Recently started a new campaign, and the more I think about all the differences from what I'm used to, the more I feel like documenting it. For one thing, this will be the first full campaign I've ever been DM for. But there are many other factors at play.
-The game is gestalt, something I've never done before. It will be a struggle to figure out appropriate challenges, though I did limit it to a single class each side and only one prestige class total.
-The party is all evil, with an ultimate goal to destroy existence. Hopefully their shared religion will keep them together.
-Rotating DM. I'm in charge, but all the players will take turns at the helm, and each respective DM runs his character even while controlling the action.
-The game is being played online in a chat room. I've done this before, but it's always a struggle to handle tactical positioning.
-Despite gestalt, we have no true arcanist (just a bard who's switching to Warchanter ASAP) and no dedicated tank. What we do have is two divine casters, two super stealthy characters, and every single person with ToB maneuvers and a recovery mechanic for them. We basically have no super-powered cannons, but between healing and maneuvers can literally fight all day. The first session saw 5 combats (total of 25 enemies), and the party still had barely cut into its daily reserves.
The party of "heroes," listed below. Started at level 3.
Spoiler:
Dolorito Montojo ("Pain"), NE Human Bard/Gladiator*. Uses a maneuver recovery mechanic based on Intimidate and Diplomacy checks.
Tanis Galleck, NE Human Rogue/Swordsage
Dais Araneae (me), NE Whisper Gnome Cloistered Cleric/Ninja of the Sublime Way**
"Sir," NE Half-Giant Favored Soul/Martial Hexblade***. Specializes in tripping and setting sun throws with whips.
*Homebrew Fighter kit, I improved all Fighters. Gets options for SA, limited maneuvers, evasion, and eventually Rogue special abilities.
**Homebrew Ninja class, like a mix of swordsage, original ninja, and monk with some new stuff, too. Link in sig.
***I basically removed spells, familiar, spellcraft; added warblade maneuvers/stances, martial lore. Altered feat selections, too. Disciplines: SS, DM, SH.
The funniest moment of the first session:
Spoiler:
Tanis is taunting the main foe, a mounted Barbarian/Fighter, who angrily declares how deadly he is with his lance. Sensing danger for the loudmouth, Dolorito readies to grease the ground he charges over. I move in the way, saying he'll have to run me over first. Grease spell goes off, Mustafa (his mule mount) crosses safely, continues on to me. I initiate counter charge, barely win, and at Sir's suggestion, send them back to the grease slick, which they promptly slip on and fall prone! Some devastating charge! Other than that, though, one of the best parts of the fight was that Tanis got his commupence every time he ran his mouth, as the NPCs proceeded to roll very well, critting twice. Eventually the whole party was telling him to shut up.
Tomorrow Dolorito's player will be running the dungeon, we'll see how that goes. It'll be fun for me to go all out with my character this time, no need to worry about "the DMPC overshadowing the others."
*Sigh* Ever since some very bad experiences with some very bad people, gaming with a group I loathed just for the sake of having a game only to ultimately leave in anger and frustration anyway, I've subscribed to a strict policy of "not doing that again." And since then, I've had to go without any D&D at all for fairly long stretches, and avoid otherwise awesome games because of one or two human scumbags that I know would ruin the experience.
Spoiler:
About half a year ago, I had a very vocal, angry "breakup" with my good friend's online D&D community, because of two particular people in it who had spent the better part of the year I was there hammering me every chance they got. I'm talking name calling, false accusations that they kept spewing no matter how much I and said friend disproved and denounced them, interrupting a whole night's RP to get in shouting matches with me, and just generally stressing me out. Final straw came when I was trying to RP my character as I thought he would act, even though it out of game I knew it was a really bad idea (trying to escape from jail after being wrongly imprisoned for saving a mugging victim but only being locked away for one week). The said persons proceeded to call me an idiot and mock me the whole time. Not my character mind you, ME. The salt to the wound was the fact that jackoff A was the player of the mugger I stopped, who had gotten out of jail early on an "insanity defense" and jackass B played the guards that came on the scene to break up the fight at the most convenient of times -- with the victim having fled and me in the middle of assaulting the criminal.
So, anyway. One of my characters in that community was part of a villain party, and a character I genuinely loved to play. He was a bodyguard, very serious, and had a great motif going with his dual heavy shields, and sorcerer casting for stuff like wings of cover and benign transposition to protect the party and control the front line. The party he was in kind of collapsed after I left, partly because he was a more important component of the group than I thought, and partly because jackoff B had a character in the group and started showing up infrequently, as my friend told me. My friend told me this, because he wanted me back to play my character, and he really wanted to focus on the party's plotline finally. I had to say no, much as I wanted to play Saval once again. I just know being in the same party with that other guy will make me miserable, and partly it's the principle of the matter. I'm not so desperate for a good game that I'm going to go "crawling back," so to speak. The jerk was still trashing me two months after I had fully left the group (I occasionally check their boards,and at that particular moment had been considering giving reasons for my various characters' sudden disappearances, to give some kind of "closure"), so clearly nothing has changed.
In the end, I'm proud of myself for not engaging in what I can only consider mental masochism, but at the same time...my moral high ground sure has a bitter taste in the air.
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