Zelicia, First Servant of the Sacred Scorpion

[Gerald Andrews]

Name: Zelicia, First Servant of the Sacred Scorpion
Female Human, Druid 9
Description: Zelicia lounges comfortably amongst simple rugs and pillows. Draped in an elegant red robe, she plays affectionately with the scorpion in her hands. Raven shoulder-length hair falls to frame her brilliant green eyes. The light brown of her skin adds an interesting effect that gives her slender body an exotic touch. Often using it to enhance her wiles, Zelicia's body belies its strength.

Hers is a hard beauty, weathered by both the desert sands and her experiences. Her gaze holds a lethal satisfaction, whispering loudly of her willingness to act as needed. Scars covering her hands show how often she has felt a scorpion's sting. Her only extravagance is a robe of red silk with the image of a black scorpion spun into its back she wears as the Scorpion Shaman.

Zelicia likes to keep mostly to the Temple of the Sacred Scorpion, the remnants of a shrine she began using for herself and her followers, the Servants of the Sacred Scorpion, to worship in. With the assistance the Servants, she seeks out opportunities to increase their number at every turn.

Whiptail, her pet large monstrous scorpion, is handled only by Zelicia.

Motivations/Goals: She desires to create a cult dedicated to Scorpion worship and to enlighten those around her of the lethal beauty of scorpions. She is contemplating trying to take the Test of the Starstone.

Schemes/Plots/Adventure Hooks: As both an extra source of revenue, Servants of the Sacred Scorpion milk scorpion venom to sell it to those interested. One of those interested has assassinated the king, now the prince has condemned the Servants placing bounty on Zelicia's head.

The PCs have been hired to work as guards for an archeological dig to the recently discovered temple. As the Dig gets underway accidents begin to happen. Injuries occur. Things and people begin to go missing. Who or what is behind it? That's what the PCs have to figure out before they become the next victims.

Caravans that travel through the Black Sands have begun to go missing. Several merchants who are on the verge of losing everything have pooled together to send one final caravan into the Black Sands. They offer the PCs a reward to get the caravan through.

Rumors abound of a town being overrun by giant scorpions. The PCs are approached by a modestly dressed woman who'd like to hire them to clear out the scorpions. When the PCs reach the town they find that the populace are now worshipping scorpions and making offerings to an altar dedicated to them. What is going on?

The Scorpion Cult is making a bid on godhood. Over the last year, its members have been traveling to Absalom where they plan to stage an assault on the Starstone Cathedral. Willing to sacrifice their own lives at any cost they hope to give Zelicia the chance to be granted divinity.

[Ed Greenwood]

Initial Impression: Not another alluring priestess wanting to found and further a faith! This had BETTER be good. (No, I don’t mean lots of participants in the Superstar are pushing priestesses at us, I mean this idea is not a new one, so I’m looking for excellent execution (or it’s probably not going to grab me).

Concept: Ambitious cynic or believer seeking to build a cult. Nothing new, but a classic villain motivation because it can work. Unfortunately, it’s rarely well handled, so I’m looking for this to be an exception.

Execution: Stilted, sometimes over-the-top, often somewhat confusing writing mars a fairly good physical description. Yet that’s it; that’s where the description fades out. I never get inside Zelicia’s head, never get anything I can take hold of to tell me how she walks, talks, and thinks. Especially thinks. I’m given some goals, but no impression of how, in a daily manner, she seeks to carry any of them out. I feel like I’m reading a film script’s capsule description of the first on-screen appearance of a character, not something intended for a roleplayer to grasp a character. I’m left thinking if I and another DM were both handed this entry and told to portray this NPC, we could quite likely end up doing it in entirely different ways - - because there’s no guidance here that would steer us in the same direction.

Tilt: “I am the Scorpion Mistress - - er, Master! Fear me! See? They caress me, they obey me! And when I order them to, they will come for YOU!” I’m TRYING to make this come alive - - but when I do, am left with the conclusion that I’m creating a Johnny One-Note, because I have so little to work with. The one bright spot: the milked venom as a business to fund her work. However, “As both an extra source of revenue,”? Why the “both”? What got forgotten and omitted here?

Overall: Undeveloped. In the end, an idea without any lore to make this villain usable, let alone attractive to a DM and memorable in play. Sigh.

Recommendation: Not recommended for advancement.

