Designing Elric of Melnibone

[Garthanos]

Personally I'd say he's closest in D&D terms to being a Warlock. While there is the question of armor I don't think its a huge problem.

As I recall it there was really only one main occasion where he was decked out in full Melnibonean battle armor, and it kind of seemed like maybe he was having issues with it not really being his thing. Its been a good many years since I last read the whole series but I don't recall a lot being said about how he was armored most of the time. His typical gear could just as easily be fluffed as some type of mail.

I recently re-read the first book... and yes aside from bits and pieces like the War helm and greaves maybe he certainly seems to drop using it, occasionally picking it up maybe in dragon flight battles or similar situations where a mount can be said to carry the weight... and intelligent use of his weapon could certainly be seen as his main defense. ie... light armor.

Moonglum classic rogue... perfect sneak attack exemplar.

Rakhir the red archer ...former chaos priest actually works pretty well as a Bard with an Archer bent.... but maybe more true to form as an Archer ranger with a couple feats and background to give him arcana he probably knows some ritual casting but doesnt do some of the divination and summoning bits... as those would mean talking to folks he is out of favor with. Rakhir might actually be doing bardic chear em up style healing during the story so dont count that out, the ease of his comradery with Elric is quite suprising given the grimness of this Champion of Chaos then Order and finally Balance

Count Smiogorn Baldhead.... warlord with a dash of rogue me thinks.
The count supplemented their pair up with minions... as did the Dragon Rider Melnibonean..Elric fought alongside.

 

[Garthanos]

PC especially in 4e are more awesome even starting out than they are sometimes given credit for.. which is one of the reasons casting Elric... so high might not be as necessary as it at first seems...
Yes maybe something like Elite Hero house rules might work cool for actual game play... I might present a build based on those though wierdly that would be less challenging and not really as interesting. Allowing minions to do there thing (a little more richly with bloodiable rules) and make the heros boss sounds more interesting right now

Note I tend to ignore the filthy richer than god status ritual caster power synergy with Elric ..... since he basically walks away from that to adventure. So emporer "richer than god" becomes one of elrics background traits .. with little game impact except when the DM wants a plot device.

Perfect loyalty to scale of effect for elric may indeed fail.. did he have a hundred fire elemental minions... did they just create difficut terrain and burn buildings ... whacking a lot of minion class enemies even with low damage.... maybe the area of effect is too great or maybe he was able to use his ritual magic to equip his minion allies with sorcerous brands that when placed and burnt did a summonation of the fire sprites so they affected larger areas... than just the immediate battle space... he did this stunt very off camera in the book even so... its a bit up in the air.

 

[silverwhisper]

garthanos quoth:
the emperors of melnibone were largely martial by this time in history and there sorcerory ... was largely ritual.... so it's not so obvious he isnt a fighter on wierd alchemy to give him a decent constitutions with learned spell caster .. multiclassing in to his summoning wizardry... we probably have numerous builds possible ;-).

well, as with all statting discussions, shared target versions of the character seem pretty important. :>

garthanos queried:
not quite getting invoker?

in retrospect, i'm not sure i understand where that thought was headed, myself. i blame undercaffeination and the hour. :>

garthanos quoth:
i am tempted to call arioch a vestige that elric has awakened... but really the basic temp hitpoints on death of your cursed victim is ummm awefully perfect.

forgive me: a vestige? i don't quite know what you mean here? i think i just got a nat 1 on my ruleset-fu...

garthanos quoth:
i knee jerk want minimalist approaches too. (ie can i design him as a level one? can even his magic item be built in to the character?)

heh...i considered trying--but then i realized that in his entire story arc, he winds up killing gods. when we meet him, he's already the emperor of the shrouded isle, which to me translates to paragon right off the bat. and when he gets stormbringer--which IMHO constitutes at least a paragon if not epic artifact--well, it just gets (game balance-wise) messy...

garthanos quoth:
there is still debate open in my mind... a mix of a magic item and part of his warlockhood.. might be most satisfying.

