Wicked Witches

I want an wicked witch for my next game session and I have been playing with the RM2 RoCoII witch profession.

This is quite easily one of the most powerful professions I have ever seen!

In my world spell multipliers are as rare as hen’s teeth. This means that power points are not overly abundant. Permanent magic items are not common either including rune paper. It does exist and the characters do have a few runes (they are all about 5th level) but there is not much of it about.

The witch can create their own potions, spell infused candles and as they are hybrids they can use Symbolic Ways to create standing stones and Rune Mastery to create runes. One ton stones are not actually that uncommon if you live out in the wilds. That gives the witch access to some home made daily items even if they are low level and not movable.

The runes as I have said are hard to make without the rune paper but if they have some then they are easier to make than standing stones and more potable.

Candles and potions though are easy to manufacture and carry around.

I am extremely tempted to give the witch some candles of Sleep V or Sleep VII and let the characters walk off with them. That is going to do their heads in for a while as I am making them roll resistance rolls almost every evening!

This profession can easily have almost unlimited low level magic. Power points can be burned using their most powerful magic as they will have tons of low level stuff just lying around.

I am thinking along the lines of a pretty high level witch as a sole adversary against 5 5th level characters. I am now thinking that I may have to tone down my NPC or they will eat the party alive (you can interpret that last sentence as you wish).

Have any of you use the Witch as a single Foe?

p.s. The boggle-eyed witch is back just because she freaks BriH out!

Which Witch?

In my game most villages will have access to a spell caster. These spell casters will often be the local witch or wiseman/woman.

I know there is a Witch RM2 profession that works with RMC but for me I have found that the Sorcerer hybrid is the perfect fit for this role.

The sorcerer has access to the closed healing lists which fits with the idea of turning to the wise woman when there little hope of normal healing.

The sorcerer also has access to their own base lists which are great for putting ‘curses’ on people in the form of inducing neuroses.

Demon summoning and control is also great for requests for real revenge.

All in all the sorcerer is a great all rounder for the local villagers to rely on.

The point of this is to suggest to you to try creating an NPC sorcerer, dump the professional name and stick them in a hovel on the edge of a village.

There have been a few references this year about healers. How simply using them as a bolt on to the PC party is a cliche, how one can do more with them. What I am suggesting here is how about making the only healer available to the party a hag or a crazy old man in a hovel in the centre of the woods?

Meet the party’s new healer!

Not making the healer an attached part of the party means that the party now have to think strategically about their health and their healing.

I’m Your Greatest Fan!

I was thinking about NPCs today. In particular about NPCs that join the party. I know some GMs like to throw in an NPC healer just because RM is so bloody dangerous that someone needs to keep the characters alive.

I am not a fan of NPC healers. I like having an NPC to give me a voice in the party. I am not sure that is always a good thing.

So, I am there happily thinking about NPCs and suddenly thought “There is a plot idea!” Imagine an NPC that is so entranced by one of the PCs that not only do they want to be in the band but they want to get rid of the others so they can have the PC to themselves.

So I am thinking along the lines of a cuckoo in the nest sort of plot with the NPC as the cuckoo. This could slowly ferment and bubble away under the skin. You could always have the NPC run short of herbs just when they get to which ever PC is closest (emotionally) to the ‘target PC’, or happen to ‘not hear’ requests for healing if it is a chaotic situation.

How soon before you reach a crisis if the healer withdraws their support?

This is an off the cuff thought this morning but scarily this is the second post I have done where the Healer is the bad guy.

Does that say something about me or should we not go there? 🙂

The NPCs of Daggerdale

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My players have been working their way through the Doom of Daggerdale module. This was one of the things I have converted over to Rolemaster. Not only did I have to convert Hook Horrors and the Nightshade/Wood Wose creatures but there are three significant NPCs in Daggerdale. These are Randle Morn, Caldoran The Razor and Tren Hoemfor.

