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kaynorr
Dec 31, 2003

Welcome to the new and improved thread for this Dungeons & Dragons, 4th Edition campaign!

By popular acclaim of the players, we will be playing EN Publishing's adventure path War of the Burning Sky. By tyrannical mandate of the dungeon master, we will be using Fantasy Grounds as our virtual tabletop. We use Mumble to chat on Camping the Stairs. Our regularly scheduled playtime is Monday at 7 PM PST.

We are looking for one player to join the campaign, preferably a defender.

Campaign Overview / The Story So Far

The half-orc emperor Drakus Coaltongue built the empire of Ragesia up from meager beginnings with cunning, balls, and the (ab)use of a powerful artifact known as the Torch of the Burning Sky. Rumor had it that the emperor was not just powerful but downright immortal - rumors that were put to rest when he was assassinated a month ago. Ragesia's client states are looking to break away in this moment of weakness, while factions within the empire mobilize to claim the empty throne.

The Grand Inquisitrix Leska now sits on the imperial throne, and her armies are scouring the continent looking for the Torch while her Inquisitors are imprisoning or killing anyone with arcane magic in the name of state security. Far to the south, a nascent Resistance has formed with the trading hub of Seaquen at its center. Seaquen's Lyceum, the greatest academy of magic on the continent, has become the backbone of the Resistance with the Lyceum's headmaster, Simeon, leading up the effort.

One of Simeon's greatest assets is his band of heroes on call, the Stormbreakers. Since coming to Seaquen on a mission of desperation from the besieged city of Gate Pass, the Stormbreakers have extinguished a forty year old everburning forest fire, dispelled a mystical hurricane that threatened to destroy the entire city, and averted a disastrous civil war with the nearest kingdom to the north(securing their aid to the Resistance in the process).

The Stormbreakers are hot on the trail of the Torch of the Burning Sky, having tracked the emperor's assassins to the hidden drow stronghold of Pharros Irrendra.

Character creation

Characters joining the game should be 20th level, with 4-5 magic items in the level 18-22 range.

In terms of long-term character planning, everything published in the DDI Compendium is fair game. I cannot say enough wonderful things about the compendium and D&D Insider generally - it is quite possibly the greatest thing Wizards has done probably since they took over D&D. The fact that they are apparently ignorant of this fact is just par for the course.

War of the Burning Sky also introduces new feats, powers, items, and paragon paths. Check out the player's guide and see if anything strikes your fancy.

The Heroes

Drago Highhill (werewolf halfling Avernian Knight), played by Gharbad the Weak
Erik (human Divine Orator), played by Herr Tog
Capmor Hudson (drow Daggermaster), played by Al Baron
Jade (human Rune Carver), played by TheDemon
Novorath (eladrin Spiral Tactician), played by Cerepol

The Hall of Legends

Jeegan (dragonborn Pit Fighter), equal parts whittler and warrior
Ingrid Zott (goliath spearmaster), more dangerous with one arm than anyone with two
Tarek (minotaur Bloody Warrior), cowboy cowman with the giant fuckoff hammer
Lock Shmee (half-elf War Chanter), perhaps the best hope for the future of the Shahalesti

House Rules

We'll be using the Inherent Bonuses and No Feat Taxes house rules. For Inherent Bonuses, this means that you get an automatic +1 bonus for attack, damage, AC, and defenses at predefined levels. Magic items are primarily useful for their other qualities now, not just to keep the math of progression from eventually biting you in the rear end. No Feat Taxes grants a free feat (either Weapon Expertise or Implement Expertise) at level 5, Focused Expertise at level 15, Paragon Defenses at level 16, and Robust Defenses at level 26.

kaynorr fucked around with this message at 04:08 on Dec 6, 2016

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Herr Tog
Jun 18, 2011

Grimey Drawer
Hihi!

NutritiousSnack
Jul 12, 2011
Sure, I'm in.

kaynorr
Dec 31, 2003


Apologies, I forgot to note in the OP that we're full right now.

Flame112
Apr 21, 2011
Nice thread tag!

Continuing the power source chat, if we want to go with primal that's fine with me. I've got a druid in another game though, so I'd rather play one of the other primal classes.

Herr Tog
Jun 18, 2011

Grimey Drawer
I'd like to keep my German invoker if that means anything.

Yngwie Mangosteen
Aug 23, 2007
Primal sounds really awesome the more I read about it. Is there a way to make the invoker Primal?

Flame112
Apr 21, 2011

nucleicmaxid posted:

Primal sounds really awesome the more I read about it. Is there a way to make the invoker Primal?

You could reskin things as coming from nature spirits or maybe instead of hitting people with fire you're summoning fire ants to bite them or something.

