Age of Mortals - The Knights of Solamnia

Recruitment: 4 to 8 players with preferential seating given in the following order - 1) Players who posted in this thread, 2) Players with the Dragonlance core book, 3) New members of the forum, 4) First come first serve.

This is cumulative, meaning that a player that meets 1 & 2 would be picked over 1, and a player that had 1 & 2 & 3 would be picked over a player with 1 & 2.

Character Creation
This campaign centers around a group of Solamnic Knights in the Dragonlance setting. This implies that the entire party must be Lawful Good and follow the Oath and the Measure at all times. See the Knights of Solamnia starting on page 54 of the Dragonlance Campaign Setting for a more specifics of the order.

Ability Scores: Epic 48 Point Buy.

Hit Dice: First two hit dice are maximized. All other Hit Dice at 75%. (d4 = 3, d6 = 4.5, d8 = 6, d10 = 7.5, d12 = 9)

Races: The characters will be Civilized Humans, with the possibility of a Half-Elf character.

Classes: 6th level Gestalt characters, with special restrictions. Clerics, Fighters, Monks, Mystics, Nobles, Rangers, Rogues, Sorcerers, Urban Rangers, Wilderness Rogues, and Wizards are all possible. Other core classes are not available, either due to alignment restrictions or non-existence in the setting.

At 1st level the character takes two classes as per the Gestalt rules, and cannot advance in any other classes or prestige classes until they have met the pre-requisites for the Knight of the Crown Prestige Class. After attaining the Knight of the Crown Prestige Class, the character must continue to take one level in a Solamnic Knight Prestige Class (Crown, Sword, or Rose) at every level, in addition to one other class or prestige class. Also implies that all characters have served as Squires of the Crown.

Skills: Like the classes, there is the restriction that you must work towards the Knight of the Crown Prestige Class wherever possible. All this means here is that you must spend your first 6 to 12 (if cross class) skill points on buying 2 ranks of Diplomacy, Knowledge (religion), and Ride.

Feats: A Knight of the Crown is required to have proficiency in heavy armor, at least one martial weapon, and shields. In addition, a Knight of the Crown must also take the Honor-Bound feat from the Dragon Lance Campaign Setting.

Wealth: Each character will own four to six different magic items, 2,000 gold pieces worth of mundane equipment and spendable assets, and up to 15,000 (45,000 if taking the Noble class) gold pieces worth of non-liquid assets such as houses, farms, titles, debts owed, minor collections, artwork, jewels, etc. For characters with no desire for such wealth, they can "donate" amounts of this wealth to causes that justify their motivations in much the same way, and will be respected as such.

Two of the magic items can be worth up to 7,400 gold pieces. One of the magic items can be worth up to 27,500 gold pieces. Last, choose between 3 potions or scrolls up to 3rd level or one wand or wonderous item worth up to 2,250 gold pieces.

This post is for my houserules library file for this game. Each element stored in the attached Zip folder will be described briefly here.

Adding a Favored Class - An alternate feat for characters that want to take additional class levels, but avoid the multiclassing penalties.

Favored Environment - A feat for Rangers that don't have a specific favored enemy. I am allowing both types of Rangers in this game.

Fractional Base Bonuses - This is the method we are using for base attack and saving throws. Self Explanatory.

Gestalt Characters - This is the method we are using for classes. Self Explanatory.

Monk Fighting Styles - An options I'm leaving open.

Out-of-Turn Dodge - Amendment to the Dodge feat.

Paladins (Freedom/Honor/Slaughter/Tyranny) - Additional Core classes. Each serves a specific deity as a holy warrior. These are not available for Player Characters, and are each unique to one specific character in the setting.

Savage Bard - Additional core class.

Stable Characters and Recovery - Change to the core rules method for stabilizing when dropped below 0.

Urban Ranger/Urban Tracking - Additional core class with a modified version of Track and other changes.

Whirling Frenzy - Variant rage that some Barbarians may have.

