My sides are in orbit.
Oh actually now you mention it I once played with a guy who made a barb who never raged because he needed a real reason to get angry. Then complained the reason he was weak was he didn't have a +5 vorpal sword. He was level 3 xD
Vorpal swords are sooo overrated. I mean, for just a +3 I could have a keen holy weapon i.e.
I honestly think he'd developed a paranoia over Adamantine Golems and Jabberwocks.
At level three.
I think I'm going to use that at work...
"Well, you're email doesn't work because you don't have a +5 vorpal sword. No, really, it does make sense, but because you've never had one you just don't understand how it makes your email work right. Give me about 15 minutes and I'll get it installed for you."
Makes about as much sense as anything else I say to the people in my office, so why not?
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Not Pathfinder related, but damn if this doesn't fit the thread theme.
A friend of mine in high school was looking for a long-term time occupier, so of course I got her into World of Warcraft (this was before I had discovered the wonder of tabletop gaming.)
She made a ranger, and then did everything that went against the core of why anyone would bother to play WoW.
She got gear with stats that did not benefit her in any way, never participated in group anything (dungeons, raids, pvp, nothing), never joined a guild, and claimed it was for RP, but never talked with any other player besides me, and we were not on an RP Server.
I got her into the game with the idea that we might be able to play together, but her devotion to hamstringing herself made that impossible, because even at a comparable level our power differential was just too much.
I tried to get her to try other games/mmos that would make more sense for a lone adventurer, but she stuck with WoW for six years, before WoW coins made it possible to play without paying.
My mind is boggled to this day.
All the power to her. It did successfully occupy her time, and she seemed to enjoy it, but gawrsh, I just can't understand how.
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Oh actually now you mention it I once played with a guy who made a barb who never raged because he needed a real reason to get angry. Then complained the reason he was weak was he didn't have a +5 vorpal sword. He was level 3 xD
Maybe he was trying to buff the party by making everyone else rage?
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"Now, folks get this impression wut 'cause I'm allegedly this 'Barbie-thingie' that it means I get all spittin' nails an' bathe in dragon dung cus it makes y' stronger.
Far f'm it. Tend t' not get pissed off, but when it happens... ooh boy, better watch out.
But I c'n respect folks what are conservative and try to not get pissed off, 'cause been in my fair share 'f ambushes where I was winded an' don' wanna do that again, thanks."
What just happened O.o
I feel like those are decent reasons for a PC to retire, the others come could cure him once they'd raised the funds and you role something new. Unless you were super attached of course.
Think I remember a 3.5 pirate game, where our group of ne'er-do-wells, a 3 lvl druid (me), 3 lvl fighter (the capt'n), 3 lvl bard (just no), 3 lvl wizard (sigh), 3 lvl gnome illusionist (groan) and a 3 lvl monk (face-palm) tried to help out some shipwrecked pirate-buddies (5 wounded 3 lvl warriors) beset by 3 sea cats.
So our buddies were stuck on a reef, in waist deep to breast deep water, and we decide to row in for the rescue. Only one problem, our characters were, to put it lightly, pretty crappy with the sum of ability scores lying in the low to middle 70's range, so when the penalties for fighting the sea cats in deep water, kicked in we were pretty quickly slaughtered in around 4 rounds.
Now a smart person would point out, why we didn't try to engage them out of the water...well first of all, we where not the most competent party with ranged weaponry, secondly the GM played these sea cats as being impossibly smart, with extensive knowledge of structural engineering as they would attack oars, boat bottoms and the like to get us into the water.
What just happened O.o
Sometimes my characters get a bit mouthy. I'd shove him back in a box, but I'm afraid I'd lose a limb or something.
Apologies for the confusion.
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In one tier 1-2 PFS game I was playing my Bard 2. She has enough points in the traditional rogue skills to do a bit of sneaking, but since we also had a Rogue 1 I figured I should stand aside and let him take the lead on that stuff. You can imagine my surprise when he turned out to have no skill points invested in Stealth, Sleight of Hand, or Disable Device.
