Here we go!
Character creation rules:
-20 point buy
-Max hp for 1st level
-No equipment to start with
-Two extra skill points at 1st level
-Choose one trait (yes, that's a reversal from my previous statement)
-There will be an additional trait-like benefit associated with your crime...I'll post that soon.
Have at it!
Done.
You win!
(I know, you had a head start and all, but still...)
Working through final tweaks on the build, as well as notating the were-wolf element we hammered out, Havoc.
I'll drop our solution into a spoiler, as well as how it plays into his advancement plans.
And just to make sure, you want to (for the time being), have Scent be a bonus to Perception? If so, how much? +2? +4?
Let me know and I'll work it into his final mechanics.
You win!
(I know, you had a head start and all, but still...)
Sweet! WhaddaIwin? Everyone gets upped to a 25 point build? A guard foolishly falls in love with me? A brand new box of Crayolas?
... a brand new box of Crayolas falls in love with her?
It's possible... Crayolas have a notoriously low Will save and Price is charming.
Okay, Trait = suspicious.
So other than your ruling on Scent, Cain is g2g. :)
Ready for approval (hopefully).
I'll have my final sheet tweaked tonight....
So we have 3 women and 2 men... hmmmm.
E = Evil = Excess Estrogen
Final, extra evil crunch up.
I'll have Xanos revised to your new specs in a bit.
It'll be a bit for me, but I should have it up by tomorrow.
Ok, so that means that the poor necromancer starts without his Bonded Item and without his Spellbook and component pouch. Ouch.
Do I have any spells still memorized?
Ok, all done.
New avatar selected for now, until he manages to his hands on a mask.
Gwen's ready.
So we have 3 women and 2 men... hmmmm.
E = Evil = Excess Estrogen
It's hard to argue with Math.
Oof. The man spits the truth!
So, everybody's skills and what-not updated on their profiles? If so, I'll run a skills audit of our group to see if we have any gaping holes in our collective skill-set.
I figured we would fill any gaps with mustache-twirling bluster.
That one is on the guys....
I don't know... Gwyn could be sportin' a 'stache underneath that little face cover thingy...
Nope, Gwyn was groomed to be the perfect little noblewoman. It was just the lessons in etiquette that never stuck. :P
and noblewomen shave their chickstaches.
Among other unmentionables....or so I heard.
Soldiers have no time for such poncy fruppery..
That's fine. Every adventure needs a hairy monster sidekick. You can be Gwyn's Chewbacca.
I will quite enjoy filling the Raging Wookie party role. But who is our Jar-Jar?
Before we get started, I was hoping we could talk about how this gme will run.
I've been in one fun evil game, and a handful of not-fun ones. In the last one, the game ended because on of the characters, a priestess of Calistra, decided "evil" meant "b+%$!y" and tried to turn every encounter into a graphic seduction scene. (no joke, happened on these boards)
I like the idea of an evil game, but I don't like the idea of constant infighting.
I'm hoping that the rest of you are like me, and appreciate it when evil is organized and willing to work with each other for mutual gain.
As such, I was hoping we could discuss our thoughts on the subject of playing bad guys, and name some of the characters we're drawing inspiration from.
For me, it's Hannibal Lecter and Victor Zsasz. Xanos is way too smart and has complete antipathy to the human condition. He's also very polite and even gets along with people even though he feels bad that they are so controlled by their unfortunate limits.
I will quite enjoy filling the Raging Wookie party role. But who is our Jar-Jar?
Don't know, but I look forward to using Raise Dead to make sure he dies enough times to sate my loathing.
Before we get started, I was hoping we could talk about how this gme will run.
I've been in one fun evil game, and a handful of not-fun ones. In the last one, the game ended because on of the characters, a priestess of Calistra, decided "evil" meant "b$*$%y" and tried to turn every encounter into a graphic seduction scene. (no joke, happened on these boards)
My god, you simply must share a link, assuming the thread hasn't been obliterated with extreme prejudice...
I like the idea of an evil game, but I don't like the idea of constant infighting.
Well, I WAS planning on shiving you all in the back after the first initiative roll....
I'm hoping that the rest of you are like me, and appreciate it when evil is organized and willing to work with each other for mutual gain.
On a serious note, I think I agree. I would argue that a decent amount of intra-party bickering is probably unavoidable (and true to the characters), given the nature of the characters we are throwing together here. Hey, there is a REASON evil is hard to organize - overcoming the inherent selfishness of the evil path takes work. I'm hoping that the party will come together organically based on the trials and tribulations presented by the adventure. It certainly helps that two of the party already have an amicable relationship.
As such, I was hoping we could discuss our thoughts on the subject of playing bad guys, and name some of the characters we're drawing inspiration from.
