Fandom Folly
If memory serves, Inquisitor and Drow Priestess don’t get along so well. Maybe Kinesticist’s faction of Quizzies run on the “opposites attract” theory? Either that or her official fan club Inquisitor hat is screwed on too tight.
While our resident fan girl may be a bit overenthusiastic, you’ve got to admire her energy. Sure I’d be weirded out if another player gave my PC the slash fic treatment. But as an admitted diva myself, watching another player take an interest in my character would be all manner of flattering.
It’s not something players generally think about doing. I mean, I’m out here to pursue my own goals and to wallow in my own backstory. If I’m supposed to embody a fictional character, then pursing their interests ought to be my business. That makes fanning-out over fellow PCs a low priority, right?
Well not so fast. RPGs are a team sport after all. And it’s important to remember that this is an ensemble performance, not a one-person play. In that vein, I’d love to hear any of the following from my buddies:
- “I’m thinking about multiclassing. Could your dude give me a bit of training?”
- “You’re wise and stuff. Any philosophical advice for my guy? What would your god say?”
- “Is there any way I can help you achieve your personal quest?”
- “What do you want to do when you retire? How are you going to spend all that gold once you’ve made your fortune?”
- “How can I help your character have a cool moment this session?”
- “Your latest spell gave me an idea… Think we could figure out a teamwork move?”
In other words, it’s all about taking an interest in the other guy. What can you offer their character, and is it possible to help illuminate them?
So for today’s discussion, let’s talk about all those times when you helped somebody else have a cool character moment. Did you pitch a wouldn’t-it-be-cool-if concept for a character? Perhaps you were simply a good audience member during their big moment? Or if you can’t think of one, imagine a way that you might bring this kind of collaboration to the table. What would it look like? Plan out your next big supporting-actor moment down in the comments!
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XD Oh, Kineticist… This is one of those times I remember why you’re one of my favourite characters in the comic.
Credit where it’s due: today’s comic was Laurel’s idea. She saw that Kineticist was high on the “haven’t used ’em in a while” list. When I pointed out that we can only do so many Airbender jokes, she simply asked, “What if she was a fangirl in general?”
Clever lady, my wife. 😀
That’s freaking brilliant.
Being helpful to a fellow party member…
One night, my goblin wizard snuck into the party’s dwarven ranger/rogue’s bedchamber and filched his rapier. How is this helpful, you ask? Next morning, he presented the dwarf with a +1 elfbane rapier.
We were tangled up with drow, you see – the evil kind.
Bloodbane remained his weapon of choice until the end of the campaign…
Well hey, GMs aren’t the only ones allowed to prompt PCs.
Did you reforge the thing, or was it more of a “mysterious swap??
It was a masterwork rapier, and my Goblin had Craft magic weapons and armour. ^_^ So kind of a re-forging, I guess? And it was mo mystery; the goblin had it ready for the dwarf at breakfast and handed it over. Wished him “good killing” and everything. ^_^
I’d planned to simarly upgrade our half-elf Inquisitor’s longbow, but had only had time to hit it up with Masterwork transformation when she went and found a superior bow in our next loot drop. Alas…
At least it gave my goblin time to Craft his first homunculus.
I’d have been scared of the longbow suddenly hating its wielder. Forget to wear wrist guards one time and that elfbane bowstring would take the hand clean off!
Well, I’d have probably made it a demonbane longbow.
You know those wacky drow clerics, always summoning something…!
i think Kineticist was inspired more by the first meeting of drow priestess and inquisitor (https://www.handbookofheroes.com/archives/comic/natural-allies). i mean the first thing they do IS hug after all..
The raw sexual tension is… I was gonna say something ironical, but mayhap I should be taking notes for the next Handbook of Erotic Fantasy page.
