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Storm of Zehir Character Concept: The Red Knights

Tags: #Dragonborn1721 
  • September 11, 2016

    Storm of Zehir is an interesting expansion for Neverwinter Nights 2, instead of building one character and recruiting companions across the world, you build a party of four different characters that are all your original design, and play through the campaign that way. It allows for some really interesting teams and party combinations. 

    My concept, is that of a party built around a single god as opposed to being as powerful as possible, Four Fighters, all who worship the Red Knight, the Lady of Strategy and Grandmaster of the Lanceboard, that has the domains of War and Law. The entire party would be Human Fighters with various different talents, that make use of a Fighters massive potential for feats, allowing them to fit different roles within the same basic class.

    Markus Overra -  During his early years as an adventurer, Markus was trapped in a cave full of Orcs, a simple iron door the only thing between him and certain death. So he was stuck there, planning ways to get through the room, with only a sword, his food and a collection of minor treasures. His solution? Well, orcs are known for being more than a little dull, so he tried the only thing that made any sense. Attempting to bargain with the Orcs.

    Of course it went horribly wrong, but Markus did at least get the chance to stop an immediate attack, meaning he only suffered a broken arm and a cut across his back, nothing a couple of healing kits couldn't solve.

    Markus is your typical warrior, he has incredible strength, is a little reckless at times and charges into combat armed with a Greatsword, and covered in the heaviest armour possible. He's the hard-hitter of the team, capable of dishing out incredible amounts of damage.

    Class - Fighter, later becoming a Frenzied Berserker

    The idea of taking the Frenzied Berserker class later on is simple, it allows Markus to enter a frenzy, increasing his strength and health to an impressive margin, meaning he can dish out more damage faster. And by level 2, it becomes a really powerful character, being able to use the Cleave feat (which lets you attack an enemy after landing a killing blow) but hitting the second enemy twice instead of just once, potentially doubling the damage dealt with the Cleave. 

    Weapons - Greatsword

    Armour - Full Plate

    Primary Feats - Power Attack, Cleave, Weapon Focus - Greatsword and Great Cleave are the main feats we'll be aiming for. Power Attack lets us to +6 damage at the cost of a -3 to hit (which by level 5 won't be that much). Cleave as mentioned above will let us attack an enemy for free after we kill a nearby one and Great Cleave basically means Cleave can be used on multiple enemies in a row as long as you kill each one. Weapon Focus is a simple feat, allowing you to get a +1 to hit with your chosen weapon. 

    Attributes - 18 Strength, 10 Dexterity, 16 Strength, 10 Wisdom, 10 Intelligence and 8 Charisma

    We aren't focusing on anything other than combat here, being able to dish out damage is our main focus so we start with as much Strength as we can (18). Constitution is the second most valuable attribute because it boosts our HP. The others are all kind of useless to be honest.

    Skills - Lore, Heal and Craft Weapon

    This character doesn't really have much use of the more common Fighter skills, so picking up Lore and Craft Weapon give the character a bit of use outside of combat, while Heal gives us just enough ability to use Healing Kits decently.

    Combat Role - Damage Dealer, secondary Tank

    Shie - A younger adventurer then the rest of the Red Knights, who's stories tend to be rather dull and boring. Rarely does she get involved in anything that ends up dangerous for her, because she always plans each adventure ahead, knowing what to look out for and what enemies she might need to fight.

    The only story that goes against this is the time she came across a Halfling death-cult, who instead of fighting in conventional manners, decided that simply jumping at their enemies to claw at them would be the best way to solve their issues. Needless to say, the Halflings didn't last that long against a quick fighter, but it was a funny enough story that Shie tells it whenever possible. 

    Oh and I suppose there was that time she confronted the drunk Kobolds, but for some strange reason that story is never talked about in polite company...Or usually in impolite company either.

    Needless to say, she is a capable and intelligent fighter. 

    Class - Fighter, later becoming a Duelist

    As opposed to pure damage, Shie is much better at distracting her enemies during combat. Combining Dexterity and Intelligence to create a versatile defensive character, who can also dish out quick damage in the middle of combat. 

    Weapons - Rapier 

    Armour - None

    Primary Feats: Improved Parry, Dodge, Weapon Finesse and Combat Expertise are the main feats Shie uses. Improved Parry and Combat Expertise allow us to create a defensive character in two different ways. Improved Parry boosts the parry skill, allowing her to counter-attack more easily, and parry more times per turn. Combat Expertise boosts AR by 3 at the cost of -3 chance to hit. Weapon Finesse lets us use Dexterity instead of Strength to determine hit chance.  

    Attributes - 10 Strength, 16 Dexterity, 12 Constitution, 16 Intelligence, 10 Wisdom and 12 Charisma

    Skills - Parry, Tumble, Bluff, Taunt, Move Silently and Hide

    Most of our skills are cross-class skills, which means they cost two skill points to increase and we can only invest in them half as much as a normal skill. Tumble, Move Silently, Bluff and Hide are all weaker than our other two skills (Taunt and Parry). Tumble and Parry are both needed to become a Duelist later on and are excellent defensive skills. Taunt gives us a kind of interesting way to reduce the defenses of nearby enemies, while Bluff is useful for dialogue. Move Silently and Hide are both half there to get rid of the rest of our skill points, but they might be useful considering they get a decent boost from our DEX score. 

    Combat Role - Defensive Fighter and Support

    Keiral - The oldest of the group, and the typical, silent but deadly member of the group. Unlike Markus he isn't prone to loud outbursts, isn't as exciteable as Shie, and is the best at talking his way out of problems.

