I've wanted to play an immortal before, but it hasn't ever happened. I know I've seen highlander sourcebooks for 2E before... and I'm sure there's SOMETHING for 3.x too, but I never looked to closely at that.
Sadly in a game like Pathfinder they don't blend in too well. too much magic and power flowing around... and half the fun of Highlander was the 'they live amongst us' concept.
Personally i prefer them in 'earth-similiar' worlds with low magic. I rolled up a character for Ravenloft 1890's which would have been awesome... and I have a really sweet sourcebook for World of Darkness that should fit QUITE nicely.
Sadly I'm DM in that game (if/when we ever play it...) so other than an npc it wouldn't get much use.
No I was thinking of only using the original idea of there can only be one.
The idea was that all or most of the party members were Immortals. They would be a group of Immortals that had banded together for self-preservation. The party would go on adventures like a normal group of adventurers does, but periodically duels will pop up with other Immortals. There would be a group that is looking to kill all Immortals, as well as duels with other Immortals looking to become the one.
My hope is to wrap up the campaign with the party members having to fight each other to become the one and only Immortal. Or the party members need to stop a being like Kurgan from becoming the one.
I've surprised characters with a free resurrection, and finding out that they were immortals before (really weak character, needed a power boost something fierce). Give 'em the ability to swift-action a stat boost, some fast healing, the ability to die only to a CdG, and you should be good to go.
As far as fights between 'em go, I'd say the PF rules handle that pretty well already... have 'em fight to 0HP, then CdG for the "official" kill, with the attending lighting goodness.
EDIT: Limit the number of Vorpal weapons in your game.
I think a game like this could work fine with the Pathfinder system with the use of critical hits/called shots/coup de grace to determine if a decapitation has occurred. Otherwise, I'd think that after being dead for a while the character would wake back up after regenerating their lost damage. As a campaign, it probably would work best with at most two PCs - a master and an apprentice similar to Ramirez and Connor and Duncan and Richie.
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Perhaps you could require the players to have to kill another NPC immortal to advance in level.
Or maybe you have to kill another NPC of your class to advance in level.
Perhaps only one immortal can harm another..permanently.....everything else is either subdual damage, or can be regenerated.
just some thoughts
Elyas Ravenwood I like the idea of an Immortal PC having to kill another Immortal NPC to advance in level. It gives a good reason for Immortal duels periodically throughout the game.
Question should the other PCs have to duck and cover or take damage from the Quickening Lightning Energy burst?
I was trying to decide what the balance to being an Immortal PC should be so that the players don't abuse it.
If an Immortal is reduced to negative hit points should they resurrect with half their hit points, or should there be a temporary penalty to an ability score or a couple ability scores? Should they have a temporary penalty to Saves or Attack/Damage rolls?
Should Immortals regenerate Hit Points like a Ring of Regeneration, but suffer from the inability to be healed by divine healing and potions?
LazarX I'll hunt around and see if I can locate the books or PDFs for Immortal and Legacy.
I was also thinking there should only be a small number of Immortals left in the world and the time is drawing near for the final battle to decide who will be the one. And the Immortal one gets to decide if they use the wish they get from becoming the one to unleash a reign of evil or put an end to a villainous plot.
Keep those ideas coming. Thanks everyone who replied.
I'd say add make an "Immortal" template that can be added to a character once they discover they're an Immortal (die and come back to life on their own). Please note that this is not necessarily balanced to anything else, and really is just (hopefully), a jumping off point for an awesome conversation.
My thoughts on Immortal Template:- Never fight on Holy Ground (lost all Immortal abilities, other than Immortality, until properly Atonement (per the spell occurs, or something equally horrible).
- All fights are duels, one-on-one. (perhaps the new Duel rules in UC could be used?)
- There can be only One.
***Potential new rule: No Vorpal/Sharpness weapons?***
Hard to have Highlander without "The Rules"
As a swift action, 1/day each, an Immortal can 1/4 their character level (rounded down), to each of their physical attributes. This lasts for a number of minutes equal to their character level.
*** Or maybe just let them activate the 2nd level buff spells? (Bull's Strength, Bear's Endurance, Cat's Grace)? ***
They may also double their movement rate 1/day, for the same amount of time as above.
***Other options: Treat as Monk of that level for movement rate, or can cast Haste on self-only 1/day***
This is for the whole "Fast as a Horse" thing.
