Green Players With Elaborate Backgrounds

[kevin_video]

So it's been nearly a year since I last DMed an actual game, and I've decided to get back into it as I've now got players interested, including the girlfriend who hasn't played a game since AD&D, a buddy who's never even laid eyes on the game before, and his girlfriend who played 3.5 once about a year or two ago, but didn't actually play because the DM she had essentially did everything himself (apparently that's an almost literal statement). In essence, very green players.

Now I like background. I don't just want characters popping up for no reason whatsoever with no sense of concept or substance. Heck, the last character I built up had a 5-page background done up with enough story plots that the campaign could have gone on forever (of course the DM didn't appreciate that and had everything written up burned to the ground and pissed on but I digress). So when they came up with lengthy, yet somehow plausible backgrounds, I was quite happy. The problem I've got is going to be the girlfriend's.

Now don't get me wrong. Hers is quite plausible, and interesting. What's actually scary is this character is going to be the offspring of her old AD&D character that she had from a decade ago. Now while I've had problems with my DMs, at least they have plausible storylines (granted one of them uses Dragon magazine pre-made ones), but hers took at least a slice of the cake. Wow. I don't know the full story because she lost me back when her character was at 10th level, let alone at 18th (seriously her DM must have snorted a bag, then smoked a bag, and then drank a 2-4 every night he came up with this insanity), but it ended off with her current character being born. She's a half-elf half-celestial half-vampire. Now admittedly, that sounds like a mouthful, and it is. However, that doesn't mean I'm going to say no. She did what I asked. She made an elaborate background that was plausible, and the character is the offspring of her previous one. The only problem I originally had was her wanting to be a Healer. Yes, from the Mini book. I managed to talk her out of that and go Cleric.

Now the issue is making that half-elf half-celestial half-vampire cleric work. When I looked at last night, it never even occurred to me that the LAs would be bad. I was probably half asleep because otherwise the +6 of no CL would have made me go "Absolutely not." But I've agreed, and now have to make it work. So I thought about the bloodlines from UA. That doesn't seem to bad, but can you take two at the same time? How does the level buy go? It says 3rd, 6th, and 12th, but if you have two does that mean 2&3, 5&6, 11&12 for the buy-offs if you can do both? As well, those affinity bonuses suck. I want to switch those out so badly. Then there's the issue of the celestial bloodline not giving you wings, which she wants.

And note, I haven't heard back from the other two yet, but my buddy always smiles when I ask him about it. His girlfriend says it's the first time she's seen him put so much energy into something that he himself wasn't working on. I'm not frightened, but at the same time I kind of am.

What can I do? What options are there available to me?

[Solo]

Let her eat the LA. Just don't target her with anything too powerful.

If she really wants to play a Healer, let her play a healer. Some people enjoy healing.

[kevin_video]

Let her eat the LA. Just don't target her with anything too powerful.

If she really wants to play a Healer, let her play a healer. Some people enjoy healing.

What do you mean "eat" the LA? Just let her take it and have the +6 added in? I was thinking of buy offs, but that's really high so that means it'll be a number of levels before she can get rid of them. I don't know about the others yet.

[Solo]

What do you mean "eat" the LA? Just let her take it and have the +6 added in? I was thinking of buy offs, but that's really high so that means it'll be a number of levels before she can get rid of them. I don't know about the others yet.

If she know that the LA is going to be high and she wants to do it anyways, let her do it and try to buy off as much as possible.

Nothing like a good learning experience for newbies.

Then again, I'm the type of person who'd let a kid burn himself on a stove so he'd learn not to touch it...

[PhaedrusXY]

There is a feat that can give an aasimar wings. I'd "suggest" for her to be a half-vampire aasimar with that feat. Explain that her bloodlines are a bit diluted from being mixed three ways (and also the metagame undesirability of playing a caster with a +6 LA). I forget the LA of half-vampire, but I think it is +2. If she actually uses the LA +0 "lesser aasimar", that's all she'll have. Even if she goes with the full-blown aasimar, it will only be +3, which while a bit high is at least tolerable and can be bought off pre-epic.