[nods]

in reading your formulation, i agree that makes sense.

garthanos quoth:
arctorios is associated with his summonings .. it is a component in his ritual magics (perhaps reducing the casting cost or the key ingredient in doing instant summonings (strasshah) as something separate from when he calls on arioch)... and identifies him to both the demon lords of chaos and the elemental and beast lords...

it's not unlike an implement but for rituals. btw, the final sentence of the quoted material above is truncated: ?

garthanos quoth:
eventually his alchemy increases his constitution to make him relatively healthy.. he could be given moderate con (but i am fairly certain that too much con would feel just plain wrong) ... rather like not having martially flavored at-wills would be bad.

i agree--but something we should consider: considering that 4e focuses on what a character brings to bear in an encounter, perhaps the weakness is a special effect? maybe the stories are wrong, and stormbringer inflicts such weakness on its bearers (by making an epic attack vs. fortitude every day, etc)? i mean, the only time i seem to recall moorcock being at a combat disadvantage WRT his weakness is after the failed invasion of melnibone, when yrkoon kicks him off the battle-barge. just a thought.

garthanos quoth:
a warlock with eldritch strike could work as well and like reapers touch using white lotus feats to create snazzy fighting moves..

er...white lotus feats?

ed

 

[Turtlejay]

Vestige refers to the warlock pact in arcane power.

White Lotus feats are in a Dragon article and add punch to arcane magic users.

Jay

 

[Mr. Teapot]

Elric seemed to me really straightforward as a 4e PC. (At least in my mind, on a recent readthrough.)

Elric is a Tiefling (not quite human last scion of a decadent, corrupt, magically powered civilisation that made pacts with demon lords... that's a Tiefling) Warlock (pacts with Arioch and Stormbringer).

He has a 20 Charisma and an 8 Con, but has the Infernal Pact. This seems like a bad idea except that Stormbringer is an artifact weapon (obviously) that lets a warlock use Charisma instead of Con for all warlock powers. (And acts as a warlock implement, of course, though Elric could easily have Arcane Implement Proficiency: Heavy Blades.)

Thereafter, Elric follows the classic Hexhammer melee warlock build. He uses a few powers in melee and relies on a constant stream of temporary HPs from cursing to keep him alive and makes a lot of melee basic attacks, adding his curse damage on top, in classic Hexhammer fashion. Probably has Melee Training Charisma or Int.

Most of his spells could easily be Infernal, Vestige or Star Pact warlock powers.



Heck, I think Elric fits Tieflings and Warlocks enough that I think WotC specifically had him in mind while designing them.

 

[Garthanos]

well, as with all statting discussions, shared target versions of the character seem pretty important. :>

Right and why I started giving as much of my understanding of the character out of the box.

forgive me: a vestige? i don't quite know what you mean here? i think i just got a nat 1 on my ruleset-fu...

Vestige Pact Warlocks - a vestige might be a kind of the old god that is forbidden from really being in the world.. so works on it through Warlocks instead... ok just my interpretation.

heh...i considered trying--but then i realized that in his entire story arc, he winds up killing gods. when we meet him, he's already the emperor of the shrouded isle, which to me translates to paragon right off the bat.

He walks away from the richer than god and a ritualist situation so its not as significant as it might be.. it basically equipped him better at the begininng of his career (and he dropped both the armor and Aubecs Sword). He also tended to overspend for everything a cosmetic difference I know but his companions didnt think so..

and when he gets stormbringer--which IMHO constitutes at least a paragon if not epic artifact--well, it just gets (game balance-wise) messy...

[nods]
The more of Stormbringer that is kept part of Elric and his Warlock power ... the less uber it has to be...when somebody else picks it up and just as ones warlock powers have more bite later in the story so does Stormbringer
heck SB is just one of many ;-)

it's not unlike an implement but for rituals. btw, the final sentence of the quoted material above is truncated: ?

Yup on the ritual implement bit... and we can pretend I finished the sentence "implement for rituals." and I will be happy... but that still only gives us a clue I might have meant it his "supernatural ID badge"
and just more evidence of his races pacts ...

at a combat disadvantage WRT his weakness is after the failed invasion of melnibone, when yrkoon kicks him off the battle-barge. just a thought.


er...white lotus feats?

ed

The white lotus feats are rather cool... Arcane Feats from the Dragon Mag probably (I got them from Character Builder) which give stylized activities with arcane at-wills. After a successful arcane at-will a White Lotus Riposte gives me a smash back equal to the attribute mod used in the Arcane atwill ... if they attack me on the round following. (probably my favorite). These skin martially for me rather well.

