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confused-stars · 3 years

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I saw your tags for the Sign AU, and I can't stop thinking about the possible interrogation. Shigaraki is preparing himself for hours of grueling questions about locations, members, quirks, and plans. But then his favorite hero shows up and asks how he knows his sign name? It's been two hours and Shigaraki still doesn't understand why they are asking about this. He is confused. Aizawa is confused. And AFO has no idea about all the chaos a sign name has caused.

*clears throat* may i-

It must have been hours at this point. Tomura is sure, from how drained he feels and how tight his stomach is with hunger. They’ve offered him a sandwich, sure, but he wasn’t about to accept it. Especially since the handcuffs around his wrists were clearly created with him - or touch-based quirk users - specifically in mind: rather than hold his hands behind his back, or loosely in front, they force his palms together, fingers pressed against each other as if he’s praying, secured together with five sets of dual rings that wrap around his joints. It’s not uncomfortable, but it also leaves him just a little more helpless. If he wants to eat, someone will have to feed him, and he absolutely refuses to even entertain the notion.

Kurogiri is still out there. The League is still out there. They’ll come for him if only he waits long enough. They’ll find out where he is. He’s not being moved to Tartarus, he knows that much, because Sensei is there and they don’t want them close.

He almost wishes they would move him. That they'd just give it up already. He hasn't said a word since they brought him in.

Well... that's not entirely true.

When All Might was here earlier, tired and skinny looking and... and pathetic, with no right to keep his head held high like that, and he called Tomura by a name that's not his (it's not, it's not, it's not), Tomura did snap at him to shut up. To 'fucking stop it'. He hated the kicked puppy look. the gentle words that felt like poison to Tomura's ears, because who does All Might think he is? Tomura Shigaraki is still a villain. Tenko Shimura is dead. When he spat that out, All Might's resolve hardened, and he began a more traditional interrogation. At that point, Tomura couldn't have answered even if he'd wanted to. He still can't speak, now. They obviously don't know that. It’s a weakness he’s not just going to admit to.

Tomura’s head jerks up when a set of steps actually stops outside the door. He shakes a loose strand of hair out of his face, hating that he can’t even brush them aside himself. Who is it this time? The detective with the lie detector quirk again? Or someone who can actually force Tomura to speak? How far are these heroes willing to go?

But the door opens, and it’s the one person Tomura can’t help but be shocked to see. Eraserhead.

Tired-looking as always, the scar underneath his eye a new addition from when Tomura last saw him in person. What’s he doing here? Tomura wishes he could ask. Instead, he just settles for a somewhat confused glare.

Eraserhead looks him up and down, expression unreadable. All underground heroes must have good poker faces, Tomura thinks. He wishes he had that ability. Tomura is not a good liar. He never needed to be.

“When’s the last time you had something to drink?” Eraserhead asks, hands moving to sign along, and, okay, is he here to play good cop? Playing off the begrudging respect Tomura has for him?

Tomura doesn’t move. He keeps glaring. Eraserhead sighs and approaches the table, dropping down in the chair opposite Tomura. He fumbles with a pouch on his belt for a moment, and eventually pulls out a juice box. It’s almost enough to make Tomura laugh at the absurdity - it’s the same brand Kurogiri buys. Eraserhead stabs the straw through the little hole on top and pushes it over on the table. Tomura looks down at the juice box, then up at him. He is thirsty. His throat is dry enough that swallowing hurts a little, and the sugar in the juice will definitely be helpful, and when the League comes to break him out, he’ll need to be in the best shape he can hope for.

He sinks down in his seat the best he can, and stretches his head forward until he can catch the straw between his lips. It’s still humiliating, though better than someone holding it for him, and he looks anywhere but Eraserhead as he empties the juice box within seconds.

“Well, that’s a start.” Eraserhead slumps in his seat and sighs, sounding very world-weary. Tomura knows the man is only in his early thirties, but he seems to have been aging rapidly lately. That’s probably due to Tomura’s own actions. He wonders what Eraserhead sees when he looks at him. A victim to be saved, like All Might apparently thinks? Just a too skinny kid who is in over his head? Or is he actually smart enough to understand that Tomura doesn’t want, doesn’t need saving? That Tomura is the monster they should all be afraid of and he lives for it?

Maybe Eraserhead sees a little bit of both. Those eyes of his are very sharp. Tomura should have had the noumu take them, back at the USJ. Then his quirk wouldn’t have been a problem anymore either.

“I’d love to know what you’re thinking,” Eraserhead tells him, voice dry as Compress’ favored liquor.

Tomura raises a brow at him. Shrugs. Looks away.

Eraserhead is silent for a little while. The seconds tick by, though Tomura can’t be sure that his count is correct. There’s no clock in here. No window, either, of course. He has no way of telling how long he’s really been here. If he ends up falling asleep eventually, he’ll be completely lost. Hopefully his rescue comes before that.

“... Shigaraki,” Eraserhead says finally, slowly, “If you wanted to talk to me right now, would you be able to?”

Oh. Oh, no. Tomura knows they're being watched, but he doesn’t know how the detective’s quirk works, if he can detect a lie when it’s just communicated through a gesture... but even if he can’t... Tomura nodding right now would kind of prove Eraserhead’s point, wouldn’t it? So he sighs and gives a jerky shake of his head.

Eraserhead nods, clearly Tomura just confirmed what he suspected. Because unlike most heroes, Eraserhead actually has the brains to back up his quirk and fighting skills. "Detective, I'm going to need the key to those cuffs."

There's a crackle from the speaker in the corner of the room. "That doesn't seem like a wise idea."

Ah, arguing right in front of him. Tomura smiles lazily, even though he hates having his face exposed like this. They took Father and the others, of course. He's going to have to find them before they leave.

"I'll erase his quirk if he tries anything. You want him to communicate, don't you?" Eraserhead asks, a tad snappy.

There's a long pause, then the door opens and the detective steps through. He doesn't take his eyes off of Tomura, even as he hands Eraserhead a single, tiny key. Tomura returns his gaze with an outward calm that he's not feeling at all. He can't make them go back on this decision, he wants so desperately to have his hands free so he can scratch that incessant itch that's been growing worse and worse with each passing minute.

"You're going to let me take these off you without trying anything, right?" Eraserhead asks. They have no replacement cuffs, but those would be a farce anyway, wouldn't they? And if they want Tomura to sign, he'll need greater range than a standard set of them would allow him. He rolls his eyes and nods, presenting his folded hands to the hero. The detective watches for another moment or two, then steps back out, undoubtedly to continue observing.

It takes a little fumbling on Eraserhead's part to get the cuffs off, with all their little moving pieces, and he's either being very careful so he won't hurt himself on accident, or, less likely, so he won't hurt Tomura. Tomura's own eyes drift to his elbow and he wonders about the massive scar that must be hidden underneath that sleeve.

Finally, his hands are free, and gently glowing red eyes turn to his face.

Tomura ignores him for the time being in order to scratch at his neck, deep and thorough until he tears skin.

Eraserhead makes an aborted movement, as if to stop him, but then seems to change his mind, fist clenched atop the table. Good. If he wants Tomura coherent, he'll need to let him fight off the onset of another episode that's been looming for a while.

"Did All for One teach you sign language because of your nonverbal phases?" Eraserhead asks. It makes Tomura very aware of the fact that he doesn't usually do interrogations. This is none of the usual bullshit, talking around the point for ages. This is blunt and straight to the point.

Tomura gives a headshake.

Eraserhead waits, expectant.

Tomura thinks the hero is lucky he's bored and his is an innocent line of questioning and he actually respects Eraserhead. That's why he pulls his hand away from his neck and signs 'Sensei doesn't speak sign.'

"Who taught you, then?" Immediate, no hesitation. Why does he want to know this, of all things? Literally anything else would be more important. He may as well be asking how Tomura got so proficient at darts.

He sighs, and spells it out. 'K-U-R-O-G-I-R-I'

Eraserhead's brows draw together. "He taught you things? How long has he been around?"

Tomura presses his lips together and glares. Like hell is he giving them anything on the rest of the League. Especially Kurogiri.

The hero sighs. "Look, kid." Tomura scoffs.

"... Shigaraki. Back at the USJ, you used a name for me that's different from my official hero name. It's a name very few people know."

Now it's Tomura's turn to frown. He knows what the separate signs of Eraserhead's name mean, of course, and he's often thought they were odd, but seeing as his own sign name is also anything but villainous he didn't think he had room to judge.

'Your sign name?' he asks, 'Eraserhead?'

"No." The hero shakes his head and makes a series of signs. "Eraserhead." He then repeats the signs Tomura just used. "Shouta."

Oh. Well, that's awkward. Tomura gets the entirely absurd urge to apologize.

Having his sign name used by an enemy who very nearly killed him must be pretty uncomfortable for Eraser. Tomura would never want his enemies to know his own. It's private, and it was a gift that Kurogiri gave him. Even the rest of the League doesn't know it, they only know the one Tomura made up for himself, reusing the name of his quirk for it.

'Not many people know?' Tomura questions.

Eraserhead huffs. "Do I look like the kind of person who goes around sharing information like that?" Probably not, no.

Tomura nods. 'That's why you're here?'

"There's a lot that's odd about you, ki- Shigaraki. A lot that doesn't add up. This, in particular, is something that's been causing me some problems."

Oh.

Oh. Tomura can't help the laugh that breaks out of him, his voice returning only for the giggles that shake his shoulders. Eraserhead thought one of his trusted few had betrayed him. Had given the information to Tomura. That's too good. He almost wants to make him keep believing it. Or even tell him a lie, but, again, the detective is on the other side of the two-way mirror.

"I'm glad this is funny to you," Eraserhead says dryly, "Care to let me in on the joke?"

Tomura is still giggling when he signs, and maybe that's why he makes the mistake.

'Kurogiri taught me,' he says, 'But good to know I created some mistrust among you.'

Eraserhead is frozen in his seat. Even his quirk is inactive now, as Tomura suddenly realizes. He's held out pretty long. His eyes have got to hurt. Maybe Tomura can make him overextend himself. But there's too many guns nearby. Tranquilizers, no doubt. He wouldn't get very far, even if a kill or two would be satisfying.

'Can I have another juice box?' he asks, just to be difficult.

Eraserhead jerks out of his stupor. "Who... who did you say taught you?"

Did Tomura use Kurogiri's sign name on accident? Huh.

'K-U-R-O-G-I-R-I. Sign name: Kurogiri.' His hands form 'fluffy' and 'cloud' like they have a hundred thousand times. It's a cutesy name for someone who is not cutesy at all. But so is 'Dust Bunny' and so is 'Sleepy Cat'.

Eraserhead takes a shaky breath. His fingers are trembling when he signs 'Fluffy Cloud' himself. "Oboro," he says, "That's... what that... who that name belongs to. Shirakumo Oboro." He looks like he's very far away, but at the same time couldn't be more in the moment. He's pale, but his eyes are focused and dark. "Shigaraki. Tell me about Kurogiri."

It's in that moment that the door gets blown into pieces by a blast of blue flames.

And the shouting and running and destruction that follow don't really give them much more room for idle chit-chat.

#elflynns-horde-of-stuff #this has been sitting in my drafts for ages im so sorry #sign au #eraserhead is really going through it #man needs a break

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grailfinders · 3 years

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Fate and Phantasms #169

Two builds in one day? That’s right! Today’s my birthday, and that means I get to pick the servants! As a birthday gift to myself, we’re making Caster of the Nightless City! As usual, expect spoilers in the build breakdown below the cut and in their character sheet here!

Scheherazade is a Creation Bard to truly bring her stories to life, and a Genie Warlock to create her own Bedchamber of Survival.

Race and Background

Wildly, Scheherazade is a Human, giving her +1 to all abilities. She’s also a Guild Artisan with one of the most demanding patrons in the world, giving her proficiency with Insight and Persuasion.

Ability Scores

Your Charisma better be as high as possible, you’re literally famous for your storytelling skills. After that is Wisdom. Anyone can read a story, but to tell a story you’ve got to be able to read the audience. Your Intelligence is also pretty good, because let’s be honest, remembering over 1,000 stories is pretty goddamn impressive. Your Dexterity isn’t awful, because we need to be able to go from standing to dogeza in seconds. This means your Constitution and Strength are rather low. Sadly, telling stories doesn’t make you all that battle hardened.

Class Levels

1. Bard 1: Being a bard gives you proficiency with Dexterity and Charisma saves to avoid fireballs and being banished to other dimensions. (Though I guess banishment is better than death?) You also get proficiency in three bard skills, that is to say, three of any skill. Performance for storytelling, Acrobatics for faster dogezas, and History for more story material.

You can use Bardic Inspiration to give a d6 to an ally Charisma Mod times per long rest, and these dice can be added to pretty much any d20 roll to make it a bit better. (Not yours though, heaven forbid you have to get out there and... attack things.)

Speaking of not attacking things, let’s talk Spells. You cast em with Charisma, and get stuff like Blade Ward for taking less damage and Friends for convincing people to let you live in the first place. You also get Charm Person for a similar reason, Bane to weaken their offense if they still want to try anything, Feather Fall to avoid death by heights, and Silent Image for the first of your storied illusions.

2. Bard 2: Second level bards become Jacks of All Trades, adding half their proficiency to ability checks they’re not proficient in. By becoming more useful, you’re less likely to get killed! Probably. You also get a Song of Rest to boost healing during short rests. Healing is good, healing helps people not die. Finally, your Magical Inspiration lets allies add your inspiration dice to damage or healing caused by spells. Again, healing is good, and I guess doing more damage can be nice sometimes.

Speaking of doing damage, we’re not doing that. Instead, grab Sleep for a bedtime story.

3. Bard 3: Graduating from the college of Creation will help you bring your stories to life thanks to your Performance of Creation. As an action you can create a nonmagical object once per long rest or by spending a 2nd level spell slot. The item must be medium or smaller, and can only be worth at most 20 times your bard level in GP.

You can also help your allies star in legends of their own with Stories of Potential that add extra effects to your bardic inspiration depending on how they’re used. Ability checks get advantage on rolling the inspiration, attack rolls deal thunder damage to nearby creatures if they fail a constitution save, and saving throws add temporary HP to their users.

You can also cast Calm Emotions to keep the king from beheading you in the morning.

4. Warlock 1: Now that that’s taken care of, let’s get some help from a Genie. Picking this patron gives you a Genie’s Vessel, a tiny object like, say, a scroll case, within which you can find a Bottled Respite that you can hang out in for up to 2x your proficiency bonus hours per long rest, but you can only enter once per long rest. Any items you leave behind stay in the respite until the vessel is destroyed or you take them out again. Also, I gotta remember to point out the inside is bigger than the outside, space isn’t an issue for you.

You also learn to imbue your attacks with a Genie’s Wrath, adding thunder damage equal to your proficiency bonus to one attack per turn. You don’t really attack that much, but it’s nice to make every bit count.

Speaking of attacking, you can actually do that with your new Spells! You still use Charisma, but you have Pact Magic, so these slots don’t mix with your old ones. The plus side is they recharge on short rests instead of long ones, and you can still cast bard spells with warlock slots and vice versa.

You get Minor Illusion for cheap lifelike stories, as well as Eldritch Blast for the ever-present caster balls. For first level spells, you get Detect Evil and Good and Thunderwave for free, as well as Comprehend Languages because copyright doesn’t exist in D&D, and Protection from Evil and Good. Some kings are evil, some are good, but very few are neutral. (WARNING: does not actually protect against good or evil aligned humanoids)

5. Warlock 2: Second level warlocks get Eldritch Invocations, ways to customize the selling your soul experience. Armor of Shaodws gives you free mage armor to avoid dying, and Eldritch Mind makes it easier to concentrate on your spells, which are keeping you from getting killed.

Speaking of spells, Sense Emotion lets you read the prevailing emotion of a nearby creature as an action, and you can repeat the action each turn. Good storytelling requires you know what your audience wants.

6. Warlock 3: Third level warlocks get a Pact Boon, and Pact of the Tome gives you a super cool magic scroll that gives you three cantrips from any spell list. You get Guidance and Resistance for added protection, and Mage Hand. Handling hot objects can be dangerous! Now you don’t have to do that.

Besides that, you get second level spells here, like Enthrall. Being the center of attention is dangerous, but you’re the most personable member of the party, so this might be less dangerous than letting them talk. You also get Phantasmal Force and Gust of Wind for free, letting you attack with fictional characters and just make things a bit more dramatic.

7. Warlock 4: At fourth level you finally get your first Ability Score Improvement, which will be used to round up your Dexterity and Constitution for a higher AC and higher HP. Not dying’s good, you should try it out.

You also get Prestidigitation to add minor effects to your stories, and Flock of Familiars to summon background characters.

8. Warlock 5: Fifth level warlocks get third level spells, like Major Image to make larger effects for your stories. You also get Create Food and Water and Wind Wall for free.

On top of that, the invocation One with Shadows lets you turn invisible as an action in dim light or darker, and lasts until you move or take an action. When a truly good storyteller gets going, the story takes on a life of its own, and they just sort of... fade into the background.

9. Warlock 6: Sixth level genilocks get an Elemental Gift, giving you resistance to thunder damage. Like Cursed Arm always says, you can’t travel the desert without protection from wind. As a bonus action, you can now fly for 10 minutes Proficiency times per long rest. Admittedly you don’t really do that too often, but I’m sure you can illusion up a big genie hand or something to lift you up.

You can also summon a main character now thanks to Summon Fey. You can create a small fey creature in one of three moods that can teleport around and fight for you. Fuming fey get advantage on attacks after teleporting, mirthful fey can charm creatures, and tricksy fey create magical darkness which you can use to turn invisible.

10. Warlock 7: Congrats on your fourth level spell slots! Your freebie spells are Phantasmal Killer and Greater Invisibility to put less focus on yourself and more focus on the terrifying monsters you can summon. You can also use Hallucinatory Terrain to reshape the world into the world of your story. You can also use Trickster’s Escape once per long rest to cast Freedom of Movement on yourself to get the hell out of dangerous situations.

11. Warlock 8: Use this ASI to bump up your Charisma for better spells and better stories. You also learn how to Charm Monsters to avoid even more danger by just... getting along with everything.

12. Warlock 9: Ninth level warlocks get fifth level spells, like the freebies Creation to make even more nonsense out of nothing and Seeming to again, avoid danger. On top of those, you can use Modify Memory to retcon your stories to prevent your audience from getting too upset. You also gain the Gift of the Protectors, allowing you or another creature to write its name on part of your scroll. The scroll can hold the names of Proficiency people, and once per long rest the first creature to drop to 0 hp sticks around at 1 hp instead. You can also erase names if you have a falling out, but since it’s first come first served you might just want to keep this to yourself.

13. Warlock 10: Tenth level genielocks get a Sanctuary Vessel, allowing you to take up to 5 willing creatures into your Genie’s Vessel with you. You can eject creatures as a bonus action, by leaving yourself, dying (don’t do that one), or by destroying the vessel.

On top of all of that, creatures that stay in the vessel for at least 10 minutes get all the benefits of a short rest, plus they add your proficiency to any healing they get from hit dice. That’s on top of the d6 they were already getting from your song of rest.

Oh right, you get another cantrip too. Grab Blade Ward again. You can never be too careful.

14. Bard 4: Yeah, did you think we were done with bards? Nope! This level of bard gives us another ASI that’ll max out your Charisma for the best spells possible!

You also learn Message, because miscommunication can be deadly, and Lesser Restoration. You never know what kind of status effects might doom your party, after all...

15. Bard 5: Fifth level bards get their inspiration bumped up to d8s, and they finally become a Font of Inspiration to recharge their inspiration on short rests. I wanted to get sanctuary vessel as quickly as possible for the sake of getting your bedchamber of survival, but it’s awfully tempting to put these two levels earlier, ngl.

You also learn how to Feign Death, because nobody’s going to bother killing you if you’re already dead, right? This spell makes you or the targeted creature effectively dead by the reckoning of anyone around them. They can’t take actions, are blinded, and can’t move. They get resistance to all damage except psychic, and any diseases or poisons they’re affected by are frozen until the spell ends an hour later.

16. Bard 6: Sixth level bards can use Countercharm to protect their party from effects that would charm or frighten them, giving them advantage on those saves for a round.

You can also put on an Animating Performance to turn a large or smaller object into a Dancing Item, which follows your orders, given by your bonus action. You can do this once per long rest, or by spending a third level spell slot.

Your last bard spell is Catnap, putting up to three creatures to sleep for 10 minutes. If they stay asleep the entire time, they get the benefits of a short rest. Dying of overwork... what a horrifying concept.

17. Warlock 11: At eleventh level, instead of getting your spell slots made bigger you get a Mystic Arcanum, allowing you to cast a sixth level spell once per long rest. Guards and Wards is very useful if you’re paranoid, creating wards to protect up to 2,500 square feet of space (a.k.a. 100 5′ squares). You can specify creatures that are immune to effects, or a password that does the same thing.

In corridors, fog fills the area, and forks in the road have a 50% chance of forcing creatures down the wrong way.

Doors are magically locked, and up to 10 doors in the area can be covered by illusions.

Stairs are covered in Webs that regrow when destroyed.

You can also place: Dancing Lights in four corridors, Magic Mouth in two places, Stinking Cloud in two places, Gust of Wind in one corridor or room, and Suggestion in one five foot square.

Casting Guards and Wards in the same place every day for a year makes it permanent.

18. Warlock 12: Use your last ASI to bump up your Constitution for better concentration and health. You also learn your last Invocation, Minions of Chaos! Once per long rest you can cast Conjure Elemental using a warlock spell slot. It is a little bit risky, but even you have to be willing to stick your neck out at some point. Might as well be level 18.

19. Warlock 13: Your seventh level Mystic Arcanum is Mirage Arcane, allowing you to reshape reality in a square mile, altering the entire terrain to your story and even making entire structures out of nothing. Even creatures with true sight will still feel the illusion, so feel free to recreate the tower of babel and hide out on the top of it.

20. Warlock 14: Your capstone level gives you a Limited Wish from your patron, recreating any spell of fifth level or lower once per 1d4 long rests. Sometimes your story just needs a Maelstrom, and nobody’s going to wait for you to take 9 levels of druid just to finish a story.

