything in the background of PCs is part of the world! But that's totally fine, I love legacy characters. This whole campaign is legacy, you know? Plus, a fighter seems like a good fit for the campaign. Don't forget to include some explanation about how and why he got in touch with the Book Club, or if he himself is an agent.

@Mahorfeus - It's plausible for humanoid-ish creatures who like sex to accidentally have children, yes, though you likely would have been born in Cheliax to a dead mother and perhaps raised by aunts and uncles. Vampire noblemen aren't known for being super dedicated and caring fathers, you know? Unless you had a different idea, and being raised by the father was important.

@kamenhero - it's totally alright for you to write rebellious cults into Nidal, as long as you don't expect it to provide you personal benefits before gameplay actually starts and you have a chance to have and maintain friendships. I can't imagine that it's a very big cult at all, given that it's kind of factually incorrect. You're totally alright to make spell tattoos of spells that you don't know, just as if they were scrolls. However, you won't get the discount for having crafted them yourself before game, because you can't craft them entirely by yourself.

If you'll see in my post about the character-creation guidelines, fetchling is not on the list.

Races: To reflect the varied nature of the kinds of characters that might go on this journey, the allowed races will be all Core plus dhampir, goblin, kobold, orc, ratfolk, tengu, changeling, duergar, strix, syrinx, skinwalker, shabti and android.

Although, now that you've made your sheet, I realize that I've forgotten something.

When calculating your health, please do maximum health for every level.

Yeah, I'm not expecting special benefits from it. I just didn't want to write story elements in to my backstory that could impact the game world without your approval. I'll also pay full price for the scrolls.

Technically, the Scions aren't entirely incorrect. They still use pain and suffering as worship tools, but they believe that inflicting suffering on yourself in the form of artistic and complex tattoos and piercings is a better way to worship Zon-Kuthon than by mutilating and torturing other people. Their right up in Agents of Evil implies that their priests can still get divine power from doing this, so Zon-Kuthon apparently is okay with self-mutilation as opposed to inflicting it on other people.

I did see that, but you had also mentioned fetchling in an earlier post, so I was curious if that was an oversight, or if you'd changed your mind. I'm fine sticking with human. Also, HP is fixed.

I figured that being born in Cheliax would be a given. As for being raised there? I suppose that he might have received the tiefling treatment - regardless, he would have made his way to Nidal at some point or another. I imagined that his father would regard him as more of a minion than a son. S@&%ty vampire parenting is about as good a reason as any to have a chip on his shoulder, on top of the resentment his loving Chelaxian relatives had towards him. Just add a few other assassins into the mix.

Oh yeah... are we doing traits?

Oh yeah... are we doing traits?

Yes. Two of them, just like normal.

Alright, answering questions/concerns:

@Thron - Anything in the background of PCs is part of the world! But that's totally fine, I love legacy characters. This whole campaign is legacy, you know? Plus, a fighter seems like a good fit for the campaign. Don't forget to include some explanation about how and why he got in touch with the Book Club, or if he himself is an agent.

I don't see him so much as an agent of the book club, but perhaps they heard of his skill and morals, and have contacted him to volunteer to help against the threat.

Question: are you using the fighter class as written on the PRD, or as presented on d20pfsrd? Namely, are you allowing the use of Advanced Armor and Weapon Training? And if so, would you allow the following build of feats?

1: Combat Reflexes, Improved Initiative, Weapon Focus (Glaive)
2: Dodge
3: Power Attack
4: Weapon Specialization (Glaive)
5: Weapon Finesse
6: Advance Weapon Training (Fighter's Finesse)

This build would, with an Agile Glaive, give the character the acrobatic, stylish fighting style I desire. Mechanically, it would give him plenty of AoO's, Dex to attack and damage, and plenty of maneuverability.

You're asking me if you can use the advanced armor and weapon training? I don't particularly care how the class is presented, those things are first-party material that's totally allowed.

So, in a less snarky way, yes definitely that's fine. Those are all standard first-party feats and abilities.

Not to tell you how or what to do or anything, but perhaps looking into combat maneuvers might be good. Trip is typically the benefit of having a reach AoO build.

Will you allow an optional drawback (and a corresponding extra trait)?