There were other times it was intimated at... but I am going to reread more of the books and get back on that... but when Stormbringer was unable to draw power from the enemies they fought and the battle was very very long and very very grindy... that would have been normal everyday fatigue and Elric boosted the quality of his enhancing drugs immediately in order to go on adventures (instead of just replacing he increased)

 

[Garthanos]

Elric seemed to me really straightforward as a 4e PC. (At least in my mind, on a recent readthrough.)

Elric is a Tiefling (not quite human last scion of a decadent, corrupt, magically powered civilisation that made pacts with demon lords... that's a Tiefling) Warlock (pacts with Arioch and Stormbringer).

He has a 20 Charisma and an 8 Con, but has the Infernal Pact. This seems like a bad idea except that Stormbringer is an artifact weapon (obviously) that lets a warlock use Charisma instead of Con for all warlock powers. (And acts as a warlock implement, of course, though Elric could easily have Arcane Implement Proficiency: Heavy Blades.)

Thereafter, Elric follows the classic Hexhammer melee warlock build. He uses a few powers in melee and relies on a constant stream of temporary HPs from cursing to keep him alive and makes a lot of melee basic attacks, adding his curse damage on top, in classic Hexhammer fashion. Probably has Melee Training Charisma or Int.

Most of his spells could easily be Infernal, Vestige or Star Pact warlock powers.

Heck, I think Elric fits Tieflings and Warlocks enough that I think WotC specifically had him in mind while designing them.

Warlock certainly gets us very close...

Love the idea of the weapon allowing use of Charisma in place of Con.
could be cool... it works mechanically for 4e certainly.

Tieflings certainly a possibility and they have the right flavor text.... but racial features just dont correspond that closely.

Teiflings natural feats and resistances arent getting much precident (from how I read the character -- no special defensive relationship over any particular element) heck a Deva might be closer in that regard. One could shift Radiant and Necrotic to be any pair of opposites (I certainly allow it). I guess the Tiefling Charisma boost is quite sensible.

Gonna have to tell me about that hex hammer melee warlock build pretend I avoid charopt forums because they leave me woozy and lets leave it at that..

 

[Voadam]

Weren't his pacts with elementals and animal lords things he could only do once each? I.e he calls on Meerclaw for a cat favor and then his pact with the cat lord is done. He calls on Straasha the water lord in that first book but can't do it again later.

I haven't read all of the novels and its been more than a decade since I've read any but that is my recollection.

I'd do him as something melee focused with the ritual feat and possible multiclassing. Paladin multied out to warlock sounds interesting and possible. I don't know enough about specific 4e powers and classes to say though.

 

[Klaus]

There's a regional benefit in 4E FR that lets a character use Intelligence in place of Constitution for starting HPs.

More important to a 4e statting: HOW does Elric fight?

Does he outlast his opponent with shows of resilience? (Defender)

Does he strike down mighty foes with few blows? (Striker)

Does he lead and support others? (Leader)

Does he affect lots of lesser foes? (Controller)

 

[Garthanos]

There's a regional benefit in 4E FR that lets a character use Intelligence in place of Constitution for starting HPs.

More important to a 4e statting: HOW does Elric fight?

Does he outlast his opponent with shows of resilience? (Defender)

Does he strike down mighty foes with few blows? (Striker)

Does he lead and support others? (Leader)

Does he affect lots of lesser foes? (Controller)

Mostly for me he is a big weapon melee striker -- with encounter powers feeling like barbians and dailies feeling like wizards (knocking down minions by the buckets).

Occasionally his close stuff feels defendery but only the more strikery defender features. He started his career wanting to end fights fast due to con deficiency and that carried through on his style... and fits with the gifts stormbringer brings.. staying power but.. it kind of converts him the last steps from defender into striker... it isnt as inclined to defend its weilder as it is inclined to destroy his enemies.