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The Thinktank => When Inspiration Strikes => : Lycarn October 09, 2011, 09:57:26 PM

: Making a Witcher
: Lycarn October 09, 2011, 09:57:26 PM
If anyone doesn't know what a Witcher is go look up the video game titled The Witcher and The Witcher 2: Assassin of Kings.
Specifically I want to build off the concept of Geralt of Rivia.

I.E. This guy

(http://wallpaperswide.com/thumbs/the_witcher_2_assassins_of_kings_geralt_of_rivia-t2.jpg)

So what I've come up with so far is this

*Updated build*
1   Fighter   Power Attack   Combat Expertise
2   Fighter   Weapon Focus (Bastard Sword)
3   Warblade   Dodge
4   Warblade   
5   Warblade   
6   Duskblade   Mobility   
7   Abjurant Champion   
8   Abjurant Champion   
9   Abjurant Champion   Brew Potion   
10   Abjurant Champion   
11   Abjurant Champion   
12   Duskblade   ?   
13   Warblade   
14   Warblade   Combat Reflexes
15   Warblade   Elusive Target
16   Warblade   
17   Warblade      
18   Warblade   Two free feats
19   Warblade      
20   Warblade   

So just trying to figure out what else to do, either tweaks on the current build or finding those last two feats that would fit with the combat style. Some kind of grenade combat or weapon oils I'm not entirely sure where to find.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: ImperatorK October 09, 2011, 10:11:25 PM
2   Fighter   Combat Casting
Combat Casting isn't a fighter bonus feat.

3   Warblade   Weapon Focus (Bastard Sword)
You don't have proficiency.

A level of Duskblade instead of Wizard would be better. Or two, it gives Combat Casting on 2nd.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: Havok4 October 10, 2011, 12:54:41 AM
I would probably actually make the guy a wizard/swiftblade, as the speed of the character is one of the things emphasized in the novels and games. Maybe look for some recommendations in the swiftblade handbook. Otherwise a warblad with some custom template or prestige class would best model him.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: Lycarn October 10, 2011, 01:37:15 AM
2   Fighter   Combat Casting
Combat Casting isn't a fighter bonus feat.

Yeah I meant to change that. Wasn't on purpose.

3   Warblade   Weapon Focus (Bastard Sword)
You don't have proficiency.

A level of Duskblade instead of Wizard would be better. Or two, it gives Combat Casting on 2nd.

"A character can use a bastard sword two-handed as a martial weapon" so you have proficiency unless you're using it one handed. Therefore you only would get the benefits of weapon focus when using as a two-handed weapon - atleast if you're using it RAW.

And yeah, I agree with the Duskblade thing.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: Lycarn October 10, 2011, 01:52:13 AM
The one problem with Duskblade is they don't get haste. Anyway to fix that? Because Swiftblade would be a good class...
: Re: Making a Witcher
: vilenatas October 10, 2011, 02:01:01 AM
Duskblade3/paladin2/abjurant1/SA1/abjurantchampion+4/swiftblade9

If you need the maneuvers switch out as needed.  SA is suel arcanamach which gives 5th level spells and gets trans as a school.  You could dump paladin for warblade as well but lose charisma synergy as this has charisma as a main casting stat as well as charisma to saves and initiative.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: Carnap October 10, 2011, 04:18:54 AM
Arcane Disciple (Time domain) feat grants among others haste.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: ImperatorK October 10, 2011, 05:49:29 AM
"A character can use a bastard sword two-handed as a martial weapon" so you have proficiency unless you're using it one handed. Therefore you only would get the benefits of weapon focus when using as a two-handed weapon - atleast if you're using it RAW.
That's an exception. A special case. The weapon is still exotic and you have to be proficient with it to take WF.