Edit: Oh wait I read sorcerer instead of invoker. I guess just have your deity be a nature-y sort of diety, and reskin things to be nature-y.

Flame112 fucked around with this message at 21:05 on Aug 18, 2014

Herr Tog
Jun 18, 2011

Grimey Drawer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avandra

?

kaynorr
Dec 31, 2003

Flame112 posted:

You could reskin things as coming from nature spirits or maybe instead of hitting people with fire you're summoning fire ants to bite them or something.

Edit: Oh wait I read sorcerer instead of invoker. I guess just have your deity be a nature-y sort of diety, and reskin things to be nature-y.

Reskinning in 4E is dirt simple, and it really does come down to just changing the power name and description to match what you're going for.

Power sources have both a mechanical and stylistic component. Mechanically, each power source will tend to have powers that all emphasize one of the party roles (defender, leader, striker, controller). Martial is the striker power source, so all the martial powers tend to hit a little harder; divine is the leader power source, and tends to have a little more incidental healing/buffing than others. It's part of what helps keep all the classes of a particular role mechanically diverse. Primal is (if memory serves) the defender source, and arcane is the controller source.

Stylistically it lends flavor in terms of how your character views the world, likely connections to other people or political groups, etc. This is actually the part that I'm more interested in when I threw out the One Source concept. The all-divine party wouldn't necessarily need to follow the same god (although it certainly wouldn't hurt), but chances are you were brought together by churches that share goals at the very least; the theme of the divine source is Belief In A Higher power, and part of the fun of the game would be watching all the variants of that concept. In contrast especially to the arcane source, which could be summed up as I Am A Higher Power.

Al Baron
Nov 12, 2007
They were all out of Marquess.
So are we going to play the same roles for this?

I deciding between a sorc again or a rogue if I want to melee.

kaynorr
Dec 31, 2003

Al Baron posted:

So are we going to play the same roles for this?

Only if folks want to. So long as the group has at least one of each of the roles, doesn't matter who plays what nor what the extra, doubled-up role is.

Yngwie Mangosteen
Aug 23, 2007
I almost definitely do not want to be the big beefy guy this time.

I'm fine with Divine as a power source, but I'd like that to be hammered down so I can start making my guy.

Flame112
Apr 21, 2011
If we go divine I'd rather not play an avenger. If nucleicmaxid doesn't want to be a big beefy guy I could play a Paladin.

Herr Tog
Jun 18, 2011

Grimey Drawer
Flame - Pally
Nuke - Some guy
Tog - Invoker
Al - Some guy who worships a god.
A swordmage

I'm cool with this.

Yngwie Mangosteen
Aug 23, 2007
I'm good with this. I also support the One God Plan. Or, am cool with Two God Plan, if we wanted to just make it a two-god coop deal. What Pantheon are we using again?

I'm also down for whateverthefuck Gods too, but One/Two God Plans gives us a reason to stick together and whatnot.


edit: Aw, there's no monk-like class. Saddest boosh. Let me do class research and I'll pick.


edit 2: Unless you guys are ok with my being a Monk but being a Divine powered one not a Psionic powered one? I dunno if that's acceptable.

Yngwie Mangosteen fucked around with this message at 00:47 on Aug 19, 2014

Flame112
Apr 21, 2011
I'm perfectly fine with you playing a Monk and calling your powers divine. Monks are kinda the odd-Psionic out anyway since they don't use Power Points like the rest of the psionics.

kaynorr
Dec 31, 2003

nucleicmaxid posted:

I'm good with this. I also support the One God Plan. Or, am cool with Two God Plan, if we wanted to just make it a two-god coop deal. What Pantheon are we using again?

I'm also down for whateverthefuck Gods too, but One/Two God Plans gives us a reason to stick together and whatnot.


edit: Aw, there's no monk-like class. Saddest boosh. Let me do class research and I'll pick.


edit 2: Unless you guys are ok with my being a Monk but being a Divine powered one not a Psionic powered one? I dunno if that's acceptable.

Both invokers and avengers could pretty easily be reskinned as monks, albeit more of the Avatar: The Last Airbender style of monks with lots of flashy special effects.

If you were talking about the other way around (reskin the mechanics of the monk class into the divine power source), I don't see any huge problem with that. I've never played or run a game using psionics, but I'm open to it.

Herr Tog
Jun 18, 2011

Grimey Drawer
1st. gently caress power points goddamn

2nd. Avandra forever

3rd. Just be a monk for a monastic order, no reskin needed really. You just SUPER love that god.

4th. I'm pumped for this game.

Cerepol
Dec 2, 2011


Flame - Pally
Nuke - Monk
Tog - Invoker


Are the mostly locked down ones right now right?

