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View Full Version : Need an antagonist race (D&D 3.5)



Myrmex
2009-07-28, 12:21 AM
I've been working on a campaign world after reading a bunch of historical fiction, and I decided to have the Gnomes play the role of the Jews in medieval europe. They'll be an insular, hardworking people, who tend to be wealthy. They're innate magical nature puts them in direct conflict with the tenets of the Church, but they are tolerated for their usefulness (industrious, magical talent, large holders of wealth).

The Gnomes have lost their ancestral homeland, and it is now controlled by hobgoblins, ogres, and ogre magi. A handful of commando whisper gnomes still dwell their, protecting those that remain, hoping for the day they can retake their land.

Now, what took out the gnomes so ogres could move in?
Restrictions:
Can't be part of a large, extraplanar faction like the Umbra, Hell, or the Abyss
Has to have hit hard, fast, and moved out
Needs to be able to ally itself with mortal races (so no ethergaunts or beholders)
preferably not a humanoid, mortal race (like Drow or Giants), nor dragons

Xyk
2009-07-28, 12:29 AM
A volcano or other large natural disaster could do that. I'm not sure about the alliances though. A nomadic, aggressive tribe of an ordinary race could also work.

DragonBaneDM
2009-07-28, 12:42 AM
Duegar or Azers could have moved in with the volcanoes. Together, little gnomish folk stand no chance...

Myrmex
2009-07-28, 12:42 AM
A volcano or other large natural disaster could do that. I'm not sure about the alliances though. A nomadic, aggressive tribe of an ordinary race could also work.

Hmm, a volcano seems feasible, or perhaps a runaway magical reaction or something (could be seen as divine punishment by the Church). I'm trying to angle for non-disaster scenarios, though.

deuxhero
2009-07-28, 12:43 AM
Elfs, the pointed eared Stolen from Tolkien pricks are exactly the kind of people I imagine killing for race Elf hate aside... Druids, the tree loving pricks are exactly the kind of people i'd imagine killing randomly for not respecting the trees err...

Uh, insect (damn spell checker) esqe creatures commanded by a Beelzebub Captain Erastaz?

chiasaur11
2009-07-28, 12:46 AM
Kobolds.

Kobolds hate gnomes. So much.

llamamushroom
2009-07-28, 12:49 AM
Humans? They're always fun. Just an old kingdom that really wanted the land, or something. Though, I do also support the 'kobolds' suggestion (much as I despise those little reptilian reprobates).

AstralFire
2009-07-28, 12:50 AM
Thri-Keen fit your requirements, depending on how loose you are with not humanoid.

Thri-Keen Nazis.

Uh, going more unusually... how about a race of sentient bulletes? They move in and out -very- fast, especially through a race that likes to live in burrows.

Nazi Bulletes.

ShneekeyTheLost
2009-07-28, 12:52 AM
They could have discovered some magic which attracted the interest of the Githyanki or Gythzeri, who swooped in, collected what they wanted, then took off.

AstralFire
2009-07-28, 12:53 AM
I'm telling you, the answer is a community of highly intelligent, sentient, Nazi bulletes. Nazi part optional because then they'll have a crippling weakness to a a Dwarf archaeologist with glasses and a mustache (the dwarf equivalent of stubble.)

Myrmex
2009-07-28, 01:01 AM
They could have discovered some magic which attracted the interest of the Githyanki or Gythzeri, who swooped in, collected what they wanted, then took off.

Gith space pirates are a good idea.


Kobolds.

Kobolds hate gnomes. So much.

Hmm, Formians or something....

Whatever pushed the gnomes out has to be too weak to keep the ogres out. Kobolds word work, as they could have just run a hit-and-run type scenario from the Underdark.

Maybe a giant worm that sinks cities?

Ohh yeah, and now I can introduce purple worms.

AstralFire
2009-07-28, 01:02 AM
Or... sentient bullettes tunneling through the ground beneath. Seriously, it fits - they move fast, they disperse more easily than a single large worm, they're not remotely humanoid, they're not extraplanar.

Myrmex
2009-07-28, 01:35 AM
Or... sentient bullettes tunneling through the ground beneath. Seriously, it fits - they move fast, they disperse more easily than a single large worm, they're not remotely humanoid, they're not extraplanar.

But... why. It's not a parsimonious solution. It raises like 100 more questions that it solves. Pretty awesome questions, but it lacks the elegance of space pirates ****ing up some gnomes.

