Getting the Complete Base Classes Involved


Age of Worms Adventure Path


Are there any plans to do official write-ups for the base classes presented in the Complete series?

Anybody want to share their ideas for tying these classes into Diamond Lake?

I am especially trying to come up with interesting tie-in suggestions for the Warlock.


One of the characters in my group is a Ninja.. I placed her within the Monastery.. not sure what I would do with the rest though..

Dark Archive

Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

I actually wrote a full backstory for a warlock I made in an Eberron version of the Age of Worms. But she's a wierd character.

Warlocks are a varied bunch. Some sought the power of demons and devils, while others were "blessed" with these powers without asking for it at all. Was the warlock in question part of a cult? Maybe he/she was exposed to evil power while still in the womb. A Warlock could draw from fey power, and live in the outskirts of town. This may be easier to accept in the case of non-evil warlocks, though the "fight fire with fire" rationale to the warlock's abilities works as well.

As a side idea, if the character has ranks in Craft or Profession, that's a reason to be in Diamond Lake. Maybe the character's power manifested due to a latent heritage tie with something more than human, and the otherwise "normal" character is just trying to deal with it. It could become a major incentive to get out of town or learn to tame these strange powers.

Just some ideas.


I think it would be intersting to have the players parents be members of the Ebon Triad. Or better yet the parents were involved when they were young but then broke away and kept moving from place to place to avoid repercussions from the cult.

They may not have ever shared what they were afraid of with their child and when the moved to Diamond Lake they didn't know there was already a cult there. They were killed mysteriously (leave some clues that can be identified once the player reaches a later point in the adventuer, like three faces).

Because of the dark worship going on while the child was either being conceived or while it was in-utero, it was infused with the powers that made it a warlock.

Sean Mahoney


Bump


Reading through Eric's preview of the Bronzewood Lodge there is mention of Scouts. And a re-read of the Garrison Contingent reminded me that there is mention of the Master Scout. Both of these organizations would be great ways to get a Scout PC involved in Diamond Lake.

Dark Archive

My wife's character is a Warlock 1/Barbarian 4. I actually came up with some great stuff for tying in her character's backstory and the warlock abilities that have begun to awaken in her.

Basically she is from a tribe of Humans and Half-orcs from the Demon Waste who follow a hero-god named Brzic. Brzic was a warrior-king who ran with several "witches" who fought against the Rakshassa that frequent the Demon Wastes' portion of Khyber. Brzic in a last ditch effort to stop an awakening Rajah made a pact with the two gods. The Traveler (known to her people as The Dark One) and The Fury (or The Burning Woman). He stopped the Rajah from awakening but doomed his own people in the process cause of the pact he made. From that point forward all who were of his tribe or born of the tribe would eventually have an "awaking" of power (warlock) at some point in there lifes. When it awakens there bodies change physical and spiritual taking on an almost Demonic look. My wife's character also has been suffering from strange vision (dreams) where she sees a strange canyon with green worms in it writhing, She sense doom, and hears strange words whispered upon the wind. Over the course of a month of nightmares like this when she sleeps the words become louder. She went to the wizard of the party who fortunatly had Auran as a langauge and told him what was said. One of the words was Vaati (which is translate in the AP), the other was Auran gibberish that he realized ment "Lake of Diamonds".

I am going to tie the Rajahs in to the campaign as the Eberron Conversion names the Lords Of Dust (Rakshassas) as one of the bad guys

Scarab Sages

One of my PC's is a Hexblade. I wrote the story as " he was the kid in town, that bad things always happend around " as he grew older, he found he could control it, hence the "curse" ability. Then his Dad died, and he joined the Garrison, but never revealed his capabilities.


I came up with the following short idea to give the player of the warlock something to start with. It is based on the mention in Complete Arcane that some warlocks are not of fiendish blood, but instead powerful fey blood.

"The Bronzewood Lodge community has made pacts with powerful fey in the past. This pact has allowed rare gifted individuals to exhibit powerful fey abilities. The lodge elders have studied these powers and have helped nurture such individuals. These “Waer-loga,” or warlocks, fit a similar role in the Old Faith as paladins do in other religions."


I've got a Marshal, Warmage and Changeling Warlock in my game.

The Marshal and Warmage both trained at the Garrison, giving them a peripheral connection to the Heironian Cleric in the party also. The Marshal is simply an amnesiac gnome that washed up on shore and found the Garrison to be the best place for his abilities. The Warmage is the son of a noble of Greyhawk who was sent here to keep him out of the way/ out of danger. (It hasn't been decided whether the father is protective, or simply a bastard. :)

The Changeling Warlock was easy enough to work in, since really changelings can work anywhere. Just blaming the Warlock powers on changeling-ocity works fine for me. Of course, she hasn't revealed she's a changeling OR a warlock, but still.


I really like getting the classes involved through the background but also dropping in places were it sets them up for shock and/or betrayal. I have done a lot of this kind of set up for the Shackeled City campaign I just started (2 sessions in now and already a couple of minor twists for them). So for Age of Worms I would try and do the same things (I can't tell you how much the players are loving the background integration and are, as a result already declaring this their favorite game they have played).

The problem with Age of Worms is that so few of the adventures are out as of yet that there isn't as much to work with. Even putting out the Age of Worms Overload would give a lot more fodder for this kind of thing. That said, I will take a stab at a few...

