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CE Cleric of Moradin

   
CE Cleric of Moradin

So, in my tabletop session, my Dwarf Cleric of Moradin (lv10) picked up an intelligent Heavy Mace unknowingly and failed his Will save. He's now being controlled by the ancient spirit of Shargoth, an evil sorcerer who tried to destroy the Kingdom of Crimson by killing its King, but couldn't and was imprisoned inside his own weapon by Olidammara's Clerics.

My cleric, Garrek, was of Lawful Good alignment and Shargoth is Chaotic Evil. Ironically, the Purpose of the weapon is to kill Clerics! O_o

My question is:

What implications will this have in my character? Does Garrek suffer an immediate personality change or does it slowly change him into his more chaotic nature? Will this have immediate effect or only when he is confronted with an interest conflict, Garrek vs Shargoth?

Can I break free of the Weapon's possession?

If he's being controlled by a chaotic evil character, then he'll basically be a different person, personality-wise. It won't be a gradual shift, or subtle; he'll act differently in pretty much every situation. However, Shargoth might be savvy enough to act like Garrek when the situation dictates it; for example, he might hide the mind-control from his party members. If you look here, you'll see that your party can see through the act with Sense Motive checks; the DC will depend on the DM and the item, whether you're dominated or mind-controlled, or otherwise how complete Shargoth's control will be.

Also, it should be noted that he'll have his casting and turning abilities until he does something blatantly Evil or Chaotic, as per "ex clerics" here.

However, the above assume you've been mind-controlled by Shargoth somehow, as per Dominate Person or Dominate Monster. If, rather, he's simply exerting his ego against you like a normal intelligent item, you're not really "mind controlled," it's more like you're under the item's sway for a day or so. Think Gollum; you'd be doing what Shargoth wants, but you'd still be Garrek, so your personality would be pretty much the same, except of course that you'd do something pretty evil. Again, if you do something evil or chaotic, you'll lose spellcasting and turning abilities.

I'd suggest reading up on Intelligent Items if you have the time. There are a couple things you need to be aware of:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Alignment
Any character whose alignment does not correspond to that of the item....gains one negative level if he or she so much as picks up the item. Although this negative level never results in actual level loss, it remains as long as the item is in hand and cannot be overcome in any way (including restoration spells). This negative level is cumulative with any other penalties the item might already place on inappropriate wielders. Items with Ego scores (see below) of 20 to 29 bestow two negative levels. Items with Ego scores of 30 or higher bestow three negative levels.
If the item has a big ego (sounds like it does), you may get even 2 or 3 negative levels.

And there there is this:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Personality Conflicts
When a personality conflict occurs, the possessor must make a Will saving throw (DC = item’s Ego). If the possessor succeeds, she is dominant. If she fails, the item is dominant. Dominance lasts for one day or until a critical situation occurs (such as a major battle, a serious threat to either the item or the character, and so on). Should an item gain dominance, it resists the character’s desires and demands concessions such as any of the following.

•Removal of associates or items whose alignment or personality is distasteful to the item.
•The character divesting herself of all other magic items or items of a certain type.
•Obedience from the character so the item can direct where they go for its own purposes.
•Immediate seeking out and slaying of creatures hateful to the item.
•Magical protections and devices to protect the item from molestation when it is not in use.
•That the character carry the item with her on all occasions.
•That the character relinquish the item in favor of a more suitable possessor due to alignment differences or conduct.
In extreme circumstances, the item can resort to even harsher measures, such as the following acts:

•Force its possessor into combat.
•Refuse to strike opponents.
•Strike at its wielder or her associates.
•Force its possessor to surrender to an opponent.
•Cause itself to drop from the character’s grasp.
So you are dominated for 1 day, and you should get more chances to save. While you are dominated, you will act evil. (Your DM might have to NPC you during this part perhaps.) It is very likely that Moradin will no longer grant you any spells while you are dominated. And you likely will no longer be able to turn undead, though your DM might let you rebuke them isntead.

It shouldn't have permanent effects on your alignment, however, so long as you continue to try to resist Shargoth's influence. You might need to receive an atonement spell afterwards to be granted spells again, but the caster won't need to spend any experience, and likely you won't be required to go on a quest (since you didn't do these things willingly, contrition isn't necessary).

Quote:
Originally Posted by svipdag
However, the above assume you've been mind-controlled by Shargoth somehow, as per Dominate Person or Dominate Monster. If, rather, he's simply exerting his ego against you like a normal intelligent item, you're not really "mind controlled," it's more like you're under the item's sway for a day or so. Think Gollum; you'd be doing what Shargoth wants, but you'd still be Garrek, so your personality would be pretty much the same, except of course that you'd do something pretty evil. Again, if you do something evil or chaotic, you'll lose spellcasting and turning abilities.
This. I've failed my check against its Ego. Soooo, what I get is that I'll be the same until clerics start crossing my way (let's hope I don't pass in front of any mirror. :P ).

@Ithamar: Thanks for the input. I was totally unaware of the alignment thingy. The item's Ego is 26, so I'll have 2 negative levels to play with.

Another questions:
1) Let's say that I make my save vs Ego the next day. If he has done nothing wrong yet, will Garrek perceive he's under the influence of a magical item? And if he did something wrong already and has lost his cleric abilities, will he understand right away that something's wrong?

