frostedWarlock had a power outage, and thus wasn't able to finish the next page in time. But here's some concept art of Rarity's pre-made-by-Twilight's-player character in the meantime, which will be replaced by the actual next page on (hopefully) Friday.
To be fair, this is what happens when you plan to go straight through to the next arc but then decide at the last minute to take a break. Mistakes made on the zero-buffer cutting edge: They happen.
In the meantime, how about some Story Time? Let's just springboard off this picture here - does it remind you of anything?
There was one campaign where the PCs managed to screw up so badly that they created a few new evil gods, got some good gods killed, and then caused a few previously evil gods to flip to the side of good.
Lolth became a happy-go-lucky goddess of laughter and merriment. She put the LOL in Lolth. :3
THIS REQUIRES A STORY!
(from you, Digo. On what exactly happened. In case that wasn't clear)
EDIT: The PCs could totally change their alignment, claim that the screw-up was intentionally well-thought diabolical plan, and become the favored apostles of the new evil gods they created... (and maybe even gain favor with the enemies of the good gods they killed?)
Hey! They could even make a bunch of money by patenting and selling a "How to kill gods and change their alignments: 12-week course with Guaranteed Results*!")
In settings where the gods are powerful beings rather than incarnations of ideas, the same way you change anyone's alignment: By convincing them to change or by impacting them with a sufficiently powerful effect so as to force a change.
Alignment is a choice for anything with enough intelligence to choose it's actions. A mindless zombie isn't so much evil as hungry for flesh and doesn't know better. A vampire knows better, and can choose to abstain / use alternatives. Your chosen actions determine your alignment, not the other way around.
But when it comes to gods, changing their alignments would endanger the claims they have on some of their portfolios. At least in Realms, it's likely they'd lose or gain some, and get their power status shaken up. Not the first time Realms has seem something like this happen.
In the campaign world I ran, gods were indeed intelligent entities, but not ones entirely with free will.
In a way, they were more like computers. Their thoughts and actions based upon calculations to further their goals. A god cannot suddenly decide to change alignment. It's programming would have to be edited. That was basically the disaster the PCs caused with a handful of gods. :)
To me, it seems as though a lot of the portfolios that gods have in RPGs are very subjective- A god with a Portfolio of, say, Imprisonment, could either (if Evil) be represented through tyrany and unrightful jailing, be a symbol of impartial punishment (if Neutral) or be a symbol/used for the capture and control of those who would wish to do Evil. Similarly for things like Punishment or Slaughter (battle, innocents or livestock? Actually, a Halfling God of Slaughter could be hilarious- play it up like it's some sort of forgotten Chthonic Aztecian deity, and it turns out to be a farmer god.)
Motive is also important. Do you steal from the shop because you want more money, you got ripped off by the owner, or because they are suspect in shady dealings and you need him or her to get spooked?
Oh On the RPG front, Ponies in Rifts just got interesting. Trixie hit Lv 6 as the only Anthro-Pony Combat Mage and for her two new spells she chose Thundermaul, a combat mage spell that summons an ethereal war hammer that you can use or hand to an ally for the duration of the spell, and...FIREBALL!! We all cringed, we know that she's gonna have way too much fun with that.
Also, a request for Ponies in the Three Galaxies has started me working on a test set, including Trixie and some background ponies as the crew of an Equestrian Runners (think Han Solo and crew).
I'm working on the basics for the Three Galaxies one. Trixie is a Runner under the orders of Luna Leader of the Lunar Republic. Trixie operates Lulamoon Light Cargo, which handles legal and less than legal jobs. I'm sorting out some weapons for her, I have a rather fun idea or two.
With modern campaigns when I get to play with magic, I tend to go with lightning bolt. The number of modern technologies that do not like surge conditions is huge. Also, while vehicles may protect passengers from most of an electrical attack, the vehicle itself rarely survives.
But modern stuff is still flammable so Fireball is a classic you can't go wrong with.
My preferred, although suicidal, method of space warfare is cranking up whatever shield protects you from physical entities, and just smash through ships and bases like liquid butter.
I usually get stuck or blown up due to the larger ships not handling the sudden loss of whatever I destroy.
That reminds me of Deffwotch. The Orks masquerading as Space Marines couldn't upgrade their Krooza's prow armor any further, so instead they just applied a power field to the whole thing for ramming.
Same GM as my Dark Heresy campaign, which we finished last night. I guess I'll storytime that down below later.
