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View Full Version : Alignment change has never been so much fun!



PaladinBoy
2007-04-29, 08:15 PM
I think we nearly made the DM cry. We escaped from Sharn in the Eberron campaign setting. Everyone was laughing their heads off at the reckless tactics we used and the ineptitude of the city authorities.

This is a pretty long story, but I think it's hilarious.


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It all started in the middle of a published adventure. The adventure set up an encounter with a group of Brelish spies, saying that the players would have to choose between Breland's or House Lyrandar's interests. Of course, my character is a Lyrandar noble. And the spies went down pretty easily.

Naturally, this did not go well with the King's Citadel in Breland. And we were being paid to see the airship safely back to Sharn, one of the primary Brelish cities. Upon our arrival, the City Watch showed up to arrest us. When they asked a crewmember where to find us, they were promptly regaled with the tale of the entire adventure....... a tale that left them terrified of us. They knew, and we knew, that if we resisted arrest that we would likely leave them as piles of ash dumped into the depths of Sharn. (After all, that's what we did to the dragon.) Nevertheless, my character wanted to find a way to be able to stay in Breland without having to kill guardsmen every day. So we went along to the Watch commander.

My character proceeded to attempt to use his political influence to get out of going to prison. Unbeknownst to me, my DM had used Rule 0 to declare that the Watch commander we faced was the one that hated the dragonmarked houses. And, therefore, hated me and didn't care that she was risking the displeasure of my house for her and Breland. She ordered us taken to prison. Unfortunately, she used the terrified Watch detail to escort us. One Diplomacy check later (32), I convinced the guards that it would be best for everyone for us to leave. We got our freedom......... and they got their lives. (At least, that's what I told them.)

Our next stop was the House Sivis message station, where I got the confirmation I needed: House Lyrandar would stand behind me, to the point of stopping all shipping and transport in Breland. With this threat in hand, our next stop was the King's Citadel headquarters in Sharn. I was still interested in convincing Breland to leave me and my companions alone.

Upon arriving at the Citadel, our first challenge was a group of adamant guards, some of whom appeared out of invisibility. They were not impressed with my threat, even though the loss of Lyrandar shipping would cripple Sharn's economy. One of them was from House Orien, House Lyrandar's rival in shipping (Orien uses caravans and the lightning rail), and he actually liked my idea. They also questioned how I could carry out my threat from prison. In response, I told the druid to wild shape and fly to the Sivis message station. Which he did, soon afterward. I told them that they had better not do anything to me if they wanted me to stop him. They still weren't impressed, so I decided to take the issue up with their commander. I put up a wind wall to protect us from ranged attacks as our half-dragon friend used an enlarge person special ability and took to the skies. Seconds later, we burst through the wall of the commander's quarters, high up on the tower.

The commander wasn't there when we arrived, but he showed up pretty quickly. I proceeded to deliver the same threat to him that I had to his guards. Unfortunately, he wasn't much more impressed. He told us that his orders came from the King, and that he would capture us. We weren't very impressed with him either, though. As the half-dragon jumped out the hole, I cast invisibility sphere, right after the warmage dropped a fireball close enough to scare him. As we flew away, he yelled, "You won't be safe in this city!" I responded, "Fine! We'll leave!"

At this point, the DM and the rest of the party were calling into question my Lawful Good alignment. We brushed it off, however, reasoning that one event does not change alignment.

At that point, we flew to the docks, looking for a way to leave Sharn. By a curse of bad luck, the only elemental galleon available was headed into Sharn. We landed on its deck anyway; I figured that upon hearing my story and seeing my confirmation letter, the captain of the vessel would begin Lyrandar's boycott of Breland now. Of course, upon landing, we learn that the Lyrandar galleon is gunrunning (or crossbow-running? :smallconfused: ) for the King's Citadel. He said that we should probably take up the problem with them before turning the ship around. Luckily, the issue was forced by the City Watch; flying Watchmen showed up overhead, with an order to heave to and give up the fugitives, or they would open fire. This just caused us to laugh; even flying, they were still no match for the offensive power of our warmage. I responded with dispel magic, and the warmage dropped another fireball to put a steam cloud in between us and the now swimming Watchmen. Their fireball still came back and hit us, and they suppressed the elemental that made our ship ridiculously fast.