Can we craft in advance at reduced cost? Either nonmagical things like her own stegasaurus-hide breastplate (which I was going to propose costs the same as dragonhide, and works the same except no potential for energy resistance savings), or magic items?

And some Unafe specific questions:
In her previous incarnation, Unafe had the Forgotten Past Story Feat. (I think of it around the following questions: Who or what gives her her Ancestor Heart? Is she truly a reincarnation of Namane, as Old Aye prophesied? And whether she is or she isn’t, why have her Ancestor memories failed to emerge from the fog?) I'm inclined to keep the feat...but only if it fits in your plans (in whatever straightforward or devious way you choose). Just let me know.

As far as her hook here, I think Unafe's tribe had some recent disaster. leinathan, I'll throw out some potential ideas for your perspective.
- What do you think of Unafe's tribe having been charged with guarding/hiding one of these 7 artifacts of Kazavon (deep in a remote village, surrounded by dinosaurs) and recently their village was razed in the process of someone stealing it?
- If this fits your plans, I'd say that her Ancestor Heart was prophesied to come into its own in time to save the village and protect the artifact...and it failed to do so, and she was forced to flee.
- Old Aye had a new vision that sent her to find...someone who'll be the link to the next step in her mission. (Perhaps an Abadaran gnome called the Procurer?)
- Unafe has traveled from the Mwangi Expanse and just recently arrived. She has doubts about the prophecy at this point--is it wrong? distorted by some force?--but it's still all she has to cling to.
- She comes with murky, disturbing visions and memories to relay (that could be story-significant hooks or just flavor).
- She's not yet associated with any group, but seeking guidance and happy to ally with someone or ones who she believes she's destined to join.
- I'm thinking of her being quite young--maybe 19. It would be almost unheard of to get to 6th level at that age...but she has been trained by Aye since early childhood, and she has remarkable gifts...and it fits how I picture her uncertain about how to carve out her own destiny, and her wish for clear guidance.

What do you think? What would you keep / add / change from that?

@Unafe -

Yes, you can take a drawback and a third trait if you like.

You can craft nonmagical items for the reduced price, if you can make the craft DC of the item on a 10. You can craft magical items for a reduced price if you can fulfill all of the item's prerequisites by yourself.

The Forgotten Past story feat works just fine with what I have in mind so far. What I have in mind is basically that Unafe's magical prowess comes from a combination of her own training and her second heart, and at a certain point there will be a dramatic story reveal that reveals the identity of her second heart.

I don't think that Nidal has possession of very many of the artifacts at the current moment, and the campaign is largely going to be pursuing them and preventing Nidalese agents from getting ahold of them. So, I am okay with an interpretation of your story... something like this:

One of her ancient ancestors was the protector of the artifact - the Bound Blade, fashioned from the dragon's claws. However, the artifact was not actually housed within the village. It was kept in some other secret location, and when Unafe's village was razed, and she was forced to flee, the agents that destroyed t he village looking for it never found it.

Unafe has no idea where to find the artifact, or why exactly her village was razed... but perhaps her Ancestor Spirit does. Perhaps she receives vague visions that lead her to Nidal, and some vague instruction from Old Aye and a general discomfort with the Nidalese puts her in contact with Book Club people.

Maybe?

I love it!

I'm inclined to say Unafe (and everyone else who was able) fled the attackers. She has no idea (yet) if the Bound Blade is or isn't still safe. She also doesn't know if Old Aye or others of her tribe still live. (If the Book Club can tell her it's still undiscovered, she'll be quite relieved.)

Note, it might be interesting if the Nidalese agents know (or suspect) that Unafe (or rather her Ancestor Heart) is a key to finding the Blade. Perhaps that's part of why Aye commanded her to flee?

And yes, I like that her own vague visions plus Old Aye's prophecy lead her to the club. Perhaps--since you suggested we all be acquainted with at least one other PC--they led her to a particular member of the party.

She knows she's trying to protect the Bound Blade, and to stop whoever is pursuing it (or to recapture it, if it's already been found). That's enough for her to make common cause with anyone from the party, and gives her an "in" to start learning more of the larger plot.

A few more Qs: how old is this artifact? How long ago was Kazavon's reign of terror?

