Nether's page

Honestly what the OP is describing sounds more like he wants a Helen of Troy, she is ooohh awwww all so pretty that everyone wants her, but people don't flock to her because they think her beauty will make her a good leader.

In this case Cha is beauty and leadership ability though, so you are set on that front, but maybe try to show you are not just pretty, that you really are a good leader.

At 6'10 she is bumping her head on everything already, short of the grand designed places.

And just because your tall doesnt mean people won't want to pick fights with you.

It is still just as common today that people of the shorter height tend to be more personality of showing the big people. (aggressive in that regard)

Okay, back up and awake after doing my morning rounds. A few things:

-I really like the non-mechanical ideas you've guys thrown out there as to how to make the consequences of their actions stick. Between the Vampire spreading word of their failure, PTSD for their actions, the literal ghosts of their villagers selves haunting them, and relieving the events to given a chance at redemption... I think I will definitely be able to sort out something cool for all the players.
-As for the Cleric, yeah hammers gonna come down hard on her. I was annoyed by the player's actions and given their god's disposition I think that they will likely be stripped of their powers worse than the Paladin will.
-On that point, you guys have convinced me to punish the Pali, but again I don't know if a complete fall is appropriate. She at least tried to fight. She DID try to stop them from jumping into the prismatic wall but she's a Gnome & couldn't even grapple them well. She also did NOT approve of them burning everyone to death, she was just outvoted and frankly overwhelmed at this point. I'm thinking, in addition to the above ideas, I will partially strip her of her powers upon meeting with her an agent of their deity, who will express their disaproval but offer a means of redemption(ie, killing the Vamp & freeing this nation attacked by undead).
-As of the negative levels thing, there were 2 dhampir's in the party, the NPC & the Wizard. They wouldn't have been too penalized by fighting the vamp, sine they're essentially immune to negative levels till they get killed by them.

And lastly thanks to those who defended me in my absence, it's appreciated.

Wow, ok. This is a great opportunity as well as a wtf were you thinking moment.

No where in this thread have i seen anyone mention this; subdual damage. The pally could have tried to subdual shield bash the dominated villagers. Even as a small fry, she would prolly be knocking them out in a hit.

Does the pally have a good Cha? Diplomacy? She could have called on the villagers, "People of Orletemburnya, rise up and fight for your souls, gather holy water and cleanse this vile taint, brandish flame and burn him from your sacred domicile. Fight with me and your soul will find peace." There, 20+ villagers minus dominated ones to assist. Sure they might not equate to much, but it gives you some cannon fodder to use your attacks on while the pally fights the vamp with every fiber of her being.

Based on the bold info above, DO NOT punish the Pally with fallen, at best give her a slap on the hand for not stopping the players from burning the people, but at least she verbally spoke up against it. Now depending on if you have any in party pvp rules, that will determine if she even gets a slap. The only real thing she did wrong is let the villagers burn, but if no pvp is allowed, then there is nothing she could do, and therefore really didnt do anything wrong in her inactivity.

The cleric of Pharsma though, to me she was the worst by far. Based on what her god stands for, she should have been in there with the pally. Then she just runs and hides and starts 'praying' for intervention? What is she, a wet noodle with no spine? Out of all character classes, anyone playing a divine character should automatically accept that they are devoted and dedicated, they didnt get chosen by a god to represent their faith if they are spineless, and part of the reason they are the gods agents is to be their hand or arm, because the god is not everywhere. I just find the BEGGING for help soo pathetic in a divine char like a cleric. She is there to enforce her gods will, and her gods will in this case is destroy undead.

As for the rest of the party, this isnt just one incident of murder, this is MASS MURDER, this is on a whole new scale evil. This to me is an alignment shift right there to evil for most of the party. Just make sure you let the players know it is for the slaughter of the innocent, and that it isnt permanent.

Which brings me to my next point, was there a time limit to this? Was it more important for the party to get to the next location then say save the lives of the villagers?

The party after the church finds a scroll of greater dispel. Did they not have any curiosity to know why the vamp wanted that letter soo badly? Use the scroll on the wall, get letter and read it to find out what the dillio is.

