Ruby - Astral Pirate and Planar Tout

"What me? I'm no one special, just another cutter trying to find her way in this barmy place of ours. Hey look, you shouldn't think about it all too hard, that'll just confuse things! Just keep smiling, look on the bright side and trust in yourself. You'll be fine in no time, promise. Now, can I show you to a nice bar or maybe you'd like a good meal? You do have jink to splash, right?"

Ruby; Chaotic Neutral Human Godsman.

12th level Bard.

Strength: 9
Dexterity: 12
Constitution: 10
Intelligence: 16
Wisdom: 11
Charisma: 18 (+1@4th. +1@8th. +1@12th)

HP: 44 (6,6,6,5,3,3,2,5,1,1,1,1,4)
AC: 16 (touch 11, flat-footed 15)
Base Attack Bonus: +9/+4
Initiative: +1

Melee AB: +8/+3
Ranged AB: +10/+5

Fortitude: +4
Reflex: +8 (+9)
Willpower: +8


Racial Abilities:-
- Skill Points +1 (level)
- Feats +1

Class Abilities:-
- Bardic Music (level)
- Bardic Knack
- Countersong
- Fascinate
- Inspire Courage (+2@8th)
- Inspire Competence
- Suggestion
- Inspire Greatness
- Song of Freedom

Feats:-
- Quickdraw
- Exotic Weapon Proficiency (firearms)
- Melodic Casting
- Jack of all Trades
- Leadership*
- Song of the Heart (+1 all bonuses/DCs)


Skills Points Left:
+18 - Bluff 14 (+4)
+13 - Craft, Mechanics 10 (+3)
+22 - Diplomacy 14 (+4,+2,+2)
+18 - Disguise 12 (+4,+2)
+18 - Gather Information 12 (+4,+2)
+16 - Intimidate 10 (+4,+2)
+15 - Knowledge, The Planes 12 (+3)
+8 -- Knowledge, Sigil (local) 5 (+3)
+19 - Perform 15 (+4)
+3 -- Profession, Pirate 3
+15 - Sense Motive 15
n/a - Speak Languages 3
+13 - Sleight of Hand 10 (+1,+2)
+19 - Use Magical Device 15 (+4)

Performance Categories: Oratory, Singing.
Languages: Planar Trade, Gith, Lower Planar Common, Upper Planar Common.
Languages Learning: Abyssal, Celestial, Infernal.


Spells(known): 6/4/4/4/3

Spells(usage): 3/3/3/3/2
Spells(bonus): 0/1/1/1/1

0 - Cantrip, Detect Magic, Ghost Sound, Message, Minor Disguise, Read Magic.
1 - Cure Light Wounds, Immediate Assistance, Inspirational Boost, Silent Image.
2 - Alterself, Glitterdust, Invisibility, Tongues.
3 - Dispel Magic, Glibness, Good Hope, Haste.
4 - Celerity, Cure Critical Wounds, Dimension Door.

Gear:-
- Mithril Bodice (+5 armour) (torso)
- Ring of the Under Merchant (darkvision 30') (ring)
- Belt of Many Pouches (waist)
- Lucky Boots (6/day. Immediate. +2 saves, AC or BAB) (feet)
- Comb of Shifting (head)

- Universal Solvent (1)
- Wand of Fireball (6) - 8d6
- Wand of Prismatic Spray (1)

- Scroll of Speak with Dead
- Scroll of Iron Silence (2)
- Scroll of Protection from Evil (5) - CL5
- Scroll of Undetectable Alignment (3)
- Scroll of Magic Circle against Evil

- Flintlock Pistol (2)
- Concealed Shoulder Holster (2)

- Advanced Pistols (2)
- Pistol Holster (2)
- Masterwork Stiletto

- 21 gold
- 12 silver

- Gunpowder and lead (15)
- Glowsticks (12)
- Tindertwigs (25)
- Smokesticks (8)
- Fire Mines (5)


Immediate Assistance: Immediate. Allows an ally to choose to reroll a skill check. Must take the second result. Must be used before success or failure is determined.

Inspirational Boost: Swift. Improves Inspire Courage by +1. Lasts as long as Inspire Courage.





