DM NomadSage's Curse of the Crimson Throne (Inactive)

Game Master nomadicc

I need to rework Mirarae a bit, got some inspiration today... Hold on...

You should stick it in Homebrew and see if anyone likes it as well. Anyone see Umbral Reaver's thread on The Colossus? Such a cool monster ideer.

Against The Colossus

Its the good version of the Ebon Triad! =)

Mirarae
The Duskflower
Hyacinth Candle
Night-Eye
Lady of the Three Balances

CN/LN/N goddess

The changeable Mirarae is a goddess whose worship is in serious decline. In the days of Ancient Osirion, she was hailed as the sister of Sarenrae, the queen of the night sky. She was a patron of sailors due to the moon's influence on the tide; she was beloved of Witches, who so often held their coven meetings at night and bathed in her magical light; but she was also a strong champion of balance, which often took the form of redress and retribution. Any creatures that lived mostly in the night, be they good or evil, were favoured by her.

The increasing popularity of Calistria and her philosophy of vengeance gradually eclipsed Mirarae, and with the fall of Ancient Osirion most of her ancient rites and legends are forgotten. Those who worship the divine in the changeing faces of the moon do not know that it has a name, or what her ancient rites are. What few myths still circulate describe the Ancient Osiriani moon goddess as a demonic patron of were-beasts and things that stalk in the darkness when the moon is hidden from sight. A few scholars know more of the truth, but even they fear Mirarae for her ability to change. Some Dusk Elf tribes remain loyal to the goddess who favoured them in the days gone by. It is believed that Calistria condoned the slaughter of so many Dusk Elves by their Light Elf cousins. Witches also continue to favour her, with many seeing her as the Moon Patron they draw on, but their faith in the goddess damns her in the eyes of those who see all Witches as creatures of evil.

Doctrine:
Mirarae teaches the importance of balance. The moon is the balance to the sun in that it brings light to the night sky. Its phases allow light and dark to shift places in a steady rhythm, allowing for balance between the two of them. Likewise, mortals should seek balance in their lives for all things. The way she advises creatures to achieve that balance changes with the phases of the moon, however. However she changes, she always claims to be unconcerned with good and evil; she bestows her blessings equally on all creatures, and it is up to mortals to use them how they see fit.

Phases
During the new moon, Mirarae is Chaotic Neutral. The sickle moon is seen as Mirarae's slit eye, looking down on a world wrapped in darkness. During this time, Mirarae advises mortals to restore imbalance in the dark. A knife to the back balances injustice; a quick leap and snap of jaws soon balances hunger; a nimble invasion of another's home balances poverty.
When she manifests, Mirarae appears as a vampiric tiefling woman wrapped in a shroud of star-studded darkness, her face pale as the moon. Her eyes and hair are as black as the great batwings that carry her through the sky. Her horns are like the horns of the sickle moon.
The CN phase of Mirarae has the following Domains:
Domains: Air, Darkness, Trickery, Water
Subdomains: Cloud, Deception, Night, Oceans, Thievery

When the moon is half full, Mirarae is fully Neutral. She grants equal opportunity to light and dark, good and evil, chaos and law, and favours none. She advises mortals to adjust imbalances in their lives with detachment and control, and recommends magic as the ideal tool. Magic itself is balanced, arcane to divine, and balances mundane life by its very nature. When not dealing with imbalance, the goddess recommends caution and wisdom. Let the light expose danger, let darkness hide you from it.
When she manifests during this phase, Mirarae takes on the form of a handsome human woman with pale skin and platinum blonde hair. Her face is covered by a half mask of ebony, her body half exposed, the covered half draped with a robe of black velvet.
The N phase of Mirarae has the following Domains:
Domains: Air, Darkness, Magic, Water
Subdomains: Arcane, Cloud, Divine, Night, Oceans

When the moon is full, Mirarae is Lawful Neutral. She advocates the redress of imbalance in greater openness. When one creature leaps out from the shadows to face another in the full light, Mirarae applauds. When blades clash, her light shines upon the steel. When fists find flesh and bone, it sparkles in the flying blood. It equally illuminates the fur of hunting werebeasts and charging champions.
When she manifests, she assumes the form of a voluptuous Dusk Elf, her dark body exposed for all to see, her eyes and hair shining with all the radiance and colour of the full moon. She is frequently seen riding on the back of a dire Worg or a were-beast of some sort across the night sky. In this phase, she is the mover of the oceans, both feared and beloved of sailors and all those who travel at night, hoping that her light will bless their path. Sadly, were-creatures also howl to her in this phase, as do those unfortunates who suffer from 'lunacy', the madness brought about by the sight of the full moon.
The Lawful Neutral phase has the following Domains:
Domains: Air, Darkness, Madness, Water
Subdomains: Cloud, Insanity, Night, Nightmare, Oceans

Regardless of her phase, Mirarae's favoured weapon is the Khopesh.