Fast Healing (Ex) A creature with the fast healing special quality regains hit points at an exceptional rate, usually 1 or more hit points per round, as given in the creature's entry. Except where noted here, fast healing is just like natural healing. Fast healing does not restore hit points lost from starvation, thirst, or suffocation, nor does it allow a creature to regrow lost body parts. Unless otherwise stated, it does not allow lost body parts to be reattached. Fast healing continues to function (even at negative hit points) until a creature dies, at which point the effects of fast healing end immediately.
This so that their fast healing scales with level. I don't think actual Regeneration is necessary, and I don't know what ability you'd use to shut it off.
An Immortal character cannot be killed, except by severing their head from their body (normally done through a CdG attempt, after reducing them to 0 or Negative HP. Effects such as Save-or-Die spells, Wish, or Miracle can render an Immortal helpless for a number of rounds equal to the level of the spell, but cannot actually kill the Immortal. Reducing an Immortal's CON to 0 (either through Drain or Damage) renders them helpless until such damage/drain is healed.
Immortals who die at the hands of another Immortal cannot be Raised, Resurrected, Reincarnated, or brought back from the dead in any way, including Wish and Miracle spells.
Essentially, they cannot be killed unless someone takes their head.
All Character levels are considered "Fighter" levels, for purpose of fighter-only feats, but only as they pertain to Slashing weapons. For example, a 4th level Immortal can take Weapon Specialization in a Slashing weapon, but not a Bludgeoning. These feats cannot be used with a slashing weapon that is dealing non-slashing damage (a dagger doing Piercing damage, or a longsword hitting with the flat of the blade).
Every Immortal is going to work on improving their martial prowess, and has an eternity to do it.
An Immortal cannot advance to levels with a multiple of 5 (5, 10, 15, 20), without killing another Immortal. Their bodies simply are unable to improve without absorbing the life force of another Immortal. Ideally, this event is the culmination of that character achieving this level.
An Immortal cannot "save" kills for later use. In other words, an Immortal who kills two other Immortals at level 2 must kill another immortal between levels 5 and 9 to advance to 10th.
This helps explain why Immortals seek each other out, from a practical standpoint.
Until such time as Epic Rules come out, an Immortal cannot advance past 20th level in any class. They may multi-class, and continue leveling up in such a fashion. Prestige classes are available for this purpose, but 20th level is a hard cap on all class abilities (BAB, Saves, spellcasting, sneak attack, Fighter level, etc).
... but seriously, how many people are going to play a character to 21st level?
Please note that Immortals can spring up at the most inopportune times. So long as no one has claimed the prize, more Immortals can easily appear, changing "the game".
Is this all very powerful? Yep. But it's mostly incredibly powerful as someone gets up into ridiculous power levels, anyway...
I never actually responded to what you said in my last post, so I though I'd answer a few directly, with my opinions.
Question should the other PCs have to duck and cover or take damage from the Quickening Lightning Energy burst?
I think that the lightning blasts from the Quickening, while causing a lot of property damage, are likely cinematic in their effects. I wouldn't worry about party members having to make reflex saves to dodge the lightning blasts.
I was trying to decide what the balance to being an Immortal PC should be so that the players don't abuse it.
I wouldn't worry about balancing against existing players, because Immortals should frankly be better. From a game balance perspective, consider giving each non-immortal player an awesome magic item, using this to shore up a character that is particularly weak to begin with.
If an Immortal is reduced to negative hit points should they resurrect with half their hit points, or should there be a temporary penalty to an ability score or a couple ability scores? Should they have a temporary penalty to Saves or Attack/Damage rolls?
My answer was to let them go negative HP, but not die, and then have them heal with "fast healing".
Should Immortals regenerate Hit Points like a Ring of Regeneration, but suffer from the inability to be healed by divine healing and potions?
I haven't seen anything implying that an Immortal would regrow lost limbs, or anything like that... that's why I thought Fast Healing was a better solution than Regeneration.
It might be intriguing to give them a hindrance regarding divine healing... perhaps MAKE them roll a save against magical healing? Or -1 per die, or half effectiveness?
Food for thought...
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That's some very cool stuff, Big John!
We played a fun immortal/Highlander campaign using GURPS: Supers rules and it was a BLAST.
Also someone (can't remember who) put out a WoD: Immortals supplement waaaay back in the day.
They had an interesting take on the "Holy Ground" rule.
There's NOTHING from stopping Immortals from fighting on holy ground. BUT when an immortal is killed on holy ground, their life energy from the Quickening is absorbed by the holy site instead of by the immortal that killed them.
