In which I take up arms again

Modern Times
A funny thing happened to me at the mall a while back. I was walking through the Apple store, when I saw the game Neverwinter Nights 2. I picked it up with a vague interest, and suddenly realized that a product for sale in the Apple store might actually run on my computer.

Most times I discover that whatever game I might want to play won't run on my newish Intel machine (Knights of the Old Republic is supposed to be awesome, but I'll never know). Or else the game has been developed for the new Super Mac Quad Intel Premium running OS X Gargoyle, a system currently owned only by Steve Jobs and a cute Harvard MBA at Apple who no one knows what she does. But this was different – this game would actually run on my computer! What the hell, I thought, I'll buy it.

And then I sat down to play.

As dawn broke I led my plucky band through the Mere of Dead Men. “Hmm,” I thought, over the screams of my enraged spouse, “this game isn't half bad.” Neverwinter Nights 2 has, I think, a very nice balance of the three elements that make any D&D campaign worthwhile: shopping, killing, and negotiation. It's a much richer experience than, say Diablo. There's a decent plot, and a well-written group of NPCs, who are voiced, with varying degrees of believability, by professional actors.

I've played D&D off and on since it first came out. But, since college at least, I've almost always been the DM. I had a four year on-again off-again campaign in school that was hugely enjoyable, I DM'd with friends in Boston, I designed a campaign based on Nostromo that alas, I never found a group to play through, and had various intermittent fits since then. (I am proudest of Once Upon a Time in Space, which the Laird and I have developed up to a treatment, but for which we are still seeking the right character/combat system.) But I'd forgotten how much fun it is to just play the game.


Country Boy Makes Good
My first PC was Isendur Telenfyn, a Moon Elf Ranger. It was an accident, but this fits the backstory perfectly. All characters in the OC (original campaign) begin as the step-child of an elven ranger in a remote, swampy village. Isendur's a ranger because his step-father is. He's an elf in a human village because his step father was the only elf around to adopt him.

I initially visualized the character as a one-dimensional dexterity-driven archer. I didn't do any pre-game research, but it turns out this is not the best choice. For one thing, back-rank characters shouldn't lead parties, because the campaign has a ton of negotiation. The game insists that your character be front and center for conversations, even with bosses you have no chance of influencing. Then, after the villain's obligatory “and now I shall destroy you!” poor Isendur is standing about three feet away from the pit fiend, wearing light armor and trying to nock an arrow.

That's the other problem. Archers in NW2 are somewhat underpowered. Given his lack of offensive punch, I had to build Isendur with more of a focus on survivability, (e.g., Dodge and Improved Initiative so he can start running early). By mid-game his feats plus high dexterity meant he could mostly stay out of the middle of the fight. And, thanks to his innate tracking ability he could usually line things up pretty well before the bad guys even knew he was there. Playing him was a challenge, but a pleasurable one.

But Telenfyn also had to learn how to function in the world of men, skills his reclusive step-father couldn't teach him. A callow country boy moving across a hostile landscape without overwhelming force had better learn to know when to talk and when to shut up. I maxed out his diplomacy skill so that by the time he got to the City of Neverwinter, he could talk his way out of anything that could be talked out of. He joined the Neverwinter City Watch, and started getting things done. He was persuasive enough that the worst bloodshed (a potential internal cop gang war) was averted. By the time he stood trial for the destruction of the village of Ember, he was even able to score some diplomatic points off that notorious sophist, Ambassador Claven of Luskan.

Then I ran into one of NW2's infamous “showstopper” bugs. A key NPC – my thief – simply disappeared from the party and couldn't be recovered. I tried various remedies, but the word on the forums was, well, this happens sometimes and if all else fails just start a new character and try again.


What Are You Looking At?
Vrogdish Holleck started out as a joke. I was showing the character builder to my kids, and I wanted to show them what a half-Orc fighter would look like (fierce!). Didn't mean to play him for any length of time. I was planning on a rogue/warlock or something like that. But as I noodled around with the character I noticed that with his high strength and dexterity, he was going through dungeons like a hot knife through butter. Where Telenfyn had to live by his wits, Holleck could just throw open the door and kill what was on the other side.

It usually didn't take long. Just picture this guy. He's basically Ray Lewis, but about a foot taller and a hundred pounds heavier, with fangs. He's really fast, and really strong, and he's running straight at you, leading with a +2 tower shield, waving this gimmick sword (+2 astral blade) with strands of electro-something coming off it. He was the last thing a lot of orcs saw at the Old Owl Well.

