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• Jun 20, 2023

  Let's Read Neverwinter: Bladesinger

  

  TL; DR

  Play a swordmage or hexblade instead.

  Introduction

  I first heard of bladesingers back in the days of 2e, when they were first introduced as an elf-only character kit that gave a lot of powerful combat bonuses.

  I was a member of a couple Brazilian RPG mailing lists where people either loved or hated them. Their fans were also elf fans in general, and their haters were usually GMs who thought it made the character “too anime”.

  I never actually read the original bladesinger writeup, so I didn’t take sides in that fight. But having read the Bladesinger class as presented in the 4e Neverwinter Campaign Setting, I have to say I’m not their greatest fan.

  They’re probably the greatest departure from the design principles established in the PHB classes, far more extreme in that regard than even the Essentials classes from the “Heroes” books. They feel very much like a return to the design philosophy of previous editions. Or perhaps they’re “foreshadowing”: while 5e hadn’t come out yet when this book was published, it was probably already in development, and one of its major goals was to recapture the feel of those older editions. In either way, they feel very dissonant to me when placed alongside other 4e classes.

  The Lore

  The book spends a whole page describing bladesingers as the epitome of elven superiority. The text feels like it was written by a sun elf. The term Tel’Quessir is used a lot here but not explained. I assume it means “the elven people”, but I am not sure.

  According to the book, the art of the Bladesong was developed by Corellon himself, and has been passed down among the elven people for an untold number of their extremely long generations. Even among elves, few individuals are worthy of receiving its teachings, for one must have the mind of a great wizard and the agility of a great dancer to even comprehend its awesomeness.

  Their techniques are passed directly from master to student, and were never written down anywhere. When the last bladesinger dies, so does the mystery and beauty of their art.

  All bladesingers are completely devoted to upholding and defending the ways of the Tel’Quessir, for such is the purpose Corellon gave them. Few bladesingers deign to leave their homelands - those who do so are surely in pursuit of some mission or relic vital to the Tel’Quessir.

  See those last three paragraphs? They’re almost direct quotes from the book. I’m barely paraphrasing.

  Basic Information

  Bladesingers are presented as a Wizard subclass, which is the kind of presentation I would expect to see in 5e but not here. The book says you should play one of them if you want to be someone who can both participate in melee combat and cast arcane spells. So you could perhaps see them as the Essentials version of the Swordmage, at least in theory.

  Despite this, they’re described as arcane controllers, because of the “wizard subclass” thing, and they get Striker-like HP and healing surges. They still get the wizard’s +2 to Will, and a fairly large list of class skills: Acrobatics, Arcana, Athlethics, Diplomacy, History, Intimidate, Nature and Perception. A bladesinger’s key abilities are Intelligence and Dexterity, in that order. They’re proficient with cloth and leather armor, with all simple and military weapons, and with wizard implements (wand, orb, staff).

  This is probably the only class in the entire edition that seems to have a hard racial requirement: no self-respecting Bladesong master would teach it to anyone who is not an elf or eladrin. Once in a great while, a half-elf might earn the honor, but even that’s a bit scandalous.

  Eladrin are pretty much ideal bladesingers since they get bonuses to both Int and Dex. Other Int/Dex ancestries are likely to be just as effective.

  Powers and Features

  We get a full 30-level writeup for the class. Like the other Essentials classes, this one comes with an exclusive Paragon Path (Sorcerous Sword) and you have no reason to pick anything else. You have a little more freedom of choice for your epic destiny.

  Level 1

  This is an incredibly front-loaded class, with a very long list of level 1 features. They all have slightly different requirements to work, but the combined result this: you want to wear at most light armor, and you want to wield a light or heavy blade in one hand, and either a wand or nothing at all in the other. Let’s call this the Bladesinger Requirement.

  When you do fulfill the Bladesinger Requirement, you can use your the following list of benefits:

  • You use Int instead of your Strength for both attack and damage when making basic melee attacks.

  • You gain a +2 shield bonus to AC.

