Sorry for the long title, I'm sure I've read other posts where people noted how bad some characters like Drizzt and Elminster looked on paper. Now, being as these are super powered heroes, wouldn't it make more sense if they were statted accordingly? Also, in home games featuring these characters, if some people were min maxers wouldn't they over shadow characters from the novels possibly spoiling the wonder and fun for some players that were fans of the books? Should players strive to be more three dimensional problem solvers like the novel characters or be allowed to min/max in order to smash encounters with ease. Not sure where I am going except I have always been terribly disappointed at seeing these "mighty" characters statted out looking like chumps on paper that most of my characters could walk on two or more levels lower than the novel hero or villain. What is the consensus regarding the design/power level of such npc's?
DnD is much different than a story I've always thought. Stories aren't as controlled by a rule book. Also Deus Ex Machina and various other things are usually part of the every day life of a fictional character in a story.
There's a difference between what makes an optimized character and what makes a compelling character to read about.
Also, Raistlin was totally min-maxed. He dumped his CON harder than any min-maxer I've ever seen at any table I've played at.
You Sir, owe me a cup of coffee as I have just upended mine due to a sudden outbreak of lulz. Well played.
It depends on the character really.
Drizzt, for example, has stats that likely fit the character described in his stories. Some feats/skills/etc are there to fill out background, or fluff, and aren't going to be the min/max decision, but then he was never meant to be a min/maxed character in the first place.
Other characters (Elminster, in example) don't even come close to the power they wield in their stories.
For example, Larloch is a powerful Forgotten Realms lich that has been statted up in one of the 3.0 books "Lords of Darkness."
But here's what Ed Greenwood (his creator) has to say about him:
"Larloch is a onetime Netherese sorcerer (still possessed of a lot of Netherese scepters, which he knows how to make) who is now a quite insane "ultra-lich" (in this case, the term means he has many unknown powers which are up to you the DM, among them the fact that he can still learn and develop new spells, increase in levels, etc.). He's probably a 46th level evil-aligned wizard right now, and he crafted many of his own undead abilities prior to undeath, which argues that he found his own 'process' for achieving lichdom.
Larloch is served by many (60+ ?) liches, formerly archwizards, whom he guides in concert, as the leader of a telepathic-web 'Overmind.' Thus far, neither psionics nor mind-influencing magics have ever been effective against him or any of his serviotr mages, because the others in the link can withstand and overcome such influences, causing them to fail.
In theory, an attack could reach all of them through the link, but some quite powerful Red Wizards have tried and failed (Szass Tam didn't try such an attack, which may be why he survived...he remains fearful of approaching Larloch and his mages, but fascinated by the details of their lichdom, hoping it might yield him some powers.)
One of Larloch's given-to-himself powers (which - in a long, involved, and secret, personally-developed process - cost him 10 years of life and some vitality, irrelevant of course given his goal of lichdom) is automatic spell reflection (of all magic cast upon him). He can by act of will override this ability, for example when he wants to work a spell on himself; otherwise, it always operates.
Mystra (Midnight's predecessor as the goddess) is said to have allowed Larloch to acquire powers approaching those of "old Netheril" in return for 'leaking' spells to persistent adventurers he or his minions might come into contact with, but this may be no more than rumour spread by the Zhents or Red Wizards or Dragon Cultists, designed to lure adventurers into Larloch-weakening forays...
As for Larloch knowing the identities and locations of other liches/Netherese survivors...no, only the one's he's destroyed. Larloch is too self-centered to hunt down folks who don't come within his easy reach. He controls plenty of archwizards/liches already, but may decide to try to either control or destroy a new one when they come into contact. He seems to be pursuing other goals, however. Which ones? That's up to each DM....."
Larloch and his lich minions have no interest in attracting attention that would waste their time and magical resources (and perhaps, if word got around how dangerous they were, even threaten their existence in the face of a concerted attack from various magical power groups working together). Larloch is not interested in ruling Faerun...but he IS interested in creating and controlling a series of magical gates linking many worlds (parallel Prime Material Planes) and Outer Planes...and so rigging their enchantments that anyone using them comes under his control/faces his forceful removal of their magic items, information from their mind, and so forth. The gates are easy for him to create (he licked all of those problems long ago). The control enchantments have been giving him troubles for thousands of years now, and as an obsessive perfectionist, he isn't going to let this rest until he gets everything just so...nor is he going to create the gates until he's ready to put the controls on them.
