A character I probably won't get to play

[Particle_Man]

I wanna play a soulknife and I don't care that they are weak.  They are like the non-psionic class in the psionics book, and they get a free glowing mindsword like a jedi.

So human, dodge, psionic dodge, mobility, spring attack, up the walls, ghost strike, cloak dance, exotic wp bastard sword (speed of thought, w focus, g w focus are free).

spot, listen, hide, move silently, autohypnosis, tumble (don't need concentration as much as I will leave my psionic focus on all day).

Kinda like a 1st edition thief.  Harrier activities.  Run and hide after the big strike, etc.

[Particle_Man]

This is a little different as it is more a "campaign" I will never get to play in, as it requires all of the other players to buy in to the concept.

Basically, take Deadlands (Classic would work best here, I think) and have *every* player character be part of the same native tribe, have all of them follow the Way of the Brave (no modern tech, no guns, etc.) and be braves or shamans or the like (someone with Taletelling, to help reduce fear levels, native magics to help people out and heal them, etc.) and be of the same faith and avoid the dangerous stuff like mad science, hex slinging, etc.

It would be a very different game of Deadlands, I think.  Maybe a more successful one.

[webservice@growbiggerpenis.com]

This is a little different as it is more a "campaign" I will never get to play in, as it requires all of the other players to buy in to the concept.

Basically, take Deadlands (Classic would work best here, I think) and have *every* player character be part of the same native tribe, have all of them follow the Way of the Brave (no modern tech, no guns, etc.) and be braves or shamans or the like (someone with Taletelling, to help reduce fear levels, native magics to help people out and heal them, etc.) and be of the same faith and avoid the dangerous stuff like mad science, hex slinging, etc.

It would be a very different game of Deadlands, I think.  Maybe a more successful one.

Augustine and I actually discussed this very same idea a while back.

edit: I personally think players would be more comfortable with playing as the Sioux Nations rather than the Coyote Confederacy. Also, we joked the players would be labelled as Ravenites, if only through sheer dumb luck.

double edit: And speaking of aboriginal roleplay settings/campaigns, may I suggest How We Came to Live Here?

[Espie]

If I recall we lamented about how we would be unable to find enough players who would also really enjoy this setting.

[Particle_Man]

Hmmmm . . .   

[webservice@growbiggerpenis.com]

Hmmmm . . .   

I have the PDF to HWCtLH if you'd like, Boston.

[Particle_Man]

Sure!

[Particle_Man]

I am looking over 3rd ed. GURPS Lite and so here is my 100 point, GURPS lite (3rd ed) only wizard.  I wanted to avoid accusations of cheese, so this wizard will not have any stat below 10 and will not have more than 40 points of disadvantages.

ST/DX/HT 10, IQ 13 (30 points) 5'6" 85 llbs

Advantages: Magery 3 (35 points), Ridiculous Luck (60 points)

Disadvantages: Dead Broke (-25 points), Skinny (-5 points), Impulsive (-10 points).

Quirks (to be determined) (-5 points)

Skills: 1 point each in Occultism (12), Research (12) and the 14 spells listed in GURPS Lite (Create Fire, Daze, Detect Magic, Fireball, Foolishness, Haste, Ignite Fire, Lend Health, Lend Strength, Light, Minor Healing, Shape Fire, Shield, & Sleep) (Each at 14), 4 points in Spell Throwing (12).  (20 points)
 
So a lucky but desperately poor wizard, perhaps a promising apprentice that barely survived the disasterous critical failure of their master summoning something powerful?

[Particle_Man]

Since some people are trying Scion, maybe I should try a Scion character.  I like the Egyptian mythos (the one and only time I played the game before was with Bastet as the divine parent, mainly because I like cats) so I would stick with that.  Let's try Osiris as the divine (yet adopted) parent.  So the "parent" that rejected me?  Maybe Isis (since she seems to expect absolute obedience from her kids, I would only have to not play ball a few times before being renounced, and it would explain why Osiris would know about me).

So, perhaps a smooth-talking private detective with an interest in justice?  (Judge as "nature")  Conviction 4, Order 3 for virtues.  For birthrights I would go for a 3 point guide and a 2 point relic (for access to the justice purview later on, as well as the ability to communicate with my guide at will).  A crown could work for this, they are fairly iconic.  A hat might also do, for disguise purposes.

For abilities, I would priorities Social over Mental over Physical, and max out charisma, manipulation (leave appearance at 1 - he wouldn't stand out until he starts talking), have the mental stats at 3, and stamina 3, str/dex 2.

I would not start with boons yet, but plan to take justice and heku boons later.  But 3 points in epic charisma and epic manipulation, plus 1 point each in epic appearance, wits, intelligence and perception, would be good.  That's 10 free knacks (Benefit of the Doubt, Inspirational Figure, Never Say Die, Overt Order, Stench of Guilt, Takes One to Know One, Serpent's Gaze, Unfailing Recognition, Perfect Memory, Instant Investigator).