[Sean K Reynolds]

I don't think there's enough here to build more than an adventure or two. You find out about the scorpionic stuff, you head to their hidden temple, you kill them, end of story. It doesn't appear that she'd act against the PCs unless they were trying to kill her. She's content to sit in her hidden temple and sell poisons, and she's "contemplating" trying to take the Test of the Starstone. Her very description implies that she is extremely passive, and therefore not particularly villainous.

Rec: do not advance.

[Clark Peterson]

Initial Impression: Sacred Scorpion. I’m in. We all saw the movie The Scorpion King, thought it sucked and long awaited the day of something cool with scorpions. Is today the day? Uh oh, another druid. Well, I guess that works with the scorpions. But I’m concerned already.

Word Count: 490.

Concept (name, title, is it actually a villain?, overall design choices, playability): C-
The Good: Expand her cult is a tried and true fantasy villain motivation...
The Bad: …and as a result has been done 8 million times, few well. Boy oh boy, I love desert settings and female villains (the last part is the one thing Disney got right). And scorpions. Very cool. But I don’t know what the “big villain idea” behind her is. Setting is not theme. I got her setting. I don’t know her theme.

Execution (quality of writing, hook, theme, organization, use of proper format, quality of mandatory content-physical description, motivation/goal, scheme/plot, presence of any disqualification criteria): C-
The Good: Some good setup and background. I love her lounging on rugs and pillows. That gets a visual in my head quick, which is important.
The Bad: How is she unique or interesting? What does she want to do, exactly? I don’t think you got me inside her motivations at all. I’m wondering if more time isn’t needed for this round since I have seen more than one submission like that where I felt that the author didn’t find the core of the villain and submitted what I felt was an early draft rather than a finished submission.

Tilt (did it grab me?, is it unique and cool?, do I like it?, flavor and setting): B
You had me at “scorpion.” Yes, I like the IDEA behind this villain, but I have to admit the execution falls too short. But I will reward you for capturing my imagination.

Overall: B-
A promising desert villainess who may sting as harshly as her pets, but poor execution drags this down.

Recommendation: I’m on the fence on this one. I could easily say NO to it, I could also grudgingly say YES. Though I like the concept, the lack of detail leads me to say that I DO NOT recommend this villain submission for advancement.

From the guy who brought us the spellcatch gauntles, which was very cool. Good luck with this villain. The voters may see it differently than I do.

[Wolfgang Baur]

Another druid, oy. This one at least starts off on the right foot by being desert-based and picking a cool scorpion theme. And hey, props for the cool pulp name as "First Servant of the Sacred Scorpion".

But after that, it gets shaky.

The problem is the lame cult element (almost as overdone as snakes), plus a general lack of momentum. What am I supposed to do with this villain over the course of a campaign? She's mostly one-dimensional, and I was hoping for ... Some richer sense of how she plans to thrive. What makes her cult worthwhile? What's her cool twist? The hooks and motivation are both sort of average.

In other words, you're showing us a lot of potentially cool pieces, and letting us do the work to actually make it fly. That's not inspiring design, that's just putting the cool toys on a list.

Recommendation Lukewarm recommendation. If the voters put you through to the next round, make sure your next one has more inspiring mojo, not just standard props.

[Nicholas Herold]

Eh. I'm getting done with druids, and the description of her beauty is a little much. She seems very passive.

[bitplayr]

Druids make interesting villains, given their motivations and their powers. The very fact that many talented designers have drawn from them attests to that.

Desert-based, which is a nice change. Lots of possiblities here, but Zelicia would have to become more pro-active to be a true villain to the PC's. Otherwise, she becomes more of a crime-boss, someone to deal with rahter than necessarily defeat.

[Mark Moreland]

I'm really not feeling this one. Your wondrous item had real flair, but Zelica seems quite vanilla to me. I'd love to know more about her cult, who her followers are, what her ultimate goal is. Sure, it's the Test of the Starstone, but isn't that everyone's goal? Like every kid wants to be an astronaut or the President? Scorpions have the potential here to be a great motif, but other than her thinly fleshed-out cult of scorpion worshipers, her animal companion, and her entrepreneurial poison scheme, I don't really see it catching. Why scorpions? What about them made her want to do eeeeevil to spread their worship? And what aspects of a scorpion's nature does she herself exhibit? Overall, I see this as having a lot of potential, but get the feeling that you were either rushed to get it in on time, or didn't feel that it needed to be further developed.

