UnbrokenEvaHIGH ON THE WIREBUT I WON'T TRIP ITRegistered Userregular
edited May 2012
I'm still not getting the logical jump of "magic, therefore heroes wielding kitchenware"
Like I see that you are making the claim that there is no setting in which there is magic that would be made sillier by having the hero killing monsters exclusively with a frying pan but I do not understand how that makes any fucking sense.
Changing it to
From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
A light from the shadows shall spring;
Renewed shall be skillet that was broken,
The crownless again shall be king.
fucks up more than just the meter of the verse, unless you're suggesting that Aragorn wielding a frying pan would not change the tone of the story to something more silly/slapstick?
UnbrokenEva on
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AntimatterDevo Was RightGates of SteelRegistered Userregular
He wouldn't use a frying pan because Tolkien isn't fun
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UnbrokenEvaHIGH ON THE WIREBUT I WON'T TRIP ITRegistered Userregular
because that's the relevant point here. Thanks Anti!
D&D is designed around traditional high fantasy and its tropes. It's bad at wacky bullshit like this. To force it onto the game necessarily messes with the game balance and rules.
You guys should use the hero system, which can easily handle wacky bullshit*! I made some enemies which used zen koans to attack people by blowing their minds.
*If you want to spend 3 hours crafting the perfect character.
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UnbrokenEvaHIGH ON THE WIREBUT I WON'T TRIP ITRegistered Userregular
Inigo and the Man In Black duel atop the cliff, exchanging banter between grunts as they expertly swing their frying pans at each other. They switch hands mid-fight not because they're better with the other hand, but because their left arms are getting tired.
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AntimatterDevo Was RightGates of SteelRegistered Userregular
because that's the relevant point here. Thanks Anti!
Welcome!
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UnbrokenEvaHIGH ON THE WIREBUT I WON'T TRIP ITRegistered Userregular
Actually, when I think of "master of cooking utensil combat" the only thing that comes to mind is that girl from Ranma 1/2 that uses the massive pizza spatula thing as a weapon, with smaller throwing spatulas.
I think maybe that's not the tone all games want to have.
Inigo and the Man In Black duel atop the cliff, exchanging banter between grunts as they expertly swing their frying pans at each other. They switch hands mid-fight not because they're better with the other hand, but because their left arms are getting tired.
I know you are trying to argue a point here, but frying pans would totally work in the Princess Bride
Actually, when I think of "master of cooking utensil combat" the only thing that comes to mind is that girl from Ranma 1/2 that uses the massive pizza spatula thing as a weapon, with smaller throwing spatulas.
I think maybe that's not the tone all games want to have.
It's a good thing no one was talking about that at all, right?
Actually, when I think of "master of cooking utensil combat" the only thing that comes to mind is that girl from Ranma 1/2 that uses the massive pizza spatula thing as a weapon, with smaller throwing spatulas.
I think maybe that's not the tone all games want to have.
It's a good thing no one was talking about that at all, right?
No, you wanted your character to be completely competent with an entirely different cooking implement, not the same thing at all.
I'm pretty sure hers actually were custom built for combat, too.
Inigo and the Man In Black duel atop the cliff, exchanging banter between grunts as they expertly swing their frying pans at each other. They switch hands mid-fight not because they're better with the other hand, but because their left arms are getting tired.
Yeah, uh, I actually want to see this.
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UnbrokenEvaHIGH ON THE WIREBUT I WON'T TRIP ITRegistered Userregular
Inigo and the Man In Black duel atop the cliff, exchanging banter between grunts as they expertly swing their frying pans at each other. They switch hands mid-fight not because they're better with the other hand, but because their left arms are getting tired.
Yeah, uh, I actually want to see this.
Oh so do I.
But you've all fallen into my trap because The Princess Bride is wonderfully silly as is.
Inigo and the Man In Black duel atop the cliff, exchanging banter between grunts as they expertly swing their frying pans at each other. They switch hands mid-fight not because they're better with the other hand, but because their left arms are getting tired.
Actually, when I think of "master of cooking utensil combat" the only thing that comes to mind is that girl from Ranma 1/2 that uses the massive pizza spatula thing as a weapon, with smaller throwing spatulas.
