Aetrimonde

Before we move on from Ragnvald, I’d like to preview what Ragnvald might look like as he gains a few levels. Although Aetrimonde has no hard level cap, I plan for the material in the CRB and GMH to support adventures from levels 0-20, which I think ought to provide enough space for development in any campaign.

For every level gained, a character can pick out a new power, new feat, and new perk. At levels divisible by 5, their expertise bonus also increases by 1, and…that’s it! Aetrimonde characters get all of their class features at level 0 and are ready to go out of the box; becoming more powerful is a matter of learning new tricks (mostly from powers) and putting new twists on old ones (mostly from feats).

In this post, I’ll cover levels 1-5 of Ragnvald’s career: enough to demonstrate where Ragnvald might be heading, but not so much as to get tedious. For his perks, I’m going to be basing his choices on what happened to Ragnvald in the campaign where I played him, but someone else playing Ragnvald could easily make entirely different choices.

Level 1

One thing that Ragnvald doesn’t have in his power selection is a way to attack–and therefore challenge–more than one enemy at once. For starters, he can pick up Cleave, which is a lesser power that offers him the chance to make a second attack against a nearby foe. Coupled with his class features, that also lets him challenge a second enemy on his turn (if the first attack hits). Like Advancing Strike, Cleave also offers him a little bit of mobility that he otherwise lacks, by giving him one square of safe movement that allows him to edge past a foe–again, if his first attack hits..

For his new feat, Ragnvald will take Improved Battlefield Challenge, which now synergizes with his ability to challenge more than one creature per round. He doesn’t have many uses for his reaction (basically just his Walk it Off power, at the moment) so he won’t suffer too badly from holding it in reserve.

And, for his new perk, Ragnvald will prepare to continue his legal studies by learning High Dwarven (or Hochdverg), the legal and ceremonial language of the Dwarven Federation. This is considered an ancient language, even though it is still used for official purposes; the Language perk allows Ragnvald to learn High Dwarven only because he is trained in History.

Level 2

All of Ragnvald’s powers so far deal relatively standard damage (2d4r1 + 4, using his warhammer), so at level 2, he will pick up a greater power giving him a higher-damage attack. Unfortunately, many high-damage Martial powers require either a two-handed weapon or a light weapon: since he wields a warhammer and a shield, it would be difficult for Ragnvald to make these options work. One option that would work with Ragnvald’s weapon setup is Deadly Strike: this power has no particular weapon requirement, deals increased damage, and has the additional perk of gaining critical threat on its attack roll. Critical threat causes an attack roll to be a critical hit if the dice land totalling 17-20 before modifiers (instead of 18-20, as is normal). This increases the chances of a critical hit from 6% to 10%, and even further if the attack roll also has favor.

At this point in his adventures, Ragnvald has accumulated some treasure, and can easily afford a suit of plate armor, but he lacks proficiency. He can take the Plate Armor Proficiency feat to remedy this, and will then acquire a suit of Full Plate at the first opportunity, giving him an additional +1 AC and AR over his scale armor. This doesn’t scale with level the way that some other defensive feats would, but he has several levels to go before his expertise bonus gets large enough that it would be better than the benefits of Full Plate.

Ragnvald’s studies continue, but this time he spends his time learning about the fiefdom he expects to inherit, the Jarldom of Helgenholt. This is represented by an Esoteric Knowledge perk, which he can apply to all sorts of knowledge checks related to the geography, history, and people of Helgenholt. Ragnvald is disappointed to learn that the people of Helgenholt are prosperous, quite happy governing themselves, and unlikely to throw him a parade if he shows up and claims to be their long-lost ruler.

Level 3

Ragnvald now has a nice, broad selection of powers: it may be time to start consolidating his options by picking some greater powers in the same niches as his lesser powers, and vice versa. Shield Charge is an interesting complement to Advancing Strike, in that it too applies forced movement, but Shield Charge is also useful as an opener: unlike Advancing Strike, it can be used while charging, allowing Ragnvald to close the distance at the start of combat or catch up with a fleeing enemy. (Also, as a Shield power, he could use it while disarmed of his weapon.)

