Rogue vs Nerco Cleric

[DangerDanger]

I'm a level 4 rogue with a dip in fighter. My feats are ambidexterity (3.0), TWF, Improved Initiative, and Weapon Finesse.

The Cleric in our group is starting to get a bit too uppity and pushes my guy around a lot. I try to get back in small ways. Small potatoes for small potatoes. However, he's planning on doing something big to my character soon, not sure what.

I need to draw the line that my rogue is not to be trifled with, but he always makes sure to keep his skeleton summons close by him. I figure one on one, I'd get the jump on him pretty easily, but he's pretty evil, and one wrong roll will equate to his owlbear skeleton turning me into mulch.

I'm sure I'll be safe for the next few levels, so in those, what provisions can I make to prepare for him?

Note: I can't just sneak up and mess him up, it has to be a direct response to him attacking me.

[LTwerewolf]

Get an item with permanent protection or magic circle vs his alignment. Not super expensive. You can also take it in stride at first, then start waking him up during his sleep periods for the next several weeks. Casters need uninterrupted rest to prepare spells.

[DangerDanger]

Get an item with permanent protection or magic circle vs his alignment. Not super expensive. You can also take it in stride at first, then start waking him up during his sleep periods for the next several weeks. Casters need uninterrupted rest to prepare spells.

I'd rather not mess with him too much leading up to his assault. Messing up his sleep schedule would hurt our party in encounters and could offer better justification towards his actions.

His alignment is pretty wonky, to be honest. He says he's Chaotic Neutral, but ever since the beginning of the campaign, everyone's like, dude, so evil. For instance, he stacked a bunch of fear effects to destroy a guy mentally, because. I'm not sure how protection or magic circle items work, I'm rather new to this ^^;

[Eldest]

I'd rather not mess with him too much leading up to his assault. Messing up his sleep schedule would hurt our party in encounters and could offer better justification towards his actions.

His alignment is pretty wonky, to be honest. He says he's Chaotic Neutral, but ever since the beginning of the campaign, everyone's like, dude, so evil. For instance, he stacked a bunch of fear effects to destroy a guy mentally, because. I'm not sure how protection or magic circle items work, I'm rather new to this ^^;

Magic Circle Against Evil. (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/magicCircleAgainstEvil.htm)

Protection Against Evil. (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/protectionFromEvil.htm)

If your DM thinks he's Chaotic Neutral, go with Protection/Magic Circle against Chaos instead. It means it is harder for him to use summoned Chaotic creatures against you, can't cast any mental spells against you (such as fear effects) and you get a small bonus against his attacks and spells.

[Cikomyr]

Find a way to become invisible. Beat him up with ranged sneak attack. Wittle him down. If he gets the jump on you, retreat. You need to be in control.

"Invisiblity from Undead" might be a good thing if you have his skelly on your tail.

Separate him from his buddy.

[Urpriest]

I'm confused. If he's got an owlbear skeleton, you're playing 3.5. But you said you've got ambidexterity, which means 3.0, since there's no reason to take it in 3.5 even if it were allowed. I feel like there are some houserules in play here, and it might be useful to know about them.

[Toliudar]

Protection from evil blocks compulsion and charm effects. Fear, unfortunately, is neither. Aside from giving a +2 to your will saves against any direct effects, there's no particular benefit there. If he has a skeleton owlbear, he's probably not focused on summoning, so there's limited help there as well.

Similarly, clerics don't actually need 8 hours of uninterrupted rest, but do ostensibly need to pray at the same time each day, so simply interrupting at that time would be enough to hamper him, should it reach that level of dickery.

A more pressing question may be: are you enjoying this conflict? In my opinion PVP conflict should go no further than the point at which it's fun for both players. If you're enjoying the scheming back and forth, great, but if you're only doing this in order to save your character, it might be faster and more useful to have a brief chat with the DM and/or the other player to set some ground rules about what's acceptable at your table.

[Togo]

Potion of hide from undead. 50gp. His skeleton doesn't even get a save. You can't attack anyone though.

Disguise skill. Get a dummy, made of straw. Disguise it as you. Hide it somewhere (inside your bedroll). If an undead creature goes after you, pull out the dummy, pretend to wrestle with it for a bit, then run off. The undead creature has no way to tell you apart.. This one only works if you're alone with it.

Alternatively, disguise yourself as the cleric. Then wear a hat of disguise to look like you again. When the cleric makes his move, drop your hat of disguise illusion and then pretend to be the cleric. Your bluff skill is probably better than his.

