Note: I'm going to try to make this as in-character as possible, from the perspective of an agent dissecting the (mis)adventures of my two favorite PCs/players to GM for.
Background information on the setting is spoilered below, to prevent unnecessary clutter. This is also out of character.
Aviros:
When creating this world, I basically took all of my best ideas for campaigns from every genre and mashed them together. I'm dead serious here. Aviros began as me doodling about sky-citadels filled with kinda racist robots in my notebook one day, then forgetting about it until I got press-ganged into GMing. I was searching for an interesting setting, stumbled across my notes about these navara folk, and figured I might as well expand it into a full-on campaign setting.
It quickly spiraled out of control into an amalgamation of all of my fever dreams about cyberpunk, high adventure, science fiction, and fantasy.
The Races
There are five main races in Aviros. I say, "main," because there are many other races in the world, but these are the only ones with a human enough mind and body to be suitable player characters. For the NPC races, we have hive-minded insect people who use magic to warp the only other surviving species in the inhospitable wasteland they inhabit to create an odd type of biotechnology, plant elephants with no opposable thumbs that use mutualistic tendril-based organisms that live on their backs to manipulate objects, fungal xenophobic owl-people, and a whole host of other weird s@+~ that would be in no way appropriate for a PC to play. But don't worry about them. At least for now.
Humans: Obligatory, of course, if just to give my players a nice touchstone to center their experience around. Enslaved to the navara until they lead a coalition of the other races (excluding the kransa, who were just war profiteering) to cast off the shackles of slavery. Although they succeeded, it was a Pyrrhic victory, and most of the humans have been wiped out. In the thousand years since the Liberation War, they've slowly managed to rebuild into a dozen or so small countries, and two empires big enough for the other races to consider negotiating with instead of just blowing away should conflict ever arise. Of course, nobody else is doing any better. Except maybe the navara. Those smug bastards.
Navara: The only sophisticated AI on the planet, and even they're not sure how they work. Back at the dawn of the world (which none of them can remember, since all of those memories take up a lot of space), they got a leg up on all the other races by the virtue of, well, whoever designed them granting them knowledge of advanced technology, if only to maintenance themselves and the three huge sky-citadels that they live on. They promptly enslaved the other races, not out of any sense of "synthetic superiority," (well, that was a part of it too, but not the biggest part) but because they just wanted to research magic and technology at their own pace and not have to worry about anything else. Even when they developed the ability to make animal-level AI and stick them in basic shells to do the work, they kept the slaves, mostly out of habit. For most of their existence, they didn't even notice the organics, until the organics got kinda pissed and revolted. Over the thousand years since the Liberation War, the navara have been instictually reprogramming themselves to be less alien to the other races, lest they fall into their old habits and whoops, the organics blow the other two citadels out of the sky. The navara are rooted in a soulstone, a flowing amalgamation of mindbogglingly complex nanites which each contain the computing power of a supercomputer the size of Earth, somehow. These soulstones are installed in shells in the physical world, which, until the Liberation War, the navara didn't bother with, until the organics forced them, at gunpoint, to be on the physical plane so that they would have to do their own work, dammit. The navara reproduce by taking a random seed of their personality programming and combining it with another in the core of a citadel, which produces a new soulstone for the newly-made navara through an unknown process. A common misconception about the navara is that they don't have feelings. Well, they didn't, until about a thousand years ago when a brilliant human mage unleased a Pulse (the world's magic) phage into the navara system and gave them emotions, which ended the war in a single stroke, as they were unable to adapt to emotions quickly enough to the organics to storm the citadels and negotiate peace. Forcibly.
Wow, that was a lot of text. Onto the other races!
Kransa: Rysky, if you're reading this, then you'll love this. I designed this before the 3PP supplement came out, so you can't accuse me of being derivative, but they're... wait for it... corporate murder bunnies. You read that right. The kransa, by virtue of being the last race on Aviros to gain sentience, managed to escape the navara. And they seemed harmless, at first, until they got a stranglehold on all of the raw building materials that the navara needed to build workershells and maintenance their sky citadels. And the resources that they needed to build warshells to get those resources back. And so, an uneasy truce was formed. The navara would leave the kransa alone, and in return the kransa wouldn't starve the navara out. They seemed pretty happy with this arrangement and, over the years, built a huge megacity that encompasses the southern tip of the main continent. Kransa society was shaped by this first act of pragmatism. The megacity became a steaming hive of political and corporate backstabbing, and a kransa had to learn both how to navigate the boardroom and how to wield a blade and gun if they were to survive the ruthless atmosphere. The kransa outsourced workershells from the navara to do most of the grunt work-they calculated (correctly), that the organic slaves would revolt at some point, and figured that they wanted to profit from the rebellion, not be on the receiving end of it. It was a good move on their part. They quickly became completely untouchable at the end of the Liberation War, as anybody who got ideas about "Hey, maybe we should make our own guns," quickly found themselves without working guns, armor, artillery, vehicles, or power.
Avash: I will be straight with you: the illustration of the ogre in the 5E Monster Manual is one of my favorite monster illustrations, ever. I can't explain why. So I decided to make a race out of them. Then cover them in fur and give them huge horns. The avash were the main labor race of the navara, given their massive physical strength. Despite their large size, tendency to go into a blood rage, and the ability to tear apart your average human with their bare hands, the avash are by no means stupid. Not being stupid, however, carries a lot of disadvantages, such as internal politics. When the humans started waging the Liberation War, the avash held a great debate on whether they should wait it out and side with the winners, or join the humans for a better chance at freedom. Eventually, one of the avash elders, a female known as Tafara, got fed up with all of this, and led her clan and all the others away to fight alongside the humans while the other elders were still debating. Coincidentally, avash society has been matriarchal ever since. The avash were instrumental on the ground, being the only race able to take on a warshell one-on-one without magic or experimental technology on their side. After they were freed, the avash briefly wondered by they were going to do until they remembered that Tafara united them, and unanimously named her the Great Han of the Avash. She led her people proudly into a golden age, building the one city that they were allowed under the navara into a great monument of freedom, and expanding her country's reach until it became the size of the Roman Empire at its peak, through diplomacy, economic savvy (which means knowing how to deal with the kransa), and might when necessary. However, due to her preference for other women, when she died of old age at 800 years old, she left no heirs. Which sparked a massive succession crisis. Now, the avash are divided into two groups: the nomadic wasteland avash, who barely remember how to use bolters, and the decadent city-state avash, who enslave their wasteland counterparts as their cities slowly spiral into decay, corruption, and control by all the other races. The only thing that the avash still have to be proud of is Tyhara, the great sanctum city. With two great horns at the center, representing the duality of justice and morality which the avash based their religion around, Tyhara remains a truly solemn, holy place, home to some of the best hospitals in Aviros.
