This character, on the other hand, is an outsider: Arian is a suli-jann from Qadira, who has come allll the way north to leave behind her bad childhood back in Kelesh lands.
Arian is also designed as a front-line fighter, but in a different way. As a spell warrior skald, she has a reasonable amount of fighting power, not quite on par with a typical fighter, but she uses a reach weapon to control the front line. Though her AC is not great, she has magic to provide concealment, giving enemies a miss chance, and her suli heritage provides her with a small amount of resistance to energy attacks of many kinds. She also can use her skald music to temporarily enhance the party's weapons. Arian also uses medium mithral armor, and several levels down the road she may gain the Shield Brace feat to push her AC up further.
Arian is more skilled than Marten in a broad sense, with strong social skills and understanding of the planes and extraplanar creatures. She has the ability to counterspell enemy magic, and she can also grant her rage powers to other party members, including the ability to survive going below 0 hit points by turning some damage nonlethal and granting a short AC bonus.
Arian is best suited to minor kingdom roles, because she's an outsider; with decent Strength and Charisma she can occupy the same sorts of spots as Marten, but she doesn't come with several built-in recruits.
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Anyway, let me know if you want a new addition, and if so, which one (or, as I noted before, tell me to come up with something else). Thanks!
I'm having an extremely hard time figuring out where things are on the map, because of the two levels and the fact that I can't actually see any tokens showing where the gremlins are. Not to mention that I don't appear anywhere on the map. That makes it impossible for me to plan.
Arian hunkers down and points toward the ladder with her glaive, then tilts her head questioningly.
Sense Motive DC 15:
She is checking to see when Viridi is ready to make a break for the ladder.
I'm leaning on the Bluff rules for sending hidden messages, which say that it's DC 15 for a simple message and DC 20 for a complex message. Arian isn't deliberately hiding anything, but I'm using these rules to approximate Viridi trying to read her body language.
The boards are currently screwing up and refuse to allow me to post; I can only preview in the gameplay thread at the moment. On the preview I rolled a 5 for a total of 6 initiative.
We are all outside the building waiting to see if anything responds to our presence. Since nothing has responded yet, we are waiting for the party leader (whoever that is) to make a decision about where to go.
Arian points briefly at the skulls with her polearm, wordlessly, and cocks her head to one side as if to indicate surprise that someone else has been hunting gnolls. Then she points to the west and raises a cupped hand, like a question mark, once Nasir looks her way.
"You got another horse or am I hoofin' it myself?" says Arian. "I'm ready to fight gnolls if the need arises." She hefts her polearm and spins it handily. "Whether with beef or chicken."
Arian glances to one side, casting her gaze out over the sere landscape of her homeland - the scrub brush, the tiny twigs with crows perched on them, the small rock formations filled with tiny lizards.
"... yes. Yes, I do."
She turns back to Viridi and says, "Gremlins, eh? That sounds like a right pain. I suppose we'll see if this old church is more of the same or something more fearsome."
"So..." she adds cheekily, "... are any of these yahoos good in a fight? I mean other than Nasir. He is obviously a slab of beef with a side of smash."
"Viridi!" says Arian, equally pleased. "Of all the good luck! Yes, I missed the original caravan connection, but you were encamped long enough for me to catch up. I had quite a trip, some with a goatherder and his entire flock, a brief stint on camelback - but that's all behind us now."
The colorful woman posts her polearm to one side and steps up to hold her hands out to Viridi in greeting. "Gremlins! Sounds awful. Well we are certainly getting all the adventure we thought we would! How have you been holding up in the desert weather?"
After the discussion with Lady Almah, Arian settles in to the camp, making a spot for herself. Night falls and she settles in on a rock to look over her jeweled setar. She adjusts the strings carefully, checks the tension, and keeps a close ear to it as she experimentally plucks it a few times. Finally, she plays a slow, calming melody that wafts across the campsite to carry people off to slumber.
~~~~~~~~~~
In the morning, Arian is up bright and early, having already cleaned her face and stowed her gear. Leaning on the post of her pole arm, she nods as Nasir speaks up, and says, "That's the right of it - I'm here to help at Lady Alma's direction. What kinds of hazards have you encountered so far? Do we have any idea what we might expect at this old building? Snakes? Gnolls? Giant scorpions?"
The woman makes an abbreviated curtsey and switches to Kelish and says, "I am Arian - I have come here to join the caravan to Kelmarane. I missed an earlier connection but had the good fortune to catch the caravan here at Sultan's Grasp. You, I presume, are part of the caravan retinue, Nasir?"
The traveller with the pole weapon and the setar stops short in front of Nasir and pulls down the scarf from her face, revealing a sun-kissed young woman with dark hair, a dusky complexion, and a wry expression. She has the rare golden-colored eyes that some Keleshites bear. At 5' 8", she is almost a foot shorter than Nasir.
"Hail," she says. "I seek the Lady Almah. Is she yonder?"