[Corrosive Rabbit]

The physical description of Zelicia is great, but the description seems to stop at physical attributes. Although it may not have been your intention, there is a sense of inaction that permeates this villain. Although there's no one thing I can point to, I'm given the impression of someone with a lot of idle dreams and no real drive to do anything in particular.

It's already been said, but I'd be interested in seeing what you could do with another 500 words with which to flesh this villain out. Unfortunately, I don't know if there's anything that could be included in the stat block that would solve the overall aura of passivity that I'm getting from this villain.

CR

[Reckless]

Reckless Ratings

Concept2
(Is this villain villainous?)
Content3
(Grammar, Format,Spelling, Etc.)
Coolness2
(Would my players be impressed by this? Am I?)
Credibility3
(Does the villain’s motives make sense?)
Clarity3
(How good a sense of how to stat this villain do we get?)

Scores out of 5 and completely based on my opinion only.
Total Score13

[Winterwalker]

Her goals are to show they are lethal beauties? - Weak.

Enter the peasent's mindset:
I will say if someone brings a giant scorpion to my town, I'll say whatever she wants to hear, lip service at it's finest, then run or fight when she isn't looking. There's no way I'm giving my life for some whacked out scorpion ladies chance at divinity.

I find it unbelievable a town would just go with the flow on this concept.

[Steven Helt]

Post eaten. Rats.

Not much of a villain. Has dreaded sentence "prefers to stay secluded in her temple."

Is not proactive. Would be more impressed if she spent her time acquiring relics and body parts or whatnot in preparation for her Starstone Test. Cult is very generic and not detailed. Low ethos.

I will say that so far the range of villains is so disappointing you would get a vote from me if I voted now.

Should the trend continue - go to last years' villains. Study the ones that advanced, and the ones that didn't advance. Many of last year's losing villains smoked the ones I am reading now. Learn about their abilities and stats to prepare for next round. Find a niche in the new Pathfinder rules and convince us you are the mechanical genius of the bunch.

Good luck if you get there.

Oh. I awarded you the Get Out of My Head award, because one of my two finalists for a villain entry was a desert druid who hunted down foreigners who looted Osirian relics, and left behind bodies that made people think of Egyptian curses. No scorpions, though. Fiendish dire crocodiles.

[Sue Flaherty]

Druid cultist in the desert and scorpions ... but then nuttin. I don't get anything to get into her as a GM, and the Cult ... nothing on it, either. There's nothing in the rules for me to check (went through the PDF of the Chronicles) unless it's in a side book I don't have access to. Shame, I wanted to like her. I like druids! Sorry.

[Russ Taylor]

My cranky tired brain agrees with Steven Helt - these villains as a group have not learned from the successes and mistakes of last year's villain round. A passive villain is a big no-no. You're inviting a plot-on-rails with that sort of a start, and your jaded audience wants bigger, grander things.

Not helped by this being the latest in many druids I have read this round. I will try not to hold that against the entry.

In the end, this is a druid with a somewhat more interesting choice of "animal". I'd have liked more words on how the choice of vermin plays into a druid's powers, even though this is a rule's light round.

Not a vote-getter for me this round, though I wish you luck advancing nonetheless.

[Patrick Curtin]

I like the desert angle, and I'm always a big fan of scorpions. Although Zelica could use a bit of polishing, I think she could be a useful villan in a desert setting. I'd love to elaborate a desert temple for her and her cult to inhabit.

[Maurice de Mare]

Grab: no
useful: maybe

Vote: no

[Charles Evans 25]

Scorpions wait for something to pass by, yes, but then they *STING*. Where is Zelicia's sting?
A couple more lines spent on things other than plots/schemes/adventure hooks would have been useful.

Will this villain cause the PCs grief?
Ummm, not likely to unless they wander into her lair.

[Charles Evans 25]

As a further comment, riffing off an idea of a villain with the nickname 'The Scorpion' from a Leslie Charteris story, I would have personally made Zelicia a master blackmailer, who lurks in her temple whilst sending out awakened animals to spy on people... then she threatens to reveal the dirty secrets uncovered by her pets, unless large quantities of 'hush money', are forthcoming on a regular basis.
It would have been so easy to have done so much more with this villain...

