Aubrey's Other Eberron Campaign - The Unbinding (Inactive)

Game Master Aubrey the Malformed

I'm away this weekend and will probably be unable to post. Please bot me as needed.

Otto immediately converts to the Church of Cole. His new domains are Bad-Assery and Robotism.

I'm curious what domain powers are coming along. If they're good, I might in fact switch!

It's mostly a lot of crushing cans on your forhead and nerd-raging against "fleshies" or "meat-bags".

A pretty good time all things considered.

Robotism

Got the moves(Ex): As a fullround action, you can do a killer robot dance move granting you +5 competence bonus on your perform(dance) skil for 1 round. You can use this ability a number of times per day equal to 3 + your Wisdom modifier.

You got the bling(Ex): At 6th level, you will start imbuing shiny things into your flesh. This grants you 1/2 your cleric level sacred bonus to profession(pimp)

Bad-Assery

Flex them(Ex): You can as a fullround action flex your muscles, this allows you to use intimidate to demorilize every foe within 30ft. You can use this ability a number of times per day equal to 3 + your Wisdom modifier.

Spontaneous combustion(Sp): At 8th level. After all foes have been killed in the encounter, you can turn your back and walk off wich causes all the corpses to explode, but only if you do not look back.

: slow clap :

Well done, Wultram. Well done.

LOL! I'm sold!!!

Well said, sir!

I'm back. Thanks for botting me!

Thanks for what? I missed!

Hopefully you'll do better.

OK - official DM ruling re Vaard:

Your bonus damage from your Outer Spheres Stance won't henceforth (i.e after the current fight) be available unless you are wielding weapons, by which I mean quite specifically that you don't get the extra damage (1) unless you are attacking with two manufactured weapons (a shield counts if you are bashing with it) and (2) you don't get the bonus on attacks with natural weapons. So if you don't do some version of two-weapon fighting you don't get the bonus, and if you throw in an extra natural attack on top (typically, a bite) you will get the bonus damage on your manufactured weapon attacks but not the natural attack.

I also think you are misinterpreting the rules for shield bashing and using natural attacks together. If this is really two-weapon fighting, then a heavy shield counts as a one-handed weapon and there would be a seriously large penalty to using it, especially as you don't have the Two Weapon Fighting feat. If you are doing a mix of natural and manufactured weapon attacks, then you lead with the shield and the other attacks take a penalty as non-primary attacks (-5 normally, -2 as you have Multiattack). It's not even clear you can attack with a manufactured weapon (the shield) and then get two natural attacks in - the rules imply quite strongly that you can only have one additional natural attack where you have attacked with a manufactured weapon.

I was just a little concerned that the previous interpretation was a little abusive as you gain extra damage without really suffering the penalties associated with two-weapon fighting. And it must be too good since you weren't really choosing to do anything else. I like the approach but you probably need to consider what feats you are taking to really make it work under the rules.

OK - official DM ruling re Vaard:

Your bonus damage from your Outer Spheres Stance won't henceforth (i.e after the current fight) be available unless you are wielding weapons, by which I mean quite specifically that you don't get the extra damage (1) unless you are attacking with two manufactured weapons (a shield counts if you are bashing with it) and (2) you don't get the bonus on attacks with natural weapons. So if you don't do some version of two-weapon fighting you don't get the bonus, and if you throw in an extra natural attack on top (typically, a bite) you will get the bonus damage on your manufactured weapon attacks but not the natural attack.

Okay, that sounds like a perfectly reasonable ruling.

I also think you are misinterpreting the rules for shield bashing and using natural attacks together. If this is really two-weapon fighting, then a heavy shield counts as a one-handed weapon and there would be a seriously large penalty to using it, especially as you don't have the Two Weapon Fighting feat. If you are doing a mix of natural and manufactured weapon attacks, then you lead with the shield and the other attacks take a penalty as non-primary attacks (-5 normally, -2 as you have Multiattack). It's not even clear you can attack with a manufactured weapon (the shield) and then get two natural attacks in - the rules imply quite strongly that you can only have one additional natural attack where you have attacked with a manufactured weapon.

Hmm, that interpretation hadn't occurred to me, but I can see where your interpretation is coming from. Okay then, henceforth Vaard will not use a shield while multiattacking.

