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Hey everyone. New member here, I just started running the Age of Worms for my 4 players. I have a human barbarian, elven (grey) wizard, gnomish druid, and an elan scout (going to become a scout/ranger/psion/Elocator). The other three are going pure their own classes, as far as I know.
What I was interested in were weapons of legacy. While I didn't think about it initially, one of the players expressed an interest, and I was thinking of how I could feasibly work them into the game. The players are still level 1 (though they will level up to 2 next game), and are in the Architect's area of the Whispering Cairn.
Has anyone used Weapons of Legacy in the game, or could advise on their use? It looks like they can start being effective at level 5+, so I'm not sure when the best time would be to introduce them, as I've only read over once the future modules a bit (the next two, I believe).
Thanks for your help!
There are currently 3 weapons of legacy in my game. The first one came in for the favored soul in my party. He "blessed" his master work bastard sword using the spell "magic weapon" and ended up making a crucial crit killing blow against the aspect boss at the end of 3 faces of evil. I had the weapon continue to stay magic as a +1 sword and turned it into a legacy weapon for the character which i created for him. The second one was Exordius from the book with some additions. I made a side quest for the paladin while they were in the free city. He liberated Exordius from the clutches of a vampire spawn in a one on one fight in the graveyard. Exordius (no money, no penalties) is his replacement for not having a special mount ability in my game. The third is a ring that came from the whispering cairn. The player actually made up the item and we used the feather fall ring from WC as it saved his life in the first session from the killer wind trap. The character is a fighter rogue and the ring gives several spell like abilities to him. Created strictly by the rules of the book as he made it. Coincidently the ring is sentimental to him as it was the first thing he stole from the party, and in the campaign. They never figured it out.
So far so good, the players are 12th and there has been no major game balance issues with the items. In my opinion only use the penalty charts as a guide and don't hesitate to adjust them. Some of the charts make no sense based on the item it's being applied to. I evened out the cost's as well for all the items instead of having different exp and monetary costs for each one, just made sense that every player be on an even footing for their item.
Oh by the way 2 things:
You can bring in a legacy item at any time, the characters may already have them and not know about it. Any magic item they find the first modules has potential. It really works out nicely if the item saved their life somehow but I can't see that being the case all the time as it makes for bad story in my opinion. So you can come up with your own explanations for how the item is awakened for the character. You should "awaken" them any time around 4th-5th level which should be near the end of the second module. At that they are all on the power level of a +1 weapon regardless of what the first ability is or if they have done the first ritual.
Also somebody in your party should play a pure cleric, that or do as I did and augment one of the legacy items with healing spells 3 times per day to help them keep up and not be a one fight a day group.
Hey everyone. New member here, I just started running the Age of Worms for my 4 players. I have a human barbarian, elven (grey) wizard, gnomish druid, and an elan scout (going to become a scout/ranger/psion/Elocator). The other three are going pure their own classes, as far as I know.
What I was interested in were weapons of legacy. While I didn't think about it initially, one of the players expressed an interest, and I was thinking of how I could feasibly work them into the game. The players are still level 1 (though they will level up to 2 next game), and are in the Architect's area of the Whispering Cairn.
Has anyone used Weapons of Legacy in the game, or could advise on their use? It looks like they can start being effective at level 5+, so I'm not sure when the best time would be to introduce them, as I've only read over once the future modules a bit (the next two, I believe).
Thanks for your help!
We use Weapons of Legacy as well, and they work well. The first is part of our party paladin's tragic tale. Melinde was his mentor, and on the way to Blackwall Keep, she gave him as a gift a specially crafted longsword by Osgood. Well, after dealing w/ the Keep and sending work back the garrison, the party dealt with the lizardfolk. However, on the return, they heard that the group from the garrison that had reached the keep "entered the basement and didn't come back." The party faced them, and it turned out it was Melinde and a few soldiers from the town. The paladin managed to kill Melinde with the sword she made. At the funeral, the paladin gave a stirring speech. We decided that the speech along with the rest of the blade's history was enough to make it an item of legacy (the speech and the visit to the grave are now part of the Least Legacy ritual).
The second is a weapon of legacy our Daelkyr-tainted warlock was given by the leader of their Dragon Below Cult (we play in Eberron). The warlock, who is redeeming himself with the enlightened spirit PrC from Complete Mage, is now fighting the rod for control. Fun times.
I have both of my players using a weapon of Legacy, and it is awesome. I have even used one of them to really do a mind **** on the Cleric of Wee Jas.
