Frenchman

Re: Help With Horror-filled High Fantasy Adventures Thanks Cap for the suggestion and website, I'll definitly be looking for Ravenloft stuff, after I finish perusing my old 2nd Ed. D&D Ravenloft books (can't believe I didn't think of that). I really like Korvar's idea that the samurai can only be killed in an honorable combat where he tries his best, I'll be sure to use it. I also like the souls idea, I'm thinkin that they would protect him from magic, either as tons of defense with recoverable charges or ablative, or as missile deflection, only usable on magic (also with recoverable charges or ablative). Further ideas we've had include a dwarf who was trapped in a cave-in. The only survivor, he began to starve and was forced to eat his fallen comrades to survive. He essentially dies/goes nutso while being alone in the dark (cannibalism part under debate by us, but I like the Dying alone in the Dark theme). Also we're thinking of an elven banshee, a woman who was a jilted lover and comitted suicide. So far, it's a pretty standard TSR-esk banshee so we're trying to come up with some more ideas to make her different and compelling.

***DISCLAIMER*** THIS THREAD CONTAINS POSSIBLY GRUESOME AND DISTURBING TOPICS AND IMAGERY!!! Currently in my group us GMs (we each have characters and we're taking turns with a plot line) are trying to come up with a spooky series of adventures loosely modeled after 13 Ghosts. Basically theres this uber-necromancer or demon lord or something (I'm not really sure, I'm not GMing the conclusion) who is trying to collect 13 souls to open the gates of hell or somesuch thing which will totally screw up the world. These souls need to be freed/captured, and to do this they must be convinced to give up their soul (with our players, that probly means killing/destroying them, but we're going to try to have some of them come less reluctantly). So each of us GMs is going to GM the adventure with four of these 'ghosts' (so far, only one is actually a ghost, though most are tending to be undead), and while all the GMs will know some basic knowledge of the ghosts, its up to us to surprise eachother. We want to give each ghost a 'title' that will be somewhat obvious and hint at their powers/weaknesses or whatever. The main point of these beings is not to challenge the players in combat, but to challenge their roleplaying abilities and, lets face it, to be downright creepy. Heres what we've got so far: The Fallen Angel: A priest of our god of Knowledge became obsessed with anatomy. He dissected animals, monsters, and Orcs (in our world noone bats an eye no matter how bestial you are to an Orc). Eventually he progressed to human and demi-human cadavers. His findings caused a revolution in medicine and healing magic practices, but he became more and more obsessed with finding out more about the anatomy of different creatures. Eventually he had to magically ward his room so that his more depraved methods wouldn't be discovered, and then he began using once dead subjects, and eventually living ones. One day he summons a powerful angel, and since he is the priest of a good god and has a great reputation as a healer, he coerces the angel into his room and places into magical shackles which render it powerless. He then proceeds to dissect the angel alive. The angel (name suggestions appreciated) tries to escape to heaven, but all escape is blocked by the wards put up around the room. Looking around and seeing previous victims of the deranged priest (paladins, elves, dwarves, and other good creatures) he decides that heaven must have deemed him expendable for the furthering of this mans research, and has abandoned him. The angel turns to darker powers and thoughts, and his soul refuses to leave his body. Now he seeks only to do evil to the world. The Torn Prince: A prince of a major royal family (to which two of our PCs belong) was captured by Orcs (long story, essentially this family has a major, unreasoning hatred of anything Orcish, and it is most definitly mutual). Hi is put into a cage and a magic ring is put on his finger, his fist then bound so that it cannot come off. The Orcs abuse the young prince in every fashion imaginable, but the most heinous is that they periodically tear or bite chunks of his flesh and eat it. The ring of regeneration which he wears prevents him from ever dying, and so he lives in this pitiful condition for an untold amount of time (years, at least). A group of adventurers, led by a member of this royal family, massacre the Orcs. Seeing the boy is virtually dead or believing that he is (doesn't really matter, this family is pretty arrogent and uncaring as a rule) they discard him and his cage, tossing it on top of the pile of rotting Orcs. Later, our party comes by the scene, and the magical ring is picked up on the caster's Loot-Dar. The poor boy's distant relative cuts the ring from his hand and leaves. After being horrendously abused and betrayed by his own blood, this child's soul refuses to leave, and now he hungers for the flesh of his royal kin. We were going to have him start hunting the party, and build him with tons of regeneration, and possibly healing or an aid body linked to his bite. Nasty Nasty Nasty. The Faithful Defender: A loyal guard, he was defended the retreat of his lord, fighting against unimaginable odds. He was eventually overwhelmed, but he bought his lord enough time to escape. When his lord returned, he paused to look at his battered corpse, lying in a pool of blood and his dented and torn armor. His lord then continued on as before, ignoring his great sacrifice, and his body was burned in a mass pyre along with the bodies of his foes. His spirit now animates his blackened and torn armor, invincible but for the still beating and bleeding heart within it. This guy is most likely a pure combat monster, but being night invincible may cause the PCs to seek other routes. Convincing his lord to honor him with a proper funeral and the accolades of a hero would probly do it. The BoneSmith: The son of a peasant, he took on his father's duty of tending graves at night, but during the day he pursued his passions. First, his passion was blacksmithing and the creation of armor, but soon passion boiled for the Blacksmith's daughter. Being an apprentice, tending the graveyard and digging graves, and attempting to woo a young lady takes it's toll on a person body and mind. Unable to keep up with it, he approaced a nearby wizard rightly suspected of dealing with dark necromancy. He made him a deal. If the necromancer would give him the ability to pursue both his jobs and win the girls heart, he would supply him with fresh corpses from the graveyard when he needed them. The necromancer agreed, and cast a spell granting him great stamina and a powerful charm among women. In return he delivered the necromancer the bodies of those who had just died. He had great success, quickly becoming a master armorsmith and winning his love's hand in marriage. But soon, this wasn't enough. The necromancer learned of his skill at fashioning armor, and convinced him to create a suit of mail out of the bones of the dead. He did this, but the armor didn't work. He couldn't get it to stay together, or the bones were too old and brittle. The necromancer used his magic to divine what the missing ingredient was. Love. He placed a powerful spell over the young man, and so the young man killed his new wife and fashioned a suit of armor from her bones. He was not caught, but instead when the girls butchered corpse was found, the necromancer was blamed. His new armor wasn't enough to protect him from the wrath of the entire town. Needless to say, the young man was driven over the brink. He fashioned yet another suit of armor out of the bones of his parents, and as his insanity grew, he gained powers over the bones with which he worked. Now he is two people. The broken and pitiful young man who spends his time in solitude or at the forge, and the homicidal terror who stalks the night, murdering those he comes across. The town is terrified, and they hire a party of adventurers to help... The Broken Samurai: Just as a note, I should mention that while our campaign world has a pretty 'standard' western feel, there is a somewhat distant oriental culture from where ninjas and samurais come (and Casey's characters). Having been dishonoured by failing to protect the shogun to whom he had sworn alliegence, this samurai falls upon his family blade. But so cursed is he that his katana breaks upon his armor, and he cannot kill himself with it. Driven by grief and madness, he travels as far as he can from his past, a tortured soul. Personally I think this one needs to be developed a bit more, but all we've been able to come up with is that he tore out his eyes for coveting his lords wife or something. We're trying to come up with at least 12 of these, and it's pretty darned difficult (so far, anyways) to come up with ones that are sufficiently interesting, tragic, and disturbing.