Warlock
"...they (or in some cases, their ancestors) forged grim pacts with dangerous extraplanar powers, trading portions of their souls in exchange for supernatural power."

I really like the idea that their parents were members of the Ebon Triad and the suffusion of dark powers came from there. The parents could be alive or dead.

If alive I would have them be a part of the cult in Three Faces, perhaps even fathered by the Faceless One. ("Luke, I am your father!") Considering the complaints about lack of role-playing opportunity in that adventure this would add a healthy chunk.

If dead I would have it be cultists from Three Faces who killed them and the player has this revealed during the attack. (This would be similar to a player in AP1 having his parents be the clerics of Pelor who were mysteriously killed and having Ike or someone own up to it during the attack as a threat to kill the child).

Warmage
Tough on this one... I think we will need more info from later in the adventure to tie it in nicely (like from the Free City).

Key here likely will be, "Some spellcasters care for only one thing: war." And the player will be getting punished by someone and sent away from possible wars to Diamond Lake. The best clues about this would be in the dining room of the necromancer and the magic societies there... but not really anything that tickles my fancy.

Wu Jen
I got nothing... First thought was the elemental nature could be tied somehow into the Whispering Cairn, but they apparently don't go for air as an element... so not sure.

Favoured Soul
This would be appropriate either as a god of knowledge or something wanting to stop Kyuss' hand in the age of worms and so giving a local powers that might be useful in stopping it. Or more interesting might be one of the gods of the Ebon Triad making the Favored Soul in order to stop the Blasphemy. Lastly an air based god might realize that the cairn needs to be discovered in order to stop the madness and it is actually the favored soul of this god who discovers the cairn in a dream (perhaps even coinciding with the discovery of his/her powers)

Shugenja
The elements are out of balance in Diamond Lake. The water is fouled, the land defiles and one strange tomb even seems to be a power node for the element of air. Raiding the tomb might help as a step to bring air back into balance with the others and give the Shugenja more power necessary to help align the others as well.

Spirit Shaman
There has been much evil visited upon the people of Diamond Lake, the loss and anger felt by the masses of the poor is only amplified in death and the Shaman is moved to right what he can so these poor souls can have piece.

The restoration of the Land graves and perhaps putting down the undead at Filge's would be particularly interesting for this character.

Hexblade
This character may have been traumatized by the uncontrollable bad luck that they spread to those around them in their youth as their powers manifest and sees the redemption of Diamond Lake, a town that mirrors their own lucky situation, as the only way to free themselves of the curses that they apply to those around them... controlled or not now.

Samurai
The obvious thing to do here would be to make them a part of the garrison, but I would like to set up more conflict than that and say they were sent by their lord because the garrison and/or guards are not able to hold justice and honor to the ideals seen by the Samurai there in Diamond Lake.

I would probably make a similar background for a Paladin, but I see the too classes as too similar and not necessary in the same game. That's just me though...

Swashbuckler
I would make this character the kid of one of the prominent mine owners in Diamond Lake. They would know many of the more unsavory elements in the background chapter and consider them as friends. (This sets up betrayal later). Perhaps most interesting would be to make this Smenk's kid.

Ninja
Like the other Oriental classes, I just don't like it in a occidental themed game. That's irrelevant though...

I would likely make this a character no one would suspect. Perhaps a child of loyal St. Cuthbert followers who have given up everything and perhaps even self-flagelated themselves to death. The ninja could be an alter-ego type thing for setting things right or just getting revenge and ones power back.

Scout
Others have already mentioned several ways for a Scout character to get trained and they are just fine... would be interesting though to actually have the scout be secretly working for a foreign government looking to steal Diamond Lake and it's mining profits from the free city. Something tells me a much better background will be able to be made for this type of character once there is more info and adventures out.

Spellthief
I know a lot of people are using Allustan as a Gandalf like good-wizard, but I would be tempted to go the other way. We know his brother at least isn't the cream of the moral crop and I don't see why two apples from the same tree should have fallen so far from one another.

The spellthief could be a special assassin he is training to get revenge on his long ago enemies in the free city. I have a hunch we will be meeting some of those later in the series and this would play well into that.

Anyway... Those are my thoughts on all of them. I know people were looking more for "this class could have been trained at X building" but the thread kicked this off in me.

Sean Mahoney


Sean Mahoney wrote:
Anyway... Those are my thoughts on all of them. I know people were looking more for "this class could have been trained at X building" but the thread kicked this off in me.

I started this thread hoping to expand on the "Getting the Players Involved" section of Dungeon #124. Paizo did the expansion for Eberron races and classes, but the Complete base classes have no "official" write-ups. I think this thread will help other DMs who's players wish to play classes from the Complete series. Thanks to everyone who has contributed!


I've also got a Hexblade in the campaign. I worked him in as an otherwise ordinary person who came to the slow realization that karma was a little bit more proactive around him than around other people. He ended up getting fired (by Balabar Smenk, heh) as a scapegoat when a mineshaft collapse ended up crushing the legs of another worker... strange that that "other worker" had picked a fight with the character the week before.

That, a bit of a mentor/apprentice relationship (DMG2, very cool) with an ex-Cyran who also had "the Evil Eye", and we have an ex- and bitter miner who now knows how to use weapons and is looking to foment a bit of trouble for the mine bosses.

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