War of the Burning Sky - Updated 1/18 with discussion of the Player's Guide

[RangerWickett]

Ah, of couyrse. Thanks, that makes perfect sense.

Another question: any tips to a player using the commander class? One of my players is looking at a multiclass half-orc paladin/commander, and another guy is arguing that with the Charisma penalty that race/class combo will be like shooting himself in the foot. But any pointers to a guy playing a commander would be welcome, since there is so much existing material on how to maximize use of the existing classes I don't want him to be at any disadvantage.

Find out what about the combo interests him. Is he a half-orc just for flavor reasons? Either way, he's in good company. The former emperor of Ragesia was a half-orc fighter/commander (not quite Lawful-Good-enough to be a paladin).

I would recommend he focus more on the leadership performance feats, which don't require Charisma-based checks to use effectively. Start with commander first for the skill boost, and rely on skill ranks to offset his lack of natural charm. He won't be able to be a front-line warrior, but he'll be a strong support character who can survive in the thick at least for a while. It's likely his Charisma won't be any higher than +2, so he might just want to take 2 levels of Commander (since going any higher would lose out on the potential of the Direct Orders ability). He can always take more levels when his Charisma increases, and a 2-level dip in commander is still pretty strong. The real fun is at 4th level, when you basically get one free leadership performance per encounter.

I would encourage you as the DM to let the character treat Perform as a class skill for paladin. It fits the theme of the character, and shouldn't be unbalancing, especially since he has picked a sub-optimal race. Or, instead of one of the listed Gate Pass feats, give him this bonus feat:

Bearer of the Coal Tongue [Gate Pass]
Trained in the tradition of Ragesia's war leaders, you know the value of a commanding presence.
Benefit: You gain Perform as a bonus class skill. You gain one additional use of either bardic music or leadership performance each day.

For a build, I'd suggest he go:

(If 28-pt. buy, after racial adjustments)

Str 14, Dex 10, Con 14, Int 10, Wis 10, Cha 14 (I personally don't value paladin spells too highly)

1. Commander - Leadership Performance and a fighter feat that will fit his combat style.
2. Paladin
3. Paladin - Maneuver Leader
4. Paladin
5. Commander - Fearless Leader
6+. Paladin

Remember that commanders (like any mass-buffing character - bards, dragon shamans) get stronger the larger the party is.

 

[RangerWickett]

Ok, downloaded Player's Guide and forwarded to my perspective player's.

I'm looking at running this for a small group 1 - 3 PC's but plan to have them be gestalt chatacters.

Any suggestions or possible problems I may run in to doing this? Beyond the normal that come from running a gestalt group.

Thanks

JD

I'm really not familiar with gestalt rules. For a really small group (less than 3 PCs), several encounters may become overwhelming simply by numbers. If your players are up for it, maybe have some of the friendly NPCs they meet in the first adventure join their mission. Other than that, I don't know what to suggest.

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

Alright then RW...

I took the new Players Guide up to my drill weekend and read over it a couple times, and now am back at a computer

First of all, I like the fluff and the crunch tie-ins to the various factions in Gates Pass. I think it would be possible to expand that one city and keep alot of adventures right in that area, even without a war.

But on to the nit-picks and 'I woulda...'s

Student of War, the wording is a bit weird. It looks like the feat allows a caster to spend longer in casting a spell in order to increase the spells DC by 1? WHy not replace the last line of the benefit with: "When you do so, the modified spell's save DC increases by +1 for each creature affected."... That makes it truely a useful ability for large scale battles. Rewriting to match a meta-magic affect might be a good thing as well.


Stand the Heat.. I get the idea of what this is meant for, but again, the wording is weird. It doesn't have D20 mechanics, instead has the physics of 'withstand temp as high as...'. Preferably it should provide Fire Resistance 15.

Leader Feats
Is the intent to make the Bard the primary combat leader? Using perform/chr does this. I would suggest a total re-write of this section and base it instead on an already present mechanic, the Leadership Score. {level+Chr+mods}. The Commander Class would add to this score. An additional mod, beyond those in RAW, would be a scale of proven combat:
> Civilian -3
> Greenhorn - 2
> REMF -1
> Combat Vet + 1
> Combat Expert + 2
> Combat Hero + 3

I like the concept and the intent. I haven't had the chance to really go over them closely, but have some general concepts as to how I would prefer them to work.
The 'Manuever Leader' feat is, IMO, too strong. I would probably have the benefit change to "As a standard action you can orchestrate the melee combat to inflict greater damage on your foes. All allies within range gain a Skirmish ability of +1D6. This stacks with any Skirmish damage the character might already have."

Operation Leader... Love it! Bit longwinded... but thats okay


Thanks again for this campaign set-up.. looking forward to the first adventure!

 

[JDragon]

Ok, just paid for my subscription and can't wait for more info and the adventures.

JD

 

[Morrus]

Ok, just paid for my subscription and can't wait for more info and the adventures.

JD

Very very soon! Only days away!

 

[dpmcalister]

Just remembered to get my subscription paid for in time. Phew!

 

[JDragon]

Just wondering if their are plans to have a specific area here on the boards for DM's running WotBS to work together, ask questions, get suggestion and share whats worked for them?

When I was running RttToEE, Monte's boards made it much easier. It was great to have a place to talk to DM's that had already dealt with issues that came up and share work we had done. I was able to find lots of stat blocks in word doc's that were a much easier format to work from than the block in the book. One thing I did was make images of the elemental keys for the different doors, and what they would look like when put together.

Something along this line would be great for a game this epic in scope. Which I think is even bigger than RttToEE since it spans a full 20 levels.

Thanks

JD

 

[Morrus]

Not really, but if it appears there are quite a few people doing it, I might set an area aside for it. Depends on whether it's needed, really. No point creating forums just for the sake of it.

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

A sub-forum might not be a bad idea.. make it easier to track discussions and stuff.
With EoM we have a lot of questions/debate mixed in here in this forum

That way you publishers could subscribe to the whole sub-forum and respond to my nit-picks faster

 

[JDragon]

A sub-forum might not be a bad idea.. make it easier to track discussions and stuff.
With EoM we have a lot of questions/debate mixed in here in this forum

That way you publishers could subscribe to the whole sub-forum and respond to my nit-picks faster

The sub forum was more of what I was thinking I just didn't describe it well. Nut as Morrus said gotta see if their are enough people running it to make it worth the time.

BTW - I plan on running this as a weekly evening game on thursday nights starting the end of Feb or begin of March.

JD