I've made two incredibly weak characters for Pathfinder in the past couple of years, mostly because I have a fondness for multi-classing.
The first was a back-up PC for a campaign, so he needed to be Level 9. The concept, which I still thing is cool, was essentially to re-create the psionic martial-artist main character in the Forgotten Realms "House of Serpents" novels. My implementation of this was terrible, as I made a multi-class Psychic/Monk. Because I wanted the high AC bonus, I put his highest stat in Wisdom, not realizing until I was all done creating the character that Psychics use *Intelligence* as their casting stat :) He would have been a mediocre monk with a few easily resisted spells. Fortunately, I recognized the problem and never had to introduce the character into a game.
My second near-disaster is my current PC who've I played since level 1 and is now level 11. I love her in terms of personality, but I forgot the KISS principle and ended up with "by trying to do everything, you're not good at anything" problem. The idea was a sort of arcane knight that specializes in buffing her allies on the battlefield. Given that her rolled ability scores were quite low, I ended up with a Dex-negative mediocre cavalier and a "can still only cast Level 2 spells" magus. I then exacerbated the problem by allocating much of her wealth to rebuilding an old castle in the swamp and hiring soldiers to staff it, leaving very little gold for much-needed equipment upgrades.
I swear to the gods that next time, I will play a straightforward, single-classed character and actually contribute positively to an encounter!
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When I was starting to play D&D I wanted so badly to play a bard. I created at least 3 bards in D&D and a noble in Star Wars.
I wanted to roleplay the face of the group.
So I just kept buffing and helping the party and doing my part in combat encounters, staying in the background to make others shine.
And when social encounters came... I tried to speak and some other character with dumped charisma cut me and did the negotiation. I tried to take part in the conversation but I'd be interrupted all the time, so I'd finally quit and let the other character do the roleplaying while I just watched. The negotiation would fail and we'd end having trouble.
It was frustrating because I was never able to play a bard for real. It's my favorite class and I never got to play one properly.
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When I was starting to play D&D I wanted so badly to play a bard. I created at least 3 bards in D&D and a noble in Star Wars.
I wanted to roleplay the face of the group.
So I just kept buffing and helping the party and doing my part in combat encounters, staying in the background to make others shine.
And when social encounters came... I tried to speak and some other character with dumped charisma cut me and did the negotiation. I tried to take part in the conversation but I'd be interrupted all the time, so I'd finally quit and let the other character do the roleplaying while I just watched. The negotiation would fail and we'd end having trouble.
It was frustrating because I was never able to play a bard for real. It's my favorite class and I never got to play one properly.
Have you not since? D:
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Never. I never had a proper chance in more than 10 years. Sometimes I was the GM, sometimes the game wasn't D&D. Sometimes the other players or the GM weren't the kind of ones with which playing a bard could be a good thing (I want to play a buffer bard and most players won't appreciate it and some GMs I've known would force a fight each time I want to solve something the social way. Sometimes I just choose another class so I can be more useful for my party composition.
And in RoW... well, I just wanted to play a witch. No excuse there.
So I might play a bard in a solo adventure or something. I don't know.
Dalindra has already told me my next character for one of his stories should be a bard and that's it. He will force me to play a bard for my own good!!! XD
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Never. I never had a proper chance in more than 10 years. Sometimes I was the GM, sometimes the game wasn't D&D. Sometimes the other players or the GM weren't the kind of ones with which playing a bard could be a good thing (I want to play a buffer bard and most players won't appreciate it and some GMs I've known would force a fight each time I want to solve something the social way. Sometimes I just choose another class so I can be more useful for my party composition.
And in RoW... well, I just wanted to play a witch. No excuse there.
So I might play a bard in a solo adventure or something. I don't know.
