Bad Hair
I know that I wouldn’t want to come at a white-haired witch with a pair of scissors. It takes a special kind of stylist to tackle special kinds of hair, and Barbarian is all kinds of special. I just wish that the other Strength-based PCs in my life believed they were special too.
No matter what system you’re running in, there’s a tendency to think of strong PCs as “the big dumb guy,” a subspecies of one-trick pony. They’re buff, they’re tough, and they stand at the front during combat. More troubling is the notion that they don’t do much else besides that. No doubt we can come up with any number of mechanical reasons why this might be so, but I think there’s more going on here than rules. In my experience, it’s simply hard to think of cool things for strong characters to do.
YMMV, but a lot of my thinking on this point comes from superhero games. When I was learning Heroclix way back in the day, I remember feeling disappointed in super strength. The ability allowed you to pick up heavy objects. You could bash people with the objects or throw them at your enemies, but that was it. While that’s still an occasionally useful power, it’s a long way from the fantasy of super strength I picture in my head. I want to bust through walls, tie people up with steel girders, maybe hurl a Canadian or two….
I’ve got to be fair to Heroclix though. That’s a tactical minis game, and you can’t do everything you can imagine in a tactical minis game. When it came time for me to sit down for my first Mutants & Masterminds campaign though, I still found myself stuck in the same “pick up and bash” mindset. I’d decided to roll up a buff dude named Dirigible. In addition to being super strong, he also catches on fire and flies at a top speed of 5 mph (Oh, the humanity!). I was happy with the character’s backstory and personality, but the first couple of combats were a slog. It was nothing but a slug-fest! “I guess I hit him again” was my mantra, and no amount of Austrian-accented one-liners could save the experience from tedium. It was only when I looked at the list of strength-related power feats (“ground strike!” “shock wave!” “super breath!” “thunder clap!”), that I began to get a sense of the possibilities. Contrast this to agility-based maneuvers. Running across enemies’ heads, leaping down from the top rope to attack, and swinging Spider-Man style from streetlamps all come naturally. I’ve seen a hundred stunt men and anime protagonists do that stuff, and it’s easy to come up with on the spot. Inventing something for the strong guys beyond “I pick up the thing and hit them with the thing” is harder.
My solution at this point is to take a cue from those Mutants & Masterminds power feats. I’ll do a bit of brainstorming between sessions, and make sure that I’ve got a short list of bullet points ready to go. The current list written on the back of Dirigible’s character sheet includes:
- “Tent stake” (read: pound an enemy into the ground)
- “Bring down the house” (read: collapse a building)
- “Hang time” (throw them up in the air for X rounds)
- “BAMWAM“
That’s a pretty short list, so I’m betting you can guess where I’m going with today’s discussion question.
What are some of the best strength-based maneuvers you’ve seen in a game? What should go on every beefcake’s list of “cool feats of strength?” Maybe you’ve even got a few ideas for interesting out-of-combat weightlifting? Let’s hear your best brawny brainstorming down in the comments!
SO WHAT ARE WE PLAYING NEXT? Tell me if you’ve been here. The campaign just ended, and it’s time to choose the next system. You’re dying for a classic dungeon crawl, but the rest of the group is ready to let Steve run his Bunnies and Burrows / Sonic the Hedgehog mashup campaign. That’s not a conversation you want to miss. If you’re the kind of gamer that wants their voice heard, check out the “Quest Giver” reward level over on the The Handbook of Heroes Patreon. You’ll become part of the monthly vote to see which elements get featured in the comic next!
I’m playing a pretty meatheaded dwarf brawler in a pathfinder game, and I borrow a lot of stuff from pro wrestling. Wrestling moves just make for great entertainment (I RKO the doppelgänger out of nowhere!) and makes combat feel less “guess I punch” most of the time
Well then. Learned something new today:
https://sports.stackexchange.com/questions/17876/what-is-an-rko-in-wrestling
But straight up, wrestling is a great resource for maneuver ideas. That exactly the kind of theatrical, over the top stuff you want to pull off in an RPG.
Glad I could introduce you to maybe the best wrestling meme out there
I dunno man… https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/the-undertaker-threw-mankind-off-hell-in-a-cell
Having 21 str after my bard Elliot ended up with a belt of giants strength turned out pretty well for him, even if he never used it directly in combat. For example, being able to constantly lift a pile of rocks for animate objects, swinging like tarzan. Working with your wizard to turn your ranger jnto a human jet plane with fly and haste, and then managing to hold onto him as he flies, together with the fighter and barbarian working to pull up the less strong members pf the party as you climb up a mountain, shocking a group of people with the tiny halfling’s/ skinny half elfs ability to arm wrestle, throwing a teammate over a wall, and so on. When you put your mind to it, lots of str can fix alot of problems.