[kevin_video]

There is a feat that can give an aasimar wings. I'd "suggest" for her to be a half-vampire aasimar with that feat. Explain that her bloodlines are a bit diluted from being mixed three ways (and also the metagame undesirability of playing a caster with a +6 LA). I forget the LA of half-vampire, but I think it is +2. If she actually uses the LA +0 "lesser aasimar", that's all she'll have. Even if she goes with the full-blown aasimar, it will only be +3, which while a bit high is at least tolerable and can be bought off pre-epic.

Cool. What's the feat?

[PhaedrusXY]

There is a feat that can give an aasimar wings. I'd "suggest" for her to be a half-vampire aasimar with that feat. Explain that her bloodlines are a bit diluted from being mixed three ways (and also the metagame undesirability of playing a caster with a +6 LA). I forget the LA of half-vampire, but I think it is +2. If she actually uses the LA +0 "lesser aasimar", that's all she'll have. Even if she goes with the full-blown aasimar, it will only be +3, which while a bit high is at least tolerable and can be bought off pre-epic.

Cool. What's the feat?

outsider wings

[kevin_video]

There is a feat that can give an aasimar wings. I'd "suggest" for her to be a half-vampire aasimar with that feat. Explain that her bloodlines are a bit diluted from being mixed three ways (and also the metagame undesirability of playing a caster with a +6 LA). I forget the LA of half-vampire, but I think it is +2. If she actually uses the LA +0 "lesser aasimar", that's all she'll have. Even if she goes with the full-blown aasimar, it will only be +3, which while a bit high is at least tolerable and can be bought off pre-epic.

Cool. What's the feat?

outsider wings

The requirements kind of confusing.
Prerequisite: Aasimar or tiefling, base Fortitude, Reflex, and Will saves +2, Celestial Bloodline or Fiendish Bloodline
So if you count as any of these? I don't quite get it.

[Havok4]

There is a feat that can give an aasimar wings. I'd "suggest" for her to be a half-vampire aasimar with that feat. Explain that her bloodlines are a bit diluted from being mixed three ways (and also the metagame undesirability of playing a caster with a +6 LA). I forget the LA of half-vampire, but I think it is +2. If she actually uses the LA +0 "lesser aasimar", that's all she'll have. Even if she goes with the full-blown aasimar, it will only be +3, which while a bit high is at least tolerable and can be bought off pre-epic.

Cool. What's the feat?

outsider wings

The requirements kind of confusing.
Prerequisite: Aasimar or tiefling, base Fortitude, Reflex, and Will saves +2, Celestial Bloodline or Fiendish Bloodline
So if you count as any of these? I don't quite get it.

They are feats from the same book, they give protection form good/evil and bless/bane a few times per day as an SLA. You could just wave those requirements though.

[kevin_video]

What? I didn't understand what you said at all. Feats from the same book? Gives you protection from good/evil? Where does it say the wings do that?

[Prime32]

What? I didn't understand what you said at all. Feats from the same book? Gives you protection from good/evil? Where does it say the wings do that?

The Celestial Bloodline and Fiendish Bloodline feats do that. You need one of them and a planetouched race and all +2 saves to take Outsider Wings.

I would suggest also using the Tome vampire template, which is LA +0 and causes fewer headaches than a standard vampire. A level of their vampire paragon class (in the same link) would let the character go for longer periods without feeding.

[kevin_video]

What? I didn't understand what you said at all. Feats from the same book? Gives you protection from good/evil? Where does it say the wings do that?

The Celestial Bloodline and Fiendish Bloodline feats do that. You need one of them and a planetouched race and all +2 saves to take Outsider Wings.

Okay, so just to make sure I have this right, she needs to a) take Aasimar as her race (whether it's lesser or the regular +1 LA), b) needs to have Fort, Ref, and Will at a BASE of 2 (taking feats like Lightning Reflexes and Iron Will doesn't count towards it???), and c) take the Celestial Bloodline feat?

