Arena Day

Amazing Triangle · Dec 24, 2005

Hello all,
Currently I am at a thought cross roads. I have designed a Gladiator Arena into my game world. Problem is I am not sure what kind of opponents to include. I am currently making Level 10-12 characters, if anyone would help with making or suggesting characters that would be great. There are really two restrictions: first, that they have no magic of any kind (or least can not use any inside the arena grounds e.g. +1 swords or +2 gloves of stuff are not allowed), and second, that they have no more than 4 of their 10 levels be monsterous (make it some what normal). I really don't care about the base stats it is the concepts that I am trying to come up with. New class twists to make great arena combatants. Also any intresting monsters to battle would be equally helpful. Thanks in advance to anyone who posts.

takasi · Dec 24, 2005

Complete Warrior has some good info on gladiator arenas.

You should pick up Dungeon 128 and read through "The Champion's Belt". If you go to the Paizo boards you'll find a thread in there call "More Warbands for Champion's Belt" that might help you.

http://paizo.com/dungeon/messageboards/ageOfWorms/moreWarbandsForChampionSBelt

Just make sure you're not a PLAYER in Age of Worms...

Amazing Triangle · Dec 24, 2005

I actually have read all that material. I just was looking for combatants in said arena because my players are usually one step ahead of me in the know it is coming department. So I was looking for some creativity, some spice as it were.

takasi · Dec 24, 2005

You've already seen my posts on the Paizo boards? There's three new statted warbands there, and 24 recommendations (not statted) for more.

Mouseferatu · Dec 24, 2005

Amazing Triangle said:
and second, that they have no more than 4 of their 10 levels be monsterous (make it some what normal).

You might want to rethink this restriction. Some of the most popular gladiatorial events in ancient Rome were "beast fights," where gladiators (or sometimes helpless prisoners) would fight lions or tigers or other animals captured in the various provinces Rome considered its own.

In a D&D world, the options for beast fights are limitless. I had a gladiatorial plotline in my own campaign a few months ago, and the players were pitted against "giant man-eating albino apes." (Dire apes in terms of statistics, but made more exotic for the gladiatorial feel of it.)

Amazing Triangle · Dec 24, 2005

Mouseferatu said:
In a D&D world, the options for beast fights are limitless. I had a gladiatorial plotline in my own campaign a few months ago, and the players were pitted against "giant man-eating albino apes." (Dire apes in terms of statistics, but made more exotic for the gladiatorial feel of it.)

I was planning some beast fights I meant in terms of combantants. As in I really didn't want to have Sand Giants as competitors even half-dragons were kind of outside the bounds I was thinking along this line with my restriction.

Amazing Triangle · Dec 24, 2005

takasi said:
There's three new statted warbands there, and 24 recommendations (not statted) for more.

I was looking for individual duelists to add, I wan't looking for warbands yet. I like the idea and will probably use it for my second time through it.

Amazing Triangle · Dec 24, 2005

These are some of the neat examples others have given me to use as examples:

The Net Brawler - Fighter with all the feats for expertise, trip, disarm, and uses the net to tangle their foe and humiliate him before they finish him with a dagger.

The Mimmic - A changeling warrior who impersonates his foe. A good opponent in team battles, when the Mimmic can get some easy kills on teammates in the confusion. Works well as a Fighter/Rogue combo

Draco, the wild Dragonling! (A Halfling or Gnome Barbarian/Sorcerer1/Dragon Deciple) Full of rage, Draco can't even speak a language (that the crowd can understand). What a savage, but he fights just as savagely as he looks!

Big sword guy: (Fighter/Major Titan Bloodline) Monkey grip and Use oversized weapon (Ex) he uses a Huge greatsword for -2

Halfling thrower (Racial Paragon Halfling/Rogue/Master Thrower) Can you say touch attack that does 1d6+3 (granted you give up your str to make it a touch attack but it makes it a sure hit and if you bluff before it as a move action) +sneak attack dice

takasi · Dec 25, 2005

Amazing Triangle said:
I was looking for individual duelists to add, I wan't looking for warbands yet. I like the idea and will probably use it for my second time through it.

Did you read my post? Two of the three bands are made up entirely of a single duelist. Check out "The Beast" - a shifter fighter 1 / barbarian 5 / frenzied berserker 4 with a vicious greataxe.

I also setup rules for building combatants.

Numion · Dec 26, 2005

Mouseferatu said:
You might want to rethink this restriction. Some of the most popular gladiatorial events in ancient Rome were "beast fights," where gladiators (or sometimes helpless prisoners) would fight lions or tigers or other animals captured in the various provinces Rome considered its own.

Going a bit further, why no magic? I think it would make the matches that much more interesting. Or at least, if I got to choose, I'd choose to go see a magic included match vs. non-magic one

Age of Worms adventure path has a good gladiatorial adventure in it - it might be good for insipiration, even though it has adventuring groups fighting each other + some beasties.