[Pirate] Rez Driftgood and His Talking Skull

[HealytheHealslime]

"Alas, poor Yorick, I knew him well."
"Hey, it's knew him Horatio, ya hairy, overgrown midget. If yer gonna use my head as a prop, you could at least take the effort ta get the lines right."
An entry idea, not entirely fleshed, about a halfling pirate and the evil talking skull what loves him. Will probably get around to fully fleshing it out next week.
(First Time...entrant? Contester? Contestant.)

[HealytheHealslime]

Rez Driftgood
Male halfling rogue
Small Humanoid
HD: 8d6 (34 hp)
Init: +3
Speed: 20 ft.
AC: 19 (+5 Armor and Magical Armor bonus, +3 Dex, +1 size)
Base Attack/Grapple:+7/+2
Attack: Rapier +12 melee(1d6+2/ 19-20 (3d6+4 against undead, 3d6+2 against evil creatures, 5d6+4 against evil undead))
Full Attack: Rapier +12/6 melee(1d6+2/ 19-20 (3d6+4 against undead, 3d6+2 against evil creatures, 5d6+4 against evil undead))
Space/Reach: 5/5
Special Attacks: Sneak attack +4d6, +1 Racial bonus on attack rolls with thrown weapons and slings
Special Qualities: +2 racial bonus on Climb, Jump, and Move Silently checks, +1 racial bonus on all saving throws, +2 morale bonus against fear, +1 racial bonus on listen checks, Improved Uncanny Dodge, Trap Sense +2, Trap Finding, Evasion
Saves: Fort +5; Ref +10; Will +3
Abilities: Str 10, Dex 17, Con 14, Int 16, Wis 10, Cha 16
Skills: (Note: Numbers in Parentheses are uncursed modifiers) Balance +14, Bluff +6 (14), Climb +16, Disguise +6 (14), Perform(Acting) +1 (9), Profession(Sailor) +11, Search +14, Sleight of Hand +14, Spot +8, Swim +13, Tumble +14, Use Rope +14
Feats: Athletic, Weapon Finesse
Possesions: +1 Chain Shirt, +2 holy bane (undead) rapier, cursed ring of sustenance(see below)
CR: 8
Alignment: Chaotic Good
Of all the famous adventuring halfling lineages, none were and are more famous than the pirating Driftgoods. Normally the Driftgoods were of the out-only-for-myself-and-maybe-a-few-other-people variety of pirate, but enough of them were gallant freedom fighter types that the Driftgoods eventually claimed respectability. One such pirate, by the name of Allan Trisullen Driftgood, was partucularly good at eradicating undead, and focused his attention on the dastardly undead pirates and merchants that roamed the sea. Of all the clashes Allan had with the undead, none were more famous than the one he had with his own brother, Darek Driftgood, the fiercest vampire pirate to set blackened sail on sea. After toiling many years to defeat his foe, Allan finally completely destroyed Darek (or so he thought) with a stake through the heart. Feeling guiltier than he thought he would for "killing" his brother, Allan retired shortly afterwards.

Many years later, when the Driftgood family had mostly given up on piracy, Allan Driftgood's grandson, Rez, got the urge to follow in his grandfather's footsteps. He was working as an actor in a traveling theater group at the time, but Rez wanted more than just the life of a two-bit actor. He wanted to make his life matter. He wanted to sail with the wind in his hair and a ship at his feet. He wanted to do battle with the forces of evil in the dark of night. He wanted to dally with fair maidens when their respective parents and/or guardians weren't looking. And, perhaps most importantly of all, he wanted to use less-than-legal matters in order to do all that other stuff.

So, when his theater troop lost all their money through embezzlement, Rez took it as a sign from the gods themselves that he should take up the life of a pirate like his grandfather before him.

Rez took a ship back home and told his family what he planned to do. They all looked at Rez like he was crazy, but they decided that if he really wanted to become a pirate, they might as well let him.

So he made plans to set off next month, and when the time came for Rez to go his family threw a going-away party for him, inviting disant relatives of the Driftgood family and giving Rez all sorts of rare and useful gifts. It was all going very well until an odd looking stranger arrived, claiming to be Rez's third cousin twice removed. The stranger dressed himself very oddly; he was clad in black from his head to his feet, and he always carried around an umbrella, which he kept open, even indoors.