If you want, you can retool Vaard to fit better with these rulings - after all, if your build was assuming things that no longer apply, then it's fair to revisit your choices.

At the moment you are using a morningstar and heavy shield combo (well, sometimes). Right now, without the Two Weapon Fighting feat, that basically doesn't work very well due to severe penalties To Hit. Unfortunately, you also don't qualify for the Two Weapon Fighting feat, which requires DEX 15, as your is 14. However, at 4th level you get an increase in one stat - it looks like you chose STR, but if you want you can instead choose DEX to bring it up to 15. You can then swap your latest feat (something warlord-y) for Two Weapon Fighting. I'm also happy for you to swap your heavy shield for a light shield (you could, I dunno, bite the edges off it or something). Then you are tooled up for Outer Sphere Stance with the Two Weapon Fighting feat, a two-weapon combo that only inflicts the minimum -2 penalty on To Hit rolls, you can still throw in a bite as part of a full attack, while you lose access to one feat (which I'm not sure I've actually seen in use yet) and you lose a point of AC.

This is a possibility, you can retrain Outer Sphere Stance if you prefer, or do something else - just let me know what you have in mind.

OK, official ruling re Wultram now:

I've compared Wultram's powers with what a wizard or sorcerer would get. Clearly, they have a bit more versatility than a dread necromancer, but I think the class abilities below are nevertheless sufficient to balance things out. Most class powers, especially damaging ones, are bounded by the number of times they can be used as well, whereas Wultram's currently are not, and I also wanted to put that more in line with other classes. Right now Wultram also has enormous amounts of self-healing on tap, plus mass death blast-y power, which doesn't really seem in line with what a necromancer in the game should typically have, particularly an arcane necromancer.

First, your Channel Negative Energy is being altered to be more in line with what the PF Wizard Necromancer gets. So instead of the Selective Channeling option, he must take the Control Undead option.

Second, when he uses his Charnel Touch ability, it consumes one of his channelings.

Third, the only option available for Death's Embrace is the Without option.

Fourth, activating the Fear Aura also consumes one of his channelings.

Fifth, the only option available for Master of Death is the Mental option.

Sixth, Necrotic Attunement: the Master's Champion can only be used on an undead creature which is controlled by him, or one that is intelligent and willing. An undead appointed as a master's Champion does not count against his HD limit for controlling undead. Using the Dark Talisman consumes a channeling each round it is used, but otherwise there is no limit on the number of times it can be used.

Seventh, Enervating Touch consumes a channeling (although not an extra one in addition to the Charnel Touch effect).

These changes apply henceforth (i.e. after your most recent self-healing). Again, if you want to reconsider some of Wultram's build as a result of this, let me know.

I'm more inclined to keep multiattack and focus on natural weapons (and retrain outer sphere stance) than to ignore my natural weapons and focus on manufactured ones, but I'm not completely certain.
I'll reevaluate my maneuver and feat choices over the next couple days.

I am mostly fine with these changes.(only 1 mechanical gripe other RP) BTW not a complaint but comparing to sorc/wiz is not really the best for comparison imo at least.

Changes?: The channel thing hurts, as without selective it is more or less just using space on the sheet untill I get minions. Will see if pushing in selective is an option. Losing self-healing as an option and becoming reliant on CON might result in changes.

Now my gripe is with number 5, that is because SR for PCs is a drawback not a benefit, doubly so now that Wultram can't self-heal. So I would certainly like to see some other solution worked into this.

Your adaptation of the class is quite a lot more powerful than the original. That's OK as far as it goes, but it is actually quite a bit more powerful than similar classes in PF. No class gets Selective Channelling as a bonus feat, plus turning the fairly limited Negative Energy Burst into the distinctly more powerful Negative Energy Channelling, some of the other synergies you built into your version of the class, plus features like Necrotic Attunement which don't appear at all in the original, could be problematic down the line. The original dread necromancer class was pretty niche and its balance in play is possibly questionable, so I'm preferring to fix it into something closer to PF norms to ensure it doesn't go OTT. Frankly, I'm fairly uncomfortable with Lich Transformation but I'll worry about that if and when we get to 20th level.

Also note - most of your powers are now fuelled by channelling, so it's not irrelevant. The dedicated necromancer wizard is prevented from channelling negative energy to harm or heal, you are an arcane caster not a divine one, and while Control Undead is niche I think it's nevertheless fair enough - even oracles of bones don't get to channel negative energy like that - plus you can use your channelling for other stuff including Charnel Touch.