In game terms that meant the killing immortal would get ZERO experience from killing another immortal on holy ground.
That was their take on why an evil immortal would bother to play by what seems like a rather arbitrary rule. *shrug* Sounded like a reasonable explanation to me. :)
Oh! And don't forget they need a Detect Immortality ability (or something to that nature) since they experience the Quickening when they're near each other.
Quite true, I'd forgotten that one. Nice catch!
I especially like the Slow Leveling and having to take the head of another Immortal to advance. I think I would just move them back one level to accommodate 20th level. So 4, 9, 14 and 19 levels an Immortal must slay another immortal in order to continue advancing in levels.
This would also help with building NPC Immortals. You know 4,9, 14 and 19 level NPCs are going to come looking for PCs as they near those levels.
That was actually my intent with that, was to require a head in order to advance TO level 5.
Yes all duels would definitely need to be one-on-one, with no interference allowed.
You might want to consider the Wounds & Vigor variant rules, as those might add to the proper flavor of the game.
The Dueling rules from UC are here. I don't know as I'd force a one-on-one duel EVERY time, especially if the there's going to be a party of Immortals running around together.
(That having been said, if a party of Immortals are running around together, there'd better be a "no PvP" rule in place at the table, or feelings might get hurt).
Completely forgot about the no fighting on holy ground.
Something that occurred to me after the initial post. I don't think I'd allow spells like Consecrate to generate what an Immortal would consider to be "Holy Ground"... that's way too much of a screw-over for them. I'd consider "Holy Ground" to be something a bit more permanent than what a 2nd level spell can provide.
That having been said, I'd also rule that the Holy Ground restriction is ONLY for Immortal-on-Immortal action, and that an Immortal could battle normal foes on Holy Ground without restriction.
I was going to give all classes the martial weapon or exotic weapon feat as a bonus feat so they can pick one type of slashing weapon to wield as their immortal weapon of choice.
If the game is going to be specifically an all-Immortal group, you might want to consider restricting classes to Martial ones to begin with. After all, Immortals with crap BAB & HD just aren't going to last as long as others. I think there's plenty of flavor for Fighters, Rangers, Paladins, Rogues, Monks (oooh... Monk Immortal with TWF Temple Sword Flurrying? Please and thank you!) would be plenty of options.
That said, a high-level Immortal Wizard would be pretty scary.
Big John you are the GM! Thank you so much for the Highlander template.
*snipped stuff*
Great idea with the Fast Healing.
Thank you, I appreciate the kind words.
They had an interesting take on the "Holy Ground" rule.There's NOTHING from stopping Immortals from fighting on holy ground. BUT when an immortal is killed on holy ground, their life energy from the Quickening is absorbed by the holy site instead of by the immortal that killed them.
In game terms that meant the killing immortal would get ZERO experience from killing another immortal on holy ground.That was their take on why an evil immortal would bother to play by what seems like a rather arbitrary rule. *shrug* Sounded like a reasonable explanation to me. :)
Funny thing was, when I made a character an Immortal, the first thing the other players did was try to abuse the "holy ground" thing by picking fights with other Immortals, who were expecting the PC to abide by the Holy Ground rule.
In retrospect, I'd probably subject each Immortal to the Sanctuary spell, regarding other Immortals, as soon as they enter Holy Ground. In other words, require a Will save for each attack. I still think something BAD should happen to a character who breaks that rule, but I can't really think of anything other than rocks falling or ability loss.
If no one absorbed the Quickening, then that should DEFINATELY cause another Immortal to pop up somewhere...
If it is a 'HIGHLANDER' Campaign, then there are a few ideas I would suggest to maintain the 'FEEL' of highlander.
They live forever.... so i would plan the campaign with time jumps. (It's hard to do Flashbacks in a game.)
Every 2 or 3 levels, I'd skip about 30/50/100 years. Make it seem grand. Suddenly the characters have a REASON for their improved stats and can discuss what they did in those years.
In fact this campaign may be a good one to SKIP experience. Just have them run their adventures and when the time jump happens, they come back a level or two higher.
After all if you went with a Connor/Duncan party.... Part one was when Connor found Duncan and trained him.
Part 2: Italy flashback in Endgame
part 3: Duncan's 'wedding' in Endgame
Part 4: Vancouver 1992
Part 5: 200x the Rest of Endgame....
Five major branches of this 'party' spread out over the years. If the whole game took place in the typical 3 months... it wouldn't be as fun.
I would SERIOUSLY avoid handing out the prize.
