Setting: The grand lodge.
A half-elf looks around at fellow Pathfinders across the table. "Any one of you know ways to catch your foes by surprise." He draws a dagger, grinning wickedly. "After all, I'd hate for my enemies to have a fighting chance."
hello, fello Pathfinders! My character has been looking for in-game tricks to confuuse his enemies. I thought I could profit from knowing hints from veterans. Thanks to another person for giving me this idea!
Concept: Ii have been thinking of developing him as a pure rogue or as a rogue/alchemist.
|Eric Brittain RPG Venture-Captain, California—San Diego|
Posting as Vakog Prac - a tiefling who is known to a) be disdainful of everyone and everything, b) be a follower of the prophesies of Kellistrade, c) carry out Venture Captain's orders to the letter of the request and not once iota more. VCs can not use aliases
"That is simple. Never fight the fight they want you to." An evil grin spreads across his fiendish features, "The trick is figuring out what they want."
The tiefling returns to his book without further explanation.
A dwarf with a deep desert tan cocks an eyebrow at the half-elf. "Look at yourself, Kyros. If you met someone dressed likewise, with light armor and fine-controlled weapons, what would you expect?" He walks over to sit in a chair closer to the half-elf, and his short sleeves reveal a Thassilonian rune burned into his right forearm.
"So glamer that armor to look like a satin tunic, or disguise it further to seem a fine breastplate bearing some religious symbols. Let your foe think you a mage, or a priest. That's good for one surprise."
The dwarf reaches into his belt pouch and tosses a handful of small items onto the lampstand between them. "Feather tokens. Only good once, so don't waste 'em, but you can grow a tree in the middle of a battleground, or summon a whip to do your bidding, or move across water faster than you can run. That's another surprise.
"Learn some magic spells, and save them for the third round of combat.
"Throw your rapier into the air, and as their head snaps up to follow it, stick a dagger in their throat."
He gathers up the tokens and winks at Kyros. "And as for the mindless foes, throw them down a pit. Heh heh."
|Violetta the Enchantress|
A tall, slender, very elegant human woman, dripping with jewels and wearing a gossamer white gown, delicately embroidered in lavender sigils which seem to shift and change in the firelight, looks up from her reverie at the question.
“Hmmm, well… I prefer the approach of simply not fighting, myself. How to “get the drop” on an enemy? I’ve always found that the surest way is to arrange, whether by trickery or coercion, to have that enemy regard you as a friend. After all, who expects one’s friend to do one harm?”
Violetta smiles, reflecting back.
“Or, failing that, you arrange to take control of an enemy’s friend, or even loved one… it’s amazing what you can achieve if you can reach into someone’s mind and shatter their will. That, or bribery… everyone has some price. I once faced a pair of twins, both wizards; the look on the one’s face when her own sister incinerated her with chain lightning – priceless.
As for unintelligent foes? I suppose certain undead, oozes, vermin? Mindless undead are trivial to command, so that’s barely worth addressing. Oozes are trickier, but they are very, very slow, and so long as they’ll fit in a Resilient Sphere, well; vermin all have raisins for brains, so they are usually perfectly susceptible to, say, shadow-evoked devastation of some kind.”
She raises a cup of tea to flawless lips.
“Of course, being very, very quiet can work wonders, as well.”
"Ah yes, the ancient art of sneakiness." Kyros's smile widens even more, and you can see the sadistic pleasure of taking a life sparkling in his eyes. "I can see how glamouring my armor could work, make it seem though I was a wizard, or cleric. Make them underestimate me. Oh, I can already see the terror in my enemy's eyes. and as for throwing up my rapier, why not simply have it a dager. After all, it is easier to throw.' He pulls back his cloak, revealing an array of notched daggers.
The art of surprise is fun at parties. I also like impersonations, (Righty changes from his current fashionable self to a rustic pirate human) getting up real close and leaving a present with your new friend. (Rogue talent underhanded). There is also the talent of improvisation, fun at the theater or with whatever is lying at hand.
One of my new friends is considering a varisian talent of reading and throwing cards. It makes those deary rules regarding pointy objects irrelevant. It makes for hearty conversation with your foe. I think there is death in your future... oh my the cards are surely stacked against you...
|Gray of the UnderRoot|
" Skweee !"
A rat runs out from the shadows and catches a 'roach. With two nibbles its head is devoured.
The rat starts to shimmer befor your eyes and grows larger, larger and more human in form. Once the transformation is complete a mottled grey humanoid stands befor you dressed in a suple doe hide and silk sleevless robe, barefoot and silk/hide hakama.
" Never underestimate that which goes unseen!"
