Goldie Lost
It’s been a while since we last saw the sentient sword Goldie. It’s been an equally long time since we’ve seen Skitters. Laurel says that has something to do with the difficulty of drawing a spider to-scale in the same panel as human-sized characters, but i think this one’s on me.
Whether you’re writing a sprawling series of disconnected fantasy vignettes or running a campaign, you’re bound to come up with characters that get left behind. While it’s a bit depressing to imagine the dreary lives of disused sentient items, I think that a sprawling cast of characters can actually serve an interesting purpose. When a few months or years of campaign time go by and you’re able to pull out a blast from the past, the world suddenly feels more real. These characters don’t disappear simply because they’ve gone off-screen, but have continued to grow and change while the PCs were away. The effect is actually more powerful when it’s a minor character: a quirky shopkeeper who now owns a franchise or a stray dog, saved by the party back at level 1, who’s since been adopted by a local nobleman. Verisimilitude comes in a lot of different flavors, but I find that minor characters growing, changing, and making return appearances is an easy trick to pull off.
Question of the day then. Have you ever seen a throw-away character come back into the campaign months or years later? Was it a cool moment? Did it fall flat in a, “Wait…who was that again?” kind of way? Let’s hear it in the comments!
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Not exactly the same, but the game I’m in currently started when our old DM had to leave and one of the players took up the same world with a new campaign, but included the old party as NPCs of equal level. We were 4th when this started, now we’re 12th and those NPCs of the old party have popped up from time to time. I never felt more joy playing pathfinder than when after 8 levels of not seeing him, my DM brought in my old sorcerer all levelled up and as powerful as I imagined him becoming.
Nice! I’m playing a legacy character in my Ravenloft campaign. Nothing quite like seeing your lowly goblin cabin boy from the six-years-ago pirate game show up in your gothic horror backstory like some fantastically powerful fairy godmother.
I’ve seen players/GMs forget that a sentient magic item/familiar is sentient. Basically everyone’s ignoring the person who’s right there with them the whole time.
It’s really uncomfortable when you think aboot it.
Yeah, my groups usually avoided fully-sentient magic items specifically for this reason. What happens when you finally go to upgrade? Either you sell off your loyal and steadfast companion, or they end up sitting around in a chest somewhere. Personally I prefer to believe that magic items can effectively hibernate when not being used.
If a campaign is going to have some sort of talking magic weapon, I think it should be given more focus than just another piece of loot. If you decide it is time to move on, then find a worthy successor to bestow it upon first (or maybe it’s an NPC who is looking for a successor, etc). That kind of thing could be a nice minor plot element I think.
My players found three sentient items at once a few years back. They each held the soul of a former adventurer, and each was a bit different. They agreed to destroy the headband and free its soul a year and a day after finding it. They’re still using the glove of storing, though its soul apparently enjoys adventuring anyway. The third was a lion shield possessed by an elderly knight. They wound up strapping a shield sconce over his mouth so he’d shut up.
Players sometimes lack in empathy. :/
I always say “Tabletop rpgs are how you figure out which of your friends are sociopaths.
Now this I object to- a good portion of the reason for playing RPGs is to roleplay as characters with traits you’d never express in the real world.
For example, I once played an evil drow Ranger (a Drizzt knockoff) who casually suggested torture in the same tone of voice you’d use to remind someone to pick up more bread at the store. It was fun specifically because it caught the group so off-guard.
Are you a fan of anime? Specifically have you heard of Soul-Eater?
The gimmick of that series is that the weapons have alternate human(oid(ish)) forms and can walk and talk like people, but going into weapon-mode and partnering with a trained fighter makes them more powerful and than fighting alone.
The relevant part is about a weapon called “Excalibur”, who’s really REALLY powerful, but…. slightly difficult to get along with? Yeah let’s go with that.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4vFP9ZgSI8
Not in my game, no, because we tended the play a lot of one-shots and the few campaigns I did took place over a relatively compressed timespan.
I’m remembering one of the Paper-Mario RPG’s though, where you, playing as Mario, would occasionally receive letters from Luigi describing how he’s off having his own adventure. I thought it was a nice touch.
I’ve heard those were really well done, though I’ve never sat down to play one. Are they all fairly standalone?
1 and 2 are quite good, and are fine standalones. The rest…
Also in 2 you actually meet up with Luigi between his adventures and he tells you his tales of heroics. Then you can talk to his companion Du Jour and they’ll tell you how badly things actually went.
I’m pretty sure I only played 1 and 2, but yes I agree they are fine stand-alones, is a bit easy for experienced gamers. If you don’t have a gamecube, I’m pretty sure you can find an emulator online somewhere.
Paper Mario, Paper Mario and the Thousand Year Door, and Super Paper Mario are all great games. Super Paper Mario is the third installment and strayed a bit from the formula of the first two with this platforming thing and a dumb 3D gimmick that drags the game down a bit, but it still has all the great story stuff so I’d still recommend it.
After that they went and made Paper Mario Sticker Star – which is horrible – and the series never recovered.