  • You don’t provoke opportunity attacks when using ranged or area attacks. This is a bit less awesome than it sounds because of how your powers work.

  • You can use your sword as an implement for powers that require one. As usual in these cases, you don’t add its proficiency bonus to the attack roll, but you do add its magic item bonus to attack and damage, and its critical dice when you score a critical hit.

  You then pick three Bladespells from a set of six - these are your at-will powers, and they all work the same. They don’t use actions, and trigger when you hit an enemy with a melee basic attack while fulfilling the Bladesinger Requirement. Each is a Ranged 10 attack that does automatic (Dex Mod) damage of a different elemental type and has a different controller-y rider:

  • Dancing Fire: Fire damage, target grants CA until the end of your next turn.

  • Dazzling Sunray: Radiant damage, target has -2 to attack until the end of your next turn.

  • Frost Bite: Cold damage, target is slowed until the end of your next turn.

  • Lighting Ring: Lightning damage, target gets damaged again if they move before the end of your next turn.

  • Shadow Sever: Necrotic damage and you knock target prone if it’s the same size as or smaller than the target of the triggering melee attack.

  • Unseen Hand: Force damage and you slide the target 3 squares.

  Because of the bonuses above, Bladespells don’t provoke an opportunity attack. They also don’t have to target the same creature you just hit, but you can only use one of them per attack. Their damage increases by 2 per tier past Heroic. Looks like Shadow Sever and Unseen Hand are more or less automatic picks here, their riders are much better. The third pick would depend on your party’s abilities and what benefits them the most.

  We’re not done with the Level 1 powers yet. You get three cantrips chosen from the traditional list of Prestidigitation, Ghost Sound, Mage Hand, Light and Suggestion. And then you get the errataed version of Magic Missile, the one that always hits for minimal force damage. That’s another spell I like more in its PHB 1 form.

  And finally, you get the Bladesong encounter power. If you’re fulfilling the Bladesinger Requirement, you can use this as a minor action to slip into a fancy bullet time trance that gives you a +2 power bonus to attack rolls and all defenses, and a +5 power bonus to damage rolls. This lasts until the end of your next turn, which means you can get 2 turns’ worth of Bladesong if you use it as your first action on your turn. There is no other way to extend its duration. The word rolls there means it doesn’t benefit your bladespells or Magic Missile, but it does affect your basic attacks and spells that have damage rolls.

  Spellcasting and the Rest of the Levels

  That huge list of level 1 stuff seems pretty nifty, and there’s so much of it! Unfortunately it also represents most of what you’ll be doing through your whole career, because the rest of your powers are kinda underwhelming.

  Let’s start with spellcasting, the main reason why this is presented as a wizard subclass and also the main way in which it breaks from this edition’s usual class design philosophy. You see, bladesingers bring Vancian spellcasting back to 4e.

  They get to pick encounter and utility powers as they advance in level, but these are treated much like wizard spells were in 3e instead of being a set of class-specific powers. While their possible choices are all detailed in the class description, they are also literally “taken from the wizard spell list” in that they’re copied from that class’s list of powers.

  There is a table showing at which levels they learn new spells. At set levels, they get to pick either two encounter attack spells or two utilities to add to their spellbook. After finishing a long rest, a bladesinger can prepare a number of these spells, detailed in another table. There is no mention of replacing spells with higher level ones as you level, so I guess they just accumulate in your spellbook. A level 1 bladesinger knows 2 encounter attack spells and can prepare 1. A level 30 character knows 14 encounter attack spells and 10 utilities, and can prepare 3 and 5 of them respectively.

  I say “encounter attack spells”, and they get presented in red boxes, but they’re only encounter powers for standard wizards. A bladesinger treats them all as dailies, and even gets them when other characters would normally get daily powers. This means the level of the powers lags behind your character level. At level 5, you pick from a list of level 3 wizard powers, and so on. So yeah, even “spell level differs from character level” makes a comeback here. Your reward for reaching level 20 is that you get to pick a single spell from a list of actual daily attack powers.