In short, he's a munchkin only if played that way. All Player Characters have to learn sometime that there are folks in the Realms just too powerful to tangle with.
I'm reminded of the original Realms campaign, and the Company of Crazed Venturers attacking Shaan the Serpent-Queen (who briefly appeared in a Wizards Three DRAGON article). She was busy working magic on a small island off Mintarn. They attacked, broke her concentration, and she looked up with an irritated frown. They bid her stop, or they'd destroy what she was working on; to demonstrate, one of the Company mages touched (and disintegrated) a stone he was standing beside.
She shook her head in derision, and touched the island beneath them, disintegrating IT, and dumping the Company into the chilly sea waves for a long swim...whilst she turned back to her spellcasting, floating on nothing and ignoring them once more.
A heavy-handed lesson, but...well, Larloch's in the same league, and more. Just consider him a power of the Realms and Don't Go There.
Ed"
Simply put, "rules" aren't enough to define that, lol.
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Short answer: Because character and story matter more than stat optimization.
That's a handy rule to remember for game sessions too.
+1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000
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Greenwood stuff
Never been a fan of Greenwood, sounds like a horrible GM, with a lot of 'cooler than thou' NPCs.
Also, Raistlin was totally min-maxed. He dumped his CON harder than any min-maxer I've ever seen at any table I've played at.
I get this was joke, but I still think this is cool factoid. Raistlin was based on someone's actual character and his player rolled a high Int and low str and Con. The whole being "damage" during the Test was created to putting flavor to stats.
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Also, Raistlin was totally min-maxed. He dumped his CON harder than any min-maxer I've ever seen at any table I've played at.I get this was joke, but I still think this is cool factoid. Raistlin was based on someone's actual character and his player rolled a high Int and low str and Con. The whole being "damage" during the Test was created to putting flavor to stats.
That and its more the DL Curse of the Magus than his Con. I want to say his Con is actually an 11 or 12 off the top of my head.
That and its more the DL Curse of the Magus than his Con. I want to say his Con is actually an 11 or 12 off the top of my head.Also, Raistlin was totally min-maxed. He dumped his CON harder than any min-maxer I've ever seen at any table I've played at.I get this was joke, but I still think this is cool factoid. Raistlin was based on someone's actual character and his player rolled a high Int and low str and Con. The whole being "damage" during the Test was created to putting flavor to stats.
I think it was 10 con, but it might have been 11, not nearly as bad as you would expect, must have those stat cards here somewhere..
According to Tracy Hickman, Raistlin's stats were rolled, not bought, and his Con was a 7.
Not exactly a min-maxed choice given the options.
I would say most of the reason has been already described perfectly, fiction isn't dependent on game mechanics. In fact in some cases the characters weren't statted up until well into their fictional career, and then you had gamers trying to look at what was available and how to make the character fit into the mechanics.
I'd also like to offer, that some of the characters weren't built for mechanical optimization, in that they weren't built just to do one thing well. They were built to be "round" characters that could do many things above average. Some of the characters had to survive on their own in both wild and urban environments, in those cases you need a character that is decent at a lot of things, as opposed to awesome at one or two things.
Many of the characters in question existed before the 3.x rules set came along. But even if they weren't, the question is easy to answer from a writer's perspective.
When you have a hero in a novel, he must necessarily survive a variety of insane situations, so must sometimes pull off some pretty fantastic feats. That's fine when it stays in the novel, or the movie. If John McClane (Die Hard) needs to leap off an exploding roof, wearing no shoes, tied to a firehose, then swing down and shoot a window out to get back inside the building, he just does it.
But when you translate John McClane to a relatively static ruleset, you need to explain the mechanics for how he gets such a feat done, and you need to be able to balance him fairly with other characters. Suddenly you have a "Firehose" feat. The inflexible nature of rulessets forces templates upon the character in order to accomplish what in a novel or book would be taken relatively for granted.