Who/what would you suggest for the Nidalese agents who attacked her village? Was it a dragon? An army of humanoids? Or of the undead?

(I'm loving what we know so far, and loving seeing everyone's character concepts come together!)

Kazavon's reign of terror was in between 4042 A.R. and 4058 A.R. (much shorter than I originally thought). The current year is 4745, which makes it nearly six hundred years (587 years) since the dragon was defeated by Mandraivus and his cabal of heroes.

I think that the average Nidalese person is just a regular humanoid who happens to be totally bound to Zon-Kuthon's will, so it's likely that they were supersekrit human and fetchling agents led by an Umbral Court member (who are largely undead).

Thanks. And would Namane the Wise have been someone involved in the time of Kazavon? (Maybe one of the original heroes who defeated him? Or someone trusted by those who defeated him to hide/guard the Bound Blade? Or just an unrelated powerful ancestor from days of yore?) I picture this tribe as having been here, largely the same, since before Starfall...but that's flexible too, to make the story work.

I... think that is not knowledge that Unafe would have specifically, but it makes the most sense narratively if Namane at least was from the same time period.

Also, I just noticed something! Kamenhero's Nicholas has the trait 'kuthite caster', which gives a bonus on concentration checks when using spells with the pain, darkness, or shadow descriptors. Yet, he has no spells with any of those descriptors. Seems odd. Was that purposeful or an oversight?

I also think that, given character position, that Thron's character should be connected to one of the characters who already is within Nidal, and the same thing is true for Unafe.

Kamenhero, mahorfeus, drallidur, dbh, you're all starting within Nidal, which gives you certain potential avenues of information and resources, so I'll have to think on that. I'd like each of you to think of your position within society, your day-to-day life and how that interacts with your mission and position as a rebel of sorts.

I'm planning to grab most of the 'Shadow' spells at higher levels (Shadow Enchantment, Shadow Conjuration, Shadow Evocation, etc) but most of them are higher level spells that I don't have yet. Though, I can technically grab Shadow Enchantment instead of Displacement. It might provide more utility and I can take Displacement when we level up for the first time. I could grab Darkness now that I think about it, but since the Shadow Bloodline gives Deeper Darkness at 7th level, so I didn't bother.

When it comes to his position in society, Nicholas is a low ranking Umbral Court Agent, one of the government's enforcers who hunt enemies of the state and heretics to ensure the Umbral Court's power. The irony of this is not lost on him. He spends most of his days hunting enemies of the state that he feels threaten the safety and sovereignty of Nidal while also covering the asses of his allies who seek to usurp the Umbral Court's view of Zon-Kuthon with their own. Being a double agent means that he constantly watches his back and has to spend a lot of time trying to look very loyal and effective while not being very loyal or effective when it comes to his friends. Luckily, the Agents have a lot of free reign, so he doesn't have to put up with a huge amount of scrutiny, but he knows that death by slow torture would be the least of his worries if he was ever found out.

His contacts would be the few other Umbral Court Agents that work in the same region as him as well as the members of the Scions of Dou-Bral who attend his local congregation.

Edit: Okay, so I am taking Shadow Enchantment, and since I don't need Charm Person with that, I'm taking Interrogation, which is a Pain spell. Isn't it nice how that works out?

Works for me. Maybe the Book Club hired me to protect one or more of their agents?

It just occurred to me, but are there enough Gnomes in Nidal for it to be reasonable to have one as a Vigilante character? Having cover as a merchant doesn't do much good if there are literally like only 1-2 gnomes in a town, and one of them is new, and suddenly there's a gnome vigilante running around :p

Confused on how to price construction of a weapon using ABP...

Agile is a +1 quality, so if I wanted a +1 Agile Glaive would it cost 2,000 gold, since the +1 is coming from attunement?

You got it!

You also have to pay the price of the masterwork weapon too.

DBH - you should look over the rules for Automatic Bonus Progression. Per those rules, you need to refund and buy something else instead of your ring of protection, cloak of resistance, and getting +1 on your weapon and armor.

At 6th level, characters get a free attunement on a weapon and on a suit of armor, making it +1 for free. They also get a +1 resistance bonus to saves, a +1 deflection bonus to armor class and a +2 enhancement bonus to a mental score of their choice. None of this takes up any item slots, and it's all permanent.

