Awnsheghlien easely to wipe ?

[irdeggman]

Kenneth, a few things:


Ariadne is a she not a he.



When I said

The major NPCs in the game should be advancing in levels as the PCs are (well at least somewhat).

I was treating the major awnies as NPCs since they also run domains and for the most part were "classed" characters in 2nd ed.

In 3.5 usage what I meant by advancing at least somewhat was that levels are progressively harder to gain in 3.5. So while a PC advances from 1st to 5th level a 7th level character would not gain as much xp to advance the same number of levels. Also PCs are usually more aggressive in "adventuring" and "risk taking" then are most NPCS.


I generally agree with your premise of how the DM really must determine what kind of game he/she is running and the "overall" goals (or milestones along the way) that will/can be achieved. The rest needs to be "adjusted" to match that vision and that includes the role and level of any major NPCs involved, as well as the details of each domain (they too should not remain constant).

I don't agree with the assumption that character level will determine who sits on the Iron Throne. (Well I read that inference in your post - if it is not true, I apologize). It will be a factor and higher level characters have a better shot at it - but someone who manages to perform great acts will get recognized by the public as such regardless of their actual level.

[Ariadne]

Then advance them in levels. The rules exist in the MM for that (or the PHB for non-monster races).

Maybe I should really improve them. I would rather add class levels as per the Epic Level Handbook (or SRD). I mean, Awnies like the Gorgon or the Manslayer are 1000 year old characters of INCREDIBLE power and even the minor ones would not last this long, if they aren't epic. Momentarly I think, some of them are powerful and a true challenge for low-level PCs, but you can't tell me, that there was in 1000 years NEVER a high level NPC around who tried to challange them. For example I'm sure, Michael Roele was at least epic too or he never could gain the IDEA to realy try to kill the Gorgon. And why he did not blow away the Spider or the Manslayer first?

The way I see things is that the awnie as written in the 2nd ed material were based on PCs having a low level (like starting level PCs).

With this I'm quite sure, you're right, but meanwhile there must be thought further...

The major NPCs in the game should be advancing in levels as the PCs are (well at least somewhat).

Here I'm completely your opinion too, but it's a bit much work for a GM to consider every turn, if Boruine or Avan got a level (whatever) meanwhile or if the Spider has eaten some new NPCs...

Assuming that the NPCs as statted are static and never changing is to me like playing a PC game and not a true RPG one. Things always change and so the big baddies should be adjusted to fit that change.

Agreed, but the poor GM...

I think its unreasonable to ask that the Spider, or any other villain, remain a challenge if you take the character as written, but abandon two or three of these assumptions. A villain created for a low level champaign, where starting PC's might be regents of Roesone or Medoere, where power ramps up at the 2nd edition scale, where soldiers are 0-level characters, and where the most powerful contenders for the Iron Throne are 9th to 12th level, cannot be meaningful opponants without those assumptions.

For 2nd Edition where you needed Millions and Millions of XP to gain a (higher) level this worked perfect, but in 3.X Edition you can't compare this any more, I fear. There aren't any 0-level characters around any more! They may be commoners, adepts or warriors, but they have at least 1 HD... In 3.X Edition level 9 to 12 is nearly nothing, you can become this level in a half year of playing. So consider a (constantly played) two year campaign. This implicates nearly automatically that you have a real chance to get the Iron Throne. WOW, why this couldn't be reached earlier in history?

Naturally there is a difference between a 2nd Ed and 3rd Ed style of playing. 2nd Ed has (nearly) no multiclassing and you have to befriend yourself with your actual level a LONG time. 3rd Edition has far more options: Multiclassing (who still has one class and no PrC?), Feats, more spells, quicker level up and simply a general boost of power level. PCs in 2nd Edition need about two years to match Avan or Theal, but PCs in 3rd Edition need 1/2 year. So I think this power increase generally should be considered if writing stats for the major NPCs and the Awnies...

Higher level PC's need higher level opponants.

Agreed competely, but there aren't any apart from the Awnies (OK, at least there aren't, if you don't advance them or create own)...

Ariadne is a she not a he.

Thanks

[kgauck]

Ariadne is a she not a he.

Applogies to Ariandne.