For me, it's Hannibal Lecter and Victor Zsasz. Xanos is way too smart and has complete antipathy to the human condition. He's also very polite and even gets along with people even though he feels bad that they are so controlled by their unfortunate limits.
I'm not sure Kalina has a villainous role model. More a product of a woman trying to survive in a medieval-like epoch. Think, say Monza Murcatto in Best Served Cold but with the amorality turned up to 11.
My god, you simply must share a link, assuming the thread hasn't been obliterated with extreme prejudice...
You asked for it. Bottom of the linked page is where it really started to make me facepalm.
I couldn't begin to tell you all the influences behind my characters. Mainly because most a mash up of previous characters of mine for stories and some interesting ideas, and different aspects of different characters from other sources, and a lot of the process is subconscious.
I've never played in an evil game before, but I will try to avoid the pitfalls.
Gwyn's two main flaws are a lapse of empathy and a serious case of hubris. On a conscious level she's humble and self-deprecating, but her desires and reasoning fly in the face of it. The reason she tried to target the royal palace was to see if she could, but also because, deep down, she believed she wouldn't have gotten caught.
Her other flaw is a little more interesting. She does have a sense of empathy. She is capable of feeling bad for causing harm and good for helping others, but she has buried those feelings deep into herself. While this means she has an almost Joker-esque level of sadism, it's also quite possible that she'll snap emotionally or mentally.
In the mean time, she'll be a vicious, happy-go-lucky thief who dual-wields short-swords.
I don't think you'll have to worry too much about Gwyn killing the party, she's pragmatic enough to know when it's a good time to not sell out your allies, doesn't mean she won't try and steal your stuff and embarrass you in public if she thinks she can get away with it.
@ Xanos:
...
wow. You were not kidding.
I've played in and run a few evil campaigns. From my perspective... evil is as nuanced as any other alignment. Not every evil-doer is selfish, self-centered, arrogant, narcissistic, blood-thirsty, or lacking impulse control. I don't think evil needs to have any of those characteristics. Similarly, being evil doesn't preclude a character from being loyal or even self-less (albeit in an evil cause).
Looking at this campaign scenario 'realistically'... We are 1st level, which means the city watch could give us a run for our money. That fact alone should deflate any character's arrogance (one of the biggest friction points IMO) to a reasonable level.
Also, we are five evil characters against an entire country filled with people who want us cooked or crucified. The odds that any of us could individually bring down this regime, or prosper, are pretty much nil. So self-interest, self-preservation, and achieving our various goals pretty much dictates that the dumbest thing any of us could do is kill each other or spend too much time squabbling. Personally, I think that is more than enough justification for all of our characters to cooperate - unless you are playing a totally insane mad-dog killer who has a death-wish. And, in that case, you should be in a solo campaign as that isn't a co-op scenario build. :)
Regarding Price in specific... She is built on the principles of a pragmatic and professional insurgent. She is fighting an asymmetric war against a far stronger enemy. Going head-to-head against the forces of good is a bad bet at this point. So she blends in and works towards achieving her goals quietly, efficiently, and without mustache twirling or maniacal laughter. Given that evil-doers in Talingarde are grossly outnumbered, she has no problem working with anyone that can help forward her goals. And since she doesn't expect 'charity' from other evil-doers, she is willing to help others achieve their goals in exchange.
Personality-wise Price is self-controlled, unassuming, and generally polite. She should be relatively 'frictionless' in terms of party squabbling. Bickering and mustache twirling are foolish and a waste of time as far as she is concerned.
THanks for bringing this up, Xanos. I've definitely had it on my mind.
I pretty much agree with you and Price 100%. I think it can be tricky to play an evil character who values (or at least understands the necessity of) a strong team and teamwork. But I sure have heard enough horror stories of evil games devolving into who can kill whom and get out with all the money.
I hope it's obvious that i kind of built Cain with this in mind. He's got a hard-wired pack mentality. Yes, he's got some serious contempt for all the weak-minded sheep that blindly follow the hypocritical Mitrans, but he knows that he can only rob, cheat, and murder his way back to the top of the food chain in his territory (Talingarde) with the cooperation of a seriously focused, talented, and ruthless Pack at his back.
Will he be best buds with everyone in the group and want to have sleepovers? Probably not, but at the very least, Im hoping he can find the motivation to embrace (at the very least) a healthy professional respect for each member of the team. And -- as Price said -- at that point it is in his best interest to insure their survival through whatever resistance they run into.
Just my 2 cents.
I'd love to hear what Cry Havoc! has to say about all this. :)
Pursuant to the burgeoning teamwork of Evil Squad, does anyone have (non-spoilery) knowledge of whether the outlines of the campaign are conducive to such? I can image the tasks set before us will have a rather large impact on the team dynamic....
