I finally finished re-reading the stories about Corum Jhaelen Irsei/Corum Cremm Croich and have developed the first draft of another Eternal Champion character. For those of you that aren’t familiar with the character, Corum is another incarnation of the Champion Eternal, like Elric of Melniboné. The character appears chiefly in six novels, though he also makes some guest appearances in other stories of the Champion Eternal.
Corum is a bit different from Elric in that his tales are divided into two separate stories, each consisting of three novels. There are some distinct differences between Corum as he appears in The Knight of the Swords, The Queen of the Swords, and The King of the Swords (all three collected into The Swords Trilogy) and how he later appears in The Bull and the Spear, The Oak and the Ram, and The Sword and the Stallion (all three collected into The Chronicles of Corum).
Male Vadhagh PaladinSKILLS
Strength d6 □+1
Dexterity d10 □+1 □+2 □+3
-Melee: Dexterity +1
-Ranged: Dexterity +1
Constitution d4 □+1 □+2
Intelligence d6 □+1 □+2 □+3
Wisdom d10 □+1 □+2 □+3 □+4
-Knowledge: Wisdom +2
-Perception: Wisdom +1
Charisma d6 □+1 □+2POWERS
Hand Size 4 □5
Proficient with Light Armors, Heavy Armors, and WeaponsYou may recharge (□ reveal) a blessing to evade your encounter with a monster.
You may discard the top card of your deck to add 1d6 (□ +1) to any check by a character at your location against a bane with the Army, Skirmish, or Swarm trait. If that card is an item (□ or a blessing), you may recharge it instead of discarding it.
CARDS LIST
Favored Card Type: WeaponWeapon 4 □5 □6
Spell -
Armor 3 □4
Item 2 □3 □4
Ally 2 □3 □4 □5
Blessing 4 □5 □6
“Vadhagh” is Corum’s race. It is an elder inhuman race, related to the Melnibonéans (the race to which Elric belongs). Physically, they have slim features, tapered ears, and almond-shaped eyes. The Vadhagh are even more physically distinctive than the Melnibonéans in that their skin is flecked with gold and their eyes are purple with yellow centers. They are comparable to the Elves of Golarion.
The choice of Paladin for Corum’s class was based on his service to a larger cause in both trilogies. In the first trilogy, Corum serves the powers of Law, mostly through Lord Arkyn. In the second trilogy, he serves the mabden (humans). In each trilogy, his service to a greater power/cause allows him to perform feats that might be considered magical/divinely inspired. He’s not an exact representation of a Pathfinder/Golarion Paladin, but it seemed like the most fitting class to me.
The choice of skills is open to discussion. Though he is primarily a combat-oriented character in the stories, he doesn’t appear to be especially strong. Since he is skilled in both melee and ranged weapons, I opted for Dexterity over Strength. I wanted to make his Constitution higher, especially after his initial encounter with Glandyth (no spoilers here), but other skills needed to be higher. Whether or not to focus on Intelligence or Wisdom came down to the choice of his class, Paladin. Also, on several occasions in the stories, Corum mentions that his race’s “magic” (as it is called by the mabden) is really nothing more than wisdom (the Vadhagh are both at one with nature and in command of science that the superstitious mabden perceive as sorcery).
Corum’s first power is based on a Vadhagh racial ability to peer into other planes of existence, and to shift into those planes at will. This takes an effort of will and energy, and it becomes more and more difficult as the stories progress.
Corum’s second power is a combination of his (Paladin) inspired abilities and his race’s extensive knowledge and wisdom. Though he is not a seasoned warrior in the first novel, he has been trained extensively in arts (he is composing a symphony when he is first introduced), crafts (he later demonstrates knowledge in sailing and boatwright skills), and war (both individual combat and mass battle). The power itself focuses on the combat aspects since those feature most prominently in the stories. My chief concern is that this power is his defining power, but the number of banes with the Army, Skirmish, and Swarm traits is low. It is, I think, fairly accurate to Corum with regard to the stories, but it doesn’t work as well in the game where the threats are a bit more varied. I’m considering expanding its scope to include Corum’s non-combat checks, or some segment thereof.