Edit: And Laurel just approved the script. So thanks for that. 😀
I don’t know what surprises me more, Kineticist not wearing her LARP outfit or the fact Inquisitor didn’t just smack her upside the head
To be fair, Inquisitor has been known to show Mercy.
https://www.handbookofheroes.com/archives/comic/tools
Just a reminder: Cats have clawed digits and sandpaper tongues. If you’re anatomically female being with a Tabaxi is an unpleasant experience.
Male cats make it even worse. They are not ribbed for your pleasure.
It’s OK. Magus is a catgirl, not a tabaxi. Completely different situation.
Eh, at least cat claws are retractable, unlike most clawed species.
I will never read Narnia the same way again. “Terrible paws, if he didn’t know how to velvet them.”
Our halfling Bard had been mistaken for a human child by the owner of the fish restaurant our party was dining at and was awarded a paper mache pirate’s hat, which immediately became a permanent part of the bard’s attire. When he later rolled a NAT 20 to solve the puzzle on the back of the place mat (which should have earned him a “fish-whistle,” the owner realized that the halfling was a halfling and NOT a little boy. –the hat and whistle were taken away.
This was all a source of great merriment, but I could tell that the Bard’s player was bummed. He really liked the hat as an addition to his character, and with Perform (wind instrument), a fish-whistle was right up his alley.
As my Cleric, I spoke to the tavern owner (DM) before we left, asking “Are you affiliated with the temple next door?”
“No,” he confessed, “I know the priests, there, but I’m not a part of their order. Why?”
“I was trying to figure out if you were the fish-friar or the chip-monk.”
The DM bowed his head at the egregious dad-joke. “Take the hat and the whistle,” he said.
The dad energy was so strong it beat treasure out of the DM. That is truly a worthy feat of punnery! My pirate hat’s off to you!
One of our recent 5ed sessions haf a fun moment both in and out of character between our Elf Paladin and Half-Ork Cleric.
The knife ear had been relatively back on the maech order in narrow corridor and the pint sized rogue on front, first cavern combat encounter and half dead rogue later, “We should send the paladin first,she’s the heaviest armored of us”, the knife ear being a noble insisted that she’d mich rather let those of lower status enter harms way first. few harsh words later, the cleric points out that if she went out front she could prove how much better she is when she could eat hits and make damage like none of them. you could hear the gears grind over the voice chat as she came to realice that he has a point. The party has now much more efective, if not more insufferable, Paladin. Good thing I am the GM so I don’t have to suffer those antics. Just nudge them to the appropriate direction.
Letting the other person hear what they want to hear is just good business, in the dungeon and out. This is the way of the negotiator, and I love it to bits when it’s the cleric picking up the trope.
So wise! So manipulative! Much reasonableness. Wow!
The group is full of manipulative bastards,the ladies using their gender and family/mariage ties as enhancers and the guys are either subtle married men or more blunt single guys. That DnD campaing is me half waiting who’s first to start Player killing.
You could cut the tension with a knife! And also your rivals!
Cat the tension with your rivals?
My Ratfolk wizard had a bunch of these moments with his party.
The most striking one of which was when he made a Padma Blossom for our Kitsune Witch who had trouble coping with the increasingly traumatic adventures we were having in saving the world from a tyrannical BBEG.
https://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/wondrous-items/m-p/padma-blossom/
OOC, we considered re-flavoring the item to be a plushie doll shaped like the ratfolk, making it equivalent to a safety blanket. It was quite the useful item in the end, letting her have a bit of calm in stressful situations and protected her from a few nasty effects.
Hey, anything that makes the Dazing condition less busted seems like a good idea. I don’t care what shape it takes!
For real though, item crafting is a great venue for this sort of thing. You’re able to transform a standard magic item into one tailored to character and situation. It’s like crafting a symbol of your relationship.
…
Can’t imagine where I got that idea:
https://www.handbookofheroes.com/archives/comic/thief-wizard-part-3-5
Kineticist needs to update her fanfiction now that Bad Cat is canon. There’s certainly room for Bad Cat x Gestalt shipping there.