Pros:

If your DM rewards creativity and you’ve got the mind thoughts to power this build, this build will treat you very nicely. This whole thing is basically an excuse for the roleplayer inside of you to ham up your acting, chew the scenery, and distract everyone from the rogue rifling through their pockets.

Speaking of distractions you can make some really good ones. Show up to the BBEG’s lair, butter them up with some stories, then trick them into entering your vessel, and then they’re trapped in there for up to 12 hours. If you can trick them into allowing you to catnap them, that gives the rest of your party a full 10 minutes to ransack the place before they even know what’s happening. You can always kick them out if they’re being unwelcome guests, but there’s no way for them to leave on their own outside of killing you. And that’s easier said than done, because...

You’re really hard to fight. Between all the illusions, summoning creatures to fight on your behalf, the invisibility, and the altering reality in a mile radius, landing a blow on you is an ordeal, especially if you know they’re coming.

Cons:

If you’re actually stuck in a cage match with an enemy it’s gonna take a while, because you really aren’t built for damage. You have a negative strength stat, and your first damaging spell doesn’t show up until level four. Just bring them into the vessel, help them relax, and put them to sleep with catnap, that’s way less work than actually fighting them.

On a similar note, anything that can see through your illusions is going to cut through you like butter, because you’re pretty squishy. Only 15 AC and just shy of 150 HP means you should avoid fights like... well, you do in canon.

Another side effect of your squishiness is that your concentration saves aren’t that great, which is really bad for an illusionist/summoner. Neither your animated item nor your invisibility use concentration though, so you can actually get away with more than you’d think, it’s just a complicated juggling act. And trust me, you do not want to drop them in the middle of combat.

#fgo #fate grand order #D&D 5e #DND #Caster of the nightless city #warlock #bard

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seimeiorigin · 3 years

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It’s time to forget Yuzuru Hanyu

(written on 27th Feb)

I think my obsession with Yuzu is not healthy. I need to do something to stop obsessing over Yuzu and get back to my normal life. I thought I should write down what I am feeling to see if it helps me let go of him. And where better to leave these thoughts than in the care of people who feel the same way?(If you are a translator, feel free to sub this for non-English speaking Yuzu fans )

I am a 50 year old Australian woman and as a long time fan of the art of figure skating I was usually only interested in watching the women. The last time I watched was during the era of Tonya Harding, Tara Lipinsky and Sureya Bonnely. I was a fan of Kurt Browning back then as my only favourite male skater.

15 days ago I saw a random you tube video of Parisienne Walkway and was immediately struck by the power, grace, beauty and effort of Yuzuru. I had never seen anyone like him and I thought that his performance was the best skate I had ever seen. Little did I know....In the last 15 days I have felt the need to see more of what he does and so have spent every free hour of my life watching Yuzu's performances, sometimes over and over as in the case of Seimei, P walkways and Masquerade.

I am obsessed with Yuzu and I deeply regret that I was not along for the ride of the last 10 years. I google for the latest Yuzu news everyday and when I find something written in the last week it is like finding a gold nugget! I have read many of the blogs about Yuzu (thank you blog writers), read the news articles, watched interviews and never have I felt the lack of a second language more keenly. A massive thanks to everybody who English subs Yuzu content.

I think about him when i should be working. I stay up late watching videos and am so tired in the morning. I am trying to find places I can buy Yuzu merchandise but alas, there are no places here to do so. I look at my phone lock screen (Seimei) a hundred times a day just to remember that this man exists. Yuzu has taken over my life.

What is it about Yuzu's skating that makes me want to watch again and again and again?The crosswalk in Seimei. Oh mi god. Such attitude. I have never seen attitude like this on the rink before. A challenge to all watching: "Do not mess with me!"I have watched the videos about the making of Seimei and am enamoured of how much work went into this program, right down to Yuzu recording his own breath to help with the timing of his opening movement. The full program is breathtaking. I love every single moment of every single aspect. After having watched the making of Seimei video i understand so much more about what I see on the ice - the spells he is casting as the character and how that translates into artistry. The speed. The effort. The more videos I watch about Yuzu the more times I watch Seimei. For example, Yuzu says in one interview that at Pyeongchang he was supposed to stay in character but was so happy at the last part of the program that he could not help smiling and feeling so happy and we saw that. Such an uplifting moment that makes me laugh every time. I think i have watched all available performances of Seimei that the music runs through my mind in my sleep. I have downloaded it on my phone and listen to it on the bus.

Yuzu's costumes: oh. mi. god. They are beautiful works of art. Such beauty of colour, decoration, design and form. I feel things when I see the costumes. I covet the heaven and earth jacket. I want one of my own to wear. The way they fit Yuzu perfectly, showing off the his perfect form in all its beauty and strength. The way they create the mood for the performance makes many other skater's costumes pale in comparison. The detail that the costume designer includes and the fact that Yuzu himself participates and tells her what he wants makes it all the more special. I watch the performances time and again just to look at the costume details.

Yuzu's sexuality on the ice is something I am in two minds about. My own son is 22 so not that much younger than Yuzu so I feel uncomfortable thinking of Yuzu that way. But I cannot help it when I watch PW or Let's go crazy or Let me entertain you. There is something so attractive about the way Yuzu's movements invite the audience to partake in a little bit of sauciness. This is in direct opposition to the fun and innocence of everyday Yuzu that I see backstage or during downtimes. It feels like a total contrast and perhaps it is for that exact reason why those movements are attractive.

Yuzuvier: I have friends but none of my friendships are like that. I wish I could experience the relationship between the two of them. I am so glad they had each other and it makes me feel happy when I see the videos of them together...and sad to see where Javi told Yuzu that it was their last time competing together. I really hope they stay in touch and catch up when they can.

Yuzu's University study: Wow, what a legacy to leave to the sport. Using his own skills and experience to explore ways to become more proficient and keep climbing those hills. I truly hope that his study has led him to a way to perfect the 4A and I am holding hope in my heart that he is the first one to do it. I also hope that the thesis will allow the sporting world to progress.

Sportsmanship: Wow Yuzu. Just WOW. A beautiful person who shares joy, encourages others, provides support and is never a complainer. This is what all sporting people should aspire to be. The depth of integrity that this man has shines out of every pore of his being.

Yuzu's work philosophy and dedication is just exhilarating. Always wanting to be better, climb that hill, be number one, try and try and try. Learn from mistakes, learn and learn and learn. I find myself going about my day now and asking myself "WWYHD" in this situation? (What Would Yuzuru Hanyu Do). I am thinking that if i can take one thing from Yuzu everyday it would make interactions with my fellow humans more enjoyable and pleasant. I truly admire Yuzu so much that I hope I can continue learning from Yuzu even when he is not skating anymore.

Yuzu's philosophy of supporting all people including his own is admirable. Truly a remarkable attitude and philosophy to have in one so young. When I see this it makes me want to do something to help my fellow man. Yuzu is a shining example for all of us on what life is really all about. The Japanese culture permeates everything this man does. Yuzu is so respectful as many Japanese people are and I admire this culture immensely for the grace, dignity and respect that abounds there. Such a contrast to what I see everyday and it makes me feel like I want to live there myself.

I have never seen this man in real life. I really cannot say I know anything about him. I have not spoken to Yuzu or anyone who has met him so anything I know is second, third and fourth hand. But even though I feel like I know everything there is to know about him now, I know that what I have seen over the last 15 days does not mean I know him at all. But I wish I did. He seems like a pretty good bloke.

I wish...no, I hope that I get the chance to see Yuzu perform live. He has just made it onto no. 1 spot on my bucket list. If I can see him live after Covid I will be yelling, cheering, screaming at the top of my lungs. And I will be crying because I have seen perfection. The Greatest Of All Time.

#羽生結弦 #yuzuru hanyu

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tigerkirby215 · 3 years

Text

5e Rakan, the Charmer build (League of Legends)

(Artwork by Riot Games)

Happy day after Valentine's Day friends. I wrote this build in August, and a lot has happened to my little bird twink during that time. Along with a damn good new skin (and you know: new season) he’s become one of the more sought out supports in pro play. Also I got him to Mastery 5 at time of writing (December 13th, 2020.) Who knows: I might update this little blurb to say I got him to a higher mastery.

Sadly I don’t have a Xayah to duo queue with. But I’m always ready to be the support that you need~ 💓

GOALS

Am I not magnificent? - Rakan’s title is literally “the charmer.” Of course we’re gonna need some charms.

War is in the dance - With an ability called “Battle Dance” we’ll need to be quick on our feat, dashing around our foes and popping them up with a Grand Entrance.

Nothing's fun without risk - While he may not be the best enchanter Rakan has a ton of heals and shields for both himself and his allies.

RACE

Rakan is half bird, but he doesn’t do a lot of flying which leaves Aarakocra out of the picture. He’s also incredibly chatty (holy shit have you seen how many voice lines Xayah and Rakan have?) so Kenku is definitely not an option. So when in Rome as a furry look no further than a Shifter.

All Shifters have Darkvision and their Shifting ability to gain temporary hitpoints, but everything else is determined by their subrace: to be ever quick and ever charming go for a Swiftstride. As a Swiftstride Shifter your Dexterity increases by 2 and your Charisma increases by 1. You are Graceful and have proficiency with the Acrobatics skill, and your Shifting feature lets you get down with The Quickness, moving 10 feet faster and being able to move 10 feet as a reaction if an enemy ends their turn within 5 feet of you, all while not provoking oppertunity attacks!

ABILITY SCORES

15; WISDOM - Rakan is all about the spirit of the wild and the subtle magic of nature. Wait Nature and Arcana are Intelligence skills? Uhhhhh...

14; INTELLIGENCE - Rakan certainly doesn’t show that he’s smart but Nature and Arcana are Intelligence skills. That, and this is a requirement for a very particular class.

13; CHARISMA - A charmer of course needs to be charming. (Feel free to swap this with CON if you want more health but worse RP.)

12; DEXTERITY - Even if Rakan is normally shirtless this is enough for good ol’ Medium Armor thanks to our Racial stat increases.

10; CONSTITUTION - Even though Rakan plays up close and personal he’s certainly not a tank.

8; STRENGTH - You wouldn’t risk ruffling your feathers by doing heavy lifting.

BACKGROUND

While Rakan didn’t start out a rebel like Xayah he gladly joined her cause, and while a background like Entertainer might make more sense for him he’s without a doubt a Freedom Fighter now... unfortunately there’s no Freedom Fighter background so Faction Agent is the next best thing.

You get proficiency with any Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma ability and naturally we’ll be going for Performance. You also get proficiency in Insight but we’re actually going to be replacing it with Arcana for knowledge of the magic of the wild. Additionally you can learn two languages of your choice: unfortunately Aarakocra isn’t an option but Auran (or rather Primordial) is. And to learn the ancient language of Ionia I’d recommend Sylvan.

As a vastayan rebel you can gain access to a Safe Haven for you and your allies. By using secret signs and passwords you can identify other rebels who can bring you to a safe house, give you a free place to stay, or assist you in finding information. They won’t risk their lives for you but as long as you remember the password they’ll be willing to help. You... did remember the password, right?

(Artwork by Riot Games)

THE BUILD

LEVEL 1 - CLERIC 1

Starting off as a Cleric, the king of supports. As a Cleric you get proficiency in two skills from the Cleric list: this is actually where we’ll be grabbing Insight proficiency from along with Medicine to keep Xayah safe.

Clerics get to choose their subclass at level 1 and there are obviously a lot of options to go for: Peace to bond with Xayah, War to better your battle dance, Nature or Arcana to further your connection to natural magic... Bet you wouldn’t expect the choice to be the Order Domain from Guildmasters’ Guide to Ravnica! (Also reprinted in Tasha’s Cauldron.) (I’ll go over why Order whenever we get abilities important to the build.)

For a start Order Clerics get proficiency in Heavy Armor as well as either Intimidation or Persuasion; Xayah’s got the scary part down so go for Persuasion, since someone’s gotta be the smooth talker! You also get Voice of Authority, letting you set up for an ally with a Grand Entrance. If you cast a spell with a spell slot and target an ally they can use their reaction to make one weapon attack against a creature of your choice. You have to be able to see the enemy you want them to target, and if you target multiple allies with a spell only one of them can use their reaction to attack. But setting up for friends to cut through foes is what you do best!

Speaking of spells and set-up Clerics get access to Spellcasting! You can learn three cantrips at level 1: for a Gleaming Quill grab Sacred Flame which does Radiant damage (not Fire damage!) to a foe. If you’re getting surrounded however Word of Radiance will let you shine on your foes for more Radiant damage! And to be a good support and help your allies out of combat Guidance lets you add a d4 to ability checks.

You can also prepare a number of spells equal to your Wisdom modifier plus your Cleric level. As an Order Domain Cleric you have Heroism and Command as part of your Domain Spells, meaning that you don’t have to prepare to be the hero and force your enemies in line. For a close range heal look no further than Cure Wounds. For a shield grab Shield of Faith to make it harder for enemies to kill your allies. And to set up for your friends grab Bless, making it easier for them to hit and survive.

LEVEL 2 - CLERIC 2

Second level Clerics can Channel Divinity once per short or long rest, invoking the power of the gods to help them. All Clerics can Turn Undead, forcing undead within 30 feet to make a Wisdom save or run away from you. However Order Clerics can charm their foes with Order’s Demand. You can charm (yes charm!) anyone of your choice within 30 feet until the end of your next turn, or until they take damage. Additionally you can force them to drop whatever they’re holding so they don’t shoot Xayah!

This is one of the many abilities I wanted out of Order Domain. A big AoE charm that also stops enemies from hitting you and your friends is right up Rakan’s alley.

You can also prepare another spell and while Rakan doesn’t have a ranged heal in-game Healing Word is just too good to pass up on as an Order Cleric. Bonus action let your friend whack an enemy!

LEVEL 3 - WIZARD 1

Didn’t take Rakan as the bookish type, did you? Well, he isn’t, but we need some abilities from Wizard that we can’t get elsewhere except Clockwork Sorcerer which makes even less sense for Rakan. Regardless Wizards also get Spellcasting. You learn 3 cantrips from the Wizard list: for a more direct autoattack grab Firebolt because I like having a variety of damaging cantrips, to add some pizzazz to your dance Prestidigitation will let you add a bunch of funky visual effects as you please, and for some coordination in Team Chat grab Message! "Did you notice the sky?" "It's lovely." "Not as beautiful as you."

You can prepare a number of spells equal to your Wizard level plus your Intelligence modifier, but when you multiclass into Wizard you can learn 4 spells to put in your spellbook. You can only prepare spells in your spellbook is the long-and-short of the class. Anyways: to bedazzle your foes grab Color Spray and blind them with your beauty. For a little owl companion take Find Familiar. To run when you need to Expeditious Retreat will help. And finally to detect the magic of the world take... Detect Magic...

Wizards also have Arcane Recovery, letting them recover a spell slots of a combined level equal to half their Wizard level rounded down. In short every spell slot counts the same number of “points” as the spell’s level, and you can recover a number of spell points equal to half your Wizard level. So a third level Wizard can either recover a 2nd level spell or two 1st level spells. Oh and you can’t recover spell slots past 5th level.

LEVEL 4 - WIZARD 2

Second level Wizards can choose their Arcane Tradition, and to protect yourself with Fey Feathers the School of Abjuration is here for you. Along with being an Abjuration Savant (letting you learn Abjuration spells in half the time for half the cost) you have an Arcane Ward to shield you: when you cast a leveled Abjuration spell you can also create a magical ward on yourself that lasts until you finish a long rest. The ward has a hit point maximum equal to twice your Wizard level plus your Intelligence modifier. (So currently 6 HP.)

Whenever you take damage, the ward takes the damage instead. If the damage reduces the ward to 0 hit points, you take any remaining damage. Whenever you cast an abjuration spell of 1st level or higher, the ward regains a number of hit points equal to twice the level of the spell.

You also learn 2 more spells so how about some Abjuration spells? Shield is a reaction Abjuration spell to protect you from melee attacks, while Absorb Elements is a reaction Abjuration spell to protect you from magic. AR and MR!

(Artist unknown. Made for Riot Games.)

LEVEL 5 - WIZARD 3

3rd level Wizards can learn second level spells but I’d actually suggest learning Alarm back at 1st level. Why Alarm? It’s an Abjuration spell you can cast as a Ritual, so you can just cast it continuously to refresh your Arcane Ward even without preparing the spell. For your other spell Mirror Image is a quick and easy way to keep the baddies from whacking you.

LEVEL 6 - WIZARD 4

4th level Wizards get an Ability Score Improvement but I’m actually going to suggest the Observant feat to increase your uneven Wisdom score. Every Support’s gotta pay attention to their wards!

You can also learn another two spells along with a cantrip: take Dancing Lights to set up a stage! As for spells you’re the loud and proud sort so to make a Grand Entrance grab Knock to make way for your party! Meanwhile if you want to keep yourself and your allies safe from ranged harm Warding Wind will do just that and more, but it will also make it harder for Xayah to hit. "What the hell were you thinking?" "Back there?" "Yes." "I wasn't. I never think. Ugh... thinking."

LEVEL 7 - WIZARD 5

5th level Wizards can learn third level spells so it’s time to grab our first mass charm: Hypnotic Pattern, which isn’t an Enchantment spell but in fact an Illusion spell (which will be important later.) If you want to get down with The Quickness however there’s nothing better than some good old-fashioned Haste.

LEVEL 8 - WIZARD 6

6th level Abjuration Wizards can finally protect their party and their girlfriend thanks to Projected Ward, letting you use your reaction to reduce the damage an ally takes with your Arcane Ward. “Thank you honey!”

You can also learn two more spells from the Wizard spell list. Xayah need to call someone? Help her with Sending. Want to go full AP for the traditional D&D Grand Entrance? Fireball.

(Artwork by Riot Games)

LEVEL 9 - CLERIC 3

We’ve spent enough time down in Nerdsville so how about some more Cleric levels? Third level Clerics can prepare second level spells like Aid to boost up your teammates with a Knight’s Vow. Speaking of Knight’s Vow Warding Bond will let you bond with Xayah so you take some damage for her.

Additionally as an Order Domain Cleric you have Hold Person and Zone of Truth innately prepared. Keep enemies at bay and let them know the truth!

LEVEL 10 - CLERIC 4

4th level Clerics get an Ability Score Improvement and I’m going to suggest further increasing your Wisdom, as it’ll help us more with our Cleric abilities which will be important later.

You also learn another cantrip such as Mending to keep your outfit in check. Additionally you can prepare two new spells with your increased Wisdom: Lesser Restoration can give you or Xayah some Tenacity when needed, but I’d suggest holding off on the other slot.

LEVEL 11 - CLERIC 5

5th level Clerics who use Turn Undead now Destroy Undead of CR 1/2 or lower. It’s unlikely that you’ll be fighting CR 1/2 enemies at level 11 but hey: it’s still useful!

What’s more useful however is that you can now prepare third level spells! As an Order Cleric you have Mass Healing Word for Redemption, or Slow to... slow the enemy. Maybe you grabbed Righteous Glory? Who knows.

Regardless the important thing is your charms so grab Fast Friends to charm single targets and Incite Greed to get a whole crowd to follow your Fey Feathers!

You may be asking why we’re grabbing Enchantment Spells of all the spells that Clerics get a third level. Well for one it’s because you’re The Charmer, but more importantly...

LEVEL 12 - CLERIC 6

At 6th level you become an Embodiment of the Law as an Order Domain Cleric. The law of dance that is! If you cast an Enchantment spell of first level or higher you can choose to make that spell a bonus action instead, and can do it a number of times equal to your Wisdom modifier. You regain these fast charms after a long rest.

This was the main reason I went into Order Domain. Being able to quickly charm foes is textbook for Rakan, which made this subclass ideal for this build.

You can also prepare another spell at this level: Dispel Magic with Mikael's Crucible in case of any strong debuffs. Also more Abjuration spells for your shield!

(Artwork by Yusuh on DeviantArt. You have no idea how hard it is to find solo artwork for these two.)

LEVEL 13 - WIZARD 7

7th level Wizards can learn 4th level spells like Confusion; something that fills my allies whenever I take Rakan into the jungle. For your other spell I’d actually suggest hopping back to third level for Counterspell to keep your allies safe with more Abjuration. Trust me it’ll be important later.

LEVEL 14 - WIZARD 8

At 8th level you get an Ability Score Improvement and despite being a Wizard we’ve kinda been ignoring Intelligence: let’s fix that with a +2 so our Ward can be stronger as can our Wizard spells.

You can also learn two new spells: more Charms? Charm Monster, so even the mighty Volibear can’t resist you. Other than that there are tons of great Wizard spells but I’m never going to say no to Dimension Door.

LEVEL 15 - WIZARD 9

9th level Wizards can cast 5th level spells like Dominate Person for charms on-par with mind control! (Because it is Mind Control.) For more combative 5th level spells Synaptic Status will let you bedazzle everyone in a 20 foot radius sphere, making it harder to hit as they’re stunned by your beauty. Rakan can have some AP; as a treat.

LEVEL 16 - WIZARD 10

10th level Abjuration Wizards get Improved Abjuration, letting them add their proficiency bonus to any ability check to Dispel Magic (such as with Dispel Magic or Counterspell.) If you wish you can also have Bless active on yourself for a d4 + 5 to any counterspell check. When you consider that the DC is equal to 10 plus the spell’s level and you have up to a +9 to the check it’s more than likely that you can be a Guardian against any dangerous spells!

You also get another cantrip at this level: do you already have too many cantrips? Yeah probably, but to get more props for your dance take Minor Illusion.

As for your two new Wizard spells Hold Monster is like Hold Person, but it works on Baron! And how about something to keep Zoe in her dimension? Banishment is a 4th level spell that works like a super CC that knocks an enemy out of the fight completely. You can’t attack them while they’re on another plane, but if they’re not native to the plane and spend a full minute Banished they go back to their original plane.