Did you set your Expertise to Athletics? It doesn’t feel very bard-like, but it sounds like it would be amazing for you.
That said, fleecing people by hustling arm wrestling competitions sounds EXTREMELY bard-like. Well done that bard!
Nah, this was fairly late in the game, I had already set my expertise before I got the belt. Still though, half proficiency can still help a lot, and a good proportion of those I mentioned were flat str checks or just showing the dm my str then anything.
Dare I ask what Barbarian even gets paid in…?
Coffee and meat.
I was going to say “ale and meat,” but on reflection I think Barbie is more of a cosmo girl.
I once had a character who’s motivation in life were the three ‘M’s: Meat, Mead, and Whores (because whores make you go “Mmmm!”)
It might come to no surprise, but I would recommend taking a look at Spheres of Might, particularly the Berserker and Brute spheres (and possibly also the wrestling sphere); and their Legendary Talents. It offers options to create tremors, difficult terrain, charge through multiple walls, etc.
lol manhandle: https://www.d20pfsrd.com/spheres-of-might/combat-spheres/brute/
I recommend that all Strength-based characters read this:
http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?468737-The-Grappler-s-Manual-%282-0%29-Grappling-in-5th-Edition
Good call on grappling. It’s one of the more interesting mechanical options a melee dude can use, and it’s exactly the kind of rule that folks in an “I guess I hit it again” mindset tend to forget.
Yeah, my Firbolg Samurai has gotten some good mileage out of grappling without any features or feats expended to make it better. Of course he’s also been grappled a bunch too.
First of all, I have to say the Barbarian special hair-dresser idea is amazing. I don’t know how or where, but I will find a way to steal it.
I don’t know if you’ve been watching the new campaign of Critical Role, but I think there’s a lot to learn from watching Marisha Ray play a monk. Even though it’s somewhat a stereotypical “just whack them over and over again” class, the way she describes her attacks is always so flavourful and cinematic. So even though she doesn’t use any fancy spells or abilities, other than the occasional ki power, I still really look forward to watching her turn in combat.
Similarly, there were a couple of episodes in the first campaign where Grog the barbarian had duels with a few different NPCs – and amazingly, Matthew Mercer and Travis Willingham turned what can easily be a dice roll snoozefest into one of the most entertaining and graphic in-game moments.
So all it takes is some creativity and fancy descriptions, imo. Of course, it’s helpful to have some experience with what you’re describing – Marisha practises martial arts and Travis is kind of a jock/football nerd.
Coming out of Exalted, I do love me some fancy descriptions. Grog’s fight vs. Earthbreaker Groon is a great example. It just frustrates me a bit that these talented guys have to work so hard to make something as inherently interesting as a high stakes duel actually feel interesting. For my money, that kind of fight can be served well by varying up the arena. A sandpit is the “no items, final destination” of dueling. Imagine that same grapple-fest taking place on the Hero’s Forge from Trollhunters:
https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/trollhunters/images/a/aa/Heroe%27s_forge.png/revision/latest?cb=20180118131321
Suddenly all those fancy maneuvers come paired with some mechanical bite.
Personally, I’m a big fan of the “beat a motherfucker with another motherfucker” style. What could be more fun than picking up the enemy himself and using him as a club to beat up his friends?
I built for that once upon a time:
https://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/barbarian/rage-powers/paizo-rage-powers/body-bludgeon-ex/
Sadly, the campaign ended well before it actually came online. Single tear.
I know it’s only a hypothetical, but due to some planar shenanigans, a Primeval of mine reached 76 strength and Gargantuan size (a double-strength Animal Growth, +16 strength and two full size increases).
The carrying capacity of my PC reached a Push/Drag Weight of 37683200 (https://i.imgur.com/G9uzaoc.png). The link is actually missing a 0 because the box isn’t designed for numbers that large. When I realized this, we basically needed to take a pause in the game because of the laughter over how terrifying such strength was. We were fighting high level demons, and even then I could have thrown them several miles.
That character had such high grapple checks that the GM basically just said “just roll to see if you get a 1, otherwise you pin it in two rounds”.
(I hope I haven’t shared this one before).
As for other feats of strength, I once stalled the implied progression of The Sunless Citadel because I wanted to fill the spiked pit with the barrels we found in another room. Me and another PC rolled the full barrels and crashed them down the pit until it was full enough that we would neither take damage in the pit nor need a skill check to get past that obstacle. I still look fondly upon that moment.
To clarify, I could move the Eiffel Tower with that strength.
I think you’re well on your way to designing a D&D strongman competition.
Have you ever seen The Adventures of Baron Munchausen?
https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0096764/
There’s a scene at the beginning with a bet and a strong man that’s hilarious.