Those who worship her and draw spells from her must choose on her Phases with which they are compatible to focus on; the Phase chosen determines the Domains which a Cleric can access, and its philosophy should influence her worshipper's actions, if only a little.

Relations:
Mirarae maintains friendly contact with Sarenrae, despite their different philosophies and the terrible fate that connects them. The Dawnflower and the Duskflower know that they are balanced, the twin rulers of the skies. As Sarenrae is resigned to the fact that Mirarae eclipses her from time to time, Mirarae is resigned to the fact that one day in the distant future, Sarenrae will be her executioner.
This bond of prophesied death is a secret of Mirarae's faith, carefully preserved only by the high priests and kept from most worshippers, not to mention unbelievers. Neither goddess knows why Sarenrae would ever need to strike Mirarae down, but both know it is inevitable.

Mirarae and Pharasma are on good terms with one another, though they rarely have time to socialize. Cynics may claim that Mirarae is preparing for her inevitable death and hopes to achieve a peaceful afterlife by getting in good with Pharasma, but her clergy claims that she respects the goddess of death because death is the balance to life.

Mirarae's relationship with Groetius, however, is chilly and distant. The two are not openly hostile to one another, but Mirarae resents Groetius' lunar form. Also, the prophecy of her death states that the liberation of Groetius to end Golarion will be the sign that signals her own execution at the hands of Sarenrae. While Mirarae accepts her fate, she is not eager for it to come to pass, and so she prefers for Groetius to stay where he is.

As a patron of Witches and magic in general in her True Neutral phase, Mirarae has a good rapport with Nethys, and there are rumours that the two have been lovers in the past. Any connection they might have is lost the instant Mirarae changes phase, however, which is probably for the best; in his madness, Nethys might ruin what they share if they stayed together for too long.

There is a terrible hatred between Mirarae and Calistria. The Duskflower carries a grudge over the slaying of her Dusk Elf followers, and Calistria is still bitter over the fact that any Elves were lured away from her at all. Neither goddess has launched an open attack yet, but each spins plots of revenge in the shadows, and the clergy of either goddess is rarely safe when that of the other is nearby.

Mirarae despises Zon-Kuthon, who unbalances the darkness completely, and is generally friendly to anyone who wishes to upset his plans.

Like all the other gods of Golarion, she is a staunch enemy of Rovagug, the Rough Beast. She likewise despises fiends of all kinds.

Maybe she's the last thing to die before that jerko Groetius shows up. Then Rovagug awakens and it's time for Tarmon Gaidon, or Dagor Dagorath, or something.

The prophecy is a bit of an astrology joke. I read once that as time moves on and suns age, they can cast off their outer mantles as they go from red giant to red dwarf. A blast of heat like that would fry most of their orbiting planets' surfaces and wipe out smaller objects. When Golarion's sun does, it will destroy the moon. ^^;

Well, she's in Homebrew now, sailing into that dark and uncertain sky...

Latest tweak of Mirarae, Triple Goddess of Moon and Vengeance... :p

Well done, Absinthe! She's magnificent.

Thank you kindly. ^^

The forum is acting up again. I can't seem to get into any of my character profiles or the hotlinks to my campaigns. *puzzled* I keep getting redirected to the main page.

Me too.

Yep. I had to ride my chocobo to get here.

I hope you fed it some extra chocolate-covered oats for its trouble. ;)

LINK

*snrk* Funny. ^^

It's a bit quiet in here, though, isn't it...?

No loot to divvy up yet. :D

Poor Lamm. This is going to go down like a Miami Vice episode where the drug lord gets shot 10000 times and bobs around in the water face down. (or is that Scarface? same diff)

It's been too long since a good (and topical) Miami Vice reference.