I would totally suggest introducing them at 1st level, or at least by 3rd or so, such that the players have time to grow with them through their entire character life. Makes them worth more to them.
I think weapons of Legacy, and their rituals allows for really cool side quests for the players. In my case I used them not only to broaden the setting (and my players knowledge of it, this being the first Greyhawk game for either of them), but also to give them a break from the main direction of the storyline. I would thus suggest that you make the rituals and storyline of the weapons more specific to each players history and less associated with the bigger AoW plotline, it allows for a breather from the worms and all, and also makes the campaign feel more spread out.
In my game, the players focused up on their Legacy rituals around 8th-9th level, and again at 11th-14th levels, about the time there is some downtime written into the AoW AP. (After their battles in the Free City Arena and later the trip to Kuluth-Mar). This worked out well, to focus the later half of the campaign on the plot line fully, while giving a nice mid break.
Basically the weapons are as follows:
The Scythe of Halkete - Used by the Cleric of Wee Jas
This scythe was forged by an Ur-Priest 400 years previously as vengeance against the churches of the Death Gods, ie. Nerull and Wee Jas (this worked especially well because I replaced the church of Erthynull in the Ebon Triad with Nerullite heretics). The player character found it after discovering his family murdered (by a Nerullite, intent on following a divination to destroy a future hero of the church of Wee Jas, as you can tell there is some enmity between the two churches in my game). The Nerullite dropped it on accident when attacked by Lady Amariss, of the Cairn of the Green Lady. The player character found it just after discovering his murdered family, thus changing his path from Farmer to Cleric.
The three rituals associated with it are as follows:
Living Death: You must travel to a graveyard sanctified by your god and spend 24 hours buried in a occupied grave to access the 4th-6th level abilites
Baneful Murder: You must find a follower of the opposing god (in this case Nerull) whose CR is equal to or higher than yours and slay him/her with the Scythe to Access the 8th – 12th level abilities. He completed this ritual by killing the Nerullite mentioned above. Cool battle.
Cursed Holocaust: You have to personally slay a follower of your own god whose CR is equal to or higher than yours. The slain party cannot be returned to life for a year and a day or you cannot Access the 14th-20th level Abilities. he complete this ritual, which he considered not completing at all, and caused him much consternation, when he took over the secret order of Wee Jas Knights, the Proselytes of the Stern Lady, by ritually killing the previous leader,
The last ritual was the real one that messed with his mind. Does he complete the ritual and gain great powers (the scythe maxed out at +5 Keen Scythe), or does he destroy the Scythe to save his church from it's terrible legacy (having been passed back and forth, as spoils between the two churches, thus having killed dozens, at least, of priests of Wee Jas).
The other Weapon of Legacy was the Dread Axe of Melek.
I made the current player (a Paladin of Hextor) only the 3rd person to own this weapon, because his father dug it out of the ruins of Castle Maure. I wanted to bring into the game the nasty family Maure, and so I figured this was a perfect opportunity.
The rituals associated with it were as follows:
Herald of Hell: You have to find an Orc Blooded warrior of at least
your Challenge Rating and convert him/her to the faith of Hextor to access the 4th-6th level abilites
Judgement of the Bright Lands: You have to spend three days without food or water, weapons or shelter in the extreme heat of the Bright Desert. You must survive the experience to Access the 8th – 12th level abilities.
Bloodline of Wrath: You have to track down a descendent of the Maure family and slay them in battle. The Axe of Melek is the only weapon you are allowed, but you can use any spells or innate abilities you possess. Once the Axe has swallowed the last of the life blood of the Maure Scion you may access the 14th- 20th level Abilities
Needless to say these rituals led to some cool side quests. It was especially cool to have them show up to Castle Maure, only to find the ruins inhabited by an army of mercenaries and a Dairn's Instant Fortress. It turned out that Auric's Warband (this now set 5-6 levels after the Free City Games) had already cleared out the upper levels of Castle Maure, much to my players chagrin. In the end, I pulled a scene from the princess bride movie (the Paladin players favorite movie) and had him accidentally find a secret lever that opened a passage in the outer grounds beyond the castle, into a new layer (the vault of antiquities) where they battled against the Maure, and discovered much about Wee Jas and a little about Malcathet (great foreshadowing to the next AP there).
Anyhow that is the skinny on the two items from my game. I think they were the best single thing I added to the AP. I totally suggest them, but make sure to plan ahead and also make them really cool for each player, work towards their strengths, but also challenge them fittingly.
