I've got a 1/2-orc fighter player in the group I am DMing that is in Magnimar and wants to eventually join the Order of the Nail there. I don't want to limit the fun, so I am fishing for ideas to accommodate while keeping the party intact.
I really do enjoy just about everything about the class, BUT - how does this work in-game with other party members who have no interest in Hellknights?
I mean, if a player starts out a Hellknight Armitage, for the party to stay together, all the players have to be Armitagers or part of the same low-level mooks "supporting Hellknight Order X" like the squire until what? The trial? Then the PC becomes a Hellknight and they (choose or are assigned) an Order... and have to go where the Order tells them, do what the Order tells them. What about the other players?
If a player decides at some point they want to take up the Hellknight class, they take the test, they are assigned an Order... and we're again at the same situation above.
The Orders have strongholds (some big some small.) Unless the rest of the party were part of the Order or, "servants," they would not be allowed to stay. Suddenly the Hellknight PC and his/her assignments take the forefront with everyone else in supporting positions, and that may be fine - but is that the only way to play this?
Non-Order missions go away? POOF! Because the Order would not take it well for one of the ranks to continually up and go, "Hey, I'm gonna go do XXXX with these guys for a while, be back sometime later."
I am seeing nothing in the Prestige Class that allows or accounts for Hellknights NOT being in an Order, or any Order allowing "independent wandering adherents." Seeing how severe the Hellknight reputation is, I would think they specifically DO NOT allow their members to go on missions that are outside their Order.
What are the opinions / how was this handled in your games?
I don't have a game with a Hellknight myself, but I wholeheartedly recommend you to this campaign journal.
Hmmm... long read there. On the surface skimming the first three pages it looks like your link is leading towards something similar to my concern.
The fact that the AP in link is set in Korvosa during a chaotic upheaval makes the setting ripe for a Hellknight PC - that's not quite the situation in our sandboxy game.
But that is pre-judging. I'll take the read-through, and thank you.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
I don't know the plot of your game, but the best and easiest way would be to make the Order interested/invested in whatever it is the PCs are doing. Then the characters Hellknight mission could simply be to assist the rest of the group with their objective, and report back to the order. Information gathering is a large part of any successful mercenary organization, and the Hellknights are no different. If they have an applicant that is already a part of something they're interested in, then I doubt they'd pass up the opportunity to get an easy in there. Efficiency is important to lawfully minded types.
The Path of the Hellknight book has a Questing Hellknight trait to reflect members that are normally abroad rather than actively working in an Order's base.
Essentially, an Armiger or proper Hellknight that's part of an adventuring party or going solo is a field agent and representative of their Order.
At least some of the Orders (God-Claw, Torrent, Pike) are the result of members of other Orders striking out and their own and tackling a general type of mission that other Orders do not, and thus being recognized by the other Orders as the founder of a new Order dedicated to this new mission.
As long the half-orc's party's goals further the Order of the Nail's interests (and Nail's pretty adventurer friendly), they won't object to him staying with an adventuring party
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
After the character has done something impressive enough as deemed by you the GM, they contact the Order of the Nail. Through that contact the leader of the order gives a field commission, impressed by the works of the PC and tells them to continue their mission and make sure to to uphold their tenets.
The trouble isn't specific to Hellknights really. This trouble is "What to do when members of the same adventuring group don't all want to do the same thing for a long period of in game time?"
And there isn't really a great general answer. A lot of it depends on your campaign and time frames involved.
Just hand waving things as I described above is the easiest and most straight forward solution. But doesn't really get much into the feel of being a Hellknight. But if you're players okay with it, that's the route I would go.
I'll have to figure something out.
The year-long in-game mission they are on, unless I completely change the way the PF Society is running in Magniamr, will require party activities any Hellknight would refuse to participate in.
Things like: False-flag operations, vandalism, spreading false rumors, burglary, forgery, bribery of city officials (or manipulating them through deceit), framing others for crimes, etc.
I can't see any of that being things Hellknights would do, much less an aspirant being allowed to act independently to do them.
The only "out" I can think of is the PC taking a moral turn and renouncing those ways when the mission is done -- taking the test AFTER the mission is over instead of at 5th level like he wants. There would be MUCH more flexibility at that point.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
^Hellknights care more about obtaining results while upholding their own organization's goals than about justice, so any of the above operations might not cause them to look askance if done for purposes that further the aims of the Hellknight order. In particular, the Order of the Rack probably conducts false-flag operations, spreads false rumors, and frames others all the time for the purpose of upholding the Infernal rule of House Thrune, and their destruction of printing presses certainly counts as vandalism of a major degree. (In other words, they are like a government department of the type that George Orwell described.)
|
The year-long in-game mission they are on, unless I completely change the way the PF Society is running in Magniamr, will require party activities any Hellknight would refuse to participate in.
Things like: False-flag operations, vandalism, spreading false rumors, burglary, forgery, bribery of city officials (or manipulating them through deceit), framing others for crimes, etc.
I can't see any of that being things Hellknights would do, much less an aspirant being allowed to act independently to do them.
There's a solution. All the Hellknight who breaks his law has to do to atone for it is to undergo a reckoning. For the Order of the Nail, it consists of piercing flesh with sharp metal (1d6 damage, leave to heal naturally), per infraction. Creepy and all, but would be acceptable to a crazy fanatic a Hellknight would have to be to really be accepted into an order.
The trick will be if the rest of the party wants to work with and around the Hellknight. Having a durable fall guy with his own resources doesn't hurt. There is some risk, however, if the Hellknight player is honestly trying to play more than a tank with cool armor. He isn't really a party member unless the party is subservient to him and his order, or at least appears to be.
Hellknights are a bit like Judge Dredd in my experience. When they catch a whiff of law breaking, they follow after it single mindedly and punish it mercilessly, but within the confines of the law. Whether they're Good, Neutral, or Evil, they will put the Lawful part of their alignment first. So if you can make the quest involve "sending an agent to find and punish the lawbreakers" and if the player is cooperative, a Hellknight player should do fine. Also, in Path of the Hellknight, there are various wandering agents of certain Orders mentioned, so a wandering Hellknight isn't out of the question as long as they report in when required to do so and follow the law. In fact, if you haven't, I strongly recommend reading Path of the Hellknight. It should answer most of your questions and is an interesting read in its own right.