Gamers would go nuts if Drizzt, for instance, did not have level dips reflecting his various accomplishments in the novels. So he is not statted to be the best, purest ranger in the Forgotten Realms, but instead is statted to reflect his time raging underground, his time being trained professionally, etc.
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One of the many reasons I like 3e compared to 2nd is that the changes to
multiclassing allows to better model characters. You couldn't be multiclass fighter/ranger before since they were both in the warrior group. Also 3e allowed Drawven Doo-dads, er druids :)
And, in Ed Greenwood's case, no need to optimize if your pet DMPCs are 46th level or whatever anyway, and competing with 1st - 14th level PCs.
You have to keep in mind that Greenwood was an old school GM. In those days many of them would keep uber level attack dog NPCs ready for when their PC's got out of hand. Elminster was one character created specifically for that purpose.
When I started playing, back in 1980? 1806? there was one kid DMing who kept doing that. One day the rest of us decided he wasn't allowed to DM anymore, and we all started learning the ropes, and never looked back. "Pet" ultra-level NPCs were bad back then, and they're still bad.
I like high level NPCs. Unless your DM handles them with profound immaturity, they shouldn't be a problem. In a setting where there are CR 20+ monsters wandering around, why not have a couple similarly powerful mortals (or, in the case of liches, immortals)?
I've been guilty of have a "pet" ultra-level NPC, but I made sure he was powerless in the scheme of things. My setting was undergoing a cataclysm, with the planes colliding with one another, and fusing in some cases. Huge, gaping portals to the Abyss, for example, were popping up... everywhere. This particular ultra-level NPC served as an Atlas figure, holding it all together. The most he could manage was to project an image or himself and communicate telepathically with the PCs, as well as his other allies. However, if he was ever to strain himself too much, or be distracted in his task, the multiverse would collapse in on the Material Plane--erasing it from existence.
So, I suppose he wasn't a threat to my players' egos :)
My setting has some powerful NPCs, usually local lords or a small group of long-time movers and shakers in the worldwide scheme of things, behind-the-scenes supervillains and the like. But most of these won't be things the PCs ever face, or if they do the entire campaign will be about facing this one guy, for most of them.
In the interest of full disclosure, I have an "insanely" high-level (25th!) wizard in my homebrew setting who is strictly non-interactive with the world as a whole unless another powerful caster starts openly and egregiously meddling with the world's political structure. Then he appears, tells them to cool it, and returns to his little manse on his little island and forgets all about it. He's, in essence, nothing more than a plot device explaining why casters don't rule the world and make everyone else on it their slaves, like Murgen in Vance's "Lyonesse" novels.
Any caster worth their salt will not want to live under another's edict, of course, so they go off-plane when they want to stir things up -- which is exacly my hope: that around 10th-11th level the PCs are ready for planar adventures, giving me a whole new and nearly infinite set of adventure possibilities.
The key here is that he's never used as an active NPC, either for or against the PCs; he's never actually contrasted with the PCs; and especially that he's not used as a wish-fulfillment proxy ego for a socially-awkward DM. (In the event that a high-level PC wizard actually started subjugating whole nations, I'd have to quick remove him, perhaps with something like, "the Archimage never does appear to contest what you're doing; indeed, you suspect he's been dead for decades, and only the rumor of his existence was keeping others from doing what you are now.")
That's a proper ultra-level NPC, Kirth.
I think Eliminster fits a similar role. He's not actively interacting with the world; he leaves that to the Harpers (as well as the PCs). He only rears his head when the realms are in dire need, and even then he has his limitations.
For some reason a lot of people seem to hate him, though.
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I think Eliminster fits a similar role. He's not actively interacting with the world; he leaves that to the Harpers (as well as the PCs). He only rears his head when the realms are in dire need, and even then he has his limitations. For some reason a lot of people seem to hate him, though.
The latter may have to do with the presentation -- as I understand it, he's of godlike power, he's oh-so-witty and cute, all the girls love him, he bangs goddesses by the score; he's basically presented as an adolescent male's mary-sue daydream alter ego. (I'm not a Realms fan in any aspect, so if I'm far-off on anything, please correct me.)
