Greetings!
Welcome to Creative Characters. This is where I indulge myself a bit and create an unusual character, based on a concept, idea, theme, feat or whatever else catches my fancy. These characters are NOT supposed to be optimized, but they ARE supposed to be INTERESTING. For the sake of reference, and consistency, all characters here are created with the Elite stat array (15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8) and all hit points are rolled as averages (and rounded down). They are also written so that they can be used as either NPCs or PCs as the reader chooses, and are written with all special abilities typed out, so as to ensure a minimum amount of book-flipping throughout your game.
This is a recurring series, and you should be seeing installments of it each week. Should you wish to see a particular build or idea featured here, then please don’t hesitate to comment
This time around, I aim to create an evil healer, one who controls the undead, but who can prepare spells to keep her companions alive. (Even if she usually doesn’t).
Melen, Deathbringer/Lifegiver (CR 5)
XP 1,600
Female changeling cleric 6 (undead lord)
NE Medium humanoid (changeling )
Init +8; Senses darkvision 60 ft., Perception +11
DEFENSE
AC 20, touch 15, flat-footed 16 (+5 armor, +4 Dex, +1 natural)
hp 36 (8+5d8+5 (favored class bonus))
Fort +5, Ref +2, Will +9
OFFENSE
Speed 30 ft.
Melee masterwork longspear +3 (1d8-1/x3)
Ranged short bow +3 (1d6/x3)
Cleric Spells Prepared (concentration +10)
3rd—animate dead, hold person (DC 17), prayer,
2nd—bull’s strength, death knell (DC 16), desecrate, spiritual weapon
1st—cause fear (DC 15), divine favor, doom (DC 15), shield of faith
0—bleed (DC 14), guidance (DC 14), resistance (DC 14), virtue
Domains: death
TACTICS
During combat Makan always has the maximum number of creatures raised with her animate dead spell, as well as her corpse companion. These are affected by desecrate (gaining +1 hp per HD), as well as her Charnel Soldiers feat. Half her raised skeletons (her preferred minion) are raised with Duck and Cover, the other half with Intercept Charge, enabling them to “take the hit” for her in various situations. During these instances, she stands in the second rank, using her spells and her longspear as best possible.
Note: If Makana has living companions with her, most of her spells will instead be changed in cure wounds spells.
In combat, she spends her time buffing these creatures and converting spells as needed to heal them. She is not averse to memorizing healing spells (which is not reflected above), to keep her companions alive, as she sees adventurers and combat as an extension of the will of her goddess, bringing more creatures to the afterlife that much sooner.
STATISTICS
Str 8, Dex 10, Con 11 (-2 race), Int 12, Wis 18 (+1 level, +2 race), Cha 16 (+2 race)
Base Atk +4 CMB +3; CMD 13
Feats Charnel Soldiers, Command Undead, Duck and Cover, Intercept Charge, Light Armor Proficiency, Simple Weapon Proficiency
Skills Bluff +11, Diplomacy +11, Knowledge (religion) +10
Languages Common, Necril
Magical Gear +1 chain mail; cloak of resistance (+1), potions of cure moderate wounds (3), ring of protection (+1), robe of bones, staff of command undead, wand of cure light wounds (50 charges); backpack, masterwork longspear; Coins 943 gp, (these remaining coins can be spent at the GM or player’s discretion before the start of the game session).
SPECIAL ABILITIES
Aura (Ex)
Makana has a moderate evil aura for spells that have effects, based on alignment, such as detect evil.
Bleeding Touch (Sp)
As a melee touch attack, Makana can cause a living creature to take 1d6 points of damage per round. This effect persists for 3 rounds or until stopped with a DC 15 Heal check or any spell or effect that heals damage. She can use this ability 7 times per day.
Channel Energy (Su)
Makana channels negative energy and can choose to heal undead creatures or to damage living creatures. Channeling energy causes a burst that affects all creatures of one type (either undead or living) in a 30-foot radius centered on Makana. The amount of damage dealt or healed is equal to 3d6 points of damage. Creatures that take damage from channeled energy receive a Will save to halve the damage. The DC of this save is 16. Makana may channel energy 6 times per day.
Corpse Companion (Su)
With a ritual requiring 8 hours, Makana can animate a single skeleton or zombie whose Hit Dice do not exceed 6. This corpse companion automatically follows her commands and does not need to be controlled by her. She cannot have more than one corpse companion at a time. It does not count against the number of Hit Dice of undead controlled by other methods. She can use this ability to create a variant skeleton such as a bloody or burning skeleton, but its Hit Dice cannot exceed 3. She can dismiss her companion as a standard action, which destroys it.
Green Widow
Makana gains a +2 racial bonus on Bluff checks against creatures that are sexually attracted to her.
Spontaneous Casting
Makana can channel stored spell energy into damaging spells that she did not prepare ahead of time. The cleric can “lose” any prepared spell that is not an orison or domain spell in order to cast any inflict spell of the same spell level or lower (an inflict spell is any spell with “cure” in its name).
HISTORY
Makana is a broken person. Originally a faithful priest of the Goddess of Death and Prophecy, and when the death of another deity proved to not have been in the prophecies, Makana suffered a mental breakdown, causing her to believe that the only prophesied end for all things is death. She now does her best to help others to understand what she calls “The Final Truth”.
While originally, she managed to keep up the pretense of being a normal priest, she eventually revealed herself and was cast out of the clergy. Strangely, the goddess continues to respond to Makana’s prayers, leading some to believe that she’s either blessed by the goddess (and therefore correct), or she’s been led astray by another deity pretending to be the Goddess of Death.
Now Makana travels, helping adventurers where she can, to deliver death to the opponent. Constantly surrounded by the undead, she still realizes that most humanoids will not accept the presence of her undead bodyguards, she leaves them outside of towns, hidden away, when she needs to enter civilization. But once she leaves the confines of the town, she summons them to her side once more.