  Utility powers are less wonky. You get them at the same levels as everyone else, their level matches yours when you get them, and their frequency of use actually matches the one in their descriptions.

  At the levels where other characters would get encounter powers, you gain new class features. These either make your bladespells a little better, or give you extra bonuses and triggered abilities that only work while your Bladesong is active.

  Impressions

  Mechanics-wise, bladesingers feel like the many 3e attempts at making a class equally skilled at swordplay and magic. Like them, it gives us a class that’s not that good at either thing as a specialist, and as a result might feel less powerful and fun in play.

  They’re labeled as controllers, but they’re not great at it. The majority of their control ability is going to come from their three bladespells, which will usually only affect one enemy at a time. They need to wait until level 24 to be able to target multiple enemies with a bladespell, and they can only do that once per day.

  Those “encounter as daily” Vancian spells can let them exert more control, but they’re weaker and scarcer than what a “proper” controller of the same level has access to. In a party with a wizard, invoker, or psion, the bladesinger will be overshadowed as a controller.

  They’re better when viewed as strikers. Bladesong’s bonuses to basic attacks and damaging spells provide an appreciable damage increase. However, I don’t think they do so as consistently as the powers and features of a dedicated striker class.

  My conclusion here is the same one I added to the helpful TL; DR section at the start of this post: play something else. Like a swordmage, for example! These great PHB-style arcane defenders do a much better job of letting you play someone who is equally skilled at swordplay and magic. Their lore is also far less snobbish, though you can still call your swordmage a bladesinger if you want without changing anything about their mechanics.

  Swordmages can be found in the 4e Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting, which as a bonus includes a lot of information on the wider world of Toril where Neverwinter is located.

  Alternatively, if you want to be a elf-flavored striker, you could go with a fey pact Hexblade warlock, who can be found in Heroes of the Forgotten Kingdoms. One of the characters labeled as a bladesinger here was in fact a hexblade warlock in that book.

  Story-wise, I guess they intended this to be the class of choice for the Iliyanbruen Guardian, but I would probably choose Swordmage even so. The only thing that could make me play a bladesinger would be if I could something other than an elf or eladrin, just so I could make fun of the snobbish flavor text. A pixie from the Player’s Guide to the Feywild would be ideal.

  The bladesinger class is the last section of Chapter 2. In our next post we’ll begin looking at the GM-focused material of Chapter 3, Factions and Foes.

• Jun 19, 2023

  Let's Read Neverwinter: Torm Domain

  Torm, the Loyal Fury, seems to be your typical “paladinic” god of justice and honor. His warpriests pursue justice in an unjust world and act with honor towards those who have none. His domain is by far the most recommended for the other FR gods, being applicable to any god who has a militant or compassionate bent, from Bahamut to Ilmater.

  Mechanics

  Warpriests of Torm are pretty much Wisdom-based warlords. Their riders boost ally attacks and defenses or allow quick repositioning, in much the same way the different warlord powers do. The optimization forums say this is probably the most varied domain around in terms of what it lets you do - it’s hard to get bored playing a warpriest of Torm.

  One thing that jumped out to me is their Level 1 utility power, which they get to keep throughout their whole careers: True Strike! This is an at-will power that lets them spend a Standard action to grant a +4 bonus to an ally’s next attack. It’s not quite as fun as the Lazy-Lord’s signature ability, but it’s the closest you can get to it in an Essentials-only campaign. It’s also super-useful for setting up big attacks with encounter or daily powers.

  Impressions

  Just as in FR, this power set could fit a lot of different core deities. The lore’s focus on justice make it a good fit for Bahamut and Moradin, and the tactical nature of its powers could allow it to stand in for the domains of non-Good “strategist” gods like the unaligned Erathis or the evil Bane.

  That’s it for domains. Next we’ll look at a full class, the infamous bladesinger.