Could the players not wait 10 days for the domination to wear off before moving on? They could easily set up defenses to protect the people, the dominated will need to be locked in a cellar for the time.
The party also now has the letter, which they could easily let the dominated know after they have set up defenses/ambush for the vamps return. He really would prolly make haste to come back for it instead of possibly going on to the next location the party had decided.

Or the players could have just you know, told the villagers to keep the dominated locked up as they either fortified and defended town, or evacuate. There was absolutely no benefit in burning the people alive, woman and childen ext, except to prevent anyone from relaying this incidents info which would greatly tarnish the characters reps.

The pally is the only one that should come out of this scott free. The Cleric should have it worse than even the other party members as she is dedicated to fighting the undead by her religious ferver and failed horribly.

As mentioned, the Ravenloft Mists style is a great chance for further character depth.

I would have the party cursed by this event until redemption or complete embracing of the vampires evil diety.

The vampire must be estatic with this outcome, sure he lost a general but just gained soo much more in a party of badasses. I would have him approach each character solo via agents, dominated npc's, dreams or even his dark god offering bidding of power and to join him and his dark god. Now that many of the groups alignments are evil, freely give them a 'evil' magic item as an offer of temptation. The items only work for evil alignment. Do this softly at first, in only requiring alliegance to him and his god (pact of sort) and next session they want a single good person killed that they will encounter, sell the 'it is only one person, and they are a greater bane to the people than for them'. Make it sound like they are fighting evil, but if they investigate or dig, it becomes clear that the action they are asked to do is very evil.

If the vamp is rebuffed, i would have him 'show' the players the error of their way. Now he dominates innocent people all along the way of the players and have them spy, try to kill players (not really, but the vamp will be amused to watch the players slaughter everyone he dominates, making their fall into darkness that much more concrete), have npc diplomats / mayors rally the town/city militia against the party, which happens to be good honest people, now the players are killing good people :)

Also, inquisitors ext should be dispatched to investigate and resolve the issue of a town massacre. They will prolly think it was the vamp at first but unless the players bluff it up to convince them it was, they will "Speak with Dead" and find out the truth.

All of the above as well as the redemption Ravenloft Mist style quests for each character as well.

Maybe such a sacrifice desecrated the area as well as brought the lands into a darker realm, merged like, and now undead / shadow creatures inhabbit the area naturally. The vamp could be given a huge elevation boost by the undead god, and now has new generals (lichs, necromancers, evil clergy ext at his whim). You just created a longer lasting and major villian for the players, and even more so because the players are 'responsible' for his elevation as well as the lands 'cursed transition'.

So much you can do with this, hope this wall of text helps. :)

Ps., i have been complimented many times from players that i have given/shown consequences in game and they might not have liked been 'happy' about it in character, the players absolutely loved it as it showed them drama, action and character growth/depth.

So i would say keep on doing what your doing, as fun is not just never never land stories, just like the cinema, drama, dark action, quality stories are just as fun if not more so than showing up and knowing they hit the I win button, sored, more along stories.

I would let your player get the sword at 16 so he can enjoy using it for 4 levels.

Also, i wouldnt use a Terrasque ´trivally´ as a CR encounter. I am not really a big fan of them myself but many like the oooh and ohhhh of the big wrecking ball. So i would build up to a major event about to happen, something that awakens / stirs the T into action, and what is the goal of this event?

Maybe it is a warrior/clan leader that wants to conqeror the whole area, but he needs to wipe out all of the kingdoms / clans in the area first so he can just plant his flag with some forces making him king. This wouldnt be an option for him otherwise as he just doesnt have a big enough army to do it, and once he starts attacking kingdoms others would ally against him. So solution, he has found a ritual/artifact that will allow him to summon and control the Terrasque for x hours a day, so he destroys the entire forces of a kingdom every other day or few days.