(Artwork by Riot Games)

LEVEL 17 - WIZARD 11

11th Wizards can prepare 6th level spells. Want to keep Xayah safe from a falling temple and shadow ninjas? Globe of Invulnerability blocks all spells of one level lower than you used to cast the spell. In general. The globe surrounds you but you can dive in to protect Xayah. But what if you just want to dance? Look no further than Otto's Irresistible Dance! It’s a spell that forces everyone to dance; that’s all you need to know! But seriously read the description of your spells.

LEVEL 18 - WIZARD 12

12th level Wizards get another Ability Score Improvement: seeing as we are going deep down the Wizard path it only makes sense to get a bit more Intelligence.

You can also learn 2 more spells: Contingency will let you cast a spell in case of emergency. Choose a spell of 5th level or lower that can target yourself and a trigger for the spell: when the trigger happens the spell activates. Backup plans are more of Xayah’s thing, but something like “Banish myself if I’m about to die because Xayah would kill herself if I died” is a good plan.

There are tons of other good Wizard spells; so many that I can’t choose any that would particularly fit Rakan or the build as a whole. You have a limited number of prepared spells anyways so take something you think will be useful.

LEVEL 19 - WIZARD 13

13th level Wizards can prepare 7th level spells: want to do a conjoined recall? Teleport will let you and up to 8 willing creates teleport to a location, such as your fountain. There’s a table of places you can end up which I suggest looking at for the full details of the spell, because it’s a rather overwhelming spell to explain without copy-pasting the description. But because I further suffer with what spells to give you in a high leveled Wizard build how about a fancy light show? Crown of Stars lets seven stars orbit your head which you can shoot out at enemies or light up the night!

LEVEL 20 - WIZARD 14

Our capstone is the 14th level of Abjuration Wizard for some much needed MR. Spell Resistance lets you resist all damage coming from spells and have advantage on all saving throws against spells!

Speaking of spells you can learn your final two but... pick for yourself this time! Xayah will love you despite all your faults, and I’m sure that you can make a choice for yourself. This is my way of saying I’m sick of picking Wizard spells.

FINAL BUILD

PROS

You will see my dance - You are the master of keeping your friends safe with charms to keep fights from happening and both shields and heals to keep your allies from being hurt.

Look at me now! - You are incredibly elusive: 18 AC (Scale Mail + Shield) you can bump up with the Shield spell, a 32 HP ward to protect you and your allies, and even Shifting for Temp HP and more dodging.

You put us in a cage? I put you in the ground - And of course as a caster with full caster levels you are more than capable of putting down the hurt, especially due to the added efficiency of being able to cast two spells in a turn (well a leveled spell and a cantrip) thanks to Embodiment of the Law.

CONS

I don't have to remember the plan if you do - You are essentially mixing two spellcasters who want you to use extremely dedicated spell lists. Abjuration spells to make Abjuration Wizard work and Enchantment Spells to make Order Cleric work. Sure you don’t only need to cast Enchantment and Abjuration spells but there also aren’t that many Abjuration spells to power up your ward.

I can't die looking this good! - The vast majority of your levels being in Wizard combined with a 0 Constitution score results in a health bar that’s easily under 100. You may have advantage on all saving throws but Power Word Kill has no save.

Woo! You animals are dumb! - The other problem with mixing two full casters together is that you can’t get the best of both worlds. You aren’t getting 9th level spells in general (even if you get the slots for ‘em) and both your Wisdom and your Intelligence aren’t maxed out. Sure if you aren’t using Standard Array that isn’t an issue but you’re bound to drop something.

But if you were perfect why would you need Xayah? She completes you, and you complete her. Fight along side her and together you’ll be unstoppable. There’s nothing you can’t defeat with the power of love... But a plan would also probably be good. "I think Xayah told me to improvise. At least, that's the only part of the plan I remember."

(Artwork by Riot Games)

#dnd #dnd 5e #dnd build #dnd guide #valentine's day #dnd wizard #dnd cleric #League of Legends #League of Legends Rakan #xayah and rakan #love

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langernameohnebedeutung · 4 years

Note

Is it bad to have an accent ? I’m studying English at uni and all my teachers say I have to work on my accent and adopt an RP or GA accent because having an accent is bad and terrible . I have a pretty thick French accent and I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to correct it and it’s making me feel very self-conscious so I almost never talk , which affect my performance in class .

Seeeee..........the thing is, there is this ideal. This gold-standard: The accent-free foreigner. (And if you do have an accent it better be from a rich white country and it better be barely noticeable and you won’t mind if someone is creepy about it) And many learners ascribe to that ideal as well. And honestly, it doesn’t go anywhere, as far as I’m concerned. There are just very little professions where you will profit from not having an accent outside of people being happy about it. There is no practical gain. Unless you want to become an actor or a spy or the Queen’s professional doppelgänger.

So, to make this short, it’s not bad to have an accent as far as I’m concerned and your teachers sound like dicks tbh.

We often complain about native-speakers who are rude about people’s accents or mistakes when they only know one language themselves. But I think it’s time to address that: ESL-speakers do it too - in fact, I would say that especially among people from countries where fluency in English is expected for the younger generation, it is very common to lash out against people from the same community who have a thicker accent when they speak English and to make fun of them. And that’s just as rude as when a native speaker does it or when you make fun of anyone else for doing something you excel at.

On the personal note: You can only do something about accent if you speak and if you’re getting berated for the way you speak and that keeps you from speaking - then you’re not going to improve. It’s fair for a teacher to point out how to pronounce a word or to point out if someone’s grammar is wrong - but I study English too and while we had to stick to a specific variety when writing (either American or British), we were never told how to speak beyond pointing out mistakes in classes that were about language proficiency. And most people do improve over time, simply because their studies expose them to a lot of spoken English. I would meet people from my first semesters again in higher semesters and note how they have become more fluent and made less mistakes. Personally, I would try speaking to at least the lecturers you think might react decently about it that you’re working on it (whether you are or not) and that for that you need to speak and right now this kind of feed-back is making you more anxious about speaking and whether they would mine focusing their criticism on more structural aspects of your speaking.

As far as accents or being “accent-free” is concerned-

I don’t even think it’s something that all speakers should aspire to. And even if someone’s end goal is to speak perfect RP or GA, that should be their personal goal. Many people uphold this strange notion of purity when it comes to people learning a language where everyone should aspire to be “accent-free” or “sound like a native-speaker”. And I guess it makes sense if you’re teaching someone how to speak that language as a beginner. It makes sense to show them how to pronounce words and how sounds work in that language. If you have a person sitting in front of you who doesn’t speak English, it makes sense to stick to one version instead of saying “wa-t-er” in one lesson and “wadder” in the next or “caahn’t” in one sentence and “cèèn’t”in the next. It gives them a certain structure, helps them tell one variety from the other and to avoid confusion. Not to mention that if someone wants to study English they are expected to write their papers and essays in one variety of English so it makes sense that they know the general rules of telling them apart or recognizing or recognising how a word would be spelt or spelled.

But when you finally become more fluent, you still have an accent and you still might not be perfect recognising one variety from the other. There are people who live in a foreign country for the majority of their lives but you can still tell where they come from.

But the question is...who cares?

Don’t get me wrong, if someone wants to put their effort into learning a specific variety perfectly, I don’t see anything wrong with it and if they accomplish that - it’s quite some feat and it’s cool. Commendable. But the truth is that we all have accents. Even in our native languages, we speak in a regional accent, we probably have specific slang-words that are particular to some group. Age, class, sex, gender, education, interests - there are thousands of factors that determine the way we speak. And it’s the same for native English speakers. There are hundreds of versions to speak English.

I actually once took part in a public speaking class and the woman who held that class was a logopaedics trainer. And she could tell by the way people spoke and moved their mouth while speaking whether they used to wear braces, which parent they had a closer relationship with and other things. The way we speak - and the way we aspire to speak - is an important aspect of our personality and who we are and where we come from and personally, I don’t see the value of erasing that. It’s like a hand-writing and no one would tell you to alter your handwriting until you write in Times New Roman or Arial.

The thing is, when Anglos complain that they don’t understand a Scottish person or an Irish person or some other regional dialect, that is because that person grew up speaking a particular variety of English in a specific community. But for someone who isn’t a native speaker, they learn English in a community with a different native language - which means we simply speak that language with them (unless it’s for practice or a joke). I learnt English in a German school among kids with German accents and German language-habits - and teachers who had the same accent and the same habits and one who pronounced “wipe” as “whip”. And you probably learnt it in a French-speaking school among kids with French accents and French language-habits. So there is practically no way for any of us to leave school without speaking in that respective accent. But unlike a Scottish person or an Irish person, we didn’t speak that variety of English with our peers. We spoke our our native language. And I think that’s the difference for most people - that one group has a native community to fall back on and the other doesn’t, so the second one should aspire to imitating a native-speaker instead of adding another variety to the mix.

Also you’re just as likely to speak English with people from any other European country (who also have their own accent and speaking-habits) as with a native speaker, so it’s not like you’re only going to be exposed to people who light you the way to a native accent. I remember when I made this post about “Euro-English” and people from absolutely random countries with different native languages all commented with: “No this is definitely how we speak, this is definitely our variety of English!” - meaning there are also a lot of unifying factors there too, based on our language families and cultural similarities - and how many people are there speaking like that? Hundreds of millions, probably.

Someone once pointed out to me that there are more Germans who speak English than there are Canadians. And you can do that maths for a lot of countries: There are more Norwegians or Swiss people who speak English than people from the Republic of Ireland. There are more French people who speak English than there are Australians. That means with the exception of Americans, we outnumber people from the countries these “ideal” accents come from. And in fact, how many British people speak RP? How many Americans speak GA? And that’s just looking at western countries. There are so many varieties of English spread around the globe due to colonialism. It’s ridiculous to expect the entire world to sound like the Queen. In the end, each version is their own variety and just because it doesn’t have a native community to fall back on, I think it’s harmful to treat it as something only worth of erasing when a person’s English skills are a factor in professional success and social standing even in the community they come from.

English is the current lingua franca - a language that non-native speakers communicate in. And as I said, it makes sense to teach it in a specific way and to teach it the dialects that exist - because if everyone would just make up their own version of English, we wouldn’t understand each other and might as well not have bothered learning English in the first place. But you don’t need to have a cut-glass accent to accomplish that or aspire to have one.

And this brings me to what I think should be the central question:

What do you want to use your English for?

See, I did mention that if you want to become a British spy or play a British role as an actor or be the Queen’s bodyguard slash doppelgänger (a film I would watch) - then it would probably pay off to master a specific native accent as well as possible. (That said, there are enough British actors who get roles as Americans and vice-versa who don’t fool anyone and there are a lot of skills other than a specific accent that you would need to master each one).

But those are jobs where you actively have to shed your own identity. That’s the point. You have to pretend to be a native speaker. But that’s not what you do in every-day life. In fact, most people you will interact with will probably know you’re French from the social context you are in or because it comes up in conversation, so beyond being a neat party trick, I don’t see what purpose having an RP or GA accent has here.

Of course, you might want to become a teacher, in which case, it would be important to have a specific pronunciation - but also all English teachers I had had German accents and I wouldn’t say that they would have been a million times better at teaching if they hadn’t had that - it’s far more important to know how to teach, to understand the grammar and vocabulary and to help your students to improve themselves and to understand why people speak the way they do.

You might want to be a journalist - if your interview-partner understands you and you can write in English, it’s fulfilling its purpose. If you want to work in a specific field - for example become a doctor in an English-speaking country - it’s important that your patients understand you and that you know your medical terms, but you don’t need Received Pronunciation. If you want to go into tourism, a bit of a foreign accent might actually come across as more authentic and desirable.

So I think the central question is whether the English you speak right now serves its purpose for what you want it to - or if it is at odds with what you want to do with it.

If your accent wouldn’t pose a problem for you, then my profeschionel opinion is to fuck ‘em haters. Do what you like. If you want to work on your accent: Do it. If you don’t: Don’t.

But...if you feel like the way you speak English now would cause you difficulties in your job or every-day life later on - then I think the best thing to do would be to look into the specific skills you need and to invest your energy into acquiring these skills. Whether that is a specific jargon specific to one field or translate very quickly - or whether you really need to learn RP or GA. If you take a professional interpreter for example, many of them do lean to a specific variety, but have accents. It can’t be so heavy that it’s difficult to understand them, but their work requires skills beyond having a specific pronunciation.

So erm...those where just my 2 cents on accents.

If you do want to change something about your accent - maybe even just to get your teachers off your case - I recommend listening to native speakers and particular, sticking to one variety you prefer. If you are already fluent and you understand them, your brain is very quick to pick up on dialects. (You know the thing where you watch someone speak in a specific dialect and for a while after you find yourself saying things in that dialect? The brain is very fast too do that and it also works in English, even if you don’t internalise it immediately and it feels artificial at first). Also don’t be afraid of speaking to yourself to practice. Obviously, speaking to others is important (and if you’re self-conscious or you are worried about your teacher commenting on it, maybe try asking a friend or sibling or someone to speak English with you or see if you can find a learning buddy) but I think talking to oneself can also be helpful. Because you are not trying to get a point across as you would in a conversation or have to focus on the words you are saying. You can focus on your accent and the way you speak and I think that is an important aspect when it comes to accents: Knowing your accent. Being aware of the way you pronounce words. You know the thing where you try pronouncing a word but you can never quite get there - much less if you’re trying to speak quickly or in a sentence? - It really helps to pay attention to the differences between the way you say it and a native speaker says it. Also if there is word you don’t know or that you aren’t used to hearing out loud and you encounter it in the wild like a video or a film - it really helps to stop it and to pronounce it to yourself.

But generally, you cannot change the way you speak over night, even if you do it. It’s something that takes time and effort and it might never work completely. So really, I would focus on what you want to accomplish with your English and what future use you see for it - and focus on your strength as well, the things you’re good at. And in the short-term, I would try convincing the teachers that you are working on it but that their current course of action is actually making it more difficult for you.

#nonfandom #languages #Anonymous

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hellyeahheroes · 4 years

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Building Rose Wilson in D&D 5e

I kinda cannot find myself other things to do, especially as I decided to not do anything for April Fools this year because, well, how do you even top the nonsense that is happening. And feel like making one more of those, so let’s build another daughter of an assassin

Because I shamelessly lifted the template for writing these from Tulok the Barbarian, let’s start with defining some goals for this build. First of all, we need to be able to move and strike like a daughter of enhanced super-soldier with assassin training would. Second, we need to be able to see the future and use it to our advantage. Third, we need a sword striking like a weapon from the future. Finally, we need to be able to do all the acrobatic fighting in armor. Rose’s most popular costume is some weird-ass skintight chainmail, which is likely bad for the skin as hell. Don’t worry, if you’d rather have her indifferent, lighter outfit, I’ll leave a few alternatives to make that work too.

For Ability Scores, we’ll be using Standard Point Array, 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8. If you or your DM prefers a point buy or rolling, use these as guidelines, just remember you need to have at least 13 in Charisma, Dexterity, and Intelligence, there is going to be some multi-classing here.

Strength: 10, we don’t need it but you are supposed to have at least somewhat enhanced strength.

Dexterity: 14, you’re extremely acrobatic and fast, enough to keep up with likes of Cass Cain or your asshole father.

Constitution: 12, you can take a hit and sadly we’ll be straying from higher hit dices this time.

Intelligence: 13, you are much smarter than some give you credit for.

Wisdom: 8, you tried to challenge Big Barda to a fistfight, that’s the opposite of this ability score.

Charisma: 15, you may act aloof to people but if you can interrupt Wonder Girl and Supergirl romantic moment with a rocket launcher and not get pulverized, you know how to talk yourself out of trouble.

Race: It’s how D&D calls species! Sorry, Christoper Priest was about burst through the door to remind us Rose is Hmong, and that’s a serious quarantine breach. Anyway, I think she counts as a metahuman, which sounds a lot like Variant Human. If you have an issue with it, pick Half-Elf, but we’ll go with Human. Variant Humans get +1 to two Ability Scores, pick Charisma and Intelligence. You get one free skill proficiency, I’d go with Acrobatics, and one free language, pick something campaign relevant. Finally, you get a free feat. Human Determination allows you to add +1 to your Dexterity and once per long rest give your self an advantage on an ability check, attack roll or a saving throw.

Unarmored Rose: Redistribute +1s so that you have 16 in Charisma and Dexterity.

Background: I wasn’t exactly sure which one to pick, but Rose and her father share that weird thing in their outfits that make them look like pirates so why not, let’s go with that. Criminal and Soldier can also work if, but I like the idea too much. Pirate gains proficiency with Athletics and Perception, navigator’s tools and water vehicles and gain Bad Reputation, which lets you get away with minor offenses in a civilized settlement because people are afraid of you and won’t report it. Rose can be rude to people and get away with it after all.

Now to the meat of the building, character levels

1st Level: We’ll start as a Rogue, gaining proficiency in 4 skills - Intimidation, Deception, Stealth, and Persuasion - Thieve’s Cant secret language, Dexterity and Intelligence saving throws, thieve’s tools, simple weapons, short and longswords, rapiers, hand crossbows, and light armor. Moreover, you can gain expertise in two I’d recommend Acrobatics and Athletics - of those, doubling your Proficiency modifier for them.

Rogue’s also gain Sneak Attack, allowing you to add 1d6 to a ranged or melee attack made with a light or finesse weapon when you have an advantage to attack roll or another, not incapacitated, an enemy of the target is within 5 feet of it and you don’t have a disadvantage on the attack roll. Rapier is a finesse weapon and can easily be refluffled to serve as a stand-in for majority of swords Rose uses.

2nd Level: We’ll now take a quick dip into the Warlock to get you that sword.

Warlock gets an Otherworldly Patron. Hexblade has one forged with some sort of weapon of unknown origin that may be sentient. It has been sort of left ambiguous if Willow is a spirit possessing you or split personality caused by brain trauma, but whichever version you want you can work into this. As Hexblade you are Hex Warrior, gaining proficiency with Medium Armor, shields and martial weapons. Once every long rest you can pick a single weapon you are proficient with that isn’t two-handed and can use your Charisma in place of your Dexterity or Strength for attack and damage rolls made with it.

You also get Hexblade Curse, letting you once per short or long rest curse a single opponent within 30 feet from you that you can see as a bonus action. As long as the target is cursed, which is until a minute passes, either one of you dies or you are incapacitated, you add your Proficiency Bonus to damage rolls against it, crit against it on roll of 19 or 20, and if they die you regain hit points equal your Warlock Level + your Charisma modifier.

As a Warlock, you gain access to Spells. You know two cantrips and two spells and have a single spell slot you regain on short rest. Spells that require an attack roll do it with modifier equal your Charisma Modifier + your Proficiency Bonus, if your target needs to make a saving throw against your spell, Difficulty for it equals the sum of these two numbers +8.

Blade Ward is a Cantrip that until the end of your next turn grants you resistance against bludgeoning, piercing and slashing damage. Your HP will not be something to write home about, spoiler warning.

Booming Blade lets you attack as a part of casting a spell, on a hit your target takes damage as from normal attack but if they willingly move until the start of your next turn they take 1d8 thunder damage.

Hex lets you curse one creature you can see with 90 feet, making you deal it extra 1d6 necrotic damage when you hit it with an attack and grants it disadvantage on all checks for one Ability Score of your choice. It is a concentration spell and lasts up to 1 hour and if your target dies early, you can just move it to another target as a bonus action on your next turn.

Shield is cast as a reaction when you are hit by an attack or Magic Missile, allowing you to add +5 to your AC until your next turn, including against the attack or Magic Missile that caused you to cast it. Play it as you being hit was just your vision and you managed to avoid the damage.

3rd Level: Back to the Rogue now, 2nd Level Rogue gets Cunning Action, allowing you to take Dash, disengage or Hide as a bonus action or use said bonus action to Aim, giving you an advantage on next attack as long as you don’t move during this turn.

4th Level: 3rd Level Rogue bumps their Sneak Attack to 2d6 and gets to choose Roguish Archetype. Swashbuckler gains rakish audacity, letting you add your Charisma bonus to your initiative rolls and use Sneak Attack if you are within 5 feet of an opponent and no other creature is within 5 feet of you and you don’t have a disadvantage on the attack roll. You also gain Fancy Footwork, meaning if you make a melee attack against a creature, it cannot make opportunity attacks against you until the end of your turn. So if your dad drugged another heroine to fight you, you can strike her, don’t even need to hit, and then just slip past her to stab Slade next turn. And if you hit her with Booming Blade she cannot even chase you without taking more damage.

Have I mentioned your dad sucks?

5th Level: 4th Level Rogue gets an Ability Score Improvement, but we’ll go with a feat - Medium Armor Master lets you increase your Dexterity by 1, increases maximum bonus from Dexterity to AC you gain in Medium Armor from 2 to 3 and removes disadvantage Medium Armor imposes on Stealth checks. Rose’s iconic suit is some weird skintight chain shirt or scale armor, but you can even pick up Half-Plate for a total of 18 AC, 20 with a shield, if you want.

Unarmored Rose: Take the feat we will be taking when Rose hits Rogue 8

6th Level: 5th Level Rogue gains Uncanny Dodge, letting you use your reaction to halve damage against you when you are hit by an attack. Again, play it as you seeing the vision of attack and using that to be able to avoid it. Also, your Sneak Attack increases to 3d6.

7th Level: One more detour, time to start messing with the fate some more. No, not with Doctor Fate, that would be lethal. Anyway, 1st Level Wizard gets a Spellbook with 3 Cantrips and 6 1st Level Spells and 2 1st level Spell Slots. The Save DC and Spell Attack rolls are like Warlock’s but use Intelligence instead of Charisma. Wizard and Warlock count their spell slots separately but you can use one class spell slots to cast spells you know from the other class. Wizard recovers them on a long rest but Arcane Recovery lets you once per day on a short rest recover a number of spell slots equal half of your Wizard level, rounded up.

Friends lets you for the duration gain advantage on all Charisma checks against one creature, but once it ends it is aware what you did and gets angry at you. The fact this is a cantrip explains some things about few of Rose’s relationships.

Message lets you send a small message to another creature and get a short reply. You can use it as a team communicator for rest of the Titans.

Shocking Grasp is a paralyzer, letting you make a meele spell attack against a single target to deal it 2d8 lightning damage (it scales as most damage-dealing cantrips) and making it unable to take reactions until start of it’s next turn.