I think maybe that's not the tone all games want to have.
It's a good thing no one was talking about that at all, right?
No, you wanted your character to be completely competent with an entirely different cooking implement, not the same thing at all.
I'm pretty sure hers actually were custom built for combat, too.
Glad we agree.
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Zonugal(He/Him) The Holiday ArmadilloI'm Santa's representative for all the southern states. And Mexico!Registered Userregular
Fearghaill, I feel like we are holding back the ocean.
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UnbrokenEvaHIGH ON THE WIREBUT I WON'T TRIP ITRegistered Userregular
And even within a minimally silly high fantasy setting I do think there is a place for a warrior with a knack for turning everything into a weapon, but for the sake of balance there should be some tradeoff to reflect time spent learning that instead of mastering "proper weapons". Perhaps they get no attack roll penalty for using any weapon, improvised, standard, exotic, whatever, and in exchange they can't take specialized feats like Weapon Focus or Weapon Specialization to master one type of weapon in particular.
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UnbrokenEvaHIGH ON THE WIREBUT I WON'T TRIP ITRegistered Userregular
I'd like to get away from frying pans someday, but I suspect the thread will end with them clanging and ringing in our ears
For the record, I'm probably someone who would let a player flavour-up a pan as some kind of club, but that carries two big provisos; one, that that specific pan is their primary weapon and that they don't expect to get a free ride with "real" improvised weapons discovered in the field, and two, that they can make a really persuasive argument as to how and why a frying-pan wielding fighter is something that belongs in my campaign
Than really this is just coming down to perspectives & approaches to role-playing games.
And one group being adamant that their side is the only one that supports fun.
I'm not sure how else someone is supposed to interpret "I'd let him use his cool idea, but his character has to be worse because of it."
Since we're talking in the perspective of D&D 3.5, spending a feat is particularly painful because martial characters are already almost irrelevant beside wizards. They need every resource they can get to stay even somewhat useful to the party.
Martial characters are always irrelevant besides casters, at least in 3.5 E. Saving a feat isn't going to change that.
But it isn't just about shelling out a feat "to be worse," (which I find odd because a character who can immediately arm himself is useful in a lot of situations) its about a character mechanically reflecting the decisions of their characters.
Playing a fighter with "weapon proficiency: club" does represent the decision of the character
they want to play someone who can club people in the face with a frying pan
they played a fighter, and now they can
it shouldn't need anything more than that.
You are still equating a frying pan to a club.
Which they aren't, they are pretty different.
How is the game any worse if you treat them the same? Weapons are already very abstract, and plenty of silly weapons are in the core rules (two bladed sword).
And you need Exotic Weapon Proficiency to wield a two-bladed weapon?
Yes, because it carries mechanical bonuses over other weapons you don't need a feat for.
Kaorti are you seriously making the argument that "Skillet Samurai" isn't inherently a little silly?
Marshmallow's idea of having a specially made combat-skillet would be enough for me to allow it as a GM, however. It's still silly, but at that point the silliness is a case of the character's own eccentricity/quirkiness in having such a thing made.
To me the other way is like the Wonderbat episode of The Simpson's when everyone brings their own home-made bats to the game.
I'd argue that it's no more silly than zatoichi, the blind swordsman. Or a large number of other interesting characters.
It probably sounds like I'm taking a harder line here than I would in person. I don't mean to be saying that anyone is playing the game wrong. The core argument I'm trying to make is:
1) Be willing to compromise on your vision of the game to enable someone else's fun.
2) If you're worried about the tone of the game, the issue is better dealt with by a mature conversation between players.
3) RPGs in general, and D&D in particular abstract a lot of things in the name of fun and playability. Extending this a little further in particular cases doesn't harm the game, so it can only help.
As long as everyone at the table is having fun it doesn't really matter how you run things. I'm just trying to say that I believe following these maxims makes it easier to have more fun. That's it.