When the time came for Rez to leave for his ship the stanger stopped him, thrust a package into his hands and said:
"Now, ye better not forgot this pretty package, see? 'Twas a gift from your own dear great-uncle. Open it right up, dearie." Inside the package was a ring of sustenance. Rez thanked the man and went on his way, eager to get to hi ship.

He didn't even make it halfway to the next port. Along the way, his shipmates got annoyed with Rez for some uknown reason, and they left him for dead on the nearest deserted island. Fortunately for Rez, he still had his ring of sustenance on, and he was able to last until another ship came along, this time a merchant ship. Rez disguised himself as a sailor and secretly boarded the ship, hoping to get back to civilization. Unfortunately, his shipmates on this ship treated him no better than the ones on his last, and it wasn't long before Rez got booted to another deserted island.

Once again, a ship came to Rez's island (pirate, like the first), and once again, he was on another island faster than you can say "lickety-wickety-spit". Over time, a pattern would emerge: Rez got on another ship (later on, Rez would take control of the ship), Rez got off another ship and on another island. It started to seem like everyone hated Rez after being with him a while. The longest Rez has been on one ship is three months, two weeks, and five days. It can pretty disheartening for a pirate, and indeed, Rez has stopped trying to reach civilization and instead uses what little time he has on his ships to grab all the treasure he can, and to find out how he can lift the curse on himself.

Nowadays Rez's thoughts often turn to the mysterious man who gave him the ring; he knew that the man did something to curse him, but he couldn't put his finger on just what until recently. He now knows the ring has something to do with it, but he still cannot lift the curse; he can take the ring on and off, but it doesn't do a thing.

Rez has also begun to suspect that the man is really his great-uncle Darek, brought back by some foul magic, and whether consciously or not he has begun to frequent islands of the undead even more...
FinalEdit: Rez is done, crunch-wise anyway. I'll see if I can't tidy up his flavor text.

[HealytheHealslime]

Skully
Unique Undead
Size/Type: Tiny Undead
HD: 6d12 (46)
Initiative:+3
Speed: 10 ft
AC: 18 (+2 size, -1 Dex, +7 natural armor)
Base Attack/Grapple: +3/NA
Attack: Bite +4 melee (1d6-3 plus Fatiguing Bite)
Full Attack: Bite +4 Melee (1d6-3 plus Fatiguing Bite)
Space/Reach: 2 1/2 ft./ 0 ft.
Special Attacks: Fatiguing Bite, Spell-like Abilities
Special Qualities: Skull Traits, Undead Traits(http://www.d20srd.org/srd/typesSubtypes.htm#udeadType)
Saves: Fort +1, Ref +1, Will +7
Abilities: Str 4, Dex 9, Con--, Int 20, Wis 14, Cha 13
Skills: Bluff +11, Decipher Script +14, Hide +8, Intimidate +11, Knowledge(Arcana) +14, Listen +13, Move Silently +8, Sense Motive +13, Spot +13
Feats: Improved Intiative, Weapon Finesse
CR: 5
Alignment: Neutral Evil
Of all the undeath cults in the Arko-Bannido island chain, the one lead by Nerrith the Ever-Seeing is the worst. Nerrith is a cleric of Nerrull who is fascinated by undeath, and often experiments on both his followers and people unlucky enough to happen upon his island home. He especially likes creating new forms of undead. One day he was lounging in his favorite chair when he spied that one of his skeleton soldiers had lost its head. He was so amused by the sight of the skeleton's body and head moving independently of each other that decided right on the spot to create a skeleton soldier without a body--in short, an animated skull.

Of course, there would be improvements--Nerrith never like the fact that skeletons and zombies couldn't think on their own, so he decided that his creation would be a fully intelligent creature, capable of speech and conversation.

The problems began shortly after this creation was finished. The skull never did like Nerrith, and it gave him a lot of sass. Pretty soon, the darned thing was making all kinds of trouble, biting Nerrith's followers, interrupting important rituals with rude comments, and generally making unnecessary miscief. It got to the point where Nerrith considered throwing it out to the ocean and ridding himself forever of the thing.

That turned out to be unnecessary. A few weeks afterwards the island was attacked by a halfling pirate by the name of Rez Driftgood. Normally this would be a bad thing, but Nerrith took advantage of the situation and left the skull on the island whlie he and the rest of his followers left quietly for another island to desanctify.