Regarding power level in the BR setting. I have made certain comprimises. I have limited play to mid levels, and there are two things I like about doing that.

• 1st, I like the fact that the powerful characters in the game are not so profoundly different from the regular folk. (This is a genre issue)
• 2nd, I like the fact that by mid-level, characters begin to invest in their realms, rather than their persons, and expect to see rewards in terms of a better and more seccure realm, rather than a tougher and more impressive character. (also a genre issue)

However, I am very aware that I am giving up articulation in character design. I really like the way a character gets a new ability when he, or she, advances. I think that one of the real advantages of 3rd edition is that character improvement adds neat choices and options for a character, and that halting advancement artificially means I don't get to experience that continued articulation of character.

Its a comprimise, I get some things and lose others.

The shift from a campaign where leaders are like followers, only more skilled and experienced, to a Heroic campaign where kings are more like Theseus, Odyseus, Achillies, and Hercules, and their soldiers and citizens are mere spear carriers is something I could get behind. In some ways its more appropriate for Birthright, if somehow the players of unblooded characters were willing to accept that they could never rise to the magnificence of blooded. Enter Ars Magica companions.

One of my concerns about heroic play is that it still doesn't involve the kind of rampling up of power from hapless babe to demigod. Odyseus is not a spear carrier who got promoted. One of the heroic notions, articulated by both Hesiod and Plato is that there are men of gold, men of silver, men of bronze, and men of iron. Our own game system might recognize these as great bloodlines, major, minor, and unblooded. I know that the ancients had notions of essentialism in human character, because things that were real did not change, so the real hero was always a hero, and could not rise from a genuine obscurity. Birthright doesn't have to be essentialist. But outside of D&D I have no experience with characters start out so helpless and ending up so powerful.

Perhaps the solution is to start PC's with an ECL of substance, and make them effectively 4th level when they start, either directly through begining as 4th level characters, or 2nd or 3rd level characters with a blooded template.

I am already happy to imagine commoners as 4th level Commoners and so on.

What this really means is cutting off the bottom several levels in order to make the higher ones more accesable. I already start at 2nd level, because I have background and professional classes.

Switching from a low-mid level approach to a mid-high, to perhaps very high and epic, does seem to abandon something of the original material, but that might just be constraints that 2nd edition had that simply can't be converted to 3rd edition without giving something significant up elsewhere.

More pondering is required.

[Ariadne]

Applogies to Ariandne.

Nothing bad happened

BTW, my name is Ariadne, think of the girl, that gave Theseus the red wool wire, so he could enter the labyrith of the minotaur and escape again.

Regarding power level in the BR setting. I have made certain comprimises. I have limited play to mid levels, and there are two things I like about doing that.

• 1st, I like the fact that the powerful characters in the game are not so profoundly different from the regular folk. (This is a genre issue)

Powerful Characters are typically scions, so they have a profoundly difference from the regular folk. It's named bloodline...

• 2nd, I like the fact that by mid-level, characters begin to invest in their realms, rather than their persons, and expect to see rewards in terms of a better and more seccure realm, rather than a tougher and more impressive character. (also a genre issue)

I don't see a problem to combine both: INvesting in the realm AND investing in a high level. High level = more protection for the realm, at least in my opinion...

[irdeggman]

Maybe I should really improve them. I would rather add class levels as per the Epic Level Handbook (or SRD). I mean, Awnies like the Gorgon or the Manslayer are 1000 year old characters of INCREDIBLE power and even the minor ones would not last this long, if they aren't epic. Momentarly I think, some of them are powerful and a true challenge for low-level PCs, but you can't tell me, that there was in 1000 years NEVER a high level NPC around who tried to challange them. For example I'm sure, Michael Roele was at least epic too or he never could gain the IDEA to realy try to kill the Gorgon. And why he did not blow away the Spider or the Manslayer first?

No reason at all to think that Michael Roele was the equivalent of 3.5 epic level.

Why did he go after the Gorgon and not the other anwnies?

It was personal. It had to do with his wife and the relationship betwen Roeles and Raesene.

Why he didn't succeed?

He was overmatched.