Duskblade3/paladin2/abjurant1/SA1/abjurantchampion+4/swiftblade9

If you need the maneuvers switch out as needed.  SA is suel arcanamach which gives 5th level spells and gets trans as a school.  You could dump paladin for warblade as well but lose charisma synergy as this has charisma as a main casting stat as well as charisma to saves and initiative.
This build is cool, but I'm not sure if Geralt could be a Paladin. I've seen only a couple episodes of the series, but quite some time ago and I didn't really read any books about him, but I don't remember him as even slightly paladin-y. He was a great warrior and could cast some spells, he was definitely charismatic and smart, but... LG? Nooo...
: Re: Making a Witcher
: vilenatas October 10, 2011, 11:07:28 AM
You could make him CG, CE, LE using the alternate paladins.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: ImperatorK October 10, 2011, 11:46:46 AM
Yeah, I wanted to edit my post and say that, but I forgot. There are variants for all the alignments in Dragon. :) (well, maybe not including Neutral, iirc)
: Re: Making a Witcher
: Shiki October 10, 2011, 11:50:25 AM
Yeah, I wanted to edit my post and say that, but I forgot. There are variants for all the alignments in Dragon. :) (well, maybe not including Neutral, iirc)
Actually there's a Neutral one. Name's "Incarnate."
: Re: Making a Witcher
: zugschef October 10, 2011, 11:54:20 AM
i know potions are really crap, but if you really want to build the witcher you need the brew potion feat...

[edit] sorry... totally didn't see that it's in your build already. your build doesn't work though... you need the 2nd level of duskblade before abjurant champion because of combat casting...
: Re: Making a Witcher
: Nunkuruji October 10, 2011, 01:27:51 PM
Geralt is pretty strong and fast, but he's certainly not at the level of magic as a full sorcerer or wizard

Aard - Telekinesis
Igni - Burning Hands + (Fire DoT)
Yrden - Ground Trap, sort of Glyph of Warding
Quen- Vigor + Fire Shield, or other damage absorb + force feedback sort of effect
Axii - Short Dominate Person, Charm Person
Heliotrope - A few possible effects, damp power, minor time stop / short 3.0 haste

All Somatic, (no verbal?), often? visual display

Recharge Magic system

Brew Potion
Enhance Potion effects & duration, pretty sure there's a DR feat for that
craft(alchemy)
Enhanced alchemy?

Lots of skillpoints / skills... like... all

All weapons & many exotic weapon proficiencies. His swords are typically longsword. Lot of random weapons you can also use in the games.
light armor proficiency

Some ToB maneuvers
Evasive Reflexes
Power Attack

Flaw: Sterility

Mutagens are a bit unique.

Ultimately fleshes out a bit different considering the skill tree paths in the games.

Haven't read the books, so there's probably even more variation.

Can probably stitch together something from existing classes, but it would be better off to just have a homebrew class that mimics the choices in the character progression of the game, or other such legends of his capabilities.

Magic usually still rules in his universe, except certainly the more powerful magics take much longer to cast, seem to suffer recharge times, and can cause mental burn on greater magics. Mages only seem to be defeated when they decide to stick it out rather than teleport away.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: X-Codes October 10, 2011, 02:00:18 PM
Arcanist-slaying Mystic Ranger of the Arcane Order 6/Witch Hunter 5/Swiftblade 9

Feats- Dodge, Mobility, Elusive Target, Extra Favored Enemy x2, Brew Potion, Otherworldly, Sword of the Arcane Order
Combat Style- Power Attack (I know there's some variant somewhere that does this, just don't know where)
Items- Bastard Swords.  You're proficient due to type.  Potion Belts, assuming your DM lets you use the potion as a swift action.  It seems fair given the absurd price of potions.
Abilities- High Strength, Constitution, and Charisma, 12 or 14 Int, 13 Dex, and enough Wisdom to get access to all spells with an item.  Avoid spells that allow saving throws.  This character should obviously only be played if you roll stats.  :rollseyes

Favored Enemies: Arcanists +6, Monstrous Humanoids +2, Magical Beasts +2

EDIT: Crap, forgot Knowledge Devotion.  That totally belongs in there somewhere, too.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: CantripN October 10, 2011, 02:11:02 PM
That's a rather powerful Gish, really. Not crazy, but certainly very powerful. While you're at it, you're already sterile, so Eunuch Warlock might be of use to get you the higher level spells, and fit the fluff, sorta.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: X-Codes October 10, 2011, 03:34:58 PM
That's a rather powerful Gish, really. Not crazy, but certainly very powerful. While you're at it, you're already sterile, so Eunuch Warlock might be of use to get you the higher level spells, and fit the fluff, sorta.
Witcher = shooting blanks
Eunuch = broken gun

Just to clear that up. :p
: Re: Making a Witcher
: Prime32 October 10, 2011, 04:16:56 PM
Is there any summary of this guy's abilities somewhere?