I'd like to get away from frying pans someday, but I suspect the thread will end with them clanging and ringing in our ears
For the record, I'm probably someone who would let a player flavour-up a pan as some kind of club, but that carries two big provisos; one, that that specific pan is their primary weapon and that they don't expect to get a free ride with "real" improvised weapons discovered in the field, and two, that they can make a really persuasive argument as to how and why a frying-pan wielding fighter is something that belongs in my campaign
This all seems reasonable to me.
I was under the impression that this mess started because Marshmallow's DM specifically put him in a situation where he was stripped of his equipment and the only thing on hand to use as a weapon was a frying pan. In that case I would rule it as a standard improvised weapon with the associated penalties. Of course, if I was the DM he would only be in that situation because I wanted him to be gimped combat-wise for a particular story reason. I would not immediately let him retcon his character into someone that specialized in the use of frying pans in combat because that would ruin the whole point of what I was trying to do.
If he made it out of the situation and decided afterwards to have a custom combat-skillet made, I would be willing to treat it as a regular or even masterwork club or mace. Probably mace, as it would be metal.
I'd like to get away from frying pans someday, but I suspect the thread will end with them clanging and ringing in our ears
For the record, I'm probably someone who would let a player flavour-up a pan as some kind of club, but that carries two big provisos; one, that that specific pan is their primary weapon and that they don't expect to get a free ride with "real" improvised weapons discovered in the field, and two, that they can make a really persuasive argument as to how and why a frying-pan wielding fighter is something that belongs in my campaign
I think this is a great way of handling it. It gives the character flavor without requiring much extra work. The idea of a sentimental warrior using his trusty frying pan even when presented with other options is cool. So is allowing the player to come up with that bit of character development on the fly.
Oh hey sweet, it was all a misunderstanding, even one most people would agree with you on
The Skillet Samurai rides on
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UnbrokenEvaHIGH ON THE WIREBUT I WON'T TRIP ITRegistered Userregular
Of course, in allowing a player to commission a custom combat-skillet, I would also leave them to deal with the consequences of NPCs and their own party members thinking they're a bit of a loon, at least until they prove themselves with their new weapan.
Of course, in allowing a player to commission a custom combat-skillet, I would also leave them to deal with the consequences of NPCs and their own party members thinking they're a bit of a loon, at least until they prove themselves with their new weapan.
The party enters a bar, each scanned by the unfavorable gang inside by their primary weapon at their side: The dangerous one with a katana, that sly one with a bow and knives, that big guy with a hammer, that... frying pan?
The gang erupts in laughter over the bizarre situation
They end up having the last laugh as their last laugh
A character I played once killed a russian mobster with one of those little sticks you use to stir coffee from across the room
got him right in the eye, and pinned his head to the wall
that was awesome
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UnbrokenEvaHIGH ON THE WIREBUT I WON'T TRIP ITRegistered Userregular
in that situation I'm staying the hell out of the way of the guy with the weaponized cookware, don't wanna mess with no crazyperson
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Der Waffle MousBlame this on the misfortune of your birth.New Yark, New Yark.Registered Userregular
Honestly, the frying pan itself is irrelevant.
The issue is basically a character has a concept that has him using improvised or otherwise non-standard weapons. Requiring him to invest character resources in order to do this, and still be at a large disadvantage for the sake of said concept is unacceptable.
If it helps any, the setting I'm playing in with the pan samurai is Pokemon.
He's got a Houndour which is probably the most outrageous damage dealer we've seen so far, but I don't really consider that a mitigating factor since we had to roll randomly for our starter species and the GM has been doing all the stats himself so it's not like I have any say in what happens there.
The issue is basically a character has a concept that has him using improvised or otherwise non-standard weapons. Requiring him to invest character resources in order to do this, and still be at a large disadvantage for the sake of said concept is unacceptable.
not really?
a mcguffin is designed to do a thing other than kill people, you might be good at using a mcguffin to kill people but that doesn't mean a it should be as good at killing people as a thing specifically designed to fuck a dudes day up
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PiptheFairFrequently not in boats.Registered Userregular
like, I do not care how many years you trained under hobbit monks to wield the legendary Cal'pha'lon, a dude that trained as long with a bastard sword is going to kill stuff a whole shitload better than you
Anyway did I ever tell the story about the guy who made a blind gunslinger in my first non-D&D campaign?
