Natasha Medvyed's page

Hulking Changeling: The changeling gains a +1 racial bonus on melee damage.

Tactician: At 1st level, a cavalier receives a teamwork feat as a bonus feat. He must meet the prerequisites for this feat. As a standard action, the cavalier can grant this feat to all allies within 30 feet who can see and hear him. Allies retain the use of this bonus feat for 3 rounds plus 1 round for every two levels the cavalier possesses. Allies do not need to meet the prerequisites of these bonus feats. The cavalier can use this ability once per day at 1st level, plus one additional time per day at 5th level and for every 5 levels thereafter.

Champion's Finesse: At 1st level, a daring champion gains the benefits of the Weapon Finesse feat with light or one-handed piercing melee weapons, and he can use Charisma in place of Intelligence for the purpose of combat feats prerequisites. A daring champion also counts as having the Weapon Finesse feat for the purpose of meeting feat requirements.

Challange: Once per day, a cavalier can challenge a foe to combat. As a swift action, the cavalier chooses one target within sight to challenge. The cavalier's melee attacks deal extra damage whenever the attacks are made against the target of his challenge. This extra damage is equal to the cavalier's level. The cavalier can use this ability once per day at 1st level, plus one additional time per day for every three levels beyond 1st, to a maximum of seven times per day at 19th level.

Challenging a foe requires much of the cavalier's concentration. The cavalier takes a –2 penalty to his Armor Class, except against attacks made by the target of his challenge.

The challenge remains in effect until the target is dead or unconscious or until the combat ends. Each cavalier's challenge also includes another effect which is listed in the section describing the cavalier's order.

Order of the Dragon:
Edicts: The cavalier must remain loyal to his allies and must always work to further the aims of the group. He must protect his allies from harm and defend their honor when called into doubt.

Challenge: Whenever an order of the dragon cavalier issues a challenge, his allies receive a +1 circumstance bonus on melee attack rolls against the target of his challenge whenever he is threatening the target. This bonus increases by +1 for every four levels the cavalier possesses.

Skills: An order of the dragon cavalier adds Perception (Wis) and Survival (Wis) to his list of class skills. In addition, whenever an order of the dragon cavalier uses Survival to provide food and water for his allies or to protect his allies from harsh weather, he receives a bonus on the check equal to 1/2 his cavalier level (minimum +1).

Aid Allies: At 2nd level, whenever an order of the dragon cavalier uses the aid another action to assist one of his allies, the ally receives a +3 bonus to his armor class, attack roll, saving throw, or skill check. At 8th level, and every six levels thereafter, this bonus increases by an additional +1.

Bardic Performance: A bard is trained to use the Perform skill to create magical effects on those around him, including himself if desired. He can use this ability for a number of rounds per day equal to 4 + his Charisma modifier. At each level after 1st a bard can use bardic performance for 2 additional rounds per day. Each round, the bard can produce any one of the types of bardic performance that he has mastered, as indicated by his level.

Starting a bardic performance is a standard action, but it can be maintained each round as a free action. Changing a bardic performance from one effect to another requires the bard to stop the previous performance and start a new one as a standard action. A bardic performance cannot be disrupted, but it ends immediately if the bard is killed, paralyzed, stunned, knocked unconscious, or otherwise prevented from taking a free action to maintain it each round. A bard cannot have more than one bardic performance in effect at one time.

At 7th level, a bard can start a bardic performance as a move action instead of a standard action. At 13th level, a bard can start a bardic performance as a swift action.

Each bardic performance has audible components, visual components, or both.

If a bardic performance has audible components, the targets must be able to hear the bard for the performance to have any effect, and many such performances are language dependent (as noted in the description). A deaf bard has a 20% change to fail when attempting to use a bardic performance with an audible component. If he fails this check, the attempt still counts against his daily limit. Deaf creatures are immune to bardic performances with audible components.

If a bardic performance has a visual component, the targets must have line of sight to the bard for the performance to have any effect. A blind bard has a 50% chance to fail when attempting to use a bardic performance with a visual component. If he fails this check, the attempt still counts against his daily limit. Blind creatures are immune to bardic performances with visual components.