Cause Fear is a vial of fear toxin you stole from Scarecrow that forces a target to make a Wisdom Saving throw or be frightened of you for the duration or until it akes a saving throw on one of its turns. Doesn’t work on constructs or undead. Honestly, it would be much better as a Warlock Spell but I wanted to get Shield faster, feel free to switch the two around.

Disguise Self is your holographic projector that lets you alert your looks to make you look like another humanoid in the same size category and having the same array of limbs.If fails under closer scrutiny as it is an illusion.

Feather Fall lets you slow down the fall of you and up to five creatures within rage and if those affected reach the ground before the spell ends, they take no damage. I guess it’s your parachute.

Fog Cloud is a fog grenade, obscuring heavily everything within the area for up to 1 hour or until wind disperses it. Use it to retreat if things go badly.

Protection from Evil and Good gives all aberrations, celestials, elementals, fey fiends and undead disadvantage on attack rolls against you (or someone else you use it on), makes you immune to being charmed or frightened by them or, if you already were, grants advantage on saving throws to break out of it. I don’t know if Granny Goddess counts as a celestial but this could be pretty useful against mind control stuff done by Hellfire Club or when Blackest Night falls from the sky again.

Sleep allows you to roll 5d8, add the results and then put to sleep creatures in the spell’s rage of your choice, starting with the one who has the least amount of HP, are put to sleep until the combined HP of creatures you put down this way equals the sum of your rolls. Sleeping gas, a friend of any human fighting superheroes and supervillains on regular basis.

8th Level: 2nd Level Wizard gets an extra Spell Slot and gets to choose a School. School of Divination grants you Portent - after finishing a long rest you roll 2 d20s and write down the results. Until next long rest, you can use these rolls in place of an attack roll, saving throw or an ability check made by you or a creature you can see. The downsides are you have only two of them, each is of single-use, if you don’t spend them they’re lost, you need to declare you use them before the dice is rolled, and you can only do it once per turn. But these are extremely powerful and let Rose act in accordance of visions she sees. Hell, it can easily be played in line with how Doctor Villain theorized her powers work

Pretty much how it is working.

9th Level: So now that made these detours, let’s go back to Rogue for some more fighting prowess and better skills. 6th Level Rogue gains Expertise in two more skills, I’d go with Intimidation and Persuasion.

10th Level: 7th Level Rogue gains Evasion, letting you take no damage instead of half damage if you succeded on Dexterity Saving Throw against all spells and effects that ask of one. Your sneak attack increases to 4d6.

11th Level: 8th Level Rogue gets an Ability Score Improvement, but we’ll instead take one last feat - Lucky gives you 3 luck points per long rest that you can spend to roll one additional die on an attack roll, ability score or saving throw and choose which result is used. You can also spend them when a creature attacks you to roll a d20 and decide which roll the attacker is using.

Unarmored Rose: Spend the rest of your Ability Score Increases to round up first your Charisma and then Dexterity.

12th Level: 9th Level Swashbuckler gains Panache, letting you make a Persuasion check against target’s Insight - if they fall nonhostile creature is charmed by you for one minute and hostile one gains disadvantage on attack rolls against creatures other than you and cannot make opportunity attack against a creature other than you for 1 minute or until you are more than 60 feet apart or another ally hits them with an attack or a spell. Also, your Sneak Attack increases do 5d6.

13th Level: 10th Level Rogue gets an Ability Score improvement, time to invest into Charisma.

14th Level: 11th Level Rogue you gain a Reliable Talent - whenever you roll for a skill you are proficient with, you treat rolls below 10 as 10. And your Sneak Attack increases to 6d6.

15th Level: 12th Level Rogue gets another Ability Score Improvement, round up your Charisma.

16th Level: 13th Level Swashbuckler can execute an Elegant Maneuver to, as a bonus action gain an advantage on the next Acrobatics or Athletics check you’ll make during the same turn. And your Sneak attack rises up to 7d6.

17th Level: 14th Level Rogue gains Blindsense, which lets you discern the location of hidden or invisible creatures near you.

18th Level: 15th Level Rogue gains Slippery Mind, which means proficiency in Wisdom saving throws. Which is good if Slade tries to gaslight you into his new bullshit again. Your Sneak Attack increases to 8d6. Also, your dad sucks, have I mentioned that?

19th Level: 16th Level Rogue gets our las Ability Score Improvement, increase your Constitution for better Hit Points and Concentration, remember your HP increases also retroactively.

20th Level: Our capstone is the final ability of Swashbuckler, Master Duelist, which lets you reroll an attack roll with an advantage if you miss it once per long rest. And your Sneak Attack increases to 9d6

Overview: Rose Wilson is a Swashbuckler Rogue 17/School of Divination Wizard 2/Hexblade Warlock 1. Let us see how good this build is:

Pros: First of all you are incredibly hard to hit or hurt in general, with AC around 18 or 20 and multiple ways to reduce the damage or turn a hit into a miss - Uncanny Dodge, Evasion, Shield, Portent, Lucky. Second, you have a lot of ways to screw with your own dice, making them do what you want through a combination of luck and foresight. There is a reason why Lucky Divination Wizard is seen as one of the most powerful things in the game and you add to this Reliable Talent, Master Duelist, Elegant Maneuver, Friends, Hex and Hexblade Curse. Third, with Hex, Hexblade Curse, Booming Blade and Sneak Attack you can deal huge damage, especially with your increased crit chance. You are also very Finally, you are incredibly mobile for someone in a half-plate, which will catch many opponents off-guard.

Cons: Your HP is decent but nothing to write home about, few hits will drop you into the danger area of Power Word: Kill easily. Your sword may be enhanced but is not magical so unless DM gives you a magical weapon a lot of enemies will be able to resit your damage or simply be immune to it. A lot of your abilities compete over your use of reaction or bonus action as well, making them somewhat redundant. Finally, your Intelligence and Constitution are not that good and it’s gonna hurt some of your spell rolls, especially concentration. Also, if you abuse your future-seeing powers too much DM will hate you.

Overall, however, you are a very good party member, fitting as both a skill monkey and damage-per-turn and even a small-part controller or defender in a pinch with power to bend dice to your will. Sweep into the battlefield, hit hard, move out and have the opponent have to go through Superboy to hit you back. Just remember that you work better as a part of a team so maybe don’t antagonize party members too much. Except if you’re on a team with Slade.

Your dad sucks.

Alternatives:

If you don’t like the whole Willow thing and don’t feel like refluffing and fixing it, skip Hexblade level for one more of Rogue, you’ll gain Elusive, ensuring no attack against you is made with an advantage.

If your Ability Scores are so high you can get an extra feat, consider either Defensive Duelist, which lets you use your reaction to add your Proficiency bonus to your AC when a creature hits you with a melee attack. Or, if you play Half-Elf Rose, Elven Accuracy for +1 to either Dexterity, Intelligence, Wisdom or Charisma and an ability to roll an additional dice when you make an attack roll with advantage using any of these 4 Abilities.

- Admin

#Ravager #Rose Wilson #DC #Dungeons & Dragons

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toxicdogars · 4 years

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((Hilbert +D&D because I'm curious about how this would turn out-))

Tumblr Meets D&D - Your Muse as a D&D Character

Hilbert Dean Bailey

So, Hilbert here is the male protagonist of Pokemon Black and White, though @luckynatured here decided to take the character in her own direction, basing the muse in its entirety on a Nuzlocke Challenge of Pokemon Black. One of the aspects of this particular challenge drew my attention- the fact that Rowan chose to implement a rule involving dice rolls or coin flips any time there was a choice to be made. Leaving things to the whim of fate, almost seems perfect for a D&D character. Let’s make that a goal, we need a little randomness. Reading through some of Hilbert’s interactions also points to evidence that he’s extremely determined and exceptionally lucky to get so far without losing core team members. Speaking of team members, let’s make sure we have varied damage types to account for any threats, paying special attention to Hilbert’s main, league-winning team. Once again, we’ll be using Dungeons and Dragons 5th edition and all books and articles related to it.

Ability Scores

These ventures will use standard array, a set of numbers given as a sort of average stat pool. Feel free to roll for stats if you wanted to use this character, just treat this arrangement as a general order for what stats are most important. No need to worry about multiclassing with this build.

Strength: 8 (Not needed) Dexterity: 13 (Useful) Constitution: 14 (Will be useful later) Intelligence: 10 (Hilly’s decently smart) Wisdom: 12 (Hilbert’s determined, and that tends to equate to decent Wisdom related saving throws and the like) Charisma: 15 (Our most useful stat here)

Race

Hilbert will be, surprise surprise, a Human. I could have gone a type of Halfling, which would have given him some extra luck, but Hilbert is shockingly tall, so that seemed a little out of place. Even so, we can make some choices early to get some handy bits of luck. Variant Humans also get some snazzy bonuses. Put the two free points Variant Humans get into Dexterity and Charisma to round those odd numbers up to evens. Then you’ve got your typical 30 feet of movement speed, a skill proficiency, and a free Feat. For Hilbert, also gets a base speed of 30 ft, a skill proficiency, and a free Feat. It might seem like a silly choice but let’s give him Perception. It will help with noticing things going on around him, and hopefully keep him aware of any dangers and it’s not a skill he’ll be able to grab from his class. As for his Feat, well I did say our boy needed to be lucky:

Lucky: You have inexplicable luck that seems to kick in at just the right moment.You have 3 luck points. Whenever you make an attack roll, an ability check, or a saving throw, you can spend one luck point to roll an additional d20. You can choose to spend one of your luck points after you roll the die, but before the outcome is determined. You choose which of the d20s is used for the attack roll, ability check, or saving throw.You can also spend one luck point when an attack roll is made against you. Roll a d20, and then choose whether the attack uses the attacker's roll or yours.If more than one creature spends a luck point to influence the outcome of a roll, the points cancel each other out; no additional dice are rolled.You regain your expended luck points when you finish a long rest.

Class and Background

Alright, but hear me out on this. Hilbert... is a Sorcerer. Not only do magical effects line up well with Pokemon attacks, but there’s a certain subclass of the Sorcerer that is the definition of random, and is the best way, in my opinion, to reflect his combination of luck and skill that got him to where he is today.

Sorcerers start with a d6 hit die (which is... not the best out there), proficiency in Constitution and Charisma saving throws, daggers, darts, slings, quarterstaffs, light crossbows, and two skills from a short list. Of the options listed, Insight and Persuasion make the most sense.

As for his background, let’s focus on his rise as a Champion and give him the Folk Hero background, giving him proficiency in Animal Handling and Survival, as well as with two tools, two languages, or a language and a tool. Gaming sets are tools, so let’s giving our boy proficiency with a dice set, and might as well toss on a language like Elvish or something. Humans in the D&D world tend to pepper their native tongue with Elvish and Dwarvish words anyway, so it tracks.

This build is taking Sorcerer all the way from one to twenty, so let’s hit up what Hilbert gets at these levels one by one. At level one, he gains the ability to cast spells. Charisma is his casting stat, and it is added to his spell attack rolls and the DC of any spells of his that require saving throws to resist. He is notably able to use a spellcasting focus to ignore material components- let’s make that coin he always has in his wallet a casting focus. He can also pick a Sorcerous Origin, and the one that best fits our chance-manipulating mage boy is the Wild Magic Sorcerer. Wild Mages get two abilities:

Wild Magic Surge: Immediately after you cast a sorcerer spell of 1st level or higher, the DM can have you roll a d20. If you roll a 1, roll on the Wild Magic Surge table to create a random magical effect. A surge can happen once per turn. If a surge effect is a spell, it's too wild to be affected by Metamagic. If it normally requires concentration, it doesn't require concentration in this case; the spell lasts for its full duration. Tides of Chaos: You can gain advantage on one attack roll, ability check, or saving throw. Once you do so, you must finish a long rest before you can use this feature again. Any time before you regain the use of this feature, the DM can have you roll on the Wild Magic Surge table immediately after you cast a sorcerer spell of 1st level or higher. You then regain the use of this feature.

These two abilities work well in the randomness aspect of things, and give Hilbert some utility to manipulate what fate gives him. As for the spells he gains at this level, he starts with four cantrips and two first level spells from those in with sorcerer list. In case someone doesn’t know the difference, cantrips are simple magical tricks you can pull off at will, while leveled spells require expending one of your spell slots of a level equal to or higher than the spell’s level. First, the cantrips:

Shape Water: A transmutation cantrip that basically lets you manipulate water. A simple utility cantrip that you could make use of for a few clever things. A good reference to his starter being an Oshawott. Light: An evocation cantrip that gives you a flashlight so your weak little human eyes can see in the dark. Just kinda useful to have. Chill Touch: A necromancy cantrip that deals necrotic damage and restricts the affected foe’s ability to heal themselves. A neat little ghostly trick to represent Chandelure, perhaps? Ray of Frost: An evocation cantrip that deals cold damage by firing a beam of icy energy- sounds like an Ice Beam if you ask me, something fitting for his Beartic or any Pokemon that knows Ice Beam.

And the spells:

Mage Armor: A first level abjuration spell that buffs up your armor class, setting it to 13 + your Dexterity modifier, which at this moment brings your AC from 12 (10 + Dexterity modifier) to 15. Pretty okay for a caster. It also lasts eight hours, meaning you can cast it at the start of a day and basically be armored for all your encounters moving forward. Chaos Bolt: Now this is the good shit. It’s just a first level evocation spell, sure, but the damage is pretty good, 2d8 + 1d6. And it can be decided what damage type it deals practically at random by selecting one of the d8s and using the element that corresponds to the number, starting with acid at 1, cold, fire, force, lightning, poison, psychic, and thunder at 8. Even more wild, if the d8s roll the same number, you can select a second target for the spell and make another round of rolls. This spell has some seriously wild propagation and represents so many types that it’s insane.

Onto second level, which gives Hilbert a Font of Magic, which gives him Sorcery Points equal to his level, which he can spend to make more spell slots (or vice versa, converting spell slots to sorcery points) and, thanks to a class feature variant Unearthed Arcana article, cool protagonisty shit. Won’t go into too much depth on the making more spell slots thing or the converting spell slots to sorcery points, that can be found in the Player’s Handbook easily enough. The fun stuff are in the protagonist powers, like Empowered Reserve, which lets you spend two sorcery points in order to gain advantage on an ability check; Imbuing Touch, which lets you spend two sorcery points to make a nonmagical weapon magical for one minute; and Sorcerous Fortitude, which lets you spend a number of sorcery points and roll that many d4s, the result of which you gain as temporary hit points. Really handy options. He also learns another first level spell, so why not try out:

Sleep: A first level enchantment spell that has you roll some dice to determine how many hit points worth of individuals you can put to sleep. Great example of the Hypnosis move Munna and Musharna are famous for.

Sorcerer 3 gives ya access to Metamagic, also known as the stuff you spent your sorcery points on before that class feature variant UA. You get two metamagic choices at this level and can only apply one of them to a given spell at a time unless it’s stated otherwise. The ones I feel that reflect Hilbert most are the following two:

Unerring Spell: A metamagic option from the aforementioned UA, it lets you spend two sorcery points to reroll a missed spell attack roll, and you can use it even if you’ve used a metamagic option on the spell. You do have to stick with whatever the second roll is though, but if you’re using this then I would expect that first roll to be terrible. Pairs well with Tides of Chaos. Careful Spell: Spend one sorcery point to make a number of targeted allies about to be hit by one of your area spells instantly succeed on the saving throw. A big way to prevent damage to your allies, though it won’t be to him right now since he doesn’t have any spells that could cause more trouble. Wonder when we’re going to fix that.

Sorcerer 4 nets you an Ability Score Improvement, let’s put that +2 in Charisma to make your spells- ahem, your Pokemon- even more badass. You also get a new cantrip and new spell, but you also get another spell at Sorcerer 5 and not much else, so let’s cover that too. That spell at Sorcerer 5 can be a third level spell so, I think you know what this means:

Shocking Grasp: An evocation cantrip that deals lightning damage and restricts the use of the target’s reaction. Pretty handy. Mind Spike: A second level divination spell that deals psychic damage and magically tracks a foe, pretty handy representation of Musharna’s Psychic attack and his general ability to perceive things. Fireball: A third level evocation spell that does big fire damage over an area, perfect for blasting shit with Chandelure. This is the one you wanna use your Careful Spell on so you don’t get any... accidents.

Sorcerer 6 will give Hilbert another fun way to manipulate dice rolls with the Bend Luck feature:

Bend Luck: When another creature you can see makes an attack roll, an ability check, or a saving throw, you can use your reaction and spend 2 sorcery points to roll 1d4 and apply the number rolled as a bonus or penalty (your choice) to the creature's roll. You can do so after the creature rolls but before any effects of the roll occur.

And one more spell, still of third level or less:

Tidal Wave: A third level conjuration spell that calls up a giant wave of crushing water. You know. Like Surf. Which I’m sure Michelle knows.

Sorcerer 7 unlocks fourth level spells, but let’s not take any of those, instead dipping back to the third level:

Fly: A third level transmutation spell that gives ya a flying speed. Requires your concentration, but your Con saves are pretty good. Keep out of range on the back of your Altaria and you’ll be fine.

Sorcerer 8 gives you an Ability Score Improvement, cap your Charisma at 20. Let’s also give him another spell, and let’s dip back to first level for:

Expeditious Retreat: A first level transmutation spell that lets you dash as a bonus action for ten minutes. Also a concentration spell, but if you need to make a run for it, this is the best way to go about it.

Sorcerer 9 gives our boy fifth level spells, so let’s take one:

Synaptic Static: A fifth level enchantment spell that is basically FIreball but for psychic damage. Wreck face with the power of your team leader, Hilbert!

Sorcerer 10 is also pretty simple, another metamagic option and a spell:

Quickened Spell: When you cast a spell that has a casting time of 1 action, you can spend 2 sorcery points to change the casting time to 1 bonus action for this casting. Erupting Earth: A third level transmutation spell that rips up the ground, damaging foes and making int into difficult terrain. Perfect for an Excadrill’s Bulldoze if you ask me.

Sorcerer 11 unlocks sixth level spells, and let’s take one:

Investiture of Ice: A sixth level transmutation spell that transforms you into an awesome iceman, blasting cones of freezing energy, gaining immunity to cold and resistance to fire respectively. Something tells me Hilbert doesn’t like dragons. Put them on ice. Just don’t try using this tactic on a cold-focused chromatic dragon. A White Dragon... Like Kyurem. In D&D terms anyway.

Sorcerer 12 no new spell, but he does get an ASI. Let’s use that to bump up either his Dexterity or his Constitution, depending on preference. Dex will help him not get hit by attacks and Con will help him maintain his concentration spells.

Sorcerer 13 unlocks seventh level spells, let’s take one:

Teleport: A seventh level conjuration spell that, well... let’s you teleport. Weird, right? Anyway, there’s some minute rules about how it works, but it basically boils down to making sure you have an object with a connection to where you’re going and you’ll be fine. Maybe Hilbert can use it to go home and talk to his mother for once.

Sorcerer 14 helps streamline the randomness a bit with the Controlled Chaos feature:

Controlled Chaos: Whenever you roll on the Wild Magic Surge table, you can roll twice and use either number.

Sorcerer 15 unlocks eighth level spells, and we’re taking one.

Earthquake: This one’s for you, Garfield and Jude! An eighth level evocation spell that does just what it says on the tin, smashing up the ground and structures to damage foes directly and crush them under toppling buildings. A really fun spell that may very well be able to crumple a sparky sparky boom dargon held by a dude with a letter for a name. Specific, I know.

Sorcerer 16 just gives you an ASI, so how bout we bump up either of Hilbert’s secondary stats? If you put this +2 in the same one, then you could max that stat in a couple levels, which could be really nice.

Sorcerer 17 gives our boy his final metamagic as well as unlocks ninth level spells, the strongest spells out there.

Empowered Spell: When you roll damage for a spell, you can spend 1 sorcery point to reroll a number of the damage dice up to your Charisma modifier (minimum of one). You must use the new rolls. You can use Empowered Spell even if you have already used a different Metamagic option during the casting of the spell. Wish: A ninth level conjuration spell and one of the strongest spells in the game, capable of duplicating the effects of any other eighth level or lower spell, or alternatively any number of possible things that could be phrased in the form of a wish. This spell is a little finicky though and it really up to the DM how easily it’ll work out. Regardless, it’s the ultimate way to manipulate fate, which is why I chose it for this build.

Sorcerer 18 if a nifty little level for Hilbert, since it gives him a nasty little ability I like to call Judgement. Same he ain’t from Sinnoh, it would reflect Arceus well. For now it will just represent the badassery of Reshiram:

Spell Bombardment: When you roll damage for a spell and roll the highest number possible on any of the dice, choose one of those dice, roll it again and add that roll to the damage. You can use the feature only once per turn.

Sorcerer 19 gives our boy his last ability score. Cap that secondary stat, or spread it around a bit. Focus on what’s mattering most based on how his battles go. Dexterity if he keeps getting hit, Constitution if he keeps dropping his concentration spells at the wrong moment.

And last we have Sorcerer 20, which only gives you one kinda eh ability. I suppose it’s nice if you use them pretty often, which a lot of the Wild Magic features do make use of them pretty consistently. So maybe it actually will benefit Hilbert xD.

Sorcerous Restoration: You regain 4 expended sorcery points whenever you finish a short rest.

Final Thoughts

Okay, so the biggest pro we got with this build is the sheer amount of damage types available by all those spells. Even Chaos Bolt alone can deal a bunch of different damage types. Wish is also a fantastic spell that can easily save yer ass. Hilbert is a really good blaster with his spells, but he also has some utility with flight and the like, not to mention ways to protect himself and his allies by manipulating dice rolls. Don’t hesitate to make use of those Wild Magic abilities. Depending on the surge table the DM uses, there’s some darn good options on there that will greatly benefit you.

Unfortunately, there’s just as many bad things that could happen. Or you could turn into a potted plant and be unable to do anything for several turns. Not to mention you’d have just... terrible hit points. Taking the average puts you well under even Homika’s 88 hitpoints. d6 hit dies are not your friend if you wanna soak damage. But that’s not what you’re good at. You’re good at taking down the big monster before you go boom.