For abilities I dunno, but would likely try to spread them out jack-of-all-trades style and then bump up Osiris's favoured ones to 2 (so presence, politics, awareness, fortitude, investigation, and command).  Mainly because I am not sure where I would be going with these yet.

For bonus points, I would bump legend up to 4 and Command up to 3.  This guy is destined to be a great leader, maybe even (gasp) a party leader.   

So, an inspiring guy but not a fighter.  That could be a weak point for the character, depending on the game, as he would be less useful in a fight (although some of the knacks might help out) and Scion is geared at least partially towards fights.  But assuming other characters are there to be heavy-hitters, my character could fill a niche or two.

[Particle_Man]

I'm playing Mutants and Masterminds, 2nd ed., and few ideas came up.

a) The Pswashbuckler.  Take Mental Blast with the meelee weapon flaw.  Take Mind Reading with the Surface Thoughts only flaw.  Take lots of Bluff.  Go to town!

b) The Mighty Mite.  16 ranks of Shrinking + 16 ranks of Density, all permanent, = love.

c) The Fog of War.  Permanent Insubstantial 2 (gaseous) + aura of Emotion Control.

d) The Iron Angel.  Wings, Density, hey it doesn't have to make physics sense it is a freaking superhero! 

[Particle_Man]

I have more ideas on the Orc paragon (3.5 D&D).

Orc Paragon 3/Ranger 3/Horizon Walker 10/Ranger 4.

He would use the Orc Double-Ax (which is theoretically an orcish weapon, though I have never seen any orc use one) and his ranger abilities mean that he doesn't have to pump his dex to do it.  Favoured enemies would likely be elf, then dwarf.  But I don't feel like making him evil.  Maybe neutral and with a wish to wander.

"Orc Paragon" is a 3 level class from Unearthed Arcana (3.5) but can be found in the d20 srd online.  It is good for making one stronger, getting better darkvision, and getting rid of the dazzle in daylight penalty.

In theory I could get to HW 1 level earlier if I actually take the Endurance feat but that seems inelegant somehow.

[Particle_Man]

Falling back in love with the 3.5 Warlock.  I love low-paperwork mage types.  That said, I also like Book of Nine Swords and Magic of Incarnum.  I would give this Warlock the Mage's Spectacles soulmeld via a feat (this helps Spellcraft and more importantly UMD, rather nice) and the feat that lest you help dispel magic and defeat spell resistance (but the two are fueled by the same power source so I would have to decide each game day what to put the "points" into (by taking the Azurin race and a feat to get 2 more points, that brings the total to 4 (although there is a character-level based limit on how many points maximum either could have)).  From Book of Nine Swords I would take martial study and martial stance as feats to get Tumble as a class skill, Wind's Blessing (1x/encounter increase land speed by 10 for one round), and the Flame's Blessing stance (get fire resistance, and eventually immunity, based on tumble ranks).  Not sure I could take those feats at 1st level, so they might have to wait until 3rd and 6th (hard to do DM's call with no DM - this character is theoretical right now, as per the thread topic).  If so, I would likely take less ranks in Spellcraft, ameliorated slightly by having 5 ranks in Know (arcana) and the corresponding synergy bonus.  I have learned to like Entropic Warding, which means I could get by with only the invocations in the Complete Arcane book in which the Warlock originates.  I would also take craft wondrous item and craft staff, as well as extra invocation (Greater) at 18th level.

This would not be a super-powerful character but I think "Soulflame" would be a fun one.  Alas, I doubt I will play him anytime soon.

[Particle_Man]

Another one: The 3.5 15 psion/5 ectopic adept, and for all my powers known take 34 of the available 36 metacreativity powers available (using both the expanded psionics handbook and complete psionic) to shaper psions without the expanded knowledge feat. I wouldn't need incarnate (because I wouldn't have the powers that get incarnated) and I could avoid ectoplasmic swarm (for aesthetic/ethical reasons, see below).  So my psion would have no powers except metacreativity powers.

This is kinda neat, and while low powered for a psion, especially at the higher levels (since there are so few high level metacreativity powers) I don't see that as a bad thing, because most people complain that at the high levels the casters/manifesters are too powerful relative to the fighters.

Metacreativity is one of the psionic disciplines that seems truly new in the psionics book in 3rd ed.  It is not like the usual fiction psionics of telepathy, telekinesis, etc.  Also, creating astral constructs overcomes the ethical issues of summoning or creating sentient beings to do your will, and/or the aesthetic issue of animating undead creatures.  Plus the other metacreativity powers encourage one to think outside the box by McGyverying something out of ectoplasm.  While some people don't like the "only have 1 astral construct around at a time" rule introduced in complete psionic (and to be fair, druids, clerics, wizards and sorcerers have no such rule), it would force me to use the other powers more, which is to the good.

