Half-dragon janni as villains (my players keep out)

[true_shinken]

Once again my players, keep out.
A little backstory first (spoilered because it's quite long)
OK, so I have a janni wizard in my game. In my current campaign (hopefully ending within a month), the players met this wizard, Ahmed. He was trying to unite all the tribes of the Blue Desert under his banner - through force. This desert is blue because of a magical cataclysm millenia ago. Here I borrowed the name of the Suel Empire, because I love Suel Arcanamachs. The Suel Empire performed a magic ritual to quickly win a war (The Rain of Blue Fire), but it resulted in the destruction of the whole empire, leaving behind only a big blue desert. All rulers, spellcasters and high priests assembled in a council and they decided high level magic was too powerful and dangerous. With the power of the assembled deities, they banned spells above 6th level from Rubia. There were a few remnants in places such as ruins and the like, but those were rare - and the yuan-ti took it upon themselves to guard the ruins in the Blue Desert.

This Ahmed dude is a janni. He used his racial abilities and wizard skills to kidnap a genie (a noble djinn) and milk him for wishes. He was very careful on who he would kidnap, studying him in his native plane, making it seem like he left on his own. He uses only one wish per day, using the second one to keep the genie bound and the third one he keeps for emergencies.
This was 200 years ago. Now, he has a huge empire built on wishes.
He has a blue dragon for a queen and a lot of resources (even the lowest warriors under his emply have magical items, for example).

Basically, I want my bad guy to have about 12 advisors/generals who are half blue dragon janni. I have no idea on how I should make their builds, though. I want them to have around 4-10 class levels each. Ideas?

[super dark33]

Make the players fight each advisor/general in signal, so you can make each one a battle controler, but not the kind that kills things yknow.
maybe one as high hp-low ac-low damage, but dont make them too powerfull.

[Greymane]

With a Wizard father and a Dragon mother, I wager they have no small amount of magic surging in their veins. I think they should have some predilection towards magic, but I can't think of any ways to differentiate them at that point, save for spell lists. Have one or two be Suel Arcanamachs, since you like them and it fits theme of where they're at. Gishes seem to fit nicely for half-dragon janni.

Though, with 12 of them, that also sounds like a nice number for some sort of theme. Only twelves I can think of though are the Zodiac and the Twelve Tribes of Israel, but I'm not sure I should bring that up on this board.

[true_shinken]

With a Wizard father and a Dragon mother, I wager they have no small amount of magic surging in their veins. I think they should have some predilection towards magic, but I can't think of any ways to differentiate them at that point, save for spell lists. Have one or two be Suel Arcanamachs, since you like them and it fits theme of where they're at. Gishes seem to fit nicely for half-dragon janni.
Hm, now that is nice. I think I can get a janni to qualify for Arcanamach without any class levels, even...


Though, with 12 of them, that also sounds like a nice number for some sort of theme. Only twelves I can think of though are the Zodiac and the Twelve Tribes of Israel, but I'm not sure I should bring that up on this board.
Hm, I never thought of using themes. Zodiac could work, yes. I think I'll use this. Thanks a lot.
But what sign would be better represented by our Arcanamach?

[Greenish]

Though, with 12 of them, that also sounds like a nice number for some sort of theme. Only twelves I can think of though are the Zodiac and the Twelve Tribes of Israel, but I'm not sure I should bring that up on this board.Twelve dragonmarks!

[Runestar]

Hmm...half-blue dragon janni is already cr6. You could let them have a disparity in cr so you can pit them in small groups against the PCs in increasing order of difficulty. Not all of them have to be casters.

What cr range are you gunning for? The king would probably be advanced to 18HD with class lvs, but do you want to advance his sons to 10HD to make them large?

Some ideas:

Swordsage (ToB) or duskblade for that melee+magic feel. You could reskin desert wind to electrical damage or something.

Wizards/sorcs can be very strong, especially with non-associated class rules. One with 8 lvs of sorc would be cr 11.

