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Message: <blockquote data-quote="the Jester" data-source="post: 2741282" data-attributes="member: 1210">All right, because it's been so long since we've played this party I'm going to run a 'warmup' game or two for the pcs... we were discussing what the party wants to do pre-Bastion of Order and the general consensus the group reached was that they were going to go "deal with" the Valonian orcs.  So in addition to the BoO stuff, I'm also statting up the orcs who I figure will count for more than a round's distraction if combat breaks out, and the more important ones for diplomacy attempts as well.  So far I've almost finished statting out the warlord in 3.5 terms (he's an 18th-level fighter).  He and his band shouldn't be much of a challenge for the pcs in a fight, but if combat breaks out the pcs are potentially performing a regime change on a fairly major power.  I'm not quite sure what other major powers would think of that- especially Prayzose.These orcs should be interesting, though not too powerful.  I know that I need to stat out at least the following:The Warlord's cohort (16th level; prolly cleric; high Diplomacy and Intimidate- helped the warlord get where he is now)The Bishop of Valonia (cleric 13-15? -orc or dwarf?)The Warlord's bodyguard (prolly a group of 20 orcish fighters or paladins; lvl about 12)The Warlord's advisor (wizard, sorc, cleric, psion, etc?  Level about 12-15?  dwarf or halfling?) Valonia is a medium-sized continent, slightly smaller than Dorhaus.  It is girded roughly along its east-west axis by a chain of mountains, the Snowy Peaks (which are extremely high in elevation).  The north half of Valonia is nestled in the Great Redwood Forest, which- as the name implies- is a huge forest of ancient sequoia redwoods (the tallest trees on earth).  In this forest are tribes of elves and tribes of hadozee, which eat each other.  The north part of Valonia is pretty 'wild' politically; the elves are more civilized, but reproduce slower, and are gradually being driven to extinction.The majority of the mountain range, plus some area around it, is claimed by Brespicacious, the amethyst dragon that was the subject of Rex's worship.  Brespicacious destroyed an orcish fort-town to make the point that the orcs were in what she considered to be her 'lair'.South of the dragon, along the east coast, are the Glen Lands- a land of halflings in the Tolkien style.  They are hapless in the face of orcish aggression.  This is where Gerontius originated, and he has pressed the party to take on the orcs on a couple of occasions (such as when they did and they fought the advanced powerful billyman a while back).Then, along the west coast, from the mountains south a significant chunk of Valonia, are the orcs... The orcs of Valonia are a subrace that are just like orcs, except they are racially Lawful and their favored class is fighter.  (In 2ed, orcs were LE and this played heavily into certain elements of the campaign.  When 3e changed orcs to CE but simultaneously endorsed subraces, I simply retrofied them for the Valonian subrace.)  Orokeuse, the orcish nation, is of great interest to me as a piece of the campaign world because my whole concept of Valonia began as Galadorian orcs.  Later, this evolved into Galadorian orcs with guns.  Anyway, the hook is that the orcish nation (there used to be a second orcish nation, Zer, but it was conquered by Orokeuse) grew strong enough and was clever enough that they began trying to get rich through trade with the (economically powerful) neighboring island nations.The nearby island nations- Pesh, Khelm's city-states and Bordis' two nations of Bordis and Casra- were in a Free Trade Alliance, which resulted in said nations gaining a lot of wealth and influence.  The orcs, once they caught sight of the alliance's benefits, decided that they wanted in and have lobbied it ever since, even going so far as to adopt Galadorianism as their national faith.  The orcs, naturally, turned their faith into a weapon. Galadorian clerics had long known a spell called distill sunlight.  This spell turns sunlight into a sort of uber-holy water that is highly flammible.  The orcs took this a step further, and the orcish clerics of Orokeuse learned to turn this distilled sunlight into a powder that was highly explosive- sunpowder.  Sunpowder is a lot like gunpowder, except I poured some Galador on it.  The orcs held the secrets of sunpowder as their final card in all the negotiating they did with Pesh et. al., never sharing them with anyone, but their cannon-rigged navy and pistoleers and musketeers were known for their fearsome weaponry that other nations could not replicate.So the cleric npcs I mention above are Galadorians, so would any paladins be, etc.  I can conceive of Prayzose as having been willing to name an orcish Bishop; I can also conceive of him setting paladins to watch over the warlord (after all, he's the main thing holding the orcs in strength right now, and they are currently a major ally of his in the Great War of Ethics).Anyone got any especially cool ideas for these npcs?</blockquote>

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