How are you guys doing on your characters? I only have basically finished stories from kamenhero and gyrfalcon I think, and I'd like the opportunity to integrate everyone into the story.

I just realized that there's a more efficient way to distribute my point buy. Instead of having 10, 13, 10, 14, 10, 18, I can take 10, 14, 12, 14, 10, 17 and still end with a 22 Cha by using my level 4 +1 on Cha instead. So I'm adjusting that. Also, adjusted my remaining wealth to pay for the masterwork I need on my armor to have it enchanted.

DBH - you should look over the rules for Automatic Bonus Progression. Per those rules, you need to refund and buy something else instead of your ring of protection, cloak of resistance, and getting +1 on your weapon and armor.

At 6th level, characters get a free attunement on a weapon and on a suit of armor, making it +1 for free. They also get a +1 resistance bonus to saves, a +1 deflection bonus to armor class and a +2 enhancement bonus to a mental score of their choice. None of this takes up any item slots, and it's all permanent.

How are you guys doing on your characters? I only have basically finished stories from kamenhero and gyrfalcon I think, and I'd like the opportunity to integrate everyone into the story.

I have gone through the automatic progression rules.

The +1 on armor and weapon are from attunement, the saves and the mental stat increase are calculated in.

If the +1 to deflection cancels the Ring of protection I will change that, I always get confused over the various AC types and how they combine.

Working on her background and story now, should be done by the end of today.

Osborne is almost done, need to upload his stat block and then write up the story tonight.

leinathan wrote:

DBH - you should look over the rules for Automatic Bonus Progression. Per those rules, you need to refund and buy something else instead of your ring of protection, cloak of resistance, and getting +1 on your weapon and armor.

At 6th level, characters get a free attunement on a weapon and on a suit of armor, making it +1 for free. They also get a +1 resistance bonus to saves, a +1 deflection bonus to armor class and a +2 enhancement bonus to a mental score of their choice. None of this takes up any item slots, and it's all permanent.

How are you guys doing on your characters? I only have basically finished stories from kamenhero and gyrfalcon I think, and I'd like the opportunity to integrate everyone into the story.

I have gone through the automatic progression rules.

The +1 on armor and weapon are from attunement, the saves and the mental stat increase are calculated in.

If the +1 to deflection cancels the Ring of protection I will change that, I always get confused over the various AC types and how they combine.

Working on her background and story now, should be done by the end of today.

A ring of protection gives a deflection bonus to armor class.

Cloaks of resistance, rings of protection, amulets of natural armor, headbands of mental stat, belts of physical stat and enhancement bonuses on weapons and armor don't exist at all in the ABP rules. You don't actually get the item, you just get a natural bonus to whatever it gives you.

Still a work in progress. I was having difficulty figuring out what would make an edgy assassin-type attempt to turn away from that lifestyle. I ended up deciding that a crisis of conscience is more plausible if he is older and already has certain values by the time he first goes to Nidal. I'll try to have a nice write up soon, or at the very least, direct answers to your questions.

The crunch on the other hand is more or less done. Go figure.

DBH wrote:

leinathan wrote:

DBH - you should look over the rules for Automatic Bonus Progression. Per those rules, you need to refund and buy something else instead of your ring of protection, cloak of resistance, and getting +1 on your weapon and armor.

At 6th level, characters get a free attunement on a weapon and on a suit of armor, making it +1 for free. They also get a +1 resistance bonus to saves, a +1 deflection bonus to armor class and a +2 enhancement bonus to a mental score of their choice. None of this takes up any item slots, and it's all permanent.

How are you guys doing on your characters? I only have basically finished stories from kamenhero and gyrfalcon I think, and I'd like the opportunity to integrate everyone into the story.

I have gone through the automatic progression rules.

The +1 on armor and weapon are from attunement, the saves and the mental stat increase are calculated in.

If the +1 to deflection cancels the Ring of protection I will change that, I always get confused over the various AC types and how they combine.

Working on her background and story now, should be done by the end of today.

A ring of protection gives a deflection bonus to armor class.