Biffoniacus_Furiou
2009-07-28, 01:43 AM
Make it a few hundred Death Giants (MM3) in command of a vast army of slaves. They conquer their way across the land, the giants collect the souls of any who fall in the battles. Anyone who isn't killed is forced into the army, or else they're executed before one of the giants who captures their soul. Once an area has been wiped out and looted they move on, greedily searching for more souls to take.

Xenogears
2009-07-28, 01:47 AM
But... why. It's not a parsimonious solution. It raises like 100 more questions that it solves. Pretty awesome questions, but it lacks the elegance of space pirates ****ing up some gnomes.

But then you can blame it on the wizard. A wizard did it. The PC's track him down.

"Oh. The Bulettes. Right. I wondered what happened to them when I replaced their food with fiendish bees...."

Melamoto
2009-07-28, 02:01 AM
I would agree with Astral here. Although, there is always a singular monster option. One that lurks near the back of the monster manual, and is highly underpowered for what it is supposed to be. One that is designed to come out, kill a bunch of stuff, and disappear again. Yes, the lowly Tarrasque can solve this, on the sole condition that he is templated and advanced to be appropriately powerful. Maybe swap out the toughness feats while granting extra move speed and the winged template.
Could make a good boss if the PCs take back the homeland (I'm assuming they will do that). They finally manage to get the land back, but WAIT! The beast that came before strikes again! Can our heroes finally defeat this legendary beast once and for all???

Biffoniacus_Furiou
2009-07-28, 02:09 AM
I would agree with Astral here. Although, there is always a singular monster option. One that lurks near the back of the monster manual, and is highly underpowered for what it is supposed to be. One that is designed to come out, kill a bunch of stuff, and disappear again. Yes, the lowly Tarrasque can solve this, on the sole condition that he is templated and advanced to be appropriately powerful. Maybe swap out the toughness feats while granting extra move speed and the winged template.
Could make a good boss if the PCs take back the homeland (I'm assuming they will do that). They finally manage to get the land back, but WAIT! The beast that came before strikes again! Can our heroes finally defeat this legendary beast once and for all???

Divine Rank 0 (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/divine/divineRanksAndPowers.htm) with Half-Fiend and different feats along with an expanded list of class skills works out well. I'd probably pick Quicken Spell-Like Ability a few times, Improved Rapidstrike for both the claw an horn attacks, and maybe Improved Spell Resistance a few times. Some people suggest giving it Martial Study and Martial Stance, others recommend Incarnum feats, but I like Half-Fiend because it actually takes planning (i.e. Greater Spell Immunity: Blasphemy) to even stand a chance of defeating it. Give it Improved Spell Resistance enough times and their Wish to permanently end it won't even work unless they're extremely high level.

Karma Guard
2009-07-28, 02:10 AM
Warforged.

Nazi Warforged. <( ._.)>

The only change you need to make is the fluff.

And come on the idea is awesome. Nazi Warforged that showed up, decided that these short fleshbags were dirtying up the landscape, and they went to town. Then they decided the place sucked (volcano??) and left for less lavalicious locales. Or the ogres kicked them in their metallic Nazi pants. Whatever :V

AslanCross
2009-07-28, 02:11 AM
Kobolds.

Kobolds hate gnomes. So much.

+1. Natural enemies FTW. I want to see Kobolds depicted as being a terrifying race for once.

RTGoodman
2009-07-28, 02:17 AM
I like the kobolds idea. Swarms of the little buggers. With knives. Selling gnome children's organs to zoos for meat. Going into people's houses at night and wreckin' up the place.

Yeah, kobolds.

Lamech
2009-07-28, 02:33 AM
Kobolds. Lots of kobolds. Plus arn't there a lot of stuipidly powerful things you can do with them?

Salvonus
2009-07-28, 02:34 AM
Flumphs. Nobody would expect them. Nobody.

kamikasei
2009-07-28, 02:38 AM
Kobolds, because then you know damn well that the gnomes had it coming. Stinkin' gnomes.

Myrmex
2009-07-28, 02:45 AM
Where would the kobolds come from? Where would they go?

paddyfool
2009-07-28, 03:28 AM
Rather than a specific race, you could always have one big, powerful evil overlord with multiracial minions. Potentially, some of the ogres, hobgoblins, etc. could be distant descendents of the army of said overlord, with others having moved in later. Which then raises two further questions:

1) What was the overlord in question? A very powerful mortal? A vampire? A lich? A dragon? A dracolich? A rakshasa? A fiend? etc.

2) What happened to them? Were they killed/destroyed, were they reformed, were they imprisoned, were they driven off, or did they simply move on in due course?