Dalindra has already told me my next character for one of his stories should be a bard and that's it. He will force me to play a bard for my own good!!! XD
Aha, good on Dalindra! I hope you get the chance to play that bard too. :D
Talking of things you want to play, I've discovered through my first PFS adventure that any character can be super weak if the game specifically neutralises the two things they do well... Which is hilarious because this character should get VERY versatile around Lvl.3. (Mind you, part of the weakness of the character is a horrific number of rolled 1s. So many critical failures, and when I DO hit I do exactly 1hp damage.)
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Strange fact: I always thought that I didn't like Bards, but I have realised that I had to force me to not roll my fourth Bard in a row!
So many Archetypes, such a flavourful class...
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Strange fact: I always thought that I didn't like Bards, but I have realised that I had to force me to not roll my fourth Bard in a row!
So many Archetypes, such a flavourful class...
One of the leaders at this youth group I'm involved with HATES Bards. He got personally offended when I suggested that Cap is The Avengers' Bard... which he totally is. Sure, he's no caster, but performing to make one's friends awesome is is whole shtick.
But this guy has an image of Bards where they're the idiots bringing a flute into battle... which they CAN do, sure, but they can also be war drummers/buglers (which existed), showoffy duelists (which also existed), charismatic sergeants (which exist today) or badasses who wield bass guitars as waraxes (which should exist).
*Sigh.* Alas, he'll never know the glory of the Pathfinder Bard. (He vastly prefers 5e.)
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Cap is a shield Shield champion brawler and I'll hear no more about it thankyou very much!
Such silliness.
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Cap is a shield Shield champion brawler and I'll hear no more about it thankyou very much!
Such silliness.
I mean yes, he is the archetype specifically designed to be Cap.
But his ROLE on the Avengers is basically that of "Bard". He's there to be skillful and inspiring, given that the usual frontliners are Thor "literal god" Odinson and Tony "walking nuke" Stark.
The exemplar brawler?!? A non-magical bard more martial bard.
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The exemplar brawler?!? A non-magical bard more martial bard.
*sigh*
My point is that, on a team where the front-liners are gods and monsters and living armouries, Cap's role is that traditionally filled by a Bard. He's not the main powerhouse; he's there to make everyone else better while helping out on the front lines.
I'm not trying to pin down his exact class assortment, which is frankly a huge amalgam (heh) of different things if you want to be true to the better part of a century of comic books. There's Bard in there, and Vigilante, and Shield Champion and Trench Fighter and Rogue... but I would argue that his most important attributes, the ones that win the battles, are Bardic.
Of course, in his own adventures he's a bit different; they don't have to compare him to the Avengers so he gets to be the highly capable martial artist that he is without focusing so much on his leadership skills. My point is mainly about how he's portrayed on a team.
I am amused by your sigh xD
anywho I don't really think a true example of a Bard can be found in the avengers. I wouldn't attribute encouragement as the main strength of any of the avengers also I think a few of them fill that role at different points.
Most importantly however I was just playing with you :P think whatcha like.
I find what Kileana said a bit odd though, whenever I've played a buffer my party has loved it I've never experienced people thinking it was worthless or weak or unappreciated.
In fact there was one player who liked to add up how much damage was done each combat by me and also by the bonus attack from blessing of fervor because he enjoyed it so much having a buffer xD
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Oh no I wasn't sighing at you two! I was sighing at myself for not being terribly good at getting my point across, sorry.
I agree that none of them are straight-up Bards, but Cap does fill that role more than any other. He's not the powerhouse, he's not the control guy, he's not able to change the fabric of a battle just by willing it to be so... what he IS, is the guy that leads through sheer force of personality and attitude, making everyone else better at doing all of those other things. I don't think anyone else on the team is quite as indispensable as Cap for that reason. Just because he's making orders rather than singing a tune doesn't mean that he's not performing; he wears the Stars'n'Stripes for a reason, and it's not for the stealth advantage.
However, I'm happy to differ. :)
Aww, that player sounds sweet. There are a few games that could benefit from that attitude...