No one can stop this thing, and no one knows why it is happening. And please, dont make the BBEG a wizard, everyone assumes wizards are the only ones that can be bad guys. So have the group find these things out, around lvl 16 have the party be in the first kingdom to get axed by the T, but design the encounter as something for the players to witness the destruction, the death this thing causes, the wrath of it's wake, and give the players a taste of how powerful it is, that they just cant stop it. They need 'items' like legendary axe, samurai family armor/weapon ext. Customize this T, give it a breath weapon that is worse than any great wyrm dragon, fire as it just incinerates mass areas in a blaze but the 'special' item per character that is legendary items give immunity to the breath weapon. Now they have a way of fighting it.

Last fight is up to you, have the players fight the T first, then they take the final battle to the 'found out' warlord who is responsible for this. Let the players already have created a name for themselves in the area, so the titan mauler may show his family's new prominence ext and then they take the fight to this warlord and his forces.

Great opportunity to have some good CR's of guard squads as well as having waves of troops always showing up every so many rounds and at least once or twice during the big encounters like captain of the guard group, queen in waiting's evil band, ext, then they fight the warlord. Again waves of generic troops keep showing up every 3rd round or something so the players feel the pressure.

Then aftermath, the players can establish their legends as great family/clan in the area, claim some new land or divide up this guys lands as well as his new lands as there is no one alive to return them to the old kingdom ext. This will give the players a feel of completion as well as some lasting impression and i bet they will all be very estatic about your final campaign.

So this is my suggestion for an idea if you like it.

Cheers

TClifford wrote:

I would like to point out that a 7 INT would be more than just -10% on a roll. We are talking more along the lines of 2 standard deviations from the norm. If you say that a normal INT of 10 is an IQ of 100, then 2 standard deviations would be an IQ around 70. At this point we would be talking about someone where they generally cannot complete elementary school. Most adults will need smarter help in coping with the world. Referring to this site

That link is hilariously wrong. Yes, a 7 Int is roughly high-60 to low-70s in IQ, but that educability bit? Complete and total b%@!%*&*.

Anyone, even the profoundly mentally handicapped, can receive a full and complete education. It takes longer, and has lots of extra requirements to help them retain and figure out how to use all that information and training, but to say that someone with the equivalent of 7 Int can't finish grade school? That's more retarded than anything we're discussing.

Seriously, it's a -2 on Int checks, mechanically, and that's it. If you don't like people dumping Int, that's fine, but don't try and dictate what people should have to do at any of the groups I play with when you're not even at the table.

Nether wrote:

Dump stat and not roleplaying it is exploiting or cheating if you will.

Just like old counterstrike online shooter, as long as everyone is cheating, it is ok, but if one person wasnt then his ability to have fun has just been destroyed.

Cheating? Exploiting? I'm starting to wonder if you're really the one who has any right to be saying other people shouldn't be playing TT PnP games.

Everyone is playing their character. Why should someone who dumped Charisma, because it has absolutely no mechanical merit for their character, have to play like they are the Hunchback of Notre Dame?

Well this response pretty much tells me what kind of player you are, the video game type.

Why someone who is only interested in the mechanical wants to play a 'social roleplaying' game is beyond me. See the irony here?

If you and your group are having fun, as i have said multiple times already, then more power to you. Your group is prolly not the norm that this thread is talking about. Our debate is done as your not grasping the points of fairness, and why a rule system is needed in that regard in a 'role playing' game.

Well, for your table, at least.

I know quite a few DMs who don't care, because as long as everyone at the table is having fun, who cares if half the party has 5 Cha and 7 Int?

I simply stated why I dump stats.

Ok it is one thing to have fun and another to just completely ignore the game rules.

If i am understanding you based on your post, it sounds like your group dumps Int and Cha, but i'm left with the impression you do not role play those low stats.

A character with a 7 Int should literally be mentally handicapped, and you should be rp'ing your character like a mild retard. A Cha of 5 means you literally cannot function very well in a group, let alone society.

So it is great that you want to have fun, but it sounds like to me you are just dumping stats to get more stats and not playing to the dump stats, so in otherwords you just exploited the system to cheat for more points.

PF i think has taken the crown for dnd because this is exactly the type of thing that 4e did, it neutered role playing while PF gave us that element back along with kick ass art.

It is the thing that i have always wondered about, is why would the non rp'ers want to play pnp TT when they could play any majority of rp video games where rp is not important at all and you can do it at any time you desire.