• Jun 15, 2023

  Let's Read Neverwinter: Selûne Domain

  Selûne is the FR goddess of the moon, and is quite an important figure in the setting’s pantheon. She originally created the world alongside her sister Shar, the goddess of darkness. Together they also witnessed the “fissure of reality” that split that world in two, Abeir and Toril. That fissure is the reason why the Realms were Forgotten.

  Shar is responsible for a lot of evil shit throughout FR’s metaplot, including the events that happened during the Spellplague/edition transition to swap bits of Abeir’s and Toril’s geography around.

  Selûne used to be a goddess who took the path of forgiveness, compassion and self-sacrifice, but the last century has seen her become more aggressive and proactive in battling evil. Light must battle darkness if it is to prevail.

  The book doesn’t suggest using her domain for priests of any other FR god. I don’t think any of them are moon-themed enough.

  Mechanics

  Warpriests of Selûne benefit from having a high Constitution, since a lot of their power riders use the bonus for that attribute. These riders usually focus on granting allies damage resistance or bonus damage, and in penalizing enemy damage or attack rolls.

  Her signature damage type is “cold and radiant”, which means PCs can potentially benefit from two of the edition’s most infamous feat combos (Permafrost and Radiant Mafia). That’s the domain’s greatest feature according to the optimization forums. It helps that their Channel Divinity power makes enemies vulnerable to radiant damage.

  Lots of radiant damage makes this domain powerful against undead, which is true for most others. Its Level 1 Utility is a daily that makes the warpriest’s weapon count as silvered for the entire encounter, also making it a good counter to lycanthropes. As we saw on the character themes, there are quite a few of those among the possible foes in the Neverwinter campaign.

  Impressions

  You would think this would be an appropriate domain for clerics of Sehanine in the core setting, but I think this version of Selûne is a bit more aggressive and militant than the trickster-ish Sehanine Moonbow. Corellon’s domain would fit her better.

  You could say this is the domain for priests who worship Sehanine’s wrathful face, perhaps. And it’s a good pick for any player who wants their central concept to be “fighting evil by moonlight”.

• Jun 10, 2023

  Let's Read Hells Rebels 3, Part 2

  

  This is part of a series! Go to the project page to see all entries.

  Let’s continue our reading of Dance of the Damned! I expect this to be the second of three posts for this adventure. In the last one, we covered two chapters of the book. Let’s aim for two more here.

  Chapter 3: The Vyre Accord

  Vyre is a city located in the same province as Kintargo. There’s a whole mini-guide on it attached to the book, but the only thing we really need to know is that it’s pretty much Fucked-Up Fantasy Venice.

  Though technically part of Cheliax, Vyre is almost entirely independent. Cheliax tolerates this because the city is a prime vacation destination for Chelish elites. On the other hand, Vyre’s slice of coast makes for a shitty port, so they’re almost entirely reliant on nearby Kintargo for the sea trade that gets them most of their food and luxuries.

  Vyre’s government is extremely self-interested, but Cheliax has good reasons to maintain good relations with them, and they have good reasons to maintain good relations with Kintargo. If Vyre backs the rebellion, they can exert pressure on those Chelish elites to back off from the province.

  Allies and Information

  Advance information on the city comes from two sources. Captain Sargaeta, whom the PCs befriended in Adventure 02, can tell them the basics, and give them a ride there on his ship. Molly Mayapple can provide them with extensive and invaluable advice on their actual goal in the city.

  The PCs haven’t met Molly yet, but they should have recovered a bunch of documents belonging to her from the Lucky Bones. These are deeds for a set of waterfront warehouses, which were stolen by the extinct Gray Spiders decades ago. Even though Molly has since rebuilt her fortune (she owns a successful hotel), she’s still going to be extremely grateful when the PCs hand the deeds back to her, and will provide a lot of insider information and help. They can track her down from the information on the deeds.