Cloaks of resistance, rings of protection, amulets of natural armor, headbands of mental stat, belts of physical stat and enhancement bonuses on weapons and armor don't exist at all in the ABP rules. You don't actually get the item, you just get a natural bonus to whatever it gives you.

OK, back to the shopping.

I am finalizing the crunch on my character, then will hammer out some fluff for him. Should be done here in the next little bit and ready for a review.

Thron's character, checking in and ready for a review and audit. Won't be surprised if an error slipped through, as this character was built over two platforms, edited from a previous alias, and partially built while sleep deprived over several different days. :-P

Thron's character, checking in and ready for a review and audit. Won't be surprised if an error slipped through, as this character was built over two platforms, edited from a previous alias, and partially built while sleep deprived over several different days. :-P

Kudos to you, then, because it looks mostly very good.

You did miss a couple of things, as far as I can tell:

Your CMD is 23, as you add everything that you add to touch AC to CMD as well - including deflection bonuses to AC.

Perception isn't a class skill for fighters. This makes your Perception bonus +8.

I feel obligated to tell you that you could have a more efficient point-buy by redistributing your racial bonus to Dexterity.

5 points in Strength, 7 points in Dex (plus level 4 and racial), 7 points in Con, 2 points in Int and 2 points in Cha leaves two more points to distribute than you already have.

Are you planning or desiring any interaction with any of Cai'nan's family? Does he have any personal stake in Nidal, or is it just a job for him?

As for being hired, I think that being hired to protect Unafe is probably the most sensible. I think that it appears A. Drallidur's character is the only official Book Club agent in the party, so...

Kamenhero, Drallidur, Gyrfalcon and Thron, I want your thoughts on the following:

Unafe stumbles into Nidal, following her ancestral visions and the cryptic last instructions that Old Aye gave her. They lead her to the manor house of Nicholas Tyrel, who takes her in out of a sense of regular, mundane concern.

Meanwhile, the Procurer finds out through various channels about Unafe, and that she may be some kind of clue to the Seven Artifacts of Kazavon, but that she's in the hands of a member of the Umbral Court. He contacts his fellow Book Club members to send additional aid for an important mission, and (at least) Cai'nan is hired on and sent to meet The Procurer in Nidal.

Where Mahorfeus' character and Marin fit in to this is still ambiguous to me.

Thoughts?

Responses:

1) CMD, Perception, and point buy adjusted (including skill modifiers). You are indeed correct, your point buy array netted me the same stats, but with a bonus +2 to Charisma. Woot!

2) Family interaction: Honestly, I leave that up to you. If you wish to include any of them, here are their basic personalities:

3) Nidal: At first, he likely views it as a job. But once he realizes what is at stake, he takes a vested personal interest in seeing the right thing done.

4) That scenario sounds good to me. Is Cai'nan being hired as part of a rescue effort for Unafe, or has she already been retrieved from the Umbral Court, or does Cai'nan not have a clue at this point?

I am thinking that he would be hired outside of the country, and merely told to report to a certain location at a certain time, to meet with a particular gnome, and that the job may be dangerous.

The only thing that might shift with your story is that Nicholas might contact the Book Club himself to get help with Unafe's situation. I don't think we ever determined if the Scions were in contact with the Book Club or not.

The only thing that might shift with your story is that Nicholas might contact the Book Club himself to get help with Unafe's situation. I don't think we ever determined if the Scions were in contact with the Book Club or not.

I don't think that we already established that. It's not implausible that the Scions would, but I wouldn't think that the relationship would be entirely trusting. Is that okay with you?

Oh, Nicholas - do you want to have other Scions near where Nicholas is, and to be accessible to him?

Also, where does Nicholas live?

Where does Osborne live?

Well, my Inner Sea World Guide says that the port city of Nisroch is the least controlled city in Nidal, and political games between members of the Umbral Court are common, along with outsiders from Varisia and Cheliax. Plus, there are cults and enemy agents that slip in with surprising regularity, including a surprising number of Desnan agents. So if there's anywhere for a spy ring and a rebel cult to be operating, that seems like the place.

There's probably a relatively decent congregation in the city simply due to how big it is, so I'll just give a couple of members who might be in a position to be helpful and you can assume the rest are relatively unimportant soldiers, workers, or low ranking officials.

