[3.Tomefinder] Beer & Pretzels PbP Recruiting

Avoraciopoctules · Post by **Avoraciopoctules** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 4:59 am

ubernoob wrote:Edit: Posting from my now working desktop from my own home. Yay!

Congratulations. It's always nice to transition back to a real keyboard.

Whipstitch · Post by **Whipstitch** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 6:17 am

Lokathor wrote:I did a little bit of dumpster diving and a little bit of "Well, I wouldn't have that I guess", and came away from it all with a pretty cool implied life story I think. Prak seems to have done the same.

This is more or less what I do, but as it turns out it's super easy to justify the standard good pathfinder traits when your character concept is a tiefling war veteran. The fluff for Reactionary is that getting bullied as a child caused you to become more alert to danger, while Carefully Hidden talks about learning to stay out of the way you're an unpopular ethnicity, two things which are easy to imagine coming up for kids who look like Nightcrawler. Mind you, Carefully Hidden is a (Human) tagged trait, but Adopted takes care of that, and again, you're a tiefling--at least one parent was human and you don't actually have a race specific culture to call your own anyway. One way or the other you're born an unhappy surprise and could easily end up being raised by [EDITED] or Frollo.

Huh, apparently the board doesn't like it when you mention the villains from Oliver Twist.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 7:29 am

So Tek now has a picture:
Portrait

Full image

ubernoob · Post by **ubernoob** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 10:11 am

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 4:14 pm

Since the bonuses are such piddling bullshit, can the people who don't want to deal with them just not use them?

ubernoob · Post by **ubernoob** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 4:34 pm

ubernoob · Post by **ubernoob** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 4:39 pm

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 4:43 pm

Natural Born Leader, Outlander, Signature Spell and Attached all pass that test.

ubernoob · Post by **ubernoob** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 4:50 pm

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 4:52 pm

Really? Because I'd thought about doing it, but figured you wouldn't take 'em. Sure, it's not that hard to pour through them, I'll find some.

ubernoob · Post by **ubernoob** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 4:59 pm

radthemad4 · Post by **radthemad4** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 9:36 pm

Sorry for the delay guys, some family stuff came up and I got hit by designer's block. That said, I think I've finally got some decent ideas

. Not specifying in advance when I'll be ready to start as some University work has piled up as well, but I'll post here once the Dungeon's ready for breaking in.

About traits (spoilered for size):

ubernoob wrote:New rule. If your background mechanic is a straight vertical numeric power grab, and does not add a new sentence into your hypothetical narrative fiction ( think +1 to saves or "immunity to rogues" vs "can talk to owlbears") your background mechanic fucking sucks.

This sounds reasonable, and skimming through the list, yeah, it is difficult to find traits meeting it. I'm okay with eliminating traits.

Unless, the pro trait folks are willing to look for traits that meet the criteria and are willing to help out the anti trait folks do this as well. Then they're okay.

ubernoob wrote: A few traits pass my test:
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/campaign ... g-the-blot
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/combat-t ... te-loyalty
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/combat-t ... lfen-guard
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/equipmen ... nsile-whip

Skimming through I found these:
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/faith-tr ... cred-touch
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/regional ... h-tianjing (same as above, different fluff, this one seems like it could be pretty handy for avoiding deaths and I'm fine with a refluff)
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/religion ... ss-of-dawn
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/race-tra ... y-tiefling (Lokathor took this)

These don't seem like narrative changers, but seem like okayish abilities
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/regional ... nal-qadira
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/regional ... al-belkzen (Wouldn't mind merging this and the above and waiving the feat requirement)
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/combat-t ... pple-wrist
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/race-tra ... l-tiefling (I HATE the name and fluff for this, and don't see why being a tiefling should be necessary)
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/religion ... -sacrifice

Anyway, I've come up with two 'generic' traits based on some of Pathfinder's ones. You may take either multiple times.

1) Bonus Class Skill: Something that isn't normally a class skill for you is now a class skill for you.
2) Switch an ability score for a skill to a different ability score that you can halfway justify being potentially used instead.

Lokathor · Post by **Lokathor** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 9:45 pm

So traits either need to be more powerful than +1s (either bonus Class Skill, or +2s, or something), or they need to not be around at all? Slightly strange I think, given that your character sheet doesn't need to recalculate bonuses often so you just put a +1 in once and you're done. Alright though.

I guess I don't really know much about your Soulborn's background or personality or anything, so I'll let Prak handle the "pick my traits for me" request.

As for myself:
[*]Raised by Owlbears - Traltex was abandoned at a young age. He suspects because of his otherworldly heritage, but he does not know for certain. Instead of humanoid caregivers, he grew up in a forest full of Griffons, Displacers, Owlbears, Hydras, and the like.
[*]Two-World Magic - Even at the youngest age, his lack of a natural fur hide did not hinder him, because one of his first magical powers was the ability to surround himself in a mild protective energy that kept him cool or warm as the situation demanded.
[*]Veteran Guide - As Traltex grew, his forest was increasingly encroached upon by humanoid hunting parties. Traltex became quite expert at locating them, and then either persuading them to leave peacefully (often aided by Charm Person to make them hand over their weapons), or simply using his outsider might to smash in their skulls if they refused to give up the hunt.

radthemad4 · Post by **radthemad4** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 10:05 pm

Avoraciopoctules wrote:
ubernoob wrote:Edit: Posting from my now working desktop from my own home. Yay!
Congratulations. It's always nice to transition back to a real keyboard.