EDIT: Alternatively.... it might have simply been a case of lots of gibberlings ;-)

Narmoth
2009-07-28, 03:38 AM
Make it a few hundred Death Giants (MM3) in command of a vast army of slaves. They conquer their way across the land, the giants collect the souls of any who fall in the battles. Anyone who isn't killed is forced into the army, or else they're executed before one of the giants who captures their soul. Once an area has been wiped out and looted they move on, greedily searching for more souls to take.

I think it's the best idea so far.
You could also use Ilithids if you don't have MM3

kamikasei
2009-07-28, 03:42 AM
Where would the kobolds come from? Where would they go?

Hmmm... where did they come from? Everywhere; it was all the kobolds in the world! Where did they go? No one knows! They vanquished the gnomes and occupied their lands for a short period, then vanished. It's speculated that their invasion was partly to obtain something found in gnomish lands, and that they used what they found to disappear into the Underdark or another plane (or maybe they just took whatever they found to wherever they went, rather than using it to get there). The gnomish hierarchy remain anxious that the invasion was just preparing the ground for some more dreadful stroke against their race, or their gods...

bosssmiley
2009-07-28, 03:44 AM
A swarm of Salamanders who came blorfing out of the volcano surfer-style
Giants engaged in the First Great Stamping War (I know the OP said no giants, but hey, they're a classic!)
Swarms of hungry, hungry trolls with shovels
Vengeful Galeb Duhr sick of having picks rammed into their heads
Azers ("Hoots mon! Ma heed's afire!")
Gnome-eating Frogemoths
Kobolds are just a gimmee


@v: Drowleks (http://webamused.com/bumblers/?p=399) (*drzzzzt drzzzzt*) :smallbiggrin:

kamikasei
2009-07-28, 03:50 AM
Also,


Warforged.

Nazi Warforged. <( ._.)>

The only change you need to make is the fluff.

Daleks?

mistformsquirrl
2009-07-28, 03:59 AM
I've got an idea, but I warn you, it does involve humanoids >.< that said; it fits the other criteria, so I'll put it out there.

Mongolian-style Orcs - the mongols were pretty much defined by "strike fast and move on" (at least the army - and since this is fantasy you don't have to worry about that whole 'empire' thing).

I personally choose orcs for this because it gives them a chance to be a bit different than the stereotypical horde of brainless greenies that wins only by numbers.

In this case, you still have good numbers, but you've also got strategy and mobility; so if they ever crop up in the campaign as antagonists, they can challenge your PCs even if their individual levels aren't so good. (It's much harder to kill a CR 1/2 orc if he's mounted on a light warhorse, riding around you in a circle and pelting you with arrows. Well at low levels anyway; you can always embelish the higher level ones).

There's also the fact that they're pretty instantly recognizable. No one will really question the dispersion of the gnomish populace or the number that were wiped out; because most everyone knows how nasty the mongols were. >.> (This also makes them satisfying to stab.)

That said they are humanoids; and even orcs with a variant theme are still orcs >< so that might be too 'typical' for ya.

--

Another possibility would be a plague of lycanthropy that turns the victims into permanent were-creatures.

In such a scenario you essentially have the gnomes confronted by a portion of their population gone utterly berserk (and having gained substantial power in doing so).

So the enemy is within; creating a great deal of confusion and making the gnomish defeat almost inevitable.

Werecreatures are intelligent too; and while I'm not sure they usually ally with others; nothing says they can't (and it's easy enough to do a little re-fluffing if necessary).

This last one really is just an idle musing though >.> dunno how much appeal it would actually have.

nysisobli
2009-07-28, 08:26 AM
Warforged.

Nazi Warforged. <( ._.)>

The only change you need to make is the fluff.

And come on the idea is awesome. Nazi Warforged that showed up, decided that these short fleshbags were dirtying up the landscape, and they went to town. Then they decided the place sucked (volcano??) and left for less lavalicious locales. Or the ogres kicked them in their metallic Nazi pants. Whatever :V

Let me get this straight, gnomes are jews, and warforged are nazis?

*So does that make the ogres america? Im just trying to grasp my thoughts around this. So if i am to understand this right i just connected short bald men with big noses to jews, metal heartless soilders to germans, and big dumb smelly monsters to americans?

Wow i think i love you =) (also im american, german, and have some jewish heritage)'

anything astricked is said jokingly

AstralFire
2009-07-28, 08:29 AM
But... why. It's not a parsimonious solution. It raises like 100 more questions that it solves. Pretty awesome questions, but it lacks the elegance of space pirates ****ing up some gnomes.