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Yes, I remember once one player had to bring a 1st level bard to an adventure while the rest of us were 4th-5th level. However, we met some sonic-based monster, and the bard started countersinging for us and stayed back while we attacked. The player worried she felt so useless, but we explained, oh no, she saved all of us by staying back and singing.
As for frustratingly weak, there was one multiclassing monstrosity who was a Monk 1/Wizard 1/Ranger 1, specifically for the saves, who would then spend the first few rounds of combat casting self-buffs for extra protection. Then, out came the net to entangle an opponent. Of course, by then, we had already dispatched most of the enemy and were essentially mopping up by then.
I don't think he was even proficient in the net.
The old cowardice build, I've seen that done a few ways in this thread but I've never seen it followed with a net xD very random.
In one tier 1-2 PFS game I was playing my Bard 2. She has enough points in the traditional rogue skills to do a bit of sneaking, but since we also had a Rogue 1 I figured I should stand aside and let him take the lead on that stuff. You can imagine my surprise when he turned out to have no skill points invested in Stealth, Sleight of Hand, or Disable Device.
Yeah, we had that happen. Our combat oriented guy said "I'll play the rogue" (I played the cleric, etc) when starting a new campaign- turned out no ranks is Pick locks, disable device, search (3.5) , etc. Stealth and weapon skills- in other words a stab in the back guy going for assassin. But we couldnt find traps or open doors without bashing them.
Now, there's nothing wrong with a "stab in the back guy going for assassin" but certain assumptions are made when your say "I'll play the rogue".
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When I was starting to play D&D I wanted so badly to play a bard. I created at least 3 bards in D&D and a noble in Star Wars.
I wanted to roleplay the face of the group.
So I just kept buffing and helping the party and doing my part in combat encounters, staying in the background to make others shine.
And when social encounters came... I tried to speak and some other character with dumped charisma cut me and did the negotiation. I tried to take part in the conversation but I'd be interrupted all the time, so I'd finally quit and let the other character do the roleplaying while I just watched. The negotiation would fail and we'd end having trouble.
It was frustrating because I was never able to play a bard for real. It's my favorite class and I never got to play one properly.
Yeah, we had that in a game. I had a PC with a maxed out CHA and diplomacy and the guys with low CHA and ranks in Intimidate kept butting in for all the social encounters, making us get kicked out of town after town.
I am amused by your sigh xD
anywho I don't really think a true example of a Bard can be found in the avengers. I wouldn't attribute encouragement as the main strength of any of the avengers also I think a few of them fill that role at different points.
Most importantly however I was just playing with you :P think whatcha like.
I find what Kileana said a bit odd though, whenever I've played a buffer my party has loved it I've never experienced people thinking it was worthless or weak or unappreciated.
In fact there was one player who liked to add up how much damage was done each combat by me and also by the bonus attack from blessing of fervor because he enjoyed it so much having a buffer xD
I love being a supporter. With my Witch it was great though I had a lot of SoS too. And my group really appreciated my role. I could be Slumber hexing and Ice tombing everything but being a supporter was much more fun for everybody so I just kept my slumber hex for repetitive fights that we didn't want to do or to remove minions from important fights. And I had a great and supportive party. It was great.
But some of the players I have played with in the past didn't appreciate it or even got pushy with me to try to decide how I casted my buffs. The options were:
-Player is under haste+ bardic performance+ other buffs. Deals some deadly blows thanks to buffs and starts boasting how good he is and how useless the bard is, as he is dealing ridiculous damage.
-Player is jealous of other character getting more benefits from, say, haste, and wants me to stop casting haste and use a less useful spell that would only benefit his character.
-I silence an enemy spellcaster, leaving him defenseless, but also silencing the party because the room is narrow, letting the martials do the job. Players complain because the martials did better in just one encounter.
-I am called «clown», «jester» or despreciative names even if my character is a diplomatic or a noble who never sings or dances but just gives motivational speeches.