Re: Help me create an Alien Arena Sport I like Bagdrag, and I have an idea for it. Instead of trying to drag the bag to your goal, the object could be to drag it over an opponents goal, thereby making them lose points. The goal would be to score the fewest points by getting the bag over other teams goals while keeping it the hell away from yours. This would encourage co-operation between teams even more. It could also be combined with the regular method (drag it onto an enemies goal, or your goal, and score points, two teams working together score half as much) where you are dragging the bag onto your goal to score points, onto enemies goals to make them lose points, and it would turn into a chaotic mess. Also, though not appropriate for what you are looking for, is Blood Bowl, a game produced by the same people who make warhammer. Think football with Orcs. And knives. And Dwarven Deathrollers. And Trolls....I could go on. I had to bring up Blood Bowl, since it has worked so well in my fantasy games.

Re: Campaign Brainstorming: "The New Abbey" I had two ideas after reading this thread. 1: The sect which shuns technology doesn't need to be restricted to one world. They can have small monastaries on each world, which might communicate with eachother through letters delivered by 'unbelievers' (which would take a long time). Alternately, they can travel from world to world through powerful divine magic (which, if you really want to be twisted, could be extremely subtle technology). With either of these methods they would have the possibility of attracting a strong following. 2: The latin names the Major Tom is coming up with are awesome, but I have noticed that they may tend to focus on the word for church (ecclesiasticloacl or whatever). Finding alternate words to use would make the different orders sound more...different. Some suggestions I have are Dios (This means God in spanish, and if it isn't in latin, its close), Christos (again, close), the allmighty (i'm giving up on guessing now), Father of All, The Holy Spirit, or even as abstract as Enemies of Satan or Darkness. Now I just want to say that I think this campaign idea is awesome, and I'm seriously considering using it for my next sci-fi game (I have so many ideas bouncing around up here).

Re: Telepathy Refraction You could also buy Usuable as Attack as a naked modifier for telepathy, Usuable as Attack, allowing you to alter their target. Reading His Mind: Usable As Attack (+1) for up to 100 Active Points of Telepathy, Ranged (+1/2), Uncontrolled (+1/2), Persistent (+1/2), Reduced Endurance (0 END; +1/2), Usable As Attack (+1) (400 Active Points); Always On (-1/2), Only works if another mind is in range (-1/2) Pointlessly complicated and ridiculous.

Re: "Bag of Holding" I have always liked the shrinking method, but upon creating a write-up, it seems way too expensive. Thankfully, in a fantasy game, it's equipment, so it costs no character points. Bag of Holding: Shrinking (0.0312 m tall, 0.0004 kg mass, -12 PER Rolls to perceive character, +12 DCV, takes +18" KB), Reduced Endurance (0 END; +1/2), Persistent (+1/2), Usable As Attack (+1) (180 Active Points); Side Effects (Side Effect always occurs whenever the bag is put into another extradimensional space; Tears a Rift in Dimensions; -3/4), OIF (Bag; -1/2), Only works on items that can fit through the bags opening. (-1/2), Side Effects (Side Effect always occurs whenever the character puts something pointy inside of it; All items contained are lost; -1/4)

Re: block Unless, of course, you aborted your next action to block. Then you don't get to go first, because you don't go at all!

Re: Eliminating Killing Attacks This is all very true, and it does reduce the effectiveness of KAs. Of course, instead of nerfing killing attacks, we could slap a -1/2 modifier on energy blast, with the same reasoning as the one behind hand-to-hand attacks. This would make them cheaper than a killing attack (which they should be, if you ask me) without mussing up the damage levels.

Re: Eliminating Killing Attacks One thing I came up with was to eliminate the -1/2 limitation on HAs (EBs don't have it, after all) and increase KAs to 4 DCs per die. So for 5 points, you'd have a 1 pip KA, 10 a 1/2 d6, 15 would get you 1d6-1, and 20 would get a full 1d6. I created a few characters doing this, and they were able to function well, but it hasn't taken with my group mainly because no one is willing to go through the extra step in the Hero Designer.