That said, based on your comments plus some further thoughts of mine, I propose the following:

Advanced Learning is expanded to include cleric and wizard spells of the divination and evocation schools as well as those of the necromancy school.

Gradual Transformation (replaces Mental Bastion and Negative Energy Resistance): Starting at 4th level, a dread necromancer gains a +2 bonus on saving throws made to resist sleep, stunning, paralysis, poison, disease and negative energy effects such as energy drain, ability drain, and inflict spells. This bonus increases to +4 at 11th level and then again to +6 at 18th level.

Master of Death is removed in its entirety.

Undead Resistances (replaces previous version): Starting at 6th level, a dread necromancer gains resist cold 5 and resist electricity 5. At 16th level both of these resistances increase to 10.

I also want to change the Master's Champion thing to be a bit more like the oracle of bones and antipaladin power when they summon an undead servant, but my wife has ordered me to bed (and not in an exciting way). I'll revisit this tomorrow.

...but my wife has ordered me to bed (and not in an exciting way).

I am sorry to welcome another member to this club, however delicately understated his qualifications for admission.

First a clarification the changes? part of the message was about giving you heads up on possible changes to the build. And yes I agree that the channel uses getting used elsewhere helps but those are also all melee range abilities(well at least fear aura untill it's range grows and at that level being in melee is a really bad idea), wich is now a lot more dangerous than before to him, this is not such a big issue as melee would have stopped really being an option in a level or few anyway.

As to the classes power, it is somewhat more powerful yes(at least as contained unit as 3.5 had other things that allowed further power.) But in PF each class got a buff.(Compare sorcs for a example) That being said I think the creator of the conversion(as noted I just modded it, mainly on the spell list dropping almost all non PF spells) tried to mainly follow the PF school of thought of very little empty levels.

You are going to have to explain what you mean by oracle of bones and antipaladin thing.

Sadly I in turn have to leave for work now, so no time for more polished message.

Well, I see this as an iterative process so we both get more-or-less what we want. So I'm happy to countenance further changes. I don't want to ruin your fun at all. But if Wultram is over-powerful, he could over-shadow the other players and make it hard for me to effectively challenge his abilities. Which could ruin my fun or the other players'.

I have to confess that I didn't really look at the class when you first proposed it. I usually say "Yes" and then see how things go in the field. But I have looked now and obviously have a few concerns. But I have some ideas as to how it can be resolved. I have to run to a meeting now - I will post up later.

Alright, as I said above I'm keen to make the dread necromancer class a bit more in line with other PF classes. This will have some upsides and some downsides.

I would be interested in your comments (everyone's).

OK, here we go...

Charnel Touch: I'd like this to be basically the same as the antipaladin's Touch of Corruption. So rather than 1d8+1/2 level damage per touch, it will do 1d6 x 1/2 level. You can do this a number of times equal to 1/2 your level + your CHA mod. This makes it a bit more powerful, especially at higher levels as the damage and number of uses goes up.

Channel Negative Energy: Yes, it's back! However, you don't get Selective Channeling (or Control Undead) for free - you have to buy those feats as normal. And using Channel Negative Energy uses up two uses of your Charnel Touch ability. This would probably not be a level 1 ability, but as you are level 4 you would have access to it now.

Lich Body: no proposed changes.

Death's Embrace: "Within" is simply too powerful - undead basically can't attack the character, and he gets access to a lot of self-healing via negative energy. "Without" is just a bit strange - I can't work out if that is absurdly powerful or not. In fact, it might be too ambiguous to be workable. I'm not bothered about the bonuses re undead creation, however. So I propose something like an Aura of Desecration - undead which you create count as having been created under the influence of a Desecrate spell, and undead which you created or control while within 10' of you gain the benefit of being within a Desecrate spell. This increases to 20' at 9th level and 30' at 15th level. At 12th level these bonuses are doubled (including the creation bonuses, even if the undead in question were created before the bonus went up).

Mental Bastion: Replaced by Gradual Transformation.

