GM Rednal's Runelords Re-Recruitment

[D_Var_Stars]

Zelani Tanith, Muse-Touched Aasimar, Lunar Guardian Druid, Burglar Unchained Rogue with a lovely black snake friend, here - mostly ready and very willing to help...

Zelani's Background:

Zelani Tanith is the daughter of an Azata and a Varisian that died many years ago who the aasimar does not like talking about. Born with a long dark curling birth tattoo on her back, Zelani spent most of her childhood tagging along with various Varisian family members on trips trading and helping among various Varisian communities and beyond. During what Zelani calls her extended childhood, she saw great beauty and people and wonders and came to think of all peoples of Varisia as her people for better or worse to defend, to protect, to right wrongs for when they cannot. She also saw the powerful take from the people, each other, and the world itself in destructive ways that hurt and angered Zelani.

As an Aasimar, she had already outlived most of the human kin of her generation before reaching maturity. To protect her, her Varisian family kept her traveling, changing trade groups every few years, and often hiding the beautiful child to ensure she did fall in with the Sczarni or worse. Zelani got the message that because she was pretty and special she needed extra protection and care, but because she is pretty and special that care came at arms length and her protection was ever changing faces that only saw that she was pretty and special, not a lonely little girl who spent years watching a world that seemed rather pretty and special to the aasimar that got little care and protection itself. Years later she has many fond memories of her travels, but many sad ones as well. The only item she really has left from that time is her kapenia scarf, bladed and finely crafted expressly to show to the trained Varisian eye the pretty and special heritage that Zelani never asked for.

In her extended adolescence, Zelani often snuck out when the trade groups were in villages and towns with oversized cloaks. With a lot of trial and troublesome error that she most often got out with a smile, Zelani picked up tricks and habit to retrieve what had been taken and defend small groups under the cover of darkness. What was far more troublesome for her kin was when she would wander off by day and end up in less than safe locations singing and dancing for much craved praise and more useful gems and information. Over time, compromises were made to give the growing young woman some freedom and allow her to contribute as any other member until eventually as she reached maturity those compromises and the stretching of them snapped.

Finally an adult, she walked away from the traveling trading life one night after a long and bitter fight with some of her kin. She doesn’t want to remember all the details, it was mostly her being upset about not being able to do more for all the people she sees and from them it was mostly about how much the family had done for her, the risks they had put up with because of her, her lack of gratitude and real usefulness, and how ‘out there’, away from her protective kin, to those people who are not her family she’s only a pretty face that people will only keep around if she’s ‘pleasing’ or powerful. Zelani walked thinking that it didn’t matter if she proved them wrong or right, she had to do something to protect and care for this pretty and special world and the every day who deserve just as much.

It was during her long and lonely walk that Zelani came across and saved a black snake though from what changes depending on how she feels like telling the tale but she always comments on how it reminded her of her birth tattoo. What Zelani doesn’t usually tell is how she ended up following the black snake purely because she felt like she should and did so for several nights until she walked into a Druidic Grove near Sandpoint. Feeling the strong call of nature surround her, the aasimar began training as a Lunar Guardian there a few years ago. Visiting the town for information and connection by day and working on her new skills to try to help people by night, Zelani knows she has a long way to go before she can really help the people and nature in the way she has long dreamed.

Zelani's Appearance:

Zelani is most often seen smiling while biting her lips. She works to carry herself as someone who knows she is the most divine beauty in a room -- and knows everyone else knows that too. With warm medium brown skin covered in freckles, moles, long swirling tattoos, and often glitter as well as shoulder length jewel red slightly curly hair, this aasimar is rather flashy for a druid or a rogue in her colourful coats and dresses by day. By night she may attempt to wear more subtle clothes, but would almost always have her sparkling fingernails and grin.

Zelani was born with a this spiralling birth tattoo on her right shoulder blade and has ensured that the other tattoos she has earned and chosen are of similar design. Her most noticeable tattoos include a swirling tattoo that begins at her chin and loops its way down her neck and a large spiraling tattoo that begins midway up her right arm and curls its way up to the shoulder. Her tattoos glow gently when Zelani uses her magic spheres and sometimes people mistake her viper resting on her for another tattoo.

