Hallavast
2008-06-27, 02:24 AM
Warning: This is a fairly long post, and most of it is me describing my character.
I'll start off by saying that I don't really want to convert to 4th edition. It's nothing against the system, really. It seems solid, balanced, and fast paced. I don't agree with all the changes they made, but I'd rather work to get fluff-specific things changed than fight a losing battle trying to convince my DM to stick with 3.5. It seems I can either play 4ed with my group or not play at all. So the question is: how do I convert my character without changing his abilities around too much (much less his attitude as a result from such a change).
The character in question is an elven wizard. He's level 13 right now. He doesn't use obviously broken spells like polymorph or celerity or the like. Further, he uses a lot of direct damage spells like ball lightning, scortching ray, and magic missile. He also makes heavy use of defensive buffs to make sure he doesn't get hurt. He doesn't have any feats or spells from the complete mage or any splatbook published after that. He's a diviner/divine oracle.
As for his personality, he's an ass. He was kicked out of his elven homeland 15 years ago not because he was a troubled, misunderstood youth who fell into the wrong crowd and simply made a few regrettable choices, but because he's an ass, and he did some pretty evil crap. To his great annoyance, he can not remember exactly why he was booted out of his homeland due to a memory spell cast by a certain individual (still hammering out the details about exactly why he was exiled with the DM).
As it happens, this individual may be the single most reclusive and unheard of being on the planet (not even sure if he's on the same plane). My character's only link in finding this fellow has been his tressym familiar (flying talking cat). The cat, however is a lazy bastard, who can't be bothered to remember specific details about my past, so I have only vague, often inaccurate details as leads.
I play the character as the party mastermind, influencing the decisions of my party to further my own goals. I am almost completely self sufficient in combat, seldom requiring any protection from the more melee minded of my party. I've taken serious combat damage (more than 10 points) only twice to date, and my character (being rather vain) takes it as a mark of pride that his face has never sustained a bruise or wound (exept for the large scar on his cheek from before he can remember - which he doesn't count). He rarely gets hit by anything in combat and makes a big deal of his wounds whenever he does sustain injury. The character rarely overshadows the other party members in combat, however, because they are also well built and I somewhat conserve my spells due to my character's paranoia.
The character's motivations also have a bearing on gameplay: He actively seeks out new spells from other wizard's books and scrolls, and he's spent over half of all the loot he's ever recieved on adding spells to his book and making scrolls (and rings). He does this to increase his magical prowess so that he can eventually hunt down and seek revenge upon the man who stole his memories. He worships a god of revenge (and the hunt) for this purpose and has specialized in divination as a result. I don't know if the Deity will be converted as the DM's campaign world is going through a moderately large overhaul. I'm not sure what will stay and what will go. There's also a current subplot involving reclaiming my former homeland from invaders that may or may not be downplayed with the conversion.
So my problem is that the 4ed wizard really doesn't fit into the role I usually play in combat. So I'm considering a warlock (maybe)? I don't know how I'm gonna keep my familiar. He's kinda custom ruled in. Obviously I can no longer go hunting for new spells to learn, but I wonder if there's a way I can keep up the "magic hunt" theme. I will assume that I can no longer be so self sufficient, and so my arrogance in this regard will become a little silly (that's a problem).
My character also likes to live in magical luxury out of combat and between adventures. For example, he teleports (frequently) instead of conventional travel, he keeps his hygiene good with prestidigitation, and uses unseen servant for household work and to entertain any guests... that sort of thing. He also uses magic for utility; like using detect thoughts to interrogate someone, uses boatloads of detect magic, and a lot of other, more powerful divination magic to scout out places and people. I'd like to find a way to keep at least some of that.
I don't have access to the 4ed books (my DM owns them), but I've looked through a little of the PHB and DMG. I begrudgingly acknowledge that my character will have a fraction of the power he possesed in 3.5, but is there some advice for retaining as much of the character theme as possible?
I'll start off by saying that I don't really want to convert to 4th edition. It's nothing against the system, really. It seems solid, balanced, and fast paced. I don't agree with all the changes they made, but I'd rather work to get fluff-specific things changed than fight a losing battle trying to convince my DM to stick with 3.5. It seems I can either play 4ed with my group or not play at all. So the question is: how do I convert my character without changing his abilities around too much (much less his attitude as a result from such a change).
The character in question is an elven wizard. He's level 13 right now. He doesn't use obviously broken spells like polymorph or celerity or the like. Further, he uses a lot of direct damage spells like ball lightning, scortching ray, and magic missile. He also makes heavy use of defensive buffs to make sure he doesn't get hurt. He doesn't have any feats or spells from the complete mage or any splatbook published after that. He's a diviner/divine oracle.
As for his personality, he's an ass. He was kicked out of his elven homeland 15 years ago not because he was a troubled, misunderstood youth who fell into the wrong crowd and simply made a few regrettable choices, but because he's an ass, and he did some pretty evil crap. To his great annoyance, he can not remember exactly why he was booted out of his homeland due to a memory spell cast by a certain individual (still hammering out the details about exactly why he was exiled with the DM).
As it happens, this individual may be the single most reclusive and unheard of being on the planet (not even sure if he's on the same plane). My character's only link in finding this fellow has been his tressym familiar (flying talking cat). The cat, however is a lazy bastard, who can't be bothered to remember specific details about my past, so I have only vague, often inaccurate details as leads.
I play the character as the party mastermind, influencing the decisions of my party to further my own goals. I am almost completely self sufficient in combat, seldom requiring any protection from the more melee minded of my party. I've taken serious combat damage (more than 10 points) only twice to date, and my character (being rather vain) takes it as a mark of pride that his face has never sustained a bruise or wound (exept for the large scar on his cheek from before he can remember - which he doesn't count). He rarely gets hit by anything in combat and makes a big deal of his wounds whenever he does sustain injury. The character rarely overshadows the other party members in combat, however, because they are also well built and I somewhat conserve my spells due to my character's paranoia.
The character's motivations also have a bearing on gameplay: He actively seeks out new spells from other wizard's books and scrolls, and he's spent over half of all the loot he's ever recieved on adding spells to his book and making scrolls (and rings). He does this to increase his magical prowess so that he can eventually hunt down and seek revenge upon the man who stole his memories. He worships a god of revenge (and the hunt) for this purpose and has specialized in divination as a result. I don't know if the Deity will be converted as the DM's campaign world is going through a moderately large overhaul. I'm not sure what will stay and what will go. There's also a current subplot involving reclaiming my former homeland from invaders that may or may not be downplayed with the conversion.
So my problem is that the 4ed wizard really doesn't fit into the role I usually play in combat. So I'm considering a warlock (maybe)? I don't know how I'm gonna keep my familiar. He's kinda custom ruled in. Obviously I can no longer go hunting for new spells to learn, but I wonder if there's a way I can keep up the "magic hunt" theme. I will assume that I can no longer be so self sufficient, and so my arrogance in this regard will become a little silly (that's a problem).
My character also likes to live in magical luxury out of combat and between adventures. For example, he teleports (frequently) instead of conventional travel, he keeps his hygiene good with prestidigitation, and uses unseen servant for household work and to entertain any guests... that sort of thing. He also uses magic for utility; like using detect thoughts to interrogate someone, uses boatloads of detect magic, and a lot of other, more powerful divination magic to scout out places and people. I'd like to find a way to keep at least some of that.
I don't have access to the 4ed books (my DM owns them), but I've looked through a little of the PHB and DMG. I begrudgingly acknowledge that my character will have a fraction of the power he possesed in 3.5, but is there some advice for retaining as much of the character theme as possible?