Another ship was promptly launched from Sharn; this ship flew the banner of the Redcloaks, an impressively strong Brelish unit that would chew our entire party up in direct combat. Of course, this wasn't direct combat now, this was naval combat, and my character and our party promptly demonstrated that that was a losing proposition against Lyrandar. Between giving us a tailwind, giving them a headwind, blinding them with fog, and the bard's illusion of a geyser, we managed to evade them long enough for the elemental to restore itself. (This also spawned numerous Star Trek jokes about the elemental "coming back online" and the "I need more power, Scotty!" quote.) At this point, we used the wind galleon's highly superior speed to leave Breland's territory.

Also at this point, we also realized that we had just ran rings around all of Breland's law enforcement and had also managed to do some spitting in their faces. My character is now Neutral Good. The half-dragon bard changed from TN to CN. Even the Chaotic members of the party became Chaotic+ alignment. (Don't ask how that works, I don't know.)

Daelon
2007-04-29, 09:37 PM
I canna do it captain! I dun't have tha powur!


Man, that was fun. I really should've torched the guards in the water, though.

Edit: I'm working my way up to C++ alignment. I'm hoping it gives me l337 c0d1ng p0\/\/3r5

tobian
2007-04-29, 10:17 PM
Nothing like arriving in town, willingly being captured by pansy guards, simply walking away from said guards while being "escorted" to prison, meeting and evading harder captors with much greater numbers, flying up to a tower on (or rather being) the half dragon to see the commander of the guards, destroying the wall of his room to get in, finding out the commander was not going to help and just are pissing him off, diving off the tower and flying to the port in the town while fireballing right above his room on the way out, commanding a lyrandar ship, sailing it as the guards are telling us to halt, dispelling the magic causing guards to fall into the sea, dealing with the references to pop culture, evading guards that could kill us while our ship is disabled via supernatural abilities and some level 2 spells, and sailing off into the sunset. :elan:

Most fun i've had in a while!

<See, thats what happens when Lawful characters pull the stick out from their rear>

storybookknight
2007-04-29, 10:42 PM
Very exciting... I think you probably made your DM cry, I mean I can see it happening.

I mean, he was trying SO HARD to get you guys, and then you do that to him... guess you're just tactically better than he is or something?

druid91
2007-04-30, 03:53 PM
yes this was fun and now im the only one in the city since i was left behind. poison shopping and i have to pick up my stuff

Daelon
2007-04-30, 06:49 PM
Including my dragonhide, right? *winkwink nudgenudge*

Jack Mann
2007-04-30, 08:03 PM
Wow. Outclassed by a warmage. I mean, I know they're NPCs, but I feel sorry for those poor guardsmen.

Counterpower
2007-04-30, 08:47 PM
HEY! They are not "tactically better" then I am!!! I was ad libbing the whole scenario. There weren't any statistics, initiative, or actual by-the-rules combat at any point in this entire scene. They just watched and laughed as I gave the guards every reasonable ability, including lots of wands. I followed the supplement Sharn, City of Towers, which told how much the authorities disliked calling on the Redcloaks. And every single element of "bad luck" was yours truly calling upon the fact that the DM rules the world. Who ruled whether there were any ships leaving Sharn at the time? Or the guard commander they met that hated any dragonmarked house?

And............ they still escaped. *sigh* Oh well, I can start using the Dragonmarked prestige classes. (hmm....... ooh, Deneith sentinels, Tharashk hunters........... yay!)

tobian
2007-04-30, 09:15 PM
Awww... poor DM.

:elan:

I read somewhere that it dosent matter how much thought the DM puts into an encounter to be complex or difficult;


The players will always find an even more insane solution. :smallbiggrin:

Stephen_E
2007-04-30, 09:31 PM
I read somewhere that it dosent matter how much thought the DM puts into an encounter to be complex or difficult;


The players will always find an even more insane solution. :smallbiggrin:

Yeah, playing Fallen the GM put most of the party into a situation where he thought they had only 2 options. They missed one of the two options, promptly discarded the other one, and came up with half a dozen more, and insisted on choosing one of them even when the GM pointed out "These are the two options you're supposed to choose from".

Stephen

Jack Mann
2007-04-30, 10:06 PM
Good for you. I have very little respect for "you have to do A or B" plotlines.

Norsesmithy
2007-04-30, 10:27 PM
Yeah, playing Fallen the GM put most of the party into a situation where he thought they had only 2 options. They missed one of the two options, promptly discarded the other one, and came up with half a dozen more, and insisted on choosing one of them even when the GM pointed out "These are the two options you're supposed to choose from".

Stephen
I love having players who do this, alternate solutions just give me more chances to be cruely innovative (and innovatively cruel).