She watches the world with sparkling brown eyes and marches through it with a finely crafted strut in her fine embroidered draping clothes that hide many things, including her armour, her bladed kapenia scarf, and a small black viper, under the folds.

Zelani's Personality:

She is a fierce femme. Zelani knows she is a celestially-blessed beauty and works it to her advantage with a smile -- and turns those beautifully sparkling pointed nails and sharp tongue in a heartbeat to defend herself and others. She smiles and dances and brings light to people by day and fights to get back what is right with bared glimmering teeth and a shadow by night.

She has built a sugar-sweet giant oak tree thick wall between herself and others. In Zelani’s experience, most people like her and treat her well -- because she’s a particularly pretty aasimar woman rather than because she’s a good or helpful or likeable person that she tries to be. Most people expect her to be good and sweetness and light because she is an aasimar and some expect her to always be...pleasing because she is beautiful woman. Her thick veneer of glamour and sweetness helps her cope with the pain of craving affection, validation and acknowledgement of her work and efforts to be and do good as being her own rather than ‘what pretty aasimars do’, and longing for good and healthy relationships of equals with others that Zelani no longer thinks she will be able to get with the people around her. While putting herself in situations to be surrounded by people to help, she hides her loneliness with a smile and innuendo.

Zelani cares for people a lot even when they only see her as a pretty angelic face. She has spent years traveling around the area and has seen people at their best and worst. She wants to connect with and protect the general public and since she can’t seem to do the former in the way she longs to, Zelani will do the latter with all of being. She becomes enraged by the theft of resources and needs from the masses and destruction of the world for profit and use her gifts and skills to try to rectify the problem preferably without causing the people more. So far she has mainly done this on a small scale - individuals and families where she is the right place and the right time and generally trying to make people happier - though she dreams of larger systemic changes that she cannot yet figure out how to accomplish.

Zelani Tanith's Crunch, Unfinished:

Zelani Tanith
Female Muse-Touched Aasimar Lunar Guardian Druid 3 - Burglar Unchained Rogue 3 - Gestalt 3
Neutral Good Medium Humanoid (Native Outsider)

Initiative; +4 Perception +9

Daily Abilities:
Spell Points - 12

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Defense
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AC 17 touch 11 flat-footed 16
hp 30
Fort +7, Ref +7, Will +6

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Offence
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Speed 30 ft.
Melee - Whip - 1d20+6 to hit - 1d4+3 damage - x20 crit - trip, 15ft range.

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Magic - Incomplete and likely will be tweaked a lot before the final version
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Casting Tradition Heavenly Caster
- Magical Signs - Glowing tattoos.
- Vocal Casting - A short song and while casting.
- Lycanthropic - Alteration Talents cannot be used on others.

Caster Level 3
Spell Points 9
Difficulty Check 14
Magic Skill Bonus 3
Magic Skill Defence 13
Ranged - Close (30ft) - Medium (110ft) - Long (440ft)

Alteration Sphere - Uses magic to transform the body.
Shapeshift - Transform into another shape, either as long as concentration holds or by spending 1 spell point to make the change last 1 minute per caster level. You may take one trait from the form or other sources allowed, and an additional one for every five caster levels.
Blank Form - Either on their own or as part of another Form, you can add Darkvision, Lowlight Vision, 2 claw attacks, 1 bite attack, 1 gore attack, 2 pincer attacks or change appearance, but enough to copy another being.
- Animalistic Transformation - Change into an animal shape granting the following abilities - 40ft landspeed, increasing by 20ft for every 5 caster levels, a bite attack, Scent and a +2 to Natural Armour, increasing by 1 every 5 caster levels. They also gain access to the following optional traits: 2 hoof attacks per pair of legs.

Life Sphere - Magics that can heal and reinforce injures.
Invigorate - Grant temporary hit points equal to your caster level. These cannot take you above your usual maximum, and last 1 hour.
Cure - Heal 1d8 points of damage plus caster level.
Restore - Heal 1d4 ability damage, and remove a number of conditions.
- Restore Health - Add an additional 1d8 to cure, and heal Poison.