1) It forces the PCs to kill each other, and while thematically aproppriate, It's never much fun when people turn on each other.
The age old of question of 'What if Duncan and Connor were the last... would they fight it out? or go get a beer?"
Don't FORCE the players to kill their own friends... if it comes up NATURALLY that's a different story.
2) I would FORCE Roleplaying. The battles are one on one. there is NO fighting on Holy ground.
PERIOD.
Kurgan obeys the rules... EVERYONE obeys the rules. Anyone who decides to be a smart alec and be some kind of 'maverick'... would be punished. Honestly, I don't know how... As DESPITE logic, there was very little evidence of any 'holy killings.' The only one mentioned in the series was Pompeii.... I MIGHT go that Route... or I may TAKE a level from the offending immortal in a bright flashy quickening...
Regardless... even the most evil of them obey THAT rule.
3) I would check out the 'Dueling rules' in Ultimate Combat. "I" havent' checked them out yet... but it looked like it would make 1 on 1 combat more interesting...
Honestly, i would keep the game SMALL. 2 players... MAYBE 3 at most... Unless there are HORDES of immortals with long lasting grudges coming out of the woodwork... SOMEONE is going to be sitting around doing nothin' while the 'duels' are going on.
Just my 2 cents :)
Rule 0: All sessions start with Queen's "Princes of the Universe" to set the mood.
Rule 0: All sessions start with Queen's "Princes of the Universe" to set the mood.
This should be rule 0 for ALL games ^_^
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If you are running a Highlander “immortal” campaign, I think there might be a couple of choices to make
1) is there magic? Is there arcane magic? Is there Devine magic?
2) If you decide to say, limit your classes to say Fighter, Chavalier, Barbarian, Roge, and perhaps monk, then it might be easier to simulate a “Highlander” feel without spell casting classes.
3) Perhaps if you take this path, you can give the Immortals some sort of Fast healing….maby some DR. And also if they die, they get to Ressurect themselves.
4) I would also suggest limiting the races to human. If you have elves and dwarves and Golaron Gnomes around, you have other racies with long memories, and that may detreact from the Uniqueness of their “long” life.
If you do allow all the other classes, all of the spell casting classes, I would suggest, that you simply need to kill the other characters, then you get their “quickening.
I would also suggest, If you have a variety of classed immortals, they need to kill an NPC of their own class type in order to advance.
Perhaps Fighters / Chavaliers/ Barbariesn need to kill each other in order to advance.
Rogues need to kill each other in order to advance,
Arcane casters need to kill each other in order to advance.
And Characters with Devine magic need to kill each other in order to advance.
Just some ideas.
I would leave the Explosive lighenting quickening as background light mostly harmless to those who cant take in a quickening.
Or alternativly, you could deal with it as an electrical energy burst effect, that affects everyone in a 20’ radius…..1d6 eletrical damage per level of the immortal killed…Save DC= 10+ HD.
Perhaps you could work in some reasons why Immortals remain in the background……If it an all human campaign, I would guess the normal reaction of humanity is to kill what they don’t quite understand…..perhaps they would kill an immortal if he is unmasked……Now they might not know the “quickening” but beheading by axe sword or guiteene would effectively kill an immortal.
Perhaps there is a reason it has to be a one on one deul……maybe that’s the only way to “level up” If more then one immortal tries to gang up on a single immortal….the quickening gets messed up, and there is no “leveling up” ( transfer of power)
Perhaps one of the reasons “holy ground “ is neutral ground, might be because if one immortal kills another on holy ground, all of the nearby immortals can feal it, and they know what happened…..then they will all hunt donw the perpetraitor and kill him.
Just some ideas .
Oh one last thought…..maybe you could limit “magic” arcane and devine to the immortals….its one other thing that separates them from meer mortals…..
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* This may not be what the OP is looking for; however:
If I want to run a game about Highlander, I have 3 pdfs to do it with already:
There is one for the old World of Darkness System, one for the New World of Darkness System, and one for Unisystem.
I probably wouldnt use the one for old world of darkness, but the New World of Darkness and Unisystem Versions are both pretty good.
A friend ran such a game under SAGA rules, allowing Immortals 'troll-like' regeneration (1 point, Stun only, that kinda thing). CdG to kill worked well.
And don't forget the most important rule of the Highlander series, only during the 1st and 3rd sessions of the campaign are any players including the GM allowed to enjoy themselves.
If its a proper highlander game, keep this in mind:
You cannot drown or be strangled.
If you're not decapitated you recover from any wound.