No one gets to write fic about Bad Cat until I figure it out myself! 😛
I’m still waiting on some Village of Brie shenanigans.
I’m still waiting to finish grad school. ಠ_ಠ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jv9sDn_2XkI
I once played in a game where one of the players character was a con artist who had fooled himself into nobility. Not actually intentionally. He had just made an off-hand joke about being a local Counts long lost cousin, and then everyone took it so seriously that he was forced to play along. Not helped by actually looking like the counts long lost cousin.
So I played his goblin batman and hypeman. Always announcing him and his many great deeds. Buffing him, and setting things up so that he would always appear better. Whenever he tried to confess the truth, I had already laid enough of a groundwork that people just thought he were being really humble . It was a lot of fun.
“Fine. We’ll go to the ball. Just don’t call me Your Highness.”
“Of course, Your Highness.”
It’s a great shtick, and I absolutely love the concept of a hype man in a party.
I run a 2E Al-Qadim campaign. The PCs started off as 0-level kids kidnapped by slavers, but rescued/escaped during various shenanigans. Time-skip several years, and they’re teenagers. One PC becomes a priest, like the priest that saved them. Two PCs become affiliated warriors. Another PC becomes a priest to a different god. The fifth becomes a sha’ir, an Al-Qadim wizard.
There are regular theological discussions between the two priests Priest 1 has done some hardcore and successful evangelizing. The two fighters regularly hit up priest 1 for advice, and he uses them for muscle.
And everybody snarks at the infidel heretic wizard.
That’s a strong party dynamic. Could be fun to reverse the dynamic every once in a while though. Have the priest ask the fighter for “earthy wisdom” or have the fighters ask priest #2 for alternative perspective.
Who or what is Quizzie pointing towards?
inQUIZitor
I think the question was about who Inquisitor is LITERALLY pointing towards. In the scene, she seems to be pointing at something off-panel to her right.
Not to be an annoyance, but …
Shouldn’t “In that vain” instead be “In that vein”?
Just askin’ …
I use an auto-translator to get these blog posts from Common into English. Sometimes it screws up. Thanks for the catch!
Kinesticist would fit in with Team Dragon, but they got a ‘no girls allowed’ policy.
We’ve toyed with doing exactly this comic. Not sure what I’d talk about in the blog though. “RPGs are for everybody” seems a bit obvious.
There is definitely potential in the idea. Though Pig might be a more suitable character, as she is not only a girl, but also a little pink dragonoid (rather than a full-blown dragon like them.) Maybe the topic could be about gatekeeping in general, moments when people have been dismissal of our characters.
My favourite supporting moment would be Project Hawkeye, when my artificer made it her life’s goal to give our ranger/rogue every kind of trick arrow she could imagine. Mostly various flavours of explosion, but she did fulfil a request for ranged ice-cream delivery
Not to be confused with the Hawkeye Initiative. 😛
I started a group chat so I could message the DM my arrow ideas out of session to avoid putting her on the spot makes stats & tool check DCs, and decided to search for some art to put as the chat symbol. I was not aware of the “Hawkeye Initiative” when I first googled it, so I did not expect to find a few thousand sexy Hawkeye images. That ended up being a fun hour of scrolling.
One of my favorite help-a-PC-out moments was when I was helping play test a system called Epigenesis. One of the other players was a Bomber, who specialized in placing time bombs that would explode at the beginning of his turn unless he spent GEN (a resource used for all sorts of things in this system) to keep them from doing so. The boss was extremely slippery, taking multiple turns and constantly maneuvering, so the Bomber placed as many time bombs as he could to cover as much area as possible just to try and actually hit the boss. Of course, with multiple turns of movement, the boss was easily able to get out of the effected area. And with so much GEN spent placing the bombs, the Bomber couldn’t do this attack again. Such a waste of bombs.