I tried to get something on there for Stoutland, but there aren’t many ways to get a Normal Type in there. ‘Cept maybe some thunder damage, equating it to Hyper Voice. I always wanted to get Awaken on this build so Hilbert could get his awakened shrub Carmen, but apparently Sorcerers don’t get the spell. I’d have to take him through bard or wizard or something like that too far to justify it.

I hope you enjoyed this. Feel free to tell me how wrong I am with my choices

#[Memes]#luckynatured

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raspberryfanfics · 4 years

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concepts pt II—hyuga hizashi

Summary: All of the world's unproven things could be explained in concepts: fate, freedom, fear, love...and a girl obsessed with birds made Hizashi question everything he believed in and made him believe. He didn't question it, he just let it be. After all, change is just a concept too.

Word Count: 6108

ON FFN HERE Part I HERE

They all made chunin that year, and Hizashi found himself struggling to keep his emotional distance from Asuka.

It seemed that every time he looked at her, she grew even more beautiful. Her once flat and unshapely body had now developed soft curves and toned muscle. She was even faster than before, her legs long and lean to help carry her at incredible speeds. Her hair was now usually braided into a ponytail to keep it out of her face and it trailed behind her when she leapt from tree to tree, becoming even closer to flying.

She was now able to use the wind-riding jutsu much more proficiently and it was now more common for her to spar in the air rather than on the ground. They all had their fair share of scars now. Some on their arms from rather tough enemies, some from surgeries after they were exposed to toxic chemicals, and some from each other. Yet their team's bond was unbreakable and stronger than before.

However, he was furiously failing to keep the distance he promised the heir of his clan.

It was hard to avoid her. Sometimes he noticed that he would be cold to her but she wouldn't care, because she knew just as well as he did that he would always find her again. Once he had a new training idea, she was the first one he went to. And when she'd sneak into his bedroom in the middle of the night and talk about her mission or birds with such passion in her eyes...how was he to continue to be cold to her when she made him feel so at home?

She took his sudden changes in attitude to be moodiness and still treated him the same. It was usually later in the day where everything would be normal again.

They each were promoted to jonin one by one in the course of four years after several missions led by Kazane-sensei. On one of the S-ranked missions, the four of them stumbled upon a map in one of the scrolls of their assassinated targets. It appeared to be a map in a language that he didn't understand. However, when Kenji examined the scroll once more, he understood it immediately.

According to their teammate, it was the signs and symptoms of strange diseases understood by a skilled medics. However, the procedure and symptoms apparently made practically no sense and were organized into several chunks. Kenji spent a week trying to figure out what it meant, even consulting Tsunade, who was also very confused.

One day, when Kazane-sensei and Hizashi were meditating, Asuka bird-watching, and he was reading, he jumped up and shouted. "I know what it means!"

The three immediately looked up and he spread pages of lined paper onto the ground, pinning them with kunai.

"So most of them provide strange snippets like right here, it says the nerve was damaged severely and the word nerve was underlined. So to try and remember this, I put the abbreviation for "nerve", which is "N" on this paper, then went to the next one, which says "sutures in the nose" so I shortened that to "intranasal" and abbreviated that to "IN". Those ones were super obvious but some of them like the missing symptom for a disease were harder to find."

"You lost me, Kenji." their sensei admitted.

"Nevermind. If you take the chart abbreviation for each section it spells out into complicated instructions to a ninja falcon cliff! It's a map to find the ninja summons of falcons written down by a med-nin who probably wanted to keep it a secret!"

And with that statement, Asuka nearly fainted.

He caught her as she fell back but she clearly needed to hear more, and she couldn't do that if she was unconscious. She recently also acquired a contract with ninja owls, and it was clear she was hungry for more. With a writ from the Hokage, she was granted permission to leave the village in search of the ninja falcon.

Sixteen-year-old Hizashi and the other two bid their teammate goodbye at the gates of Konoha, supplying her with emergency contact gear, extra weapons, summoning scrolls within summoning scrolls, and items that were supposed to bring luck. She assured them she would be fine even as Kazane-sensei reminded her to do things in the way she used to back when they were genin. They were reluctant to let her go, knowing that it could be half a year before seeing her again. Yet this was her passion and if she succeeded, she would be a stronger ninja, something they all wanted to be.

After hugging the other Kenji and Kazane-sensei, she quickly threw her arms around Hizashi, taking him by surprise.

"I know you don't like hugs," she softly as his frozen hands shook, then slowly wrapped around her waist. "But I'm really gonna miss you, Hizashi."

He blinked, burying his face in the crook of her neck into the soft fabric of her dark grey cloak. It was true that he disliked hugs, but having her in his arms was a completely different story. "I'll miss you too, Asuka. Please be safe."

"I will,"

They seemed to linger for a few moments, even as the other two watched their interaction carefully. She then pulled away and ran off, speeding towards the distance. She leaped and turned around mid-air, giving them a final wave before disappearing.

He felt disappointment flood his body and admiration as her flowing cloak and hair escaped his immediate sight.

Kenji put a hand on his shoulder and shook his head, a grin plastered on his tanned face. "Oh man, you really got it bad, don't you."

"I—I'm not supposed to—"

"Have you told her how you feel yet?" his friend asked.

"I don't have—"

"I have my own Byakugan that see through the lies you tell yourself, Hizashi."

The young jonin sputtered, his face reddening. Kazane-sensei rolled her eyes and shoved her hands in her pockets. "Come on, Kenji. Let the poor guy try to actually sort his feelings out himself. He'll tell her when it's ready."

"Is it really that obvious?" he said a little bit too loudly.

They both gave him an identical look and he groaned, burying his face in his hands.

Four months later, he was nearly asleep when a bird was tapping at his window. It was Suisen, the tiny swift that destroyed his twin brother in the Chunin exams. At first, he thought it was a dream. But when he opened his window and let her in, she quickly flew onto his lamp. "Asuka is back."

His heart pounded in excitement. "Did she summon you to get me?"

"Nah, I thought you'd like to know. She's back home, finishing up cleaning. I think if you get there fast enough, you'll still get there."

He didn't need to be told twice. "Thank you, Suisen."

Hizashi cranked open his window as she disappeared with a poof and silently leaped over the rooves until he reached the window of her apartment. She lived on the highest floor, close to the sky and the roof. Her light was still on when he crouched on the sill of her window, knocking on it three times. When she didn't answer, he slowly pushed it open with a little bit of chakra and crept in. No one was in her bedroom and he was slightly worried.

Suddenly, the door opened and she was standing in a towel, dark hair dripping, and completely oblivious to the fact that he was in her bedroom.

"Asuka," She screamed, throwing her hands out to make hand seals, nearly losing the grip on her towel. He quickly looked away and raised his palms up. "Wait! Wait, it's just me."

His best friend relaxed and put her hand over her chest. "Lord Kami, you scared me, Hizashi — wait — Hizashi!"

Her face lit up and she hugged him once again, damp skin pressing against his clothes. He had to push her away, knowing that nothing was under her towel. She seemed to suddenly realize this fact too and blushed hard, stammering.

"Let me put something on."

Asuka took a few clothes out of her drawers and headed back the way she came, coming out once more with a loose shirt and shorts. "How did you know I was home?"

"Suisen," he replied, still trying to grasp his mind around the fact that he was home.

He wasn't supposed to miss her so much.

Every day he thought about her, wondered if she was ok, or if she missed him too. His nights were restless even though in the day he prayed he could go back to sleep just to see her in his dreams again. Then he wondered if she would even come back. What would he do without her? And even then, he thought about her hair and her birds, her cloak and her smile, he was pretty much a wreck while she was gone.

"I—I thought Suisen went back. She didn't tell me that she would find you—"

"I'm glad she did."

"Oh?"

"Yea. I really missed you, Asuka."

She smiled, brown eyes beaming warmly at him. "I missed you too."

"How did it go? Did you make a contract with any falcons?"

Her face lit up and she started on the tales of her journey, nearly falling off a cliff several times, being soaked to the bone, getting lost, and finally making it to their habitat, only to be tested if she was worthy. She talked for an hour, the light in her eyes shining as she talked about something she was passionate about. Usually, she didn't say much and they could understand each other through glances alone, but she could go on forever about birds. Sometimes he would zone out, the sound of her voice morphing into music and the way her lips moved entrancing him. Though she looked exhausted, she had enough energy to finish her story.

"The falcons can see even farther than you can," she whispered.

"Don't tell me I'm being replaced." he joked.

Asuka laughed, shaking her head. "Unfortunately, they don't see tenketsu points. Otherwise, you would have been screwed."

"Do they have crazy families?"

"Oh, yea. That falcon family would be crazier than yours besides the fact that they don't inflict terrible pain to those who disobey them."

It was a weirdly morbid joke that made the two silent for a moment, but Hizashi started laughing and she was on her way to apologizing until she burst too. They laughed, clutching their stomachs and rolling around, trying not to wake up her neighbours. Then he realized how pretty she was when she was laughing like that and stopped admire her.

When she noticed that he was no longer laughing, she stopped too. Her eyes fluttered to his lips, then back to his eyes. He prayed she would do whatever her eyes were saying she wanted to do. He prayed for her to have less self-control than he did because right now, he knew he didn't want her enough to kiss her but wouldn't stop her if she did.

Yet Asuka was never one to be bold in situations like these. Even in the rare seduction missions, she wouldn't even have to play the innocent girl because it came so easily. In a mission where she would have to show a lot of skin and crawl her fingers up an old man's arm, they would be screwed. When she looked away embarrassed, he wasn't surprised. It didn't stop Hizashi from feeling disappointment though.

He coughed awkwardly, reluctant to go but unsure of what else he could do. She smiled weakly at him when he crouched at her windowsill.

"Goodbye," her soft voice echoed through his ears.

"I'll see you tomorrow, ok?"

She nodded and he waved a final greeting before jumping out her window, feeling light and airy, almost as if he could fly as she did.

Months later, he found himself winded up in one of the most intimate moments he ever had. The two lay side by side, staring up at the sky, which was littered with flecks, shimmering above them. Nothing touched his skin but blades of grass on their open training field, and the soft breeze of the summer night. He was fully clothed but he never felt so exposed in his life.

Hizashi didn't know much about stars and neither did Asuka, but she explained to him how birds sometimes knew where to go by looking at them. It was one of the few things about the feathered creatures she couldn't figure out: how they found their way home no matter what.

She reached out her hand as if she could touch the brightest stars and he briefly wondered how soft her fingers would feel if he wrapped his around them. Yet instead, a small owl flew past and fluttered silently around them, landing near her, looking around for prey before flying off again.

"Back in the academy, I thought your obsession with birds would be a phase. I've been proven very wrong. You have a way with them and you don't even seem to try."

She shrugged and sat to look back in the direction where the owl left. He now only saw her face, rather than stars in his vision.

"I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because I respect them. I always have seen them as equals." she paused for a moment. "For the longest time, I've wanted to be like them. They're free. They have no bounds. I wished so badly that I could fly as easily as they did."

"You said all of that in past tense. Do you not wish to fly anymore?"

Asuka chuckled. "No, I do. But I can almost fly, and for me, that's enough. I wanted to fly because of the freedom, but even birds have their limits. They have more limits than humans do. I didn't want to be caged but the truth is, all of us are in one. For them, they cannot swim or go past our earth into space. For me, my limits are the same as birds and the laws of the shinobi. For you, it is your clan. I am happy with my cage. It satisfies all my needs, there is enough space, and enough unknowns to last me a lifetime."

"You always talk about freedom, but if you are caged, then how can you be free?" he asked.

"Freedom is a concept," she explained. "We all are restricted by one thing or the other. It is only freedom when you don't feel like you are restricted. I feel free even within my restrictions, therefore I am free. Yet if I were to be put into your place, in your clan, I don't think I would be. Do you feel free?"

"Sometimes," he said. "When I'm not at the compound, I feel it completely. I'm free until I take off my forehead protector and see my cursed mark. Or until I see my brother without one. When my parents don't look at me anymore."

"I'm sorry."

"It's ok," he smiled weakly. "Around the team, on missions, and with you, I usually just forget about it."

"Do you hate them?" she asked.

"I try not to. It's hard, that's for sure, but there is little I can do about it." Hizashi then hesitated.

"What is it."

"I—I hate my brother."

"I can hate him with you,"

He laughed softly. "It's ok, my hate is powerful enough for one person. It's just that I see him and try to find things I'm better at than him. And I am better than him. I learned all the techniques faster, became jonin quicker, and I know that we're identical, but I feel more attractive than he is."

Asuka rolled her eyes. "You have no idea how odd that sounds coming from a person like you."

"Anyways, I think about all the ways I'm better than him, but then I remember he doesn't have a curse mark and it outweighs everything."

She thought for a moment, staring down at him with sad eyes as he watched the stars.

"What about our team?"

"Hmm?"

"You have our team. Does that outweigh your seal?"

"Asuka I—"

"Does being on a team with me outweigh your seal?"

He felt himself at a loss for words. When he thought about it, she was right. Having such a close bond with his team outweighed the seal. Being close to someone as wonderful as her by itself outweighed the seal.

She blushed, looked away and sighed, threading her fingers around the long grass.

"Hiashi…he likes you. I—I can't."

"Since the academy, right?" she murmured. "It's just an infatuation. And it's not like he even knows me. How could he have real feelings for me when he knows practically nothing about me?"

"How do you know he doesn't have real feelings for you?"

"Are you defending him?"

She didn't seem angry, just surprised. He nodded, thinking selfishly that if she were to like him back, it would be easier for him to avoid her.

"May I ask why?"

"I'd rather not say."

Asuka crossed her legs and he propped himself up on his elbows. The moonlight hit her face at a perfect angle, highlighting her soft cheekbones and illuminating her eyes, making them appear almost silver. Her lips seemed incredibly welcoming at the moment and he wondered if they felt as soft as the looked. Would he be more satisfied by a quiet gasp if he kissed her jaw and sucked her neck or if she pressed her thin frame onto his, winding her fingers into his hair?

"H—He doesn't look at me like you do." she breathed. "You look at me li—like you—"

"Like I what?"

When words didn't arrive, he felt his stomach drop. Yet he suddenly tensed up much more when her hand reached up to his jaw and her thumb brushed lightly against his cheek, turning his face to her. His heart pounded in his chest so loudly that he couldn't hear his own thinking. Did she think about doing that? Was it easy for her to just touch him like that or did she contemplate on it, like he did every time he was around her?

"You care," she whispered. It wasn't a comparison anymore. She didn't say "like he cared". She knew. And the way she said it, he knew that she didn't mean it platonically.

She knew that he was in love with her.

It was something he had denied to himself until the very moment. He knew this as his skin heated before her hand even touched his face and as he found himself dizzy around her. When the thought of losing her made his chest hurt so much that he felt like he had to hold it and cry. How just being around her was probably the best thing to ever happen to him and how he wanted her to be around for the rest of his life.

Her whisper may have been quieter than his raging thoughts, still deafened by his pulse, yet the two words rang in his head over and over again.

Hizashi swallowed, slowly raising his hand to grab hers, locking their fingers, and painfully choosing to lower them from his face and back to her side. He let go of her hand and a new set of voices rang in his head again.

"Stay away from Asuka,"

"Hi—Hizashi?"

"I can. I can make you do whatever I want,"

"I should go—"

"Am I wrong?" she said, sounding hurt and so innocent, looking at him with big sad eyes that made him feel disgusting.

"No," he choked. "You're not wrong."

"Then why?"

And they both knew that deep inside, he knew she returned his feelings. Two people who loved each other should hardly be a problem, but it was. He lay back down from his elbows and rubbed his face with his hand.

"I don't want to hurt you—"

"You know I can handle pain, even emotional,"

"I—You—What if you realize that I'm not worth being around—"

"We've been teammates for five years."

"I have orders!" Hizashi choked, trying to keep the tears at bay. He wasn't going to cry in front of her. "I can't make any advances on you."

She was silent because even she knew that orders from the main family weren't to be taken lightly. "For how long?"

"Since you beat Hiashi during the chunin exams."

"That's when you started trying to avoid me."

"I know."

"I'm not an object."

"I told him that,"

"Yet it's an order nonetheless." she sighed.

"I'm sorry, Asuka."

He sat up, deciding that it could be a good time to leave.

"If—If you didn't have these orders, wo—would you have kissed me by now?"

One last sentence rang in his head.

"You better keep your word, brother."

"Yes, I would have," he said honestly. He wasn't going to lie to her, especially when it was a truth, not an advance. When he wasn't going to let himself go any further, she deserved it.

"Then if you don't make advances, is there anything about rejecting one?"

He blinked a couple of times, running her question in his mind over and over again. "No,"

She leaned in closer, darting her eyes between his and his lips. He prayed she would break the distance. Once again, he wouldn't lean in until she kissed him. Asuka hovered over his lips, so close he could feel her breath, so close that they shared the same air, and so close that he was scared she would hear his heart beating out of his chest.

It seemed to be forever when she finally closed her eyes and kissed him, wrapping an arm around his neck and slowly joining their breaths together. He sighed in relief and wrapped his arm around her waist, lightly pushing her to the grass and savouring her lips. They were just as soft as he imagined them to be but the fireworks exploding in his chest and the dopamine rushing through his system were completely unexpected.

When it was time to pull away, they lingered around each other, eyes still half-lidded, faces still pulling towards each other like two positive ends of a magnet, almost touching, but never there. They didn't want it to end.

"Asuka…"

"Hizashi…"

"May I walk you home?"

"You don't have to ask."

It was silence on the way to her house, unlike the other times he walked her home. Yet it was a comfortable silence, one that was warm and welcome.

She pecked him on the cheek just before walking inside, beaming radiantly.

"Goodbye,"

"I'll see you tomorrow, ok?"

She nodded and smiled, then closed the door.

On his way home in his daze, he didn't realize that her small summoning owl was trailing him. His strength was his sight, not his hearing, and the owl also knew how to keep in the blind spot of his, even when his Byakugan wasn't activated.

What he did notice, however, was his brother standing at the entrance of the compound with his arms crossed. Hizashi was not one to be scared of another. He was scared of concepts. He was scared of dying without purpose, others controlling his fate, and unimaginable pain that was enough to strip him of his humanity. Yet as he stared in the identical yet much too different eyes, it was clear that he was scared of his brother because he could be all the concepts that Hizashi was ever afraid of.

"You broke your word."

Funny how the same vocal cords can sound so cold when they come out of another's mouth. Or how someone you are more powerful than can still hold more control over you.

"I did not,' he replied steadily.

"Then what was your session in the woods today?"

"You watched me?" he growled.

Hiashi didn't move. "I have watched you uncountable other times. It appears that you never came to your senses after all."

"I did not put forth advances. It is she who has chosen to kiss me. Do not blame me for the fact that she knows I'm a better shinobi and a better person than you are."

"Don't lie, you kissed her back."

"I did."

"That counts as an advance."

"You did not specify."

"Must I spell it out for someone of your calibre?"

Hizashi ground his teeth together. "If you truly had feelings for her, you would consider the fact that she can make her own decisions."

"Oh, I know she can. I'm not stopping her from falling for you. I'm stopping you from letting her. I can't control her, but I sure as hell can make sure you don't lay another finger—"

"You make her sound like she's your property! You probably don't even remember the type of bird she summoned to defeat you in the chunin exams. You don't care for her at all."

"Her name was Suisen. She's a swift, a White-throated Needletail to be exact. I know more than you think."

He blinked a couple of times, surprised. "You can't have actual feelings for her, can you?"

"I can."

"Wow, I'm surprised that you even had any emotion left inside of you, Hiashi-sama. Looks like you've changed. Next time work on treating women as equals and brothers as humans. Or maybe try to give people a choice and to stop lying about caring for someone you don't know—"

Hizashi suddenly felt a fist hit his face, faster than he could react.

"You don't know what you're talking about, branch filth." his brother spat.

In his years of knowing him, even though Hiashi never defended him or did anything good for him, he had never sunk so low to call him by his status in the clan. Furious, he went to punch, but Hiashi's Byakugan was already activated.

Everything turned downhill from there. Two brothers, similar in skill, equal in rage, threw gentle fists, weapons, and chakra towards each other. It was a battle to kill.

Yet Hizashi was just a little stronger than he was, so Hiashi slowly started to lose. It was until the branch member was about to close a tenketsu point until a searing pain erupted through his head.

It was indescribable.

The pain could not be explained and he wasn't aware of anything anymore. He suddenly could not use any of his senses. He didn't know if he was screaming or not. He couldn't tell if anything was happening because he couldn't hear himself, nor could he feel his vocal cords growing sore as the pain in his forehead masked it. The agony started to subside in what felt like an eternity.

When his sight started growing clearer, he saw elders looking down at him with disgust. His brother's mouth was open in shock and he was staring at his hands. His own father stood over him and looked at his state without any sympathy, then at the bruise on the heir's cheek.

"Do it again," he demanded.

"Father," Hiashi's voice shook. It was the first time Hizashi had ever heard him falter. "I—I ca—is it really necessary?"

"Do it!" he bellowed. "If you are ever to rule the clan you must be able to inflict the curse mark like I taught you to!"

"Please Hiashi," he whimpered, "Please don't,"

"Address him with the proper suffix, branch scum,"

"I—I'm sorry, Hiashi-sama,"

"Son, do it now! Don't show branch members any mercy. You let them beg, but you do not ever grant their requests. They must know their place within the clan."

But Hiashi didn't move. He shook. For a moment, Hizashi was relieved, glad that his brother really did have some compassion, even after inflicting the seal on him himself. Yet his father quickly brought his hands together and the pain was present once again, this time even worse than it was before. Those hands were experienced. They had struck pain into countless branch members, rather than just one.

He wished he could pass out but he didn't. He wondered if this was the end for him. Would they even find his body? His hands gripped at his hair, his scalp so numb that he didn't know how much he could have ripped out. It could have been days when the pain finally started to ease. Yet it was still night, the footprints still fresh on the dirt.

Hizashi couldn't hear it but he felt a warm presence drift near. A huge bird landed by his side and a girl jumped off, gathering his forehead protector and pressing an ice pack to his head. It didn't completely ease the pain but it helped and he blindly reached out to whoever had provided him with the relief. She took his hand and let him squeeze it as hard as he could, even when he may as well have crushed her bones.

