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I'm building a gnome wizard for PF, and of course when you think a gnome wizard, you think illusionist. So I created a character that is a Mage of the Veil that will be going into the Veiled Illusionist PrC.
Here's the thing though. Since he is a pathological liar with no trust for anyone and he remains constantly in disguise thanks to his Hat of Disguise and (soon) his veil pool, I don't want the party to know anything about him. So I worked with the DM and we came up with a way for the DM PC to know my character and help the party recruit him without them knowing anything about him.
Essentially, the party is going to come to a town where the entire city is abandoned and there are gang signs everywhere. They will be met by a few of my "associates" (all of them either illusions themselves or my character in disguise) who will inform them about The Deceiver, a powerful black market thug who intimidated the entire town into fleeing thanks to his huge amount of ghost thugs (basically, me in disguise coming to places wearing The Deceiver's sign and collecting protection money and harassing others, then vanishing and never using that disguise again. Hence the ghost part).
After the party escapes the illusion I plan to trap them in (walls and ceiling closing in on them), my character will emerge, permanently disguised as a dwarf barbarian with a warhammer that I am not proficient in, begrudgingly joining the party.
The group will love this because there is only one real warrior in our group (unless the alchemist decides to be the barbarian kind instead of the bombing kind), so they won't question anything.
As the game goes on, I plan to slowly use more and more of my magic (I already have Still Spell and Silent Spell, as well as Magical Lineage (Major Image) so once I get level 7 and have 4th level spell slots I will devote them solely to Stilled Silent major images).
The issue I'm worried about is, how much troll is too much? I know it's going to be funny, sure, especially when they find out I've been lying to them the whole time, but I don't want to wreck the game because of it. I want to find a nice balance between useless fake fighter and giant jerkface wizard who could have been saving the party the whole time.
Any thoughts on this?
Does your group, or at least your GM use tech at the table? If so, you will get insane mileage out of getting him to open up email or an IM for you.
Either way, I think I would pose as a rouge or monk something, you will get eat alive as their only front line fighter, and posing as a barbarian they will very quickly know something is up.
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Does your group, or at least your GM use tech at the table? If so, you will get insane mileage out of getting him to open up email or an IM for you.
Either way, I think I would pose as a rouge or monk something, you will get eat alive as their only front line fighter, and posing as a barbarian they will very quickly know something is up.
Well, I'm not too worried about it because first of all, only two of the five of them have ever really played PF extensively, and secondly, of course we have a frontline fighter. We have a human samurai of the seal. I'm helping him build tank personally.
The issue with posing as a rogue or a monk is that I have to be a dwarf or a halfling (since the disguise self spell only lets you add up to one foot of height and I'm a gnome). I suppose I could pose as a halfling rogue, but if I do that the rogue in our group is going to be pissed.
Good point about the emails and IMs though. I'll talk to him about it.
Since he is a pathological liar with no trust for anyone and he remains constantly in disguise thanks to his Hat of Disguise and (soon) his veil pool, I don't want the party to know anything about him.I can guarantee that this will not go as planned. The other players will wind up hating your character and probably you as well. Any time you build a clever scam that relies on controlling or predicting how the other PCs must react to your character, it WILL fail. 100% of the time.
I think it depends on the group. I recently finished a Shadowrun campaign where my character had been screwing the party the whole time. When they found out it made for a very memorable last session (my character died horribly of course, but we all had a blast).
My other regular gaming group probably wouldn't have taken it so well mind...
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Since he is a pathological liar with no trust for anyone and he remains constantly in disguise thanks to his Hat of Disguise and (soon) his veil pool, I don't want the party to know anything about him.I can guarantee that this will not go as planned. The other players will wind up hating your character and probably you as well. Any time you build a clever scam that relies on controlling or predicting how the other PCs must react to your character, it WILL fail. 100% of the time.
I think it depends on the group. I recently finished a Shadowrun campaign where my character had been screwing the party the whole time. When they found out it made for a very memorable last session (my character died horribly of course, but we all had a blast).
My other regular gaming group probably wouldn't have taken it so well mind...
Shadowrun has the expectation that you are going to be conned as part of the genre. "It's only a Shadowrun if the Johnson screws you over 3 times."
Pathfinder doesn't. It's better to be upfront with your party about whats going on out of character, even if if you are a pathological liar in character. But it's best for group cohesion to choose more party friendly character flaws.I really don't think this is going to end well for the op.
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You should be upfront and honest with the other players out of character and hope they have the role-playing cajones to separate in and out of character knowledge. I've had players attempt similar things and it usually ends in bad blood between the players. There is a certain amount of implicit trust expected in this game for it to work without it devolving into PvP in the first 5 minutes. If you later reveal that you had been conning them all along...well don't expect them to want to play with you anymore.