Rallying Cry (Su): At 1st level, an arcane duelist can use performance to rally dispirited allies. Each round he makes an Intimidate check. Any ally (including the bard) within 30 feet may use this check in place of his own saving throw against fear and despair effects. Those already under a fear or despair effect can attempt a new save each round using the bard’s Intimidate check. Rallying cry does not work on effects that don’t allow saves. This is a mind-affecting ability that uses audible components.

Distraction (Su): At 1st level, a bard can use his performance to counter magic effects that depend on sight. Each round of the Distraction, he makes a Perform (act, comedy, dance, or oratory) skill check. Any creature within 30 feet of the bard (including the bard himself) that is affected by an illusion (pattern) or illusion (figment) magical attack may use the bard’s Perform check result in place of its saving throw if, after the saving throw is rolled, the Perform check result proves to be higher. If a creature within range of the Distraction is already under the effect of a non-instantaneous illusion (pattern) or illusion (figment) magical attack, it gains another saving throw against the effect each round it sees the Distraction, but it must use the bard’s Perform check result for the save. Distraction does not work on effects that don’t allow saves. Distraction relies on visual components.

Fascinate (Su): At 1st level, a bard can use his performance to cause one or more creatures to become fascinated with him. Each creature to be fascinated must be within 90 feet, able to see and hear the bard, and capable of paying attention to him. The bard must also be able to see the creatures affected. The Distraction of a nearby combat or other dangers prevents the ability from working. For every three levels a bard has attained beyond 1st, he can target one additional creature with this ability.

Each creature within range receives a Will save (DC 10 + 1/2 the bard’s level + the bard’s Cha modifier) to negate the effect. If a creature’s saving throw succeeds, the bard cannot attempt to fascinate that creature again for 24 hours. If its saving throw fails, the creature sits quietly and observes the performance for as long as the bard continues to maintain it. While fascinated, a target takes a –4 penalty on skill checks made as reactions, such as Perception checks. Any potential threat to the target allows the target to make a new saving throw against the effect. Any obvious threat, such as someone drawing a weapon, casting a spell, or aiming a weapon at the target, automatically breaks the effect.

Fascinate is an enchantment (compulsion), mind-affecting ability. Fascinate relies on audible and visual components in order to function.

Inspire Courage (Su): A 1st level bard can use his performance to inspire courage in his allies (including himself), bolstering them against fear and improving their combat abilities. To be affected, an ally must be able to perceive the bard’s performance. An affected ally receives a +1 morale bonus on saving throws against charm and fear effects and a +1 competence bonus on attack and weapon damage rolls. At 5th level, and every six bard levels thereafter, this bonus increases by +1, to a maximum of +4 at 17th level. Inspire courage is a mind-affecting ability. inspire courage can use audible or visual components. The bard must choose which component to use when starting his performance.

Power Attack: You can choose to take a –1 penalty on all melee attack rolls and combat maneuver checks to gain a +2 bonus on all melee damage rolls. This bonus to damage is increased by half (+50%) if you are making an attack with a two-handed weapon, a one handed weapon using two hands, or a primary natural weapon that adds 1-1/2 times your Strength modifier on damage rolls. This bonus to damage is halved (–50%) if you are making an attack with an off-hand weapon or secondary natural weapon.

When your base attack bonus reaches +4, and every 4 points thereafter, the penalty increases by –1 and the bonus to damage increases by +2.

You must choose to use this feat before making an attack roll, and its effects last until your next turn. The bonus damage does not apply to touch attacks or effects that do not deal hit point damage.

Arcane Strike: As a swift action, you can imbue your weapons with a fraction of your power. For 1 round, your weapons deal +1 damage and are treated as magic for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction. For every five caster levels you possess, this bonus increases by +1, to a maximum of +5 at 20th level.

Flagbearer: As long as you hold your clan, house, or party’s flag, members of that allegiance within 30 feet who can see the flag (including yourself ) gain a +1 morale bonus on attack rolls, weapon damage rolls, and saving throws against fear and charm effects. You must hold the flag in one hand in order to grant this bonus. If the standard is taken by the enemy or destroyed, this bonus becomes a penalty, affecting all creatures that the bonus previously affected for 1 hour (or until you reclaim the lost flag).

