In Hellfire Mountain in issue 140, on page 77, it says of Copperbelt, the azer smith:
"Mephistopheles sent Copperbelt, one of his best blacksmiths, to the Temple of Hellfire to assist with the production of weapons and armor."
Turning the page to see the rest of his stat block I was horrified (OK, I'm kidding, I was surprised, though) to see:
Craft (armorsmithing) +9, Craft (blacksmithing) +9, Craft (gemcutting) +4, Craft (weaponsmithing) +9, Craft (locksmithing) +3, Craft (sculpting) +3
While he is definitely proficient in armor-, black-, and weaponsmithing he's not what I imagined. He's not even hitting double digits. I don't imagine he's one of the best a prime king could muster, let alone an archdevil.
Or are my expectations skewed?
I agree. Mephistopheles' minions must have really crappy weapons and armor.
This looks like a simple fix - just put a one in front of each number. Ta-dah now he's good and somehow I don't think his CR is going to be adversely affected by the change.
GGG
In Hellfire Mountain in issue 140, on page 77, it says of Copperbelt, the azer smith:
"Mephistopheles sent Copperbelt, one of his best blacksmiths, to the Temple of Hellfire to assist with the production of weapons and armor."Turning the page to see the rest of his stat block I was horrified (OK, I'm kidding, I was surprised, though) to see:
Craft (armorsmithing) +9, Craft (blacksmithing) +9, Craft (gemcutting) +4, Craft (weaponsmithing) +9, Craft (locksmithing) +3, Craft (sculpting) +3While he is definitely proficient in armor-, black-, and weaponsmithing he's not what I imagined. He's not even hitting double digits. I don't imagine he's one of the best a prime king could muster, let alone an archdevil.
Or are my expectations skewed?
Alas, you've found my weakness - slavish devotion to the rules which don't adequately cover situations like this. I wanted to make Copperbelt a cleric, but clerics don't have a lot of skill points, and I spared what I felt I could on the "non-combat" ones. But, as has been discussed in other posts, D&D as it is written in the core books doesn't really cover those bases so well.
So what GGG suggested is the best, really, but I didn't want to just throw that in the adventure since it *technically* violates the rules (albeit in a small and non-game impacting way). I dared not risk the wrath of The Editor.
Alas, you've found my weakness - slavish devotion to the rules which don't adequately cover situations like this. I wanted to make Copperbelt a cleric, but clerics don't have a lot of skill points, and I spared what I felt I could on the "non-combat" ones. But, as has been discussed in other posts, D&D as it is written in the core books doesn't really cover those bases so well.
So what GGG suggested is the best, really, but I didn't want to just throw that in the adventure since it *technically* violates the rules (albeit in a small and non-game impacting way). I dared not risk the wrath of The Editor.
And you and GGG have found mine -- I don't think well outside the rules. The first thing I thought was, "Shouldn't those be 19s?" But the math didn't seem to work out.
In reality, it's unlikely that anyone other than the DM will ever know those stats and it's unlikely that even the DM will need them. It's just an anomaly that sticks in my craw like descriptions of NPCs who are "powerfully built" and have a Str 10.
Thanks for the clarification!
Another option that does play by the rules is to just increase his intelligence score enough that he scores some bonus skill points. Attributes for NPCs don't always have to be the elite array or point buy the game says you can roll them so why not "roll up" a smith with one that's got an 18 Int. Then there are magic items that give bonuses to crafting feats (maybe a hammer or magical set of tools). Feats are another way to get Copperbelt past your inner rules lawyer. If he doesn't have Skill Focus feats you could sub out some of the ones he has for those or going by Unearthed Arcana's Character Flaws section give him one or two flaws which inturn give him two bonus feats. Lastly he works for a demon these guys grant wishes in return for souls, so why not make him a mediocre smith who sold his soul for a +10 profane bonus to all crafting checks. It's all good.
On another point Wierd, I think you made the right call in relation to the editors. This is technical writing more so than fiction writing, and you want to make sure that your stat blocks are as correct as you can make them. Without some sort of explination for the change you would have had them questioning your other blocks that much harder.
GGG
Just take all his ranks in blacksmithing, gemcutting, locksmithing, and sculpting and put them into armorsmithing and weaponsmithing. That's another 10+ ranks right there. Of course, Mephistopheles likes to make sure his nightmares have really good shoes, so maybe Copperbelt should have some ranks in blacksmithing. ;)