It was basically a time when a player had to basically beg me to stop being a git and just let him use a character concept, and I'm so glad I did
Tell us about something awesome he did!
Dang it man you quoted me using basically twice in the same sentence! I don't know if I can handle the shame
But anyway. At the time I called the underlying system for this campaign a homebrew, but in truth it was basically GURPS with a healthy dose of The Window; a d20 was used, but the stats were GURPS attributes with different names, powers and equipment rattled down to M&M style aspects. Spoiling this for looooong:
This friend of mine made a blind gunslinger; let's call him Harold, because I can't actually remember what his name was. Come to think of it there's a non-zero chance that the character really was called Harold. Dual-wielded photon pistols, which in practise had the exact same damage output as the other two ranged party members and their rifles, but lacking sight he relied on his telepathic abilities to pinpoint targets.
I insisted that this wouldn't do, that I'd intended psionics to be an alternate sense rather than a replacement, that the campaign would be crawling with entities that, in-universe and mechanically, I would declare to be invisible to telepathy. He went to great lengths to explain how he would do this concept justice, and argued that it wouldn't be comedically underpowered and ineffectual, just different. It transpired that he actually had a slightly better chance to hit sapient enemies than the average shooter, but he suffered incredibly versus psi-resistant or immune enemies, such as cyborgs or robots respectively. Slightly higher crit range, and the Crippling critical type (if you haven't heard of GURPS books with that variation, it just lets you inflict nasty status effects instead of damage). I grudgingly accepted his sheet.
And when the campaign kicked off and I allowed Harold to rub shoulders with the soldiers and telekinetics, it all seemed to go swimmingly. Picking up stealthy would-be ambushers with psi sense, shooting while disregarding mist or darkness. Granted the attack penalties were gargantuan when the party fought drones, but I tried to keep those rare so as not to render him entirely useless in any one encounter.
And then Asonus entered the frame.
Asonus was the campaign's cyborg big bad. Well, perhaps not the overlord of everything nasty happening in the campaign, but at this penultimate juncture he certainly held most of the power. And you can probably tell where this is going.
Initially the team was going to split up and do some action movie "splitscreen" work with everyone playing at the same table but in completely different areas, and it was agreed that Harold would lead one party and Katia (a sniper/officer type) would lead the other; they guessed, correctly I might add, that Asonus would be backed up by cyborgs and robots aplenty.
Unfortunately, Katia rolled horrifically and ate a direct hit from a bigass gun and had to sit out the encounter, joining the resident hacker at HQ to supply support and intel via communication, not in person.
And for reasons I'm not entirely sure I understand, the party decided to shift Harold and put him in charge of what would've been Katia's expedition.
In three or four sessions, he scored, on average, 2 hits a sitting. He rarely rolled above 5, and his attack penalties ensured that such rolls weren't nearly good enough to hit cyborg bastards. When the odd baseline human appeared, he still managed to miss. Fate was not kind to Harold, and while to begin with people had laughed at his misfortune it got to the stage where the persistent bad luck was just tragic and uncomfortable. I was seriously considering scrapping what I had planned and saying "strangely, it turns out that Asonus's inner circle entirely consists of... normal humans! Standing still and talking loudly!" but that seemed equally unfair to the rest of the party, who'd invested in speciality equipment such as EMP grenades.
But, and this is why I bother telling a story that at face value appears to be about my poor design decisions, Harold had a couple of bright moments in the crapfest that was his experience of the tail end of the campaign.
He interrogated a high-ranking officer, a cyborg with gun hands (this was years ago, and I thought that was cool. Leave me be!) but no mental implants. He'd previously spent the other night working a junior officer, an early capture, but he knew nothing.
Harold makes sure this officer is tied to a chair, and then he brings in a junior officer, also bound. And he tells the officer to talk.
The officer refuses. Harold asks the junior officer to talk. He also refuses.
Harold unholsters both pistols and empties their charge into the junior officer. He's immobile, so the attacks hit automatically. Harold fills every limb with photon bolts, reloads, repeats, and describes how the junior officer, by the end of it, resembles a sponge that someone's baked in the oven overnight.