Side note...there is technically a light sword, outside of psychic or magic ones, that one can have in Rifts. It's not very reliable battery wise...but as a GM, I decided that one of the weapons companies, Northern Gun, could do their version of it, as they often research rival weapons and make better or knock off versions. If I do this, both Rifts Trixie and Three Galaxies Trixie would have the equivalent of a freaking Light Saber!
That picture reminded me of some of the necromancers that I've tried to make over the years but never really got the chance to play. And speaking of necromancers, I actually have a short story involving one:
This was actually my first session ever, before I got to know everyone else that I would soon develop the relationship I've no doubt keep bringing up here despite myself. We were tasked by the king to go to a necromancer's tower and, well, kill the necromancer. After going through the forest where we murdered spiders and goblins, we managed to get to the locked entrance of the tower. After some discussion, our dwarf decided to use me (one of two clerics) as a battering ram and somehow got a natural 20 on the roll. Suffice to say it worked and one thing I learned about my group is that if something worked, we keep doing it. After the third door (where I continued with the glorious job of being a battering ram), Our party decided to split up and try to find the necromancer. We justified it to ourselves saying we hadn't bumped into anything at all after going through a few rooms. This wasn't too far off in hindsight since this DM liked traps and illusions more than actual monster encounters. So after I discovered a secret passage and being thrown out the window by our short tempered dwarf because I succeeded where he failed, said dwarf found the necromancer who was narcissistic enough to instantly teleport everyone to where he was (I ended up belly flopping the floor as I was still falling at that point) so he could declare that it was too late! He informed us that all his forces were at the castle and were ready to take it over and nothing in the world could stop him now! Cue evil laugh.
So, as a party of good and neutral aligned characters, we did what any party like us would do: Join the necromancer in exchange for wealth, power, and glory of course! Don't be silly! So we got a teleport back to the front lines, took over the castle, and became generals in the necromancers grand army as he attempted to take over the world. And all of us continued to argue about what to do next all along the way.
First thing I want to say is, "Not the thing you really want to wake up and see."
Now let's see... this looks like an evil campaign... with everypony not having their own unique taste, which makes Rarity the mutation, Rainbow Dash the colorless, Applejack the cut-throat, Fluttershy the corrupt, and Pinkie Pie the... umm... 4th wall killer?
the picture reminds me of, ah... Sleipnir I guess? I mean I see from the spiderwebs and the red-hourglass-on-black-background it's supposed to be spiderpony but what I thiiink are eight legs + horse = sleipnir to me, heh.
...or is that just really bilowy robes? I can't tell.
You ask for storytime, and storytime is what you'll get!
Excelsus, the Dark Heresy campaign I've been playing in, has drawn to a close.
After crash-landing an ancient shuttle on a long-forgotten planet, we - a fire team of the Shattered Suns mercenary guild - were near the mysterious cache of archeotech we'd been hired to find way back in session 3. After a night of recovery in an abandoned Castellum Stronghold from the crash and the fight that preceded it, the latter requiring that we use up the last of our medicines and install new eyes on our combat specialist, we hopped on our jetbikes and moved across the swamp towards our destination.
Tyranid Raveners from Hive Fleet Nidhoggr ambushed us along the way, and we dueled them in the air en route. We dodged every claw that they swung our way, until the fifth and final managed to tear into Bekowski, our grenadier. His bike took the worst of the blow, though, and he lived to end its fiery flight with his power fist.
I'll edit in the rest tomorrow(EDIT: eventually); just noticed the time. Our gamemaster is more eloquent than I.
No story time, per se, but who would like to hear about Raxon's big psychological warfare campaign?
You see, Raxon has a family crest. This crest is also on his flag. He designed it himself. It is immediately recognizable. And it is so damned ominous that you can't help but immediately decide he's evil for it.
The crest has an image of Earth, hanging from a spider web. The webs are connected to marionette sticks. Under the globe are the words, "Many threads, one web." This just screams evil, right? Nope! The crest is literally just to screw with the UN. He was planning to have a flag depicting a hand burning a white flag, but that was kind of hard to get right.
Also, Raxon feels it's the kind of flag that will make people think twice about trying to attack him. Add to that, the fact he has a friend who plays his trusted adviser, and they constantly go back and forth, 'betraying' each other to seize power, so nobody is sure which one is the real guy in charge. (Spoiler alert, It's Raxon. You know how he can make flesh golem drones? Yeah, the whole thing is one big sock puppet act. They are both him.)