Kasharn: I love games like Genius: The Transgression, where you play as brilliant scientists, more than slightly mad and able to cobble together a working Tesla coil from a fork, a battery, some gum, and copper wire. So I decided to crank the concept up to 11, set on fire, and make it a whole race. The kasharn are, physically, very buff red-skinned tieflings. Some speculate that the kasharn and the avash descend from the same origin species, but that has been probably been disproven by the kasharn, since they reportedly devolved a volunteer and a non-volunteer back about a 100,000 years and said that it was inconclusive, since they both disintegrated into slightly different-looking piles of flesh goo. The kasharn have an addiction to inventing. They always have to be working on something, building something, tweaking something. It's an instinctual drive that no-one understands, not even the kasharn. Well, they would probably understand it if they set their minds to it, but they're too concerned with SCIENCE to worry about it. And this is after puberty, when the kasharn are harshly trained to the point where they're able to slightly control their manic inventive energy, enough to go out in public, at the very least. The sole purpose of the kasharn under navara rule was to figure out how the navara and the sky-citadels worked. In the process of pursuing the goal, the kasharn blew a large chunk out of their home continent, and reduced everything aboveground on it to a smoking, volcanic wasteland. Once the revolution started, the kasharn were split down the middle on whether or not to join the humans' revolution. That is, until the humans promised them that they were going to take down a sky-citadel, and the kasharn had free rein to come in and investigate it, take it apart if they wanted to. Having only worked with secondhand parts that were essentially the equivalent of wingnuts for the sky-citadel, the kasharn readily agreed, and even manufactured the weapon that too down the third citadel. Today, the kasharn function and important role in worldwide civilization: although much of the technology they produce is too unstable to be released into the wider world, every time that they stumble across something that could, potentially, be used widely, it causes a massive spike in the overall technological level of the world.
Wow. That's a lot. And it explained pretty much everything about the world. I'll return soon with the actual dossier.
Okay. Woof. First of all, I'm sorry if I'm posting this to the wrong thread. I just feel like it will reach the people I'm trying to talk to best here. Second, I can only claim limited experience with PFS, so I apologize if I make any mistakes about it, and I would appreciate it if you educate me on the matter. Third, I might ramble and this post is probably going to be long.
As you could probably infer from the title of this thread, I'm going to rant about my opinions on why Starfinder Society is a great idea, and not-so-succinctly list the reasons why. So, here we go!
Alpha:Starting a new canon for an organized play experience will attract new players to the playstyle. That's... a lot to unpack there. I guess I'll start with an anecdote. About two years ago, I decided to try PFS. Nobody at my group particularly liked PF-fair, since a lot of them were new and 5e was a lot more friendly to new players-so, I decided to jump in. I was immediately overwhelmed. Oh, I understood the mechanics just fine. My wizard was slinging 4d6 of any elemental damage at level 1. It was the story. People were slinging around names and events and places that I didn't have an inkling about all the time. It wasn't just the NPCs. The players looked at me like an alien when I asked around every ten minutes "who is this?" and "wait, why is that relevant?" I eventually caught on after a deep dive into PFWiki and after playing a few older scenarios, but diving into the deep end may have turned a lot of players off. Starting a new story for the new system should attract a lot of players who felt intimidated by the complexity of PFS' story before, and they'll be plenty excited to shape the world as the plot moves on.
Deux:Unlike the Pathfinders, the Starfinders have a clear mission. Don't get me wrong, the idea of an adventurer's guild who collects dangerous magic and artifacts and does... something with them is interesting. But it doesn't supply a sense of mystery. An overarching plotline that extends even beyond one or two seasons. That wonderful sense of uncovering an important discovery that slots another clue to the BBEG's identity into place. Starfinder does all of that. In the blog, the devs mentioned that the Starfinders seek what happened to Golarion. They hunt down tiny clues, by the margin of a few years of remembrance, to find out what happened. That's thrilling. Plus, characters who err on the side of good should stop feeling slightly uncomfortable because they don't know what happened to the immensely powerful artifact that they just brought back.
Tres:Opportunities for stories that Paizo would not otherwise be able to put into the module/AP line will present themselves. PFS not only serves as a great organized play experience, it also lets the devs who got a cool idea for a story, but don't have room or time to fully develop into a module or AP, express themselves. With a cool science fantasy setting such as Starfinder, with multiple planets and space stations to explore, the ideas will explode. Starfinder Society should be able to take the load off of devs who have to cull dozens of ideas just because they don't fit into the most recent module or AP, and instead turn them into cool scenarios for our characters to explore.
Wow. That was a biggie. Please, let me know you're opinions below, and elucidate me on all of my mistakes, or provide counter-arguments for my ideas.
Recently, while discussing with another member of the forums how awesome the Illusive Man is as a villain, I started to really want to make him for Pathfinder. And my homebrew campaign, which should give my group of Mass Effect players squees followed by "oh s%*$."
Now, the Illusive Man would make a great Mesmerist Cult Leader. It seems to fit him perfectly well. But the thing is, I'm not really great at conversions, so whoever helps me make a conversion for TIM and Kai Leng will have my eternal gratitude and a multitude of internet cookies from me. No stuff from the technology guide, though. It's purely a medieval setting.
I recently presented my idea for a very intrigue-heavy game. They liked it, but they didn't want it to be the whole game, which I can understand. But I'm kinda tapped out for ideas. So, I need YOUR help!
Basically, this will be a brainstorm of a campaign setting and campaign, all in one. The rules are is that one poster presents an idea, the next poster builds upon it, and then presents their own idea. Let me give you guys a high concept:
A Medieval Mass Effect[
No, I don't mean Dragon Age. I mean a game in the style of ME2/3. Collecting companions, gaining their loyalty, gaining support for a war, and an epic story. Here is something I want to avoid, though: standard fantasy races. I've already got a few ideas, and I'll present them... now, for you guys to build upon.
Humans: Humans have been enslaved by the other races for their entire existence. Their high fertility rate, creativity, and adaptability has made them ideal for this role. In a recent, bloody revolt, the humans broke free and established their own queendom, but at the expense of half the population. Now, half a century later, they struggle to gain recognition from the other races.
Mirai: I only have one idea for this: plant-owl people. Do with it as you will.
Now, I want at least three other races. The tech-level is mid-medieval. There are three types of magic: Obliteration (arcane), Warp (psychic), and Celestial (divine).
Recently, I have acquired Ultimate Intrigue. And I motherfluffing LOVE LOVE LOVE it. Best book ever. But praising the Paizo creative team is not the reason I'm here.
Rather, after running countless hack 'n' slash campaigns that quickly dropped off due to lack of player interest, and one Kingmaker campaign that the players enjoyed the tribal politics of the Stolen Lands before they started hating the actual kingdom building part, I'm looking to make an Ultimate Intrigue game, as it outlined in the book's games and themes section.