Actually in our Crimson Throne campaign, a couple of characters were left out of the game (a DM PC to fill in where needed, and an old PC dismissed to roll a new One), and now they have come back as NPCs who act as informants on recent events around the city.
Nice. It’s always fun to see continuity in action.
Do they tend to show up frequently, or is it more of a once-in-a-blue-moon sort of thing?
Well without spoiling too much, it’s the first time we had seen them since splitting off from our group.
Hmmm… So what you’re telling me is that they’re zombies now.
lol no, we were just absent from their location for a bit (and are now again as it would seem…) then we met up again when something big went down and they needed our help.
Sorry I’m being so cryptic, but I remember you are going through the campaign and others may yet as well, so I don’t want to ruin anything.
So does Thief’s incompetence stem from neglecting “Thieving for Dummies” or from abiding by it?
Thief’s incompetence stems from her proximity to Warrior. Check out the Companions, Familiars & Minions section over here:
https://www.handbookofheroes.com/role-call
So none of it is actual poor decision-making? It’s all Warrior’s fault?
https://d2nzqyyfd6k6c7.cloudfront.net/styles/nova_large_square/s3/article/thumbnail/mia-porque.jpg?itok=HNYnBmNu
So my original question stands: “Does Thief’s incompetence stem from neglecting “Thieving for Dummies” or from abiding by it?”
https://d2nzqyyfd6k6c7.cloudfront.net/styles/nova_large_square/s3/article/thumbnail/mia-porque.jpg?itok=HNYnBmNu
I’ve got an off topic but related to the comic answer and one that’s on topic.
I’ve made a weapon based off Pathfinder artifact; it’s a obsidian sword that on a crit casts Fireball centered on itself in addition to dealing slashing damage as it the blade shatters with it and then reforms. For it’s personality I’m either going for Torque from Borderlands 2 or Megumin from Konasuba, basically a personality that loves the fuck outta explosions. I’m thinking of giving it to a red dragon in human form to take advantage of immunity to fire for shenanigans.
For the question you asked; I’ve got a campaign set up that roughly 250 years into the future of the campaign that my DM is using. Normally that time frame would leave the more mortal races quite dead but there’s actual in-game reasons in my DM’s story that can explain them being alive. In fact something happened by accident that made it better; I was trying to keep it a secret (with the exception of my DM since I had to ask about his world to mesh) but I caved and told another player and he decided to be the son of his old character. That was pretty cool and gave me some hooks to use. I’m looking forward to when we can play so I can see how they react.
Think any of the long-lived characters will return for cameos? Or would that be a little much?
Out of all of us there’s two who are (Both Wood Elf). One is from another person in the group, she’ll show up but due to reasons she’ll likely not want to deal with the rest of the old party members. Nothing antagonistic, more like disappointed; She was the sort of mom to the party and in character said that if my character does this thing she try to kill my character. It’s more dangerous than evil so it feels more out of concern than hostility. Considering that my character goes through with it and succeeds they’ll likely not meet. She might show up though just to have some counter to any possible self-wank of my incredibly strong character.
It can be a tough tightrope to walk when you’re balancing interesting cameos vs. masturbatory self-reference. That’s why I think it’s almost a better idea to include minor players rather than PCs. You get that sense of continuity without any of that weird “look at my old 20th level dude who’s so awesome now.”
Quite true, which is why I’m hoping that using the old characters of the group I play with will make everyone happy to see them. Another one of those things where you hope you do them justice.
Good luck getting their accents right! I hope it comes off spectacularly. 🙂
I’ve mentioned this before, but in the Runelords campaign I’m in, we’ve had a lot of player turnover over the years, and so when the cool NPC return in Book 3 happens (Shalelu), none of the active players had encountered her before, changing her from a fun callback to a random stranger. On a similar note, due to both the turnover and player absences, there is only one PC (mine) who has been present at pretty much everything. In particular, we’ve been expecting a grudge match with an escaped boss (Xanesha) that none of the other PCs besides mine have met.
On a different but related note, I have now taken Improved Familiar, and have to come up with an explanation for upgrading my loyal hawk into a Paracletus Aeon with the Scholar archetype built to be someone in the party good at Knowledge checks. Right now I’m going with something along the lines of “PC bought a KnowledgeBot from a cosmic mail-order catalogue”, but where should the hawk go?
A buddy of mine went through this. He wanted to trade in his kestrel for a lyrakien azata, but he didn’t want to give up his old pal. The solution was to simply say that the bird received a boon from the gods, and has simply leveled up, same as any PC. It’s got the stats of the azata but continues to look like a bird.
If you’re a wizard, then your bird buddy simply studied your tomes over your shoulder all this time. He gained an unusual level of insight, and has experienced a sort of logic-driven enlightenment. Now in mental contact with the Plane of Law, the hawk is slowly losing his hawk-ness and become more aeon-like. His eyes glow now, but eventually a cluster of shimmering lights begin to float around his head. As the campaign continues, he struggles to find his own balance between logic and emotion as he continues to observe you like a good Paracletus Aeon should.