[Jason Nelson]

It's a nice physical description, and I like druids (maybe I haven't read enough of this year's entries to be sick of them) and deserts and scorpions, and her goals and plot hooks are okay, but there's just really not a lot here. Half the entry seems like it's description, but not much on why or how she's someone memorable and proactive as a force for evil in the world.

[raincricket]

I really hope there's an obese female villain in here somewhere.

The bit about milking venom is awesome...

[Jason Nelson]

raincricket wrote:

I really hope there's an obese female villain in here somewhere.

Tru dat. They are all a little on the skinny side. Perhaps something like the following could help give inspiration. (It's true, there is nothing like the original, but imitation is the sincerest form of flattery):

For the truly brain-meltingly insane version.

For the emo version.

And, of course, in one of the great parodies of all time, for the renegade Christian version that goes in an ENTIRELY different direction.

Enjoyments to all in the Paizo-verse.

[roguerouge]

That's funny, and kudos for making the point. But I vote we start a thread in the general forum on this issue if we want to discuss this further, rather than clutter up this thread. 'Cause, really, this objection's about more than just this one villain.

[Montalve]

*Sight* i usually love an alluting dark haired, red dressed villainess... and on top of it... scorpions... i love the dark and scary image an scorpion compels... its something definitive about life and death...

still as she is alluring, she is lacking in background and besides selling scorpion poison I really don't see that much evil in her... the adventure hooks give us something, but now how or why she really does it...

and she does not need to assault Absalom to try the Starstone test... she just need to fly or something over the 200 something feet chasm that separates the Cathedral from mainland... aside of that... it doesn't matter what she does... the Cathedral won't open for her.

[Kor - Orc Scrollkeeper]

I like the idea of the villain (good desciption) but in the bigger picture of things she seems a little one-dimensional. (Loves scorpions, worships them and thinks everyone else should too).

[Ernest Mueller]

6/10

Crazy hot scorpion lady. Interesting and memorable, though seems like a one trick pony for a standard adventurer "kill your way up the food chain" adventure.

[Joel Flank]

I kept reading through the entry, waiting to find out what makes Zelicia a villain. I got to the end and started over. After a second read through, I still don't know what makes her a villain. She wants to promote worship of scorpions by showing they are naturally beautiful killers. Okay, that's a bit odd of a religion, but promoting a religion isn't evil. Maybe if her religion required human sacrifice to scorpions, or force breeding man-scorpions to make a killer scorpion army to kill all non-believers or something. Just looking to covert people though - not so villainous.

Milking and selling of scorpion venom is possibly bad, if poison is illegal, which varies from country to country. Even if it is evil though, I don't want a villain support role as the main reason for a villain. Whoever sells the poison might be bad, but you find them so you can track down the real villain that poisoned the king, not because they're so horrible. (As an aside, who is the king? Being specific here would have been better than just saying "the king" and "the prince") Selling poison is not a lot different in my mind as being an accountant for other villains. Yes, it might make you evil, but it doesn't make you a villain, just a flunky.

Finally, planning on taking the test of the starstone? That's open to anyone who wants to. Not only that, but it's free to try (you might not live to tell about it, but there's not really anyone out to stop you from trying.) I'm not clear on why the cult would stage an assault on the Starstone Cathedral, since it's free and open to the public to try the test.

As for the writing, I found lots that I didn't really like. An example is the sentence "Zelicia likes to keep mostly to the Temple of the Sacred Scorpion, the remnants of a shrine she began using for herself and her followers, the Servants of the Sacred Scorpion, to worship in." She "likes to keep mostly to the temple"? How about "she likes to keep to the temple" or "she mostly keeps to the temple"? Keeping to the temple isn't a great villain thing anyway, but you don't need to tell us that she both likes it and mostly does it. One or the other is fine. Also, this sentence is a run on. Split it into two sentences.

[Jorrik the Fat]

This is a really cool and atmospheric villain that made it a long way through my deliberations without being ditched. But, then I got down to selecting just four to advance, and there are just a few other villain entries that strike me as more original. It's one I would have considered for my fifth vote, which puts it in pretty select company, and, frankly, there's really nothing wrong with it... so I hope you advance to the next round!

[Charles Evans 25]

Sorry you didn't make the top 16. If only she had perhaps had a little more sting....

[Patrick Curtin]

Sorry KMD. I was pulling for you :(