Here's the basic premise: The players are all fledgling members of a noble house in a massive medieval megacity a la Ravinca. A civil war is brewing between the Celestial Court (a lot more like Bayonetta angels than anything else) and the common folk, headed by a extremist, some say terrorist, group named the Hellfire Collective. In the chaos of a Hellfire Collective attack, the PCs are bumped up to the leadership of their house, with only a few retainers remaining. The PCs can either pursue revenge and side with the Court, recognize the need for rebellion and join the Collective, or forge their own destiny, while desperately rebuilding their house before the coming storm.
That's the basic premise. I'm looking for help fleshing it out. Here's some basic setting stuff: There are thirteen noble houses that rule the city, but answer directly to the Celestial Court. It works rather like feudalism: the fiefs of each individual house are left largely untouched as long as they obey Court laws, and they are expected to lend support to the fight against the actual forces of Hell whenever the Court asks. There are also a number of guilds and trade consortiums that operate across districts. Fleshing out the houses and the guilds would be a great help. The main theme of the game is Order vs. Chaos, in the same vein as Continuum if you've watched it. Essentially, although the Collective's actions are extreme, brutal, and violent, they are the only viable option against the the totalitarian Celestial Court. The game is going to be about two thirds social, and one third combat.
Races: Only humans, really. The Celestials are really powerful, and the Abyssals are more like Lovecraftian abominations that real demons.
Magic: Rather than divine, arcane, and psychic, there is Obliteration (arcane), Celestial (divine), and Warp (psychic). Obliteration is a roiling mass of energy and hate that warps and twists those who use it, in both mental and physical ways. Celestial, as much as the Celestials would like to suppress this information, does not come from the Empyreal King, but rather from personal willpower, belief, and pureness of heart (either way). Warp comes from the collective mental power of the entire plane, and extensive use of it can bring powerful Nightmares birthed from the fear of the user into the world.
Celestials: The Celestials are fighting a losing war agains the Abyssals. They truly believe that they are doing the right thing by "protecting" the humans, and hope to buy enough time to build the Destiny Engine, which will purify everything with Celestial energy-think Synthesis from ME3,
I want to make an insane character. Not insane in the literal sense of the word-that can wait for Strange Aeons-but a crazy, fun build. I'm not looking to make this build optimized. I'm looking to make it workable. Here is the basic concept:
Dual-wielding large-sized bastard swords.
That got your attention? Alright, here's how it works:
Thinking Out Loud
At third level, assuming two mwk weapons, I'll have an attack bonus of +11 while raging. My high CON gives me plenty of rage rounds, so I don't need to worry about running out. However, the penalties start hitting. First of all, TWF gives me a -2/-4, leading to a +9/+7 attack bonus. Then, large sized weapons reduces that further to a +8/+6, due to Massive Weapon's Bonus. The final gut-punch is -2 penalty from Jotungrip, bringing me down to +6/+4. What I want help with is boosting my attack bonus so I can reliably hit things. Any thoughts?
Since we've all been getting sick of selling our own organs for APs and new systems that the group gets sick of within a session, my gaming group finally had a sit-down and discussed what we wanted to... well, do. What we ended up with was a fantasy-western-political intrigue-Mass Effect 2-cosmic horror thingy. At first glance, this monstrosity seems destined to crash and burn. Yet, strangely enough...
IT'S BLOODY AWESOME!
While our resident DM (who has about eight years of experience on me) is running this-and doing a FANTASTIC job, I might add-I'm making a contingency once he starts getting burnt out, so he can step aside and make sure the game remains fresh and exciting for everyone involved while I DM something else.
My high concept started with a fairly simple, FUDGE-like dice pool system-5's and 6's are Victories, 1's are Mishaps-with an ME-style six class system (in case you haven't figured it out already, our group ADORES ME and Bioware in general). There are 12 specializations, which are shared between classes. Mechanically, I think it's pretty sweet. I've got most of the stuff hammered out, so no need to worry about that. What I'm worried about... is maybe I've gotten a little *too* crazy with the setting.
A few cliches I immediately set out to avoid is the Mysterious Precursors and the Humanity is Top Dog tropes. The Mysterious Precursors in of itself isn't a problem, but it can cause lazy explanations (well, the Precursors had really advanced magic/technology, so that thing works despite the internal logic of the universe), as well as quite a lazy way to get the players hooked in (well, you all got this dream from the precursors telling you to go to this place...), so I generally like to avoid the "Mysterious" part of the trope. The actual Precursors part, though? I love subverting the hell out of that.
On Aviros, the Brix (think Beholders except not evil and with arms instead of extra eyes) are directly responsible for the three main races' existence (more on them later), and indirectly responsible for everyone else on the planet, whether through their devastating experiments turning an area the size of Eurasia into sand with wild magic storms coursing through it, or accidentally giving some plants sentience when a professor overloaded their Overmind with too many micropersonalities (basically getting high) and decided to do it for a lark. The tweeest is... they never disappeared. In fact, they're gleefully watching their experiments from space, constantly making notes and discussing what will happen next. This is common knowledge. There are even a few on the surface who wan to see things up close and personal! So there. Trope subverted.
Another trope that grates on me is the Humans Are the Top Dog. A race of squishy, somewhat intelligent monkeys who figured out how to smelt iron live among tough-as-nails tunnelers who, to every man, woman, and child, are combat trained, and nigh-immortal, graceful, intelligent humanlike creatures who command enormous supernatural power. And that's just the standard fantasy setting. But, somehow, they end up dominating most of the world, driving the elves to the forests and the dwarves underground. Sure, this is waved away with the standard explanation of how humans breed like rabbits and we have a special kind of willpower, but this always felt kind of weak to me. I mean, if we had such amazing willpower and determination, we probably would have colonized Mars a generation ago. So I decided to turn that trope on its head: among insanely intelligent robots who view everybody else as pawns in elaborate games of power, infernal mad inventors and magicians who are tearing the fabric of reality apart, insectile krogan-mixed-with-vorcha, except with above average intelligence, lumbering, sentient, flying elephant-sized plants who can make the landscape bend to their will with but a word, it made sense to me that that humans were the default slave race. Eager, disposable, breed like rabbits, able to get the job done no matter what... Only recently (a dozen years ago), did humans manage to finally break free in a rebellion that annihilated two-thirds of them, and even still most humans live as scavengers (their former owners are too suspicious of them now to reaccept them as slaves) or nomads rather than trying to build their own nation. Their only marginal allies have a mess of problems of their own as well as being disregarded as oddballs by everyone else.
Okay, pretty much out of time. I'll update with more setting info later. What do you think? Future subversions include: All Races Are Humans and Universal Technology Levels.
I was just idly thinking about MMOs today (I have this ongoing fantasy about making one, but it will probably never happen), and I just had a maybe-brilliant, maybe-horrible idea: what if an MMO had permadeath?