I turned the +1 shortsword found on the body of a dead seeker in the Whispering Cairn into a legacy weapon. It's called 'Malice' and is a legacy weapon whose history is tied to the assassin guild in greyhawk. This added another dimension to Khellek's interest in the Whispering Cairn. My player just loves it.
I also turned the greataxe found in three faces of evil into a dwarven waraxe legacy item tied to the history of Kyuss (more specifically a dwarf paladin devoted to the destruction of the Kyuss spawn)
I also turned the cloak in the faceless one's possession into the 'Cloak of Graz'zt'
My players and I both just love the addition of legacy items to the game. They add so much dimension and tie in additional histories to the characters. I highly recommend their use.
My game currently has three, with a forth about to appear. I opted to have items belonging to the players become legacies as their part in the AoW prophecy. The items initally awaken due to some action on the part of the player, with the next stage of legacy abilities becoming available either due to some heroic action on the part of the player or when a specific advanture event occurs (such as when the party finish SoLS or face big D).
Currently the legacy items are:
The sword "Reflection," whose omen is that an image of each creature killed by the sword can be seen in the reflection of the blade. It belongs the the Duran, the Marshall/Artificer and party leader.
The dancer's robe "Kismet," whose omen whose omen is that the fabric never stains and small cuts instanly repair themselves. The cut and design provide a +2 circumstance bonus to Diplomacy checks when first meeting someone. It is worn by Kaya, the battle dancer.
The gloves "Spark of Life." Its omen is related to its healing powers. They appear to be blood stained and worn, but fit comfortably and never need to be oiled. The bloodstains blacken when undead are within 10 feet. These are worn by Stone, the Kobold ninja/sorcerer.
The one that will soon appear is Alastor’s Archival Tome, carried by Alastor the archivist/savant. I though that since her knowledge skills have saved the day a few times, that the book she has been keeping as a record of the party's progress and what they have learned about the AoW should become an item of legacy.
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Thanks for all the great information! I've only looked through the book a bit, but so far I only have two ideas of what to do as legacy items for the players, assuming they are interested.
The human barbarian in the group uses a heavy flail, and because of her nature attachments (she's using the Wolf Totem variant from UA, and took the Wild Cohort feat off of WotC's site for a wolf pet), the Skull..something heavy flail would work great for her, especially the animal skull part (good con, scent, perfect for a wolf totem barbarian).
The gnomish druid in my group is mostly a healer, but she also carries a sling with her. I was thinking the Wind Legacy sling would be good, the one that turns stones thrown into larger and larger rocks and boulders, and lets her use wind type spells, very appropriate for a druid.
The other two I am not too sure about.
Except for the last person, all three (two above and the next one) are going pure 20 levels in their class.
The first player I'm unsure about plays an Elven (Gray) Wizard. She uses a shortbow instead of spells when she can, at least right now, and doesn't specialize in any school. She likes getting new spells, putting them in her book, etc. She does have one variant I allowed. She didn't want her familiar, but didn't want to worry about preparing 0 level spells either, so we made a 'trade'. In exchange for losing her familiar, she gets to pick 10+int mod 0-level spells that she will always 'know', like a sorcerer, and can cast them spontaneously. The limit per day is still equal to her wizard spells per day for 0's, though, and since they're only 0's, it's not a big deal at all. For a legacy item though, I had no idea what to offer.
The other player is a bit confusing. He is a bit of a power-gamer, not in the bad way though, he's no munchkin. He's an Elan, and started as Scout. His end build plans to be 9 levels in Scout and Ranger (5/4 or 4/5) using one feat from the Complete Scoundrel to stack their favored enemy and skirmish bonuses. He'll also take one level in Psion at some point (no penalties since it's his favored class) and 10 levels in Elocator, which I thought was a really cool psionic scout type. He uses a bow and a morningstar (a masterwork one he found) at the moment, but he doesn't have any particular attachments to a weapon type right now. I believe he plans to dual-wield, though he wasn't too interested in the dual kukri set in the book.
Any suggestions for the latter two, and ideas on how to integrate the former's legacy items into the campaign would be great. I think I'll plan on having the barbarian's flail be a legacy weapon already, since it works with her background and she got it via an interesting death route (ties in with skulls). Basically, her dad (a bard)'s good friend got mad and drunk one night and accidentally killed him. In his fright and shame, he chased her out into the woods to kill her too, so there were no witnesses. Wolves came out, killed him, and she took the flail he had been using, along with going back to get the dad's guitar.
As for the druid and her sling, I'm not sure. Is there a magical sling or missile item I could replace it with soon in the campaign?
Any help from all of you vets is appreciated. Thanks!