In all the groups i play in, if anyone dump stats or just has a low stat then they need to play that, it needs to be part of the background ext, as when i gm i force players to play it, and then they get emo about how stupid their character is ext, well after that they dont dump stat their next characters as they know i will make them represent.

In my experience, most people that dump stat, have 0 intentions of playing that weakness. Well point buy is to make it so everyone is on equal terms, and dump statting just means you found a way to get more points with very little penalty if any as that area is just ignored. So now you have characters with unfair advantage.

On the flip, if it is rp'ed like littlehewy's concept, than more power to the player. But in my experiences, dump statting in general is an exploit.

Come on guys, seriously are so many of you 'falling' for the oh you need to talk to him, show him the rules, ext ext.

This guy 'knows' exactly what he is doing. He knows he is cheating, and when confronted he reacts just like soo many other liers and cheaters, he gets all defensive and mad, like how dare you question my integrity.

This guy is a cheater, he knows it, he will keep doing it unless it becomes to much to maintain. Like the foam dice.

Well, I would seriously state at the begining of all your sessions from now on, if you find anyone (and look at him when you say this) cheating, using resources they dont have, that you Will doct hefty xp, where they might at best get only 25% of it, but you will keep raising challenge ratings normal, and mention that this will make a cheaters character more likely to die. So it is up to the players to show the gm respect and not try to cheat him.

So even if he 'gets' away with things you described, that is fine, but he gets away with it but gains literally 0 experience. If he says it was a mistake, tell him that he needs to be more careful then because mistakes cost him dearly in xp. But let him know this at the beggining of the session. And then back it up.

Taking a similar approach as Blackbloodtrolls thread,

I have been having a very difficult time trying to stay with the party recently and the annoying thing is that i feel i didnt do anything to deserve this treatment nor group alienation.

This is a long post so bear with, i feel i should explain how things got to where they are.

All the players are citz of a small but rich kingdom called Frostholme. It sits way up in the north naturally.

My character is a the head of the small official kingdom assassin guild.(Ninja/Monk) He is LE but he is completely dedicated to the protection and safety of his kingdom.

The other player is a CG Druid and things have become difficult at best between our characters, and i have always supported the party at every turn.

The other party members are
Ranger/rogue horizon walker (i dubbed him the nickname 'houndmaster' as he always has about 3 hounds with him.
sorceress/fighter arcane archer who i call frosty because she shot the last guy that made advances on her in the heart.

So we went thru the first campaign, to save Frostholme and potentially all the northern kingdoms from this demonic ice army that was forming on the planar ice lands past the Frostwall. So demonic hordes would start to pour into our realm if the planar ice lands Rift was not closed. So we ventured for, braving this dire wilderness and obtained a wand artifact that would allow us to close the rift. When at the ice citadel, we split into two groups, the druid and I. He doesnt like sneaking around, and in many situations he left me high and dry with all the creatures as he would fly off down the hall somewhere else. This happened a few times and i was left holding the bag and almost died multiple times because of it.

So we seal the Rift, heading back to Frostholme where the ice dragon keeper is no on its way to assault. We catch up with the dragon and a fight goes down. The dragon is much tougher than we are in our exhausted and depleted state, so i opt to use one of the few remaining 20th level scrolls we were given. It was a 20d fireball i believe. I am concerned about placement as i dont want to lay waste to our party, so the gm says at best placement, i have a 35% chance that the fireball will also encompass the druids life long pal the polar bear. I dont hesitate, what is a small risk to possibly saving all our lives? So shizam wham, fireball away. I roll 13 on percentile. The polar bear gets toasted along with the dragon. The druid is livid with me and i think the player was upset i just nuked his furry friend as well. I was a little cold to him after he confronted me, I told him something like 'the cold void sometimes demands sacrifice' and he wasnt to happy with that response.