I remmember that a 'drowned' character effectively became a zombie until he walked from a sunken ship to the coast, some days later, but I wasn't playing in that game at the time and don't know the details. I also recall there being rules about how long it took to regen from fire, acid, electricity, etc. There were rules on mental disability from it taking too long.
The first Immortal in game was built long the same guidelines as the rest of us, for a film nior/Hammer horror game, but staggered by a 50% exp penalty. He survived a medusae gaze, taking a week to 'shake it off', several KIAs and a car wreck that wiped the party.
I ran some homebrew rules for Highlander in a Shadowrun Campaign setting years and years ago. Man my players thought that was a blast. Come to think of it my Shadowrun "borrowed" heavily from W.O.D., X-Men, Grand Theft Auto and a million other places as well for campaign setting, Extra homebrew Archtypes and even certain action scenes I nabbed from movies. We had car chases in stolen rides, Vampire crime lords, Immortal company men and Mutant liberationists, alongside, street samurai bikers, and wage mage car boosters. That was some of the most fun times I had sitting behind the screen...
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Any thoughts on Immortals being physically scarred or maimed from massive damage or Immortal Hunters?
If you use the critical hit deck that's great for the chance of flying body parts.
Up to you whether there's a straight up chance (50% or something?) on ANY critical hit leaving a scar. Would account for most injuries healing "clean" due to the immortals' obviously superior healing and some injuries leaving marks (Kurgan's neck wound from the first movie).Just thoughts.
NOTE on Drowning: but in the first Highlander movie McCloud walked across the bottom of a lake no problem. Maybe part of that "slightly different powers for different immortals thing?
And the river guy WAS a creepy one. I remember that episode as well as the immortal stranded on an island who kept starving to death over and over and over... yikes.
NOTE on Drowning: but in the first Highlander movie McCloud walked across the bottom of a lake no problem. Maybe part of that "slightly different powers for different immortals thing?
I've seen it done different ways. the 'different powers for difffernt immortals' was the more popular. Also gave the potential for getting something tangible with a quickening.
NOT my particular favorite. As a rule, Quickenings were sooooooo 'Vague' that trying to quantify them into game terms is more trouble then it's worth.
The other question is how long to keep the immortal dead for.
In the series it varies from minutes to hours. Maybe a series of Fort saves?
Fort would probably be the best. When you make 3 or 4 in a row you get up...
it all depends on whether you are seeking to imitate the MOVIES... or the SERIES.
They REALLY were two seperate animals with their OWN seperate rules.
In the movie, they were immortal. They NEVER died. Connor was wounded in battle, and on his death bed, but he never 'actually' died. When he goes to the tavern the next day... they remark that he was 'all but a corpse' yesterday... and now he's walking and drinking with them...'
in the 'duel' He drops and gets back up... over and over again.
He 'drowns' but walks around...
In the movies their hearts never 'stopped'.
In the Series, they died ALL THE TIME, they just got better. ;)
They also need an ability to allow them to conceal a sword on their person.
Not really. Much like the quickening, it's... NOT something worth worrying about. They never REALLY explain it in the series... So there isn't any reason for YOU to explain it in game.
in the movie, he had to ditch the sword before the cops showed up. Besides... in a medieval world... they tended to just wear them on their hips like everyone else ;)
They also need an ability to allow them to conceal a sword on their person.
Well in a 1st edition game I played years ago, the DM said that the eunuch guards wearing only loincloths, managed to hide bastard swords on them, when he was called out on that he shrugged and said, "Switchblade Bastard swords!!!" So I assume the immortals have something like that
They also need an ability to allow them to conceal a sword on their person.
Nah, they've got hundreds of years to practice their Sleight of Hand skills. Between that and a trenchcoat, they're all set.
EDIT: How awesome would it be for an immortal to have Gloves of Storing?
They also need an ability to allow them to conceal a sword on their person.Well in a 1st edition game I played years ago, the DM said that the eunuch guards wearing only loincloths, managed to hide bastard swords on them, when he was called out on that he shrugged and said, "Switchblade Bastard swords!!!" So I assume the immortals have something like that
That just raises Further Questions!
That just raises Further Questions!They also need an ability to allow them to conceal a sword on their person.Well in a 1st edition game I played years ago, the DM said that the eunuch guards wearing only loincloths, managed to hide bastard swords on them, when he was called out on that he shrugged and said, "Switchblade Bastard swords!!!" So I assume the immortals have something like that
I KNOW RIGHT!!!