Protection from evil (potion). 50gp - Summoned creatures can't touch you.

Hide. Spot is not a class skill either for him or his summoned creatueres. At higher levels he may end up with with something with lifesight, in which case you'll need to hide amongst living creatures.

Use magic device - wand or scroll of protection from evil. Cast it on his summoned intelligent undead (usually the incorporeals). It's harmless, so the creature has no reason to resist, and the creature is being compelled against its will, so unless is has instruction to resist, it won't. That severs the control of the summoner. Then just ask it to turn on its creator. A good cleric would be able to turn it, but he's not very good, so he's probably chosen to rebuke undead instead, which won't work through prot evil.

[DangerDanger]

I'm confused. If he's got an owlbear skeleton, you're playing 3.5. But you said you've got ambidexterity, which means 3.0, since there's no reason to take it in 3.5 even if it were allowed. I feel like there are some houserules in play here, and it might be useful to know about them.
Yeah. The book we have is 3.0, so starting the DM was like, this is law. But then the necromancer starting using online sources for his summons, the wizard for his summons, and the ranger for her animal companion and spells. The DM is crazy against retraining though, so we house-ruled that I take no draw backs from twf and I can go all CQC with a crossbow and dagger.

[DangerDanger]

A more pressing question may be: are you enjoying this conflict? In my opinion PVP conflict should go no further than the point at which it's fun for both players. If you're enjoying the scheming back and forth, great, but if you're only doing this in order to save your character, it might be faster and more useful to have a brief chat with the DM and/or the other player to set some ground rules about what's acceptable at your table.
We're enjoying the conflict, but he's been slowly raising the stakes lately. My goal isn't to save my character, but to draw the line with his. We can still scheme against each other, I just want to keep a level playing field.

[Toliudar]

We're enjoying the conflict, but he's been slowly raising the stakes lately. My goal isn't to save my character, but to draw the line with his. We can still scheme against each other, I just want to keep a level playing field.

In that case, one of your strongest options is to form a mutual protection arrangement with one or more of the other players. A cleric with undead servants is a pretty tough nut for a rogue/fighter to crack. But a rogue/fighter with a ranger flanking buddy - or having all of the players dogpile on the cleric when he steps over a line - may be more instructive.

[eggs]

You should use UMD to Planar Bind Zargon the Returner (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=258840). Say it's to help you build an orphanage or something.

You probably won't compel Zargon to do you any services (or not to eat you), but he should still ruin divine casters within 100 miles. Plus, summoning ancient unspeakably evil enemies as a part of personal quarreling is what's called "plot." :smalltongue:

[Arcanist]

You should use UMD to Planar Bind Zargon the Returner (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=258840). Say it's to help you build an orphanage or something.

You probably won't compel Zargon to do you any services (or not to eat you), but he should still ruin divine casters within 100 miles. Plus, summoning ancient unspeakably evil enemies as a part of personal quarreling is what's called "plot." :smalltongue:

Honestly, If you're going to bind an Elder Evil, it's best to just let them run wild on the plane, because I highly doubt that anything short of complete and utter annihilation will make them happy. So just pop one out, greater plane shift away and then come back when the mess is all cleaned up by a god or the DM spills his dew on it and it dies.

[DangerDanger]

You should use UMD to Planar Bind Zargon the Returner (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=258840). Say it's to help you build an orphanage or something.

You probably won't compel Zargon to do you any services (or not to eat you), but he should still ruin divine casters within 100 miles. Plus, summoning ancient unspeakably evil enemies as a part of personal quarreling is what's called "plot." :smalltongue:

I think for now I'm going to go with the minor spells and potions. Small potatoes for small potatoes, not N-bombs for rocks thrown. ^^;

[docnessuno]

Assuming that your hide / move silently roll is high enough to fool his undead mininos (and it should), you can just get him in his sleep.

On the next party rest, fake sleeping.
A couple hours later, stand up, sneak to the cleric's bedroll / tent and pour a flask of water over his head.
As he wakes, probably confused and irated, throw a dagger to the ground, having it stick next to where his head was, and whisper: "You can only stretch it so much before it breaks"

[White_Drake]

The Alchemical Flarestake from the Expedition to Castle Ravenloft would be great against his skeletons/zombies. If you stick it in an undead creature (treat as an attack roll with a dagger) it burns for 1d6 fire damage per round. In itself that isn't so hot, but there is no duration, so it burns until it is pulled out. Guess what mindless undead won't think to do?