2) If I make the save and Garrek is somehow aware that the weapon is controlling him, he'll decide he wants to get rid of it. This will lead to a Personality Conflict between them. If I succeed in the Personality Conflict, am I free to drop the weapon somewhere? Or will I need some kind of temple service to get rid of it (atonement, or something)? (I know I'll need Atonement for getting back my spells.)

You should note, most of these rules are a bit fuzzy. First and foremost, you should go with what your DM says, especially since the magic item has it's own story and personality (and so it might have it's own special abilities with regards to controlling your character, altering your perceptions, etc). As I see it (and I may be wrong):

1. It's unlikely that the mace would dominate you and then not force you to do something. The primary cause of personality conflict isn't being a different alignment; that causes the level loss. Rather, the ego vs will battle comes about when you act in opposition against the weapon:
Quote:
If the character who possesses the item is not true to that alignment’s goals or the item’s special purpose, personality conflict—item against character—results.
My argument is, that being untrue usually refers to an action; in this case, seeing a cleric and not working to harm them, or doing a good deed, etc. So if the mace was just going to let you go about your business, there'd be no will save.

If the mace did exert its will in such a situation, for that action and for subsequent actions for the rest of the day, you'd essentially be acting against your own will. Since neither intelligent item ego domination nor the Dominate Person spell wipe the subject's memory, you'd be perfectly aware of what you'd done, and how you felt while doing them. Generally, though, you don't get a mental alert when you fail a will save (e.g. illusions), so it'd be a question of how you perceive your own actions and motivations, which there aren't really concrete rules for.

For example, you might not initially realize what you'd been forced to do; if the mace's personality was very subtle, it might get away with having you, say, defend a certain person being accosted in a street. Since you don't know that that person had actually just killed a bunch of clerics, and was gonna do it again soon, you get off feeling good about yourself for protecting somebody, and the Mace gets away with harming clerics and being evil. In this case, it's not entirely clear when, if at all, a personality conflict would arise; it's possible, for example, that the mace would stop you from casting Detect Evil on the person. You'd be perfectly aware that you hadn't cast the spell, but it's imaginable that you wouldn't know why. It's possible some kind of Sense Motive check would reveal what the item was doing to you; theoretically, you and the mace should be on speaking terms of some sort (empathy, at the very least), and so it would have to conceal its motivations from you.

Similarly, if you walked up to a healer and bashed him in the head, you'd have no doubt that that was an evil act, and not the sort of thing you generally do. Whether you'd figure out that you'd done so because of the mace, however, is a bit unclear due to the rules being nonspecific. It doesn't say you'd be unaware that the mace had made you do it, so maybe the mace would get a bluff check? It can have skill ranks in Bluff and it should have a charisma score, and if it's a trapped sorcerer, that score might be pretty frighteningly high. But that'd be up to your DM; there's not exactly a "sense who's enchanting me" skill. Actually, spellcraft might let you do something similar. In any case, it's not explicit anywhere that I know.

So overall, you'd never really be in doubt as to what you'd done, but you might be in doubt as to why exactly you'd done those things, and you also might not realize the full implications of your actions, implications your mace might know full well.

On the second part; yes, if you lost all cleric casting abilities, you'd know that something was wrong. Barring special circumstances, you wouldn't immediately forget your previous spellcasting abilities, and if you have any Knowledge(religion), you'd be aware that clerics who offend their deities often lose spellcasting; it wouldn't take a rocket scientist to piece the two parts together.

2. If you succeed on a will check against the item (again, assuming it's no more than an Intelligent Item, i.e. not a relic or something special-made by your DM), you'd be free to do whatever you wished with the thing. It wouldn't be prevented from communicating with you, so it might try to convince you that it shouldn't be dropped, but beyond argumentation it would hold no sway. It seems like the personality conflicts trigger each time you or the item is forced to act against it's nature, so for example you might have better luck throwing it off a bridge (1 action, so 1 check) rather than, say, putting it up for auction, where each step in the process (finding an auction house, bringing it to auction the day of, physically handing it to the buyer, etc.) might cause another conflict, and thus another check.

That enlightened me to no end.

Thank you very much for the input. *bows*

Quote:
Originally Posted by P4yne View Post
What implications will this have in my character? Does Garrek suffer an immediate personality change or does it slowly change him into his more chaotic nature? Will this have immediate effect or only when he is confronted with an interest conflict, Garrek vs Shargoth?

Can I break free of the Weapon's possession?
If its a possession then nothing Garrek does under Shargoth's domination will cause alignment conflict and possible change to CE. It may be Garrek's body but somebody else stole the keys and is in the driver's seat.

I think I'm leading you into confusion by my choice of words.

The weapon is an Intelligent Weapon with 26 Ego. It's CE in alignment. And I failed my Will save vs its Ego, as I picked up the weapon.

By what I've seen and read both in the SRD and here, my character remains with his normal behaviour, though he might be deviated from his normal personality traits in a determined situation (depending on the weapon's purpose, for instance).

Hope it gets crystal clear now.

A weapon's successful dominance lasts one full day. Its faithful to its goals and alignment over anything a character desires and if the character acts contrary the weapon can successfully force the character to do otherwise.

Generally I read this as the character being in control until the weapon wants something else, then BAM...the character is compelled to do it. Its a compulsion though. The character is not given a choice and it won't cause alignment conflict as long as your LG cleric works to correct the problem....when he is allowed to.




 

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