It's a cool concept, especially in a game with heavy guild politics. If you do it, assassinating the leader of a nation acutually makes a difference. You'll spend a LOT more time setting up defenses and training NPC grunts to keep you safe. You'll also want to consider whether it's really worth it to get into a fight with those orcs.
But then again, it would require a LOT of anti-frustration features.
For example, you would need to set up a Pathfinder-esque system of "bleeding out" rather than simply dying when you hit 0. Monsters won't touch in this state, so that solves a problem... but players can probably still coup-de-gras you. Maybe a Borderlands-type Second Wind mechanic that can get you back up on your feet?
And when you do die, there needs to be a system set up so you don't lose ALL of your progress. Maybe you create another character with all of the levels of your dead one, but without any of the special gear and NPC political ties? But that will make assassinations pointless again, since a player can just log on to the guild boards and post their new character to be reinstated. Pretty much the only solution at that point would be to police the meta so hard that it would be eradicated-but a large part of any MMO is its meta community.
Anyways, just rambling, but I was wondering how would YOU handle this?
I'm developing a character for a campaign starting from level one. She's level one, young-ish (20 years old), and carries intense abyssal power locked in her bloodline (a bloodrager, essentially). Oh, and at the time of the campaign, she's has neither yet "hulked out" or even killed anyone. Furthermore, she's most definitely good aligned. So, I suppose my question is: how should my character react AFTER her first encounter? I've already concluded that she will not actively fight back until she takes damage, at which point she rages. She is fully aware during this transformation, and I must repeat, she has never killed anyone before. Anybody have any advice to give? NOTE: I want this to have a bit of drama-lasting for a session or two as she copes-but nothing that will impeded the overall campaign.
Today, I'm starting my fourth attempt at a Kingmaker campaign. The first two were when I was a complete rookie, the third was good, but nearly all of the players dropped out, and now I'm finally trying to do it again. I'm using a variety of subsystems for this game, including a few of my own. They include:
Armor as DR: I'm trying to run a gritty, semi-realistic campaign using the Pathfinder rules set, so this and Vigor and Wound Points seemed a natural choice. Essentially, whenever an attack makes it past Vigor points, the DR kicks in for wound points.
Armor HP: I'm keeping track of the HP of armor. The HP of any given armor piece is equal to 10 x the DR it gives, and any time an attack makes it past the armor's DR, it takes damage equal to the player. Repairing armor costs 1 silver per hit point.
Limb HP: Each limb has wound points equal to half the character's CON, the torso has wound points equal to the character's CON, and you subtract damage from the character's wound points as a whole and the limb's wound points. Whenever an attack hits, I roll d100 to determine what part of the body it hits: 1-50 is the torso, 51-65 is the sword arm/right arm, 66-75 is the shield arm/left arm, 76-85 is the right leg, 86-95 is the left leg, 96-100 is the head. When a limb runs out of wound points, it is crippled. A crippled arm gives -4 to attack and -2 to damage, or halving the shield bonus to Defense (depending what the limb is holding), a crippled leg gives -10 to movement speed and -2 to reflex saves, a crippled torso is 1d6 bleed damage per round until it is patched up with a DC 15 Heal check, and a crippled head means decapitation.
"Piecemeal Armor:" I'm using my own, simpler variant of piecemeal armor: light armor gives DR 1/armor to limbs, medium armor gives DR 3/armor to limbs, and heavy armor gives DR 5/armor to limbs.
Here's the basic campaign info:
The player characters are all noble scions of some standing in one of the following three noble houses: House Forrester, House Winterhavyn, and House Whitehill. The three houses have been in alliance for as long as anyone can remember, standing against the wild frostkin from the north and acting as the first line of defense from the foreign legions of the mysterious and sinister realm of Thikas from across the Virden sea. All of the houses are fiercely loyal to the old line of the Sunborn kings, who have lead the kingdom of Wyrd for two thousand years. Seven years ago, however, a rebellious, powerful noble family called the Saerkasen (Old Speech for "the Proud and Mighty) staged a coup against the Sunborn with the support of two of the other noble houses, Ithara and Othasdin. They slaughtered nearly every member of the family, and have been hunting fervently for the few that survived.
Ever since then, the assaults from Thikas and the frostkin have ceased, with only a few scouts sighted now and then. This coupled with the Saerkasen's brutally efficient scare tactics against the barbarians which have made them all but cease their raids, the northern houses of Forrester, Winterhavyn, and Whitehill have been made redundant. In addition, the new King Lithiras knows of the northern houses loyalty to the Sunborn, and is rather suspicious of them. On the verge of being merged with Ithara, Othasdin, and Pnumi (a house that stayed neutral in the coup, but has since allied itself with the Saerkasen), the northern houses are making a dangerous gambit. Their resources stretched thin due to Lithiras' ridiculous demands, they are sending their most promising scions (ages 16-20) north of their territory, in a bid to scout out the fuzzy region between frostkin lands and Wyrd under the pretense of searching for more darkwood that the Forresters have a talent for shaping. In reality, they are scouting out the Frostlands in an attempt to discover whether they are suitable for settlement. The northern houses hope to establish a power base up there on the pretense of logging darkwood that they know is up there and then have it "unexpectedly" declare sovereignty a month before the date for the the northern houses are to be merged with those that are loyal to the king.
-House Forrester: One of the oldest houses, it primarily exists for its lumber industry. Its craftsmen are legendary, able to create the finest shields out of the darkwood that is found primarily in their lands. However, their supply is dwindling, and they are desperate to get more.
-House Winterhavyn: A house of almost entirely soldiers, it has been in existence ever since Wyrd was founded by the Sunborn to protect its borders from the frostkin up north. Legendary for its warriors, not so much for its political savvy.
-House Whitehill: When a young Winterhavyn noble was exiled for having an affair with a minor Pnumi, she gathered her most loyal followers and set up a fort on top of an ancient cairn. The stones of the cairn were bleached white by some unknown force, and proved unusually strong. After many generations of building and expanding, the Whitehills were finally recognized as a house of their own, and are now on amicable terms with the Winterhavyns. The Whitehills have discovered the secret to "stonebleaching," as they call it, and are the best masons in Wyrd.
Some basic information that I have so far:
-The frostkin are not one cohesive creature, rather, they are various fae (some monsters from the Beastiary have different types, but they are all fae for my purposes) who all belong to the Winter Court. However, due to the small amount of survivors from their raids on northern villages, and the fact that those under siege in forts want to fight them at a distance, they all view the frostkin as one species.
-Oleg's trading post is now an unnamed fort that primarily exists to guard the only crossing across a broad, wild river from the barbarians. Although the soldiers there have been growing complacent in recent years due to the lack of raids, on the day the PCs arrive the barbarians will return in force to assault the fort. Oleg is the captain of the fort, and Svetlana is his young daughter.