The girl carried him onto the back of the bird, he decided it could only be an owl from the silence, and they flew off.

"Asuka?" he breathed. "Is it you? Am—Am I alive?"

It was only then when he heard her sobs as she wiped his tears away with her finger. It stung when she touched his cheeks from the tears he didn't even know he had shed. The rush of wind blowing past them as she held him on top of her owl soothed the pain on his skin but did nothing for the agony in his temples.

"You're alive, Hizashi. I'm so sorry. I'm so so so sorry." she cried. "You're going to be ok, we'll be at Kenji's house in seconds."

"It hurts," he whimpered. "It hurts."

"I know, I know. I'm sorry,"

She apologized over and over again, though he didn't know or ask why. The owl fluttered by a window and rapped its claws along the glass until their teammate saw. Kenji was didn't have his prosthetics on so he stumbled out of bed and used his hands to propel himself towards the window at an alarming speed, cranking it open so she tumbled in, dragging Hizashi with him. She still pressed the ice pack to his head and tears were still streaming down his face.

"What the hell happened?" Kenji asked as he strapped on a pair of legs and removed the ice pack from Hizashi's forehead and replacing it with the back of his palm. His eyes widened when he realized that it heated up seconds after removing it. "How did he get this fever?"

Asuka cried even harder. "It's not a fever. It's the curse mark."

And the seal was still glowing.

His groans filled Kenji's apartment and his parents rushed in the room, shocked to see their child's teammate clutching at his head, another teammate crying over him, and the pain he seemed to be in. The medical ninja quickly explained the situation and took out his summoning scroll. He bit his finger and with a poof, a small needle and a vial labelled "morphine" appeared. After measuring a small amount of the drug, he took out a tourniquet to find a vein in Hizashi's arm. However, his skin was so pale and the veins already protruded from the tension and all he had to do was look to inject the morphine into his system.

Hizashi's screams and moans were finally reduced to small whimpers.

"I've been working in the hospital for almost 5 years," Kenji broke the chain of unspoken words. "I admit, I may not ever be as talented as Tsunade, but that also means I have dealt with more traumas, cases that don't require 12-hour surgeries, far more patients than she had at my age because I treat everyone, not just the serious ones. In these five years, I have heard screams louder than his and eyes swollen shut from crying but I don't think I have ever and will never see someone in so much pain, physical and mental. I would even go so far and say that the curse mark functions by combining the user and the receiver's emotions, throwing it into the mind, and turning it into pain. Usually, someone would have passed out from how much of it he was experiencing, and I think he endured it without falling unconscious because that was just a part of the torture."

The medical-ninja switched the melted ice pack for a fresh one. "Hizashi, please tell us what happened."

The deathly pale sixteen-year-old looked at Asuka for permission and she nodded. "It's your story to tell, not mine."

"Wait, what do you have to do with this—" Kenji interrupted, then saw the way they were gazing at each other. "Oh...oh...oh shit."

"Hiashi has liked Asuka since the Academy, as I'm sure you know. After he realized that she would never see him the same, he, uh, he ordered me not to make any advances on her."

"But you did," their teammate sighed.

"No, I did," she said. "I—I did. It's my fault. If—If I hadn't then none of this would have happened. You wouldn't be—"

"It's not your fault," Hizashi said soothingly, slowly sitting up. "You can't blame yourself."

"But."

"He's right," Kenji replied. "Is it ok for you to tell us what happened next?"

He took a deep breath. "I don't know why, but Hiashi was watching us. We argued and I told him that he was emotionless and called him out on the way he was treating us. He punched me and we started attacking each other. I was about to knock him out before he—he activated the cursed seal."

Even his forehead hurt by thinking of it, and Hizashi winced in pain. They set him down and lay his head back on the pillow. He continued to tell them what happened, how Hiashi refused to activate the seal again so his father did, and how he begged for them to stop.

"What about you two? What's gonna happen now?" Kenji asked. "Will you still be together?"

"No," said Asuka.

"Yes," Hizashi replied at the same time.

The two looked at each other uncomfortably, then at the medical ninja.

"Don't look at me! I'm worried for you too and you probably need to figure out what you'll be from now on. Dating? Secret lovers? Friends with benefits?"

The kunoichi nearly passed out of a nosebleed at his last comment. "N—No. I won't let us go on. You can't suffer more because of me."

"Are you breaking up with me?" he asked, failing miserably to bring light into the situation. "Wow, I'm glad you thought of me as your boyfriend in the first place."

"I—"

"What if you do keep whatever you have going on?" Kenji asked. "I'm rooting for your safety, but if you guys can be safe and dating or whatever, I want that for you two. If you keep—er…this, will Hiashi continue to activate the curse?"

"I don't think he will choose to. I can only hope that he has enough humanity left to let us be."

"Do you really think so?"

"He's my brother. Hopefully, he will put aside his anger and remember that."

Originally wasn’t going to post the other parts on Tumblr but I caved.

#hizashi hyuga #hiashi hyuga #hyuga clan #hizashi #oc #naruto #narutoverse #if charli d'amelio had a minimal look instead of the instagram influencer look she'd be asuka's faceclaim but i just realized it #raspberryfanfics

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cyberkevvideo · 4 years

Text

Throne of Night Theory Builds Part 20: The Ghostly Dwarven Guard

I was releasing these on a daily basis, but then realized that I only have a few of these left to do, and that’s stretching things. I’ve already got the skeleton for the next two done up, with the second one being something really far out.

So because of that, I’m slowing things down some. This is doubly important because I’ve got a doctor’s appointment coming up that will make or break my life this year. Most won’t know, but I haven’t been working for almost year because my body’s so messed up. It has been for even longer than that, but it got so bad three years ago that I was unable to do regular work. Last year, my body got so bad I could barely stand. Well, we think we might know what’s finally happening and I’m getting tested for it this week. I’m excited for what might potentially be the best news I’ve heard in almost seven years. On top of that, mom got her radiation appointment, so she can finally continue her battle with cancer. Just one good thing after the other. Considering how crazy 2020 has been, we could definitely use some.

I am hoping that everyone is staying healthy and safe.

Time to get into things.

For space reasons, I’ll be cropping the encounter build.

All images shared here were done by the forever fantastic and amazingly talented Michael D. Clarke, aka SpiralMagus

EDIT: Made the weapon and armor out of gunzarak.

While I’m not 100% sure if the exact picture would have been in Book 3, the story definitely is. Like the giant dwarves I did previously, the story about this NPC is brought up in the synopsis of Book 3. On May 5th, 2013, the update talked about two factions. The first faction were mutated and augmented dwarves, warped and twisted. The second faction were potential allies, and were the spirits of the High Kings of the dwarves (called the “dwarven ancenstor-ghosts” for the drow side of the AP).

Because Book 3 was supposed to be levels 10-13, and there’s the potential of more than one ghost, having them be CR 10 seemed reasonable. There’s also the possibilities of them being ectoplasm creatures from Occult Adventures, but the picture definitely screamed “ghost” to me. I didn’t figure on a dwarf becoming a wight, shadow, or other kind of standard undead. I mean, they’re supposed to be “spirits”, afterall. Also, unless you have ghost touch weapons, incorporeal undead are going to be difficult to deal with. And as allies? Yeah. Most encounters would get stomped by these guys, even with magic weapons, assuming the enemies have any.

For this guy, he’s obviously using armor and an axe. Ghosts can use them unless they’re ghost touch as well. Short of making the items actually ghost touch, because what are the chances, I took from a 3PP source and gave this guy the ability to have items he once wore be ghost touch. I made sure to leave the link at the bottom. Thankfully d20pfsrd was kind of enough to make it known to us all. It should be noted that ghosts don’t have a Strength score. Even if they use ghost touch weapons. Period. Instead, as per the incorporeal universal monster rules, they use their Dexterity to swing them around. However, unless the ghost originally was an unchained rogue of 3rd level or higher, the Slashing Grace feat with a longsword, or are using an agile weapon, they cannot add their Dex to damage. That said, there is nothing saying that feats and class abilities that boost damage, as well as the weapon’s enhancement bonus, don’t work. So if you’re curious about the damage, that’s how I’m getting away with it. As for the close weapons, when he was alive, this dwarf used his gauntlets to punch whenever he was in a grapple. Ghosts don’t have to worry about that kind of stuff.

Other than his gear, the first thing I noticed was the helmet and the runes. Likely dwarven over archaic. It makes me curious as to what it says though. That and the “Z” on the gauntlets. Might just be the stamp of creator.

When the PCs finally manage to complete Book 3 and start the coronation for the next dwarven king, the thought process was that this particular ghost might give up his weapon and armor. For PCs, having deathless armor would be fantastic.

THE LAST FAITHFUL GUARD (CR 10; 9,600 XP) Male variant ghost dwarf fighter 9 LN Medium undead (incorporeal) Init +2; Senses darkvision 60 ft.; Perception +9 DEFENSE AC 24, touch 17, flat-footed 21 (+7 armor, +4 deflection, +2 Dex, +1 dodge) hp 108 (9d10+54) Fort +10, Ref +7, Will +6; +2 vs. fear, poison, spells, and spell-like abilities Defensive Abilities bravery +2, channel resistance +4, defensive training (+4 dodge bonus to AC vs. giants), incorporeal traits, rejuvenation; DR 3/—; Immune undead traits OFFENSE Speed fly 30 ft. (perfect) Melee +1 ghost touch guardian gunzarak dwarven waraxe +15/+10 (1d10+5/×3) or corrupting touch +11 (10d6; F-DC 18 half) Special Attacks hatred (+1 on attack rolls against goblinoid and orc humanoids), telekinesis (CL 12th, every 1d4 rounds), weapon training (axes +2, close +1) STATISTICS Str —, Dex 14, Con —, Int 12, Wis 16, Cha 18 Base Atk +9; CMB +9; CMD 26 (30 vs. bull rush and vs. trip) Feats Blind-Fight, Combat ReflexesB, Dazzling Display, DodgeB, DisruptiveB, Lighting Reflexes, Step Up, Toughness, Weapon Focus (dwarven waraxe)B, Weapon Specialization (dwarven waraxe)B Skills Climb +12, Fly +10, Intimidate +17, Knowledge (dungeoneering) +8, Knowledge (engineering) +7, Knowledge (religion) +5, Perception +9 (+11 to notice unusual stonework), Sense Motive +9, Stealth +10, Survival +10; Racial Modifiers +8 Fly, +8 Perception, +8 Stealth Languages Common, Dwarven, Undercommon SQ armor training 2, eternal warrior, stonecunning Gear +1 ghost touch deathless gunzarak breastplate, +1 ghost touch guardian gunzarak dwarven waraxe SPECIAL ABILITIES Corrupting Touch (Su) By passing part of its incorporeal body through a foe’s body as a standard action, the ghost inflicts 9d6 damage. This damage is not negative energy—it manifests in the form of physical wounds and aches from supernatural aging. Creatures immune to magical aging are immune to this damage, but otherwise the damage bypasses all forms of damage reduction. A Fortitude save halves the damage inflicted. Eternal Warrior (Su) The ghost died in righteous battle. The ghost may choose to treat any weapon, armor, or shield with which it is proficient as though it had the ghost touch weapon quality. Rejuvenation (Su) In most cases, it’s difficult to destroy a ghost through simple combat: the “destroyed” spirit restores itself in 2d4 days. Even the most powerful spells are usually only temporary solutions. The only way to permanently destroy a ghost is to determine the reason for its existence and set right whatever prevents it from resting in peace. The exact means varies with each spirit and may require a good deal of research. Special Wealth CR The ghostly dwarf has a gunzarak weapon and set of armor, which puts him above the standard wealth for NPCs of his level. However, this does not grant him much in the way of a mechanical benefit, therefore it does not increase his CR.

Gunzarak (true mithral) special material.

-------------------------------

Sources: Variant special attacks come from Spenser Isdahl http://rocksfalleveryonedies.blogspot.com/2010/10/ghostly-manifestations.html

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beyondfm · 4 years

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TAKE IF YOU CAN.

WHO SAYS TIMES ARE HARD ? pleased to make your acquaintance, CLAUDE SUNVIUS – say, i haven’t seen much of you around town. you look pretty good for a 25 year old ! i hear you’ve got quite the reputation for being NEUTRAL EVIL. you’re a HUMAN SORCERER, right ? how cool ! you’ll fit right in here in anthezia. ( LUKE PASQUALINO. CISMALE, HE/HIM. PANSEXUAL. )

GIVE IF YOU MUST.

STAT BLOCKS

ABILITY SCORES

STRENGTH: 11, +1

DEXTERITY: 13, +1

CONSTITUTION: 15, +1

INTELLIGENCE: 14, +1

WISDOM: 14, +1

CHARISMA: 17, +1

CHARACTER BACKGROUND

Proficiencies: arcana & deception. no armor. daggers, darts, slings, quarterstaffs, light crossbows. constitution & charisma are his saving throws.

Languages: ellinumenos & araimenos.

Equipment: quarterstaff with arcane focus, explorer’s pack & 2 daggers.

Cantrips: light, prestidigitation, firebolt & message.

Spells: thunderwave, detect magic, shield & alter self.

Sorcerous origins: wild magic.

Positive personality traits:

i can effortlessly adapt to situations (adaptable).

it’s easy to get what i want with a few words and a smile (charismatic).

i devote myself to my life goals and studies (tenacious).

Negative personality traits:

no one knows the real me (deceitful).

most of my actions have ulterior motives (scheming).

the end justifies the means (immoral).

Ideals: there’s a moral line that men don’t cross if they’re good men, and i like to wave at it as i keep going. (evil)

Bonds: i encountered wild magic by the touch of a demon. / i brought death upon my mentor for holding me back, and i would do it again. / the boy i grew up with is the most suited to kill me, as i am to kill him.

Flaws: in the pursuit of power and knowledge, i abandoned honor and compassion.

Hometown: aoratios.

the bravery of green hearts and curiosity led them through to the path that the workers told them not to cross, where so much darkness dimmed the flames of the torch they carried and they weren’t sure if it was their shadows dancing on the walls of the mines or someone else’s. they wouldn’t know it then, as mere children playing at adventurers, but on the day that their mentor would be killed, he’d tell them that there was only one thing they should hope always follows them: their shadows. shall it always touch them but be apart from them, to be there to fall back on when they needed to survive but never to be consumed by it wholly. on that day, they would look at each other and think too late.

the first time they were consumed, claude was seven years old. he walked beside the boy he called a brother with a torch between them and flames that ceased in the stillness of the mine, with no wind or water to put them out. it was at that moment that the two boys believed in the rumors of hades working in those mines. they were looking for any signs left of the ancient god, and they found it in the form of claw marks. claude got them on his back, right where his collarbone ended and shoulder blade began. he clutched at the wound and thrashed on the floor, feeling his blood spill out so more darkness could fit inside.

it was hard to tell if a god had anything to do with it or if they had just been convinced of their childish fantasy out of fear. after they survived and grew to be young men, they did learn that it hadn’t been darkness that seeped into them, but magic. so far, they had lived with a guild of mercenaries, adopted as orphans by the man who they called their master. claude had dreams of becoming a fighter then, of striking monsters down with a sharp blade and bringing peace to the lands.

some say that sorcerers are blessed with magic, mighty and powerful, but others have seen the hopeless decline of a person after encountering this magic before to call it a blessing. the touch of a god doesn’t leave claw marks, after all. only creatures of evil dwell in such darkness, and claude has been too close to madness to think that he can tell the difference between a blessing and a curse.

somewhere along using his magic to kill monsters and keeping it under tight reins the rest of the time, after one too many accidents involving shockwaves and injured companions, the darkness started to seep out. their master was not a magic-user, but he didn’t allow them to find someone they could hone their skill under. he kept the two around as clutches, for they rarely failed to take down a monster with their newly found power. whatever had gone into claude deep in that mine was swirling angrily inside of him, slowly driving him closer and closer to being the man he would never be able to come back from until that’s who he became.

when he killed his master, he heard something about shadows, but the only shadow he saw was of a young man killing an old one.

PLAYER INFORMATION

kit / 21 / mdt / she/her

#semi appless rp #new rp #town rp #mumu rp #oc rp #beyondfm.accepted

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o-hybridity · 5 years

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how would you make a tabletop system like D&D that's crunchy for players, but not a huge pain in the ass for the DM to make monsters?

This is the Eternal Question, and it cuts pretty close to the core of my basic principles of design philosophy! I don’t know if I have a definitive answer but I can springboard into a meandering explanation of the things I’ve done to wrangle with this exact problem. Here goes:

for a while I thought there was a game that answered that question perfectly, and it was called Dungeon Crawl Classics. I don’t hold that belief now (Zocchi dice…), but we can loot an important principle from its couple of good design decisions:

1. Every player gets one really good toy. DCC’s chief virtue is that it found a way to make Fighters a fun choice, not just the choice that’s less mentally taxing than being a spellcaster, and the way they make that work is by giving the role an inherently textured core mechanic called Mighty Deeds of Arms. Instead of giving them a flat ascending to-hit bonus that’s just numerically better than the other classes get, Fighters in DCC roll a separate Deed die that scales with level alongside the attack roll and add the Deed die to the to-hit roll and damage, and if the Deed die comes up 3 or higher they also pull off a maneuver that improves their immediate tactical situation.

Swashbuckling chandelier swings, disarms, feints, coating your foe in lamp oil, and basically anything Jackie Chan has ever done besides just hit guys count as Deeds, and the only things you need to make them happen are your own imagination, GM fiat, and the will of the dice—just so long as the effect isn’t “do more damage.”

Altogether, the method requires even less bookkeeping than your standard D&D fighter, while being way more versatile and giving the player something to actively play with and find new implementations for every time their class role is relevant.

Spellcasters in DCC similarly put some wrinkles in the Vancian procedures by getting rid of conventional spell levels, turning each spell into a range of effects keyed to the results of a casting check, and letting casters burn their physical stats temporarily to pump up a single casting attempt—and that’s before we get into mutations and faustian pacts. The role falls into some of the same pitfalls it always has: spellcaster players have to juggle a lot more functions than fighters or thieves and at the top of their game they’re still going to make wilder shit happen than the other classes, though it balances out a bit by making casting itself a higher-risk affair.

The trouble with DCC’s classes is it tries to spread about 2.75 really good player toys across five classes, and when it comes to thief stuff it can’t really come up with anything all that good.

So Digression 1: What makes a really good player toy? How do we fill out those empty spaces in the party roster with cool stuff for players to use that isn’t a headache to keep track of?

In my humble onion, a good player toy needs to be flexible, haptically engaging, low-bookkeeping, and freely usable but not strictly predictable. To be flexible, a player needs to be able to apply the toy in a range of play situations—getting too attached to pre-defined mechanical effects is toxic to flexibility. A haptically engaging toy prompts the player to engage with something physically at the table to use it; die rolls are the most obvious but there’s lots of options ranging from the nifty to the balls-out bizarre.

There’s also some mechanics that I think are inherently more satisfying because the things they make you do with numbers has kind of an inherent pleasure that feels kinesthetic—I get warm, kind of stimmy feelings thinking about roll-high-but-not-too-high dice pool systems.

Low-bookkeeping toys are pretty self-explanatory; if it requires resource management or tracking multiple modifiers across different locations on the character sheet, those elements need to be doing extra work to make themselves memorable. The Goblin Laws of Gaming’s spellcasting system introduces a bookkeeping element in that you have to track your caster’s accumulated Dooms, but any caster only ever gets 3, the last one is pretty final, and they all translate into memorable moments of play.

When I say that a good toy is freely usable but unpredictable, I mean that the mechanic should tempt the player to use it often—because it’s powerful, because the results are exciting or cool—and temper that eagerness to toy with it less with anxiety over whether they’re going to blow one of their limited uses on a whiff or a no-sell when they could need it later and more with the question of whether it might blow up in their faces this time. Spellcasters in DCC or GLOG are way more equipped to cast all day long compared to their D&D brethren, and that leaves caster players in a position to have more fun with their role, but there’s always the lingering possibility a spell might pop off wrong and now you’ve got a lobster hand. Even when a PC gimmick doesn’t work in the player’s favor, it should make the next moment more exciting. Non-events are poison to gameplay.

Something to keep in mind in reference to player toys: nothing obligates you to make these toys all fit into a single coherent reference frame or “preserve game balance.” What you’re looking to do here is create what game devs over on the digital side of things call Incomparables—play elements that you can’t meaningfully “balance” because you can’t meaningfully convert one into the terms of another.

All of this is building up to point 2. Monsters are self-contained toys for the GM to play with. Like how you’re not obligated to have player toys all fit together neatly into a balanced and 100% shared language of play, monsters can and should operate on their own distinct mechanical plane, and not every monster will be able to fit within the same framework of rules matter.

By that token, I strongly encourage anyone looking to break out of the framework of play you’ll find in a WotC book to ditch as much of the content in your statblock that carries over into the character sheet as you can. Give ‘em hit dice and hp totals, sure, give ‘em an AC rating and I won’t complain, to-hit bonuses even if you’re feeling nasty, but skip the ability scores and saving throws and proficiencies, and remember that there’s a special circle in hell for designers who give monsters big piles of feats that you have to dig back and forth through the damn book to find and make spot play decisions around (admittedly that’s not the problem it used to be back when 3e was what everyone was doing, but damned if I’m going to let anyone forget that it was a thing).

That sounds like heresy, but here’s the wild thing: there’s a whole armature of play to D&D that nobody uses and it would make the whole affair so, so much simpler if we did, because D&D is built to be a player-facing system, despite appearances. The original mechanic’s been buried under ability score modifiers, saving throws, attack rolls, and skill DCs, but it’s still there, baked into the dice and the stat spread. Roll a d20 and compare the result against the relevant ability score; if it’s equal to or lower than the stat in question, you done did the thing. High rolls within the margin of success are better than low ones; use this to determine who comes out on top in a contested action when there’s a tie.