The party is utterly horrified, and the senior officer talks. About everything.
On his way out of the interrogation chamber, Harold explains that he'd spent the night psionically scanning the junior officer- not to try and read his mind, but to mimic him. The junior officer he'd killed was a psychic projection. The real one was still tied up next door.
I didn't even make him roll for that, I just accepted that it happened, and that it was amazing.
Inevitably, the party tracked down Asonus and fought him. And Asonus wrecked them.
Asonus was your classic "brain in a jar" cyborg. Very little flesh, effectively a mech. And although his honour guard went down quickly, he didn't. A combination of awful rolls for the party and amazing rolls for Asonus had the swordswoman fumbling a parry and being put through a wall, the assassin stumbling and sent sprawling by a plasma blast, and the engineer- the guy with the expensive ion rifle- landing far fewer hits than he should have.
I'd decided there and then that Asonus had a big old cannon that was very, very loud when it charged and slow-firing; and yes, that was so Harold could still dodge it. And dodge it he did, often by the skin of his teeth, all the while ineffectually pattering little bolts of light at a metal hulk that he could barely sense.
The engineer made a gamble, and rushed in close to plant an EMP charge on Asonus. It didn't work. He got planted on his ass because Asonus, it turns out, was even more monstrous in melee.
Wounded but by no means defeated, Asonus starts walking towards Harold, the last man standing.
Harold goes all out, sacrifices his movement and his defence chance to make a double attack.
And he rolls two crits.
And opts to use both of them to Cripple Asonus's to-hit chance.
Or, as Harold described it, the blind gunslinger ended that mission by shooting out the cyborg's eyeballs and then running in and beating the shit out of him with his steel-toe-capped boots while Asonus kneeled on the floor and clasped at his bleeding sockets.
A little later the party realised that Asonus could be rearranged to spell So anus and, forever more, Harold was the defeater of So anus.
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Der Waffle MousBlame this on the misfortune of your birth.New Yark, New Yark.Registered Userregular
like, I do not care how many years you trained under hobbit monks to wield the legendary Cal'pha'lon, a dude that trained as long with a bastard sword is going to kill stuff a whole shitload better than you
Well duh. Monks.
Look can we just agree that the best killer in this scenario is going to be the guy who spent most of his life reading books?
Posts
Because then you go all biblical and quip that you used the jawbone of an ass to makes asses out of 'em.
http://deicidecomic.tumblr.com/
READ MY COMIC ^^
Like I see that you are making the claim that there is no setting in which there is magic that would be made sillier by having the hero killing monsters exclusively with a frying pan but I do not understand how that makes any fucking sense.
Changing it to
fucks up more than just the meter of the verse, unless you're suggesting that Aragorn wielding a frying pan would not change the tone of the story to something more silly/slapstick?
One-shotting orcs everywhere, obviously using a house rule
You guys should use the hero system, which can easily handle wacky bullshit*! I made some enemies which used zen koans to attack people by blowing their minds.
*If you want to spend 3 hours crafting the perfect character.
Welcome!
I think maybe that's not the tone all games want to have.
I know you are trying to argue a point here, but frying pans would totally work in the Princess Bride
It's a good thing no one was talking about that at all, right?
that would be awesome.
http://deicidecomic.tumblr.com/
READ MY COMIC ^^
No, you wanted your character to be completely competent with an entirely different cooking implement, not the same thing at all.
I'm pretty sure hers actually were custom built for combat, too.
Yeah, uh, I actually want to see this.
Oh so do I.
But you've all fallen into my trap because The Princess Bride is wonderfully silly as is.
Yeah, this sounds amazing.
http://deicidecomic.tumblr.com/
READ MY COMIC ^^
Glad we agree.
And Straightzi. He's cool too.
For the record, I'm probably someone who would let a player flavour-up a pan as some kind of club, but that carries two big provisos; one, that that specific pan is their primary weapon and that they don't expect to get a free ride with "real" improvised weapons discovered in the field, and two, that they can make a really persuasive argument as to how and why a frying-pan wielding fighter is something that belongs in my campaign
Yes, because it carries mechanical bonuses over other weapons you don't need a feat for.
