Post by meribson on Jul 26, 2018 1:29:28 GMT
Great episode, as usual. What I loved most about it though is the surprise question. More specifically, the NPCs it made me think of. Personally, I have 2 candidates for Favorite NPC: a paladin and a dragon.
The Paladin, known only by his nickname (Slim Jim), met the party as they descended into the sewers of a megacity. He was already down there, and had just slain a group of zombies. Greeted the party, as cheerful and noble a knight as you could imagine, especially upon seeing a fellow member of the Pelorian faith (the party cleric). His introduction went something like:
"Greetings fellows! It is good to see others patrolling these dark undercorridors to keep our fair city safe. Everyone calls me Slim Jim," lifts up the visor of his helmet, revealing a bare skull as he scratches at his forehead, "I never understood why."
The cleric, seeing that he is undead, draws forth his holy symbol and bellows, "TURN UNDEAD!" Slim Jim drops his helmet, draws his sword as he spins around and shouts, "Undead! Where? Where?!"
Long and short of it, Slim Jim was an awakened skeleton that was completely and utterly convinced that not only was he alive, but he was a paladin of Pelor. Pelor, of course, gave the deluded fool no power whatsoever. Olidamara on the other hand, thought that it was hilarious. Most of the gods agreed with Oli.
The other NPC was a young adult blue dragon who came about because one of my players was being a munchkin and talking about how to easily get around all the tricks and abilities for a blue dragon that age while I was sitting right there. So I decided that I was going to really throw him for a loop. Did away with all of the sorcerer spells, swapped age-based Strength and Intelligence bonuses, and gave him 10 levels in the Alchemist class. On top of that, I modeled his personality after Varrick from Legend of Korra. So you have a young adult dragon far more intelligent than most great wyrms, with the personality of an eccentric businessman.
There was a war between dragons going on, and he stayed out of it by selling alchemical goods to both sides. What the party was after was a magical drinking horn said to be able to cure any injury that he had obtained through such a transaction, but the last team to go in their employer (all former PCs) had lost contact with after confirming the presence of the drinking horn. So the plan (campaign unexpectedly ended), was that the party would go in, meet with a monster that was one of the former PCs heavily mutated alchemically, who would give them a speech about how the dragon was strange and eccentric but far more dangerous than any others his age.
Partway through the speech, a loud voice would yell out from within the lair, "SNOOOKIE!!! YOUR MAST********** BREAK'S OVER, GET BACK IN HERE!" Senoke (the mutated PC) would growl/sigh and lead the party in. He would explain that no divination could pierce through the walls of the lair, because the dragon had lined them with a foot of lead. Simple, blocks all forms of divination, can't be dispelled, and much cheaper than hiring a couple dozen wizards. Upon reaching the dragon's lab, Senoke would explain why the party was there, the dragon would say that he was done studying it and they could have it.
But if the party pushed for more, like the mutated PCs, the dragon (who as a character quirk was always licking the odd tooth) would calmly and seriously tell the PCs, "Do not be fooled by my pleasant demeanor. I am willing to let you run off with my unneeded cast offs, but take the subjects of continuing experiments, and I will forcefully remind you that all else aside: I am still a dragon."
If the party didn't get the message, he would lick a tooth before unleashing a breath...of acid. A good quarter to third of his teeth were replaced with false teeth containing assorted potions he'd made.
Basically, the dragon was a very kooky individual that coveted knowledge, specifically alchemy, rather than gold or treasure. Bit of a friendly mad scientist type.