So meh, I'm not playing a bard with some kind of people.
So meh, I'm not playing a bard with some kind of people.
I've just stopped playing buffers with those people. I think they finally managed to appreciate the (absent) buffs while they suffered some horrible deaths.
The moral? Don't despise the buffer. He may end playing an antipaladin.
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In one tier 1-2 PFS game I was playing my Bard 2. She has enough points in the traditional rogue skills to do a bit of sneaking, but since we also had a Rogue 1 I figured I should stand aside and let him take the lead on that stuff. You can imagine my surprise when he turned out to have no skill points invested in Stealth, Sleight of Hand, or Disable Device.Yeah, we had that happen. Our combat oriented guy said "I'll play the rogue" (I played the cleric, etc) when starting a new campaign- turned out no ranks is Pick locks, disable device, search (3.5) , etc. Stealth and weapon skills- in other words a stab in the back guy going for assassin. But we couldnt find traps or open doors without bashing them.
Now, there's nothing wrong with a "stab in the back guy going for assassin" but certain assumptions are made when your say "I'll play the rogue".
So... Belkar!
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@Dalindra, you mean that Antipaladin that could only heal himself? That was great.
For those who don't know, in WotW Dalindra got tired of being the supporter and being always unappreciated. So he decided to play an antipaladin before the other players chose their characters. They were a ranged rogue, played by a really good player, another antipaladin, played by the same guy who always plays Fighters, an alchemist who only wanted to goof around and an Inquisitor played by the infamous Fire Wizard.
Both the Inquisitor and the Alchemist refused to provide support to the party or learn how to heal, remove status, etc.
The Inquisitor finally decided to charge against a raging barbarian alone and ended half dead. The player asked: can nobody heal me?
Dalindra answered: I cannot. My character is unable to do that. You are our healer.
He looked terrorized. He looked at me like asking me to tell the other players that he wasn't a healer. Then his character died.
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...And he was a veteran player with experience since 3.0. No regrets.
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Weakest I've seen was in a 3.5 Homebrew I ran. My first step into 3.5 was with the eberron setting, so I told my players hey, "anything goes" - I was fortunate that the other people were as new as I was so none of the CODzilla or absurd template builds popped up.
No, what we got was a Kender Warlock. Imagine a Kender. Now make it an edgelord, played by someone who is intentionally being Ironic. Skull motifs, spikey dyed hair, angsty prose. All while still being a Kender. With all THAT entails. The line "This isn't a phase! This is who i REALLY AM!" was yelped in a squeaky voice to the group's very paternal druid several times before they even got to the dungeon.
Where the kender, brave, fearless, and stupid, rappelled down into the abyss without a second glance. No attempt at stealth or caution.
he got eaten by dire rats that he tried to make friends with before the rest of the party was even halfway down. The player was a good sport about it. "Well, that's how he would have wanted to go." Literally all the character did was steal laundry, hit on the halfling rogue, and feed the local wildlife.
After that... what comes to mind is an Iron Gods game I joined on Roll20. We had a tengu whose player was one of "those" guys. The character was a cleric who never cast a spell, but was first on the corpse to plunder their riches ("OH BOY, PURPLE GOO TUBES!") and a running gag was that he would run from a fight, trip, and get his beak stuck in something. he also frequently made passes at the halfling rogue. Which the Tengu player did in their best Steve Irwin voice... you can imagine where that went. basically he tried hard to play "comic relief," but wasn't terribly funny, sponged (or stole) party resources, and contributed nothing.
I still don't know what a Kender is. Feel that I'm missing out.
but based off what you're saying I imagine a Kender Void Kineticist might be similar to what they were after.
I still don't know what a Kender is. Feel that I'm missing out.
but based off what you're saying I imagine a Kender Void Kineticist might be similar to what they were after.
I believe Kender are the same thing as halfling.