  The Basics

  Vyre is ruled by five monarchs, each tasked with an aspect of government. The one they want to meet is Manticce Kaleeki, the Queen of Delights, who is in charge of the city’s economy and foreign relations. Vyre’s laws are simple yet baroque, creating an environment where non-lethal duels and eternal feuds are common, all sales are final, but prejudice of any sort is frowned upon. However, you can get away with anything if you follow the last and most important rule: don’t get caught.

  The Queen of Delights is set to host a banquet in the near future, and that will be the PCs’ opportunity to talk to her. The GM determines how long the PCs have until the banquet. Most of this time is probably going to be spent looking for outfits, gifts, and information, but the GM can also introduce a few Vyre sidequests to spice things up.

  The Banquet

  The Banquet might be an entirely non-violent scene, but it’s as difficult to navigate as any dungeon. Vyre high-society etiquette is weird, and the Queen of Delights heaps even more weird on top of that because she’s basically Morticia Addams as a Tiefling in Fucked-Up Fantasy Venice.

  Molly’s help is absolutely vital here. The book doesn’t even mention how the PCs get invited to the banquet, but I assume she’s instrumental in arranging invitations for them and for herself. She’s also an excellent source of information on the complex etiquette surrounding the event.

  This starts with what to wear and what gifts to bring. Molly knows what the Queen likes, and PCs good at gathering information might learn about Manticce’s less well-known preferences.

  There are nine other guests in the banquet aside from Molly and the PCs. We get personality notes for each one. Most are only sources of roleplaying color, but one of them will be important in the next adventure: Hei-fen, former guildmistress of the Gray Spiders. Tough it’s been decades since she escaped the destruction of that guild, she’s still a spiteful old wererat and is angry at the PCs for stealing “her home”. She’s here to size them up for future reprisal.

  The other “special” guest, not counted among those nine, is the Queen’s long dead husband, whose skeleton adorns one of the table’s chairs. The correct move here is to not acknowledge poor Gomez in any way. To do so is considered crass.

  While roleplaying should be first and foremost in this scene it also has a mechanical component. The banquet is effectivelly a long and colorful skill challenge. PCs get a number of starting “banquet points” depending on how they dress, what gifts they bring, and whether or not they participate in a standing ovation when the Queen appears (they should!). After that, each course in the banquet allows them several opportunities to learn more.

  The first is a knowledge skill test to identify the dish in question and how to eat it (probably Area Knowledge, Current Affairs or Savoir-Faire in GURPS). Careful PCs can just wait for one of the other guests to start eating and skip the skill test, but succeeding shows they know what they’re doing and earns them a point.

  The second is a series of tests to actually eat the course, which varies with each dish. There’s no way to skip this one, though the PCs doesn’t need to succeed at them all to earn a point. If they do, they earn extra. If they fail badly enough or just decide to forgo rolling and eat the thing wrong on purpose, they lose points.

  The third is a social skill test to do well in the conversation that accompanies that dish. This would likely be Fast-Talk, Diplomacy or even Public Speaking in GURPS, modified by what the players actually say. Success makes them come off as smooth operators and earns points. Failure loses points and leaves them embarrassed. Again careful characters can just keep quiet and skip this part, but it earns them nothing.

  The dishes range from the merely bizarre to the horrific:

  • We start with quicksoup, a bowl of boiling hot soup accompanied by a water bowl containing five small live fish and a set of peculiar utensils. This requires tests involving manual dexterity to properly poach the fish in the soup and eat them. Probably plain DX modified by Manual Dexterity in GURPS, though I’d also let a daring PC test Surgery instead.

  • Next is Galtan Squash, which looks like a severed head but is just a carved pumpkin full of extremely spicy red soup. This is a straight-up Fortitude save/HT roll to endure the spice. A bad enough failure leaves your face swollen and penalizes your talky rolls for the rest of the feast! I’d probably let it be modified by Resistant to Poison and other advantages that include it.