I was playing an Angler, which is a class that focuses on pushing and pulling characters around so that they focus on me rather than my allies. As a tank, I wasn’t being very useful to the fight since the boss could easily move back to where they were before I moved them, and I couldn’t deal much damage or keep their focus on me otherwise. So I decided that it was much more important that the Bomber has GEN to attack with than it was for me to have any. So I spent all of it.
In Epigenesis, one of the common actions that someone can do is a Genesis Cancel which allows one to use an action twice in a row, by paying an ever-increasing amount of GEN every time they use it. I used it to use my highest-cost ability usually restricted to once per turn, that pulls an enemy to me and moves us both. It was my only movement ability that was guaranteed to move a target even on a miss. Even though both attacks missed and only did a tiny amount of damage, I was able to pull the boss and myself to the center of the cluster of time bombs. And the Bomber took their turn immediately after mine.
The explosion was glorious, even if I was still hit by most of the bombs. And the Bomber was able to put their last bit of GEN (plus all the GEN they got from hitting with the bombs) to use in a glory of more traditional attacks, finishing off the boss and taking more than half of it’s total HP in essentially a single turn’s worth of damage. They were extremely happy at this, especially after they had thought their previous turn of setting up so many time bombs was just going to go to waste, and it felt amazing to me as well, even though my turn was practically wasted by missing all of my highest-cost attacks and leaving me with no GEN for the rest of the fight. If I hadn’t spent everything to set this up then the Bomber wouldn’t have had the GEN from hitting the bombs and thus we probably would have lost that fight. It really opened my eyes to the glory of more strategically focused TTRPGs, and how powerful just pushing enemies around is as a supporting role.
Not only did you manage to do the characterful self-sacrifice, but you managed to make the other guy feel like a badass in the process. Not the kind of RP situation that comes up all the time, but this is EXACTLY what tactically-focused gamers mean when they talk about roleplaying continuing into combat. Well bloody done!
Speaking of slash-fic’ing your teammates… in an old campaign I was in, we had two characters: The LG Inquisitor (fitting) and the Chaotic Evil Mesmerist. The two in-character *hated* each other, but also had this weird tendency to constantly roll nat 20s to save each other. So for all of us except the two players, well, they were (and still are to a degree) our Crack Ship.
As for other relevant stories, I have a few from a recent(ish) PF2e campaign, though it was mostly the other player supporting me more than me supporting them <.<;
I was playing a Fighter with Red dragonblood (Sorc MC, later Dragon Disciple) and a penchant for polearms (playing on FF Dragoons), my ally was another Fighter, with a natural werecroc curse (it's a thing with this player).
The first story, at the end of the second part of the campaign the other Fighter was tinkering with their curse, using some samples collected from this massive brontosaurus-style dino we encountered during the segment. This resulted in upgrading their werecurse from werecroc to weredino. This included a full Dino Form. The player's first response: Turn to me, and basically just say "Ride me." And so I did, and we spent the next while as a unit, me fighting from their back or using them as a launching platform for my mad hops.
Then we get to the end of part 3. The final boss of part 3 was a Magma dragon. The one thing this player likes more than being a werebeast is trying to get teh GM to let them play a dragon. So of course they took samples. But now they need to use it, and needed a ritual. So who do they turn to? Well, I already have dragonblood, and as a side effect of that and some other things was pretty heavily invested in Arcana knowledge. So the two of us team up both In- and Out-of-Character to brainstorm a ritual, which thanks to some very lucky rolls successfully turn my ally from Weredino into full-on Dragon.
Then, around the end of book 5 we decided we were strong enough, well, it was my turn. So the two of us teamed up and went dragon hunting, and slaughtered a Red dragon so I could do my own ritual. Mine went a bit sideways and I wound up Half-Dragon rather than full Dragon, but that wound up just fine.
All in all it wound up with half the party being totally immune to Fire going into a final act full of Fire damage, so that was fun.