How would you use Takofanes?

[Lord Liaden]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

At the risk of repeating myself from Superskrull's thread earlier in the year *SNIP*

 

There were in fact some neat suggestions on that thread. Not quite what I was going for here, but I think it would be appropriate to refer interested folks to it: http://www.herogames.com/forums/showthread.php?t=41734

[Lord Liaden]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

I was thinking about those "pocket dimensions" that Takofanes is said to retreat to if he runs into more opposition than he can handle. The text in Conquerors, Killers And Crooks makes them sound like hidey-holes, but there's really no reason that they have to be so limited. They might even support a fair amount of extra-dimensional real estate, and in lieu of a base for Tak on Earth they'd probably be the main repository for the vast resources his writeup says he's supposed to have.

 

It could make for an interesting adventure if PCs who have dimension spanning abilities, either through magic or technology, were to accidentally stumble into one of these pockets. Particular ones could contain all sorts of different things, like demons or other monsters left over from the Turakian Age, armies of undead awaiting their lord's command, or fabulous magical treasures (potential source of hero or villain origins). One such dimension might even contain the souls of those unfortunates who were rendered undead by the Archlich; freeing them could be the key to eliminating his principle minions (over and above being an act of compassion).

 

Some of these dimensions could have very different environments from what the PCs are used to, dangerous and challenging in themselves. They might even have different physical laws that affect how the heroes' powers work. When you have a justification to change the ground rules that your players take for granted, it can be good for them and fun for you.

 

These places could provide a Takofanes-related adventure that doesn't even have to involve the Ravager of Men. OTOH finding a way to sneak in through his "back door" can be a real strategic advantage when the heroes finally decide to take him on.

[OddHat]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

OTOH finding a way to sneak in through his "back door" can be a real strategic advantage when the heroes finally decide to take him on.

 

Flesh Gordon: "Anyway, Quick Lee and I decide we need to sneak in through Takofane's back door. Lee has this magic oil stuff you need to rub into your skin to lubricate the passage. So, we strip down..."

 

Hyborg: "Flesh, I speak for the entire group when I say that we don't want to hear this."

[SirViss]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

I was thinking about those "pocket dimensions" that Takofanes is said to retreat to if he runs into more opposition than he can handle. The text in Conquerors' date=' Killers And Crooks[/i'] makes them sound like hidey-holes, but there's really no reason that they have to be so limited. They might even support a fair amount of extra-dimensional real estate, and in lieu of a base for Tak on Earth they'd probably be the main repository for the vast resources his writeup says he's supposed to have.

 

It could make for an interesting adventure if PCs who have dimension spanning abilities, either through magic or technology, were to accidentally stumble into one of these pockets. Particular ones could contain all sorts of different things, like demons or other monsters left over from the Turakian Age, armies of undead awaiting their lord's command, or fabulous magical treasures (potential source of hero or villain origins). One such dimension might even contain the souls of those unfortunates who were rendered undead by the Archlich; freeing them could be the key to eliminating his principle minions (over and above being an act of compassion).

 

Some of these dimensions could have very different environments from what the PCs are used to, dangerous and challenging in themselves. They might even have different physical laws that affect how the heroes' powers work. When you have a justification to change the ground rules that your players take for granted, it can be good for them and fun for you.

 

These places could provide a Takofanes-related adventure that doesn't even have to involve the Ravager of Men. OTOH finding a way to sneak in through his "back door" can be a real strategic advantage when the heroes finally decide to take him on.

You know, your giving me enough ideas that I may actually USE Tak in the campaign I am running. I wasn't particularly adverse to using him, I just hadn't come up with any ideas on the how. So a big "Thank You", if only to have inspired me (into bringing greater levels of Terror to my players )

 

Argh!:

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to Lord Liaden again.

[Lord Liaden]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

Thank you, that's very gratifying. It's exactly what I started this thead for.

[Twilight]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

A sleepwalking lich - that is cool.

 

Then it becomes a matter of where Tak's "mind" is. Another buried chamber like the one he was imprisoned in? Some mystic artifact, maybe in the possession of a supervillain, or hero? Maybe someone is unknowingly the reincarnation of Takofanes, merely awaiting the arrival of his true physical form to restore all his memories. Perhaps the lich form of Takofanes would merge with this person, restoring his living body.

 

(Oooh... I just got visions of Tak's mind in the body of a small child, like Damien from The Omen. In fact IIRC someone on the boards once suggested that he'd be like Stewie Griffin from The Family Guy.)

 

Why make him an overtly creepy kid like in the Omen, Liaden? Why not make him more like Chris from King of Fighters, y'know a smiling adolescent that nobody would suspect of being part of an ancient evil. Why nobody's concerned about him at all untill he says/does something profoundly evil. To me the smiling kid cheerfully doing evil is far creepier.