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Statistics
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Str 11 Dex 16, Con 12, Int 12, Wis 16, Cha, 17
Base Atk +2; CMB +3; CMD 18

Feats
Overwhelming Beauty, Exotic Weapon Proficiency (Scorpion Whip)

Traits Innocent

Racial Traits Celestial Resistance, Darkvision (60ft), Spell-Like Ability, Skilled

Skills Appraise +6, Bluff +9, Diplomacy +11, Disable Device +12, Handle Animal +8, Heal +8, Perform (Dance) +11 Perception +9, Sleight of Hand +9, Stealth +9, Survival +9
Languages Common, Celestial, Druidic, Sylvain

Combat Gear - Incomplete
Masterwork Scorpion Whip, Darkleaf Cloth Armoured Coat, Darkwood Heavy Shield
Other Gear Adventurer's Clothes x 3, Courtier’s Clothes, Jewelry, Bladed Kapenia Scarf
Perfume Kit x 10, Grooming Kit,
Masterwork Backpack, Masterwork Thieves Tools, Thieve’s Ring.
False Bottomed Mug
Whistle
Charcoal/Chalk

Money 749gp

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Special Abilities
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Celestial Resistance - +5 against, acid, cold and electric.
Damger Sense - Gain a +1 to reflex and AC against traps, and a +1 to Perception to avoid being surprised.
Darkvision - See in non-magical darkness up to sixty feet, with an additional thirty feet from Night Sight.
Evasion - When hit with an attack that allows a reflex save for half damage, instead take no damage at all.
Finesse Training - Gain Weapon Finesse as a bonus feat, and at level 3 learn to do dexterity to damage with a Light or Finessable weapon.
Innocent - Gain a +5 bonus to lie using Bluff.
Nature Bond - Gain a venomous snake animal companion.
Nature Sense - Add +2 to Knowledge (Nature) and Survival.
Night Sight - Add an additional 30ft to Darkvision.
Rogue Talents - Special tricks and tactics a rogue can acquire.
- Combat Trick - Gain Proficiency (Whip) as a bonus feat.
Sneak Attack - Add additional precision damage when flanking or denying an enemy there dexterity modifier.
Spell-Like Ability - Cast Glitterdust once per day as a spell-like ability.
Skilled - Muse-Touched gain a +2 to both Diplomacy and Perform.
Trackless Step - Do not leave tracks in natural surroundings.
Trapfinding - Add half of the Rogue’s levels to Perception for finding Traps and Disable Device. Allows the disabling of magical traps.
Wild Empathy - Influence animals to improve their disposition towards the Druid.

Favoured Class Bonus +3 HP.

['Hawk' Hargraves]

:drum-roll:

OK, this is a little premature but... good luck, applicants!

[Shalluk]

There is no luck, only Shalluk!

[GM Rednal]

That was bad and you should feel bad. v.v

Incidentally, I'll be picking characters tonight. o wo/ Last-minute entries are fine. Remember, basically all I care about is your background and a rough description of your classes and build. Full sheets and aliases are NOT required. ^^

[Shalluk]

...now if only I had functioning sense of guilt...or shame...or anything like that. Oh well.

[Yidhra, Goddess of Paradoxes]

Don't worry. o wo/ You'll always have me.

[Fury of the Tempest]

I admit, I'm nervous about Valerem getting picked.

I absolutely love the background I wrote up for him, and I think it is far and away the best background I have done explain the crunch and build he has currently. From traits, to feats, and even equipment.

But... I'm afraid that the crunch might let me down. That the apparent melee focus above all else might be too much, despite the strong ability to support allies with Improved Weal and Woe, and Twist the Pattern... plus, I'm afraid that Fortune Creature Template + Fate's Favoured might come across as too gamey/powerful... through I would like to not that yes, it is pretty powerful, but I have a lot of flavour backing it up, AND the bonsues don't scale compared to say, Divine Favour, or the Destined Bloodrager Bloodline.

['Hawk' Hargraves]

Shalluk wrote:

There is no luck, only Shalluk!

lol. You ought to trademark that as your Superhero catch-phrase!

[Shalluk]

Yidhra, Goddess of Paradoxes wrote:

Don't worry. o wo/ You'll always have me.

That's...probably worryingly true.

'Hawk' Hargraves wrote:

lol. You ought to trademark that as your Superhero catch-phrase!

Sadly, Shalluk is actually the least heroic hero ever. He's frightened, nervous and occasionally terrified. He's come out of his shell a bit, but I'm sure something will terrify him before long.