With that being said the stranger pops the last morsel of bug in its mouth and sits in the nearest unoccupied table.
A masked and cowled being probably male, clothed is fine tailored clothes of black and red draped in a black cloak with a red lining sits up from the chair it was leaning in. "Well, my dear lad, as our fellow 'finders have said going unseen goes a long way. And when they can't see you shoving your blade into their kidney goes a long distance. They'll surely think twice about trifling with you. I've found scrolls and such to be useful to remain unseen, but in dire straights, when time is of the essence, they can be, well, time consuming. Having one of these," with a raised hand Crimson shows a fairly unadorned silver ring, "Is much quicker and will render you positively invisible. But if you're looking for something with a bit more UMPH, well," Crimson chuckles and returns to his lax and leaning posture. The other hand raised this time, upon the black gloved hand a charred bone ring. "Using this little jimmy will surely let you get some firey retribution on your enemies. Just be sure you remember to duck."
The waiter walks up to the table and sets down pitcher of beer, and a folded paper. Marked on the paper is the glyph of the open road.
"Da man at the end of the bar sent dis over."
You glance over to the bar to see... no one. Turning back to the waiter, he is now a short dwarven man dressed as a rogue, who picks up the pitcher and takes a health pull. "Look like someone they are expecting. Did you take out guards going in? Disguise yourself as the guard, or at least one of them." The dwarf shimmers and is replaced by the same dwarf, in plate armor with a tower shield. Touching the hat on his head he says, "Hat of disguise - but it's all in HOW you use it. Who do they expect to see? Guards on patrol can walk right by check points. And two loud guards marching will cover the sound of several invisible persons cat walking by."
|Bloodspeaker Mea Culpa|
The tall tiefling over by the bar, scarfing down a plate of woefully undercooked-looking chicken looks up, a glimmer in her eyes. She has a smattering of draconic scales along her limbs, rippling as the hege underlying muscles flex and relax, and large horns curve back from her brow and temples, patterned similarly to a black dragon.
"I like those tokens, I made a tree inside a frog that ate me once! It was a frog tree teeheehee! If you wanna be sneaky though yeah, just be invisible! Use your wizard spells and then the bad guys won't hit you if you run up to them to punch them. It's fun! But then it is hard to make the bad guys attack you so they don't hit your friends, and it is nice to do that like grand mister Torch taught us."
Although she was recently published, you begin to understand the rumors that her manuscript was submitted in crayon.
|Twig the Witch|
The black robed woman's skeletal thin body is covered by her dark, silver lined robes. Only her hands, tipped with fearsome looking claws, betray in any way what the rest of her body looks like. She moves slightly, then holds up a hand and allows a whippoorwill to land on her extended hand.
"I have found that, knowing much has aided in surprising a foe when they do not expect you to know what you know." She says, her voice carrying the accent of an Absalom native. "Though... the undead show little surprise before they are removed from this world." She adds, a steely glint in her eyes, visible even behind the funerary mask that she wears.
A dwarf in over used and underwashed garments starts to speak up after taking a bit of his meal, spitting a bit of his haggis as he speaks.
"Oi, if ye caster can't climb, I've found carrying them into battle works wonders! If tha' dun work, then an unexpected weapon may do tha trick. 'Nother trick for me kind are to fool tha enemy by moving slower tha' normal for the beginnin' o the fight."
|Avelina of Mendev|
You see a young human woman in an outfit that has much in common with the standard Iomedaean cassock. However, the yellow trim has been replaced with a more ostentatious gilding, the skirt only goes to the knee and is pleated, and the arms are sleeveless. Her leather opera gloves and thigh-high boots match the same style. Most of her wavy golden blonde hair is back in a ponytail held by at least half-a-dozen ad hoc ties, but a few loose locks frame her face.
Two engraved tomes hang from belt cords on her right, and a longsword modeled after Iomedae's holy symbol hangs in a ruby-encrusted scabbard on her left. Her spring-loaded wrist sheaths are the same ivory and gold color as her gloves.
"I never have to resort to such vulgar tactics. I find that villains are surprised enough by my unmatched holy power. They keep mistaking the Word of Iomedae and the Arrows of the Inheritor for mere arcane trifles. I can hardly blame them, though; it may be difficult for them to comprehend how a mortal could be both a timeless beauty AND a paragon of righteousness. I marvel at it myself, sometimes."
|Avelina of Mendev|
Vakog snorts in amusement at the long running conversation but does not look up from his book.
Vakog Prac is a tiefling who is known to a) be disdainful of everyone and everything, b) be a follower of the prophesies of Kellistrade, c) carry out Venture Captain's orders to the letter of the request and not once iota more.