I have two characters whose stories will probably never be revealed, especially since they are passed over NPCs I made as choices to round out a 3 player party running Hollow's Last Hope and Crown of the Kobold King. The first is Kid, a Female Halfling Rogue (Flicher Archetype). Not many choose to end up in Falcon's Hollow by choice which makes it a decent place to hide if you don't want to be found and Kid didn't want to be found. Having escaped from Cheliax she hides among the drown trodden people of the town keeping a low profile stealing just enough to survive and only from those few who can afford it. Her life has become one of concealment and deception tricking even those few who know her into thinking she is just a human child. She barely remembers her real name having adopted the name Kid which on some level actually aids in her ruse. She has become close to the children of the town and can point the PCs in the direction they need to go or if convinced even join them in their adventure to save the lost children.
I have to disagree with Isger simply because Cheliax definitely wants to keep it due to the importance of it's strategic location between the mountains and the trade routes it gives access to. If you were sent in by House Thrune to bring order to Isger that would be another matter. Iobaria seems like a good place to me though, the lack of population, vast stretches of land, eerie cyclops ruins, and a few detailed cities. The terrifying and reoccurring plaques seem like the only down side which could still be a great plot point for the campaign. One place that hasn't been mentioned yet is the Whistling Plains which lies on the eastern edge of Taldor and stretches from the borders of Galt to the deserts of Qadira and then to the east, deep into the heart of the Padishah Empire of Kelesh. I could see Taldor setting up a group to create a vassal state as a border between it and these nations, particularly Qadria.
The immediate benefit is that the weapon activates it's powers itself meaning you don't have to waste a standard action on a command word. And they would only take over if you are opposed in some way, if you were making the item yourself it's seems unlikely you would create one that had goals or ideals other then what you wanted. Mistakes and cursed items do happen however. And the simplest of Intelligent Weapons have ego scores that are in the single digits which is a breeze to make as a Will save, even for a Wizard high enough level to make said item.
Your examples of the undead doing very basic tasks to complete a simple goal is making me think of a huge if grisly Rube Goldberg Machine.
While I don't know the exact build my group faced a Court Bard by the name of the Jester, he had a helper in a harlequin outfit. She was a Rogue with the Acrobat Archtype. The last we saw of her was her mocking us as she was escaping by backflipping over a wall, which she shorted and caught her by the waist. She had enough momentum to be thrown to the other side though. It was a very fitting moment for a Harley Quinn.
The Outcast King from Council of Thieves. One of the freakiest monsters I've ever fought. The mini the GM made for it caused confusion and fear in us players.
That is your choice in your world. But generally speaking no one other then a expectionally good LG character would try to redeem a monsterous creature. The normal NPC would do just what the wizard did and burn the creatures they knew would most likely cause them harm in the future. Heck there are LG characters built solely on eradicating evil with little mercy to those they see as evil and yes that would still be LG. It seems like you are making the monsters 'more human' or trying to force moral dilemmas on them.
What is East of Taldor?
During one game session we were facing down an Illithid that had upset my rogue greatly. Two combats before he had drunk down an Elixir of Fire Breath and and really wanted to use it before he exploded. We were using the 2nd Ed rules for the potion, more powerful but more dangerous. I luckily got initiative and ran forward and let him have the fire breath full blast. Quite a bit of damage as he didn't make the save. Now what happened next was a bit of confusion and retconing. Essentially I ticked off the Illithid enough he let off a lightning bolt that knocked the party to half. The fighter of party let loose a fireball from his Necklace of Fireball, this is when the GM says 'Good idea, I think you'll get one of those back.' Paraphrasing of course, but we stopped for a moment and reminded him what happens when someone who has a Necklace of Fireball fails his saving throw against fire. 'Wait, what?' The answer of course is Boom, Big Badaboom, if the item fails it's savings throw too. It did and a full necklace detonated around it's neck 'before' the Lightning bolt was fired off. The lesson is large magical explosions sometimes alter the flow of time and GM's should make sure they know all the items a main villain has. As a side note the GM was a bit disappointed he didn't get to eat anyone's brain.
A small little line in the skills section that might save your characters life. "If you have 3 or more ranks in Acrobatics, you gain a +3 dodge bonus to AC when fighting defensively instead of the usual +2, and a +6 dodge bonus to AC when taking the total defense action instead of the usual +4." |