[Burnscar]

Ladon Brine

Appearance:

Ladon is of middling height and heavily muscled. He keeps his dirty-blond hair short, and his face neatly shaven, giving his face a boyish cast that's quite at odds with his physique.
He has quite the flair for theatrics, a legacy of his pit-fighting days, and forgoes wearing a shirt whenever the weather allows to show off the large tattoo of a green dragon that covers his back, tail trailing down his right arm while its face emerges from his chest.

Personality:

Ladon is generally easygoing and carefree. He enjoys jokes, wealth, flirting and pleasant company. There's a gleam to his brown eyes that's hard to resist, and he's a bit of a daredevil. He might not be the best decisionmaker around, but he's thus far been able to talk or fight his way out of most of the trouble he's gotten himself into, with a few notable exceptions.
He has a lot of respect for his power, and is acutely aware that a big part of it isn't due to his own work, but is instead something bestowed upon him. He figures he owes his ancestors for that, and feels the need to respect that debt. It turned his life around, after all. So he trains, intensively and incessantly.

Background:

Ladon Brine was born the son of a fisherman in Magnimar, and for the longest time, it seemed that he was destined to grow up to take his farthers position. Not that he had anything against fish in the abstract; he'd own his own boat, when he grew up, and he'd be reasonably well off... For a commoner. Ladon dreamt of adventure, until riches, legend, and heroics. He wanted to be part of the great songs, to steal the heart of a beautiful with of the north, to stand tall against the onslaught of the abyss, and so on. Nothing a thousand boys before him hadn't dreamt, but as it happened, Ladon had opportunity that they did not.
When he turned sixteen, long lost power awoke within him. He could do magic! After the fight to end all fights with his farther, he up and left his childhood home.
He sought a way to turn his newfound powers into money, and got into a pitfighting ring, calling himself the Green Dragon.
He turned out to be good at it; his magical powers worked well with his natural talent, and a quite a few hard-fought wins and losses later, he was an established figure.
That's what he was doing the last few years. He made friends, and found Irven, a young half-elf with a head for business, and together they made bank.
Life was good.

One day, he was cornered by an elven man in immaculate clothes, who tried to pressure him into fixing a match. He took the money, but couldn't quite bring himself to lose on purpose, when it came down to it. He figured he'd give the money back, after.
Except they murdered Irven in retalliation. That nigh, he found his friend dead in their shared appartment, his guts deliberately spread over the floor. Fearing for his life, Ladon skipped town.

And that's how he got to be in Sandpoint.

He figures he'll lie low for a few months, maybe see if he can scrounge up some excitement in the small town while he's here. If nothing else, it'll be a fine opportunity to train, and meditate on his skills.

Once he's consolidated his spirit, he figures he'll go back and deal with the elf. If he can catch him alone, it might be that he'll be able to prevail. And he doesn't like the idea of letting Irven lie unavenged. He deserved better than what Ladon's thoughlessness awarded him.

Human(dual talent str/cha) LN or LG Draconic Bloodline Sorcerer//scaled fist unchained monk.

I've been wanting to do something a little different for a monk for a while now. I don't know that he'll have a chance of getting in, what with all the excellency offered up by the rest of you, but then again, you miss all the shots you don't take, so here goes.

[Ashe]

Alright another Rednal game and I have time. Working on backstory now. Should have up in 30mins or so.

['Hawk' Hargraves]

Shalluk wrote:

Sadly, Shalluk is actually the least heroic hero ever. He's frightened, nervous and occasionally terrified. He's come out of his shell a bit, but I'm sure something will terrify him before long.

Fair enough...

Not to wax too philosophic but it has been said that real heroism is still choosing to act in spite of your fears. So, Shalluk might actually be the most heroicy hero evah. :)

Aside:

True story about the most unheroicy hero I think I've ever seen. I was DMing a campaign and one of my players had a full-tilt, polish-your-armor-till-it-gleams-I-only-wear-white-cuz-I'm-pure Paladin. The rest of the party were mostly neutral folks and pragmatists - no true 'heroes' in the lot. Our protagonists were at a village funeral, dressed appropriately (no armor), when the BBEG decided to decimate the townsfolk. The 'non-heroes' decide to try to stop the BBEG sans armor or most of their gear. The Paladin decides to run back to the Inn to get his armor and gear. I point out that it will take several rounds to get back to the Inn and, given his armor, it will take 4 minutes to don it. The Pally decides to ask one of his compatriots to accompany him to help him don his armor. Stunned at the request (both IC and OOC), they all refuse and go after the BBEG. Our Pally gets back to the Inn and starts dressing. I ask if he wants to don his armor (4 minutes) or don it hastily (1 minute) and take the paltry AC penalty. He decides to don his armor properly. The battle was over before the Pally made it out of his bedroom.