With their racial HD, they should qualify for ur-priest easily. Why they would do so however... :smallconfused:

Dragon magic has some flavourful options, such as pact-bound adept. You could also let them take draconic feats like dragon tail. Alternatively, few lvs in totemist with draconic soulmelds?

[true_shinken]

Hmm...half-blue dragon janni is already cr6. You could let them have a disparity in cr so you can pit them in small groups against the PCs in increasing order of difficulty. Not all of them have to be casters.
In small groups? No, these guys are commander types. You fight them plus mooks... two at once should be a clear case of 'run for your lives'.


What cr range are you gunning for? The king would probably be advanced to 18HD with class lvs, but do you want to advance his sons to 10HD to make them large?
The emperor is a janni Wizard 12 (I might add prestige classes later, dunno).
I won't advance their racial HD, I just want some class levels.


Swordsage (ToB) or duskblade for that melee+magic feel. You could reskin desert wind to electrical damage or something.

Wizards/sorcs can be very strong, especially with non-associated class rules. One with 8 lvs of sorc would be cr 11.

With their racial HD, they should qualify for ur-priest easily. Why they would do so however... :smallconfused:

Dragon magic has some flavourful options, such as pact-bound adept. You could also let them take draconic feats like dragon tail. Alternatively, few lvs in totemist with draconic soulmelds?
Good ideas, thanks. I'm having trouble with the zodiac theme, but I really like it. I should probably read a bit about the zodiac... (after all, I watched Saint Seiya a long time ago)

[paddyfool]

There's also the Chinese zodiac, although why they'd be animal-themed is rather questionable.

Alternatively or in addition, you could split them into threes and fours.

Four casters (wizard, sorcerer, cleric, artificer)
Four melee (warblade, crusader, swordsage, barbarian)
Four balanced/skillmonkey (bard, duskblade, factotum, swift-hunter ranger/scout build)

Gives you plenty of scope to play with, and roles to play.

Wizard: Chief student to father; keeps an eye on other apprentices, maybe heads magical r&d
Sorceror: Maybe a blasty enforcer type?
Cleric: Royal representative to whatever religious groups they encourage.
Artificer: Heads the weapon foundries etc.

Warblade: Main general of the army (under parents)
Crusader: Commander of the royal guards
Swordsage: Commander of some kind of special forces strike force
Barbarian: Commander of a gang of brutal enforcers (could team up with the sorceror)

Bard: Minister of propaganda information (could also be beguiler)
Duskblade: Chief of police; some counter-intelligence, perhaps.
Factotum: Minister without portfolio; general-purpose problem solver and spymaster. Affects to be a useless layabout.
Scout/Ranger: Minister for agriculture and/or chief sheriff over rural areas? (Running out of ideas...)

EDIT: All of this is very much a "for instance". You could pick pretty much any classes you like... the one thing that concerns me most is the simple question of whether twelve scions as active elements is too much. Maybe give the party basic information of all twelve, but emphasise that they'll have to decide how they approach/attack/otherwise interact with them.

[JaronK]

I'd give them thematic abilities, each with a different one, and keep them relatively consistent in power, but everyone with magic of some variety.

Perhaps one Dread Necromancer, one Beguiler, one Warmage, one Desert Wind themed Swordsage, one Duskblade, one Paladin of Tyranny/Battle Sorcerer, etc. Each one could have complimentary or thematic mooks... for example the Dread Necromancer could of course have undead minions, while the Paladin of Tyranny guy has mooks who debuff saves and use save or suck attacks (Binders, Hexblades, Unseelie Fey creatures, etc), and the Beguiler has a fortress full of various illusions and traps. That way taking on each commander feels dramatically different.

JaronK

[Grendus]

The comment on the 12 tribes of Israel makes me think that having some inter-familial drama would be appropriate. Alliances between the siblings, rivalries, etc. Maybe the youngest is conspiring against the others and hires the PC's to hinder their plans, or maybe one of them feels their father favors another ("a chimera ate Joseph... honest!"). The idea being that they don't see the council as 12 bags of exp before they can go after daddy, it's an actual political organization, one that has to be manipulated instead of being attacked directly.