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You should be upfront and honest with the other players out of character and hope they have the role-playing cajones to separate in and out of character knowledge. I've had players attempt similar things and it usually ends in bad blood between the players. There is a certain amount of implicit trust expected in this game for it to work without it devolving into PvP in the first 5 minutes. If you later reveal that you had been conning them all along...well don't expect them to want to play with you anymore.
That's the issue though, I really don't think they will be able to separate IC and OOC. As I stated earlier, this is still new for three of the five of them.
You all think it's going to go wrong, and that's the reason I posted this thread. I was unsure. Are you all absolutely sure there are no steps I can take to make this work out nice in the end?
I think you should do this if you want, but you should be prepared for an very strong and possibly negative reaction when they discover what has been happening. But maybe they will not; these types of schemes go over very well in some groups, and there is no way to tell if it will go over well with yours if no one ever tries.
Prepare an apology though that sounds sincere, just in case :)
The goal of a roleplaying is for everyone to have fun, and having an ongoing running joke between you and your DM, that the other players are the brunt of, doesn't sound like fun to anyone but you two.
You achieve that goal by everyone getting a moment in the spotlight, so they can feel awesome.
If I was going to go ahead with this I would build in a place where the group sees through your clever disguise and see if you can talk your way out of it, which not since you've built a character that simply cannot be trusted (as a DM I wouldn't let this character fly since I expect players to build characters that can have some chance of fitting in with the group). If not, accept the re-roll/char gen with good graces.
p.s. The best liars include much of the truth, rather than complete fabrications.
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Or you could ask them.
Without giving away to much, you could ask the other players: "hey guys, my next character will be holding back some info, and will keep secrets from the rest of you. Do you want to know these secrets out of character, and share a laugh, or do you want to have them revealed to youa s players at the same time they are revealed to your characters."
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Or you could ask them.
Without giving away to much, you could ask the other players: "hey guys, my next character will be holding back some info, and will keep secrets from the rest of you. Do you want to know these secrets out of character, and share a laugh, or do you want to have them revealed to youa s players at the same time they are revealed to your characters."
This is a really good idea. It gives them the option of knowing or not, and it lets them know that you aren't lying to them to be a jerk, but its for your character and a part of the story.
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Or you could ask them.
Without giving away to much, you could ask the other players: "hey guys, my next character will be holding back some info, and will keep secrets from the rest of you. Do you want to know these secrets out of character, and share a laugh, or do you want to have them revealed to youa s players at the same time they are revealed to your characters."
Okay, yeah, that's brilliant. I'm going to do this. At least that way, they'll see it coming and it will most likely keep them from being agitated if they say keep your secrets. And if they don't, well, then I'll know they would have been upset later on and I will have avoided it altogether.
Thanks for the advice everyone.
remember hat of disguise only gives you +10 to your disguise check, they might see through it any given day
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This is a terrible plan. Don't do it.
I know it's going to be funny sure, especially when they find out I've been lying to them the whole time. . .
No, it won’t be funny. It won’t be funny at all. Correction, it might be funny to you, the way it’s funny to a bully when he teases another kid on the playground, but it won’t be funny to them.
I want to find a nice balance between useless fake fighter and giant jerkface wizard who could have been saving the party the whole time.
There is no nice balance between “useless fake” and “giant jerkface”. There’s nothing “nice” in that plan at all.
No, don't listen to these people. Do your original funny idea. It becomes less funny if they know the whole time.
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Um, will saves all the time? How will you keep that secret ooc?
The Will save is only if they interact with the disguise. Since disguise self doesn't mimic auditory, they don't get to save against my voice, only if they touch me, and they won't.
No, it won’t be funny. It won’t be funny at all. Correction, it might be funny to you, the way it’s funny to a bully when he teases another kid on the playground, but it won’t be funny to them.
Well, I'm a sadist, so that makes sense. I love enjoying a nice prank at other people's expense. But like I said before, I'm going to make sure the group is okay with it first and if they aren't, I'll just tell them the truth out of character and only deceive them in character.
With my maximum ranks in Disguise, my Charisma and the +10, I have a +19 to my Disguise checks, making my lowest rolls in the mid 20s at level 5. However, remember that I only make one Disguise check at the very beginning of the Disguise and it only comes up if the enemy tries to see through it. So...I guess they can call Perception checks on me when they like, but I won't be subject to the RNG more than once.
Well, I'm a sadist, so that makes sense. I love enjoying a nice prank at other people's expense. But like I said before, I'm going to make sure the group is okay with it first and if they aren't, I'll just tell them the truth out of character and only deceive them in character.
But then you're just pretending to deceive them.
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It also becomes less funny if you're relying on PC glow and GM fiat to pull it off. I'm not sure what level you're starting at, but it's not low if you've pulled off the scam in the backstory.Don't forget how Disguise works either:
Usually, an individual makes a Perception check to see through your disguise immediately upon meeting you and every hour thereafter.You [b]need to always beat everyone's 20 on perception. That's a lot of rolls. They don't have to ask to make them. Eventually the guy who's maxed Perception will roll a 20.