i know potions are really crap, but if you really want to build the witcher you need the brew potion feat...
Brew Potion
Enhance Potion effects & duration, pretty sure there's a DR feat for that
craft(alchemy)
Enhanced alchemy?
[...]
Mutagens are a bit unique.
Potions and mutagens you say? (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/base-classes/alchemist)
: Re: Making a Witcher
: Nunkuruji October 10, 2011, 04:26:49 PM
Is there any summary of this guy's abilities somewhere?

i know potions are really crap, but if you really want to build the witcher you need the brew potion feat...
Brew Potion
Enhance Potion effects & duration, pretty sure there's a DR feat for that
craft(alchemy)
Enhanced alchemy?
[...]
Mutagens are a bit unique.
Potions and mutagens you say? (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/base-classes/alchemist)

Ah, I haven't really read any PF stuff

http://witcher.wikia.com/wiki/Witcher_Wiki

: Re: Making a Witcher
: Tshern October 10, 2011, 04:55:11 PM
This is utterly off-topic, but thanks for reminding me, I need to play through Witcher again on my next vacation.

On topic: I think the swords he uses are more like longswords than bastard swords. Easier to pull off as well. Also, he probably could be counted to have medium armour proficiency. At least to me Raven's armour looked like medium, not light.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: Talore October 10, 2011, 06:07:09 PM
That's a rather powerful Gish, really. Not crazy, but certainly very powerful. While you're at it, you're already sterile, so Eunuch Warlock might be of use to get you the higher level spells, and fit the fluff, sorta.
Eunuch Warlock was updated in Dragon Magazine to 3.5, it now grants 9/10 casting progression instead of bonus spells.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: zugschef October 10, 2011, 06:19:17 PM
That's a rather powerful Gish, really. Not crazy, but certainly very powerful. While you're at it, you're already sterile, so Eunuch Warlock might be of use to get you the higher level spells, and fit the fluff, sorta.
Eunuch Warlock was updated in Dragon Magazine to 3.5, it now grants 9/10 casting progression instead of bonus spells.
eunuch warlock really doesn't fit at all though...
: Re: Making a Witcher
: X-Codes October 10, 2011, 06:28:55 PM
This is utterly off-topic, but thanks for reminding me, I need to play through Witcher again on my next vacation.

On topic: I think the swords he uses are more like longswords than bastard swords. Easier to pull off as well. Also, he probably could be counted to have medium armour proficiency. At least to me Raven's armour looked like medium, not light.
The silver sword, maybe, but he generally uses them both two-handed, so I'm not inclined to think that they're not at least somewhat heavy.

Also, his armor looked like studded leather to me, if I remember it right.  Maybe a very light chainmail.

Geralt's abilities are limited spellcasting, but he's a fast and strong swordsman.  Basically a poster-child for the Swiftblade PrC.

The Witcher's abilities are almost universally tied to potions and mutagens beyond that point, which you could translate into potions and custom grafts in d20.

The Alchemist class in PF doesn't really suit Geralt, though.  Geralt does alchemy as a secondary shtick, not as his life's career.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: Havok4 October 10, 2011, 06:47:23 PM
A witcher could be a interesting custom archetype or prestige class for the alchemist class. Likely focusing having a permanent mutagen and more melee abilities at the cost of a few discoveries, swift poisoning, swift  alchemy and persistent mutagen.

But in 3.5 a mystic ranger/swiftblade seems to fit best.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: Tshern October 11, 2011, 01:03:54 PM
The silver sword, maybe, but he generally uses them both two-handed, so I'm not inclined to think that they're not at least somewhat heavy.
Generally, but with the group style he swings the sword with one hand. Very easily as well.

Also, his armor looked like studded leather to me, if I remember it right.  Maybe a very light chainmail.
The standard armours, yes, but the one you get as a reward for complete the mission Raven's armour (or something like that) he gets a heavier armour. I do agree this could easily be done with light armour, because that is what he is usually wearing.

Geralt's abilities are limited spellcasting, but he's a fast and strong swordsman.  Basically a poster-child for the Swiftblade PrC.
Swiftblade is a good answer, although perhaps more powerful than what Geralt ever displayed. I still think Switblade works though.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: X-Codes October 11, 2011, 01:44:36 PM
I don't know.  Geralt takes on some pretty ugly critters.  I think if we're going to translate that into 3.5e effectively, we're going to have to juice his spellcasting a little.  Also, most of the low-level spells he'd have access to would mostly be used to satisfy pre-reqs for potions.