Also, how high are the stakes, and what is the group cool with? I second recruiting a loyal minion fellow party member to help you. Try to use poison brewing rules to create a laxative to slip in the cleric's drink. Accidentally pocket his onyx. Use disable device to rig his armor to fall apart if he gets struck by anything. Attempt to addict his character to narcotics. All else failing, dress him as a teenage girl, slather him in steak sauce, take away his items, and shove him into the middle of his ravening hordes.

[Deophaun]

You're going to want to negate his spell casting abilities. Might I suggest UMDing a silence spell on a coin, and then Slight of Handing it onto his person? Bonus points if you have two coins, one you keep on you, to prevent him from easily disposing of it. You can also use SoH to place questionable items on his person that could get the authorities to look into him (poisons, unholy symbols, stolen goods, etc). Heck, swap out his holy symbol for a fake. That'll make a bunch of his prepared spells useless (such as the Summon Undead line), and he won't notice until it's too late.

The problem is, as a rogue, you can't be reactive to his threats. If he is allowed to pick when and how to start a confrontation, you have already lost. You have to have pegged him as a threat before hand and initiate the confrontation when you hold the advantage. This is mechanically the wrong class to be honorable with.

Protection from evil blocks compulsion and charm effects. Fear, unfortunately, is neither. Aside from giving a +2 to your will saves against any direct effects, there's no particular benefit there. If he has a skeleton owlbear, he's probably not focused on summoning, so there's limited help there as well..
The owlbear skeleton would be acquired through Summon Undead II, so there's actually a lot of help there.

[eggs]

What's that undead ghost thing in Libris Mortis that turns divine casters off? Quell? You should go on a sidequest that "incidentally" gets some of those pissed off at the party. :smalltongue:

[DangerDanger]

You're going to want to negate his spell casting abilities. Might I suggest UMDing a silence spell on a coin, and then Slight of Handing it onto his person? Bonus points if you have two coins, one you keep on you, to prevent him from easily disposing of it. You can also use SoH to place questionable items on his person that could get the authorities to look into him (poisons, unholy symbols, stolen goods, etc). Heck, swap out his holy symbol for a fake. That'll make a bunch of his prepared spells useless (such as the Summon Undead line), and he won't notice until it's too late.

The problem is, as a rogue, you can't be reactive to his threats. If he is allowed to pick when and how to start a confrontation, you have already lost. You have to have pegged him as a threat before hand and initiate the confrontation when you hold the advantage. This is mechanically the wrong class to be honorable with.

The owlbear skeleton would be acquired through Summon Undead II, so there's actually a lot of help there.
That's some fun dickery there.

And I have to be honorable about it for now. Diplomacy with the party. Without proper provocation, who ever draws first is sort've a ****. That's why these tips about magic items, spells, potions, and what not are useful. It ups my defense against his assault, giving me more options than "roll good." Later on this may become a spy vs spy sort've thing.

I'm kind of annoyed right now, though. Like, it's a moot point, but we're all level 4. Animate Undead is a level 3 spell... :smallannoyed:

Whatever, I wonder if this'll allow me to finesse some cool stuff from the DM :smalltongue:

[Deophaun]

Bwahahaha. I found it.

Now, I don't necessarily like that most of the best options for a rogue involve UMD, but this one is just absolutely perfect.

You're afraid of animate dead coming online next level. Don't be. This is your cleric's undoing. The creatures created by animate dead respond to his spoken commands. You are going to get a scroll (well, probably a wand, as he is going to get a DC14 Will save here) of Sculpt Sound. When he finally goes aggressive, you cast it on the cleric. His voice now says "Kill me!" Stab him. Make him scream in pain and that scream tells his horde that he desperately needs to die. As it is a transmutation, it should work to turn his army against him. If you swapped out his holy symbol for a fake, he is now royally screwed as he can't turn his minions as the loyally carry out their "orders." All you have to do is run away.

[LTwerewolf]

That's some fun dickery there.

And I have to be honorable about it for now. Diplomacy with the party. Without proper provocation, who ever draws first is sort've a ****. That's why these tips about magic items, spells, potions, and what not are useful. It ups my defense against his assault, giving me more options than "roll good." Later on this may become a spy vs spy sort've thing.

I'm kind of annoyed right now, though. Like, it's a moot point, but we're all level 4. Animate Undead is a level 3 spell... :smallannoyed:

Whatever, I wonder if this'll allow me to finesse some cool stuff from the DM :smalltongue:

Steal his holy symbol. Can't cast spells without it.