[3.5]Help with character creation needed - A Possessed or corrupted kind of character

[Incarnate]

Hey everyone here at GiantITP.

I have a player in my group who wants to play a character who's possessed or living in symbiosis with an entity that is a fiend or wraith.
He's says that this entity gives his characters powers related to darkness, like being able to create darkness, to move freely in darkness (like shadow-door), being in darkness empowers him, and so forth. At the cost of this entity being able to take full control of his character when certain criteria are met, which in many cases would mean his character would be under complete control for very long periods of time. I have pointed out to him that a characters like this would be very unbalanced in relation to the other characters, so it would be better for the character to gain these "powers" from class abilities, racial abilities, feats and so forth. I suggested that his character be corrupted by the entity in question, which would make his character evolve in that direction that would give him these sort of "powers". He also wanted his character to be ninja-like, to me this could be the swordsage with a darkness/shadow theme (basically re-flavouring of the martial maneuvers). Also, I asked him what was the most important thing, the rp-elements about the character or the "powers" where he said it's the rp-elements. To me that seems to indicate that it doesn't really matter how its achieved to get the "powers" as long as it gets achieved and it fits with the theme and story of the character.

From the top of my head as I mentioned - swordsage, but what else could fit with this? There is 10 levels worth of experience to play with, along with 36000gp's, so if magical items could help also to attain this, then that could also work. Its set in Forgotten Realms and we have most of the official material available so there are plenty of possibilities, the only real requirement to the character is that it has to be playable.

Thank you in advance. :smile:

[Gildedragon]

Swordsage fits well.
Binder also fits quite nicely you might have to write up a vestige for shadowy abilities
Beguiler or abrupt jaunt conjurer into shadowcraft mage

As to the pc getting NPCed at times: think if -you- really want the hassle of that.
Honestly I'd recommend to ditch that and stick to strict power by level abilities.

Also note that some basic and ubiquitous protections would hamper his PC... such as Protection from X...

Binder 8/Ssage 2 might fit well...
If one adapted the Tenebrous Apostate to progress SSage instead of cleric then one could be v shadowy with: Binder 6/Ssage1/Tenebrous Ap 3

Also it'd work with the idea of the bound shadow entity...

[tuesdayscoming]

You might consider looking at Intelligent Items/Symbionts/Weapons of Legacy for a way to execute the "assuming direct control" moments without making the character dramatically more powerful than other PCs. Still, would potentially add a decent amount of flavor and new abilities.

These all have Ego scores, which allow the item in question to enter into a "contest of wills" with their owner if they disagree on the best course of action. If the item wins, then its opinion rules.

edit: I'm going from memory on the Weapons of Legacy; they may or may not actually have an ego.

[Incarnate]

Swordsage fits well.
Binder also fits quite nicely you might have to write up a vestige for shadowy abilities
Beguiler or abrupt jaunt conjurer into shadowcraft mage

As to the pc getting NPCed at times: think if -you- really want the hassle of that.
Honestly I'd recommend to ditch that and stick to strict power by level abilities.

Also note that some basic and ubiquitous protections would hamper his PC... such as Protection from X...

Binder 8/Ssage 2 might fit well...
If one adapted the Tenebrous Apostate to progress SSage instead of cleric then one could be v shadowy with: Binder 6/Ssage1/Tenebrous Ap 3

Also it'd work with the idea of the bound shadow entity...

Thats what I wanted to do, power by level abilities and such, and I already was going to try and avoid having to npc his character, which was why I suggested the character be corrupted instead.
From what you suggest with the Binder/Tenebrous Apostate it would fit quite nicely, especially if the character had been deceived by the entity in question, thinking he's helping it or being tricked to binding it.

I think Binder 6/Ssage1/Tenebrous Ap 3 would very likely be the one he'd go for.

What would you suggest in terms of race & feats? Desn't have to be optimal in terms of performance but rather supporting the characters rp-elements.


You might consider looking at Intelligent Items/Symbionts/Weapons of Legacy for a way to execute the "assuming direct control" moments without making the character dramatically more powerful than other PCs. Still, would potentially add a decent amount of flavor and new abilities.

These all have Ego scores, which allow the item in question to enter into a "contest of wills" with their owner if they disagree on the best course of action. If the item wins, then its opinion rules.

edit: I'm going from memory on the Weapons of Legacy; they may or may not actually have an ego.