Unless that's all getting handwaved away.
Sure, it'll be difficult, though I doubt my DM will want to bog down gameplay by making five Perception rolls every hour.
Anyway, even if they realize it's a disguise, that doesn't mean they see my true form, right? It just means they know that I'm not actually that particular dwarf wearing that particular armor with that hair color and that beard. Sure they might think something's up, but they can't force me to tell them anything and if they confront me about it then the jig is up sooner than I expected.
I have to at least try. There's really no other way to play a character who is so obsessed with deceit that he chooses Illusion over every other school of magic and goes into a prestige class whose only class features give him more real and more long-lasting disguises.
I kinda like the idea. Communicating via sending your GM messages on his cell phone or just passing small paper below the table, should work unnoticed.
I once played a witch in a different RPG system, where witches are in constant danger of being burned at the stake. She specialized in social skills, and pretend to be more of a roguelike character, instead of a caster. I also had the front page of a fake character sheet on top of a normal one.
When they found out they didn't mind at all.
The problem with your scenario though is, it going to take a lot of time to introduce you.
And scaring away an entire town with just disguises? Why make it abandoned in the first place?
Why not just have some merchants and tavernowners be afraid of some faceless kingpin?
Why did your character stay there alone? What did he do there until the heroes arrived?
And last but not least aren't there any neighbouring cities, who could send adventurers? A high level Paladin, totally ignorant of fear, and with insane Willsaves to resist your illusions. A wizard specializing in Divination out to find you. There still are many unanswered questions.
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I kinda like the idea. Communicating via sending your GM messages on his cell phone or just passing small paper below the table, should work unnoticed.
I once played a witch in a different RPG system, where witches are in constant danger of being burned at the stake. She specialized in social skills, and pretend to be more of a roguelike character, instead of a caster. I also had the front page of a fake character sheet on top of a normal one.
When they found out they didn't mind at all.The problem with your scenario though is, it going to take a lot of time to introduce you.
Yeah, that's true.
And scaring away an entire town with just disguises? Why make it abandoned in the first place?
Why not just have some merchants and tavernowners be afraid of some faceless kingpin?
I thought the idea of the PCs coming to a ghost town would set a real cool mood for the introduction.
Why did your character stay there alone? What did he do there until the heroes arrived?
Ah, that's all explained in my character's backstory. My character was a child when his father was tricked into investing a large amount of money in a black market operation by his uncle. When the operation was found out, his uncle produced papers that showed his father's investments, making his father seem like the head honcho. So the king had his father, mother and him all sent to a prison work camp, where he slaved away day after day while the warden harassed his mother. Then...some inappropriate stuff happened that ended with his father being executed and his mother sentenced to solitary confinement for her lifetime. He is fed and tries to escape, managing to sneak into the palace and flat out running through the halls making a break for it in a panic. He knocks over the king, which makes the king drop the ring he was examining and it lands in my character's pocket LOTR style, then he keeps running none the wiser.
So my character is an escaped convict who has physically assaulted and stolen from the king. That's why he's hiding out in a ghost town alone with a million different disguises. He's worried that he's going to be captured and killed for his crimes.
These crimes happened 36 years ago, and they were the cause of him studying magic in the first place. When he escaped to this town he hid himself in a condemned library that hadn't been scheduled for demolition. He taught himself magic with the books there and spent his life hiding in fear. His paranoia has only built up over years and years of solitude.
And last but not least aren't there any neighbouring cities, who could send adventurers? A high level Paladin, totally ignorant of fear, and with insane Willsaves to resist your illusions. A wizard specializing in Divination out to find you. There still are many unanswered questions.
Dunno about you, but "other adventurers" rarely comes up in my games. It makes the PCs feel more special if they really are just the cream of the crop when it comes to good guys. I have yet to meet a DM who had a powerful NPC that wasn't either a part of the party or just a quest giver.
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Do you plan on letting the thread know how it all plays out? I'd like to know if your group found it an inspired idea, or got angry and leapt into sudden, over-reactive PvP.
Or just had one of the others take Skill Focus (Sense Motive) out of suspicion.
I wasn't, no, because the game doesn't start until mid August and there's the whole thread necro thing.
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The issue with posing as a rogue or a monk is that I have to be a dwarf or a halfling (since the disguise self spell only lets you add up to one foot of height and I'm a gnome).
Just be a different gnome ("I have purple hair! The wanted-poster says green haired gnome! What's wrong with you? This is police harrassment!").
And definitely take Bewildering Koan if you play a class with Ki.