Gradual Transformation: amended so starting at 4th level, a dread necromancer gains a +2 bonus on saving throws made to resist sleep, stunning, paralysis, poison, disease, mind-affecting effects and negative energy effects such as energy drain, ability drain, and inflict spells. This bonus increases to +4 at 11th level and then again to +6 at 18th level. In addition, starting at 4th level, you gain resist cold 5 and resist electricity 5. At 11th level both of these resistances increase to 10, and to 15 at 18th level.

Advanced Learning: Expanded so it covers Divination and Evocation school spells, as well as Necromancy.

Fear Aura: This becomes a subset of your Aura of Desecration, so enemies in that Aura, from 5th level, are Shaken as per the Fear Aura.

Master of Death: Removed. The whole "going undead" thing is a bit powerful - that's really your capstone ability, you shouldn't be getting it effectively at 6th level, and for hours on end. I think you were looking forward to the hp boost with your CHA, so sorry about that. I think that the bonuses around Gradual Transformation, which cover lots of ground, should do the trick. Likewise, you don't actually want SR.

Dreadsight: No change proposed. Not sure if it is part of Master of Death but you can have it as a constant ability from 6th level.

Necrotic Attunement: Dark Talisman version. It's poorly worded (Heighten Spell - Heightened by how much? Does he need to make a new talisman every time he levels, or just add another 100gp?) and therefore ambiguous. That said, I propose we ditch the requirement for a focus and uses/day, and instead it consumes a use of Charnel Touch for each level by which the spell being cast is Heightened.

The Master's Champion thing I'd like to (1) make a separate class ability, and (2) put it down to 4th level. This puts it on a par with similar sort of "get a friend" abilities like a paladin's warhorse or a antipaladin's fiendish servant. Without writing it out in massive detail here, you would get either a Skeletal Champion Warrior or a Zombie Lord Warrior (your choice - basically, in Eberron terms, a Karnnathi skeleton or Karrnathi zombie) the same level as you (standard array for stats), who would level up along with you. Your champion would benefit from the same bonuses as any other undead created within your Desecration Aura. Your champion can also control undead created by you, limited by its CHA in the normal way, so you can "hand-off" undead you control to it. So your champion will be reasonably tough and hopefully useful, but not in such an open-ended way as the version you have.

Alternatively, you could have something like an Arcane Bond item.

Undead Mastery: The extra bonuses to STR, DEX and HD for created undead is removed (covered by Aura of Desecration). However, the CHA bonus to controlling undead remains.

Negative Energy Resistance: Removed (covered by Gradual Transformation).

Undead Resistances: Removed (covered by Gradual Transformation).

Enervating Touch: No real change proposed, except that it is simply rolled into Charnel Touch at level 12 and doesn't have separate uses per day.

Craft Wondrous Item: Removed - frankly, it's a bit late to be handing out a feat like this at 19th level.

Lich Transformation: No change, except you are assumed to have the Craft Wondrous Item feat, if you don't already have it, for the purposes of creating a phylactery.

It's not that I don't care about those adjustments, I'm just unlikely to be the person to offer an opinion on them (as I'm not the most savvy about the comparative power levels of casting classes and their class features).

These certainly seem fun, interesting, and well-incorporated.

What's a dread necromancer? ;)

@Otto: If you have Heroes of horror book from 3.5. Check it out there. If not, basicly a dedicated class to necromancy. Something akin to the difference of Master summoner and Conjuration specilist wizard.

Seems fine at first look over. Let me go over all the changes as I write this. And generally I do not like changes after the game has started but I would agree that the original conversion is a bit too good. I think the idea that no empty levels was a good one but some of the abilities could have been made more minor in nature. My only real concerns are on the RP department as this changes relatively lot on how Wultram will act in combat mainly, though I reckon the fact that things were to change in few levels anyway should take care of the issue. Also I would like to go on record saying, that this is one of the better handled discussion such as this that I have been involved in.

1) No issue. Now but if we were making a general conversion, low levels might be an issue with number of uses(as many things use this pool) Figured it might be worth mentioning were you to use this later, in later campaings or for NPCs.

2) As noted not an issue. I will contemplate on picking up selective, hard choice to make, but I am leaning on no as channel damage very quickly will fall behind usefulness, even at next rise. (3d6 save for half is pretty lousy at that point unless you get a lot of enemies in the area.)

3) As no changes hardly needs a comment. I do like these abilities that mirror the gradual change in the journey towards undead.

