I recently had a concept that I'm interested in trying at some point in time and I'm hoping to see what people think would be the best class / archetype to fit this idea.
A young, kind magician stumbles across an obscure book with odd writing in a flea market. Seeing the mage's (could be divine mage as well) interest in the book, the mysterious merchant pushes it on him almost eagerly, all but giving away the book, the price was so low. Despite feeling apprehensive over the somewhat shady salesman, the mage agrees and purchases the tome.
After buying groceries, the mage leaves the flea market, noticing on his way out that the merchant he had bought the book from was now absent. The mage settles in at home and after finishing some work and a fine meal, he decides to sit by the fireplace and read his new book. After a few minutes he realizes that reading the book will be more a puzzle than anything. He accepts the tomes challenge and begins work at deciphering it. Getting a large chunk of the beginning decoded after a few days time, he decides to put it all together and see what he has thus far.
Whether by excitement or a sense of triumph he nearly shouts the words out loud. It was just then that he realized his mistake. It was then he realized true, maddening horror. A portal opened to another plane and what he saw, can never be articulated into words. Near dead by the sight alone, the mage collapses as the portal closes. Weeks later the mage awakens among healers hovering above him. Abruptly he sits up and desperately pleads for those around him to give him his book. They only calm him once they get him his book. He clings to it as if his life depended on it. After some brief questioning, little was gained. The mage couldn't remember anything. All he knew, all he felt, was a deep soul pulling urge to finish his work on the book.
After being released from the ward, few saw the mage. Those who did see him however, noted that he seemed obliviously cruel. Committing attacks, yet looking as if he legitimately didn't understand he was doing serious harm. The mage had changed. He was being pulled to a goal and it seemed that goal would either be the end of him, or the end of peace itself.
What I'm looking for is a lawful neutral (maybe true neutral since he may summon demons often) magic user that unintentionally intends to summon forth the great old ones, or at least equivalents to them (Cthulhu, Bugg-Shash, Hastur, etc..). I'm looking for flavoring for abilities that matches this concept as well as still being useful in game. 20 point buy, paizo material only and say 6th level to start.
The backstory is most definitely not necessary to get the idea of the concept. It was only for fun and no one needs to read it as it is sort of long-ish.
I like human, but half-elf or full elf may work better. I know there's an oracle that has this sort of flavoring, I'm just not sure it's effective enough to be useful and fun. I think there's a bloodline for sorcerer that also sort of fits the idea, but again I'm not sure if it's "worth it". I feel like focus could be on planar binding eventually, although it's risky (he is mad after all) I feel like it could be a way of showing he's trying to summon something that should never be there.
Any ideas, suggestions on how to do this concept and do it effectively would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
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Oracle of the Dark Tapestry seems made for this concept. They'd probably need to have been a normal person (maybe a scholar or scribe) before the thing with the book, but aside from that, they're perfect.
Looking back on it, that seems like it will pretty much handle what I'm looking for. All I'll have to do is pick the "weird" spells along with it, or spells that can be flavored as weird as well as a curse that would seem to fit.
I definitely like him once being a wizard and the madness altered him, story wise as you say. Having a distant ancestor that messed around with such things is also a possibility, perhaps partly why he wasn't killed.
Dangerously Curious definitely fits, especially with the background and UMD is always useful.
Unpredictable is interesting, but the way I'm seeing the character is he's doing things without completely understanding why or even what he's doing, more doing it urged on through his madness (and the great old ones). He might stab an enemy right in the chest and instead of laugh maniacally he'd respond, "Oh dear. You're bleeding. Are you alright? Hold on. I'll get some help." as he continues to stab them, and actually be sincere in that he's worried for their health. The social skill is definitely useful, but he's not really lying when it seems he doesn't quite understand. To him, he's the same, gentle person he's always been, it just seems like bad things happen around him.
That being the case, I'm feeling the Haunted curse might be best, giving him a reason to explain to himself why bad things happen around him.
1) - He understands the group (PC party) he's with can keep him safe enough to work on the book during quiet times, if he in turn helps them as best he can.
2) - He understands that he needs to work on the book, but he doesn't quite understand why, other than it's extremely important.
3) - He is still knowledgeable and intelligent enough to do work on the book and make decisions including tactical decisions during combat and simple choices regarding every day life (soup or salad, chair or couch, take gold or give it to thief, etc...)
4) - He can still be sociable, striking up friendly conversations, knowing when to keep quiet, but prefers to spend free time on his book.
Some very useful ideas though. Thank you.
A few levels of aberrant sorcerer and then dark tapestry oracle into mystic theurge sounds really cool for this idea. I'm not sure how strong it would be mechanically though.
If you're allowed to use 3.5 stuff then check out the Alienist prestige class from Complete Arcane. It's all about summoning crazy tentacle monsters and going insane while doing it.
there's the drawback Attached
This way you can have the book irregardless of your class.
Aberrant, Protean, or Starsoul sorcerer all kind of fit.
A wizard with the Shadowcaster archetype kind of works. You could have the character look human but the experience with the tome has turned him into a Fetchling.
A cleric with the Dark Tapestry subdomain is probably closest to what you want except that you probably don't want to play a cleric.
Some awesome suggestions everyone!
I wouldn't mind Intimidate at all. It definitely fits the character so it may be worth taking. Focused mind also fits, so I'll have to do some laying out of the character and see what would be the best choice. I will probably go with augment summons at the very least and you are right about just flavoring them to look weird and I'll probably go that route.
The Attached drawback is quite fitting indeed. I may just have to take it.
I would indeed prefer not cleric, although they can be quite good. The protean and starsoul bloodlines are quite fitting and I might take Arcturus24's idea of eldritch heritage for one of them. I love protean's spatial tear ability and it's bloodline arcana seems a bit more useful, but I somewhat feel that starsoul is slightly more fitting and the breaching the gulf is just terrifying sounding.
Thanks again everyone.