[Al Sa-Her]

Al Sa-Her checking in. Backstory is in profile build complete. I had to change Giant Slayer a bit to fit in. Seemed plausible given his luck maybe. Anyways Renal you know what type of poster I am, as does Shalluk thanks for the consideration. :)

[Cade Goodbarrel]

Interested, will adjust the level, and such tonight but the character should be good to go.

[Arkon the Thunderer]

If Shalluk scared he can hide behind me, shoot our distracted enemies and then heal me when they are gone. This could work well as Arkon will eventually turn into a huge dinosaur and be very distracting.

[Sundakan]

Well, my power's finally back on, but I'm too tired to stay up and write more. Ah well.

[GM Rednal]

All right, after a day that was longer than expected, I have... narrowed things down. XD There's actually quite a lot of really good submissions here, so what I'm going to do is see what the current players think about the finalists, and hopefully we'll be all done tomorrow.

[GM Rednal]

All right, after discussing things with the players, I'd like to welcome Zelani Tanith.

Actually making a decision here was pretty hard, because there were a lot of great submissions. Thank you all for your applications, and I wish you the best of luck in your future submissions. ^^

[Al Sa-Her]

Congrats. Good to see a newer poster get a shot. If things don't work out you know where to find me ;) Have fun all.

[Sundakan]

Have fun Zelani!

I in the meantime will probably keep working on Damien for the next Gestalt SoP game that pops up.

[Fury of the Tempest]

Darn it.

Hope I got into the finals at least...

Where do I need to improve?

[Zelani Tanith]

Thank you Rednal! *happy dance*

I will try to finish up the last parts of the mechanics and get the profile properly set up over the weekend while I recover from my eldest child's birthday fun that was today [so many kids, so much sugar, so much walking around in so little time]. There is really only equipment and magic left to finalize.

I feel I should now ask the players, and you Rednal, if there is any type of magic or anything else that would be particularly useful or unuseful for the final version before I finish tweaking.

Thanks again :) Hopefully Zelani won't terrify poor Shalluk...too much.

[Burnscar]

Congratulations!

Ah well. Now I have to find a gestalt game somewhere.

[GM Rednal]

@Fury: You actually had a pretty good backstory, and I noted the effort that went into it. In this case, it was just a few factors, including things like party makeup (it was just a bit too smashy, still, for what I was aiming to get).

However! Good submission overall. Keep it up and I definitely think you can get into some games. ^^

@Zelani: Runelords is pretty classic, so there's very little that's either an absolute must or likely to be totally horrible. XD Go for a good balance of different powers and I think you'll be fine. (Except for Weather. Weather is bad at low levels.)

[Burnscar]

The teleportation things from Warp are ridiculously good. I'd make sure to pick that stuff up, if I were doing SoP.

[G-unit]

Congrats!

[rdknight]

Congrats Zelani!

[Fury of the Tempest]

GM Rednal wrote:

@Fury: You actually had a pretty good backstory, and I noted the effort that went into it. In this case, it was just a few factors, including things like party makeup (it was just a bit too smashy, still, for what I was aiming to get).

However! Good submission overall. Keep it up and I definitely think you can get into some games. ^^

*Sigh* Seems my fears about his melee power did come true in the end...

[GM Rednal]

If your instincts say something could be a problem, they're usually right. o wo/ Listen to them.

[Laufey Gemshrike]

Hm, since you're giving feedback Rednal, did Laufey have the same issue?

[Fury of the Tempest]

I knew it could be a problem, but it was the character build that struck a chord with me when I was presented the world and crunch I was going to be playing with.

What else could I do but do my best, and hope for it as well?

[GM Rednal]

Laufey, I felt your character was, role-wise, a little too similar to our Ninja/Warpriest.