They Just Are. Make the Sentient (sorry, Sapient) Nazi Bulettes a nomadic community that just are. Give them their own creation myths. It could be pretty cool.

Tiki Snakes
2009-07-28, 11:41 AM
Hmmm... where did they come from? Everywhere; it was all the kobolds in the world! Where did they go? No one knows! They vanquished the gnomes and occupied their lands for a short period, then vanished. It's speculated that their invasion was partly to obtain something found in gnomish lands...(snip)

The Kobolds of the neighboring regions allied together, yes, and when they found what they wanted, they went back home. Simple.

What were they looking for? They were looking for lots and lots and lots fo dead gnomes, of course. :smallamused:

Caveats: There's no way they did it via mounting an army. They came up through the ground, the country is now riddled with tunnels from all directions, with entrances and exits all over the place, all barely large enough for a halfling to squeeze through. They fought via cowardly ambushes and the most dastardly total-war tactics you can devise.

They'd salt the earth, set fire to the forests, undermine their fortresses and ambush gnome women and children as a priority. Poison the wells, cast terrible enchantments on the livestock, and blanket the entire territory in a million improvised traps of feverish creativity.

And heaven help any of the Gnome war-parties that tried to chase them back into the tunnels...


Of course, the Kobolds aren't finished. Even now, they are gathering the artifacts required, training their best, most sadistically creative and dashingly fearless warriors and combat-trapsmiths. Because the 'War' will never be over, until Garl Glittergold is dead, in revenge (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurtulmak#The_Collapse_of_Kurtulmak.27s_Hall).(See the 'Third Version')


Because I forgot - If there ARE dragons in the setting, at all, then they are likely securing the artifacts from them, by working for them for hundreds of generations mining vast sums of gold, gems, etc, as well as reinforcing and trapping their lairs. Hence the large delay, they've got a billion man-hours of work to put in to get what they need. Sure, they could just TAKE the artifacts, but they are too respectful of True Dragons to do that. :)

Myrmex
2009-07-29, 01:30 AM
Ok, I think I'm going to go with the following:

About 300 years before the campaign starts, the Gnomish empire to the east collapsed, sending thousands of refugees into the human, halfling, elvish, and dwarven lands. The gnomes claim that kobolds released a plague upon the gnomes and hired stone giants (once allies of the gnomes), ogres and hobgoblins to attack the empire while it was weak, while also burrowing into their cities and wreaking havoc. In a last ditch effort to save their empire from the subterranean invasion, they opened up the spellpools below their cities and flooded the kobold tunnels with unbelievable amounts of raw arcane energy.

The kobolds claim that the greedy gnomes slew several dragons that owned rich gem seams the kobolds were mining, and imprisoned the dragons' souls to fuel their spellpools. A plague was visited upon the gnomes by their dragon god, a divine retribution. In order to lift the plague, the filthy gnomes were told to release the dragon spirits. Spitefully, the gnomes did so, but in such a manner as to destroy the kobolds and forever pollute the rich gem loads. The giants & their hobgoblin mercenaries were merely scavengers and opportunists.

The humans don't really know what a kobold is, and 300 years is a lot of years. All the average human knows is that the gnomes messed with forbidden magics and are being punished for it, exiled, their homeland sentenced to destruction at the hands of monsters.

For the gnomes, 300 years isn't long at all. Gnomish grandmothers tell their children the night when they were girls and they had to leave the city as giants rained stone down upon them and the ground burned with purple flame. The betrayal of the stone giants is still fresh in their cultural memory (bonus vs. giants).


I've just been really fascinated with the idea of exile communities within another community that perform extremely vital services, are wealthy and educated, yet relegated to second class citizenship, or worse. And I think that in D&D, the differences between races are even more vast, which would lead to interesting conflict between a race whose oldest members are a fourth the age of the other, especially if they are living side by side.


Mongolian-style Orcs

Actually, that's going to be the huge event that occurs at level 9ish- a full scale invasion of Mongolian style orcs that are going to sweep out of mountain passes east of the old Gnomish lands.

Asbestos
2009-07-29, 11:20 PM
I'm surprised no one mentioned these guys, which meet pretty much all of the requirements the OP asked for.

Delver: Could have moved into the Gnome area, eaten all their metal/ore and moved out.

Destrachan: A large group led by a huge one could have come in, tortured all the gnomes to death and then moved on.

Neogi: Ride around on Umberhulks like Master-Blaster and are interplaner/planetary slavers. Could have swooped in, destroyed the gnomes/carted them off and left.