I'd argue that it's no more silly than zatoichi, the blind swordsman. Or a large number of other interesting characters.
It probably sounds like I'm taking a harder line here than I would in person. I don't mean to be saying that anyone is playing the game wrong. The core argument I'm trying to make is:
1) Be willing to compromise on your vision of the game to enable someone else's fun.
2) If you're worried about the tone of the game, the issue is better dealt with by a mature conversation between players.
3) RPGs in general, and D&D in particular abstract a lot of things in the name of fun and playability. Extending this a little further in particular cases doesn't harm the game, so it can only help.
As long as everyone at the table is having fun it doesn't really matter how you run things. I'm just trying to say that I believe following these maxims makes it easier to have more fun. That's it.
This all seems reasonable to me.
I was under the impression that this mess started because Marshmallow's DM specifically put him in a situation where he was stripped of his equipment and the only thing on hand to use as a weapon was a frying pan. In that case I would rule it as a standard improvised weapon with the associated penalties. Of course, if I was the DM he would only be in that situation because I wanted him to be gimped combat-wise for a particular story reason. I would not immediately let him retcon his character into someone that specialized in the use of frying pans in combat because that would ruin the whole point of what I was trying to do.
If he made it out of the situation and decided afterwards to have a custom combat-skillet made, I would be willing to treat it as a regular or even masterwork club or mace. Probably mace, as it would be metal.
I think this is a great way of handling it. It gives the character flavor without requiring much extra work. The idea of a sentimental warrior using his trusty frying pan even when presented with other options is cool. So is allowing the player to come up with that bit of character development on the fly.
The Skillet Samurai rides on
It was a time when a player had to basically beg me to stop being a git and just let him use a character concept, and I'm so glad I did
Tell us about something awesome he did!
The party enters a bar, each scanned by the unfavorable gang inside by their primary weapon at their side: The dangerous one with a katana, that sly one with a bow and knives, that big guy with a hammer, that... frying pan?
The gang erupts in laughter over the bizarre situation
They end up having the last laugh as their last laugh
got him right in the eye, and pinned his head to the wall
that was awesome
The issue is basically a character has a concept that has him using improvised or otherwise non-standard weapons. Requiring him to invest character resources in order to do this, and still be at a large disadvantage for the sake of said concept is unacceptable.
He's got a Houndour which is probably the most outrageous damage dealer we've seen so far, but I don't really consider that a mitigating factor since we had to roll randomly for our starter species and the GM has been doing all the stats himself so it's not like I have any say in what happens there.
not really?
a mcguffin is designed to do a thing other than kill people, you might be good at using a mcguffin to kill people but that doesn't mean a it should be as good at killing people as a thing specifically designed to fuck a dudes day up
Dang it man you quoted me using basically twice in the same sentence! I don't know if I can handle the shame
But anyway. At the time I called the underlying system for this campaign a homebrew, but in truth it was basically GURPS with a healthy dose of The Window; a d20 was used, but the stats were GURPS attributes with different names, powers and equipment rattled down to M&M style aspects. Spoiling this for looooong:
I insisted that this wouldn't do, that I'd intended psionics to be an alternate sense rather than a replacement, that the campaign would be crawling with entities that, in-universe and mechanically, I would declare to be invisible to telepathy. He went to great lengths to explain how he would do this concept justice, and argued that it wouldn't be comedically underpowered and ineffectual, just different. It transpired that he actually had a slightly better chance to hit sapient enemies than the average shooter, but he suffered incredibly versus psi-resistant or immune enemies, such as cyborgs or robots respectively. Slightly higher crit range, and the Crippling critical type (if you haven't heard of GURPS books with that variation, it just lets you inflict nasty status effects instead of damage). I grudgingly accepted his sheet.
And when the campaign kicked off and I allowed Harold to rub shoulders with the soldiers and telekinetics, it all seemed to go swimmingly. Picking up stealthy would-be ambushers with psi sense, shooting while disregarding mist or darkness. Granted the attack penalties were gargantuan when the party fought drones, but I tried to keep those rare so as not to render him entirely useless in any one encounter.
And then Asonus entered the frame.
