GM looking for advice - Haunted Oracle

[mcgharst]

I have a player who wants to play an haunted oracle and I was wondering whether I should (as the GM) add in bits for the curse or let the player role play the curse's impact?

I have played and GMed a lot but I just haven't ran into someone wanting to play an Oracle as of yet. Ironically, I've often thought of playing one myself. I always imagined it would be a combination of the two, but I figured it would be a good idea to glean any wisdom I could from people more experienced in this regard.

Thanks,
MC^G

[blackbloodtroll]

I played one myself.

Usually, I would RP it myself, and at times, when it would be thematically appropriate to do so, my DM would add something.

We found that, it was important to not to have it impede upon play, more than it is already described as doing.

Good examples for when the DM could add something, are when certain social skill rolls(Intimidate, etc) are made, and the PC fails, or succeeds by a particularly large margin.

[mcgharst]

blackbloodtroll wrote:

I played one myself.

Usually, I would RP it myself, and at times, when it would be thematically appropriate to do so, my DM would add something.

We found that, it was important to not to have it impede upon play, more than it is already described as doing.

Good examples for when the DM could add something, are when certain social skill rolls(Intimidate, etc) are made, and the PC fails, or succeeds by a particularly large margin.

Thanks!

[ElyasRavenwood]

I played through the first part of the Carrion Crown: The Haunting of Harrow Stone. My character was a Dhampire Oracle with the Life Mystery, and the Haunted curse. He was a servant of Pharasma.

The Gm and I decided that my character was a "ghost whipserer", the "spirits of the dead' would talk to him so he could pass messages onto the living.

we RPed my character's spells as one of his "spirit" friends going ad doing something. For example, Ghost sound, was one of his spirits going over and making a noise. Mage hand was one of these spirits going and fetching something for him. we only developed the cantrips.

I had a great time with this character in the haunting of harrow stone.

once my character bought a Heward's handy haversack, the GM and I agreed that the magic of the haversack, would not override the a divine curse.

The GM and I had allot of fun with the haunted curse.The gm would describe paintings being knocked askew on the walls, Candles on the alters of Pharasma being "re arranged". They would sometimes take take hats and put them on someone elses' head. Oh there was also...oops sorry I really didn't bump into you and make you spill your beer.....it was your dead brother Alfred....no really honest"

I hope this helps.

[blackbloodtroll]

Be sure to remember this, and this FAQ though.

It will come up.

Also, remember the theme/concept of the PC's character.

Having the incidents reflect this makes it much more entertaining for both the player, and DM.

For example, my PC was a Oracle/Barbarian, scarred mind, body, and soul, from the demonic radiation of the Worldwound.

Many of the "minor mishaps and strange occurrences" reflected this, such as a nearby statue of a holy icon shedding a tear of blood, brief quiet sounds of what sounded like sobbing, a candle blowing out, and holy symbols falling to the ground.

These weren't so often that they created undo stress on the PC, or party, but a reminder of the existence of the curse.

[mcgharst]

Thanks again for all the help!

[Corlindale]

I've played a haunted oracle who was haunted by his old crew, whose death he was responsible for. Our GM would often let some of my crewmembers talk to me, comment on my actions in various ways. Sometimes he also used it to hand out warnings, like if we were heading into a more than usually difficult encounter: "You're in way over your head, I hope you know that. You're all going to get killed!"

But never anything mechanical, I agree. The Haunted curse is annoying enough with its existing penalties, especially at low levels.

[DM_Blake]

My take is that about 98 percent of oracle players see it this way:

Oracles are pretty cool. But that curse is awful. Have to be blind, or deaf, or crippled or... No, wait a minute. How about "Haunted"? Wow! Amazing! It doesn't really do anything to me. I mean, I'm almost never in a situation where this would actually hurt me. So what if I spill a mug of ale or knock some apples off of a vendor's cart? That's all RP stuff, what harm can it do? Surely it's FAR, FAR less onerous than being blind. Yep, that's it, that's my ticket to oracle goodness. Haunted. All the sweet oracle stuff with none of the penalty.

Smacks of cheese to me. Except, it's not cheese because the devs put that curse right into the core/base class.

Oh, sure, some players have a great time RPing this and really do enjoy the RP of this curse. But the other curses are SO VERY NASTY that nobody wants to play those, so every oracle is haunted. All of them. I have never seen a non-haunted oracle.

So my rebuttal is this: Apparently the game designers think the oracle is a bit overpowered. So much so that they added a curse, clearly expecting to make oracles blind, deaf, crippled, etc. Then they stuck this Haunted curse in there and made it fairly stupid. Or did they? Maybe the devs wanted this curse to really play a major part in the oracle's life. Clearly, being a blind or deaf spellcaster is a huge limitation, so maybe Haunted should be exactly as huge - playing it any other way is like letting the oracle have his built-in cheese.

So for me, I think Haunted should mean something. The FAQ says not to mess with spell components or weapons, but anything else is fair game. I trip them in combat, have saddles unbuckle in critical moments (chases, combats, etc.), boat oars slip out of the locks and fall overboard (and oh my, that sea monster attacks when someone dives into the water to get the oar), etc.

My goal is to have oracle players tell me that they really wish they had been blind instead of haunted - then I know their curse got its money's worth.

[blackbloodtroll]

Wow.

That's needlessly brutal, and unhelpful to the OP.

The class has a whole "cursed with awesome" mechanic, that by design, is meant to eventually be a boon.

Also, that random "cheese" rant I hear so often has no place in an Oracle discussion, and certainly no place in this thread.

[Tacticslion]

Dot.

[ElyasRavenwood]

"Retrieving any stored item from your gear requires a standard action, unless it would normally take longer. Any item you drop lands 10 feet away from you in a random direction" Page 45 APG

We were playing in the "Haunting of Harrow Stone" Well I can say this, with my character as the healer in the party, and since we were 1st level, the curse did get in the way of things at very inconvenient times. like in the middle of combat. I quickly found out the old "free action drop something, move action retrieve something, standard action use it" simply didn't work. I found when my character dropped his long spear, it would land out of reach 10' away, and then to pull out a potion or scroll.....well that took a standard action so I would have to use it the next round. This became important when I had to heal.

:

I had to use my character's channel positive energy to deal with the haunts, even with our haunt syphons,

and my character was using my spells to bless the party, so that left the potions the alchemist had brewed to heal the party.

[ericpants]

I like blackbloodtrolls option of playing the curse. I played a haunted Oracle for a brief time. The GM used the curse to move and hide other players items and weapons. The curse was also used to interfere with other player perception checks. It felt like I was a detriment to the group and complicated an already severe handicap of not being able to use any items in combat without obliterating my action economy.

I would recommend not being a DM_Blake and causing needless strife for no apparent reason.