[kgauck]

Powerful Characters are typically scions, so they have a profoundly difference from the regular folk. It's named bloodline...

What if a player didn't want to play a blooded character? Would they have to play it more like the spear carriers?

I don't see a problem to combine both: INvesting in the realm AND investing in a high level. High level = more protection for the realm, at least in my opinion...

What happens when the regent dies or otherwise passes their realm to a successor?

[Dcolby]

What happens when the regent dies or otherwise passes their realm to a successor?

Alas what was the Fate of Alexanders empire after his demise...

When the once in a hundred years leader passes on those that follow are unlikely to have the ability of the Great/High Level leader.

If his/her rise to power was especialy rapid with no great dynasty or tradition to fall back upon the effects could be even more dramatic!

Great Roleplaying oppurtunity imo..

[Thelandrin]

I can guess why Michael didn't go after Rhuobhe or the Spider. The Spider generally keeps to himself and anyhow provided a distraction for Diemed and its offshoots. Likewise, Rhuobhe presents a powerful distraction for the two most powerful men in Anuire - Aeric Boeruine and Darien Avan. Chances are that there was a similar dynamic when Michael was alive and he preferred to keep his noblemen busy!

Then again, the Gorgon was clearly the greatest threat, especially considering the abilities to hide away of Rhuobhe and the Spider and any possible political fall-out from Tuarhievel over the death of Rhuobhe. (And of course that Michael was a distant nephew of the Gorgon.)

However, the Emperor clearly had to be highish-level, 12th to 15th say. The Imperial Chamberlain is near epic himself and the modern claimants are all in the low double figures themselves.

[Thorogood Roele]

Immunity to poison isn't such a problem. You only need to be a druid of 9th level, member of one of several PrCs (like Celestial Mystic or Contemplative) or otherwise protected (spell etc.) and poisenous spiders are no hazard for you. Combine it with some kind of DR (through template, blood ability, spell or whatever) and even millions of them don't deal one point of damage to you...

That may be true to a single individual, but explain how a single Druid is going to deal with the non-poisonous damage (ie bites) from the millions of little spiders, the thousands of giant spiders the 10's of thousands of goblins etc. A single character of less than god status couldn't even reach the Spider, assuming they knew what they had to do to get past his blood ability that makes him impossible to kill without doing certain things, otherwise he just regenerates over and over. Remember than just learning how to truly kill him is a monumental task in itself requiring massive research, and likely having to test each new theory on the Spider himself just to see if it would work. Either that or divination of nearly godlike status.

[dalor]

It is much easier to do away with the Spider than
people seem to think...you don`t have to kill him is
the key!

It IS a hard task to get to him, but if you can manage
that it is better to CAPTURE the Spider and imprison
him by magic.

There is always the option of burning the Spiderfell
to the ground and wait for the Spider to come into a
well laid trap...that is what I would do.



--- Thorogood Roele <brnetboard@BIRTHRIGHT.NET> wrote:

> This post was generated by the Birthright.net
> message forum.
> You can view the entire thread at:
>
http://www.birthright.net/forums/showthread.php?goto=newpost&t=3659
>
> Thorogood Roele wrote:
> ------------ QUOTE ----------
> Immunity to poison isn`t such a problem. You only
> need to be a druid of 9th level, member of one of
> several PrCs (like Celestial Mystic or
> Contemplative) or otherwise protected (spell etc.)
> and poisenous spiders are no hazard for you. Combine
> it with some kind of DR (through template, blood
> ability, spell or whatever) and even millions of
> them don`t deal one point of damage to you...
> -----------------------------
>
>
>
> That may be true to a single individual, but explain
> how a single Druid is going to deal with the
> non-poisonous damage (ie bites) from the millions of
> little spiders, the thousands of giant spiders the
> 10`s of thousands of goblins etc. A single character
> of less than god status couldn`t even reach the
> Spider, assuming they knew what they had to do to
> get past his blood ability that makes him impossible
> to kill without doing certain things, otherwise he
> just regenerates over and over. Remember than just
> learning how to truly kill him is a monumental task
> in itself requiring massive research, and likely
> having to test each new theory on the Spider himself
> just to see if it would work. Either that or
> divination of nearly godlike status.
>
>

>
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