Sound workable?
Hmm… Various factors I’m considering:
My PC is in many ways the perfect subject for a real Paracletus to study. She’s an Intelligence-based prepared spellcaster (Magus), but also uses Bloodrage in combat (Bloodrager dip). Thus, she is a balance between logic and emotion.
My PC in her backstory was raised and trained by an order of human knights, who found her abandoned. When she had a falling out with them and went off on her own to prove herself, she brought with her her knightly sword (with a special hilt), her armor and that hawk. The sword and armor have both been replaced now (though she still has them in storage), and the hawk is in many ways the last remaining connection to who she once was and where she grew up. Though she wants to hang onto it, maybe it would be better for her to move on. After all, she has become a very different person since then (transforming from an aggressive but fragile glass cannon to an impenetrable tank; going from the main fighter to a support unit and, more and more, the leader). She is no longer a Wizard pretending to be a Fighter, nor the other way around. She is no longer a half-elf pretending to be a human by denying half of herself. She is a fusion of the two, embracing her human combat training and elven senses and magical blood to become something greater than either – a true Magus. (And, yes, she is totally getting the Paragon Surge spell once she can cast it.)
Her god is Milani, goddess of hope, resistance and devotion. Her faith sustained her during her early days of adventuring, when she failed constantly and was repeatedly beaten within an inch of her life. It continues to inspire her to face foes of unimaginable power and impossible odds in order to save others. The Paracletus can inspire hope as well as its opposite, despair. It also offers knowledge, the key to victory, which the party has sorely lacked. Could it be a boon of Milani, given to provide guidance against the vile tyranny of a Runelord?
The party suffered its first killed PC a day ago (in-universe). My PC didn’t know him that well, but they’d fought together a few times. He died right beside her. Not only could she not save him, even with her tankiness, but, in fact, her durability made it worse for him – the enemy focused all of her attacks on him because he was an easier target. If she’d just cast Displacement on him the previous round instead of the next one (as she had intended to), he probably would have survived. Even now, she carries his sword. He was an Inquisitor – might some of his knowledge have rubbed off on her in a literal sense? Did her crisis of conscious lead to the Paracletus being gifted to her by some entity? Did she replace her familiar with a more powerful one to gain the strength and knowledge to never lose another teammate again, even though the hawk was her friend? Or was it her balance of grief and commitment that lured the thing to her in the first place?
Wow, that was a lot. Sorry, I’m just thinking out loud, I guess. ROLEPLAYING!!
I recently had both success and failure with this.
Lucrecia escaped her original fated encounter with the PCs when they raised seven degrees of the Abyss (and noise) when assailing her location’s second floor. This got her attention, but only after they had left a trail of bodies through the first floor. Having been briefed on the party’s strengths, weaknesses and prowess by her spies, she fled to her master.
In that encounter, my players killed her Master without actually injuring her (she was invisible and using Buffs) and so she fled again. I ended up writing a section between Chapters 4 and 5 where Lucrecia used her magic to infilitrate and manipulate the citizens of Sandpoint into dangerous situations that the party had to try and save. I succeeded in making her the most hated villian of the campaign. I failed in getting people to remember a few of the NPCs used as bait in the plots. There was an NPC tied to each PC.
It also ended up causing a bit of a inter-party conflict due to a certain charmed individual being killed during the incident, even though they knew he was charmed.
So Lucrecia has become the BBEG? Interesting… Figuring out how to pay off that sort of shift in player-perspective should be an interesting challenge. You don’t want her to overshadow the AP’s actual BBEG, but you do want to give her an interesting send-off. Always interesting to see what the PCs glom onto!
She became most hated, not biggest. Karzoug still looms in the background and with his special reveal and all the stuff the Runewell allows him to do (my wizard made the knowledge checks for most of it) he is the scariest thing they’ve ever faced. It’s just that they hated Lucrecia with a personal hate that did not translate to Karzoug. Karzoug is an absolute nightmare monster that makes me worry my group will TPK in round 2. o.o’
Well if it is to be a TPK, I hope that it is glorious. 😀
Hey question I’ve been doing recently and I’ve noticed that my dungeons are starting to turn…..weird to say the least lamentations of the fire princess weird. Any good suggestions for dungeons or demons guides before I unveil my NEWEST CREATION!!!
If you don’t find something worth stealing in this thing then you’re not looking hard enough:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/adventureaweek/mini-dungeon-tome-for-5th-edition-or-pathfinder-rp
Do you have anything that’s free? :V
OK then. Ima try a new funding model. Ahem:
You walk into a room. There’s a [insert micro-payment to unlock monster expansion pack] guarding a chest. What do you do?
😛 heheheh well appreciate the help if i ever run a offline campaign i’ll look into it. (i run a roll20 campaign) Guess the interwebs will have to do. Wish me and my google fu luck >:3
Actually, now that you’ve got me thinking about it, I know how to fix the fox my players and I keep forgetting about.
Oh? Do tell!