She has a rich, velvety voice, surprising for someone who's probably been breathing dust and sand all day. Likely goes well with the setar that she carries - closer inspection shows that it does, in fact, bear elaborate painting, lacquering, and inlaid jewels.
The woman leans her polearm vaguely in the direction of the large tent to indicate.
Since you asked to keep things spoilered, here you go.
A lone figure strides out of the desert in a long, gauzy robe with a hood and a scarf over the face. Dusty studded leather armor provides a modicum of protection, while beneath the white linen cloak is the occasional flash of color from a multi-layered skirt of reds and oranges. A hefty leather pack, well-tooled and lacquered, rides on the traveler's back, with a thick waterskin dangling from one side and a carefully-stowed setar on the other; the setar occasionally sparkles, like it is catching the desert sunlight on a jewel or piece of glass. The figure hikes with the aid of a pole that has a dark cap of metal on one end and a broad, curving blade with a curling hook on the other.
After pausing at the edge of camp and squinting at the tents and wagons, the figure starts walking again at a brisk pace toward the large wagon and sumptuous tent next to it.
Dug up the wealth info from your recruitment thread and finished up. Will take a little work for the character to be a strong contributor, but even a few early improvements will go a long way. Taking up Viridi’s suggestion of being pals from an earlier venture.
I started rebuilding Arian here into a skald (spell warrior), which will provide some backup healing in a pinch, and a little extra fighting (she uses a reach weapon). Couldn't squeeze in trapfinding - just not enough points to make it work.
Based on party composition, it seems like having some additional healing would be useful, as there's one healer for six party members. It also looks like having an additional front line would be good, as the lynchpin of the front line is the bloodrager, with a rogue looking for flanking and a ranger doing archery, rounded out by the oradin doing some minor support melee and the transmuter doing buffs and debuffs.
The ideas that come to mind are:
* Bard could help with minor spot-healing and the usual bardic buffing. Story-wise this might be rebuilding Arian here to actually be a bard instead of a slayer, so she's a wandering singer and storyteller from the region. PF tie with Viridi would probably be early in Arian's career while just getting her feet dusty with the adventuring lifestyle.
* Hunter could do assistance in the front line and also have some off-healing (possibly grabbing something for Trapfinding, since the rogue traded that away with the knife master archetype). Story-wise that would probably manifest as a human character who's a nomad, used to moving about in the desert on long journeys, relying on hunting and trapping to survive, interested in fighting off the infestation of gnolls and gremlins in the region. PF tie with Viridi would be having worked a job together for the Society in the past, maybe as a guide in the desert, or maybe a rescue of captives.
* I'm really tired of playing clerics at the moment, so I'll leave that off.
* We already have a ranger, and the oracle is clearly going to multiclass into paladin. So that's about it!
DM, apologies for the delay, I just want to make sure I have a good fit for story and team utility. If any party members have a strong feeling one way or the other, please let me know!
That's a pretty solid foursquare, which likely covers all the usual gaps. I'll have to think a bit to come up with a supporting fit. Maybe an archer of some sort, since we have the bloodrager for the front line with the knife-fighting rogue doing backup there.
I will probably build a completely new character, as this character doesn't work well on 15-point buy (not enough stat points to be good at Str, Dex, AND Cha).
I'm happy to concept out a fellow Pathfinder from your history though!
Hiya, looks like I'm the other invitee. I played this character in no less than three Legacy of Fire games that all failed during or at the end of the first book.
Unfortunately this character isn't 15-point buy and it's harder to make an effective character at that level, so I'll have to make something different, but what would you like to add to the party? And does anyone want a pre-existing character tie, like a family member, lover, rival, old friend, professional connection, etc.?
I made this character for a Legacy of Fire game that limped on for a couple of years and then the DM wrapped it at the end of book 1. I'd love to try again fresh and see if it's possible to get through more of the story.
Arian takes one of the healing potions, pulls out the cork with her teeth, drinks the fluid in one swallow and tosses the vial aside to shatter on the rocks.
"What else, Haleen?" says Arian. "With Kardswann thrown down, what could possibly be left?"
That's some crummy damage there. Again, remove the sneak attack damage if I'm not able to re-establish the flanking. (That would bring it down to 7 and 2, respectively.)
Arian lets out a scream and pushes in to keep the pressure on Kardswann, swinging wildly with her pole arm, slamming both ends repeatedly into the huge foe.
Arian somehow manages to keep her feet without wavering. She plants her glaive-guisarme and holds the pole out at post and says in a low, gravelly voice, "I think we're done." She turns her head to one side and spits out a gobbet of blood.
Arian staggers under the terrible blow, but Faffnyr's timely intervention keeps her from falling. Knowing that she is in a difficult spot, she does her best to finish the foe with another one-two attack. Timing it carefully as Zoisa moves in, she lashes out for soft points - joints, elbows, knees.