    As for interesting stories, well he tends to fall back on the one about killing an ogre by himself with just a shortbow and three arrows, but I think he just likes to tell that one because it's more impressive then the fifty different ones he has about sewer rats...Yeah for some reason he never tells anyone about sewer rats (the true adventurer's bane). 

    Yeah, most of us consider him to be a bit more boring, but he's definitely a great guy, really good at...you know shooting things. 

    Class - Fighter

    Weapons - Longbow

    Armour - Studded Leather

    Primary Feats - Point Blank Shot and Rapid Shot

    Basically the bread and butter of being an Archer. Point Blank Shot allows Keiral to fight effectively even if an opponent tries to get closer, pretty much removing a common weakness of Archers. Rapid Shot lets him attack more times per turn (1 more), potentially doubling damage output. 

    Attributes - 12 Strength, 18 Dexterity, 14 Constitution, 10 Intelligence, 10 Wisdom and 10 Charisma

    Skills - Intimidate, Craft Armour and Survival

    Intimidate and Craft Armour are rather simple, but useful non-combat skills that can be used for dialogue and item creation respectively. Survival is a bit more interesting, and mainly is used for being able to see enemies on the mini-map, but in SoZ can also be used to judge how far you can travel on the area map. 

    Combat Role - Long Range Support, Archer

     

    Layra Ironblood- Easily the best member of the Red Knights, a strong warrior, great leader and just all around nice person to be around. Her best quality is definitely the fact that she can survive just about any blow from anyone and keep fighting through combat. 

    Okay, so I might be just a little biased, but I am definitely the leader of the group. I'm not really the strongest fighter or anything, but I can take hits better then anyone. 

    I don't have as many interesting stories.I mainly just do the more boring things for the team, organizing payments, finding jobs for the others to do, and just all of the fun things that the others can't be hassled to do. Without me we'd kind of fall about. Oh, there is one story that I have, about this merchant that hired us to kill bandits, but...Oh, I guess technically that one isn't that interesting, there were no bandits and we got paid for lounging around for a week. 

    Class - Fighter, possible Champion of Torm later on

    Weapons - Longsword 

    Armour - Full Plate and Tower Shield

    Primary Feats - Steadfast Determination, Toughness and Weapon Focus - Longsword

    Steadfast Determination is a really interesting feat, that allows you to use your Constitution modifier for your Will saves instead of your Wisdom score. Which for Layra, basically means a hefty increase to resisting a number of different spell effects. Toughness is a great feat that gives you an extra HP every level, which isn't all that much (I mean, at level 30 that would only mean +30 HP) but it is useful for taking hits easier.

    Attributes - 14 Strength, 8 Dexterity, 18 Constitution, 10 Intelligence, 10 Wisdom and 14 Charisma

    Skills - Appraise, Lore and Diplomacy

    Layra's main skills are meant to be meant for trading or dialogue rather than anything else. Appraise will get you better prices in shops (though admittedly not that much better because it's a cross class skill), Lore is just good for saving a bit of money identifying items and Diplomacy is useful in dialogue, and can possibly earn you a bit more money from finishing quests.

    Combat Role - Primary Tank, Leader

    The Order of the Red Knights is primarily a Good-aligned party, by no means we the Lawful Good, goody-two-shoes kind of group . We do have our own motives, primarily wealth and fame, but we'd rarely (if ever) put that above helping people out. For example, we certainly wouldn't kill or assault an innocent person just for wealth, but wouldn't be against the idea of intimidating someone if it meant a good amount of gold being exchanged. 

    We are your typical adventurers (well we'd like to think we're at least better than the rest of them),travelling around towns and cities, clearing out bandit camps, hunting monsters and just doing any little thing we can to to help out and if possible gain just a little bit of money (have I mentioned how important earning money is.).

    Markus is a little different in that matter, he isn't usually that interested in money, and is much more interested in simply getting into as many good fights as he can. The stronger the foe, or more difficult the odds simply means he's more interested.

    Shie also likes to fight but in a slightly different way. She's a little demon at fighting in legal duels, challenging just about anyone who annoys her to battles under very specific rules. Of course those duels don't happen nearly as often as she likes anymore. 

    Keiral...Uh, he likes, honestly I'm not really sure what he does. We just let him do his own thing most of the time.

    Oh, and I'm a big fan of gambling, honestly if I much worse at it we'd be completely broke. But I will totally gamble on just about anything I can, my favorite thing is Shie's duels, but they're almost too easy to bet on so I do play card games a lot more. 

    Alright everyone, you might recognize this, it is a repost from Ning, and was based off of my idea for Character Concepts, short build-like discussions that primarily differ from builds because they aren't playtested. It's more an idea that was designed to spur content creation that inspires other people. Anyway, I hope you guys enjoy this concept. 

  • Member
    September 19, 2016

    I remember reading this back on Ning and finding it amusing. I might end up trying my hand at one or two later on.

  • September 19, 2016

    I remember reading this back on Ning and finding it amusing. I might end up trying my hand at one or two later on

    A character concept? If so I'd definitely encourage you to give it a shot, it's a bit different from building (I found it odd to not know exaclty how it would turn out), but definitely interesting to make. Saves me a lot of time compared to the 30+ hours it'd usually take me just to play a build, not to mention the 5-10 hours it'd take me to write it.

  • Member
    September 19, 2016

    Dragonborn1721 said:

    A character concept? If so I'd definitely encourage you to give it a shot, it's a bit different from building (I found it odd to not know exaclty how it would turn out), but definitely interesting to make. Saves me a lot of time compared to the 30+ hours it'd usually take me just to play a build, not to mention the 5-10 hours it'd take me to write it.

    My play tests last... a very, very long time. My current one is at 5 days of gameplay. :|