So we get back to the kingdom and the king has been possessed by a prior demonic enemy established from before that started the Riftwall event. I gave time in the combat for players to try and figure out how to save the king while i studied for death attack, as i had no way of preventing it. No one could figure out how and the king was about to change our lands for the worst. The sorcereress 'forgot' about the item she recieve a while ago just for this scenario which i didnt know about. So death attack it is, i bluffed so he didnt know what i was doing and then wakizashi thru the armpit into the heart. Well the druid didnt like this resolution, and yep, he was ready to have a go at me. He would have won i am pretty sure as i was in bad shape, and he used his heals on himself and none for me. The party held him back, but the druid wanted me to know he would never forget this.

End of campaign 1.

2nd Campaign,
A very large empire called the Republic (yep, simular to rome) which is prolly the largest nation around, decided they wanted our kingdom as it is chalk full of diamonds, minerals, magic resources ext. So the now ruler, the queen sent us to find a way to prevent this. Came up with going into thier lands, joining the military and then as allied envoys we went to the 2nd largest nation, but they use magic heavily. Their generals are called Battle controllers, and the one that could break their alliance and start war between them was the one we needed. Long story short we made it to his lands and went into his fortress outpost to meet him and tell him how much the republic loves him. We were acting as agents of the republic of course. Now this is where things just go terribly wrong for me.

The battle controller is a beholder. The druid starts being all buddy buddy with the controller making friends, chatting it up blah blah blah. I think excellent, i ask if i can study for death attack on it. Gm asks for knowledge check, then bluff check which i both make. So i study. On the last round the druid starts to get suspicious of me and warns the beholder as i attack for death attack. No flat foot, i miss the attack. We have a big ass fight, but the druid for some reason is on the beholders side and wants me dead. So it is us 3 vs beholder and druid. My two party members focus on holding off any reinforcements.. ok, i have the beholder and druid to myself, great...:( I get the beholder down to a sliver of life, then it is the druids turn. ... what do you think that tree hugger does? Ya he heals the beholder! sigh. Fight some more i get the beholder down to low life, it flees. It has a escape route, where it flies off the top of the tower, hovers down to the ground below where a large sewer grate opens for him. I go to the tower edge and look down at the fleeing beholder. I dont have alot of health left again after fighting the beholder health bar twice. It is a long way down, which would kill me, but my dedication to Frostholme has no bounds. So i leap off dual wielding kukri's, aiming my jump to land/strike the beholder and hopefully not kill myself. I hit the beholder but only one kukri successfuly strikes. The beholder is still alive. I make and fail my balance check :( and fall off the beholder but thankfully we are close to the ground. The beholder goes into the tunnels. I now have a whole lotta guards looking at me now and a pissed off druid in bird form swooping down at me. Scroll of obscurring mist, into the grate, pull it closed (i have a great str)and lock it, then pursue the beholder. The druid is blinded by the mist and eventually turns into a big strong beast and rips open the grate. I am bleeding out pretty bad and cant find the beholder. So i barely escape within seconds of the druid swooping in searching like a madman for me. I make way to the city that sits next to this outpost.

So now the druid is trusted to the beholder, and i have no idea why he sided with it. Even worse is the druid vouches for our other two party members as it was all miscommunication except for me, the assissin hidden in our midst. They want me. So i meet up with the other two party members who the druid is having watched. Good thing for lots of skills. Disguise, bluff, stealth ext ext. The beholder now under escort wants to question my party members. I take opportunity and strike, bye bye you ugly ass eyeball.

We escape, the druid comes with us, we are travelling as a party again, but i have to travel a distance behind hidden. Now we have also discovered that there is possibly an artifact that might help protect Frostholme hidden far into these canyone mountains, so we head their. The druid starts to become talkative to me again over this trek, and the hostilities is there but the threats have stopped. Well this character doesnt accept threats. So i leave it be for the time. We get to the top of the canyone mesa where a dragon lives, and its horde possibly has our artifact. The dragon isnt there initially when we get up there, but it returns while we are in ruined tower there. We slay the dragon. I find the hidden trapdoor to the treasure.

That is where we left off.

Next session I am thinking it is time for the druid to go, permanently. No more threats, and all this crazy the druid has been bringing has made thing much more difficult. The other two players try to stay out of the conflict. Sinse we left off there, my current plan is to let him open the treasure door and start searching the horde while i bluff for death attack.

What do you guys think?
Do i sound like i have a reason to you?
Any advice on this situation?