-The attacks from Thikas and the frostkin have ceased due to a profane pact between the Saerkasen and Thikas. In return for a guaranteed success for the coup, the Saerkasen would act as puppets for the Thikans and the Thikans would bind the portal leading to the Winter Court to a frozen pool in an ancient temple to the Norns (the primary religion in Wyrd), thus preventing the frostkin from entering Wyrd.
-The frostkin only enter Wyrd to make assaults on the Sunborn, whose ancestry to the Summer Court gives the sun fae a foothold in the Prime Material Plane.
-The barbarian's new activity is because they were drawn together by one woman, Okatha Saerkasen, an exiled princess who, bitter from her family abuse and exile, is determined to strike a blow against them. This makes the barbarians a valid ally, if the players choose to think. This is my replacement for the Stag Lord and his bandits, although the Stag Lord is a lieutenant of her's.
-The Frostlands have been a prison for an exiled Winter Court king, the central glacier serving as a binding point. With the recent buzz of activity in the Frostlands, he connives to break free.
The Lakara and Fintas tribes, although well within Okatha's domain, have largely been left alone. Most likely because when scouts were sent into their strange forests, none of them returned.
In truth, the forest of Lakara and Fintas are the legendary lost grove of darkwood the party is allegedly looking for. The Lakara are the equivalent of the kobolds, and act like a tribe of Loraxes: they keep the trees happy and healthy, tending to their needs. Their leader, an adept named Ulana, is somewhat troubled by a newcomer who lives on the fringes of the tribe's territory. Named Tiniri, he has been leading some of Ulana's tribe to the worship of a strange creature named Sharptooth. Having seen the terrible effects of "Sharptooth's curse," (in reality just a particularly nasty poison), now the Lakara tribe is an even split between those who worship Sharptooth out of fear and those who still venerate the Wild Court of fae.
Ulana's troubles are doubled by the fact that the neighboring tribe, the Fintas, have started desecrating the corpse of a massive darkwood tree, which used to be a portal to the Wild Court. Ever since Wyrd's ties to the courts have been cut off, the tree has been withering. Recently, however, it started growing again, while still maintaining that strange withered look. The Fintas have recently turned to the worship of the vile, exiled Void Court (the equivalent of the Cthulhu Mythos), and are releasing and corrupting the trapped energy within the ancient tree to summon a portal to their domain.
Another problem in the darkwood grove (I guess forest would be more accurate) is that mites, sensing the arrival of their masters, the Winter Court, imminent, has been setting their insectile army on the roots of the darkwood tree in the hopes of presenting a gift of a despoiled place of beauty to the court. These insects have been empowered with the spare magical energies from the ritual the Fintas are performing, allowing their jaws to become powerful enough to actually be harmful to the trees.
The two players who have actually created their characters are:
Sherlock Shirogane Whitehill: The apprentice spymaster for the Whitehills, Shirogane (Sherlock is his title) is roguishly charming and has a rather dry wit, and has taken on the responsibilities of his master due to the fact that he is often away on missions (NG Sleuth Investigator 1).
Miserix Winterhaven: An up-and-coming officer in Winterhavyn's small army, he is completely ruthless, serious, and somewhat amoral, but he uses these traits for the greater good. (LE Warmaster 1).
Recently, I have been enthralled by George R. R. Martin's gritty, political world of Westeros. I then scrambled to convert Kingmaker, one of my favorite APs, into a low magic setting (read: none of the players can cast spells). Foolishly, I alerted my players that we would be trying the campaign this Saturday before I completed the conversion.
Here are some subsystems I'm using:
Wound and Vigor Points: Personally, this is one of my favorites. It nails down and helps me visualize what actually happens in combat, and helps add to the more gritty feel of a low magic campaign.
Armor as DR: I also tacked this on, because again, it helps represent what armor actually does. Note that the DR only applies to Wound Points.
And here's the campaign info available to the players:
The player characters are all noble scions of some standing in one of the following three noble houses: House Forrester, House Winterhavyn, and House Whitehill. The three houses have been in alliance for as long as anyone can remember, standing against the wild frostkin from the north and acting as the first line of defense from the foreign legions of the mysterious and sinister realm of Thikas from across the Virden sea. All of the houses are fiercely loyal to the old line of the Sunborn kings, who have lead the kingdom of Wyrd for two thousand years. Seven years ago, however, a rebellious, powerful noble family called the Saerkasen (Old Speech for "the Proud and Mighty) staged a coup against the Sunborn with the support of two of the other noble houses, Ithara and Othasdin. They slaughtered nearly every member of the family, and have been hunting fervently for the few that survived.
Ever since then, the assaults from Thikas and the frostkin have ceased, with only a few scouts sighted now and then. This coupled with the Saerkasen's brutally efficient scare tactics against the barbarians which have made them all but cease their raids, the northern houses of Forrester, Winterhavyn, and Whitehill have been made redundant. In addition, the new King Lithiras knows of the northern houses loyalty to the Sunborn, and is rather suspicious of them. On the verge of being merged with Ithara, Othasdin, and Pnumi (a house that stayed neutral in the coup, but has since allied itself with the Saerkasen), the northern houses are making a dangerous gambit. Their resources stretched thin due to Lithiras' ridiculous demands, they are sending their most promising scions (ages 16-20) north of their territory, in a bid to scout out the fuzzy region between frostkin lands and Wyrd under the pretense of searching for more darkwood that the Forresters have a talent for shaping. In reality, they are scouting out the Frostlands in an attempt to discover whether they are suitable for settlement. The northern houses hope to establish a power base up there on the pretense of logging darkwood that they know is up there and then have it "unexpectedly" declare sovereignty a month before the date for the the northern houses are to be merged with those that are loyal to the king.
-House Forrester: One of the oldest houses, it primarily exists for its lumber industry. Its craftsmen are legendary, able to create the finest shields out of the darkwood that is found primarily in their lands. However, their supply is dwindling, and they are desperate to get more.
-House Winterhavyn: A house of almost entirely soldiers, it has been in existence ever since Wyrd was founded by the Sunborn to protect its borders from the frostkin up north. Legendary for its warriors, not so much for its political savvy.
-House Whitehill: When a young Winterhavyn noble was exiled for having an affair with a minor Pnumi, she gathered her most loyal followers and set up a fort on top of an ancient cairn. The stones of the cairn were bleached white by some unknown force, and proved unusually strong. After many generations of building and expanding, the Whitehills were finally recognized as a house of their own, and are now on amicable terms with the Winterhavyns. The Whitehills have discovered the secret to "stonebleaching," as they call it, and are the best masons in Wyrd.
Some basic information that I have so far:
-The frostkin are not one cohesive creature, rather, they are various fae (some monsters from the Beastiary have different types, but they are all fae for my purposes) who all belong to the Winter Court. However, due to the small amount of survivors from their raids on northern villages, and the fact that those under siege in forts want to fight them at a distance, they all view the frostkin as one species.