There’s one in 3.5’s Planar Handbook on page 183 called Densahl’s Challenge, an Encounter Level 13 Planar Touchstone.
It is a 20 foot tall rose-colored boulder. The story goes that a drunken dwarf warrior (Densahl) on the plane of Ysgard stumbled into the tor and took exception to it being in his way. He climbed to the top of it and announced he would break it into a thousand pieces, but only managed one swing before passing out. That swing broke off a rock the size of his head and shoulders.
The gathered crowd was impressed, but others insisted they could do better. And so the Challenge began! The record blow was struck by none other than Kord, the God of Strength; he broke off a workhorse sized boulder. No matter how much is broken off, the next day the tor is recovered back to its full size.
The size of the rock you break off is relative to the damage dealt by swinging a sledgehammer (treat as warhammer) at the rock. It is possible to roll critical hit damage, but the PC hits on any roll that is not a 1. Anything more than 19 damage breaks off a rock weighing 5 pounds, plus five pounds per five damage (20-24 = 5 pounds, 25-29 = 10, etc). Any damage less than 10 fails to even chip off any rocks.
I have a Spheres of Might Brawler in one campaign and she is pretty strong.
The BAMWAM reminded me of something I was gonna try with her at some point in time:
Wrestling Sphere has Greater Grapple (which lets you maintain as a Move action) and Living Weapon which lets you wield a person as an improvised weapon (the chart says a normal size person is a medium weapon).
Barroom Sphere lets you wield improvised weapons without penalty.
Boxing Sphere has Counter Punch, and Heavy Counter (which lets you use Counter Punch with a one, or two-handed weapon).
So with 6 Talents spent you can do this…
T1 Punch and Snag with Wrestling.
T2 Pin as a move and use living weapon slam. Ready counter punch and have fun…
There’s other thing you can mix and match too, but Brawler lets you be more versatile in a fight to try new things.
When I was trying to do the build sans spheres, I went with monk (martial artist) / barbarian (brutal pugilist). The build focused on body bludgeon/greater grapple/rapid grappler. Depending on how you run armor spikes and if you’ve got an anaconda’s coils belt, that is one whole hell of a lot of damage.
Heh, with Monster Hunter World out, it could be called the Deviljho build.
Strength, raw strength, can be problematic, it requires, for me at least, too many required secondary powers. It also is, for me, the lamest power. Now power over darkness, it’s too much fun, creating weapons out of darkness, creating things, angry things, with claws, teeth and wings from it. Mawhahahahah, fear my power you heroes, i am your nightmares i am the night!!!
Er… i mean… anyone can have different tastes. Super strengt is such a cool power.
On another topic as you, always makes a question let me make you one. Each week you need at least two questions and stories related to them for the Handbook of Heroes. So, do you think of each of them before making them, you have an archive with unreleased comics until you have the right question for it, how is the creative process?
We ought to have a proper archive built up, but Laurel and I are usually only one or two comics ahead.
The workflow involves me writing 5-6 scripts, and Laurel picking her favorites, usually around half of the scripts on offer. We’ll discard the others.
There was a time not so long ago when I was in eight games at once, so I’ve got a lot of stories to draw on for the blog posts. Usually I’ll have something in mind for the discussion question when I’m writing the script, but lately I’ve been trying to move away from that. The comic has to be funny first, and I can always make a semi-related blog post afterwards.
I’ll often run through forums for inspiration, but lately I’ve taken to keeping a “most recent appearance” document for our many characters. That way dudes like Alchemist and Monk have a chance of showing up every once in a while. We hadn’t seen Barbarian or Witch in a while, for example, so I asked myself why they might appear together. That’s where today’s comic comes from.
Know what, when i read this comic, witch and barbarian haircut, i was thinking that the topic would be downtime tasks and talents. Not every comic needs, or can have a common theme with the question of the day. The creative process was something i was pondering for a time. Thanks for the answer, now you reward.
You said you have watched that tengu trope hurrem lasagna, or after checking google, Tengen Toppa Gurren-Lagann, what about an atomic punch? Last week in a webcomic i read, The Handbook of Heroes, some guy asked about explosives. So, i was thinking that a sufficiently strong person could theoretically punch something and compress the atom inside it until they reach critical mass and you get a nuclear fisión reaction. That way you get a “Cherno-punch” or maybe “Fukushima Boxing style” or another title less related to nuclear catastrophes. Enjoy it and don’t forget to take your Geiger detector to any fight. Thanks for the answer and great comic.
PS: Laurel have considered some art of The Handbook of Heroes characters, Adventure Time’s stile?