So... Belkar!In one tier 1-2 PFS game I was playing my Bard 2. She has enough points in the traditional rogue skills to do a bit of sneaking, but since we also had a Rogue 1 I figured I should stand aside and let him take the lead on that stuff. You can imagine my surprise when he turned out to have no skill points invested in Stealth, Sleight of Hand, or Disable Device.Yeah, we had that happen. Our combat oriented guy said "I'll play the rogue" (I played the cleric, etc) when starting a new campaign- turned out no ranks is Pick locks, disable device, search (3.5) , etc. Stealth and weapon skills- in other words a stab in the back guy going for assassin. But we couldnt find traps or open doors without bashing them.
Now, there's nothing wrong with a "stab in the back guy going for assassin" but certain assumptions are made when your say "I'll play the rogue".
More or less. ;-)
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No, what we got was a Kender Warlock./takes notes for a future campaign.
We're doing Yawning Portal eventually (which will let us explore lots of different characters), and in 5e, lightfoot halflings get Charisma bonuses... **evil grin**
I once played a 3.5 kender rogue/fighter spiked-chain wielder. Well, technically, I didn't, because he was killed by a Charisma draining monstrosity that made you disappear from existence when your Charisma hit 0.
So is there anything weaker than not existing at all?
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It's better to think of Kender as Chaotic Stupid Halflings. To call them Halflings is an insult to Halflings.
They actually have nothing with halflings but sort of similar looks.
Kenders tend more towards good than towards evil, at least how they are supposed to be, but people roleplays them just for mischief.As a concept they character with child-like curiosity, no sense of danger and lack of understanding of the meaning of private property. You can see there are many conflictive points there. Well, people who roleplay them usually exaggerates those points instead of trying to do something playable.
As a playable race I always say they are flawed, because they encourage some bad roleplaying habits. I think they can make playable concepts but they need a sensible player and some work.
In my longest Dragonlance campaign I had 3 kender NPCs and one of the players took them under her protection for a time. At first the other players were reluctant as they knew kenders, but in the end everybody was OK with them as they didn't cause any trouble. Everything depends on how they are roleplayed... but getting them to work while making them still be kenders is not easy. They are a race with so many issues.
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The kender I (didn't) play used Sleight of Hand to put stuff in other people's pockets.
Usually not hungry rodents.
Usually.
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These three were NPCs.
One of them was a Kender Nightstalker who are kenders that speak with dead and are more interested on them than in living. He carried a lot of body remains with him to communicate with dead people and the ghost of an angry drowned woman. He wanted to help dead people because they looked sad and lonely and they needed someone to cheer them up. He loved also to hear their stories. He didn't act foolish or too daring because, even if he didn't fear dying, he didn't want to be sad, and all dead people looked sad.
Another one was a typical Kender, but after having his younger sister kidnapped and almost sacrificed, he was usually too busy making sure she didn't disappear again to cause mischief.
The latter was a young kender bard, the former one's sister. She was sweet and innocent and her curiosity leaned more towards stories than to material things so she didn't pick pockets. She was very inquisitive and loved to tell and hear stories. They found her half starved at a hole where she had been kept for weeks to be sacrificed. She never realized she could have died. When they found her she said with a broken, hopeless voice: «help me! I'm soooo bored!». Since then, everytime she thought of taking too many risks he asked if she should go, as she feared to end being trapped alone for a long time again. That's also the reason because she never went solo.
I tried not to overplay them and keep them mostly in the background, as kenders can be asphyxiating. And they worked well. In the end I suggested my players to get rid of them because traveling with a bunch of low level kenders while going to really dangerous places could not end well for the kenders. So they left them in a Solamnic settlement. The next time the PCs went there they were no longer there. They got bored and left.
I think belkar is just ranger. he doesn't rage and he has animal companion.
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20TH LEVEL WIZARD. SOMETHING LIKE FIFTY TIMES.
THEY AM AT LIKE EVERY TABLE BARBARIAN SIT AT, FOR SERIOUS.