Asonus was the campaign's cyborg big bad. Well, perhaps not the overlord of everything nasty happening in the campaign, but at this penultimate juncture he certainly held most of the power. And you can probably tell where this is going.
Initially the team was going to split up and do some action movie "splitscreen" work with everyone playing at the same table but in completely different areas, and it was agreed that Harold would lead one party and Katia (a sniper/officer type) would lead the other; they guessed, correctly I might add, that Asonus would be backed up by cyborgs and robots aplenty.
Unfortunately, Katia rolled horrifically and ate a direct hit from a bigass gun and had to sit out the encounter, joining the resident hacker at HQ to supply support and intel via communication, not in person.
And for reasons I'm not entirely sure I understand, the party decided to shift Harold and put him in charge of what would've been Katia's expedition.
In three or four sessions, he scored, on average, 2 hits a sitting. He rarely rolled above 5, and his attack penalties ensured that such rolls weren't nearly good enough to hit cyborg bastards. When the odd baseline human appeared, he still managed to miss. Fate was not kind to Harold, and while to begin with people had laughed at his misfortune it got to the stage where the persistent bad luck was just tragic and uncomfortable. I was seriously considering scrapping what I had planned and saying "strangely, it turns out that Asonus's inner circle entirely consists of... normal humans! Standing still and talking loudly!" but that seemed equally unfair to the rest of the party, who'd invested in speciality equipment such as EMP grenades.
But, and this is why I bother telling a story that at face value appears to be about my poor design decisions, Harold had a couple of bright moments in the crapfest that was his experience of the tail end of the campaign.
He interrogated a high-ranking officer, a cyborg with gun hands (this was years ago, and I thought that was cool. Leave me be!) but no mental implants. He'd previously spent the other night working a junior officer, an early capture, but he knew nothing.
Harold makes sure this officer is tied to a chair, and then he brings in a junior officer, also bound. And he tells the officer to talk.
The officer refuses. Harold asks the junior officer to talk. He also refuses.
Harold unholsters both pistols and empties their charge into the junior officer. He's immobile, so the attacks hit automatically. Harold fills every limb with photon bolts, reloads, repeats, and describes how the junior officer, by the end of it, resembles a sponge that someone's baked in the oven overnight.
The party is utterly horrified, and the senior officer talks. About everything.
On his way out of the interrogation chamber, Harold explains that he'd spent the night psionically scanning the junior officer- not to try and read his mind, but to mimic him. The junior officer he'd killed was a psychic projection. The real one was still tied up next door.
I didn't even make him roll for that, I just accepted that it happened, and that it was amazing.
Inevitably, the party tracked down Asonus and fought him. And Asonus wrecked them.
Asonus was your classic "brain in a jar" cyborg. Very little flesh, effectively a mech. And although his honour guard went down quickly, he didn't. A combination of awful rolls for the party and amazing rolls for Asonus had the swordswoman fumbling a parry and being put through a wall, the assassin stumbling and sent sprawling by a plasma blast, and the engineer- the guy with the expensive ion rifle- landing far fewer hits than he should have.
I'd decided there and then that Asonus had a big old cannon that was very, very loud when it charged and slow-firing; and yes, that was so Harold could still dodge it. And dodge it he did, often by the skin of his teeth, all the while ineffectually pattering little bolts of light at a metal hulk that he could barely sense.
The engineer made a gamble, and rushed in close to plant an EMP charge on Asonus. It didn't work. He got planted on his ass because Asonus, it turns out, was even more monstrous in melee.
Wounded but by no means defeated, Asonus starts walking towards Harold, the last man standing.
Harold goes all out, sacrifices his movement and his defence chance to make a double attack.
And he rolls two crits.
And opts to use both of them to Cripple Asonus's to-hit chance.
Or, as Harold described it, the blind gunslinger ended that mission by shooting out the cyborg's eyeballs and then running in and beating the shit out of him with his steel-toe-capped boots while Asonus kneeled on the floor and clasped at his bleeding sockets.
A little later the party realised that Asonus could be rearranged to spell So anus and, forever more, Harold was the defeater of So anus.
Look can we just agree that the best killer in this scenario is going to be the guy who spent most of his life reading books?