The inverse actually: https://www.deviantart.com/fishcapades/art/Adventure-Time-Royalty-184247651
Hahaha. I was thinking of Fighter the Human, Bubblegum Thief, The Ice Wizard and Cleric the Dog. Still very funny and well done 🙂
Huh… You know, Laurel has been doing different genres for the monthly wallpapers on Patreon. I’ll make sure she gets the Adventure Time note.
One last thing about strength, i check Godbound and in the Might word, the word of primal strength, it has the usual power. Throw anything as far as you can see, jump and fly, sunder buildings, lift any object no longer than a warship, and like two of the powers can be used by the godbound allies. Also he who binds this word has a natural strength score of 19, even other words only push the scores to 16 or 18. Check it out if you want, combined with the Endurance word makes you a good Heracles poser.
Scion, for all its flaws, is a great system for having fun things to do with Epic Strength (and Epic knacks for the other attributes). I play a Scion of the Morrigan, who has used her Epic Strength, to, among other things:
Carry two cows around, one under each arm (she’s a dairy farmer)
Drag her truck to a mechanic when it breaks down, at about the same speed at the truck itself could manage
Jump onto the wing of a WWII fighter plane performing a strafing attack, which she then crashed through sheer power of ugliness
Various bedroom feats which probably don’t belong here
Nice! I made a Scion character once upon a time, but the campaign never saw its first session. Dude was a philandering Southern Baptist preacher by day, and a scion of the voodoo love god by night. Can’t remember the name of the deity, but I remember being all kinds of amused by the premise.
Any dang way, your lady must have been pretty tall to fit cows under her arms. That’s some Stretch Armstrong mess right there! Finding a way to do real world tasks like you describe (move a car; move livestock) is evocative in a way that “pick up a castle” isn’t. This kind of “street-level” super strength is easier to grok, and is especially helpful if you’re playing in a contemporary setting like Scion. I love the image of this buff farm girl rolling up on a gas station with her busted truck dragging behind her like a bad dog on a leash.
Man this is exactly the sort of thing my current orc barb Katalmach is made for. Even before he took rogue levels he was doing things with his muscles that you’d think his biggest muscle was his brain.
Stop a wizard from spell casting? Headlock so his cant breath. Damage done to the enemy reflect back to you? Grapple em through spike growth. Integible ghost creature? Flail around holy water on a rope. This is the same guy who cooks with his gut or when he’s making something really spicy, cooks with fury.
I think a lot of people expect strength based characters to be really basic is because of the fear of wizards. Wizards are smart and have a lot of tricks up their sleeves. Barbarians are suppose to be super strong but simple so you can out manivere them. But if they start fighting smarter, fighting like a wizard, using their biggest stat to do the most damage, then people would get annoyed. A fighter can’t do this because unlike barbarians, they aren’t innately muscle wizards. They’re more like muscle tricksters.
I picture him yelling at a pot of five alarm chili like Happy Gilmore yelling at a golf ball.
I’m reminded of one of my own jokes from a ‘roll d12’ table;
What kobold/grung fusion kitchen monstrosity has the food cart ‘chef’ come up with this time….?
7. Spicy Cockatoo Surprise (made spicy by teaching jungle parrots a few words of Dark Speech and/or Infernal before roasting them)
Heh. I bet little demon ghost parrots spew profanity when you cut into it.
…now I’m imagining a demon ghost parrot voiced by the late sgt. R. Lee Ermey.
Now I’m imagining this as a sitcom. Evil parrot ghost helps hapless rogue get his life together.
“Alright maggot. You want to die poor? Get and there and get the loot!”
Does a White-haired Witch actually have to have white hair? What happens if you dye it a different color? Do you loose your powers, Samson-style, until the dye wears off?
Witch is a regular at Barbarian’s Hairena for a reason. Gotta keep that color vibrant!
Now I’m imagining a whole selection of PRCs with different hair colors!
Red trades Rogue talents for Babarian rage.
Blue gets more spells.
Green gets animal companion or maybe wildshape.
Hot pink w/sparkles gets Bardic music…
Hmmm, hair colour as an indicator of your multiclass preferences? I can see that working.
No lie? Laurel would explode in a puff of glitter and rainbows if someone came out with a supplement detailing hair slot items.
Coming back to this, considering that I’ve taken a shine to the latest iteration of the Unearthed Arcana Artificer, and its ‘replicate magic item’ infusion…. A lot of the minor items available at level 2 in that class can be easily reimagined/flavoured as alchemical colour washes; aqua blue for the cap of water breathing, straw blonde for rope of climbing, matching bleached forelocks for sending stones….
Adventuring hair dresser? Hell yes. Do it!
One of my best friends got there first and did it better;
https://acontinentofbanalities.blogspot.com/2019/08/magick-of-hobgoblin-wardressers.html
“By Crom and Hera! What do you use for product, honey from angry bees and Harpy eggs?!”
nice