  • Then you get the Unseen Feast, meat pies made from the flesh of an invisible stalker. I’m pretty sure invisible stalkers are sapient, which makes this the most horrific dish of the lot. It’s quite possible some PCs will refuse to eat this one on moral grounds. Those who decide to forge ahead need to be fast and perceptive. They have to eat the invisible meat before it turns visible and loses its flavor. PCs who can see invisibility can pass this one automatically, though it’s considered crass to cast a spell for it while at the table. Others must succeed at a difficult Perception check, which I guess I would modify for Acute Smell/Taste.

  • Finally, you get Sweetfats With Honey Sauce for dessert. Sweetfats are candied spiders - this is an Underdark dish. The most difficult thing here is opening the honey sauce container, which is a mundane replica of a Hellraiser-style puzzle box. Time to break out the Thaumathology and Hidden Lore (Demons) skills, though I guess Traps or Lockpicking might also work.

  Whether Vyre allies with the Silver Ravens or not depends entirely on how many banquet points the characters manage to get. They need at least 20. A party of 5 who arrives properly dressed will start out with 10, and might get a few more from bringing optimal gifts. Even so, they will still need to take active part in at least some of the banquet in order to succeed at the mission. I’d probably give them a sign that they succeeded once they get enough points.

  If the party succeeds, the Queen might invite the individual who gained them the most points for an intimate night. Ties go to the prettiest or most charismatic PC, and if they’re still tied she invites all of the tied PCs. If the party has more than 30 points and the propositioned PC(s) accept Manticce’s invitation, she will also offer the group her personal alliance, providing extra mechanical boosts to the strategic rebellion layer.

  Notes and Impressions

  This part is very different than what you would expect from a standard dungeon fantasy adventure. It can be really fun for PCs who like role-playing, so even in a condensed approach I’d recommend keeping it. If you want to make the Unseen Feast part less objectionable, you could perhaps say the “meat” is gelatinous cube jelly, which is almost as hard to see and doesn’t come from something sapient. And if you don’t want to feature sexual themes at all in the adventure, you could remove Manticce’s invitation at the end and just say that the party gets her personal support if they get more than 30 points.

  The downside when using GURPS is that if your PCs are overly focused on dungeon delving they might not have the skills necessary to cause a good impression here. In this case I suggest being generous: if none of the delvers has the most appropriate skill, ask for a roll on the closest skill one of them does have, or perhaps even roll against DX or IQ. That said, characters who followed the tips from the Player’s Guide or who used earned points to become a bit sneakier and more social shouldn’t have too much trouble covering their bases.

  Part 4: Breaking the Menador Gap

  The Menador Gap is a mountain pass in the mountains separating Ravounel from central Cheliax. It’s the only viable route for marching an army through those mountains, so it must be closed. The PCs start the adventure at level 7, and the book says they should be level 8 before tackling this chapter.

  The gap is protected by a fortress named Menador Keep. It used to be an old dwarf fort, but is now occupied by Chelish military. Rexus, who studied those old Silver Raven documents extensively, can tell the PCs that there’s a dwarven self-destruct mechanism deep within the bowels of the fort. The PCs’ goal here is to get to that mechanism, activate it, and get out. This will demolish the fort in a way that ensures the pass is completely closed.

  It’s theoretically possible to demolish the fort from a distance using spells like Earthquake, but a) this might not block the pass completely and b) it will bury all the sweet loot located inside the fortress.

  Dungeon: Menador Gap

  The fortress itself has two above-ground floors and an underground level. Its ground floor contains a courtyard with two large gates on either side, which blocks the mountain pass. Inside the building are a large number of guard posts, utility/storage rooms, and a couple of monster pens.

  The fort is defended by a garrison of 23 soldiers, commanded by Lucien Thrune, a wyvern-riding cavalier. He also has a bound erinyes devil with him, and a very unhappy bound jann servant. Another devil acts as a stationary sentry at the entrance to the treasury. The soldiers are weak individually, but dangerous in large groups. They wear mail and are armed with halberds and crossbows, favoring ranged attacks over melee.