I wasn't planning on making the character more powerful than the other characters, in fact I'm trying to avoid that. Intelligent Items could be an interesting element, thanks for bringing that to my attention. :smallsmile:

[ShurikVch]

Fiend of Possession PrC (Fiend Folio) have Transfer Spell-Like Ability CF; since those abilities are not "for granted", but completely depend on the Fiend in question (and no more than 4/day anyway), it probably wouldn't unbalance game too much
Note: in that case, PC should take Blood Oath

[Gildedragon]

Thats what I wanted to do, power by level abilities and such, and I already was going to try and avoid having to npc his character, which was why I suggested the character be corrupted instead.
From what you suggest with the Binder/Tenebrous Apostate it would fit quite nicely, especially if the character had been deceived by the entity in question, thinking he's helping it or being tricked to binding it.

I think Binder 6/Ssage1/Tenebrous Ap 3 would very likely be the one he'd go for.

What would you suggest in terms of race & feats? Desn't have to be optimal in terms of performance but rather supporting the characters rp-elements.


A whisper gnome... penalty to cha though, but the idea is that guy makes a poor pact all the time so that works

A ghostwise halfling also works

Ditto for a lesser dhinni

[TheFurith]

Not sure what the rest of your people playing are running, or how unbalancing this would be, but the savage progression half fiend could work with the whole evolving part. Could limit it to only being able to take a level every fifth level. You'd lose class features, but it would be less unbalancing and easy to quantify.

As far as "ninja like" there is a ninja class. Don't remember where it is, but it is a thing. It's pretty ninja like.

BoVD has a whole section on possession and the fight for control of the host. Might be useful, though if the possession thing is just a plot device it wouldn't really matter much.

[Zaq]

Okay, so, what I'm about to suggest is way outside of RAW. It's going to take a lot of GM cooperation. But I think it'd be cool if you could make it work.

You mentioned Swordsage, and that got me thinking. Crusaders pick which maneuvers they ready, but they don't pick which ones they get granted, right? The easiest way to handle that is through a deck of maneuver cards, which the player shuffles and deals to themself as the time comes. But for the purposes of this discussion, let's say that the GM is the one in control of that deck, not the player.

So normally, the character is a Crusader, and they have normal Crusader maneuvers, which is awesome. But when the circumstances are right (the character is in darker-than-average conditions, or the character's will is shaken and they're more susceptible to the influence of the possessing spirit, or it's the new moon, or whatever else is fun and dramatically appropriate), the GM replaces some of the Crusader's maneuvers with other ones. Shadow Hand being the obvious choice, though with enough fluff-based effort, others might be appropriate. And sometimes that might be exactly what the situation calls for, though sometimes it wouldn't. (Hell, maybe the GM could even occasionally give the character a higher-level maneuver than they'd normally have, though that would probably only happen if there were some kind of cost or some kind of way for the possessing spirit to benefit.) The character (and the player) wouldn't be in direct control of this, so it'd be an interesting way to represent the concept of "there's my abilities, but there's also the possessing spirit's abilities, and I'm not fully in control of which ones I've got."

Since Crusaders normally have semi-random maneuvers anyway, this isn't as jarring a break as it would be for the other types of initiators. But it would give the GM a way to vary the amount of influence the possessing spirit has. This likely wouldn't happen every round or every fight. But when it DID happen, it'd be weird and different, and if all the respective actors play their parts, it could be very cool.

[Incarnate]

Tenebrous could in fact be this shadowy entity who somehow has corrupted the mind of this character and fits quite well with the backstory of the character, although there would have to be some adjustments here and there.

However this: Binder 6/Ssage1/Tenebrous Ap 3 as far as I can gather wouldn't be legal, as one has to be able to bind Tenebrous, which you become able to do at Binder 8 - UNLESS one could still attempt to bind Tenebrous at lower levels?

It sounds interesting with the Fiend of Possession as well as the idea around the Crusader "cards", definitely something worth considering.

[Gildedragon]

Tenebrous could in fact be this shadowy entity who somehow has corrupted the mind of this character and fits quite well with the backstory of the character, although there would have to be some adjustments here and there.

However this: Binder 6/Ssage1/Tenebrous Ap 3 as far as I can gather wouldn't be legal, as one has to be able to bind Tenebrous, which you become able to do at Binder 8 - UNLESS one could still attempt to bind Tenebrous at lower levels?

It sounds interesting with the Fiend of Possession as well as the idea around the Crusader "cards", definitely something worth considering.
There's a feat: Improved Binding that ups your binder level by 22 for determining what vestiges one can bind

[carrdrivesyou]

I would suggest Shadowcaster from Tome of Magic. Not very optimizable IMHO, but they do fit the flavor almost dead on the nose. All kinds of shadow powers. Either that or a beguiler/rogue that took levels of shadowdancer (they get a shadow companion/familiar thing).

There is also the Taint rules from Heroes of Horror. definitely some dark corruption filled goodness to be had there. You might even consider some sort of fiend familiar or some-such from I think MM5??

Just my thoughts, hope they help.

-Carr :D