Even without that, trying so hard to give a personality to your Ultra-DMPC (even going so far as to write stories about him, using him as a protagonist) is a sure way to upstage the PCs. Restraint would require that the NPC in that role be more or less faceless.
I suppose that makes sense.
My question would be how much of that featured in Ed's actual games? Separate stories using him as a protagonist may have nothing to do with his appearances in game. Or Ed may have been completely obnoxious with him in game. I don't have any idea.
I never played with the dude; I have no idea, either. But thinking of a handy plot-device in that much boyhood-fantasy detail hardly speaks well of the way in which he thought of the character. Couple that with the examples cited above, and I think it paints a resonable picture of someone who wasn't particularly worried about upstaging the PCs.
Talking with Ed a few years ago, it sounded like his games are rules light and role playing heavy--i.e., he cares more about interesting characters than making and using stat blocks.
Even without that, trying so hard to give a personality to your Ultra-DMPC (even going so far as to write stories about him, using him as a protagonist) is a sure way to upstage the PCs. Restraint would require that the NPC in that role be more or less faceless.
TSR decided who served as protagonists of the books. Ed just writes 'em as work for hire, same as everyone else writing gaming fiction. They sold well, so TSR and then WotC kept asking for more of them.
TSR decided who served as protagonists of the books. Ed just writes 'em as work for hire, same as everyone else writing gaming fiction. They sold well, so TSR and then WotC kept asking for more of them.
That actually makes a lot of sense, in retrospect -- thanks.
I never played with the dude; I have no idea, either. But thinking of a handy plot-device in that much boyhood-fantasy detail hardly speaks well of the way in which he thought of the character. Couple that with the examples cited above, and I think it paints a resonable picture of someone who wasn't particularly worried about upstaging the PCs.
Looking at the 1E and particularly 2E REALMS products, Greenwood repeatedly says that players should never find Elminster at home, or if they do he would need some pressing reason to help them or even speak to them (he used the conceit that Elminster is famous in-setting and acts like a celebrity would, to the point of lying low or getting others to speak to the 'trespassers' on his behalf etc). If you look at the AVATAR adventure modules, when an event so massive that Elminster actually needs to get involved is taking place, Elminster is specifically removed from the equation (apparently blown to a million pieces by a collapsing celestial stairway, though it's later revealed he was simply knocked into another plane and took months to escape) to prevent him from upstaging the PCs.
I get the impression that when Greenwood did more regularly use Elminster in his home games, he was much lower in level (his 1E stat block was much less impressive and, IIRC, a clear ten levels lower than his 2E incarnation) and used more as a 'powerful-but-not-godlike wizard who gives the PCs some help' rather than 'goddess-tapping superbeing Gary Stu'. Almost all of Elminster's more eye-rolling traits were actually added in after the character first appeared in gaming products and fiction. For example, he was said to only be 200-odd years old right up until the novel THE MAKING OF A MAGE established him as 1,100 years old, and the phrase 'Chosen of Mystra' didn't show up until a while into 2E's timespan.
In an interview with Ed Greewood I saw he said Elminster was created as a sort of him in his books and games. Someone how could do the commentary, read the narrative and stuff.
I doubt that. Greenwood always has said that Elminster is not his expy, Mirt the Moneylender is.
But I seriously love that there are beings of unfathomable power in the Realms, which the PCs simply cannot touch. High level PCs often get way too arrogant for their own good and it is good to know that at least in that world a GM has methods to give a little demonstration to show that they are not the top dogs yet. I've always thought that players who are angry at the mere existance of really powerful NPCs ( who may not even have interacted with them at all ) are more out to establish that they are the top dogs of the world.
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I think Eliminster fits a similar role. He's not actively interacting with the world; he leaves that to the Harpers (as well as the PCs). He only rears his head when the realms are in dire need, and even then he has his limitations. For some reason a lot of people seem to hate him, though.The latter may have to do with the presentation -- as I understand it, he's of godlike power, he's oh-so-witty and cute, all the girls love him, he bangs goddesses by the score; he's basically presented as an adolescent male's mary-sue daydream alter ego. (I'm not a Realms fan in any aspect, so if I'm far-off on anything, please correct me.)