I don't have a clue, though I do know that the write-up for the game specifically mentions the focus on an evil campaign where teamwork is imperative for success.
Me neither. I do recall seeing (in one of the recruitment posts, I think) some mention of infiltrating a Mitran stronghold - so it sounds like the odds are seriously stacked against us and we need a wide range of subtle and not-so-subtle skills. :)
Just the whole tenor of the thing -- NE or LE highly recommended, even Anti-Paladins get a waiver on having to be CE so they can play, teamwork emphasized, etc. -- makes me think this is the kind of campaign where if we try to bulldoze our way through it, we will get rolled up.
And that's what reason we got some folk wit sum smartz up in here.
LOL. Absolutely! I think we are a bit light in certain Knowledge areas but (and this is my biggest concern) we don't have much healing. It looks to me like Xanos' Channel Energy can only be used to influence undead. Speak up Xanos if I'm wrong on that. I'll be relieved if I'm mistaken.
So, it seems the magical healing in the party is Price's measly two CLW spells. I think we're going to want to 'acquire' a Wand of CLW or a stack of potions real quick.
Yep. That should be one of our first priorities. If we can manage to keep rolling up to level 5, Cain will gain access to divine spells - namely the Cure spells. So at that point, he can be armed with some wands/scrolls and support heal.
Up until then, he's trained in Heal, but that's the best I can manage to contribute.
And until then, we'll want to be smart about our tactics in and out of combat. If we can out-smart an encounter, we should (and this comes from a guy who LOVES ME SOME COMBAT!). :)
When that fails, we need to do our best to work together, control the field, and KILL FAST AND EFFICIENT!
It looks to me like Xanos' Channel Energy can only be used to influence undead.
That's correct.
Something tells me I should be glad I'm going to be keeping diplomacy, bluff and all the other rogue-y skills at max.
I can help avoid combat, but if it does come down to it, helping me get flanks will help a lot. +2 to hit and another 1d6 of damage can really help take down the goodies.
Another thing we can do is disguise ourselves and get information that way. As for getting wands and stuff, well, I guess we'll be helping ourselves to a five-finger discount a lot.
I think we're going to want to 'acquire' a Wand of CLW or a stack of potions real quick.
First stop...armory.
Second stop...prison apothecary.
Third floor... Women's apparel and lingerie. :)
Squeekie bones?
Well, whatever kind of lingerie you fancy there, stud. XD
Sigh... no... squeakie toy in the shape of a bone?
: kicks dirt :
Pet Toys are on the Fourth floor... and if you wanna stitch a squeaky toy bone onto the old banana hammock, you go right ahead.
I'll be over here gouging my eyes out with a spoon. This is an eeeevil campaign but I didn't think it would go that eeeevil. :)
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Posting this out of concern that you are being Trolled, dear players.
I intend to make this one post and then i'm not coming back here, i'm not looking for an ongoing flame war or whatever.
I'm not going to discount the possibility that Malvoisin just has an extremely chaotic life or personality, or that hes worked out kinks in his schedule and this is the game that actually sticks. Maybe even a serious illness that makes these optimistic games problematic to keep up. A couple of times hes mentioned being ill or RL getting very busy before never returning to an IC or OOC thread, only for another game to spring up some time later.
But heres the track record here on the PbP forums for him and his aliases. I'm an avid fan and propogator of PbP and it is upsetting to see players get excited by games over and over with DM's that run off from their games on a regular basis. If Cry Havoc a.k.a Malvoisin has a reasonable explanation that satisfies everyone then by all means game on...
Council of Thieves game abandoned on page 3
Legacy of Fire game abandoned immediately after starting the game thread
Rise of the Runelords game abandoned on page 4 and taken over by another GM
Curse of the Crimson Throne game abandoned on page 1
Homebrew game abandoned before creation of the IC thread
Legacy of Fire game abandoned on page 5 and taken over by another DM
DungeonaDay game abandoned on page 1 and taken over by another DM
Curse of the Crimson Throne game abandoned on page 5 and taken over by another DM
Kingmaker game abandoned before starting the game thread
Ruins of Madaro Shanti abandoned immediately after beginning IC thread and taken over by another DM
Zeitgeist game abandoned after one page
Legacy of Fire game abandoned before creation of the game thread
Maybe the 13th game will be lucky this time rather than unlucky...
Well Meant Tip: Good PbP DM's do vet potential players, their playing habits and writing styles before selecting. You may want to do the same for any DM you consider signing up to.
I appreciate your concern. It matches my at this point. I was trying to give him the benefit of the doubt.
I guess we'll see if that was a good call or not.
Hmmm... that's a track record.
Hmm. If it doesn't work out that's too bad. Looks like a good group...