At first I thought, there's no hope for this guy's backstory. But then it started to make sense to me. To paraphrase Yoko Ono, orc is the nigger of the Forgotten Realms. Why is he living in a remote swampy village? Because he's an orphan half-orc. He wouldn't last five minutes anywhere else. Why is his step-father a reclusive Elven Ranger? Because no one but one of his mom's old adventuring buddies would touch a half-orc kid with a 10-foot pole. His step-dad can barely stand people, either, so they get on ok. Why is he a bully? Because he's the only thing like him in his world, and people try to bully him. It's not in him to knuckle under, so he bullies back.

So why is he a fighter and not a berserker? That's so racist. Why does everyone think “berkserker” the minute we bring up that he's a orc? Shame on you. He's a perfect fighter and he's just loaded up on longsword feats – weapon focus, improved critical, etc. etc. He also has gauntlets that can get his strength into the mid-20s, so he can hit almost anything, and what he can hit, he can wreck.

With his low charisma there was no hope of negotiating his way through life, so I just added skill points to Intimidation every time he leveled up. And sure enough, this works. Vrogdish tends to end proposals with phrases like “if you want to live,” or “you'd look funny with no arms or legs.” He takes Plan B through Act I, joining the mob in Neverwinter and overseeing their protection racket. The good news, is he's successful. The bad news is, the body count is so high it sickens even the local crime lords. No one's sorry when he leaves town to deal with other things.

I originally aligned the Character as Chaotic Neutral. But as he gets deeper and deeper into the campaign, Vrogdish discovers he's not such a bad guy. His decisions start to trend toward the good side of things. Sure he's gotten a raw deal in some respects, and he's never going to be a movie star. But he has loyal friends, influence with the nobility, and no one dares cross him, so it's all good. And when he comes face to face with real evil – a really fucked-up assassin from his old village – he whips him, but doesn't finish him off. He knows the guy's mother, ya know? What would he say to her? He lets the assassin live, knowing full well that the guy's boss will not be so full of the milk of human kindness.

Then, at the end of Act II, we have one of the climactic moments of the game – a face-to-face confrontation with an immensely powerful warlock who foolishly destroys something profoundly valuable to both him and Vrogdish. In an emotional scene the warlock declares his repentance, and raises his arms to transport the party to safety, and their starting point for Act III. And then...

The game crashes. Re-load, re-play, crash again.

And again.

Another showstopper.

Research shows that there is a patch. Word on the street is, if you load the patch and try to play an existing character, you'll have all kinds of problems. The only thing to do is start over. Time to roll up a new guy. Crap, I was really enjoying Vrogdish.


The Banality of Good

Well now that I know 2/3 of the damn campaign, I know exactly what I need. The campaign is best-suited to a front-line fighter that can handle gobs of orcs and undead and who can take the fight to the lords of evil in Act 3. No Wizard/Thief/Druids need apply. The man for that job is a Paladin. Have aura, will travel.

I've never played a paladin before, and haven't had one in a campaign since high school, when the Laird's went around slaughtering everything in sight. There's a simple reason for this: I can't stand paladins. They're not just self-important and arrogant – they're self-important and arrogant with the full backing of a divine power. I generally root for the vampires.

But what the hell, paladins get nice perks, if I remember right, and while we're at it I'll make him planetouched to pump up his charisma a little more. So we get the blond-haired, golden-eyed Will Brown, the little angel who grew up in the swamp and learned to fight the baddies.

yawn ... snort ... oh, sorry, fell asleep for a second there.

Will's well into Act III now, doing fine. He's certainly the best-looking of my PCs, cutting a dashing figure in his black half-plate (needs a Nike logo) and natty blue City Watch cloak. And he has a distinctive fighting style, wading into battle without a shield and wielding his +2 zap-o-matic (bonus electrical damage) halberd. If Isendur is a sniper and Vrogdish a tank, this guy is a torpedo. He makes a beeline for the most powerful offensive force on the other side, and starts landing charisma-power (Smite, Divine Might) halberd shots. He often dies, but that has dropped off sharply since he got a magic-resistant belt and took the Divine Shield feat. He's now a pretty effective force, although relatively lame against high-level neutral foes. He'd be considerably more lethal if I could get some more feats, but he's serviceable. Still, Vrogdish could kick this guy's ass across the Spine of the World if he felt like it.

But the real issue is, paladins are dull. I believe Tolstoy said all happy families are happy in the same way. So it is with paladins. When you're 100% lawful good, what else is there to say? In a movie you could get some mileage out of the various temptations he encounters (Galahad: “Oh, let me have just a little bit of peril?”). But in D&D if your paladin goes off the tracks, he loses his paladin-ness, and then you just have a crappy fighter with not enough feats.

I suppose I'll finish the campaign, but I'm in no rush - the game shows telltale signs of hurry in Act III, and I strongly suspect I've already seen the best parts. But it's sure been fun playing so far.

Hmm, come to think of it, maybe I should try out that rogue/warlock after all...