Bam, you’re done. That’s your core task resolution mechanic. The great thing about this is that it takes a huge amount of pressure off the GM to pin down extraneous numbers. Your monster doesn’t need an AC score, just a penalty it applies to a player’s attack check. Same with to-hit bonuses, just applied to the roll the player’s making to avoid or resist the attacks it has. Same with exceptional (or exceptionally shitty) base abilities like strength, speed, and intelligence. You don’t need to so much as think the phrase “Passive Perception.” All of that lets you pare down a monster’s statblock to a pretty spare couple of lines that you can fit on a notecard, leaving you room and time to come up with mechanical texture that’s actually fun.

Additionally, using stats this way leaves plenty of room to come up with fun implementations on the players’ end. Stat damage rules begin to make a lot more sense when you strip away all the derived values and re-center your players’ attention on those 5% probability increments. Rolling high but shooting for less than a target number is one of those mechanics that’s really satisfying to then carry over into some kind of direct numeric result. Just narrowing things down to a smattering of possibilities for martial characters, n this framework you can set up mechanics for defensive fighters to convert a failing attack roll into a substitute AC score for the next round, while a more buckwild berserker type who plays more for risk/reward sets their hp total to whatever the die result is—that 1 hits, but now your timetable for the fight’s shifted drastically, but if you hit high, you can pull in a killer second wind. In short, you have an infinite canvas for crunch if that’s what your players are into.

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grailfinders · 3 years

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Fate and Phantasms #181

Today on Fate and Phantasms we’re finishing up the last of the racing teams from the Dead Heat Summer Race with Minamoto no Raikou (Lancer)! She’s the new addition to Team Prefect of Public Decency and Monk Sanzang, a name that just rolls off the tongue.

This shadow prefect is a Devotion Paladin to supercharge her lance/yo-yo with lightning and shut down any indecency this summer, as well as a Monster Slayer Ranger to sense evil before it happens.

Check out her build breakdown below the cut, or her character sheet over here!

Next up: The commissioner!?!

Race and Background

Like most summer servants, your background isn’t that different. Raikou’s still a Fallen Aasimar, giving her +1 Wisdom and +2 Charisma, Darkvision to dunk on those dumb human eyes, Celestial Resistance against Radiant and Necrotic damage, and Healing Hands so she can make people feel better by pressing her body up against them. Get your mind out of the gutter, there’s nothing improper happening here. She also gets the Light cantrip. You might not be able to actually stick lightning in your weapon yet, but at least it looks like you did!

You’re also still a soldier, giving you proficiency with Athletics and Intimidation.

Ability Scores

Make sure your Charisma is as high as possible. I don’t know why, but you’re just really persuasive in this spirit origin. After that is Strength, you still have to be able to chuck a lance at someone’s head if they’re misbehaving. Your Dexterity also has to be pretty good, both for multiclassing and so you can wear that swimsuit later without getting destroyed. Your Wisdom isn’t terrible; you’re not that observant about most things, but you can tell pretty easily when someone’s up to no good. That leaves you with a pretty low Constitution, but it would hurt too much to dump that, so we’re dumping Intelligence instead. A. it’s summer, and B. you have no issue criticizing other’s swimsuits while wearing one of your own.

Class Levels

1. Paladin 1: Starting the build off as a paladin is pretty cool, it gives you proficiency with Wisdom and Charisma Saves, as well as two paladin skills. Grab Insight for a non-magical way to tell when someone’s up to mischief, and Persuasion for... reasons.

You also get a Divine Sense, letting you sense extraplanar creatures near you as an action. Now, I’m not saying an undead creature is inherently evil (esp. with those new playable races), but it’s probably a pretty good indicator when demons show up. You also get Lay on Hands for more physical contact based healing! Admittedly Raikou doesn’t have a healing skill, but somehow I doubt the rest of the party will mind, aside from perhaps Kintoki.

2. Paladin 2: Second level paladins get a Fighting Style to customize how they slap things, and the Dueling style adds 2 to your attack damage if you’re using a one handed weapon and nothing else. You can also cast and prepare Spells using your Charisma modifier, or use those spell slots to make Divine Smites for extra radiant damage. It’s not lightning, but we’re getting there. As far as what you should prepare goes, I’d suggest anything with “Detect” in its name, as well as a Thunderous Smite. Still not lightning damage, but thematically we’re getting closer.

3. Paladin 3: Third level paladins get Divine Health, making you immune to disease. You’re also so devoted to your cause that you’re a Devotion paladin, which gives you Protection from Evil and Good and Sanctuary as free spells.

You can also Channel Divinity once per short rest in one of two flavors. Sacred Weapon adds your charisma modifier to a weapon’s attack rolls, and it becomes magical for the duration. Meanwhile, Turn the Unholy forces fiends and undead to make a wisdom save, and on a failure they have to move as far away from you as possible for up to a minute, or until it takes damage.

Also, since this is your third total level, you get a Necrotic Shroud that settles on you as an action once per long rest. When you transform this way, you get all spooky and force a charisma save on nearby creatures, frightening them for a turn if they fail. Afterwards, for up to a minute you can add necrotic damage equal to your level to one attack or spell per turn.

4. Paladin 4: Use your first Ability Score Improvement to get more Strength. This improves your stabbing, and... that’s it. Still, stabbing’s pretty useful.

5. Paladin 5: Fifth level paladins get an Extra Attack each attack action. Now your stabbing is even more useful, you’re welcome.

You also get second level spells, like your freebies Lesser Restoration and Zone of Truth. More importantly, you can use Find Steed to find yourself a steed for the race. Your warhorse comes out of the box as a celestial instead of a beast, and it also has an Intelligence of 6 so it can understand one language you speak. Any spell you cast on yourself also targets your steed if you’re riding it, and you can talk to it with your mind if you’re within a mile of it.

6. Ranger 1: Now that we’ve got your ride set up, it’s time to get shocking. To help with this, we’re going ranger. Multiclassing into ranger gets you one ranger skill, so grab Animal Handling so your horse doesn’t throw you off first thing.

As a bonus action, you can turn one enemy into your Favored Foe, dealing a bit of extra damage once per turn until you take a short rest or tag someone else.

You’re also a Deft Explorer, which right now means you’re Canny with Persuasion, doubling your proficiency bonus.

7. Ranger 2: Second level rangers get a second fighting style, and Thrown Weapon Fighting lets you add 2 to the damage of a weapon after you chuck it at someone’s head. You can also draw the weapon you’re throwing as part of the attack, streamlining the whole process.

You also get another set of Spells that you can cast with your Wisdom, like Animal Friendship, which ironically won’t help with your own horse. You also get Detect Poison and Disease to free up your paladin prep space.

Since you’re multiclassing now, check the player’s hand book for how many spell slots you have at a given time. Also, you’ll get third level slots eventually, but you won’t be able to prepare third level paladin spells. Stick with what you know.

8. Ranger 3: Third level rangers get Primeval Awareness, which lets you spend spell slots to sense weird creatures within a mile of you, though you don’t find their location. Think of it like a terrible, terrible smite. Like the anti-smite. Because that’s what it’s doing; it’s taking smites out of your child’s mouth. Let Kintoki have his smites.

Oh right, you also get your subclass. Monster Slayers get Protection from Evil and Good as a freebie like devotion paladins, but neither one uses your casting modifier so it doesn’t matter. You also get a Hunter’s Sense that lets you sense a creature’s weaknesses as an action. You learn your target’s immunities, resistances, and vulnerabilities unless they’re immune to divination. You can use this Wisdom Modifier times per long rest.

You can also turn one creature into your Slayer’s Prey as a bonus action, dealing an extra 1d6 damage once per turn when you hit it with a weapon attack. You can have one prey at a time, and it lasts until you finish a short rest.

You can also Detect Magic now. Any sort of magic on the race track is probably improper, right?

9. Paladin 6: Sixth level paladins get an Aura of Protection, adding your charisma modifier to all saving throws done by your allies near you. If you weren’t around, your allies might have fallen prey to all sorts of spells! How improper!

10. Ranger 4: Bouncing back to ranger gets you another ASI, use this to grab the Armor of Shadows invocation from the Eldritch Adept feat. Now you can change out of those stuffy prefect clothes and into something more appropriate. For Summer, at least.

11. Ranger 5: Fifth level rangers get second level spells and nothing else, since extra attacks don’t stack. You can now Find Traps that have been set up around you, and you get another way to cast Zone of Truth, but your charisma’s better, so stick to using paladin to cast that one.

12. Ranger 6: Your Favored Foe takes more damage, and you’re now Roving, giving you some extra speed plus a climbing and swimming speed. Perfect for a day on the beach!

13. Ranger 7: Seventh level monster slayers can put up a Supernatural Defense, adding 1d6 to saves and grapple escape checks against your slayer’s prey. You’ve seen these kinds of hooligans before, and they’re all the same. You know what they’ll do before even they do.

You can also provide Aid to your allies, giving them extra maximum HP. Put those overcharge spell slots to use! (Or just smite stuff. Either or.)

14. Paladin 7: Seventh level devotion paladins get an Aura of Devotion, preventing you or friendly creatures near you from being charmed. Summer romance... how indecent! Don’t they know what they’re doing?

15. Paladin 8: For your last paladin level, use this ASI to bump up your Charisma and Dexterity for a higher AC, stronger saves, and better spells.

16. Ranger 8: Use this ASI to bump up your Charisma again, for even stronger saves and better spells. You can also use Land’s Stride to avoid damage from nonmagical plants and avoid getting slowed by difficult terrain. You also get advantage against saves from magical plants. Yeah, every summer servant can fight without armor on, but the second they have to walk through a thorn bush they’re hosed. You’re ahead of the game!

17. Ranger 9: Ninth level rangers get third level spells. Elemental Weapon finally lets you stick lightning in your spear for extra fun. You also get Magic Circle for free.

18. Ranger 10: A tenth level ranger is Tireless, letting you heal yourself as an action Proficiency times per long rest, and you can reduce exhaustion on short rests. Now you can spend all night... making sure nobody does anything naughty under the cover of darkness, obviously.

You can also Hide in Plain Sight after crafting camouflage over a minute. Once becamoed, press against a surface as big as you are, and you get a +10 bonus to stealth checks as long as you don’t move.

19. Ranger 11: Your last Monster Slayer goody turns you into a Magic-User’s Nemesis, using your reaction once per short rest to force a wisdom save on a creature teleporting or casting a spell within 60′ of you. If they fail, the spell is wasted.

If you want that spear of yours to be really flashy, you can also use Lightning Arrow to give it a lot more oomph, dealing lightning damage to the target whether it hits or misses, and then dealing more damage to all creatures around that target. Use Elemental Weapon for longevity, or Lightning Arrow for a big blow all at once.

20. Ranger 12: Use your capstone level’s ASI to bump up your Strength one last time for even more accurate and deadly attacks.

Pros:

With your auras and ranger defenses active you can be really annoying to spellcasters. Charms don’t work, you might just counterspell them, your saves can be somewhere between +6 and +11. It’s just a mess for wizards to put up with.

Mixing paladin and ranger also lets you combine their tracking abilities to become the ultimate evil detector, seeking out and shutting down baddies from the shadows.

You specialize in boss fights, focusing on a single target and gradually stacking buffs against them, like favored foe and slayer’s prey, letting you deal pretty consistent damage against a single target over time.

Cons:

You multiclassed into two classes that both require two ability scores to be good. And neither one shares an ability score with the other. You’re MAD as hell, is what I’m trying to say here. Also, your paladin abilities won out handily against your ranger abilities, so your wisdom ended up way lower than you’d probably like.

Similarly, neither class required Constitution, so yours is pretty low for a mid-line fighter. You have barely over 100 HP, and your AC is only 15. Be really careful your horse doesn’t get shot out from under you, you’ll need that extra mobility.

Stacking buffs takes a lot of time, either dedicating an entire turn just to making your next turn good or having a few not so great turns right at the start. Depending on the kinds of situations you end up in, a character ready to go turn one might be a better option.

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recentanimenews · 5 years

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How to Make Your Own Goblin Slayer: Sword Maiden Edition

Previously, we used the Dungeons & Dragons character sheet as a guide to recreate Goblin Slayer from Goblin Slayer as a D&D character. it turned out that the show's world was so close to the game that transferring from the former to the latter was a surprisingly simple process with a few choices based on information exposited throughout the story and a couple of guesses when things didn't line up as cleanly.

However, all of the characters in Goblin Slayer live in the same world, so at the very least all of the adventureres and magic users should be almost as 1:1 to transfer from the show to the game. With that in mind, let's try the same process again, but with someone we know a little less about, or at least isn't quite as straightforward as Goblin Slayer.

Let's try to turn the Sword Maiden into a D&D character.

In many ways, she is actually much simpler to turn in to a Dungeons and Dragons character than Goblin Slayer. She doesn’t seem to have any armor, weapons or other equipment, at least that we’ve seen, and based on the abilities she’s shown, we can safely assume that she did not multiclass.

Unfortunately, she is significantly more difficult in one specific way, but we’ll get to that at the end.

Like with any D&D character, the first choices also have some of the biggest impact. What is Sword Maiden’s race, background and class? Race is still by far the easiest, since she is clearly a human.

Background is even trickier than with Goblin Slayer, because almost everything known about her past is in a single conversation in episode 7, and it tells us nothing to narrow down the options in the Player’s Handbook. Given that at the end of episode 1, Priestess mentions women attacked by goblins tend to go to monasteries to recover and lead different lives, we will assume an Acolyte background.

For her class, the two main options for clearly religious characters are Cleric and Paladin. Given the name “Sword Priestess,” Paladin doesn’t seem like too poor of a choice, but a level 20 Paladin still only knows up to 5th-level magic. The one spell we know Sword Maiden has is Resurrection, which is a 7th-level spell. As a result, she is almost certainly a Cleric.

This adds an extra step to the early process, since Clerics are the only class whose subclass opens up at level 1. For Clerics, subclasses are called Divine Domains. There are a lot of Domains, 8 in total. Given the healing focus that we have seen in the main religion of the show, in all likelihood Sword Maiden is a Life Domain Cleric.

This immediately gives her Bless and Cure Wounds as spells that she has prepared at all times, proficiency with heavy armor, and the Disciple of Life trait, which makes her healing better (specifically, every time she heals, it adds another 2+the spell’s level HP).

As with D&D Goblin Slayer, D&D Sword Maiden’s stat block is going to use the standard block to start. This means that instead of rolling dice or buying stats with points, we automatically have 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8 and need to assign them to stats. In the case of a Cleric, the highest stat should go to Wisdom, since it is what their magic will scale from for both damage and healing.

After that, which number goes to which stat is more dependent on how the player wants to roleplay the character. If Sword Maiden is extremely knowledgeable about religion and history, then it makes sense to have a higher number in Intelligence. If she is wielding a mace or a greatsword instead of a staff when in the field, she should probably have pretty high Strength. If she is built like the Player’s Handbook recommends for a quick start, then the second highest stat should be Constitution.

For this guide, I am choosing to make Sword Maiden be a pure magic caster built for healing and protecting the party, so her stats (from highest to lowest) are:

Wisdom: For damage and healing, as mentioned.

Constitution: To give a high HP total so that she can survive more hits.

Dexterity: So that she can dodge more incoming attacks.

Intelligence: Since Clerics so not cast with Intelligence, this adds nothing in combat. However, it increases her Religion, History and a few other skills that make for a more in-character roleplay.

Charisma: This stat can go pretty much anywhere, but the others all had reasons to be placed where they are, leaving this one to take the remaining spot.

Strength: As a pure caster with good Dexterity, she should never be using a Strength-based weapon, and so this should be her lowest stat.

Remember, she also gets +1 to every stat because she’s a Human!

With her initial stats, class, background and race all decided, we need to determine Sword Maiden’s level. Given that she is one of the heroes that defeated the Demon Lord, which is directly stated as an example of what it would take to get the highest ranking in the guild, it’s probably safe to import her as a level 20 character.

As a level 20 character, she gets 5 Ability Score Improvements (10 additional points total) and her proficiency bonus is +6. Since D&D Sword Maiden is being built as a caster, it makes sense for 4 of the additional points to get to 20 Wisdom 3 for Constitution to get to 18 2 for Dexterity to get to 16 And the final point on Strength, to get the -1 modifier to a neutral 0.

Now that her level 20 stats are decided, all of the various skill bonus are almost ready to be filled in. The final step is to figure out what she is proficient in.

As mentioned when we decided that she was a Life Domain Cleric, she has proficiency with heavy armor. As a Cleric, she is also proficient in light and medium armor, shields, simple weapons, and Wisdom and Charisma saving throws. Her Acolyte background gives her proficiency in Insight and Religion, while being a Cleric adds 2 of the following: History, Medicine, Persuasion.

Since she seems to be a healer, Medicine makes sense, and History might be a better choice than Persuasion since she is an actual part of the local history by virtue of being a hero.

And with that, we can fill in all of Sword Maiden’s skills and saving throws, and can update her other proficiencies.

As for her equipment, all we really ever see her owning or using is a staff and her robes, so we will give her the starting Cleric and Acolyte equipment, but if Goblin Slayer were an actual D&D game, she would likely have a significantly different inventory.

The Acolyte background gives: a holy symbol (a gift from when you entered the priesthood), a prayer book or prayer wheel, 5 sticks of incense, vestments, a set of common clothes and a pouch containing 15 gp.

Starting as a Cleric gives a mace, chain mail, a simple weapon (let’s go with a quarterstaff, since it most closely resembles the staff she has in the show), a priest’s pack, a shield and a holy symbol.

Why she has two holy symbols is up to the player--the starting equipment doesn’t give a choice for either of them, so you’re stuck with both until you sell one or something.

The Acolyte background also gives +2 languages of your choice, and being a human grants another. Like with Goblin Slayer, Sword Maiden has not shown any aptitude for speaking languages outside of Common, the language that everyone speaks, so which three other languages is also up to the player.

Since Sword Maiden is a level 20 character, there are 20 levels of abilities to get through, and the first one is a doozy: Channel Divinity.

To keep the explanation short, Channel Divinity is the Cleric directly channeling power from their god to do extra magic that doesn’t use a spell slot, but which has a limited number of uses. Some Channel Divinity effects are Domain-specific, while others can be used by every Cleric.

By level 20, Sword Maiden can use Channel Divinity 3 times per long rest (effectively per day).

The universal uses of Channel Divinity are:

Turn Undead, which essentially makes any undead within 30 feet of Sword Maiden make a Wisdom saving throw, and if they fail run away as fast as possible for a minute.

Destroy Undead, which instantly destroys any undead that fails its saving throw, up to a certain Challenge Rating (think of it as a power level) based on the caster’s level (for a level 20 character, CR 4 or lower is destroyed).

As a Life Domain Cleric, she also gets Preserve Life for her Channel Divinity, which allows her to heal any number of creatures within 30 feet of her up to a total of 5 times her Cleric level (at level 20, 100 HP split among however many creatures).

For the rest of the abilities granted by being a level 20 Cleric, Sword Maiden gets:

Blessed Healer: When you cast healing spells, you also gets healed for 2+the spell’s level.

Divine Strike: Once per your turn, when you hit a creature with an attack, you can add 2d8 radiant damage (1d8 when you first get this ability)

Divine Intervention, which lets the player do almost literally anything they want. As long as the request is within the character’s domain and the DM allows it, the player rolls a d100, and if they roll their Cleric level or lower, the request is granted. If they succeed, they can’t use Divine Intervention for an ingame week. If they fail, they can’t use it until the next day. At level 20, the roll automatically succeeds.

Supreme Healing: When healing creatures, instead of rolling dice, just use the maximum amount. So instead of healing for 3d8, heal 24 HP.

For her final trait, her Acolyte background gives her Shelter of the Faithful, which gives herand her party free healing and care and temples to the Supreme God, and the people at the temple will support her specifically at a modest lifestyle.

The last big hurdle of the first page is Sword Maiden’s personality. We don’t get much about what she personally believes, but we know enough to get a strong sense of justice and duty from her, likely indicating a Lawful Good alignment.

Since her personality isn’t as single-minded as Goblin Slayer’s, we will use the suggested personality trait tables in the Player’s Handbook.

For her personality, nothing fits very well with the show’s portrayal of Sword Maiden. The closest one is “I’ve enjoyed fine food, drink, and high society among my temple’s elite. Rough living grates on me.”

Based on her work as an Adventurer and her request for Goblin Slayer’s party, her ideal most closely matches “I always try to help those in need, no matter what the personal cost.”

Without knowing more of her backstory and thought process, her bond is probably either “Everything I do is for the common people” or “I will do anything to protect the temple where I served,” depending on her reasoning for fighting earlier in her life.

Finally, her flaw is the only part that we can make a fair inference on. Based on her conversation with Goblin Slayer post Resurrection, she seems to still be scared of goblins even after all she’s been through, hence why she requested the party in the first place.

With that, there are only a few stragglers in the middle remaining on the first page.

Unarmored Armor Class without a special ability is 10+Dexterity modifier, so D&D Sword Maiden’s AC is 13. Initiative is effectively just Dexterity modifier, so +3. Speed is unchanged from basic human walking speed, so 30.

HP is going to be somewhat dependent on when Constitution gets boosted, but it should end up somewhere around 157 with 0 temporary HP. Hit Dice should be 20d8.

Weapons probably don’t matter, since she probably wouldn’t even have any on her, but since her equipment says that she has a mace and a quarterstaff, we’ll put in their damages and hit bonuses for completion’s sake.

That is the end of page 1. Like with Goblin Slayer, page 2 is significantly quicker and easier. Unlike with Goblin Slayer, it’s not the end.

Starting with the banner at the top of the page: age. She killed the Demon Lord 10 years ago, so we will assume that she was probably in her prime at the time. If that was in her mid-20’s to give her time to build up skill and experience after becoming an adventurer, then she would be in her mid-30’s during the show.

As with Goblin Slayer, her exact height and weight aren’t explicitly known, but also likely aren’t needed for a game, so we will leave them blank. Hair: Blonde. Skin: Pale and scarred. Eyes: Clouded grey, based on the show.

Allies and organizations: because we don’t know all of her past, this is a bit tricky. Obviously she is devoted to the Supreme God and associated religion, and she seems to have bonded with at least Goblin Slayer by the time the party leaves Water Town. Outside of that, things get fuzzy. She probably had friends, and she was almost certainly close to the other heroes that killed the Demon Lord with her, but it’s difficult to know for certain.