[Havok4]

What? I didn't understand what you said at all. Feats from the same book? Gives you protection from good/evil? Where does it say the wings do that?

The Celestial Bloodline and Fiendish Bloodline feats do that. You need one of them and a planetouched race and all +2 saves to take Outsider Wings.

Exactly, sorry if that was less than clear. The feats are all from races of faerun.

[Prime32]

What? I didn't understand what you said at all. Feats from the same book? Gives you protection from good/evil? Where does it say the wings do that?

The Celestial Bloodline and Fiendish Bloodline feats do that. You need one of them and a planetouched race and all +2 saves to take Outsider Wings.

Okay, so just to make sure I have this right, she needs to a) take Aasimar as her race (whether it's lesser or the regular +1 LA), b) needs to have Fort, Ref, and Will at a BASE of 2 (taking feats like Lightning Reflexes and Iron Will doesn't count towards it???), and c) take the Celestial Bloodline feat?

And then take the Outsider Wings feat.

Or you could just use a good-aligned adaptation of Tome's Wings of Evil feat ([Fiend] feats can be taken by evil Outsiders or creatures from one of the evil Outer Planes). Note that Tome's feats are balanced for a higher power-level than most standard D&D feats.

[Sohala]

I would say Aasimar as a base race would be good, give the option of the Aasimar/Half-Celestial transition class and the Vampire template class, then she could slowly gain racials or go cleric/healer if she wanted. Seeing as she is the spawn of an elf I would have her character still count as one for the purposes of PrC if the question ever came up.

[PhaedrusXY]

I would say Aasimar as a base race would be good, give the option of the Aasimar/Half-Celestial transition class and the Vampire template class, then she could slowly gain racials or go cleric/healer if she wanted. Seeing as she is the spawn of an elf I would have her character still count as one for the purposes of PrC if the question ever came up.

I wouldn't even mention that, as she doesn't understand the rules well enough to know that it is a bad idea... LA + caster = fail

[kevin_video]

And then take the Outsider Wings feat.

So probably like, 3rd level then because as a cleric she's not going to have +2 Reflex as a base, and I guess the feats that give you +2 to saves don't count.

@ Sohala -- I've been talking to her about this, and she's okay with the Aasimar and is choosing the +1 LA and the Libris Mortis half-vampire template, but we've opted out the blood drain that you can get for free as a +0 because it also gives you the thirst too, and since she's good, she doesn't want to accidentally feed on innocent people.

@ PhaedrusXY -- I've told her that, and she's still okay with it because it's her character. Doesn't want to go with the bloodline if at all possible. Just wants to have fun with the character in general regardless.

[skydragonknight]

Since all the Half-Celestial SLA's are Cleric spells, you can claim that she "draws out more of her celestial powers" as she takes levels in Cleric.

[Prime32]

@ Sohala -- I've been talking to her about this, and she's okay with the Aasimar and is choosing the +1 LA and the Libris Mortis half-vampire template

Do you mean LA +1 aasimar or LA +1 half-vampire? Because the only difference between aasimar and lesser aasimar is that one gains the Outsider type, which would probably be overriden by Undead anyway (does half-vampire actually make you undead?).

@ PhaedrusXY -- I've told her that, and she's still okay with it because it's her character. Doesn't want to go with the bloodline if at all possible. Just wants to have fun with the character in general regardless.

Feel free to remind her that an incompetent character who dies from papercuts is not fun.

[kevin_video]

@ Sohala -- I've been talking to her about this, and she's okay with the Aasimar and is choosing the +1 LA and the Libris Mortis half-vampire template

Do you mean LA +1 aasimar or LA +1 half-vampire? Because the only difference between aasimar and lesser aasimar is that one gains the Outsider type, which would probably be overriden by Undead anyway.

Aasimar is +1, lesser Aasimar is +0. Half-vampire is +2.