Zutha and Xanderghul Alara’quin

[Major_Blackhart]

When I was going through the details and noted that both of these symbols of rule have no stats or rules in place.

I was wondering what would be a good way to design these? Should Xanderghul's be a mythic tier weapon? What abilities would make sense for them?

[Phntm888]

I'll start by answering your second question, to which I think the answer is no. We have Sorshen's stat block, and from that we know that she does not have the Mythic Path Ability Legendary Item, despite her alara'quin's abilities. I don't think Xanderghul would either, as he would likely focus on Archmage specific abilities.

The published alara'quin of Karzoug, Belimarius, and Krune are also considered major artifacts, but as none of those three are Mythic, the power of their alara'quin is not tied to mythic status, either.

As for the Xanderghul and Zutha's alara'quin, we'll start with the description from the inside front cover of Temple of the Peacock Spirit.

Xanderghul's Flawless Hammer wrote:

The seven skymetals were a favorite medium for the runelords to work with when creating magic items, deadly guardians, and ancient weapons. Today, the most common of these, adamantine, remains a highly sought-after resource, while the others exist in increasingly rare supplies. Some shimmer with strange colors and exude dangerous energies, while others seem to defy the laws of time and space. Today, common wisdom holds that there are seven varieties of skymetal, but in truth there may be as many varieties as there are stars in the sky. Xanderghul’s favored weapon, his Flawless Hammer, was reputedly crafted from one of these unknown metals. Unlike many others, though, this metal had no distinctive visual traits, and—to the untrained eye—resembled nothing more than crude iron.

However, this metal imbued Xanderghul’s Flawless Hammer with potent and deadly power. Its blows always struck true, regardless of illusory defenses the target might hold, and such blows never qualified as grazes—the hammer’s damage always hit its peak potential. Like the other Alara’quin wielded by the runelords, Xanderghul’s Flawless Hammer had an intellect of its own, but this was not an awareness granted by another—it was said to be nothing less than a duplication; a mirror of Xanderghul’s own arrogant mind.

I've bolded what I think are the important lines. From this description, we learn the following:

1) Xanderghul's hammer was crafted from an unknown skymetal.
2) It ignored illusory defenses and always did max damage due to the skymetal (which is probably why we didn't get full stats).
3) The hammer did not possess its own awareness, but instead reflected Xanderghul's mind.

From Xanderghul's stat block, we also know the shadow version of the weapon had the follwing attributes: +3 axiomatic spell storing lucerne hammer.

If we assume the shadow weapon was not quite full power, it should probably have stats similar to this:

Xanderghul's Flawless Hammer:

Aura strong evocation [evil] CL 20th
Slot none; Price —; Weight 12 lbs.
Statistics
Alignment LE; Ego 37
Senses darkvision 120 ft., hearing
Int 20, Wis 14, Cha 18
Communication read languages, read magic, speech, telepathy (Abyssal, Aklo, Azlanti, Giant, Thassilonian)
Description
Xanderghul's Flawless Hammer is a +5 axiomatic greater spell-storing skymetal guisarme. The skymetal causes the weapon damage dice to always act as though they rolled the maximum and ignore any miss chance granted by illusion spells or effects. All other damage dice must be rolled normally, and the miss chance from mundane circumstances, such as darkness or concealment, still applies. As its intelligence is a reflection of Xanderghul's pride and ego, the hammer grants its wielder a +2 luck bonus on attacks, saves, and ability and skill checks. It can cast overwhelming presence once per day, cure serious wounds upon its wielder three times per day, and minor image three times per day.
Destruction
Xanderghul's Flawless Hammer can be destroyed if it is hurled under the crushing feet of the Oliphaunt of Jandelay, but only if there is no current Runelord of Pride living in the world.

The statistics are similar to Sorshen's (as she and Xanderghul were the most powerful Runelords, I decided their weapons should have similar attributes), although I swapped Intelligence and Charisma, plus changed the alignment to reflect the axiomatic property. Since we don't know the type of skymetal used, I just referred to it as "Skymetal".

