Welcome back to our series of conversions of Pathfinder’s Iconic Characters to GURPS Dungeon Fantasy! This is the tenth post in the series. Previous entries can be found here:

Today’s template is the Thief, which means today’s character is Merisiel. Here she is:

By Wayne Reynolds, Copyright 2007 Paizo Publishing

Merisiel has all the knives. All of them. We’re back in familiar territory with her, as she’s one of the Iconics from the core book. Her bio is here and her stats are here. From these, we can learn the following:

  • Merisiel is one of the Forlorn, an elf raised among humans. They get this depressing name because Pathfinder elves are of the type that takes nearly a century to grow up. She spent these decades as a street urchin who stowed away on ships bound for different cities when her current buddies outgrew her.

  • She’s not the sharpest knife in the drawer but makes up for that by carrying a lot of really sharp knives on her person. She tries to start every combat hidden, to better backstab her foes.

  • Merisiel has an open and expressive personality, always tries to have fun in the moment, and is always chasing the next get-rich-quick scheme.

Despite being pretty much a bog-standard d20/Pathfinder character, Merisiel presents us with several interesting challenges when it comes to adapting her to GURPS Dungeon Fantasy.

First of all, she’s an elf, but which type of elf? There’s like a hundred of them in Dungeon Fantasy 3. Pathfinder’s stats for elves would suggest the High Elf racial template is appropriate. That’s not all, however! Merisiel is a Forlorn elf, which means she grew up among humans and had no contact with elven culture to speak of. And the DF 3 elf template that best models that is the Half-Elf, even down to the problems relating to both humans and elves. Theoretically full-blooded elves would have longer lifespans and such, but that’s not worth any points in a DF campaign.

The other challenge is finding the appropriate template for her. The Thief template from DF 1 is a lot closer to the Thief class from early D&D - a middling combatant who’s great at stealth, trap-finding, and reaching difficult places. The d20 Rogue class is still good at those non-combat things, but its main focus is stabbing monsters for massive damage. This is why Merisiel’s Pathfinder stats give her a rapier despite her bio’s focus on knives - it’s the best melee weapon for rogues in that system. I’m going to use the Thief template here, since it’s the whole point of this post, but I don’t want to leave the stabbing part entirely out. Fortunately, the list of Thief Power-Ups in DF 11 gives us something to remedy that.

Our version of Merisiel is quite sharper than her original bio indicates, though I suppose it wouldn’t be apparent to someone who witnessed her failing two or more simultaneous self-control rolls. Both her DX and IQ are one point lower than you would expect for someone with these templates, to make room for the stabby (Weapon Master for all sorts of knives and Backstabber). The reduced IQ hurts some of her thief skills, but we make up for that with an extra level of Manual Dexterity (which also affects DX-based rolls for Traps and Lockpicking).

Some future upgrades that look particularly appropriate are more levels of Backstabber and Night Vision. As a member of one DF’s “skill monkey” templates, she can also benefit from increases to all of her skills, particularly Main-Gauche (which is a bit low for a weapon master) and the mental skills hurt by the IQ reduction. Actually buying that “lost” point of IQ would be a worthwhile investment, as would the Thief-specific Talents from DF 11.

Merisiel, 250-point Forlorn Elf Thief

ST 11 {10}; DX 15 {80}1; IQ 12 {40}; HT 11 {10}

Damage 1d-1/1d+1; BL 12.1kg; HP 11; Will 12; Per 13 {5} FP 11; Basic Speed 6 {-10}; Basic Move 7 {5}.

Advantages

  • Backstabber 1 (DF 11, p. 35) {10}
  • Flexibility {5}
  • Forlorn Elf (as Half-Elf) {20}
  • High Manual Dexterity 2 {10}
  • Magery 0 {0}1
  • Night Vision 6 {6}
  • Off-Hand Weapon Training (Thrown Weapon (Knife)) {1}
  • Perfect Balance {15}
  • Striking ST 2 (Only on surprise attack, -60%) {4}
  • Weapon Master (One Skill: Main-Gauche) {25}

Disadvantages

  • Compulsive Carousing (12) {-5}
  • Curious (12) {-5}
  • Greed (12) {-15}
  • Impulsiveness (12) {-10}
  • Sense of Duty (Adventuring Companions) {-5}
  • Social Stigma (Forlorn; as Half-Breed) {0}1

Primary Skills

  • Acrobatics (H) DX-1 {1}2 - 14
  • Brawling (E) DX {1} - 15
  • Carousing (E) HT {1} - 11
  • Climbing (A) DX+3 {1}32 - 18
  • Escape (H) DX+1 {1}3 - 16
  • Fast-Draw (Knife) (E) DX {1} 15
  • Fast-Talk (A) IQ-1 {1} - 11
  • Filch (A) DX {2} - 15
  • Forced Entry (E) DX {1} - 15
  • Gambling (A) IQ-1 {1} - 11
  • Gesture (E) IQ {1} - 12
  • Holdout (A) IQ {2} - 12
  • Lip-Reading (A) Per-1 {1} - 12
  • Lockpicking (A) IQ+1 {4} - 13
  • Main-Gauche (A) DX {2} - 15
  • Observation (A) Per-1 {1} - 12
  • Pickpocket (H) DX+1 {2}4 - 16
  • Scrounging (E) Per {1} - 13
  • Seamanship (E) IQ {1} - 12
  • Search (A) Per {2} - 13
  • Shadowing (A) IQ {2} - 12
  • Sleight of Hand (H) DX {1}4 - 15
  • Smuggling (A) IQ {2} - 12
  • Stealth (A) DX+3 {12} - 18
  • Streetwise (A) IQ {2} - 12
  • Thrown Weapon (Knife) (E) DX {1} - 15
  • Traps (A) IQ+1 {4} - 13
  • Urban Survival (A) Per {2} - 13

Equipment

$754.0, 17.3kg. Light Encumbrance.

  • Ordinary Clothing [Torso, Limbs]: Free, 1kg.
  • Heavy Leather Leggings [Legs]: DR 2. $60, 2kg.
  • Heavy Leather Sleeves [Arms]: DR 2. $50, 1kg.
  • Leather Armor [Torso]: DR 2. $100, 5kg.
  • Backpack, Small [Torso]: Holds 20kg of gear. $60, 3kg.
  • Bull’s Eye Lantern [Backpack]: DF 1, p. 26. 10m beam, burns 6 hours per 0.5L of oil. $100, 1kg.
  • Oil, 1L [Backpack]: Includes flask. $4, 1kg.
  • Personal Basics [Backpack]: $5, 0.5kg.
  • Rope, 3/8”, 10m [Backpack]: Supports 150kg. $5, 0.75kg.
  • Lockpicks [Backpack]: $50, 0.05kg.
  • Long Knife x2 [Torso]: Damage sw-1 cut or thr imp. $240, 1.5kg.
  • Dagger x4 [Torso]: Damage thr-1 imp. May be thrown. $80, 0.5kg.
  • $246 remaining.

  1. Part of or modified by Forlorn Elf racial package ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  2. +1 from Perfect Balance ↩ ↩2

  3. +3 from Flexibility ↩ ↩2

  4. +2 from High Manual Dexterity ↩ ↩2