Each of the roles is a representation of Corum as he appears in one of the trilogies.
In the first trilogy, Corum is pitted against the Lords of Chaos. The defining elements of Corum’s potency in this trilogy are the gifts of Shool, a replacement for the hand and eye lost to mabden torture (I won’t give more information on their source – no spoilers). The two are magical, the eye allowing him to peer into an eerie nether cave and the hand summoning the strange denizens of that cave to Corum, helping him in combat. The creatures he summons are undead and seek to gain their freedom by killing others at Corum’s behest, at which point those others will replace them in the nether cave and be summoned forth by Corum next time in a weird cycle. The hand, too, sometimes acts as if it has a mind of its own, saving Corum from treachery and acting with its great strength.
Flavor text.POWERS
Hand Size 4 □5 □6
Proficient with Light Armors, Heavy Armors, and WeaponsYou may recharge (□ reveal) a blessing to evade your encounter with a monster.
You may discard the top card of your deck to add 1d6 (□ +1)(□ +2)(□ +3) to any check by a character at your location against a bane with the Army, Skirmish, or Swarm trait. If that card is an item (□ or a blessing), you may recharge it instead of discarding it.
When building your deck, include the cohort Gifts of Shool. When setting up the scenario, draw a random monster from the box and display it. When you would banish a non-Villain bane you encounter on your check that invokes the Nether trait, display it instead.
□ For your combat check against a non-Villain bane that is not immune to the Attack trait, you may banish a displayed bane to add its highest combat check to defeat and the Undead and Nether traits to your check.
□ You may bury a blessing to search your deck or discard pile for Gifts of Shool and return it to your hand.
□ When you defeat a monster during your turn, you may draw a card.
The role focuses on the Gifts of Shool. One chief risk is if the creatures that Corum summons from the nether cave aren’t able to defeat whatever creatures Corum sends them against. This is brought up several times in the stories, with Corum worrying that the foe is too great; and it is captured in the role’s powers (though not permanently, only affecting the remainder of a scenario if it happens). The wording of the monster summoning is a bit tricky. Corum most often summons the nether creatures when he is faced with multiple opponents, including armies and warbands. So instead of saying “monster,” it focuses on combat checks against banes, which allows for barriers with the army/skirmish/swarm traits in addition to monsters. Also, since the background of the nether creature cycle is that the creatures are trying to regain their souls, the wording doesn’t allow the monster summoning to be performed against creatures that are immune to the Attack trait (e.g., golems and constructs and the like). Mechanically, it can’t work against villains. Adding the Undead and Nether traits to the check usually won’t add anything mechanically, but they are thematic (and there might be some boons somewhere that can build upon these traits, so just in case…).
I’ve created the Nether trait to facilitate the wording of the powers (as wordy as they are now, they were much worse before I adjusted them). The word itself is frequently used in the novels when describing Corum’s use of the hand and eye to summon the creatures forth from the cave.
The other powers are intended to be relatively minor since the Gifts of Shool provide a big leap forward immediately upon picking the role. They’re effective, but don’t have a huge impact.
An inherent part of this role is the Gifts of Shool, which I’ve developed as a Cohort. The card represents both the hand and the eye. The card’s powers are relatively minor, but the card is also key to one of Corum’s role powers (that of summoning forth the creatures from the nether cave).
Cohort 3
Traits: Veteran, Magic, MythicPowers:
Display this card. You may put this card on top of your deck to add 1d4 plus the scenario adventure deck level to your Strength or Perception check.
When you would be affected by a power on a card you encounter before you act, you may put this card on top of your deck to ignore that power; and you may add the scenario adventure deck level to your checks against that card.
If there’s anything that is missing from this card, it is that Corum can’t give the cohort away. The hand and the eye are magically grafted to his body. Such a power/rule isn’t necessarily mechanically, but it might be necessary thematically. If such a power/rule is added, it would probably be something along the lines of “After using this power, if you do not have the Vadhagh trait, bury this card.” Or something like that.
