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View Full Version : [4e] Warforged questions (mostly fluff)



slyfox99
2010-03-03, 10:25 PM
Ok my questions here are pretty much all fluff, but kind of necessary to the storyline of my campaign, so I'd appreciate any help...

1) It says in MM1 that warforged are created via a ritual, and in my interpretation of the 4e rules, any character of sufficient level who knows the ritual can create Warforged?

2) So any ideas as to the level and component cost of the ritual?

4) How about time? How long would it take to create a Warforged?

My story idea is this... The BBEG in my campaign is a necromancer who is loosing armies of undead upon the Northern Kingdom, the armies of which are broken... The king has died and been raised up as a Death Knight in service of the BBEG. The second-highest ranking man in the kingdom, commander of what remains of the army and arch-duke of the kingdom's border stronghold, has sold out to the BBEG in order to keep his lands and title. He has become a vampire lord and his once peaceful city is soon to become a little slice of the Abyss on earth.

Meanwhile, back in the capitol, the cleric who rules the kingdom as regent (the cronw prince is a boy of 9), has the idea to combat the growing army of undead with an army of warforged soldiers. Would this be possible, to create such a large group of them in such a short time?

This leads to the last question, which is how indepent to warforged think? My BBEG specializes in treachery and would try hard to bring them over to his side. Could he?

Thajocoth
2010-03-03, 10:34 PM
The ritual has not been statted out. I believe it had been lost to time when Nerath fell, or something.

chiasaur11
2010-03-03, 10:44 PM
The ritual has not been statted out. I believe it had been lost to time when Nerath fell, or something.

So, if'n you feel the need, homebrew.

KillianHawkeye
2010-03-03, 10:44 PM
I'm not sure if this has changed in 4E, but in Eberron (where the warforged originated) you needed these big things called creation forges, of which there are precious few remaining.

Gralamin
2010-03-03, 11:39 PM
I'm not sure if this has changed in 4E, but in Eberron (where the warforged originated) you needed these big things called creation forges, of which there are precious few remaining.

Still true in Eberron 4e, but not in base 4e.

Colmarr
2010-03-03, 11:43 PM
I'm not sure if this has changed in 4E, but in Eberron (where the warforged originated) you needed these big things called creation forges, of which there are precious few remaining.

It hasn't changed in 4e Eberron. The creation forges required massive amounts of resources (including wood and metal ore) as raw materials to create the warforged.

In Eberron, the warforged were created as living soldiers towards the end of a century-long war. I don't think they're suitable as a solution to an imminent invasion or threat.

In those circumstances, a better solution might be having the regent enter into a compact with the denizens of the Elemental Chaos or the Astral Sea. An army of angels or archons would be equally as impressive and could be mobilised much faster than warforged could be created.

Angels aren't goody-two-shoes in 4e - being more in the nature of divine enforcers - but they probably wouldn't be easy for the BBEG to co-opt. If you want to play up that storyline, archons are probably a better bet.

Of course, either ally might have some pretty serious demands in return for their assistance.

EDIT: Alternatively, you could create some fluff by which angels possessed the humanoid soldiers of the kingdom, giving them strength to defend against the invasion, but once the threat was repelled it was discovered that the angels couldn't entirely be separated from their hosts: suddenly you have another explanation for Deva :smallsmile:


This leads to the last question, which is how indepent to warforged think?

Warforged are sentient and free-willed. Once created, they are just as likely as any other soldier to desert and/or change sides. Bear in mind though, that being made of metal and wood might change what you consider to constitute an attractive proposition.

deathpigeon
2010-03-03, 11:52 PM
Still true in Eberron 4e, but not in base 4e.

Actually, according to the MM, it is still true in base 4e. They were created by Nerath with creation forges.

Hzurr
2010-03-04, 02:01 PM
Actually, this became an interesting issue in my game (I was running mostly core-4E, so a lot of this plot I made up as I went). One of my players decided he wanted to be a Warforged, and at the time my characters were in the Pyramid of Shadows (Module H3). They discovered the borken down warforged, and after some repair checks, found out that he had been in there for nearly 900 years.

When they finally got out of the Pyramid, and started doing research, they discovered that he was one of the last remaining warforged. The player (who named the PC "Optimus Prime" decided that Optimus' goal was to find a way to re-create the Warforged race). They were able to put together bits and pieces at random library's they stumbled across, and just recently found out several things about Warforged:

First, that Warforged do, in fact, have a soul. The soul of a living creature must be transfered into a Warforged via a ritual; yet this transference is for the soul only, not the mind (so no memories). This made the warforged exceptionally controversial, since a person was essentially allowed to call a "re-do" on his or her life. In a world where there are very tangible and definate consequences for your actions in the after-life, this raised some weird issues. What happens if a person was evil his entire life, and then after getting reset into a warforged, was a champion for good? Who has final call over the soul? What about creatures who were turned into warforged against their will (a common practice by drow, as my PCs will soon be finding out).

The creation of Warforged is a cool thing, and can become a really neat plot point. (In addition to the PC who wanted to re-create the Warforged racel we also had an artificer in the group who wanted to find out if there was a way to transfer his son's consciousness into a Warforged (his entire body had been paralyzed).

So...yeah, that's what I have to say