D20M Character Idea Help Needed

[FCWesel]

Hi All. Thanks for looking and posting (hopefully) your helpful ideas. We will be starting a D20M game this week and one fo the players (my wife) has not read the Azure Bonds novel (FR) and I floated the very basic concept of th character to her and she liked the idea, so I thought for her character, I would do a "modern" version of the character.

For those of you who do not know the story it is basically this. A woman awakens in an inn. She doesn't know how she got there, she doesn't know who she is...she has some very vauge memories as a child, and these are at best, cloudy. The one thing she is sure of is she is a trained fighter (8th level in the FR RPG books).

She has a series of tattoos along her right forearm with five symbols involved in it. They are blue and magically bind her to those that affected her (hence the name Azure Bonds).

The basic gist of her part of the campaign adventures will be discovering who she is, what the tatoo is and who was involved in her circumstances and dealing with them in the appropriate manner.

Here is my dilema:

I want to start the game at about 4th level characters. But she needs to be more lethal then that, so I was going to start her at 8th level. Her stats are high, 17 in the physical and charisma, 15 int and 11 wis. (Or something close to that.) But I don't want to make it too unfair (unfun) for the lower leveled PCs.

Here's a few ideas for further balancing her out that I had:
* I plan on only giving her enough EXP for the 4th level character...so she will have to, leveling wise, sit back while the other PC play catch up.
* She would have NO wealth.
* She would have NO identity, no SSN.
* I was thinking that she would have no finger prints...literally (this idea just came up now to be honest)
* Her "emotional age" would be that of a 10 year old, so emotional situations should be fun for the Player to RP out. This is represented by the low wisdom. As she would level and gain exp as a character I was going to allow her wisdom to go up.

Anyways, let me know what you think...

 

[cybernetic]

Those are some good ideas...

normally a Higher level character would advance a lot slower than a lower level one anyways...so lower levels will catch up..

another idea I just had is to, instead of making her higher level, allow her to take levels in an advanced class earlier..or maybe allowing her to be the only one eligible for the Shadow Slayer adv. class..

overall, I think the idea is a good one...and while I'm not too sure about your gaming group..but my group wouldn't mind having a someone start at a higher level as long as there is a good concept (like the one stated) involved

 

[Dareoon Dalandrove]

Ok first Why does the character have to be higher lvl than the rest of the group? This is the first and biggest problem that I think you have to face. Is this a group that you play with regularly? If so you are already falling into "The Dm's wife get special treatment" pitfall.

My own opinion, after reading your outline there is no reason that she has to be higher lvl than the rest of the group. She has story based around her, that all. While it may be a cool idea in your mind, your players may not want to play background characters for your story. I've seen this happen before. Your group won't go with it for to long. They'll get board and fustrated. Is this your first time running a modern game? I've found that good tactics and correct use of weapons are a formitable combo. Any lvl character can be deadly. I burst fire on your wife (i'm a second lvl fast ordianary criminal) with a HkG3 your wifes taking 4d10 points of dmg. There is a good chance that she is going to have to making a MAS save.

What disadvantage is having no fingerprints, SSN, or identity? I'm running a group right now were none of them officialy exist.

I would stick to everyone starting even. Your overall story arch maybe more about your wifes character but don't forget the other players are playing to have fun. From the start they are already penalized.

 

[Shadow64]

I am assuming you want to make her 8th level because that is what she was at before she was knocked out, correct? But, when she wakes up she can't remember everything, right?

Here is what I would do. Build the character to 8th level, but keep track of what you do from 4th to 8th level. Y'see you keep the 4th level character so she starts play with that. Then as she progresses in levels she remembers things. So, when she hits level 5 you pull out the 5th level sheet and say "viola, here is what you remember!". It doesn't allow a lot of flexabilty during those 4 levels since she is "remembering" things, but i think it is fair enough.

If you want here to be a bit more "deadly" then the rest of the group allow here to keep the follwing:
1) the 8th level base attack bonus (her body remembers how to wield her weapon even if her mind has forgotten). Unless you are going straight Strong Hero class she shouldn't be to far ahead of the group. If the character is a strong hero I'd say only allow up to the 6th level base attack bonus (+6/+1). She gets an extra attack at +1, which shouldn't make that much of difference.
2)keep that stat raise she would get at 8th level. it's already occured so there is no reason to take it away.

You'd probably also want to compensate the other players in the group so they don't feel left out, or that you are playing favorites. Even if it as simple as giving them their weapon of choice (Within reason) for free, or giving them a break on the cost.