Her backstory is also pretty vague. She was attacked and assaulted by goblins when she was young. She eventually became an adventurer, and was one of the heroes that killed the Demon Lord. Now, she is a figure held in high esteem due to her actions. That’s... pretty much all we have.

Since she lives in a temple and doesn’t go adventuring anymore, we will assume that she has no additional treasure worth mentioning on the Character Sheet, and so we will end page 2.

Thus begins page 3--what magic does the Sword Maiden know?

In the show, we have only ever seen Sword Maiden cast one spell, and even that was off-screen, so there isn’t much to extrapolate from. With that in mind, the spells she knows are largely up to how the player wants to play her. As mentioned when determining her stats, we are building her out as a pure caster focusing on healing and party defense.

As a Cleric, her Spellcasting Ability is Wisdom. With her stats, her Spell Save DC (8+proficiency+Wisdom modifier) is 19 and her Spell Attack Bonus (proficiency+Wisdom modifier) is 11.

At her level, she should also have should have 5 cantrips, a bunch of spells given by her Domain and 25 other spells prepared.

Cantrips -

Guidance: Helps the party get better rolls on their ability checks (such as Perception when trying to look for enemies).

Mending: Repairs an item. Not particularly thematic with Sword Maiden, but she gets 5 cantrips out of a possible 7 and the other two are Light and Thaumaturgy, a.k.a. a torch and yelling, but with magic.

Resistance: Helps the party succeed saving throws.

Sacred Flame: A damage-dealing cantrip, and one that does radiant damage, no less.

Spare the Dying: Basically a medical kit in spell form. It doesn’t heal any HP, but it stops people from dying.

Spells from being a Life Domain Cleric -

Bless: It’s in the same category as Resistance and Guidance. It gives a boost to any attack roll or saving throw, although it works on 3 people at once without boosting it to a higher spell slot level.

Cure Wounds: The first true healing spell, and an absolute must have for any healer.

Lesser Restoration: The first debuff removal spell. Can vary between completely useless and life savingly invaluable, depending on the campaign.

Spiritual Weapon: An attack that not only does force damage (which is surprisingly rare), but also allows Clerics have have early access to multiattack, since the weapon can attack as the Cleric’s bonus action.

Beacon of Hope: Gives advantage on Wisdom and Death saving throws, and makes all healing heal for max.

Revivify: If someone died in the last minute, they’re alive again with 1HP.

Death Ward: If the target of this spell would go to 0HP due to damage, they go to 1HP and this spell ends.

Guardian of Faith: A spectral guardian appears in a place you can see and attacks any hostile creature that moves near it for 20 damage. The guardian disappears after 8 hours or 60 damage.

Mass Cure Wounds: Mid-level healing! A point within 60 feet of you gets a 30-foot sphere around it. In that sphere, up to 6 creatures get healed.

Raise Dead: Remember Revivify? This is Revivify, but better. Instead of a one-minute time limit on bringing someone back, it has a 10 day time limit and removes nonmagical poisons and diseases!

The other 25 spells -

Detect Evil and Good: You can tell if aberrations, celestials, elementals, fey, fiends or undead are within 30 feet of you, and you know if any ground in that range is magically consecrated or desecrated.

Guiding Bolt: Long range radiant damage, and on a hit gives advantage to the next attack against whatever you hit.

Healing Word: The first ranged healing spell (the one before this on the list is of a higher level, so is technically after). It’s weak, but 1HP is a lot more than 0HP.

Protection From Evil and Good: Creatures of the good and evil types (aberrations, celestials, and so on) have disadvantage to hit the target of this spell. The target also can’t be charmed, frightened or possessed by them, and has advantage on saving throws to break out if they already were.

Shield of Faith: +2AC to target

Aid: Up to 3 allies within 30 feet of you get more HP.

Gentle Repose: Since Sword Maiden has Resurrection, it makes sense that she would have this spell, which effectively extends the timer that a corpse can be brought back to life.

Hold Person: While not directly helping to heal the party, this paralyzes an opponents, stopping them from doing damage.

Prayer of Healing: Up to 6 people within 30 feet of you get a chunk of healing.

Dispel Magic: Very few things actively stop magic from happening. This spell not only could prevent the party from taking damage, but at level 20 it could stop almost literally anything magic-based.

Magic Circle: This is effectively a wall for a specific type of enemy (designated by the caster from a list of options). The designated enemies can’t normally get in and has disadvantage to hit things inside, if it somehow is in range to hit them, and can’t charm, frighten or possess them.

Mass Healing Word: It’s Healing Word, but better because it can have more targets.

Spirit Guardians: Sword Maiden has a lot of concentration spells, which means that getting hit is potentially even worse than people might think. This makes it significantly more difficult for melee enemies to get to her.

Divination: Sword Maiden calls on the Supreme God to answer any 1 question.

Dispel Evil and Good: Evil and Good creatures (the celestial, fey, fiend, and so on group) have disadvantage to hit Sword Maiden. Alternatively, a) break this spell early and break an ally out of being frightened, charmed, or possessed at the same time, or b) hit an Evil or Good creature, end the spell, and try to send the creature back to its home plane.

Greater Restoration: Like Restoration, but better. Instead of 1 disease, all diseases.

Hallow: Evil and Good creatures can’t pass through the spell, and the spell has no time limit, it lasts until it is dispelled. It has an insane 24-hour cast time, but it’s also possible to completely surround a building with magic circles that also have additional effects that are just passively in place.

Blade Barrier: Slow down the enemies, make them take damage each turn, and give some kind of actual reason for the Sword Maiden to have her namesake.

Heal: As we get in to the high level spells, we can see the clear difference. Level 1 spell, heal about 5HP from 30 feet away. Level 6 spell, heal 70HP from 60 feet away.

Heroes’ Feast: Along with being thematically appropriate give that Sword Maiden and her group are called heroes, the spell makes people immune to poisons and diseases, gives advantage on Wisdom saving throws, and gives everyone temporary HP, which works as a buffer before getting to the character’s normal HP and more max HP for 24 hours.

Planar Ally: The Supreme God sends a celestial emissary to Sword Maiden to aid her on her quest.

Resurrection: The one spell we have seen Sword Maiden use, and thus know that she has.

Conjure Celestial: In some ways weaker than Planar Ally, since the Ally is going to fight for you, while the Conjured being might want to strike a deal. However, since Sword Maiden can summon and promptly kill fiends and the like as well, the spell itself could’ve helped her to defeat the Demon Lord’s army.

Holy Aura: Allies within 30 feet of you have advantage on all saving throws, and all attacks against them have disadvantage. Also, fiends and undead need to succeed a saving throw or be blinded whenever they attack.

Mass Heal: It’s literally a 700HP heal split among anyone within 60 feet of the caster.

The full character sheet.

And with that, there is nothing left to do. The entire character sheet is completely filled out for Sword Maiden, and she is ready to begin giving quests or killing demons in any campaign.

Are there any other characters you want to see turned into D&D characters, even outside of Goblin Slayer? Would you have made any other choices when creating Sword Maiden? Let us know in the comments!

---

Kevin Matyi is a freelance features writer for Crunchyroll. He's been watching anime for as long as he can remember, and his favorite shows tend to be shonen and other action series.

By: [email protected]

#Anime #News #Latest in Anime News by Crunchyroll!

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tigerkirby215 · 3 years

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5e Qiyana, Empress of the Elements build (League of Legends)

(Artwork by Aley Ghallan. Made for Riot Games.)

So it turns out I was wrong about Evelynn: there is another champion who doesn’t have “the” in the title! Leave it to Qiyana to be special. Anyways: after making this post my brain decided to hype fixate on a potential Qiyana build and then... oops. It suddenly got made. Truth be told I still haven’t got a goddamn clue how Qiyana works in-game.

GOALS

Not my fault; they should have bowed - Qiyana’s an assassin which of course means we need assassin damage.

Let us throw rocks at them and laugh - The Empress of the Elements needs elements to control! Earth, Wind, Fire, and Air!

Why are you in my space? - Riot sort of just... decided Qiyana should have two dashes in her kit? I guess?

RACE

Qiyana is clearly human but the Ixtali have some innate magic to them, so for control over the primal magic of (area with trees) go for a Half-Elf for Fey Ancestry to resist charms and sleeping.

But we won’t just be going for any Half-Elf. You know me I use Dragonmarks way too much, but it works since the Dragonmarked houses are above the rest. We’ll be going for a Mark of Storm to control both the oceans and the river! As a Mark of Storm Half-Elf your Charisma increases by 2 (as per usual) and your Dexterity increases by 1. You have Windwright’s Intuition to add a d4 to any Acrobatics checks you may make (as well as Navigator’s Tools which is slightly less important), and the Storm’s Boon to resist Lightning damage. "I see you have mastered the element of wind."

Of course what we’re mainly here for is Headwinds for a bit of elemental manipulation! You can cast Gust at will, and at third level you can cast Gust of Wind once per Long Rest as a very shitty version of your ultimate! You can also learn a language of your choice and Primordial would let you speak to the earth; it’s up to you to make sure it listens!

IF DRAGONMARKS AREN’T AN OPTION: Both Drow Half-Elf and Wood Half-Elf work very well for Qiyana. Drow gives you more spells while Wood makes it easier for you to hide. You’d also get more ASIs by going for a regular Half Elf (as opposed to a Dragonmarked race) so put the +1 you’d get into Strength.

ABILITY SCORES

15; DEXTERITY - Qiyana is a master of acrobatics, doing flips and kicks as she so desires.

14; CHARISMA - A ruler is meant to be attractive... and imposing.

13; STRENGTH - That ring you carry is heavy. Also it’s a multiclassing requirement.

12; CONSTITUTION - Qiyana is squishy in League but that doesn’t mean she has to be squishy for this build.

10; INTELLIGENCE - You must know your legacy in order to rule, and while your magic is a natural gift it’s good to know your way around Arcana.

8; WISDOM - So what if you have a hot head? You can shape the river to cool yourself off!

BACKGROUND

And here you were thinking I’d use Noble... Not many know of the Ixtali people, so you’re more of a Far Traveler than anything else. You get proficiency with skills but they don’t really fit you to be honest, so take Arcana and Nature proficiency to know your natural magic. You also gain proficiency with a musical instrument or gaming set of your choice (pick your fancy) and a language of your choice (also pick your fancy!)

But most importantly you know that you have All Eyes on You. Everyone knows you’re from the great land of Ixtal, and some will offer you service to know of the history of your great land. Won’t they be excited to know they’ll be joining your kingdom too?

(Artwork by Jennifer Wuestling. Made for Riot Games.)

THE BUILD

LEVEL 1 - ROGUE 1

You are an assassin, and an empress needs as many skills as she can get. Take proficiency in Acrobatics (obviously) and the three big Charisma skills: Deception, Persuasion, and Intimidation. You could get Performance instead for some TRUE DAMAGE, but trust me when I say Performance barely ever comes up in standard D&D. You also get Expertise in two skills: Nature and Arcana are kinda your thing, so...

As an empress you know just the right way to word your phrases to sound like Thieves’ Cant, and can understand any roguish discussion of those trying to overtake your throne. But of course as an assassin you’re expected to build lethality and Sneak Attack, doing an extra d6 to any enemy who mispositioned.

LEVEL 2 - ROGUE 2

Second level Rogues get their Cunning Action, allowing you to have the Audacity to Dash, Disengage, or Hide as a Bonus Action. It’s really nice when I can recreate League of Legends dashes as just... the Dash action.

LEVEL 3 - ROGUE 3

Third level Rogues get to choose their Roguish Archetype and Swashbucklers can move from enemy to enemy with ease and taunt them all the while. As a Swashbuckler you get two features but it’s more like three features: Fancy Footwork lets you dash away from a foe you’ve just hit without taking opportunity attacks.

Rakish Audacity meanwhile lets you Sneak Attack anyone who doesn’t have bodyguards, and has the added benefit of letting you add your Charisma to initiative rolls! "Some wait their turn, and some take what they deserve." Speaking of Sneak Attack: your Sneak Attack also increases to 2d6, and you also get Gust of Wind from your race now!

LEVEL 4 - ROGUE 4

4th level Rogues get an Ability Score Improvement: Dexterity kind of controls... everything that you do at the moment? So a +2 increase to DEX will go a long way.

(Artwork by eollynart on DeviantArt.)

LEVEL 5 - PALADIN 1

Did you swear an oath to Ixtal? Well it doesn’t matter. As a Paladin you have a Divine Sense to know the lay of the land: if there are any Celestials, Fiends, Fey, or Undead walking through your river or if the land is Consecrated or Desecrated. The ability does have a limited number of uses and a limited range however, so be mindful.

You can also heal yourself (or others, I guess) with a Corrupting Potion thanks to Lay on Hands. You can even cure Poisons or Diseases with 5 health points, because no one is assassinating this empress!

LEVEL 6 - PALADIN 2

Second level Paladins get to choose their Fighting Style: while it may not be the most effective you need to control the elements, and Blessed Warrior will give you some more minor control over the world around you. Thaumaturgy is the main one we’re here for because we can’t get Prestidigitation, and while it’s perhaps not the most in-character Guidance is still always useful to have, if only to use it on yourself.

Now would also be a good chance to talk about your Ring Blade ohmlatl: I actually think opting for Two Weapon Fighting with Qiyana works quite well to recreate her weapon! I’d opt for two Scimitars but Shortswords obviously work well too. Alternatively a Rapier and Shield would still let you Sneak Attack while also letting you block attacks.

Of course you don’t just get cantrips: you get actual Spellcasting! You can prepare a number of spells equal to your Charisma modifier plus half your Paladin level (rounded down.) Divine Favor will let you use your passive to get more damage and Thunderous Smite will let you knock a foe down as if stunning them with an icy blade.

Other than that? Command suits you well but there are few other spells we really need. I’d recommend you ignore all of that and concentrate on Divine Smite, turning magic into raw damage with your blade! "I command you to die!"

LEVEL 7 - PALADIN 3

The magic of Ixtal is ancient and to bend it to your will look no further than the Oath of the Ancients. You learn both Ensnaring Strike and Speak with Animals as Oath Spells (one of which is far more in-character than the other, but hey the birds can bow to you too), and you get two Channel Divinity options:

Nature’s Wrath will let you ensnare a creature within 10 feet of you. (It’s supposed to be flavored as vines but I’d reflavor it as ice from the river.) They can make a Strength or Dexterity saving throw or get free, but if they fail they will be restrained until they break out. Yeah there’s no max duration on this! Yes they can repeat the save each turn but the point still stands!

Turn the Faithless meanwhile is your standard turning effect, only this affects Feys and Fiends. The jungle natives know to bow to you, and usurpers shall be made to bow!

LEVEL 8 - PALADIN 4

4th level means another Ability Score Improvement but I don’t think we’ve hidden in the grass enough. The Shadow Touched feat will let you increase your Charisma by 1 and will also give you the Invisibility spell for when you need it. You can also learn a first level Illusion or Necromancy spell like Disguise Self to change up your wardrobe as necessary. You can cast both these spells once per Long Rest without using a spell slot, but can then use your spell slots to cast them some more.

Speaking of spells you can prepare more of them. But again: not much I really want. I’d recommend waiting for...

LEVEL 9 - PALADIN 5

5th level Paladins get an Extra Attack, allowing you to attack twice in one turn for more chances to Sneak Attack, Smite, or both!

Additionally you get a lot of good stuff at this level! You can learn Misty Step and Moonbeam as Oath Spells to recreate Flash and what we’ll call your ultimate for the sake of this build. You can also prepare Branding Smite for more Elemental Wrath and uhhhh... oops that’s kinda all I want. I mean Lesser Restoration is nice in a pinch. Truthfully it’s 3rd level where the true Qiyana spells come in.

(Artist unknown. Artwork made for Riot Games.)

LEVEL 10 - PALADIN 6

6th level Paladins can evade any danger with their natural beauty. Aura of Protection grants a saving throw boost equal to your Charisma modifier to yourself and anyone within 10 feet of you, so their empress can lead and put those who oppose her in the dirt.

LEVEL 11 - PALADIN 7

Oh did you think a bonus to saving throws wasn’t enough? Well as an Ancients Paladin you get Aura of Warding as well, giving yourself (and your allies) resistance to magic! This means that if you succeed on a saving throw against a spell you’ll take a quarter damage total (half of a half), and even if you (somehow) fail you’ll still only take half damage! "You are right to fear my greatness."

LEVEL 12 - PALADIN 8

8th level means another Ability Score Improvement: cap off that uneven Charisma score as well as your uneven Strength, because a +2 modifier is nice even if you aren’t really using it.

LEVEL 13 - PALADIN 9

9th level Paladins can cast third level spells which means oh boy: I get to tell you all the spells you should prepare to be in-character for Qiyana that you’re never going to be able to cast with your limited spell slots! Regardless Ancients Paladins get Plant Growth and Protection from Energy added to their spell list, to manipulate the elements to their liking. But with four other spells to prepare what should we take?

Elemental Weapon is the “yeah duh” spell, letting you invoke Elemental Wrath and really get value out of your passive. (It also makes your weapon a +1 which is helpful.)

Spirit Shroud is like Elemental Weapon but objectively better except for the fact that it doesn’t deal elemental damage. (Well it can deal Cold damage.) But instead of a d4 extra damage you’ll do a d8, and you can also slow those near you!

And again: I don’t really want any other spells. Almost like Qiyana is an AD champ masquerading as a spellcaster. You are allowed to take Cure Wounds you know? Just saying.

(Artwork by Mavoly on DeviantArt.)

LEVEL 14 - ROGUE 5

Hey aren’t you an assassin? Shouldn’t we be concentrating on like, assassin stuff? 5th level Rogues get Uncanny Dodge, letting you spend your reaction to halve the damage of an attack against you. This would affect attack rolls from spells like Shocking Grasp, meaning it would stack with Aura of Warding, but you can’t Uncanny Dodge a spell to only take an eighth of the damage.

Oh and your Sneak Attack (finally!) increases to 3d6.

LEVEL 15 - ROGUE 6

6th level Rogues get Expertise in two more skills. By this point you should probably be at peak performance with Acrobatics. After that pick your poison for one of your Charisma skills if you want to deal in public relations, subterfuge, or pop music.

LEVEL 16 - ROGUE 7

Are saving throws still (somehow) getting you down? Well Evasion just makes it so you take 0 damage if you succeed on a Dexterity saving throw, and only half damage on a failure! It’s probably worth mentioning that you currently have a +13 DEX save. To put this into perspective Tiamat’s breath weapon is a DC 27 DEX save; meaning that you have a 30% chance to take zero damage from an attack from Tiamat.

Oh and your Sneak Attack increases to 4d6, so you can then destroy Tiamat with a Supreme Display of Talent.

LEVEL 17 - ROGUE 8

8th level Rogues get another Ability Score Improvement: Dexterity still controls our AC and attack rolls (along with many other things) and it still isn’t maxed, so capping it off at 20 would be a good idea. "Jaw-dropping, I know."

(Artwork by LittleKumaArt on DeviantArt.)

LEVEL 18 - PALADIN 10

Rounding this build off with a final few levels in Paladin: level 10 Paladins get Aura of Courage, because if you’ve lasted long enough to hit level 18 why would you be afraid of anything? "So basic."

LEVEL 19 - PALADIN 11

11th level Paladins get Improved Divine Smite, letting them add a d8 Radiant damage to any hit with your weapon (not just hits with Divine Smite, despite the name.)

But I’m going to be honest: what I really wanted was the extra third level spell slot. Not that an extra d8 every attack isn’t good though! Show off that Royal Privilege!

LEVEL 20 - PALADIN 12

12th level Paladins get our final Ability Score Improvement: cap off your Charisma for a +5 Aura of Protection, and also more spells to prepare. "If talent were an element, perhaps I could throw some at them."

FINAL BUILD

PROS

Smash these idiots, won't you? - It may be a surprise to you but Rogues and Paladins are both very good at doing damage. 4d6 of Sneak Attack damage is never a bad thing, and that d8 from Improved Divine Smite helps too. And if they’re still standing then a regular Divine Smite will quickly force them to bow. What’s really nice is that unlike other Rogues you are practically guaranteed the Royal Privilege of Sneak Attacking your foes!

I would say “watch and learn,” but unfortunately you cannot learn this - Having a few spells in your back pocket never hurt anyone, and even your weakest spells pack quite a punch. Divine Favor stacks up over a long combat, and Ensnaring Strike can set an enemy up for failure.

Some people are just born better - I swear this happens whenever I make either a Rogue or a Paladin but it turns out that Rogue and Paladin are both extremely good at resisting damage. Evasion combined with Aura of Protection is huge but the biggest factor that makes this build so crazy is Aura of Warding. Ancients Paladin is one of the best Paladins in the game specifically because you take half damage from magic. Add this all onto a Rogue who can dash as a Bonus Action every turn, essentially got the Mobile feat for free, and has 135 health? You can be everywhere at once and you foes can’t do anything about it.

CONS

It is exhausting to crush you so much - While all your spells are amazing they’re also very limited. 3 spell slots for your best tricks means that you won’t pull them off too often. It also means that your Smiting abilities are a little limited overall.

That was no crushing; that was merely a squeeze - Multiclassing does give you a taste of everything but it also means that you miss out on the best of both worlds. Your sneak attack could be higher, and you didn’t get any of the particularly powerful Paladin features.

I'm extremely good... at everything - Well except for one thing: Wisdom. While Aura of Protection helps you somewhat with Wisdom saves +4 means nothing against higher tier spells. And of course a -1 to Perception and Insight never helped anyone.

But your greatness far overshadows your flaws. Show them that greatness and let the nature around you help magnify your magnificence. It is your right to conquer above all, and subject those beneath you for the glory of Ixaocan. Don’t let silly things like “sisters” or “birthright” or “hard CC” stop you. Go fight that 1v5 and prove how great you are!

(Artwork by Jessica “OwleyCat” Oyhenart. Made for Riot Games.)

#dnd #dnd build #dnd guide #League of Legends #League of Legends Qiyana #dnd rogue #dnd paladin #Ixaocan #earth #water #grass?

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