Dwarven locksmith turned adventurer - your input?

[Driddle]

Looking for your thoughts on the shallowest beginnings of a character concept: the dwarven locksmith, a respected man in his community who is a master craftsman when it comes to creating and repairing all manner of locks. He has a strong asthetic appreciation for the mechanisms, and has even been called on to professionally test them on occasion. He believes that a lock hasn't fulfilled its purpose until it can be proven to hold something secure.

* His alignment?
* What craft subskill would you give him?
* Would he stick with the rogue class or multiclass?
* Assuming his two highest attributes scores were both 15s, where would you assign those numbers?
* And what reason would he have to leave his community and take off with other adventurers for parts unknown?

 

[Inconsequenti-AL]

Sounds like a good idea.

* His alignment?
Sounds possibly Lawful to me... N or G, I guess. Or just Neutral or Neutral good. Reckon any of them would work. Perhaps even chaotic good or neutral if he's a mad genius type.

* What craft subskill would you give him?
Craft(Locksmith).

* Would he stick with the rogue class or multiclass?
Possibly Fighter if that fits with what he does. Wizard > Arcane trickster could be an interesting way to go? Evolve onto magical locks.

* Assuming his two highest attributes scores were both 15s, where would you assign those numbers?
Dex and Int for a locksmith/lockpicker. Would also fit well if you did the wizard thing.

* And what reason would he have to leave his community and take off with other adventurers for parts unknown?
He wants a new outlet for his life, his life is locks and the community is too restrictive for him to do anything else.
He may have decided he needs to adventure, so he can learn to build even better locks... inspiration he can't get at home.
One or more of his locks was defeated by a really clever thief:
He could have been exiled as a result.
He may be out to retrieve what was stolen.
He could be obsessed with catching the thief.

Hope any of that's some use!

 

[Altamont Ravenard]

*Alignment: lawful neutral
*
*Class: hm. Since you say he's already a "master craftsman", I wonder how he could be anything but an expert...
*15 to Dex and Int
*He left his community because he mastered his current techniques, but still needs to improve it, and thus will explore the world to find new locksmith techniques. Also, he may have left because he organized a contest where he said that no one would ever be able to pick his best lock, and someone did. So he left in shame, but also because of the first reason I evoked.

AR

 

[Henry]

Truth be told, I'd give him levels of Expert, not Rogue, since I doubt he'd had magical trap-finding or sneak attacking unless he'd spent some time learning some "dirty fighting" techniques and was a master trapsmith. Try to convince the DM to give you one extra level of expert over the other characters, since experts are NPC classes, and take another class from there based on his first forays into adventure.

I would put the high scores into INT and DEX; if you planned to go a Fighter route with him later (depends on concept), I'd think about putting the other 15 into STR than INT...

 

[Driddle]

Thanks.

Yes, expert. Good ideas.
But if we're going to step outside the box just a teensy bit and allow him to take an NPC class level to avoid acquiring the uncharacteristic 'sneak attack' ability, then perhaps merely swapping that rogue ability for appropriate feats would be a legitimate alternative instead.

I'm torn between lawful-neutral, neutral-good and neutral alignments.

Nice backstory concepts.

 

[Crothian]

I wouldn't use expert, I'd use the Professional; its a new class that can be bought at RPGNow here:

http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=3083&

Its really cheap, but you will have to get other things to meet the minimium purchase of the site. THe class is a proffessional, but its designed to be a little more in balanmce with the adventuring classes. THe idea behind it is Unlikely Heroes, people from more mundane beginings that end up going out adventuring.

My review on basically all of them:
http://www.enworld.org/reviews/index.php?sub=yes&where=active&reviewer=Crothian&product=SSUHC

 

[Umbran]

Yes, expert. Good ideas.
But if we're going to step outside the box just a teensy bit and allow him to take an NPC class level to avoid acquiring the uncharacteristic 'sneak attack' ability, then perhaps merely swapping that rogue ability for appropriate feats would be a legitimate alternative instead.

There's also a simple role-playing solution - just don't use the sneak attack for one level. You simply pretend that he doesn't have it for a while, and that he picks it up as "on the job training". This preserves his progression in the ability for the long term, and allows you to use a class that is more adventure-friendly than the expert.

I'm torn between lawful-neutral, neutral-good and neutral alignments.

I agree that the guy is probably non-chaotic, as that fits in better with the "respected member of the community" part of your description.

As to which of these you should pick, consider - by the PHB, the difference between beign neutral and sitting at one of the alignment extremes is a matter of degree and commitment. He isn't Lawful unless he's really got a bee in his bonnet about organization and rules. He isn't Good unless he really does stick his neck out for other people.

If you want to use the "community too restrictive" backstory element, he probably isn't lawful. If you want to "lost a challenge and left in shame", he's more likely to be lawful (imho).

 

[jerichothebard]

Looking for your thoughts on the shallowest beginnings of a character concept: the dwarven locksmith, a respected man in his community who is a master craftsman when it comes to creating and repairing all manner of locks. He has a strong asthetic appreciation for the mechanisms, and has even been called on to professionally test them on occasion. He believes that a lock hasn't fulfilled its purpose until it can be proven to hold something secure.

* His alignment?
* What craft subskill would you give him?
* Would he stick with the rogue class or multiclass?
* Assuming his two highest attributes scores were both 15s, where would you assign those numbers?
* And what reason would he have to leave his community and take off with other adventurers for parts unknown?

he's picked, opened, tested, or broken every lock in town. Boredom, baby. The great motivator.

 

[Brennin Magalus]

There is also the expert class from UA, if you wanted to go that route.

 

[Shallown]

I played a character like this, in fact my first in 3.0 when it came out. I generated him with teh character generator and ended up with a sad charisma.

So I explained it as he was s killed craftsman but a failed business man. His brusque manner and gruff attitude basically made him lose business so he had to move on. This is why he became an adventurer. He was gnomish by the way. I used rogue as his class with craft trap and lock as his base skills. He believed in testing his own security designs and others if hired to do so. If anyone accused him of being a thief or rogue he usually tried to pig stick them. He was a professional fallen on hard times. I think he was LN. He didn't break laws if it could be avoided.

So perhaps this dwarf was failed as a business person either becuase of his own failings or perhaps there were enough where he was and he is striking out to make it on his own. Hiring on as an adventurer since they seem to hve the money to hire people like yourself so it must be profitable job. A good way to build a fund for starting a business. Plus most adventuring parties need an honest trap finder instead of putting faith in those nasty thieving guys they usually can find.

I explained his sneak attack and other rogue abilities as a natural defence developed by being a little person in a big person's world. I also wrote into his background he did associate with the darker side of the street as a way of learnng about the criminal mind set. Something a security specialist should know.

As far as stats go the Dex/Int are most important for this type of build.

You could also think about modeling yourself on something like the movie "Sneakers". Would make for an interesting character to say the least.

just a few ideas

later