I've been reviewing the feat selection in Ultimate Combat. Nightmare Fist and Nightmare Weaver look rather tempting, except for my low Charisma score... I'm also tempted to Two-weapon fighting and Two-weapon defence, to maximize my sneak attack potential. Any thoughts?

Well TWF is a rogue staple for obvious reasons. You can't go wrong with it. Nightmare fists looks really cool and I would go with that just for style, plus it's not bad either. Though since you can only cast darkness 1/day its use is limited. That and the rest of us can't see(sans Mel) in the dark so darkness hinders us. I think going with a monk style(one that isn't crane or snake) would kinda cool actually. You thinking of multiclassing into monk?

If anything, I was thinking of picking up a few ranks of Fighter, to smooth my passage into the Duelist PrC. It'd offer me some significant combat benefits while augmenting my 'low-armour' build.

If I ever do take Nightmare Fist, it would probably be for emergency purposes, for instance if Absinthe is caught needing to fight someone or something without backup.

Ah okay. I would reccomend against duelist since you only have 12 int so even if you increased it at every opportunity, it would only be 2-3 more since it caps at your int mod. As opposed to going straight rogue and using Offensive Defense, that would give you more AC in the long run.

Hmm, good to know! The downside to that I see, though, is that Offensive Defence only lasts for one round. Also, I thought that Duelist gives you a +1 to AC per level of the class?

It does, but it caps at your int bonus.

When wearing light or no armor and not using a shield, a duelist adds 1 point of Intelligence bonus (if any) per duelist class level to her Dexterity bonus to modify Armor Class while wielding a melee weapon. If a duelist is caught flat-footed or otherwise denied her Dexterity bonus, she also loses this bonus.

And Offensive Defense does last for 1 round, but you can put it back up by sneak attacking again. As long as you get a sneak attack versus your target, you get that bonus against him.

Note that if you're a class that doesn't benefit significantly from any mental stats you can use a small Duelist splash to get some AC out of the headband slot (The Int headband) but even that's kind of questionable.

Alright, if that doesn't get him to talk, I don't know what will.

Well, I've got an elaborate backup plan if that doesn't work in the immediate.

How elaborate?

Actually, it works pretty well with what you did, although I wish I'd thought of it with more time to set up. You threatened him with a horrible fate. Rosa might just have one in mind.

Well, go for it. I'm tapped out of ideas.

Would prefer to make sure this didn't work first - never use the elaborate when the simple can work.

True.

Merry Christmas etc! Will resume regular posting in a day or three... =)

Merry X-mas to everyone!

And to all goodwill and a good night. ;)

Merry Christmas, e-Lamm-inators!

Merry Christmas all!

Been traveling. Just connecting. Merry Christmas!

Did the croc make its save vs. Mel's sleep hex?

I hope this doesn't count as Absinthe going evil... :-\ I don't usually have my characters execute bound prisoners, but it seemed appropriate to what was happening and we already know the guard considered the man low priority. They might not even have bothered to arrest him, for all we know.

Eugh. Now I'm starting to feel morally icky... o_o

Yea, I'm having a hard time figuring out how I wanted Demitri to handle this. On the one hand, he's tortured and filled with grief and emotion. On the other he wants to be a good example and to be internally strong enough to do the right thing.

Guess Absinthe is going to a temple soon, for confession and atonement... >_<;

It's all good, IMO... Lamm was pretty vile. Maybe not on the lawful side of things, but certainly not evil.

Unless there's a reason for the team to stick together right now, Absinthe heads off to tend her spiritual needs at a secret, and little-visited shrine of Mirarae, provided she can be considered canon. ;)
In RL terms, she's off to confession -- but without mentioning anyone's names!

Ugh....18 posts while asleep and I have work tonight...I'm gonna have to catch up when I can.

*pat pat* It'll be okay. ^^

Unless there's a reason for the team to stick together right now, Absinthe heads off to tend her spiritual needs at a secret, and little-visited shrine of Mirarae, provided she can be considered canon. ;)

In RL terms, she's off to confession -- but without mentioning anyone's names!

The world is filled with little blasphemies... =)

You all have yet to inspect the "loot" and handle the children.

Even though I recommended we do so...

Seems like a good time to point this out, but Pathfinder has rules for lifestyles and living expenses (scroll to the bottom)