For Zutha, we'll look at the blurb on the inside cover of Runeplague:

Zutha's Scythe wrote:

The Runelords all carried powerful weapons as symbols of their rule,
icons of their power known collectively as the Alara’quin. In the case of the Runelords of Gluttony, this weapon matched their temperament well—a deadly scythe made of magically strengthened bones and sinew capable of draining life from those it struck. The weapon served its wielders well, but in the case of the final (and arguably most powerful) Runelord of Gluttony, Runelord Zutha treated the deadly weapon more as an affectation and symbol than a tool of destruction. He favored his powerful rings and magical stones in battle when not relying upon his magic or the protection of his undead minions, and he was known to loan the scythe to favored agents to bolster their odds in battle. When such an agent fell, the scythe invariably returned to Zutha’s corpulent hands, ready to be wielded by his next champion.

The scythe not only drinks life from those it harms, but transforms that life into negative energy that heals its wielder—provided the wielder is undead, of course! Living wielders of the scythe tend not to remain so for long...

From this blurb and associated picture, we learn the following:

1) The blade of Zutha's scythe is metal, but the rest is bone and sinew.
2) It drains life from those it hits (energy/hit point drain).
3) The scythe always returns to its wielder.
4) The scythe converts drained energy/hit points into negative energy that is then applied to the wielder.

The stats for the scythe in Zutha's stat block are actually less useful than Xanderghul's. James Jacobs has said that to create shadow Xanderghul, he needed to create Xanderghul's full stat block, but he did not need to create Zutha's full stat block for partial-power Zutha (I can't remember which thread, but I think it's one of the ones on this subforum). So, with that in mind, here's a stab at Zutha's Scythe:

Zutha's Scythe:

Aura strong necromancy [evil] CL 17th
Slot none; Price —; Weight 10 lbs.
Statistics
Alignment CE; Ego 19
Senses darkvision 60 ft., hearing
Int 13, Wis 10, Cha 15
Communication read languages, speech (Necril, Thassilonian)
Powers enervation 1/day, false life on wielder 3/day, inflict moderate wounds (DC 16) 3/day
Dedicated Powers drain life (see below)
Special Purpose Serve the Runelord of Gluttony
Description
Zutha's Scythe is an intelligent +3 keen gory bone scythe. When a living creature is struck by this scythe, they must succeed on a DC 16 Fortitude save or else take 1 negative level. On a critical hit, they instead take 1d4 negative levels. Each time a negative level is bestowed upon a creature, it deals 5 points of negative energy to the wielder. This energy harms living creatures and heals undead creatures as normal.

The Runelord of Gluttony can loan their alara'quin to their servants, and always knows the status of the servant wielding it, as the cleric spell status. Upon the death or destruction of the servant wielding it, the Runelord can, as a free action, call the scythe back to them. It instantly teleports from wherever it currently is to the Runelord's hands. The Runelord can do this at any time after the death of the servant it was given to, regardless of how much time has passed.

Some of the intelligent item rules might need to be cleaned up, since I'm a little fuzzy and these are rough conversions, but they should provide you a valuable starting point.

[The Shifty Mongoose]

Huh. I always presumed that Xanderghul's Flawless Hammer was made from a skymetal alloy, and considered its' Full Potential ability to mean it could get around any sort of DR.

Plus, since the Runelords are all wizards, none of the Mythical ones would need mythcial weapons, since they relied so much on their spells and the polearms were usually more badges of office.

[Phntm888]

Shifty Mongoose, Xanderghul's Hammer ignoring DR could also be the effect of the skymetal. My mind read "blows always hit at peak potential" as maximized weapon damage. Ignoring all DR is another perfectly valid interpretation, however.

I think there's a lot of room for interpretation and customization. Instead of greater spell storing, for instance, you could have the impact enhancement instead.

Also, I just realized I wrote guisarme instead of lucerne hammer in there. Whoops.