Leaving us with a Defender (Paladin), a Striker (Monk), a Controller (Invoker), leaving us short a Leader + Wildcard.

I'd like to try out either a Controller(w/ defender traits) or maybe a Leader(w/ Striker traits) if no one minds. Just going to check my options first and see what fits what I'm thinking of. Going to read up on the campaign guide first as well.

Herr Tog
Jun 18, 2011

Grimey Drawer
Leaders with striker traits can be fun as they can flank with other strikers and give buffs to their flanking buddy.

Yngwie Mangosteen
Aug 23, 2007
Ok. With the ability to be a Godmonk I'm totally down with anything and super pumped. I've a huge nerdboner for monk-like classes, all fast and weaponless.

Leader with striker tendencies sounds really cool, btw and it lets the last guy do whatever he gently caress he wants to.

Plus a monk of Avandra sounds really cool. Basically walk around all day beating up jailer-god bros and protecting merchants from bandits and whatnot. Sounds ace as hell.

Yngwie Mangosteen fucked around with this message at 06:12 on Aug 19, 2014

Cerepol
Dec 2, 2011


Alright I've read a bit of the Campaign Player's Guide and I'm totally down for a Leader, at this point it's either a Bard or a Warlord (reskinned to sound like a Cleric for the glory of our Gods). So the last guy is good to choose whatever.

Herr Tog
Jun 18, 2011

Grimey Drawer

nucleicmaxid posted:

Plus a monk of Avandra sounds really cool. Basically walk around all day beating up jailer-god bros and protecting merchants from bandits and whatnot. Sounds ace as hell.

Avandra forever! NEVER TAKE OUR FREEDOM

Cerepol posted:

Alright I've read a bit of the Campaign Player's Guide and I'm totally down for a Leader, at this point it's either a Bard or a Warlord (reskinned to sound like a Cleric for the glory of our Gods). So the last guy is good to choose whatever.

Warlords are the tits since you just stand there and we are better at our jobs. Then you use commanding strike and the monk punches someone in the face CAUSE YOU SAID SO. BTW are you hurt? SUCK IT UP.

Flame112
Apr 21, 2011
What are your thoughts on giving people a free "Melee Training" feat, kaynorr?

kaynorr
Dec 31, 2003

Flame112 posted:

What are your thoughts on giving people a free "Melee Training" feat, kaynorr?

Interesting notion. The question is whether or not you can have a viable build without it - I'm inclined to say you can, because a lot of classes don't make use of their MBAs (most ranged implement users, primarily). Making an MBA-capable implement wielder is something that's possible with this feat (plus a few others, I assume), but that means you're focusing on being an up-close danger at the expense of something somewhere else.

The other possibility is that this is relevant if you're a weapon-wielding class which doesn't use Strength, and not having MBAs completely breaks the class, such that there is no viable build that doesn't include that feat. I think this would have to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis; what did you have in mind?

Flame112
Apr 21, 2011

kaynorr posted:

Interesting notion. The question is whether or not you can have a viable build without it - I'm inclined to say you can, because a lot of classes don't make use of their MBAs (most ranged implement users, primarily). Making an MBA-capable implement wielder is something that's possible with this feat (plus a few others, I assume), but that means you're focusing on being an up-close danger at the expense of something somewhere else.

The other possibility is that this is relevant if you're a weapon-wielding class which doesn't use Strength, and not having MBAs completely breaks the class, such that there is no viable build that doesn't include that feat. I think this would have to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis; what did you have in mind?

Well, I'm going Paladin, and they have stuff that scales off, like, 4 different ability scores. Some of their powers use Strength, as well as MBAs. Some attacks are based on Charisma as well as their Divine Challenge/Sanction. Some powers have secondary effects based on Wisdom, and they can only use Lay On Hands/Ardent Vow a certain number of times according to their Wisdom. And then, naturally, as a defender you want to have a good Constitution score, especially if you take Lay on Hands and give up your surges to your teammates.

So basically, if I had Melee Training (Charisma) and didn't take any Strength based powers, I wouldn't have to worry about spreading my scores to Strength at all and could focus on Charisma, Constitution, and Wisdom.

kaynorr
Dec 31, 2003

Flame112 posted:

Well, I'm going Paladin, and they have stuff that scales off, like, 4 different ability scores. Some of their powers use Strength, as well as MBAs. Some attacks are based on Charisma as well as their Divine Challenge/Sanction.

Ah yes, paladins. I sometimes think that Wizards pulled the trigger on 5E early because it was easier than fixing a class that has been a part of the game since literally day one. There was a paladin in the last game I ran but the player wasn't super familiar with D&D so she didn't really notice just how unoptimized it was.