The first that the Players meet is Randle Morn the displaced Constable of Daggerfalls, the traditional ruler of the town and Dagerdale. According to the module Randle is a 7th level fighters/6th level thief. In my conversion I have made him a 10th level Rogue. This gives him the strength in combat as well as the breadth of skills. You can use the standard generic NPCs for him and just give him +5 Chain mail (AT14), +10 full shield (+35/+25), a +5 long sword and a +10 long bow. In my world these are all superior quality non-magical weapons. I chose to give him the leadership and public speaking skills required to inspire a band of 200 men to continue to fight a partisan war against the Black Network.

Tren Hoemfor is a D&D 7th level fighter. This translates into a Rolemaster 10th level fighter with Chain (AT13), a +10 broad sword and two interesting magic items.

The first is a Cloak of Displacement. I have made this a Daily Item that casts Displacement I once per day (5th level Guises, Illusionist Base). I made this decision because I did not want to introduce a magical item into the game that I would regret if it fell into the players hands!

The second item is a Ring of the Ram. This ring in D&D does 1, 2 or 3d6 damage in the form of a ramming attack depending on how many charges are used. My version is again a daily item embedded with Vacuum I (3rd level Gas Destruction, Sorcerer Base) three times a day this  delivers a single impact critical severity B. I thnk the damage it delivers is slightly less than the D&D version but it does not have a limited number of charges so on balance I think it is on a par.

The third and final NPC is Caldoran the Razor. I am not going to give you his complete stats but a general outline. In D&D he is a 6th level Mage. I have made him a 10th level human Archmage. The interesting thing about archmages is that they can pick their ten base lists from any profession and any realm. I this case I chose the Alchemist list Liquid Gas Skills that enables him to create potions. The eaty of this list is that it allows him to create potions. I have then given him a substantial stock of potions from his own spells (1st to 3rd level and those of his allies. What I have aimed for is to massively extend his pool of powerpoints and therefore how dangerous a foe he is without having to resort to giving him powerful magic items. Potions are inherently single use and in someways force players into making choices. If they use the potion now then it is gone or save it until they really need it. As it is they have no way of telling what any of these potions do without testing them the most basic way of holding your nose and swallowing it down.

I am a big fan of low level spells. I think there are some really cool powers in there that often get over looked by bigger and more powerful spells. Another option is of course you can give potions to somebody else and there is no skill involved in use it. In Rolemaster you need a certain skill to invoke a rune or scroll. Potions are just glug it down and hope for the best!

As it is Calderan is still alive and kicking and a danger to the PCs so I cannot go into much more detail. Once he is done for I will share what his stock of potions was and how he used them.

Who Am I? I’m 24601!

OK, So I am not Jean Valjean. I’m not even French. Here is a little story for you that got me thinking about NPCs in the world around the party and could be useful to DnD DMs moving over to Rolemaster.

I took up fencing with Sabre and Epee after the London 2012 Olympics. I started with Sabre but after six months or so I tried Epee and for me it was everything I was looking for in a sword fight.

Three months ago I took up horse riding again. I did it for a few years as a teenager but gave it up when I was about 14. They say that at that age boys either give up horse riding or turn super competitive. I obviously was one of the former not the latter.

Tomorrow I am going running, just for fitness. I swore I would only go running when I saw a happy jogger. They always look in pain to me but I am getting fatter by the week and need to do something as I am 47 in three weeks time and staying fit is not getting any easier.

Back in February I was going to a gaming weekend with a friend and I commented that with the fencing and new horseriding hobby, if I could find an archery club near me I could be a first level fighter by the time I am 50. My friend replied that I was probably higher level than that as a Computer Technician (a SpaceMaster profession).

He was probably right but what level am I and what level are the normal people in the world around the player characters?

In DnD most people are 0 level human, 1d6 hit points, AC 10 as I remember. Things are a litte different in Rolemaster. Rolemaster has a profession (class) called ‘No Profession’ and that is a sort of generic person. If you really needed to detail someone because they have become important to the story then unless they are one of the player character professions (or an evil variant) then the No Profession is where you would start.

But at what level? For most people that the party meet, who cares? You do not need to roll every waiter and barmaid the players meet nor every blacksmith or horse dealer. I would only consider creating NPCs that are going to have a direct impact on the players story and will have to make skill rolls or combat rolls and the like.

