NEW GAME! Level 4 "Awakening"

Once the initial bumps and bruises go by, this party will end up rather well-rounded. Scrapper, scout, arcane, divine, with good crossover and style support. Not to mention the quite wonderful warlock ace-in-the-hole. I might also add that Dolmen is now considered just neutral. I've come to realize he's acting half on instinct, like a mindless beast, and half on whatever seems prudent at the moment, which is neutral anyway.

Also, when you have a party face to nudge out in front, it's an added bonus when he registers as non-evil. Makes it more believable when you walk into town with enough power to take over, and smile and say "We're just passing through."

I'm wondering how long this will last, because I'm already having late game progression ideas and OOC goals for Dolmen. Regaining his memories and intellect, controlling his form to become more humanoid... maybe even acquiring something to give him back his original form, like a "ring of the aranea" or something, that will give him a more normal alternate form. I love the idea of walking down the street again, in the sunlight, and a fight breaks out, and... take off ring, cue hideous transformation into killing machine.

Tsuru

Male Nezumi, Tatooed Monk 4, LN

Str:13(+1) Dex:18 (+4) Con:16 (+3) Int:14 (+2) Wis:14 (+2) Cha:6 (-2)

Race Features: Low Light Vision, +2 Hide & Spot, +2 vs. Poison & Disease*
Claws & Bite (d4 damage), Immune to Taint
Keen Scent (ID person by scent, Detect opponents within 30’)

Class Features:
Evasion (no damage on save), Simple & Monk Weapons
Unarmed Strike & Improved Unarmed Strike, Stunning Attack (forces Fort save)
Flurry of Blows (1 additional attack with -2 mod)
Magical Tatoos* (see below)

Feats:
Improved Grapple (with a successful unarmed strike, can initiate grapple as free action)
Deflect Arrows
Track by Scent (DC 10, -2 per hour old)

Skills (+ total bonus):
Balance 4 (+8 ), Climb 6 (+ 7), Escape Artist 4 (+8 ), Hide 5 (+11), Jump 4 (+5), Listen 4 (+6),
Move Silently 6 (+10), Search 1 (+3), Spot 3 (+7), Swim 2 (+3), Tumble 3 (+7)

Saves : Fort +7, Reflex + 8, Will +5

Combat: Initiative +4, AC 15, 30 HP
Melee Att +4, d8+1 unarmed strike
Ranged Att +7

Speed: 40

Special: Magical Tatoos
Crane - Immune to Non-magical Disease & Poison
White Mask - Immune to Detect Thoughts, Detect Lies, and Detect Alignment

Equipment:
Loose Pants (white), Sash (black)

Physical Description:
Tsuru is a Nezumi, or ratling as they are sometimes known to the humans of his homeland. He looks like a humanoid rat about 5’5” tall. His fur is gray, except where he has been given magical tatoos, where it grows out a stark white. His tatoos are of a white crane. The crane’s wings spread down his arms, while the crane’s head and beak are tatooed upon his head and face. His eyes are black and his tail, though naked, is a gray color not unlike his fur.

Personality & Background:
Tsuru was a foundling, raised in a monastery within the lands of the Crane Clan. Although the local peasants let their misconceptions and superstitions concerning the ratlings govern their attitudes towards him, the Monks raised him as they would have any other orphan with nowhere else to go. He eventually met others of his Nezumi kin who secretly wandered the benighted countryside, and from them leaned of their once-proud but fallen empire, swallowed up by the tainted Shadowlands. They also taught him of the existence of other worlds beyond the lands of Rokugon, and instilled in him a great wanderlust. At that time his sense of honor and his commitments to protect his adopted home kept him at the monastery, but all of that was soon to change forever.

An army of fearsome Oni and Bakemono issued forth from the Shadowlands, bringing destruction and the taint of evil with them into the human lands. Although the monks fought bravely, only Tsuru, with his natural resistance to the Shadowlands taint, managed to survive. Fleeing before the monsters, he discovered and old ruin, and inadvertently stepped through a long forgotten portal.

Finding himself in the fabled city of doors, Tsuru decided to turn his back on his homeworld. Those he was honor-bound to protect were all dead or mutated by the taint beyond all semblance of humanity. He was not, however, used to fending for himself in an urban environment. Luckily, the Nezumi are consummate scavengers, and his natural instincts have served him well. Tsuru now lives on the streets of the Hive and in the tunnels of Undersigil, scavenging for scraps. He has learned enough about Sigil, however, to visit the Great Gymnasium quite often, to clean himself and to practice his martial arts to stay in fighting trim.

Tsuru is an honorable individual, though he is also smart and devious enough to not meet every challenge head-on. He is not a being of eloquent words. His isolation growing up and some lingering self-consciousness about his race has made him mostly quiet, but direct and terse in conversation. His sense of honor has gotten him into more than one scrape, as he tends to be of the “act first and explain yourself…rarely, if ever” type. Thus despite his physical appearance, he has made a few foes within the were-rat community in Undersigil. He is no fan of bullies or tyrants. Then again, he is no paladin, and has been known to use whatever means necessary to win and to survive.

We ready to get this moving?

/does the Ben Grimm punching his palm thing

It's a prelude cutscene and a picture. Nice flavor, but an opening scene it does not make. For example, Dolmen wouldn't wander far from the Hive, so if I throw up a opener there, and Trias wants the scene to open in the Sensorium or the Lady's Ward, I look stupid.

He's late, or this is all we're getting. Damn. A prelude like that makes me think he has a opener... but maybe that's it.

Alright. No worries. I'm easy as butter.

Alright, the campaign has begun! (and with some tension already -very nice Trias).

Glad to have you aboard Azure -I like your work and character.

Its really late and so I'll post a little later on, since I don't want to have my first post be sloppy (first impressions and all).

Trias -what was up with the cool PS picture (it was up yesterday and now gone)?

Ok, I've posted on the campaign thread -sorry it took me a while (first post and all being a little longer especially since I had to give my char's description since Trias never got to me about just posting it here).

Anyways, nice to see it all start and can't wait more responses.