"MeekaMeekaMeeka! Ugggh! Mooka! Mooka!" he gibbers, walking around on the table top, his mechanical eyes rolling around clockwise along with quiet ticking noise, "Meekaboo!" he says, fluttering with his tiny wings to Ruby's left arm, which he drags himself up to rest upon her shoulder, before belching cutely, tiny bubbles drifting from his mouth.

Hehe.. Forgot about Bubs. Do you have stats for all that group perchance? Can have all kinds of fun with the talking monkey.

Unfortunately not

I made the forums at the same time we started that campaign, but we wasn't using the forums for character creation at that point. I actually thought we did!

I was very disappointed to find that Ruby, Dashuann, Monkeyman and Snakeboy were all dried up. Oh, don't forget Goatee

Taan was very strong though and drunk booze from a bucket. Snakeboy was completely insane and banned from a Hive Boozer (and that takes effort), Goatee was about to be interrogated by the Ripcage (Baator) Intelligence Service and Dashuann... is probably punching ghosts out somewhere and laughing whilst doing it

Okay. I believe I'm done here.

There's a few pieces of misc equipment to knock up, but they're all minor and mostly non-functional. 0-Level spells need determining, but since I've been looking for a while, the choices with them shouldn't effect any later spell picks.

I've written up the non-PHB spells, at least with the absolute basics, so they can be viewed without too much of a headache. If there are any dramas with them, again post here and let me know and if those dramas become complicated we'll take it to email.

Feat wise. I spent a lot of time thinking about Ruby and her "Astral Pirate" background and how I could appear to achieve that via numbers and statistics (see her skills).

I wasn't sure about my feat selection, I had the first two pinned down, but didn't know what to do with the last three. I look around at the options for a while, then decided that she had to be able to "swashbuckle". Unfortunately "Swashbuckler" is a fighter base class and wouldn't stack with her abilities at all, so I attempted to make her kinda decent at "swashbuckling".

To be good at "swashbuckling" I assumed, lots of parries and lots of damage on riposte.

I wasn't entirely successful, but somewhat.

Combat Expertise allows her to attack, whilst defending herself. A perfect feat for swashbuckling. Lots of flair, lots of parries and sacrificing the ability to attack for the lot.

Deadly Defense allows her to deal more damage whilst on the defence, which (naturally) works well with combat expertise and swashbuckling as a whole. So whilst fluffing around with intricate and (mostly pointless) moves, you can actually deal a lot of damage on the counter attack.

Arcane Strike was a 50/50 (mostly since I intend to do zero melee combat with this PC), because firstly it requires spells to power it and secondly I had intended to save it for a proper D&D basic Elf idea I had (fighter/wizard).

It requires the usage of spells to power and their usage is slim as it is, but for what it delivers it's good, MOSTLY I think because it's applied to a bard whom have a distinct lack of offensive magics, thus it suddenly feels like you're doing a lot of damage.

I'll write the two new feats below in a very basic, to the point, style, again so it doesn't require a headache when researching.

Deadly Defense. When you use defensive fighting or use combat expertise with at least a -2 attack modifier, you deal an additional +1d6 damage with melee attacks.

Arcane Strike: On your turn, you may sacrifice a spell as a free action and gain +1 to hit and +1d4 damage per level of the spell sacrificed. I.E. a 3rd level spell provides +3 to hit and +3d4 damage. The bonus effects all attacks and lasts until your next combat turn.

I'll answer any questions, queries and problems here.

Many thanks.

seems good to me mate with an interesting character line. someone new for Velenur to dote apon.

I've leveled Ruby up, but since I hadn't used her much previously, I've changed some aspects of the character to what I think, better suit.

Nothing that I've used has changed however.

If that's a problem, lemme know and we'll work it out. Tar.

Ruby seems fine to me Iain, not that i pretend to know alot about Bards ofcourse

at the severe risk of opening up this long running debate, i reckon nightsong infiltrator would be a good option if you think you've gone far enough with bard. you would have to do some OOC training in fighting and sneaking etc to explain the change, but otherwise id have no drama with it or the reallocation of a couple of levels.

Sneaking and thieving generally. Leaving aside for a moment we have little enough sneaking and thieving even to keep Tza occupied (I've disarmed 2 traps and opened no more than 5 locks all campaign), I'm not sure how turning into a sneak thief fits Ruby's style.