 

I'd also say pardon the thread necromancy, but considering the topic of the thread it just seems SO appropriate.

[Lord Liaden]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

No pardon needed. Thread necromancy seems to be popular today.

 

Creepiness does seem to add to the mood, but I have no problem with such a child playing the innocent to keep people off balance. There should still be moments, though, when out of the corner of your eye, when he thinks no one is looking, you notice an expression of frustrated rage and utter hatred flicker across his face...

[Twilight]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

No pardon needed. Thread necromancy seems to be popular today.

 

Creepiness does seem to add to the mood, but I have no problem with such a child playing the innocent to keep people off balance. There should still be moments, though, when out of the corner of your eye, when he thinks no one is looking, you notice an expression of frustrated rage and utter hatred flicker across his face...

 

True enough. Of course being an evil kid he truely does enjoy doing the evil things he does, thus he would have reason to be happy and cheerful doing them. Also this old mind in young body thing has great possibilities for future adventures as well. After all, theoretically he could survive if his original body [meaning the rampaging husk the world recognises as Takofanes] was destroyed and what does the mind of Takofones do then?

[bigdamnhero]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

Only time I've actually used Takofanes to date was when I needed another Hunted for a Mystic PC. It was for a con game, and the Hunted wasn't going to feature in the game, so really I was just looking for a name to slap on the character sheet. Wouldn't you know it, only one player had enough familiarity with the CU to even know who Takofanes was...and guess who picked that character...

 

keyes_bill: "I have Hunted by Takofanes? And I'm still alive?!"

 

[Twilight]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

Hmmm, interesting idea I just had. What if the seperated mind of Takofanes doesn't want to get his old body back? After all he still has all the knowledge he possessed back in the Turakian Age even if his current form is still young. His old form is powerful it's true, but does he really want it back considering all the heroes that are hunting it?

 

What if he just decided he was going to let his roaming body distract the heroes while he discovered new ways to commit evil and new magics for him to wield? After all, his form is young and innocent and there's so much trouble he can cause with it.

 

Thoughts? Comments?

[DEFCON Clown]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

What if he decided DEMON would be good to take over while he's waiting for his new body to mature.

[Twilight]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

What if he decided DEMON would be good to take over while he's waiting for his new body to mature.

 

Good one! Especially since he probably knows three or four ways to swipe the magics DEMON's leader, who's name escapes me for the moment, stole for his own plan. After all, his body might be young but he still has the mind of Kal Turak and his magical knowledge is exponentially more vast then anybody in DEMON.

[Lord Liaden]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

Hmm... not sure I'd agree with that one. The leader of DEMON (referred to circuitously so as to avoid spoilers) is probably the most knowledgeable and adept black magician of the last few centuries, and his power is nothing to sneeze at. And he's made DEMON an extremely difficult nut to crack as far as an outsider penetrating it.

 

You're also assuming a complete body-mind split between these two characters, which is hard to support given the published info for Takofanes. Tak may arguably be lacking some of his higher brain functions based on his actions, but he obviously still remembers most or all of his boundless occult lore. There's no reason to assume that his "other half" has knowledge in any way comparable to that. In fact he may only possess those intellectual elements that the lich-form lacks.

[Twilight]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

I don't know Liaden, if we're using the divided mind and body idea that Derek suggested in the first page of this thread then it would make sense that most of the knowledge ends up with the mind while the body has more physical attributes. Of course this may not be in line with Tak's write up in CKC but it wouldn't be the first time a GM ignored something about a published character in order to tell the story he wanted to tell.

 

That said, you're probably right about me underestimating the leader of DEMON. While I don't think his dark knowledge matches that of Takofanes, he's definetly a close runner up for that postion. Of course, I belive I have mentioned that I was unfond of the 5th Edition DEMON sourcebook so I'm likely biased.

[Lord Liaden]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

Fair enough.

 

If you did want the "mind" of Takofanes to take over DEMON, you could have the Edomite (DEMON leader) come to believe that the vessel of the mind is the missing fifth member of his Inner Circle. That would give Takofanes a major inroad to DEMON.

[Twilight]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

Oh good idea!

 

And of course once he gets his inroad into DEMON, it's fairly simple for somebody with his knowledge to manipulate the orgization anyway that he wants. Well perhaps relatively easy would be a better way to put it, Takofanes [though I'm thinking his mind has gone back to calling itself Kal Turak, Kal for short] is quite smart after all.

 

Well done Liaden!

[Peregrine]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

If he refers to himself as Kal, might the rest of the world know him as...

 

Calvin?

 

(Puts the tiger in a whole new light, doesn't it?)

[Enforcer84]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

In my world Takofanes thinks he's Thor.

[Lord Liaden]

Re: How would you use Takofanes?

 

In my world Takofanes thinks he's Thor.

 

I wanna play in your world. All the pretty colors and lights...