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Posts
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Rules
1. NWN is janky. Be prepared for some awkwardness and occasional disasters. Let me know at the end of the session if something wasn’t fun for you so that I can adjust. Be prepared to occasionally have to carry parts of the session on the back of your roleplay alone, while I frantically move things around elsewhere.
2. Death: permanent. PCs bleed from -1 until dead at -10 hit points, players can be stabilized using bandages, healing, or making a CON check. Dead PCs cannot be raised or resurrected. It’s a grim setting, so the rules for death are grim – characters should take care to stay alive.
2. Rest: allowed once every eight game hours. Resting ideally should be done as a group and may involve advancement of time.
3. Time: time will proceed at a logical pace, with occasional advancing of the clock based on PCs’ stated actions (waiting in an inn, resting, etc.) Time in the campaign may advance in between game sessions as well.
4. Multiclassing: all new classes must be selected via appropriate roleplay, to be worked out with the DM. Selecting a similar new class may involve little or no additional requirements, if the PC has already been acting appropriately in-game, while selecting a very different one would require suitable efforts by the PC.
5. Roleplaying: PCs should stay in-character while in the campaign. There is an OOC starting area where OOC issues can be discussed each session if needed, and /tells can be used for private OOC banter (though obviously, avoid metagaming).
6. XP: XP slider for combat is set at a custom level. Session award of 100 XP for each PC is given, representing progress made in working with the group and “normal” use of your PC’s skills. XP is also given out for PCs’ individual or group accomplishments.
Note on roleplaying fear
I am including this here because it is a note rather than a rule, but fear should be roleplayed appropriately.
In my experience, it is very difficult for NWN to be used to create a chilling or frightening atmosphere without the help of players who are willing to roleplay their characters’ fear in order to add to the atmosphere.
Player characters in this module are not adventurers in Faerun, where magic is plentiful, danger common but surmountable and death a minor inconvenience. They are witch hunters in an altogether different world – a world where the fabric of reality has been rent by black magic, and unimaginable horrors drift into the world like shadows. Witch hunters are the fragile line between the civilised world and these shadows.
Naturally, they often suffer horrific and gruesome fates. Even the bravest of witch hunters will feel the icy grip of fear and doubt, even if that fear or doubt is only evidenced in subtle ways on the surface. Bravery is not the absence of fear, it is the strength of will to feel fear and act anyway.
This doesn’t mean that everyone has to scream and jump into each others’ arms at the slightest creak, but the DM and the players should be able to work together to create a chilling atmosphere. The alternative is to use one of the ‘hard’ systems for temporary stat debuffs for fear, which would not be fun.
8. Character creation. This one is important so it’s getting its own post.
Gear
Download the CEP version of PGC3 (see “Technical stuff”, below) to create your Level 6 character. PGC3 will give you 13000gp to spend. Since this is a dark, low magic, low power world, none of the player characters should possess magical items. Mostly, this just means changing the flavouring – so a +1 sword is just a really good sword, +3 lockpicking gloves are just very well-balanced gloves – but this does mean that:
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[*]no potions or healing kits, these will be available ingame
[*]no starting weapons or armour should have higher than a +1 benefit for AC or enhancement
[*]no obviously magical items – these include items that change ability scores, grant feats, or have spell effects or add obviously magical effects to weapons (eg. flaming swords, acid swords) or items that would not logically help a skill (eg. rings with skill buffs)
[*]skill buffs are fine for items that would logically help with that skill. Your boots of +3 discipline are just really good, sturdy boots, your gloves of +3 lockpicking are well-balanced gloves
[*]no starting equipment should have higher than a +3 benefit for skill buffsSo just to be clear, showing up in full plate +1 with a +1 axe and gloves of +3 lockpicking is fine. Showing up with a +5 greatsword and a helmet that gives you Knockdown and an amulet of Freedom of Movement is not fine.
Powerbuilding
The build should match the character, and the character should take priority over the effectiveness of the build. Remember that this is a multiplayer campaign, not a Persistent World, and skill and ability checks are common. Do not build an 8 CHA character unless you’re willing to see them treated as though they have 8 CHA!
Any queries or requests for an exception, shoot me a message on Discord.
Technical Stuff
The only hak we’ll be using is CEP 2.69, and you will need the CEP-enabled version of the Pretty Good Character Creator to create your character.
1) Download CEP 2.69 and install the files to your user data (“Neverwinter Nights”) folder. It is actually necessary is to place all of the .hak files in your NWN:EE user data “hak” subfolder and paste the “tlk” folder into the base “Neverwinter Nights” folder (which by default may not have a “tlk” subfolder). The other files included with the CEP download are builder tools and are not necessary for play.
2) Download the PGC3 character creation mod and place it in your user data “modules” subfolder. This is what you’ll use to generate your PC. Feel free to play around with the customization features as much as you like while following the rules on Character Creation above.
3) Send me the .bic file of the finished character with the player name that you’ll be using to join the server. I’ll create a folder using that name, and you’ll have access to the character in the .bic file.
I strongly recommend you turn off the idiotic Beamdog ‘keyholing’ effect in your NWN settings, and lower the ingame music volume to 0 as I have not paid any attention to that when building the module. Since this is a grim and gothic mini-campaign, I suggest you find some grim and gothic music to listen to while you play!
Send any custom portraits you want to be used so that they can be shared.
Checklist
1. Send your character concept to Face as a private message on this site, using the questions / lore cheat sheet to help. Answer any follow up questions from Face so that he has a better understanding of the character.
2. Download CEP 2.69
3. Download the CEP version of Pretty Good Character Creator and create your character, keeping in mind the rules above (Level 6, no obviously magical items, maximum of +1 for weapons and armour, maximum of +3 for skill buffs)
4. Send your playername, the .bic file of your character, along with any custom portrait, to Face so he can add to the server vault.
5. When it’s time for the session, disable keyholing in the graphics settings, mute the ingame music and follow instructions given over Discord to join the server!
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