Y'know, Kirth, you always mention his banging goddesses when the subject of Elminster rears its head. I can't help thinking there's some issues there for you to work through. Just sayin'. For me, I can't stand the way he talks, and the fact he's nearly named after a town on Dorset.
On the broader issue, I agree totally that super-powerful characters are much more interesting as character hooks than anything else. Facing off in combat against a god seems a silly use of a god, all other things being equal.
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Elminster, Khelben, Larloch, the Simbul and Halaster etc were basically safeguards put in place to ensure that the PCs didn't break the Realms.
Rather ironic that Wizards of the Coast themselves then went and broke the Realms more completely than any high-powered PCs could ever manage :)
Some friends and I actually had this specific conversation regarding the way Drizzt was statted out back when the FRCS came out, and in his particular case, his build isn't as important as his overall levels, vis-a-vis the kinds of challenges he usually faces. Drizzt isn't an ideal TWF warrior, but most of the time he's fighting orcs, kobolds, the occasional Umber Hulk or Earth elemental... in short, he's got so many levels that he already outclasses his typical enemies.
And that particular observation might be worth applying to a number of other NPCs - given the challenges they face, a great many of them don't really HAVE to be optimized.
Y'know, Kirth, you always mention his banging goddesses when the subject of Elminster rears its head.
Have I done so before? I don't recall another occasion.
Maybe it wasn't you. But that aspect seems to really bother some people.
Can't speak for anyone else, but for me it just seems needlessly adolescent. "He doesn't just date supermodels -- he gets GODDESSES!" seems like something a 13-year-old would come up with. Then again, this is a hobby in which grown adults play make-believe, so I guess, realistically speaking, that would be par for the course.
For me, I can't stand the way he talks, and the fact he's nearly named after a town on Dorset.
Elminster Newton? :)
I recall it was implied that Elminster knocked boots once with Mystra (the first one) but I thought he was going steady with the Simbul up until the Spellplague? At least they're on the same power level (though the creepiness factor, since Elminster looked after the Seven Sisters as kids and helped raise them, remains high), and the Simbul was a more interesting character because of the whole 'borderline insanity' thing.
Whatever happened later on, I have no idea. My knowledge of FR ends abruptly and with finality with the release of 4E Realms.
Strictly speaking, I think he only looked after Storm, Dove, Alusair, and Laeral, but I started reading less and less Realms-stuff after they started releasing details about how the shift to 4E-rules would affect the Realms and I didn't like a single one of them, so my Realms-memory's getting a tad fuzzy (along with my sentence-structure).
I recall it was implied that Elminster knocked boots once with Mystra (the first one) but I thought he was going steady with the Simbul up until the Spellplague? At least they're on the same power level (though the creepiness factor, since Elminster looked after the Seven Sisters as kids and helped raise them, remains high), and the Simbul was a more interesting character because of the whole 'borderline insanity' thing.
Whatever happened later on, I have no idea. My knowledge of FR ends abruptly and with finality with the release of 4E Realms.
So far as goddesses go, Elminster's only had sex with Mystra to my recollection. They apparently did so fairly often at various times, but she tended to run hot and cold on that and the new Mystra has never touched him. His steady paramour from somewhere around mid-2e until the end of 3e was the Simbul.
Quite a bit more than borderline insanity is supposed to be the subtext for all of Ed's immortal NPCs, with all of them finding different dysfunctional ways to manage the endless parade of funerals. Sex is obviously one of Elminster and Alustriel's ways. But we only ever see them from their own POVs or the POVs of people who have good reason to be sympathetic to them for such encounters and obviously they don't see themselves as desperate and needy.
So far as goddesses go, Elminster's only had sex with Mystra to my recollection. They apparently did so fairly often at various times, but she tended to run hot and cold on that and the new Mystra has never touched him. His steady paramour from somewhere around mid-2e until the end of 3e was the Simbul.
I could swear Drows of the Underdark was strongly hinting that Elminster was hooking up with Eilistraee, too. Though I don't really care enough to dig up my AD&D stuff. :)