By level 3, Ragnvald and his adventuring companions are starting to encounter some more powerful foes, and Ragnvald’s attacks (already slightly inaccurate due to his use of a warhammer) are becoming more so. To try and catch up, Ragnvald now takes Weapon Aim [Hammers], giving him a +1 feat bonus to attack rolls using his warhammer and any other hammers he picks up. This bonus will scale, increasing to +2 at level 10 and +3 at level 20.

Ragnvald has finally had a chance to actually visit Helgenholt, while he and his fellow adventurers were en route to an adventure putting a stop to gryphon rustling in the high valleys above the town. The locals were, as he glumly predicted, unimpressed with his claim to the Jarldom, but he was pleasantly surprised by the warm reception he and his companions got on the way back through town with a manacled band of captive rustlers in tow. They might not have welcomed him with open arms as their rightful liege, but the town archivist did offer to let him look through their genealogies next time he has some time to spare, and the captain of the town watch has offered him a job if he ever decides to give up on adventuring…and, it is implied, his inheritance. Ragnvald now has the Contacts [Helgenholt] perk, allowing him to call in some favors with the locals if he is ever in the area again.

Level 4

To continue consolidating Ragnvald’s powers, let’s give him Overpower as a lesser power equivalent to the Unrelenting Strikes greater power he already has. Overpower is a bit more limited than Unrelenting Strikes, in that it only works on creatures that are already flatfooted, but used correctly and with a bit of luck it can keep an enemy flatfooted for a few turns, and without using a greater power.

For his feat, let’s try improving Battlefield Challenge by giving Ragnvald the Challenger’s Sunder feat: this will let him try to smash an enemy’s equipment instead of making a regular opportune strike. That’s a little bit niche, since it won’t work on animals or other creatures that don’t have equipment they rely on, but against someone with a weapon or shield they rely on it can be a game-changer. Sundering is a combat maneuver, and any character can attempt it, but this feat will give Ragnvald some extra opportunities to try it. In many cases, an enemy might choose to take damage instead of letting Ragnvald deal the damage to a valuable item, but that still works out in Ragnvald’s favor.

For his perk, Ragnvald will take another Esoteric Knowledge perk, this time about Dwarven Inheritance Law as he picks up his legal studies again. Ragnvald is beginning to understand just how tenuous his clan’s claim to the Jarldom of Helgenholt really is, and just how silly and wasteful it has been for them to keep pressing it for decades.

Level 5

Ragnvald will pick up his first ranged power, Flattening Hurl, to be used with his throwing axes. This is something Ragnvald can use when pursuing a fleeing enemy, or if he starts combat just a little too far away to close with the enemy. (It also has a niche use in pushing enemies off of ledges or into traps, like any power that can push.)

For his feat, Ragnvald will take Toughness, which synergizes nicely with the hefty armor resistance he already gets from his full plate. Combined with the increased hit points he gets as a result of his expertise bonus increasing from +2 to +3, this will bring his total hit points to 50 and his large heals to 1d12 + 5. (Unlike Weapon Aim, another feat that just grants a numeric bonus, the Toughness feat does not scale based on Ragnvald’s expertise bonus, because hit points and large heals already do so.)

Finally, as a result of his latest adventure, which brought him in contact with his rival claimant to the Jarldom, Ragnvald has taken some time to think about the futility of a generations-long legal battle over a title and a town that’s getting along fine without a Jarl. He has renounced his clan’s claim and submitted a motion to dissolve the Jarldom entirely, earning the ire not just of his own clan but of all the other claimants. Since this doesn’t map well to any of the perks with specific rules, we will just name this perk “Dwarven Reformer,” and have it apply to any checks related to overcoming the inertia of dwarven traditions and stubbornness.

Up Next

This is as far as I’m going to take Ragnvald in this blog, but I think it should give some idea of how a character progresses. I’m going to spend a few posts talking about other things, like the enemies Ragnvald might face in his early adventures, before diving into the next sample character.