-Oleg's trading post is now an unnamed fort that primarily exists to guard the only crossing across a broad, wild river from the barbarians. Although the soldiers there have been growing complacent in recent years due to the lack of raids, on the day the PCs arrive the barbarians will return in force to assault the fort. Oleg is the captain of the fort, and Svetlana is his young daughter.
-The attacks from Thikas and the frostkin have ceased due to a profane pact between the Saerkasen and Thikas. In return for a guaranteed success for the coup, the Saerkasen would act as puppets for the Thikans and the Thikans would bind the portal leading to the Winter Court to a frozen pool in an ancient temple to the Norns (the primary religion in Wyrd), thus preventing the frostkin from entering Wyrd.
-The frostkin only enter Wyrd to make assaults on the Sunborn, whose ancestry to the Summer Court gives the sun fae a foothold in the Prime Material Plane.
-The barbarian's new activity is because they were drawn together by one woman, Okatha Saerkasen, an exiled princess who, bitter from her family abuse and exile, is determined to strike a blow against them. This makes the barbarians a valid ally, if the players choose to think. This is my replacement for the Stag Lord and his bandits, although the Stag Lord is a lieutenant of her's.
-The Frostlands have been a prison for an exiled Winter Court king, the central glacier serving as a binding point. With the recent buzz of activity in the Frostlands, he connives to break free.
Now, even though I have lots of things fleshed out, I still need some help. How am I going to convert the Kobolds and Mites to humans? I want at least two more factions the players can side with, as well. What to do with the pseudodragon and grig? What about the Stag Lord's lieutenants? How should I flesh out the political back-and-forth between the Summer and Winter Courts of fae once the binding is shattered, and how will it relate to the PC's new nation?
Recently, I've been fantasizing/drooling/what-have-you about playing a Fifth Edition Kingmaker Campaign set in Eberron. Exactly what it says on the tin, pretty much.
Does anybody else want to play/DM this, or am I alone? NOTE: I'd rather play than DM this.
Tomorrow, I will start a liveblog of my homebrew campaign, of which I will be flying by the seat of my pants for. I have a basic outline, a group of raucous players (but whose group isn't raucous?), and a bunch of ideas, so surely, hilarity and hijinks will ensue!
The Premise:
Thousands of years ago, the church of Akandilur sealed the ancient red dragon Fakarn'tisaza, who's plans were nothing more than to conquer a small region, inside of Shadowfell. That was a really bad move. Since then, madness and the eldritch magic of the plane of shadows has seeped into the dragon's brain, elevating him to a demigod level of power. Now a dreaded shadow dragon, Fakarn'tisaza has dreams of conquering the multiverse.
Working slowly and carefully, he has subtly influenced the material plane through whispers in the minds of the weak-willed and strong to form a cult, who's purpose is to keep the world in a technological stasis and try to find a way to destroy the 3 massive obsidian pillars scattered around the world (two of them have not been found yet) to free their master.
On a slightly less cosmic scale, the Dawn Tournament has just begun in and around the city of Nelia. The church of Akandilur has organized this event for hundreds of years as a way for rookie adventurers to make a name for themselves. The sole winner will be named the Dawn Champion and be given a unique magical tattoo that identifies them as the Champion, while the 7 runners-up will be named Dawn Knights and all be given the same tattoo.
However, something evil is afoot this year: a mad mage with dreams of conquering the kingdom has happened upon a thousands-years old tome in the Midnight Records, a magical extraplanar library. Filled with shadow magic, including a virulent magical plague that separates the shadow, soul, and body of the victim and places them under the creator's control.
As the plague is unleashed upon the city and shadows start separating, the heroes must find and kill the culprit before it's too late! Otherwise, the tournament will be canceled, and we can't have that, can we...
The Journal
This journal will be done in a "liveblog" format: that is, I will post updates of combat, roleplay, and exploration as we go, along with witty commentary.
I'm prepping for my first homebrew module-which, weirdly enough, I'm not freaking out about-for a party with no arcane casters.
This is the party makeup (we used the point buy, so there's equal stats):
Wood elf ranger 2
Hill dwarf cleric (Light domain) 2
Human fighter 2
Human rogue 2
I'm here to ask for advice!
The premise is that a cleric of Death has unleashed a magical... not plague exactly, but more like a viral curse, that saps the strength from people and puts it into their shadows, eventually making their shadows become independent and malevolent when they die. Simple investigation, right? But the problem is, the Dawn Tournament-which is basically a way for rookie adventurers to get famous-is taking place while this is happening, and the characters have to both compete in there while trying to find out the source of the problem.
I have a few details, but not enough: to find a way to combat the plague, the characters must escort a prominent sage to an ancient library that is infested with demons, undead, and unnatural abominations. During the CTF round of the tournament, the villain will unleash a horde of zombies and skeletons onto the battleground that will pose a threat to all the teams and indeed the city, but will have to convince the other teams to put aside their lust for victory in favor of combatting the army.
Hi, everyone! With being somewhat dissatisfied with published adventures so far, I've decided to write my own campaign. I'm still working on the premise, and I want some feedback from the community.
The Crunch
We're playing 5e. My reasoning behind this is that half of my players are newbies-never set eyes on a d20 in their life-and 5e is much, much simpler than Pathfinder. We're starting at level 2 (the two players who are not new strongarmed me into this, otherwise they wouldn't play), and we're using point buy and the four common races.
Here's the roster:
Wood Elf Ranger
Human (Variant) Rogue
Human (Variant) Monk
Human (Variant) Druid
Undecided
The Fluff
The basic premise is that a seemingly evil empire is expanding, rapidly taking over the world. A scrappy rebellion of oppressed humanoids have formed to repel it, and are valiantly defending the last bits of land the empire has not yet claimed.
Sounds pretty simple, right? Except it's not.
Contrary to what you might believe, the players do not start off embroiled in this conflict. Rather, all of them are approached by a museum curator to venture out into the deserts to go to a lost library, where a legendary artifact is housed. Here's how the PCs get involved:
The primary monk order in my world is less about peace and meditation and more about gold and smashing faces in. An elite mercenary company, people shell out top gold just to get one of their adepts. Their initiates cost far less, but are less trained. However, it is a good opportunity to get field experience into them. This is where the PC monk comes in.
The thieves guild the PC rogue belongs to has fallen on hard times. Overshadowed by other guilds and low on funds, they are desperate enough to send inexperienced members out into the field if it means getting a few more gold into their coffers. When a museum curator asks for a stealth specialist, he gets the PC rogue.