Let's take a stroll over to the 4E CharOp thread and consult with the sages on the best ways to unfuck a paladin, of which Melee Training sounds like a viable candidate.

edit: Oh look, they changed the Stupid Newbie avatar. Blech.

kaynorr fucked around with this message at 00:04 on Aug 20, 2014

Yngwie Mangosteen
Aug 23, 2007
I wouldn't mind a free one, I could do Dex or Wis quite easily with my monk.

kaynorr
Dec 31, 2003

Looks like Virtuous Strike might be a good alternate to Melee Training - uses Charisma for attack and damage, and can be used as an MBA. This thread seems like a good, detailed summary of both the good and bad options for paladins from 1-30.

Flame112
Apr 21, 2011

kaynorr posted:

Looks like Virtuous Strike might be a good alternate to Melee Training - uses Charisma for attack and damage, and can be used as an MBA. This thread seems like a good, detailed summary of both the good and bad options for paladins from 1-30.

Oh yeah, I could absolutely just take Virtuous Strike. For some reason when I was looking at it earlier, I thought it only worked as an MBA on a charge. I think I had it confused with another power. Anyway, yeah, Virtuous Strike works for me.

So far this still holds right:

Flame - Paladin
nucleicmaxid - Monk
Herr Tog - Invoker
Cerebol - Some Leader

which leaves Al Baron as whatever he wants to pick?

Al Baron
Nov 12, 2007
They were all out of Marquess.
Yeah. I'm going Rogue but doing more of a range build. I might end up multi-class with a ranger.

Question: Are themes and backgrounds required? I'll probably take the local thieves guild background from the player's guide but where are themes from? I'm assuming some issues of Dragon?

Al Baron fucked around with this message at 21:56 on Aug 20, 2014

Flame112
Apr 21, 2011
Okay. I'll probably try do take some leader-y powers where I can then.

Yngwie Mangosteen
Aug 23, 2007

Al Baron posted:

Yeah. I'm going Rogue but doing more of a range build. I might end up multi-class with a ranger.

Question: Are themes and backgrounds required? I'll probably take the local thieves guild background from the player's guide but where are themes from? I'm assuming some issues of Dragon?

So you're not going to go down a Divine worshipping path? It's not required or anything, just curious.

Herr Tog
Jun 18, 2011

Grimey Drawer

Al Baron posted:

Yeah. I'm going Rogue but doing more of a range build. I might end up multi-class with a ranger.

Question: Are themes and backgrounds required? I'll probably take the local thieves guild background from the player's guide but where are themes from? I'm assuming some issues of Dragon?

Themes were introduced later which is why the DDI character builder is recommended.

kaynorr
Dec 31, 2003

Al Baron posted:

Question: Are themes and backgrounds required? I'll probably take the local thieves guild background from the player's guide but where are themes from? I'm assuming some issues of Dragon?

They're not required - they're basically just additional layers of customization available for some minor perks. Backgrounds were introduced as way to mechanically represent your "level 0" life and backstory before you became a professional murderhobo, in the form of a couple of skill picks. Themes are a little more powerful than skill picks, and can have prerequisites so they're more like a very specific kind of feat slot.

Al Baron
Nov 12, 2007
They were all out of Marquess.

nucleicmaxid posted:

So you're not going to go down a Divine worshipping path? It's not required or anything, just curious.
Having the Divine power source? No.

I'm trying to figure out how my rogue would fit in with the group, though. A church orphan who sometimes donates back to the church out of respect and/or penance could work.

kaynorr posted:

They're not required...
Ok, that makes sense. I do not have access to the web DDI so I wouldn't know.

Al Baron fucked around with this message at 22:42 on Aug 20, 2014

Herr Tog
Jun 18, 2011

Grimey Drawer

Al Baron posted:

Having the Divine power source? No.

I'm trying to figure out how my rogue would fit in with the group, though. A church orphan who sometimes donates back to the church out of respect and/or penance could work.

Also You could really value freedom as a rogue and thus AVANDRA FOREVER.

Flame112
Apr 21, 2011
I'm curious why you like Avandra so much, Herr Tog.

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kaynorr
Dec 31, 2003

Flame112 posted:

I'm curious why you like Avandra so much, Herr Tog.

To be fair, I've done some poking around and brainstorming on Avandra as part of campaign prep and she makes a pretty good patron god for the kind of shenanigans that PCs tend to get up to. She's the goddess of halflings, travelers, and merchants. Literally and figuratively, she's the patron goddess of The Little Guy. A rogue who was trained by a priest of Avandra, or otherwise worships her, is entirely in the center of what she's about.

And makes a particularly good counterpoint to Ragesia's Inquisition, which is an order of divinely-fueled assholes who basically do whatever they want in the name of protecting people from "dangerous" arcane spellcasters.

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