Why won't I get to play it?  Well quite simply most DMs I know don't like psionics. Some feel it is unbalanced (which it was in earlier editions of AD&D but actually is quite well-balanced in 3.5 (arguably more so than the core rule spellcasters!)).  Some don't like the "feel" of psionics in a fantasy game (fair enough - I once reskinned it as "fairy magic" and did fairly well).  Some just don't want yet another system of magic to learn after they learned the core rules system (or whatever favourite system they have, like Elements of Magic, another "point-based" magic system).

There are exceptions:  I briefly got to play a low level psion twice (once in an Eberron campaign, and once in a homebrew) and had fun both times.  But that is all so far.

Ah well.

[Particle_Man]

Speaking of 3.5, the Beguiler in phb II looks pretty fun to play as well.  Maybe I will get a chance for that one (probably more chance than playing the above psion shaper).

[Particle_Man]

Still on a 3.5 kick I guess.  I want to try an Incarnate/Cleric/Sapphire Hierarch (a kooky prestige class from Magic of Incarnum that worships a big blue rock that fell from the sky and can make predictions about the future - what's not to like?  It is like one of those old "lost colonies" on star trek that went primitive and started worshipping a powerful computer, just before James T. Kirk comes along to wreck it).  I think I would be human and the alignment restrictions pretty much guarantee a LN alignment.  Curiously, one could with a little work enter this prestige class after only one level of incarnate and three levels of cleric, which would mean some loss on the incarnate side (like while one could have soulmelds, one could not "bind" them without help from feats or spells), but also that one would basically be a cleric that lost one level of casting and most of the turn undead abilities, in exchange for an interesting prestige class and some soulmeld shaping abilities.

Some of the incarnate feats would be spent on being able to bind melds, and one on crafting arms and armour (to make more axiomatic weapons, leaving a lasting mark of law on the world).  Also, with the right feats and domains I could at first level cast SM I to get a celestial dog that lasts for 4 rounds!  Woof!

Trouble with playing it?  Well for one thing, the Big Blue Rock is in a hard-to-reach location, so if I do any travelling, I would be out of touch (and some of the SH class abilities, like getting cheap healing/other spell services (10% costs!) and access to Commune spell-like ablities require being at the temple).  Also, the SHs hate chaos the way very holy good folk hate evil, and let's face it, a lot of D&D player characters are pretty darn chaotic.  So this would have to wait for a DM that is willing to allow non-core 3.5 classes *and* a group of players that is willing to play lawful characters that are not beholden to a particular deity (aside from the big blue rock of course).  So I won't hold my breath, but I won't give up hope either.

So, Cleric 3/Incarnate 1/SH 10/Cleric 6/SH forevermore (epic).

Race: Human.  Minimum stats: Con 14 (to make sure I have Con 17 by 13th level when I need to keep up 7 soulmelds), Int 10, Wis as high as possible.
Domains: Law, Incarnum
Skills: max out Concentration, Know (arcana), Know (religion).  If available look to Diplomacy, Sense Motive and Spellcraft.  This is a bookish fellow, raised in this place, and his adventuring outside would be the first time he left the comforts of his "home".

Feats: Midnight Metamagic and Extend Spell at 1st level (+bonus feat Incarnum Spellshaping from domain).  Then Shape Soulmeld at 3rd to get Blink Shirt.  At 6th take Bonus Essentia (more of these always help).  Then Craft Arms and Armour at 9th (to make Axiomatic weapons for the world!).  Then Open Lesser Chakra (shoulders) at 12th, Double Chakra (shoulders) at 15th and Open Greater Chakra (waist) at 18th to make the best use of my three bindings.  At epic levels I would look to Open Soul Chakra, but I have never played epic so who knows what that would be like.

Favourite soulmelds: (Blink Shirt), Lightning Gauntlets, Incarnate Avatar, Bluesteel Bracers, Pauldrons of Health, Strongheart Vest, Planar Ward, Wind Cloak (eventually - replaces Lightning Gauntlets)).  Note that like cleric spells, soulmelds can be switched out daily.  Also, I would not start with all these soulmelds - this would be the "high level version".

His soulmelds are vulnerable to dispel magic, but he is still a cleric, so it is not too bad. 

To streamline the character I might take the following route, DM permitting:

There is an optional rule in Unearthed Arcana that would allow a cleric to give up turning undead and instead get the paladin's smite evil ability (or good for evil clerics) and the paladin's aura of courage.  I like that idea, but would ask the DM if I could have smite chaos instead of smite evil.  If allowed, it would stack with the SH smite chaos and would fit the theme of the character perfectly.