Far out into the wilderness, a contemplative druid suddenly receives a vision of a coming apocalypse, where darkness engulfs the world. At the center of this vision lies an ebon blade, sized for a giant, lurking in a darkened library in the desert. When she wanders into town for supplies, she finds a "Want" ad for a curator who wants that exact item. Intrigued, she takes up the offer.
Finally, the wood elves in my world are less "Wood" and more "Desert." The other two elf races-moon and sun-live in orbiting celestial bodies that act as moons and suns for the world. Moon elves are aligned with transmutation, illusion, and enchantment, while sun elves were aligned with evocation, conjuration, and abjuration. The wood elves were aligned with Necromancy. The most powerful of the three elf races, the other two turned on them and cast their citadels down to the earth, where the necromantic energy annihilated all life in the radius. They lived and survived in the desert, and eventually forgot their own heritage and wandered the place as hunter-gatherers, gaining crucial supplies that are not found there by escorting travelers across the desert. This is where the PC elf ranger comes in: he has been hired to escort the PCs to the original wood elf citadel, where they will find the ebon blade. Young (by elf standards), and eager to prove his worth, he is the only one willing to venture to the place.
So that's the role of the PCs. The initial dungeon is going to serve as something like a necromantic version of Wan Shi Tong's Library, full of skeletons, zombies, a few ghouls, and the occasional demon. It's also going to have the feel of Arbiter's Grounds of Twilight Princess. The final boss is basically going to be Death Sword from the same game, wielding the Ebon Blade. Once the PCs finally vanquish him, they will hear a slow clapping from the shadows as the curator emerges. Dismissing the illusion, he is revealed to be a handsome young man with white hair, who promptly telekinetically summons the sword to his hand. He is the ruler of the expanding empire. Coincidentally, he is not evil: he is attempting to unite the whole world under him to fight off an invasion from beyond the stars: Elder Things, Mi-Go, Shining Children, maybe even a few Star-Spawn... he's thinking big picture. The Blade is instrumental in defeating an Old One of my own design.
However, he knows that the PCs will take a dim view of him. He will give a calm and reasonable explanation of his actions-the Library can only permit those who don't know of the Blade's true power, lest they abuse it-but, in all likelihood, the PCs won't listen, and attempt to fight him. After all, the Ebon Blade is a big, ol evil-looking sword, and the long white hair will most likely make them think of Sephiroth (all of them are FF fans.)
So he will kick all of their asses if they fight him, apologizing and attempting to make his point all of the while.
It's pretty much guaranteed that the players will go join the rebellion at that point, drawing the conclusion that the Empire is most definitely eveel. However, it should become gradually apparent that the rebellion is the same, if not worse, than their counterparts. They use fear tactics, torture, slavery, subjugation, mind-controlling magics, and painful and scarring spells to win the war by any means.
It's more like the Imperial Legion vs. the Stormcloaks than the Empire vs. the Rebellion.
Eventually, the players will choose to side with the Rebellion or the Empire. If they side with the Rebellion, the "final" boss will be the Emperor. If they side with the Empire, the "final" boss will be a Balor as the Rebellion gets desperate enough to summon that thing. The actual final boss, regardless of who the players choose, will be an army of Outer Things and their leader as they descend on the planet.
So I've recently become stuck in an infinite loop of watching the For Honor trailer, and a few of the beta matches. I've actually become researching some of the techniques the Legion use, and I've come across two techniques that I'm particularly interested in and would like to introduce to my Paladin:
Half-Swording: This is an interesting technique. You grip a large sword (such as a longsword or greatsword) halfway up the blade, and stab with it with both hands. This offers greater power and armor piercing, but often a reduction in accuracy. I'm thinking this could be easily represented by Power Attack.
Mordhau: Now this is more complicated. Mordhau is the technique of gripping the sword by the end of the blade, so the crossguard and hilt are where the point is normally. This is normally done for armor piercing purposes, as it bludgeons instead of slashes. Now, this would be Power Attack combined with an effect that changes the damage type of a sword to bludgeoning instead of slashing. Problem is, I don't know what this effect is yet? Does anybody know of a feat or trait that could do this?
Recently, I've fallen in love with the Badass Pacifist trope. It, in my opinion, is awesome. However, there are quite a few obstacles to creating such a character in a combat-focused RPG such as Pathfinder. So, I'm asking for your help on this!
The first step, of course, is to get an absurdly high Diplomacy as soon as possible. Since the campaign I'm about to play in is starting at third level, this should be no problem.
Step One: Psychic Searcher Oracle. Fairly obvious, right? I take the Amazing Inspiration talent at third level, and have my feat be Extra Revelation (Tenacious Inspiration) for an average of +5 to my diplomacy through Inspiration. I'll probably take the Nature Mystery, because of my trait selection...
Step Two: Traits. I'll be taking Ease of Faith, Trustworthy, and Patient Optimist for a net +4 for most situations in which I'll be using Diplomacy (i.e., defusing combat situations). My drawback is probably going to be an Attached to a teddy cat (for the kawaii)
Step Three: Half-Elf. Use my Skill Focus for Diplomacy, and my other feat for Persuasive, for a total of +5 to Diplomacy.
What do you guys think? Currently, since I'm starting at third level, I have a +20 to Diplomacy, not counting Inspiration. Any other tricks I can use to boost my Diplomacy, and any other things that should be useful for a Badass Pacifist?
I'll be starting a Kingmaker campaign this Saturday. I completely fallen in love with the campaign's concept; however, I may have waded into the adult pool a little too early, as all of my players are complete rookies at Pathfinder. As a matter of fact, they haven't played any tabletop whatsoever before.
My process for figuring out what kind of characters they want to play led up to this party makeup (one member is currently debating over witch, cleric, or druid):
I'll be using Dudemeister's Party Origins (good alignments only) to help ease them in with some simple encounters as well as help them develop roleplaying skills. However, beyond that I'm a bit of a loss on how to help my players (one of whom is extremely indecisive) play Kingmaker.
I've got UCAMP (I've been told that the rules in the appendices of the adventures are rather shoddy), and once we get into RRR I'll be using Hargulka's Monster Kingdom. Which leads me to my next question:
How does a kingdom raise armies? More specifically, armies of specific classes, etc.? I've gone through all of UCAMP and find no mention on how long it takes to raise armies, how many BP you have to expend, etc. I'm very interested in this, because the Barbarian player is of a very militant bent and will be interested in raising some sort of army ASAP once we start the kingdom, and I want to give him concrete rules for that.
So, this my first shot at a forum game. Might be a little cheesy, but...
The first poster gives the command "Jhu Lee, DO THE THING!"
The next poster does the thing. However, the thing is entirely up the poster that is Jhu Lee. It can be anything. Then, this poster gives the command "Jhu Lee, DO THE THING!"
The next poster, as Jhu Lee, reacts to whatever circumstances that the last poster produced by doing their thing, then gives the command "Jhu Lee, DO THE THING!"