I normaly work on this schedule. People who are just living their normal lives whatever that may be with no significant threats, I give them one level for every five years beyond the age of 16. for people living a harder life or with regular existential threats then it is one level for every four years. This is where I would put your normal gate/town or wall guard and even farmers living on the very edge of civilisasation. For people who are actively going into dangerous situations on a daily basis such as caravan guards, sell swords or tyrants bodyguards then it is one level for every three years.

So here are some concrete examples.

A courtesan, early 20s, would be 2nd level with a couple of skill ranks in performing arts type skills such as dance or playing an instrument, social and political history, heraldry and etiquette. I imagine that would take up most of their development points but you may want to buy a single rank in dagger if it is that sort of world. The character would be useful to the party in helping them navigate the dangers of a political campaign and may have skills they lack.

A farmer, 56 years old, raising crops and live stock. Here we have an 8th level NPC with skills in various ‘Lores’, herb lore, flora lore (so he knows what to plant where and when), fauna lore (so he knows what to feed each animal and what predators are local), animal handling, loading, driving, some animal healing. Some performing arts, a bit of dance and a musical instrument, useful for attracting a wife and a few ranks in weapon skills. There probably have been a few instances of banditry in the area, joining a posse or driving off or hunting wolves and that sort of thing. He may even have served in a peasant levy at some time. I doubt he has a sword but spears are good all round weapons, easy to make and do not need much metal, bows are likewise and both are good for hunting.

The guys stood at the city gates or patrolling the walls could vary. In a war torn area a guard in his early thirties could be 5th level in a peaceful region just 3rd. If the same guard had been in the rank and file of an army in a protracted war then he could be as high as 6th level.

In these three examples I would make the courtesan and the farmer ‘No Profession’ but the guards would be fighters. Character Law has a table of all the core professions with typical armour types, and skills and even the typical number of spell lists and to what level.

So what am I? Well I’m nearly 47, living a peaceful not particularly stressful or dangerous life so by my own reckoning I would be a 7th level No Profession or IT professional (in RM parlance that would probably make me a rogue or thief depending on your opinion of IT guys)

Khelben “Blackstaff” Arunsun

Khelben “Blackstaff” Arunsun is a major player in the culture of Waterdeep. He is described in the source material as interfering in events often years into the future. To this end ‘my’ Blackstaff is going to be a Seer.

The sourcebooks describe him as just a ‘magic user’ but Rolemaster gives you plenty of different types of magic user to choose from. There are three realms of magic. The Eassence is Mystra’s Weave, Channeling is power derived from your god or deity and mentalism is that inner magic controlled by the mind of the caster. We are in Jedi territory with the mentalists!

Eassence is proably the most overtly powerful magic, this is where you will find your fireballs and lightning bolts and such. The three core magic users of this realm are the magician, illusionist and alchemist.

Channeling includes your cleric, animist (druidic type) and the healer. All Channeling casters have access to some level of healing magic with Clerics being able to raise the dead and healers instantly healing the wounded by taking the injury on themselves and then healing themselves with their magic.

Khelben
Khelben “Blackstaff”Arunsun

Mentalists focus on the mind and bodily control for the most part. Their magic rarely effects more than one target at once and can be more subtle. The mentalists have a healer called a Lay healer and a Seer who can work with past and future knowledge. This is where I want to put Khelben Arunsun.

Don’t think for one second that a Seer is a push over. Mentalists are great ones for Telekinesis and he can easily pick up objects and throw them across the room with devastating effect (don’t think vase of flowers, think ripping up a cobble stone and throwing that 300′).

There were more options for my Khelben. In addition to those nine options Rolemaster has three ‘hybrid’ magic users that straddle different realms to give us a sorcerer, mystic and astrologer. These are really fun to play and Mystic was a really strong contender when considering this NPC. In Rolemaster terms Khelben is 39th level which does give a lot of scope.