Needless to say, Raxon is tons of fun to work for, since you get bonus pay for voluntarily helping with confusing and screwing with reporters and visiting dignitaries. Not so fun to be other countries and deal with his lunacy.
Actually, if there was a national flag that was always on fire, that country would seem awesome. Raxon should have a !!FLAG!! that's just a sheet of white cloth, on fire.
Hey, as long as you ask the dead's permission before summoning and binding them, I figure you don't gotta worry about that Good alignment.
Actually have that as a character idea that's been floating around in my head- a Necromancer who's first 'zombie' was actually her sweet old nursemaid, who just wanted to be able to come back and watch over her and take care of her.
Well, Raxon, I played a Chaotic Good Cleric once, DM expected the other Monster-Hunter themed PC's to instakill me, so he allowed it...
Apparently they really liked the Hellsing approach of Using vampires to Fight vampires... >:D
In a weird sense of Irony, dispite having a template, my inability to Munchkin at all resulted me in being the weakest Attacker in the Team, but with massive AoE Radient-Damage channeling, equelly as huge AoE heals, and Massive AC, HP, and Fast healing, I basically became the Ultimate Tank... Even tho my AoE's were never game-winning in damage, they LOOKED Dangerous, so Enemies always tried to take me out first!
Thats when the Human Sniper and Tengu Samurai removed their Organs. >:3
Really, we ended up making a Amazing 3-man team, and broke several Plots akin to this comics first Arc, with us beating the enemy like... several encounters early.
frostedWarlock got caught by a power outage yesterday too? Wow. I'm glad work and the game store had power yesterday, as I've have been sitting home in the dark otherwise. A shame about all the trees we lost across the city, though. Wet snow on a full set of leaves was devastating. :(
There was one campaign where the PCs managed to screw up so badly that they created a few new evil gods, got some good gods killed, and then caused a few previously evil gods to flip to the side of good.
Lolth became a happy-go-lucky goddess of laughter and merriment. She put the LOL in Lolth. :3
(from you, Digo. On what exactly happened. In case that wasn't clear)
EDIT: The PCs could totally change their alignment, claim that the screw-up was intentionally well-thought diabolical plan, and become the favored apostles of the new evil gods they created... (and maybe even gain favor with the enemies of the good gods they killed?)
Hey! They could even make a bunch of money by patenting and selling a "How to kill gods and change their alignments: 12-week course with Guaranteed Results*!")
In a way, they were more like computers. Their thoughts and actions based upon calculations to further their goals. A god cannot suddenly decide to change alignment. It's programming would have to be edited. That was basically the disaster the PCs caused with a handful of gods. :)
Oh On the RPG front, Ponies in Rifts just got interesting. Trixie hit Lv 6 as the only Anthro-Pony Combat Mage and for her two new spells she chose Thundermaul, a combat mage spell that summons an ethereal war hammer that you can use or hand to an ally for the duration of the spell, and...FIREBALL!! We all cringed, we know that she's gonna have way too much fun with that.
Also, a request for Ponies in the Three Galaxies has started me working on a test set, including Trixie and some background ponies as the crew of an Equestrian Runners (think Han Solo and crew).
But modern stuff is still flammable so Fireball is a classic you can't go wrong with.
Someone's never been on the business end of a reflected lightning bolt. (N.B. The 'billiard ball' reflection was always an optional rule.)
I usually get stuck or blown up due to the larger ships not handling the sudden loss of whatever I destroy.
Same GM as my Dark Heresy campaign, which we finished last night. I guess I'll storytime that down below later.
This was actually my first session ever, before I got to know everyone else that I would soon develop the relationship I've no doubt keep bringing up here despite myself. We were tasked by the king to go to a necromancer's tower and, well, kill the necromancer. After going through the forest where we murdered spiders and goblins, we managed to get to the locked entrance of the tower. After some discussion, our dwarf decided to use me (one of two clerics) as a battering ram and somehow got a natural 20 on the roll. Suffice to say it worked and one thing I learned about my group is that if something worked, we keep doing it. After the third door (where I continued with the glorious job of being a battering ram), Our party decided to split up and try to find the necromancer. We justified it to ourselves saying we hadn't bumped into anything at all after going through a few rooms. This wasn't too far off in hindsight since this DM liked traps and illusions more than actual monster encounters. So after I discovered a secret passage and being thrown out the window by our short tempered dwarf because I succeeded where he failed, said dwarf found the necromancer who was narcissistic enough to instantly teleport everyone to where he was (I ended up belly flopping the floor as I was still falling at that point) so he could declare that it was too late! He informed us that all his forces were at the castle and were ready to take it over and nothing in the world could stop him now! Cue evil laugh.