Also, as nunkuruji said, Aard is pretty clearly some manner of TK, and that's a 5th-level spell, so the ability to cast 5th-level spells is pretty much a must-have.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: Scrollreader October 11, 2011, 03:04:27 PM
Human w/ mark of making into that cyran explorer class from Dragonmarked, maybe.  Has some martial fu, and some infusions.  Expensive infusion components as potions, and such.  Tk is a bit hard to get, but spell storing item might work in a pinch, if you can find it on some one's spell list.  Alternatively psionics might be the answer.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: Tshern October 11, 2011, 07:00:48 PM
I don't know.  Geralt takes on some pretty ugly critters.  I think if we're going to translate that into 3.5e effectively, we're going to have to juice his spellcasting a little.  Also, most of the low-level spells he'd have access to would mostly be used to satisfy pre-reqs for potions.

Also, as nunkuruji said, Aard is pretty clearly some manner of TK, and that's a 5th-level spell, so the ability to cast 5th-level spells is pretty much a must-have.
Precisely the reasons why I agree with Swiftblade, he needs more casting than is depicted in the games.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: Nunkuruji October 12, 2011, 01:11:25 PM
In regards to the Witcher universe, and power of surrounding characters and creatures.

Witchers themselves by default posses the capabilities of about E8-11, in terms of spellcasting, basically capped off by telekinesis/tk-maneuver. However, that list narrowed only to the list I previously posted. Swiftblade might emulate Heliotrope to some extent, but I never went down the magic path to see how it really worked. Probably extra actions, probably not time stop. This is assuming he goes down the magic path anyways.

So then, you really have the last chunk of levels finished off by probably Swiftblade, an Alchemist PrC, or Initiator levels.

A small handful of mages posses the potential to be E17 with 9th spell capability. Witcher2 pretty much has an apocalypse from the sky event, combined with a greater curse. Though, these are largely ritual-time casting, and the mages only display the combat capability of maybe 5th or 6th level spells, as far as what they can sling as standard actions. Aside from the signs, other effects seen performed by mages are teleport, dimension door, flesh to stone, stone to flesh, shrink item, polymorph, personal range area protection from arrows, anti-unlife shell, summon monster, dominate.

You also have the Wild Hunt, which at the moment seems to be a bunch of plane shifting, nightmare riding specters, or invaders posing as specters. Home plane being alternate time flowing. This arc will probably be covered more in depth in a future game.

The final encounter in Witcher2 is about a CR14 - CR16
[spoiler]One on one fight, is essentially either a young adult, or adult gold dragon. Mages didn't get to rampage due to a suppressing mythal.[/spoiler]

A Witchers primary profession is to deal with unintelligent monsters, and in fact, killing intelligent living monsters such as trolls and dragons poses a moral dilemma. Of course, Geralt gets caught up in politics and whatnot, so he inevitably ends up slaying an armies worth of humans as well. Typically dealing with usual aberrations, magical beasts, undead, and demons, typically possessing no more than low to mid level SLA/Su effects if they have them. Monstrous threats are typically going to be large and brutal, or overwhelming speed & numbers, rather than the threat of a slay living SLA instagib.

Ultimately, if you try and dump Geralt into a 3.5e game, the disparity is going to be the magic capabilities of characters and creatures around you. Items similarly are typically enhancement bonuses, rather than producing impressive magical effects.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: Scrollreader October 13, 2011, 01:10:46 PM
Wilder?  Decent BaB, narrow power list.  Can use synchronicity and hustle, and actual time screw.  Grab a couple potions, drugs, and oils and call it good. Maybe sprinkle in ranger/slayer.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: stranglebat October 14, 2011, 08:30:12 AM
Geralt also should really be an Elan or something, to cover his non-human status
: Re: Making a Witcher
: ImperatorK October 14, 2011, 09:31:02 AM
Witchers did age, IIRC.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: X-Codes October 15, 2011, 04:48:54 PM
I picked up the Otherworldly feat for him, which makes him an Outsider.

Aberration is probably more appropriate thematically, but mechanically I needed the martial weapon proficiency.
: Re: Making a Witcher
: awaken DM golem October 15, 2011, 06:08:22 PM
That's a rather powerful Gish, really. Not crazy, but certainly very powerful. While you're at it, you're already sterile, so Eunuch Warlock might be of use to get you the higher level spells, and fit the fluff, sorta.
Eunuch Warlock was updated in Dragon Magazine to 3.5, it now grants 9/10 casting progression instead of bonus spells.
eunuch warlock really doesn't fit at all though...

... and you really don't want to have to role-play this one.