It was while I was developing Khelben that it occured to me that although creating NPCs is a great way to learn the basics of any roleplaying game, for a new game master creating a 39th level character is not the best way to start. I would strongly recommend creating a fist full of lower level characters before tackling anything like these more powerful NPCs.

I would also say for NPCs don’t fall into the trap of always going for Magicans and Clerics as stock magic users. If you mix it up a bit and use the entire spectrum then you players will never know quite what is going to hit them next.

Roleplaying software review Rolemaster Character Utility

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One of my favourite pieces of software as a GM is the Rolemaster Character Utility or RCU. This is a piece of freeware (you can download it from here Rolemaster Character Utility full) that you can share and anyone can use. This is the windows version but I have run it under WINE on linux boxes without a problem.

What the programme does is allow you to step through the character creation process from name and profession, race, stats and skills in a wizard style interface. Every time you make a choice it eleminates things that no longer apply, so chose a mentalist and all the channeling and essence spell lists drop off the lists. Chose a halfling and all the height and weight charts adapt to give sensible results for halflings.

Once a character has been created it can be saved and recalled to do the leveling up including stat gain rolls, spell aquisitions and hits and skill. It automatically calculates level bonuses, stat bonuses and updates the spells available.

You can when developing a character go back and keep the same basic character but change their profession or race to see if they would be better as a different realm, profession, race etc.

It is easy enough to set the GM specific optional rules such as if you allow characters to reroll paticularly low stats, whether to add stat bonus on to spell aquisition rolls and such. Everything is optional and you can just skip things that do not apply to your game. When you are buying skills it shows you just about every possible skill with the correct costs for that class. The programme was written back in 1999 and seems to include every profession, skill, spell list and background option from every book published up until that point. In my case this inlcudes many skills and spells that I do not have in my game but that is not an issue.

Creating a 1st level character takes about 15 minutes for a spell user, slightly less for a realm of arms character and then leveling up takes about 5minutes to 10 minutes depending on the level as I find some are more significant than others especially 4th level and 9th.

The only thing this doesn’t do is spend the points for the coming level, the ‘learning’ development points.

The output is clear and simple to understand and all the ‘DruTam’ character sheets in this post were created using this programme. If you are playing RM2/RMC and you have not used this before then I would seriously consider giving it a whorl. It looks dated because it is but it will save you hours upon hours in creating interesting and fully developed NPCs in any ongoing game.

 

Finished Rolemaster NPC (Little Miss Defensive)

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I have been thinking abou this NPC for a while and I know what she looks like, how she acts, how she fights and the nature of her magic. All that really remained were the actual skills on the page and which profession best realised the concept.

She has a working title of DruTam as part of her original concept was a mix of Drusilla from Season 2 Buffy the Vampire Slayer and River Tam from Firefly/Serenity. the actual character name will be decided when her twin brother is created and has a name.

The dilemma with DruTam was always that she she could easily be one of several classes. What I have done is create her as each class, Astrologer, Seer, Monk and Mystic. We have the same stats, potentials and background options (all skill with magic and all ended up as stat bonuses) The only variable was the character profession. That of course changed the stat costs, professional level bonuses and to some degree the spell lists available.

All the character sheets are below, the one marked Ch is the character sheet with stats equipment etc, skills is the full list of skills and totals and the spells is the list of spell lists and actual spells.

None of these characters can cast spells at first level. The lists chosen just do not not have first level spells on them, except for the monk who simply did not make the spell gain roll. She is capable of defending herself as descussed in this post on her kick boxing fighting style. She also has an interesting mix of predictive skills in weather watching, stargazing and divination. By changing the two spell lists she has aquired you could easily make her far more proactive if that was your choice.

It should be noted that I do not use stat bonuses on spell gain rolls. This would make a significant difference as she would possibly have had four or five more development points per level to play with.

I think the most agressive character here is the mystic but the best fit for my game and the party I have in mind will be the Seer.

As an aside I have also created another version of this NPC but in this case I have used slightly more mainstream rules, stripped out the combat abilities and taken her all the way to 20th level. I will be submitting her with her story to the Guild Companion this week. If they publisher her then I will post a link to the article, if not I will share her here. She has a sligthly diferent name but you would recognise her.