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You should be upfront and honest with the other players out of character and hope they have the role-playing cajones to separate in and out of character knowledge. I've had players attempt similar things and it usually ends in bad blood between the players. There is a certain amount of implicit trust expected in this game for it to work without it devolving into PvP in the first 5 minutes. If you later reveal that you had been conning them all along...well don't expect them to want to play with you anymore.That's the issue though, I really don't think they will be able to separate IC and OOC. As I stated earlier, this is still new for three of the five of them.
You all think it's going to go wrong, and that's the reason I posted this thread. I was unsure. Are you all absolutely sure there are no steps I can take to make this work out nice in the end?
You see, here’s the problem. EITHER they are mature enough to handle this OOC so that it doesn’t spoil it IC, or they are not mature enough to handle it at all. In other words, if your fellow players can’t split OOC vs IC and have fun with is despite the fact that the Players know something is coming, then you shouldn’t do it. The same goes for stealing from the party, being a party traitor, etc.
In this case- you shouldn’t do it. As you said, there are three new players. This could even turn them off gaming.
BzAli's idea could work, however.
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If you want to be slightly more effective in combat while pretending to be a barbarian, you can use arcane strike to add a little damage to your hits. You also may want to use a club instead of hammer. It isn't outside possibility that a savage barbarian would use a simple weapon, and you wouldn't have the non-proficient penalty.
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If you want to be slightly more effective in combat while pretending to be a barbarian, you can use arcane strike to add a little damage to your hits. You also may want to use a club instead of hammer. It isn't outside possibility that a savage barbarian would use a simple weapon, and you wouldn't have the non-proficient penalty.
Hmmm...thinking about it, it's not the best idea. I'd have to use a Medium sized weapon to make it believable, which puts another penalty on my attack rolls.
But...how else to make this work? I can't just walk into the party as a wizard, no way my character would do that. He'd disguise himself as one of his thugs and pretend to be ignorant and Marty Stu like so no one pays attention to him.
I guess I could just claim to be an ineffective combatant? But if I don't participate in combat at all the party will be even angrier at me...hmmmm...
This would be a lot easier if I were level 7-9 already, then I could pretend to be a blaster sorcerer with shadow evocation/conjuration.
Suggestions, guys? What would be the best way to handle playing a paranoid character who hides his magic from everyone else while still contributing to the party?
Edit: I think I should post some details since I'm asking for advice. Here you guys go:
Party composition:
Samurai (Order of the Seal)
Rogue with an epic backstory
Alchemist
Bard
Undecided
Me (Mage of the Veil/Veiled Illusionist)
Loki the Deceiver
Mage of the Veil 5
Str 8
Dex 14
Con 16
Int 17
Wis 10
Cha 12
Feats:
Effortless Trickery
Scribe Scroll
Spell Focus (Illusion)
Still Spell
Silent Spell
Traits:
Fast-Talker
Magical Lineage (Major Image)
Specialist School: Illusion (Mage of the Veil)
Restricted Schools: Necromancy/Evocation
Arcane Bond: Ring stolen from the king
Gear:
Hat of Disguise
Headband of Vast Intelligence +2
Pearl of Power (2nd level)
Skills:
Bluff +10
Disguise +9
Know (Arcana) +14
Perception +7
Spellcraft +12
Stealth +10
Spellbook
All 0 level spells except Necro and Evoc
1st level spells:
Mage armor
Color Spray
Disguise Self
Silent Image
Ventriloquism
Enlarge Person
Charm Person
Peacebond
2nd level spells:
Invisibility
Minor Image
Mirror Image
Dust of Twilight
3rd level spells:
Major Image
Hold Person
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Use a crossbow and pretend to be a crossbowman instead of a barbarian. You have proficieny, and will be skulking at the back of the party anyway, so people wont be looking at you giving you more opportunity to use your magic unnoticed.
As for the weapon-size difference, changing the look of your equipment is included with disguise self. You equipment would look larger as well. there is no reason to use a larger size weapon, you small weapon will look medium as part of the spell/disguise.
Pretend to be a Bard?
Pretend to be a rogue who has taken the minor and major magic rogue talents, and make a big production of casting those small things, while in combat you always just miss your opportunities to get sneak attack damage <_<
I love this idea. I wouldn't be upset at all at this table. Anyone who would be cares too much about the mechanics and not enough about the story and plot twists. A lot of players will love noticing something is off, and investigating what it is will be a great down time killer.
It sounds like great fun to me! I would love it if a fellow player at my table did something like this.
You're the one who knows the people you're playing with, so just judge how well they might take it. I can't think of many people I've played with who would respond negatively.
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Just a thought, but a sorcerer might be better for this than the wizard. Arcane bloodline will let you apply metamagic to increase dcs and add effects without increasing cast times, and you'll have mor efreedom in spontaneous casting vs prepared. Cha as a cast stat helps for a gnome with a bonus to cha and will help with your bluff and disguise checks