  The best way to handle this might be as a Metal Gear-like stealth mission. The PCs are very likely to have the necessary magic to turn the whole party invisible and levitate them for a short time. Clever PCs might find the entrnce to the wyvern’s stable down on the cliffside and enter through there, bypassing a lot of the security measures on the surface. The same technique might allow them to land atop the fort’s battlements and begin from there, bypassing the courtyard kill box. Even if they immediately go loud and begin a frontal assault, they’ll begin doing that from a hugely advantageous position.

  The third-best option is for them to disguise themselves as someone authorized to cross the Gap and ride into the courtyard, from which they can force their way into the fort. It’s less than ideal because they can be targetted by crossbow and ballista fire from the battlements.

  Starting an overt assault will sound a general alert and have every soldier converge on the party’s position. It’s easier to deal with them piecemeal, though that might require magic to prevent the sounds of fighting from spilling out. Stealth might also allow the party to fight the “elites” (Lucien, his wyvern, the devils) while they’re alone and isolated. The jann servant, Zorumar, is a potential ally here. He can’t do anything against his master directly, but he can give all sorts of information about enemy locations and the layout of the fort, including all secret doors. Killing Lucien will set Zorumar free, and he will return in the future to gift the party with magic items in thanks.

  There’s a secret door in the fort’s armory leading to the ancient dwarven mechanism in the “basement” level. The only one of its current inhabitants who knows about this is Zorumar. The device, called the Anvil of Unmaking, is protected by ancient guardians and traps, some of which can be bypassed by proper prayers to the dwarf god Torag and by diplomacy. Activating the contraption will cause it to completely destroy the fortress in 10 minutes. The PCs have that long to run away and get clear. Also the tremors and rumbling will definitely put every remaining enemy in the place on high alert, if they weren’t already.

  Loot-wise, the most valuable places to hit here are the treasury (obviously), the war room, and Lucien Thrune’s person. Lucien has a sweet flaming sword, lots of bling, and the key to the treasury chest. The treasury has a bunch of magical gear and the fort’s payroll. And the war room has an extremely valuable dagger lying around next to a pile of important strategic documents full of classified Chelish military info.

  Notes and Impressions

  A good old tactical espionage action romp, with the potential to turn into a wonderfully chaotic battle if the PCs trip the alarm. It’s likely to be the most time-consuming scene in the entire adventure, and could conceivably take more than one session to resolve.

  I suggest playing the enemies with a modicum of intelligence here, but remember that raising the alarm is not an automatic action. If a single guard spots the PCs, the rest of the fortress won’t automatically know they’re there. An alarm must be raised, which takes time and is susceptible to disruption from the PCs.

• Jun 10, 2023

  Let's Read Neverwinter: Oghma Domain

  Oghma is the Forgotten Realms god of knowledge, occupying the same conceptual slot as Ioun does on the default 4e setting. His purview includes knowledge, inspiration, and discovery. His followers believe that to serve him is to serve the truth.

  The stats for this domain can also be used for priests of the god Gond, which I think is an artificer god?

  Mechanics

  Oghma’s powers focus on boosting allies’ skill checks by granting them bonuses or rerolls, and on penalizing enemy attacks and saves. Its main distinction from other domains is that its attack powers focus on doing psychic damage instead of Radiant, though one of your at-wills still does radiant and thunder damage.

  The old character optimization forums rate this domain as pretty good, though they say it takes until the mid-Paragon tier to really get going: its level 11 feature makes that radiant and thunder at-will immobilize on a hit, and its level 16 one makes your Healing Word grant the target a free basic attack. You should still be able to do just fine in a standard Heroic-only Neverwinter campaign, though.

  As you might expect, this theme combos well with the Oghma’s Faithful. The domain’s first-level feature lets you use Wisdom to make Int-based skill checks, and the skill-boosting abilities from the theme will let you easily become the party’s encyclopedia.

  Impressions

  I don’t have much to say about this domain that hasn’t been said above already. Oghma isn’t a particularly exciting FR deity to me, though this campaign does give his clerics some pretty nice hooks. The domain’s powers could easily be used for priests of Ioun in a campaign in the core setting.

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