Teamwork - Precise Strike: Whenever you and an ally who also has this feat are flanking the same the creature, you deal an additional 1d6 points of precision damage with each successful melee attack. This bonus damage stacks with other sources of precision damage, such as sneak attack. This bonus damage is not multiplied on a critical hit.

Overprotective: If one of your allies should fall unconscious from hit point damage, you take a –2 penalty on attack rolls and skill checks as long as you are farther than 10 feet away from your fallen ally.

Clarion Call
School: illusion
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Components: V, S, M (a piece of brass)
Range: touch
Target: creature touched
Duration: 10 minutes/level
Saving Throw: Fort negates (harmless); Spell Resistance yes (harmless)

The subject of this spell gains two benefits. First, the affected creature gains the ability to create a sound like the blast of a mighty horn or trumpet simply by miming the action of sounding one. Second, the subject can speak in a booming voice that carries easily over great distances, lowering the DC of any check to hear what is said by –15. This spell is particularly prized by battlefield commanders and champions who wish to make themselves clearly heard or gain the attention of their allies or foes.

Saving Finale
School: evocation [mind-affecting]
Casting Time: 1 immediate action
Components: V, S
Range: close (25 ft. + 5 ft./2 levels)
Target: one living creature
Duration: instantaneous
Saving Throw: Will negates (harmless); Spell Resistance yes (harmless)

You must have a bardic performance in effect to cast this spell. With a flourish, you can immediately end your bardic performance when a creature within range affected by your bardic performance fails a Saving Throw, allowing the subject to immediately reroll the failed Saving Throw.

Natasha Medvyed was born in the deepest heart of the stolen lands, the daughter of the most hideous creature far and wide. The aniss hag Gradushka was her mother, and she had great plans for her daughter.
Natasha surely had a different forename then, but luckily she didn't have to live for a long time in the tainted bog-hole in the swamp that Gradushka called her home.

A few months earlier, her mother had used foul magic powers to assume the form of a strikingly beautiful maiden, seducing the young nobleman Velery Medvyed. Back then, he was a was a womanizer through and through, and so he took the bait without a second thought. After one eventful night he didn't see the mysterious woman for almost a whole year.
In these times, he had not the title of a count, he was just a young lad, trying to earn the recognition of his father by doing service at the southern border.
When he returned to the estate of his family a few months later, he didn't expect what fate awaited him, but a short time the beautiful woman returned - and she brought their child with her.

Valery was a man of great pride and an even greater sense of honor. Therefore he took a stand against his father and accepted the child as his own, but the mysterious woman vanished again after just a few days and left him alone. His action unsurprisingly turned out to be a harsh blow for the family's reputation. The lands in possession of Valery's father were a small part of the Medvyeds' full property, as they represented an unimportant branch of the noble clan, and the power his father wielded was limited at best. They lived in a part of Brevoy whose earth was less fertile than the peasants would like and therefore had to base much of their wealth on the trade with lumber from the near Grazi Forest. The true power lay with their distant relatives, and the power struggles between the family's members were merciless. With the humiliating truth of Valery's firstborn being a bastard, the rival cousins and uncles of Valery's father were able to erode the man's standing even further.