In the second trilogy, Corum no longer has the gifts of Shool, instead wearing a mechanical prosthetic hand of his own devising and a simple eye patch. Corum is a much more straightforward character in this trilogy. In each of the novels, he (temporarily) makes use of magical creatures and artifacts; and he has powerful allies. One magical ability he exhibits is that the belief in his demigod status [by the mabden] means that certain items have magical properties when he uses them (though they are mundane in the hands of others). Overall, though, he is much more of a mounted warrior in this trilogy.
Flavor text.POWERS
Hand Size 4 □5 □6
Proficient with Light Armors, Heavy Armors, and WeaponsYou may recharge (□ reveal) a blessing to evade your encounter with a monster (□ or to add the Magic trait to your check).
You may discard the top card of your deck to add 1d6 (□ +1)(□ +2)(□ +3) to any check by a character at your location against a bane with the Army, Skirmish, or Swarm (□ or Giant or Outsider) trait. If that card is an item (□ or a blessing), you may recharge it instead of discarding it.
□ You may reveal a card that has the Mount trait to add 1 (□ and the card’s adventure deck level) to your combat check.
□ When you would discard a card that has the Mount trait for its power, you may recharge it instead.
Where The Sword Trilogy pitted Corum against demons, The Chronicles of Corum pit Corum against the Fhoi Myore, giant creatures from Limbo. His chief allies, other than the mabden, are the Sidhi warriors Goffanon and Ilbrec, along with the eternal companion, Jhary-a-Conel and his black and white winged cat, both of which also fought alongside Corum in the first trilogy. Corum’s “powers” in this trilogy are much less fantastical, focusing more on his combat prowess. This role doesn’t focus on the magical artifacts that Corum uses, since each is used for only a short while and none really define him. He frequently rides into war astride warhorses and the like, so I’ve reflected that in his powers.
Next in the queue are Erekosë and then Urlik Skarsol, each after I finish their respective novels.
Again, your feedback is appreciated.
Just from a balance perspective, the base character powers seem a little weak to me. It's like a blend of Seelah and Merisiel, which is good except that it feels worse than either of them to me, because the powers are both so narrow.
The Lord of the Silver Hand still feels pretty weak. The base "reveal a Mount" power should at least add a dice or something.
Prince in the Scarlet Robe on the other hand is over the top. You get a cohort and an (admittedly no use on its own) power for free for starters. But the main thing is adding the bane's entire check to defeat to your check. That will trivialise combat checks. Plus, it seems to chain into itself. The chain breaks if you fail, except with that bonus you can't fail.
It should just add a d6 or the monster's AD# or something. Using a monster's actual check to defeat has been done before, but only on cards where you can't add anything else and don't get to see what it is beforehand.
I think that one of the problems I was having was in trying to derive a core power based on the chosen class. In this case, the second power was clearly drawn from the other Paladins. One change I've made as a result of my development of Erekosë, and which will be applied to the other characters in the project, is that the class trait will be "Champion" instead of Sorcerer (Elric) and Paladin (Corum). The reasons for that change will be explained whenever I get around to posting Erekosë. For the purposes of Corum, though, it means that I can adjust the second core power. I'm still working on that, but at this point it might be changed to be closer to the Warpriest template or else it might focus more on Corum's Knowledge trait (which he appears to have plenty of in the novels).
For the Lord of the Silver Hand role, do you think that 1d4 would be sufficient for the revealing a Mount card? Or should it be 1d6?
For the Prince in the Scarlet Robe role, perhaps the power should be changed so that it becomes the Combat check (e.g., For your combat check against a non-Villain bane that is not immune to the Attack trait, you may banish a displayed bane to use..." with the roll being 1d6 for each adventure deck level of the banished card (I don't recall the wording off the top of my head, but there are a few cards that do this, so I'll find those for the template) and add the Undead and Nether traits.
Regardless of how the banishing a bane power works, my concern is that losing a single combat check in this way loses the power for the rest of the scenario. So there would have to be a safety built in. My current thinking is that the Gifts of Shool could be discarded to allow a re-roll if the first roll would fail. Something like "When you would fail at your combat check that invokes the Nether trait, you may discard this card to re-roll the check" (or whatever the correct template is).