Wilderness Rogue - Additional core class.

This post contains the short list of supplemental rules allowed for this campaign. This is In-Addition to the core rules and the Dragon Lance Campaign Setting books.

Book of Exalted Deeds: General and Metamagic feats (but not Exalted feats), and some equipment.

Draconomicon: Feats by approval, some equipment, the Dragonrider, Dragonslayer, and Dragonstalker and Talon of Tiamat prestige classes.

Complete Warrior: Feats by approval, Cavalier and Spellsword prestige classes, and some equipment.

Complete Divine: I don't own it, but I might approve a small bit from it by hand.

Other than the above, I'd like to keep this list as small as possible. I feel that the above are just generic enough that they can fit into this campaign and setting without creating any problems.

This post is currently holding my general thoughts on background (probably will be made more official at some point).

Since all of these characters are going to be Knights, you should establish when you became a squire of the crown (recently, by birth, somewhere in between), and how you became (or will become) a knight of the crown. I'd also like to have some insight into your characters desires in the knighthood, especially whether or not they plan to advance into the next levels of the order.

I've also granted a rather sizable amount of resources to put into assets that help develop your character a bit more. If the character is a noble, you should probably establish their hereditary line (how far descended they are from some high ranking person), and possibly have a title. Even non-nobles should consider a title, such as a rogue/knight being "the wayward" or something similar. These often have a monetary value, meaning that you can "borrow" against your own title through noble houses and merchants, as is often done for young nobles that wish to develop their own income (most often from the family, of course, but still borrowing on title). Especially with knights, these are ranks of esteem.

Your characters religious and political tenants should be well established and well known to the Knighthood in general. So, because of that, I'd like to know a bit about both. Also, marriages (promised, current, or future possibilities) could be important, as are relatives and siblings. I'd like to know as much as possible about the matters, as they could very well come up.

If you wish, your character can have passed up to two of the tests to become a Knight of the Sword, but you will need to provide the story of it so that it can be references, should you ever be called upon for promotion or your honor questioned. You cannot supercede the combat test, facing an opponent in single combat, because I just love designing those sorts of encounters and want to do so.

Like GFA, I'm a 1,2,4 and I would give up my spot to a new person I guess...

Honestly I probably would.

I meet # 1,2,4 - and will give up my spot (should I have one) to someone who is new to PBP games who wants to get in. (I know when I first started PBP games a couple of months ago, I found it hard to get into games and I don't want to be a hog now.)

i want in

i meet 1, 2, and 4... but if someone's got me beat on #3, i'm in a bunch of games anyways, that's only if they get all four of 'em though

oh yeah, side note... favored classes and gestalt characters don't really work together

Well, I'm a selfish cad, so I will not volunteer to give my spot up to another player; as I'm only a 1 at the moment, though, I might be skipped anyway. At the moment, I'm looking at a fighter/wilderness rogue, who will likely stay within the Order of the Crown.

The half-kender reference comes from the character Tarli Half-Kender, a Knight trainee in the short story Kender Stew, contained within the first volume of the Tales II series. To the extent that it will not disrupt the campaign, I would like to strive to emulate this character in all regards.

Was she really a half-kender? If so, I'll need some idea of what "half-kender" adjustments to stats would be (or just go with full kender or full human).

I'm sure this would come out later, but I've only read the 3 books about Raistlin (and that was years ago) and the chronicles of Sir Pirvan the Wayward, and the bad guy he was fighting against. I've also read a bit from the Chaos war, involving the thane of Thorbardin, and I do believe another book but I can't recall a thing about it except a priest of paladine that lost her powers.

i'm thinking a half-elf fighter/rogue, the bastard son of a knight of solamnia (thus half-elf) who being visited as a youth by his father as he grew up with his elven mother came to idolize him, when his father never returned, he set out into the world to attempt to claim the heritage that was his. only recently has he started upon his path to become a true knight of solamnia.