When after some years it became clear that something with the little girl Natasha (named after Valery's grandmother) was not quite right, the situation for Valery's father grew even more dire.
Strange things happened sometimes near Natasha, her eyes and hair took on a strange color - and her nails grew long and sharp as a knife. To add insult to injury, they seemed to grow with an unnatural speed when trimmed, and her hair was wild and shaggy, whatever the maids tried to stop it. It was hard to conceal the strange curse that lay on her.
Growing older, she developed unnatural strength in her arms, while at the same time not growing much at all. Her small and fragile stature, combined with her monstrous strength did much to scare the servants and spawn rumors. People said she was cursed or possessed - some even guessed the truth but were to scared to suggest something so dire, and those who did were not believed - until the fated day when Natasha's mother returned many years later.
Natasha's father became count himself after his father died of a strange malady. He was able to finally find a woman to be his wife, the musically gifted Svetlana, daughter of an unimportant steward. She was able to gift the man with two sons (Ivan and Zlatan), and he turned his attention towards them very soon, neglecting Natasha more and more.
She never got along very well with her brothers. They were spoiled brats in her eyes, calling her a worthless bastard whenever they could, always teasing and insulting the small girl. They used the many quirks she showed to make her life as miserable as possible, and when they were much taller with 12 than she was with 16 years of age, it all grew worse. They never tried to beat her up though - she was much stronger than them.
Natasha's only true friend was her cousin Andrej. He was a distant relative (his mother was a cousin to Natasha's father), who visited Valery's estate to learn swordsmanship and the correct usage of the dueling sword - something Natasha's father was famous for. The boy was quite gifted in the arts of battle, but surprisingly he also turned out to have a talent for music and took many lessons from Valery's wife, honing his beautiful singing voice.
Andrej and Natasha had many "adventures" together in the fields and the nearby forest during their youth, to escape the boring castle walls whenever possible. He always made sure to act as her bodyguard during these forays, fully well knowing she was more than capable of protecting herself - and him as well. A few times they were even able to make the acquaintance of the fey who dwelled in hidden vales and groves. Luckily those were mostly harmless little creatures, the most dangerous a joyful satyr on a journey of discovery. There were much worse things waiting in the dark.

When she came of age, Natasha lived through a nightmarish growth spurt. She was bedridden for days, suffering agony and pain, her screams often only silenced when she finally fainted. When the disturbing process was finished, she suddenly towered at almost 7 feet, which surpassed her father and her brothers by far. The gossips grew stronger and theories about her mother became wilder with the day. She was becoming an outcast within the walls of her home.
Then her mother returned.
Wearing the mocking face and body of the same woman her father met 18 years before, she appeared at the court of Valery Medvyed and demanded her daughter back with a thundering voice. After overcoming the shock of this unexpected meeting, her father refused, accusing the nameless woman of witchcraft because of her strangely youthful appearance - she looked not a day older - and he tried to expel her from his property.
Her only reaction to his words was a blood-curlingly mad cackle, and her form turned into the most disgusting creature that was ever seen in these halls.
More than 8 feet tall, with putrid greenish skin, wild black hair and covered in scars from head to toe, she stood there, wearing the face of the most hideous crone imaginable. Long powerful arms with wicked claws stuck suddenly, flailing around and cutting deep gouges into faces and bodies. During not much more than an eyeblink, half of the servants in the room lay dead, as well as most of the guards. The surviving men and women fought valiantly against the wicked thing, but in the end her mighty arms butchered them all.
"Give me my daughter, you worm!" she shouted while clawing into Valery's face. "Give her to me! She will be one of us! Give her to me!"
But an overwhelming number of reinforcements poured into the room when the screams of the dying filled the whole castle, and the fencing prowess of both Valery and Anrej were finally able to drive her back.
With a last furious scream and a nightmarish laugh, she let down a deadly spell on those still left standing, turned invisible and fled the scene.
Many of them fell onto the floor with screams of agony and died soon after in spasms of pain. Among them was Svenlana, Valery's wife.

After this incident, there was no doubt about Natasha's heritage, and the grief over his beloved wife's death made Valery miserable, blaming his daughter for what happened. But it was not only her father who branded her a witch and demonized the innocent girl. Almost everyone at the court - and also those outside it who knew the truth - treated her like a monster. Only her cousin Andrej remained faithful to her and stood by her side in this hard time, letting her feel the warmth of friendship and familiar bonds.

She was not able to withstand all the hate, and volunteered for military service at the southern border, to watch the frontier lands to the Stolen Lands.
In her short military career she was able to show that she was a born leader- being trusted to command larger patrols in battles with brigands and monster tribes after mere months. But true acceptance she was not able to find anywhere. Therefore she jumped at the opportunity when a larger expedition into the Stolen Lands was planned. She suggested to put together one of many squads of mercenaries and adventureres to reclaim the land and bring stability and security to the wilderness and was trusted to search for individuals best fit for the job.
Natasha was drawn to other outsiders like her, and pulled many hermits and lone souls together, who didn't belong anywhere else to embark on a glorious journey.
Most of them died a bloody death.