4) The original definetly should have had caveats in the protection from undead thing.(hadn't come up yet so did not analyze it properly) Without, not that powerful really as DN has relatively little spell to capitalize on the ability. the DR is relatively minor thing, though I suppose it could be abusable in spesific context of lot of low HD undead used as an army instead of some powerful ones. That being said, sort of nice to have less book keeping when it comes online. And as noted the desecrate aura handles the HP increase, although it also means you can't stack them when you have the time for such preperation. Either way rather minor loss.

5 & 6) Making the minor things under a single ability certainly makes things a lot smoother. Also it is mostly unchanged so not a lot of comments needed here.

7) Well it is nice certainly as not every spell level have a good necromancy spell(that is not already on DN spell list). Divination I can see the connection(talking with spirits and all that) but I would just like to hear how you came up with evocation, not that I mind just the choice does not seem clear to me at the moment.

8) Seems like a good join up here. Also not much of a change so no need for further comment.

9) Works. I suppose if I was making this again I would make it a lot more temporary effect.

10) Wasn't part of it, it seems to miss the level thing in the original. Mistake that passed my inspection.

11) I would assume it was ment to count as highest you can cast. Was more looking at masters champion for Wultram so did not look too deep into it. This version seems a lot better balanced.

12) I really like this approuch. Especially since it allow me to actually have an undead before animate dead comes online. Mechnics are a bit vague however. So those need hammering out. (As far as I can see the difference between Karnathi versions are they are not mindless. And zombies do not get staggered instead just can't run, also they do not seem to get the stat changes that normal skeletons/zombies gain.)

13) Not a huge deal, only thing I miss from this is the fluff thing that someone dedicated to necromancy to that extenct surpasses other peoples creations.

14 & 15) See 5 & 6

16) Again no real change so...

17 & 18) Honestly this is the way it should have been handled.

So in the end it seems like all that needs doing is me deciding if I want to change one feat to selective channeling. And hammering out the new Masters champion.(also how it will work in the game world as now suddenly he has this ability.)

OK, cool!

I added evocation as the other schools seemed even less suitable, and I wanted to provide a little bit of balance for the character. The main reasons were mechanical, in other words, rather than flavor. On the other hand, it's another way of killing people... Another possibility might be abjuration, I guess. Can't see illusion or transmutation fitting in so much. Conjuration...? A possibility, but really a specialism for someone else, and you can already summon undead.

I'll clarify Master's Champion tonight, if I get time. I doubt you'll want to raise him in the middle of combat so it's probably not urgent, but it would be nice to get things done and dusted.

By the way, for clarity about the Karrnathi skeleton and zombie - I'm proposing that mechanically they will be a skeletal champion (per Bestiary 1) or zombie lord (per Bestiary 3 (I think)), they will just be dressed up as "Karrnathi" versions for fluff purposes.

Aaah that makes it lot easier to understand.

And evocation does have some spells that fit into the general theme. And anyways it only 1 of 3 schools so should not be an issue there. But yeah was more curious than anything.

What's a dread necromancer? ;)

3.5 Heroes of Horror class. Both classes in the book (the other being Archivist) were pretty fun and fairly different from all other options added before the book came out.

Dread Necromancer was the class I played in my longest-running IRL game. We went from level 3 up to about ECL 34 or so. Tons of fun.

As you can tell, I haven't got round to setting out the new version yet, and it won't happen for a few days as I will not be at home. However, I have mad a start, so hopefully by Monday evening UK time I can have the updated Dread Necromancer done.

I will be out and busy all day tomorrow, and probably won't be able to post. I will be back Sunday (or possibly really late tomorrow night).

Aubrey,
In light of your interpretations about how Scarlet Throne maneuvers work, I'm going to request to switch my Warlord (Vanguard Commander archetype) levels to Warlord (steelfist commando archetype). Basically, I want manuevers that work well with my natural attacks, and Broken Blade is the most obvious way to do it. It would also require swapping out all Scarlet Throne maneuvers.

OK.

On a similar note, until I get the updated version of the dread necromancer up, Wultram will continue to operate as before.

Oooo. If Nalverren steps up and looks sufficiently threatening there'll only be a 50% chance that Ygza tries to flatten me like a stirge.