So, as a party of good and neutral aligned characters, we did what any party like us would do: Join the necromancer in exchange for wealth, power, and glory of course! Don't be silly! So we got a teleport back to the front lines, took over the castle, and became generals in the necromancers grand army as he attempted to take over the world. And all of us continued to argue about what to do next all along the way.
Ah, good times.
Now let's see... this looks like an evil campaign... with everypony not having their own unique taste, which makes Rarity the mutation, Rainbow Dash the colorless, Applejack the cut-throat, Fluttershy the corrupt, and Pinkie Pie the... umm... 4th wall killer?
... yeah, not a team one could easily kill...
Let's get back to some Music.
...or is that just really bilowy robes? I can't tell.
That picture probably isn't improving my thoughts on Rarity.
Excelsus, the Dark Heresy campaign I've been playing in, has drawn to a close.
After crash-landing an ancient shuttle on a long-forgotten planet, we - a fire team of the Shattered Suns mercenary guild - were near the mysterious cache of archeotech we'd been hired to find way back in session 3. After a night of recovery in an abandoned Castellum Stronghold from the crash and the fight that preceded it, the latter requiring that we use up the last of our medicines and install new eyes on our combat specialist, we hopped on our jetbikes and moved across the swamp towards our destination.
Tyranid Raveners from Hive Fleet Nidhoggr ambushed us along the way, and we dueled them in the air en route. We dodged every claw that they swung our way, until the fifth and final managed to tear into Bekowski, our grenadier. His bike took the worst of the blow, though, and he lived to end its fiery flight with his power fist.
I'll edit in the rest tomorrow(EDIT: eventually); just noticed the time.
Our gamemaster is more eloquent than I.
You see, Raxon has a family crest. This crest is also on his flag. He designed it himself. It is immediately recognizable. And it is so damned ominous that you can't help but immediately decide he's evil for it.
The crest has an image of Earth, hanging from a spider web. The webs are connected to marionette sticks. Under the globe are the words, "Many threads, one web." This just screams evil, right? Nope! The crest is literally just to screw with the UN. He was planning to have a flag depicting a hand burning a white flag, but that was kind of hard to get right.
Also, Raxon feels it's the kind of flag that will make people think twice about trying to attack him. Add to that, the fact he has a friend who plays his trusted adviser, and they constantly go back and forth, 'betraying' each other to seize power, so nobody is sure which one is the real guy in charge. (Spoiler alert, It's Raxon. You know how he can make flesh golem drones? Yeah, the whole thing is one big sock puppet act. They are both him.)
Needless to say, Raxon is tons of fun to work for, since you get bonus pay for voluntarily helping with confusing and screwing with reporters and visiting dignitaries. Not so fun to be other countries and deal with his lunacy.
Totally stealing that! They will be the flags carried into battle! Flaming white flags that don't burn up! Yesssss...
Now granted, the KKK are racist douchebags, but which one has the better symbol?
Chaotic Good, member in good standing with the Mages guild, and does not even attempt to hide her Vocation...
Her familiar is a extremely adorable crow with a fetish for anything Shiny.
Tho, to be fair, She focuses mostly on debuffs and debilitating her enemies, then summoning undead.
Actually have that as a character idea that's been floating around in my head- a Necromancer who's first 'zombie' was actually her sweet old nursemaid, who just wanted to be able to come back and watch over her and take care of her.
Apparently they really liked the Hellsing approach of Using vampires to Fight vampires... >:D
In a weird sense of Irony, dispite having a template, my inability to Munchkin at all resulted me in being the weakest Attacker in the Team, but with massive AoE Radient-Damage channeling, equelly as huge AoE heals, and Massive AC, HP, and Fast healing, I basically became the Ultimate Tank... Even tho my AoE's were never game-winning in damage, they LOOKED Dangerous, so Enemies always tried to take me out first!
Thats when the Human Sniper and Tengu Samurai removed their Organs. >:3
Really, we ended up making a Amazing 3-man team, and broke several Plots akin to this comics first Arc, with us beating the enemy like... several encounters early.
Basically nothing deathy about her outfit, she even got mistook for a Priest once XD
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Count_Duckula)