I'm surprised you managed to post as much as you did. That can't have been easy.

Prak_Anima wrote:So Tek now has a picture:
Portrait

Full image

Looks great Prak, though it might lose a bit when I doodle it later on for your battlemap sprite. By the way, guys if you don't pick a picture (or aesthetic description), I'll just doodle whatever I feel like.

I think ubernoob was mainly annoyed that many of the traits tended to very slightly improve existing abilities, instead of adding new abilities or significantly improving existing abilities, and that there are a few that are significantly better than the other traits.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 10:17 pm

You know, I really don't care about traits if Uber's going to throw a fit over Tek having one more Magic Missile than normal and being able to compensate for not prioritizing Wisdom when he only needs it for leadership. Of the "extra power you will not give a shit about 99% of the time" traits, none of them make sense for Tek to have, beyond "add a spell to your list" and that's even more fiddly and meaningless in the long run than "+1 CL and DC to three spells."

If Uber wants to replace PF traits with horizontal power grabs rather than vertical ones, then he's welcome to come up with traits that fit Tek as I wrote him. I didn't even take the most broken traits (you can seriously start with 2000 more gold than normal), I took traits that made him a little better at a spell he'll likely fall back on a lot and gave him a couple more zombie/skeleton followers without me having to rearrange my ability scores.

Actually, fuck, I'd upvote a "+1 soulborn whateverthefuckitscalled." I'd even upvote three that do that one thing so he can fill his boots, because I don't want to have to figure out what makes a good "bonus power" trait and fits Tek, or rewrite Tek.

Actually, a couple questions that are tangentially related here: Are we playing in Golarion, and are Cantrips at will like they would be in normal pathfinder?

Lokathor · Post by **Lokathor** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 10:24 pm

radthemad4 wrote:By the way, guys if you don't pick a picture (or aesthetic description), I'll just doodle whatever I feel like.

Jonathan Frakes in a cloak. With the beard, clearly.

Prak wrote:and being able to compensate for not prioritizing Wisdom when he only needs it for leadership.

Leadership doesn't use wisdom though... ?

Prak wrote:Actually, a couple questions that are tangentially related here: Are we playing in Golarion, and are Cantrips at will like they would be in normal pathfinder?

Pathfinder has free cantrips? Fuck, I guess I got kinda boned on that one.

ubernoob · Post by **ubernoob** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 10:25 pm

radthemad4 · Post by **radthemad4** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 10:43 pm

You've got a good point Prak. Your traits seem okay.

How about the option to pick whatever traits, but downvote broken traits and make new ones (subject to approval)?

Cantrips are at will, but we're not playing in Golarion. The setting at the moment consists of nothing but that one dungeon, and will grow as I think of more stuff.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 11:14 pm

Lokathor wrote:
Prak wrote:and being able to compensate for not prioritizing Wisdom when he only needs it for leadership.
Leadership doesn't use wisdom though... ?

FrankTrollman wrote:Lord of Death [Necromantic] [Skill] [Leadership]
A whole bunch of skeletons and crap show up to fight under your tattered banner.
...
4: You can muster a group of followers. Your leadership score is your ranks in Knowledge Religion plus your Wisdom modifier. Your followers are all mindless Undead. You don't make them or anything, they just show up.
...

ubernoob wrote:The two generic traits are horizontal instead of RNG breaking garbage. I'm fine with them.

Which two?

Radthemad wrote:How about the option to pick whatever traits, but downvote broken traits and make new ones (subject to approval)?

I'm totally cool with custom traits, I just wouldn't know where to begin with Tek.

Lokathor · Post by **Lokathor** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 11:18 pm

Oh right, Lord of Death. Huh.

Can you, uh, control those undead? Like, the feat seems intended for Clerics, but you don't have Rebuke Undead, so how do you give them orders since they're mindless?

Prak wrote:Which two?

radthemad4 posted two in his spoiler block about traits.

*Bonus Class Skill
*Switch a skill's stat to be any other stat you can make up a reason for.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 11:20 pm

Oh, those. Yeah, those don't do much for Tek.

The mindless undead are followers, so I'm assuming I control them that way.

Grek · Post by **Grek** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 11:24 pm

Requested traits: Oh God, Hide In A Tree (You have a Climb Speed equal to your Land Speed) and No, Wait, Swim for Shore! (See above, but Swim Speed.)

ubernoob · Post by **ubernoob** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 11:33 pm

ubernoob · Post by **ubernoob** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 11:43 pm

Grek · Post by **Grek** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 11:49 pm

Posted it a while back. Reposting:

http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.p ... tid=835244