However, this turned out better than expected for the skull, for Rez took it, thinking it was a costly, if ghastly trinket. When Rez found out the skull could talk, he was initially distrustful, then delighted, for Skully, as Rez called the thing, could be a friend that wouldn't desert him no matter what.

Now Skully identifies himself almost exclusively as a male, and is (a little) kinder to people, especially Rez. He won't let go of his evil tendencies, but Rez tries to set a good example for him. He still is very sassy, making fun of Rez for almost everything he does wrong, but, despite Skully being thrown against the wall a few times or Rez getting bitten every now and then, they still get along, perhaps because they're the only ones that can stand each other.

Fatiguing Bite(Su): Whenever Skully makes a sucessfull hit with his bite attack the opponent must suceed on a DC 17 Fortitude or be fatigued.

Spell-like Abilities: Skully may use each of the following spell-like abilities three times per day as a 6th level wizard:
Ventriloquism, Silent image, Cause Fear, Color Spray

Skull Traits: Skully has no arms and thus cannot make a grapple check. In addition, he takes a -8 penalty to checks that focus on moving.
Edit5: Pretty much everthing is done!

[HealytheHealslime]

The Loot
Ring of uncharismatic sustenance: Like Rez suspected, the ring the stranger gave him has a profound curse on it, making it almost impossible for even the most charismatic bard to relate to people over a period of time. The ring functions exactly as a real ring of sustenance would, down to the letter. However, whenever someone puts on the ring of uncharismatic sustenancehe becomes much less diplomatic, so to speak, recieving a -8 penalty to all Bluff, Diplomacy, Disguise, and Perform checks. As if that wasn't bad enough, the wearer of the ring gives off an ugly pall, making the people around him want to be around him less. The longer a person is around the ring-wearer, the more he or she doesn't want to be around the ring-wearer, until it gets to the point where that particular person wants to get rid of the ring-wearer at any cost. This last effect is a mind-affecting trait.
The ring may be taken off, unlike many other cursed items, but the curses may only be removed with either a remove curse, wish, or miracle.

Strong Enchantment CL 17th; Craft Ring, create food and water, bestow curse, antipathy; Price 45,000 gp.

In addition to the ring, Rez has his grandfather's old sword, Vampire's Bane, which he (meaning the grandfather, not Rez)used in his quest to eradicate the undead (functions as a +2 holy bane[undead] rapier) ; a +1 chain shirt, passed down from some forgotten relative and now slightly rusty from his travels; and a few copper, silver, and gold pieces (about 2d6 of each) left from miscellaneous raids.

[HealytheHealslime]

Plot Hooks
--Rez Driftgood attempts a take-over of the ship the PCs are on. How will the PCs react to such a strange fellow?
--Rez wants to raid an island beset by the undead, and needs the PCs' help.

In addition, here are some questions to think about when constructing a game with Rez in it.

--What exactly happened to his great-uncle Darek? Did some dark magic bring him back, or was he never dead to begin with? If you're using the second option, what really happened when grandpa Allan "defeated him? (Did Darek trick some subordinate into being the fall guy? Was ol' granpy Allan feeling pretty bad about having to kill his own brother, and lied about killing him?) Or is he still dead, and some vengeful pal of his gave Rez the ring?
--What about Nerrith, Skully's creator? How does he feel about his creation teaming up with Rez? Does he even care anymore?
--Lastly, if and when Rez and Skully meet up Darek Driftgood (or his cult of personality), what role will they play in the resulting fight? Primary role? Secondary role? Pancake flipping role?

[Rolaran]

This looks pretty cool, sorry about having a similar idea... Like I said, good luck. :)

[Carmichael]

Hey, I think you stole my gimmick with teasers/sneak peeks. Or maybe it's just coincidence. :)

[Psymon]

Is the skull anything like a football called Wilson? ;D I love it!!

[Rama_Lei]

Is the skull anything like a football called Wilson? ;D I love it!!

I believe Wilson was a volleyball.

[HealytheHealslime]

Is the skull anything like a football called Wilson?
Actually, it's more like a skull named Murray. ;)

[HealytheHealslime]

Okay, I've almost got all the crunch down. I'm not completely done, but feel free to point out any mistakes all the same.