Simon Ocur (LN Human Cleric of Zon-Kuthon): The local head of the Scions. He's ostensibly the caretaker of one of the churches to the Midnight Lord in the city, but he's also the Scion's priest within the city. He holds a secret mass for their small group once a week, which is disguised as a private sermon for a few wealthy patrons who desire Zon-Kuthon's favor.

Diana Kriff (LN Halfling Rogue): The daughter of a Chelish slave who was abandoned in Nidal when House Thrune returned most of Nidal's sovereignty. She works at the docks as a foreman, and also acts as a smuggler who slips supplies through the gaps and helps members who are in danger of being caught slip out.

Okay, the fluff is (finally) done for my dhampir shadowdancer, Cierno Lorenz. As always, critiques are welcome. And of course, I can adjust certain things as needed. I think he can pass as being plausibly Neutral. Since dhampirs can live for a really long time, I tried not to specify how much time has passed during certain events, so let me know if that's all right. And if he sounds too accomplished for a 7th level character, I can tone it down some... I just figure that most people do not quite make it that far.

Thanks for that response, Nicholas. I can definitely use and work with that.

Whew! That was a long read. It's perfectly alright for your character to be an ambiguous age, though it doesn't really seem like he's that old, especially since he was a teenager when he met his father. It seems to me that he's probably between thirty and fifty, but I could be way off base from what you intended.

Remember when you make crunch that your character's only level 6, not level 7. He certainly doesn't seem too accomplished. He's probably murdered quite a few people, but he wasn't exactly self-directed, and he hasn't had any grand accomplishments.

I still want three things from you:

How the Book Club got in contact with Cierno, why it was him that they chose, and, if you want to be acquainted with a party member, who it is and how you know them.

Personally, I think it works best if Cierno has been working with the Book Club for a pretty decent amount of time by the time the campaign starts and the other PCs get brought in, and the PC that he's acquainted with is Osborne. However, your preferences are up to you.

Sorry for the delay, ended up not having any free time today like I hoped I would. I've got stat blocks up, but I haven't spent any gold yet, I need to choose like 12 languages, and there are likely lots of mistakes as I'm exhausted :P

Gonna whip up answers to your questions and then the background.

Slate, Osborne's Familiar

Passing out, so if something doesn't make sense, let me know.

Drallidur, I was curious about your VMC Wizard, since both that and your class grant full familiars. Were you intending to have two? (I may well be missing something as I'm quite unfamiliar with the Magical Child Vigilante.)

BTW, working on crunch now.

I'm going for a caster-focused shaman, with the INT to take Arcane Enlightenment to gain 3 Wizard spells / day on my Shaman list. Note, leinathan, I've chosen to have a high enough INT to do this...but let me know if it'd be thematically appropriate for me to *not* know how to do this yet in game (in case it's something that makes sense to 'unlock' at some point as I gain access to my Ancestor Heart).

Still trying to get a handle on my Slayer, I've rebuilt and renamed her, now doing the questions and trying to get a feel for her.

Yeah, I've arranged with leinathan to swap it out for arcane bond instead. Getting a second familiar is tempting, but would just be too much work I think. Would end up falling between the cracks most of the time.

Interesting, sounds good. And I woke up this AM waffling about whether to build her as

- a caster Shaman with a mix of healing, debuffs, buffs, and battlefield control (lots of spell choice due to arcane enlightenment as a wandering hex)

OR

- a caster Druid with a summoning focus and the ability to tussle in melee...and the druid's normal flexibility for support casting.

As the party is shaping up, it seems either fills a need. Happy to get suggestions, but I'll know within a few days. I may need to build both options to get a feel for them.

leinathan, do we have a timeline that you want crunch done by?

We should be ok either way as long as you can bring some healing along. We're pretty melee heavy, but more isn't necessarily a bad thing, and summons provide a lot of flexibility and utility.

One thing that might be an issue is that I am not sure we have many of the knowledge skills covered. Osborne should be able to provide aid in the form of a +4 bonus to all knowledge skills, and he gets to take 10 on aid another checks to do it, but he doesn't actually have any knowledge skills himself.

I don't have any specific timeline for people to be totally done, no. It's Christmastime, after all, so I'm sort of expecting people be be going kind of slow on PBP.