How many hands?

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I have a party of adventurers clearing out an underground complex. Most of the fighting has been sword on sword against intelligent foes. In the first session of the new game we only had three PCs and no NPCs. There will be another regular player who could not make the first session so we have four PCs. I want to introduce an NPC to the party.

As a GM I am not a huge fan of NPCs in the party. I don’t do accents so they can become a bit bland and I have seen NPCs save the entire party when they got themselves stupidly slaughtered (I was one of the party in most instances of this) and it begs the question of why didn’t the NPCs just do the job without the party in the first place.

I also dislike the NPC healer as that just encourages either the GM to fix things when they get broken or for the party to be completely wrecklous in their battles. Why not the NPC will sort out the mess.

I don’t like NPCs who end up as mouthpiece of the GM proding the party in the right direction when they get stuck or coming up with the right solution just as the party are about to get themselves killed.

You can gather I am really not a fan of NPCs but this time I think the party needs one. The great thing is that the main healer is one of the party and of the three party members so far all three potentially have access to healing magic to a lesser or greater degree. Theymay not know the spell lists yet but it is always there as an option.

As I have a new PC entering the story I am temped to give him a twin sister. This one is slightly damaged and knows no other languages than a ‘twin’ language that only she and her bother know. That gets me off the hook with the NPC being asked to come up with ideas and I have been know to even forget there is an NPC in the party for hours at a time so if she is effectively mute then so much the better.

So I have been toying with this idea of the hardly ever speaking twin sister of one of the heroes. I have a few ideas for her and as I have been bringing them together then quite an interesting character is emerging. So why would a hero take his slightly damaged twin sister out on monster filled adventures? Because they fight really well together is my answer. So I have to make her really useful to have around in a fight but I don’t want her to be killing everything and making the party redundant. So how about makingher defensively really strong? There are some nice parrying weapons in Arms Law like the Shang, a parrying scimitar.  When not used to attack it gives +30DB. So a Shang in one hand, a small shield in the other, a bit of a quickness bonus and you have a DB of nearly 60. Not that impressive. Now I noticed in Arms Law that there are descriptions of how many attacks a person can do in one round depending on what weapon and shield combinations they have. The most extreme is probably the single handed weapon, thrown weapon and shield. The idea is that the attacker can swap their weapn into the shield hand momenarily, throw a knife and the get back into position to defend with the shield. There are minuses on both attacks (-20 on the single handed attack and -20% on the thrown attack).

We are probably all falimiar with seeing Broadsword (LH) as a skill as the player is learning the weapon as part of a two weapon combo. Why could I not learn Martial Arts (strikes) rank#1 (kicks only). So this character is going for the kick boxer look. I wouldn’t have a problem with that if a player came to me with it.

Going back to Little Miss Defensive (LMD) and now we have a Shang in one hand, a small shield in the other and martial arts. (in our gaming circles we call skill ranks ‘boxes’ after the record sheet so that is what I am going to use here.  So lets give LMD one box in martial arts kicks at adolescence and another at appenticeship and a +15 stat bonus. That doesn’t seem too excessive. Total OB +25. She can parry with that, not attack with her Shang giving another +30DB, her small shield gives another +15DB and lets give her a reasonable Quickness and now we are looking at a total DB of maybe -90. that is a fairly hefty DB for a 1st level character. I would give her at least one box in using the Shang but the total development cost is one box a level in martial arts and a one off purchase of a box in shang. She is not going to attack with the Shang so I don’t feel the need to buy two weapon combo. I am not buying any armour skills so the total cost is pretty small and I have not really reduced my choices in character profession either.

roundhouseSo so far I have LMD who parries away like mad tying up the foe while her brother does the killing. That works. There is one particularly cinematic shot that I love and that is the martial artist with their leg elevated in a poised round house kick slowly uncoiling and standing at ease if you know what I mean.

I have not go so far as to rolling any dice yet or developing LMD any further yet but if any other GMs read this would you allow a character to use a parrying wealong, a shield and attack with a kick all in the same round?