Thanks for the feedback!
Re the mount, yes even 1d4 and I at least wouldn't be embarrassed to tick the box.
For the nether monster power, here's an idea:
"For your combat check against a non-Villain monster, you may banish a displayed bane to use 1d6 plus its lowest combat check to defeat, and add the Undead, Nether and Attack traits to your check."
With that wording, you can now actually add blessings to the check and they add 1d6. That solves the problem of being stuck with a bad monster and/or unable to chain it generally, while fairly adding a cost to doing so.
Mind you I'd still say it was too good. Though my main concern is more that, for a character with both the melee and ranged skills, and at least 4 weapons in his deck, there's something a little unsatisfying about having his own combat abilities completely overshadowed by this new power. It seems more like something a character should have straight out of the box to then build around.
Which is why I'd still think it better if it just added a straight and smaller bonus, so that it supplemented his combat skills rather than making them irrelevant (whether by replacing them or giving such a big bonus that they're unnecessary anyway). I know (actually I'm just assuming) the flavour is that the monsters are fighting for you at full strength, but compare Balazar, who also has monsters fighting for him and only adds 1d4 or 1d4+1d6 as a consequence.
Also, I think the power to get monsters might need rewording. You don't generally banish monsters "on [a] check", you banish them after an encounter. As it stands it doesn't make a lot of sense if the monster had multiple checks to defeat. I assume you want it to work so long as at least one of those checks had the required trait.
Thanks, I'm working on the character and taking your suggestions into account (I think I've incorporated all of the concepts so far).
One of the interesting challenges posed by this character (as well as the other characters in the larger Eternal Champion project - actually, any character based on some literary/cinematic character) is that accurately* representing the model in question might lead to inefficiencies that can easily be avoided when creating a character from scratch. Worse, there's always the potential to create an overpowered character in the effort to accurately represent how the character behaves in the stories. Ultimately, while a character should be as accurate as possible, game balance has to be paramount in the design process. So I need to water the character down a bit, but I'm not going to get rid of necessary** inefficiencies.
The Elric character was actually pretty easy to create in comparison to Corum. The only problem with Elric was that he is such a powerful character in the novels that I had to break him down into multiple components (via the roles) to reach theoretically balanced outcomes. Corum, on the other hand, while a much more straightforward character in the novels and not as wildly powerful, is much more inefficient. He excels in combat, but in multiple ways - he is skilled in battle with weapons; he understands warcraft; he inspires others; he often rides potent warhorses into combat; and in each of the trilogies he commands supernatural aid (in the first, it is the calling of dread allies; and in the second, it is that his Vadhagh nature creates magical effects). Tack on to that the ability to perceive and shift into other planes of existence (which, admittedly, really only matters at the start of the first trilogy) and you have a lot of overlapping powers.
Ultimately, I think that the "balance" of the character is that each of these combat powers should be mildly potent, but they shouldn't be additive (or, if additive, don't become overpowered in sum).
I'm not in any way asserting that I've necessarily gotten it "right" in what I've presented so far, though. I'm in the process of revising the character in my efforts to more closely realize this end-state. I've incorporated some of your suggestions with regard to the wording, but I'm revising the core character. His powers are now more like S&S Oloch's (so he's a mix of Merisiel and Oloch). Everything is still at my initial rebuild, though, so I'm going to spend some more time before I present version 2.
* "Accurately" might not be a great word because there is always room for interpretation and subjectivity. Someone else that has read the novels might disagree with my perceptions/conclusions (in which case, a discussion/debate of the character might prove very interesting).
** "Necessary" is also a risky word to use because there's a lot of subjectivity in determining what might be "necessary" for inclusion. As above, discussion/debate might help to reach a better consensus of what is necessary.
In both cases above, a lot depends upon understanding the character. For those that haven't read the novels, the descriptions I've provided have to be sufficient to convey an understanding of what I'm trying to portray. If my descriptions haven't been sufficient, I'll have to provide more information.
In many ways, the blog post and discussion for the Pathfinder Tales Character Deck perfectly illustrates some of the issues I described above.