If you want, I could set one? I was just gonna start gameplay whenever I felt the appropriate people were done. For example, when Unafe and Nicholas are both completely done I'll probably start an interaction between the two of them, and when those who are set to meet with them are done, then we can do that as well.

As for Unafe's Arcane Enlightenment - I'm happy for you to pick whatever abilities you want. I don't want to restrict your mechanics behind some story things I haven't even fully defined yet.

Well, I think Cai'nan is ready to roll. Can't think of anything else I need to do with him.

How melee heavy are we? Is Osborne (or his familiar) going to want to be on the front lines most of the time? Otherwise we've got:
Thron - melee fighter
DBH - archer slayer
Mahorfeus - shadowdancer--unclear to me how much heat he wants to take on the front lines?
Kamenhero - sorcerer
...and circadian mentioned a paladin or a monk, but has been busy recently. Circ, are you still planning to join in? Do you know more about your concept?

I don't think anyone's planning on summoning much unless it's Unafe...though if we have a 7 person party, the map'll be pretty full already so maybe that's a good thing.

The Shaman does have 3 class knowledge skills (nature, planes, religion) and that build would have a 14 INT vs the druid's 10 INT, so that's an argument in that build's direction. I know that Nicholas has arcana, and Marin's draft crunch covers local + dungeoneering, so we're probably in reasonable shape...but that *is* a nod toward the Shaman build.

Thanks for the thoughts! I'll keep thinking (and hopefully stop waffling soon). Other comments/ideas welcome.

@Unafe: I plan on playing a combination of debuffing and control when in combat, but a lot of Nick's abilities are more utility. It will be a few levels before I get the Shadow spells to increase my versatility. So I have to agree with Osborne.

How the Book Club got in contact with Cierno, why it was him that they chose, and, if you want to be acquainted with a party member, who it is and how you know them.

Since Cierno has been on the run for a while now, I figured that news of a rogue agent would have circulated throughout the underworld. It's something that a spy ring like the Book Club would have picked up at some point, I'm sure. Given their sources, tracking him down would not have been too difficult, and if they made it apparent that they weren't trying to kill him, he would have been willing to listen to their recruitment pitch.

Cierno was chosen for the simple fact that he defected from Nidal of his own volition. He is familiar with some of the Umbral Court's inner workings and his skill set makes him ideal for espionage. Likewise, his abilities put him in a unique position to use some of the Nidalese agents' advantages against them, should the need arise.

He is most likely acquainted with Nicholas, who was also an agent of the Umbral Court (albeit in a different sector), and with Osborne, who might well have been the one to recruit him to begin with. Depending on who defected first, perhaps Nicholas was the one who blew the whistle on him in the first place, alerting the Book Club to his location.

Personally, I think it works best if Cierno has been working with the Book Club for a pretty decent amount of time by the time the campaign starts and the other PCs get brought in, and the PC that he's acquainted with is Osborne. However, your preferences are up to you.

I think that works for the best. That way, there is more trust between Cierno and the Book Club; they have less incentive to believe that he is a double agent.

Regarding Ciervo's party role, he is definitely a two-weapon front-liner. His AC will be pretty high, and as he reaches higher levels his mobility will be pretty crazy... provided it's a little shady in the area. He can handle traps, disguise himself, and lie his ass off in a pinch.

The main obstacle will be his aversion to positive energy... which I am sure leinathan can tell you all about. :P

Great to know we do indeed have a front line. I'm 90% settled on the shaman build. For now.

How melee heavy are we? Is Osborne (or his familiar) going to want to be on the front lines most of the time?

Slate (aka Aurus) is pretty beefy and should be an effective front-line tank given his DR and high AC (nearly 30 fully buffed). Osborne can handle melee as well with his high HP and decent buffed AC. After my two levels of eldritch guardian, I could in theory go Vigilante for more social talents, Eldritch Knight to trade social for combat feats for Slate, or more levels of fighter to go all-out melee afterwards at the cost of social and higher level spells, depending on what we need.

Ciervo's statblock is done...ish. Might adjust his gear a little bit. Put some ranks into UMD so that he could use a negative energy wand on himself if the need arises.