I'm out of town through tomorrow. Back online Monday morning. Bot me as needed.

OK, updated version of the Dread Necromancer for review and comments. Note that I fiddled with the Summon Undead spell as well, which now goes up to level 9.

Rules for Dread Necromancer

I am going to sleep after posting this so I might have missed something. I read it up but did not look into things deeper(for example the creatures in the new summon list)

Only mistake I saw was with Undead Mastery, well I am assuming it is a mistake as gaining it at 7th level seems somewhat pointless as a spontanous caster DN gets animate dead at level 8.

Masters champion: Mechanics are good, not sure about the whole summoning flavor of it. Human might be issue if the class is ever used outside of Wultram, though you can easily just use human mechanics and flavor it as pretty much any common race that is medium sized. I would also note that the penalty for the thing perishing are pretty damn harsh in comparison to paladin/druid/ranger/cavalier.

I will look over it in detail when I get back from work tomorrow.

Wow! I now dread Wultram!

At least Otto's inspire courage made Vaard's will save close. Is it too late to apply an action point?

I posted a spoiler with the panicked condition on the previous page of the game thread. If you don't save you can join Rehil in a whirlwind tour of this dank maze-like grotty grotto.

Doing a little vacation. Back Tuesday..

Yes, the Undead Master was a mistake - I thought Animate Dead was third level.

On Master's Champion, summoning isn't necessarily the same as Summoning - the flavour is just fluff. Human was chosen for the sake of uniformity - I considered making it any of the basic races or the same race as the master, but decided it was easier to just specify human as it made little difference anyway and a non-basic race master would make it tricky. The penalty for the creature dying are, I thought, the same as for a paladin's mount dying.

The Summoning list is based on the creature's CR (as the Summon Monster lists seem to be). I worked out what the CRs were for the creatures on the Summon Monster list, and then found undead which fitted the bill with the same CR, (hopefully) editing out anything that seemed a bit strange or tricky to handle easily in combat or might swing things overly. Undead are potentially tricky in that they have funny powers, particular if they are Insubstantial. But that becomes an issue only as you climb levels, and I reasoned that these issues would sort themselves out as the enemies climb levels. After all, the CR of your opponents would probably be significantly in excess of anything summoned.

Yeah easy mistake to make, the original creators probably decided to go with 4th level spell because arcane caster.

Should the paladin's mount die, the paladin may not summon another mount for 30 days or until she gains a paladin level, whichever comes first. During this 30-day period, the paladin takes a –1 penalty on attack and weapon damage rolls.

Looked over the monsters I was not familiar with and nothing seemed off.

Everything else is more or less just a refined form of what we already discussed about so not much to say about that.

Few questions though

1) Start using this version after this encounter?

2) Masters champion Standard ability array= 15 14 13 12 10 8? This is/n't counting the increases from human and the template?

Yes, use this version once we complete this encounter.

The standard array is 13, 12, 11, 10, 9, 8 - that's set out in the Bestiary. The one you quoted is the advanced array. The basic array is the standard for creatures with NPC classes (like your champion).

I guess the 8 goes on CON?

Oh, and that doesn't include the racial bonus or the bonuses from the template.

Aaah roger, this is what you get from looking up databases and google instead of bothering with the book.

I'm away for the long weekend (Canadian Thanksgiving) and do not know how often I'll be able to post, if at all. Please bot me as needed.

And Happy Canadian Thanksgiving!

Didn't know Canadians had their own version. What are you giving thanks for? For not being American? (I know, cheap shot. But hey, what do we Brits know anyway?)

Hah!

I asked an Australian coworker of mine of she was going to celebrate Paul Hogan day. She pretended to be amused but i'm sure she was slightly offended. Haha

FYI, i'm currently primarily posting from my cell phone, dealing with crappy Hawaii hotel wi-fi (it's like they expect me to go outside or something) for four days until i fly to a different hotel with unknown wi-fi potency for an unknown number of days.

So, while i will be posting, they will be slightly more infrequent and most typically brief.

Copy/pasted to all games.

Guys, I'm running a Dark Sun game that's getting a reboot. It's converting from 4e to PF and I'm also looking for one or two more players. Anyone interested? If so, the discussion thread is here and the gameplay thread is here.

I'd be interested! I'll have a look at the conversion site you linked.

Flying tomorrow so may not post.