Tharadon's page

if you want some flavorful undead, use the baneguards from the 3.5 monsters of faerun book... semi-intelligent skeletons with the ability to blink and cast magic missile every 1d4 rounds. keep those guys on the periphery of the map, firing a volley of force bolts every few rounds. that woul,d draw someone into the horde of undead, knocking down skeletons like sauron as they carve a path to those magical snipers. the pc would kill a few, then the baneguards would blink. that would leave a pc or two exposed, in a field full of sekeltons, and there are still snipers. sound dramatic enough?

I’d love to play or DM a Paladin in this scenario.

You do need to make clear what will make the Paladin fall. For example, I wouldn’t rule that any of the actions so far would warrant a fall in one of my games. As long as he is pursuing a conversion or redemption of the antipaladin, this plotline can be a lot of fun.

I also don’t agree with screwing over the paladin either. For my tastes, I’d pursue scenarios where the paladin has to thwart her plans, and may even have to fight her, but he’s fighting non-lethal, and she’s outright trying to kill him.

IF he is able to turn her to the path of righteousness, the conflicts do not end either. Her former allies may not take such an act kindly, or may want to stop her from revealing more secrets. They may send high level assassins to wipe out such an embarrassment.

The BBEG may also have loved ones or items that are important to the anti-paladin to ensure her loyalty. If she were to betray him, a loved one may be targeted for death as well. So before she can leave her current organization, the paladin would need to secure the safety of such loved ones.

so, the party has to exfiltrate the family of the anti-pally, and secure their safety, against someone with the resources to perform greater divination spells and the ability to teleport a platoon of bearded devils anywhere on the planet. that would prompt the party to come up with a clever way to hide the family, and then force them to defend the family when the BBEG proves smarter than them and sends the affore mentioned platoon of devils to kill them. that sounds like fun.

I'm all for tormenting paladins. it appears that neither of them really follow their code, if their actively flirting with the other side, and contemplating bumping uglies. SO, i suggest that they both fall (rise in her case?). He is associating with someone whose wholly evil, a woman with a soul blacker than the nightmares of azathoth... and she's doing the same. if they both lose their powers, as their deities get pissed at them, they'll just be fighters without bonus feats. then, they might adventure together for a bit, but the anti-pally will have to choose between her lust for power, and her love for the pally, and the pally will have to choose his companions, or his lover. the key is forcing him to choose.

also, i'm well aware that that last post had no text in it... tiny buttons and a possessed phone. nuff said.

If you have a copy of the sixth book in the legacy of fire AP, it has a sidebar about cinematic combat. in a nutshell, each player makes a skill check each turn... using their sword, casting spells, channeling energy, whatever. if they succeed, a number of enemies die, if they fail, they take damage from the swarm of monsters. its been years since i even opened that book, but i think it'd be worth a look into.

conversely, you could set it up as something completely different. use the chase scene rules from the game masters guide and set up a series of events that happen during the battle, and require skill checks or attack rolls or whatnot for them to go as planned. then have some back up events if they screw up enough times, so that this doesn't become a TPK.

or you could just have a ton of minis on the map... its really fun, and the pcs feel satisfied when their fireball kills like thirty.

anyway, there's my two bits. i hope it helps.

As for artificial environments, a variant desecrate spell focussed on an altar, or some artifact would work nicely. as the PCs search through this mysterious swamp, which eats at their will and saps their sanity, they find they macguffin that maintains the spell, and they can go through an ordeal to destroy it.

or, take a more Ebberon style approach; have bound water elementals in containers in the ground being used as a synthetic aquifer. the swamp was formed naturally as water leaked out of the containment cells, and destroying the swamp would be a little bit harder than with a plot item.

the only other thing that i can think of to create a swamp, is a curse or some form of cursed creature. maybe a bound devil or demon whose very presence infects the earth, and the swamp is like a sore. there could be infected wildlife, the swamp water could be diseased or poisonous.

Thats all I've got, but i hope it helps you out.

cheers.