And so on, and so forth. However, there is once complication: you have to fit an Avatar (either TLA or TLoK) in there.
Example:
Poster 1: "Jhu Lee, DO THE THING!"
Poster 2: I bow politely, then activate the spirit vine generator. "Jhu Lee, DO THE THING!"
Poster 3: I frantically scramble to deactivate the spirit vine generator before it obliterates Republic City.
So, I really want to get Pathfinder Online. Like, I really want to. But the thing is, I have a really hard time justifying paying sooo much money for it. I guess I'm just looking for somebody to sell me on it. (No pun intended.)
I'll be starting up a Kingmaker campaign in a month or two, and I'm looking for any advice/modifications I should make to the modules. Here's the type of game I'll be running:
1. A Core Rulebook+APG campaign. I have a bunch of rookie players, so I figured it would be best to keep things simple.
2. Unchained classes and stamina rules.
3. One of my players is definitely playing a rogue, one of my players is definitely playing a sorcerer, and one of my players is definitely playing a druid. With this sort of party makeup, I think I'll DMPC an Unchained monk.
So... advice? For 3/4 of the group (myself included), this'll be our very first long term campaign, so I want to make it special.
Other than that phrase which is always a sign of impending doom, there is some slightly good news. Or bad news. However you may take it. You see, my creativity and hilarity have been waning of late, and I don't like it. I used to be able to come up with the wackiest stuff, but now my humor seems bland or overt. Like Wheaties. See? *Whacks herself* That's exactly the kind of thing I want to avoid! So, in an attempt to expand my creativity and become a Paizo forums personality, I will be doing ten minutes of freewriting every day. You are allowed to provide prompts that you want to to write about, but they may or may not get used.
DISCLAIMER: Reading or writing on this thread may cause SAN loss on both parties. Also loss of control of bowel functions.
Alright, first topic, let me think... Oh, oh! I know! I shall write about my mortal enemy:
PINEAPPLES!
You see, it is my opinion-no, it is a fact-that pineapples are out to destroy humanity. Here is my non-reasoning:
1. Pineapples are delicious.
2. Pineapples are very spiky.
3. Pineapples have not been proven to be poisonous. Now, ponder that for a moment. They have not proved to be poisonous. How many times has your D/GM has said that the door doesn't look like it's trapped, and a TPK results immediately after? Hmmm?
4. The pineapple's plan is to exploit genetic engineering companies through insidious mind control to make them more delicious-addictively so-their spikes more deadly, and their poison more potent. The result would be a mounting list of fatalities as humanity becomes addicted to pineapples and impales itself on spike spears and gets pineapple poisoned.
The pineapples now control nearly every aspect of our lives. Rise up and resist, brothers and sisters!!!
So, recently I have made a ranger for D&D AL. However, since this is more of a roleplaying advice thread, I'll post it here, where there is a better community (at least in my opinion).
Rather than dumpstatting Intelligence and Charisma in favor of a higher Wisdom bonus, I instead took Intelligence up to 12 and left my Charisma at 8. My stat array looks somewhat like this:
STR: 10
DEX: 16
CON: 14
INT: 12
WIS: 14
CHA: 8
Rather than playing a typical, country-bumpkin abrasive murderhobo due to her low charisma, I decided to play my Ranger as rather shy and timid. However, I ran into a problem:
How do you get involved in group roleplay discussions if your character is inherently shy?
So far, I've just played her as looking like she wants to say something, or taking a look at a clue inquisitively, or holding [insert McGuffin here] and scrutinizing it, but I feel like I could do more.
Alright, I know I should be posting this in the WotC forums, but they hate me, so I had to settle for Paizo. ;P
So, I leveled up my Great Old One to 3rd level in Adventurer's League. I became unsatisfied, and I was toying around with rebuilding my warlock from the ground up when I saw the Ranger.
I had already gone through the necessary "Half-Elven Ranger Craze" at this point (it's like puberty for gamers, in my opinion) so that was not my reason for choosing it. I saw the two-weapon fighting style. Curious, I combined it with the variant human's bonus feat, the Colossus Slayer Hunter feature and the Hunter's Mark spell. The Hunter's Mark spell is very nice: basically for an hour, you can designate a target as a bonus action. Whenever you hit that target, it takes a +1d6 damage. Pretty meh buff spell, however, you can choose a new target every time the previous one drops to 0 hp. Combined with everything else, here's what my attack should look like (using rapiers, for finesse weapons):
+5 to attack. Assuming both hit, I deal: 3d8+6(+3 on each from my Dex mod)+2d6.
The only little snag I can find is that I can't both designate a target and dual wield in a turn, as both require a bonus action.
What do you guys think? As the title says: am I doing it right?
This is probably the wrong forum to put this in, but I frequently play at the Saturday sessions at Enchanted Grounds. And that is the only offline Pathfinder experience I have.
Naturally, I'm itching to play in an actual group at Enchanted Grounds out of PFS in an actual campaign. For example, RotRL, which I'm very excited to play.
I know this sounds futile and pathetic, but there's nobody in the local area who even knows that Tabletop RPGs exist, and I want to have actual F2F games out of a game with random strangers.
Again, I know this is kind of pathetic, but I've seen other threads about "sounding out" local areas for potential groups, so is anybody else interested in starting a group at Enchanted Grounds, Colorado? Or perhaps I can join an existing group?
I know the answer to this is probably an emphatic no, but could you potentially use an Aldori Dueling Sword two-handedly to add 1.5x your Dexterity bonus to damage rolls?
So, my last two PFS builds have been either sub-optimal, or no fun to play because of being a one-trick pony.
I've decided to use my favorite show ever, Doctor Who, for inspiration. As the title indicates, I want to try to build River Song.
I'm thinking Investigator for the class, and Empiricist for the archetype. However, I'm stuck on race, class, stat array, etc. Does anybody have any advice for this?
In addition, I'm looking for effects that might replicate her famous Hallucinogenic Lipstick. Again, any ideas?
So, for other Dragonlords, you already know what I mean. However, I'm going to explain it to other people.
The Soulweaver is an extremely cool and thematic class in a web browser game called Dragonfable. They bond with a spirit of sorts, which grants them various powers, and they use force weapons with a lot of hyperfast, teleporting attack routines. They also sometimes use mind-affecting stuff, and when you complete the class training, you gain an ability that allows you to merge with your spirit and use an ultrapowerful, trump-card beam attack after three rounds of meditation.
I'm too new to PF to try creating a class myself, so I ask for your help!
The class actually needs to be kind of overpowered due to the game I'm playing it in (Tales of Agartha: The Avalon Chronicles, for those who are familiar), so feel free to let your inner powergamer to run free with this.
However, there is one caveat: The class CANNOT be psionic. I don't have any access to the SRD, and I don't have any DSP books, so that is out.
Other than that, feel free to have a go at it, and critique other's takes of it.
