Mmmm... Cheese. It comes in many forms -- cheddar, swiss, american, and - of course - munchkinized characters!
Welcome to Hero Craftsmen #15, where you make a character and get it voted on according to all its facets by our judges, to see who can make the best character!
This time our chosen theme is cheesy munchkins, in honor of April Fool's Day. We've covered the "munchkin" part by providing you tools to build a slightly more powerful character; it's up to you to provide the cheese. How? Well, really, that's entirely up to you. You can whip out some cheesy combination of rules and exploit the heck out of it; you could write up the world's cheesiest stereotypical background; you could be a cheese-maker turned adventurer. Whatever way you want to incorporate "cheese" into your character is fine with us.
The required level for this competition is 13th level, with 150,000gp to spend on magic items and equipment, though no more than 50,000gp can be spent on any one item.
The following section contains the specific rules of the competition, as well as the standards for how the characters will be scored, and general tips to consider when creating a submission.
The following are rules for the Hero Craftsmen competition, and are subject to change at any time between competition periods.
Do note that the Code of Conduct is in effect for all aspects of this contest, and those who break it will be disqualified, and their post will be reported.
Character Creation Parameters Effective Character Level (ECL): 13th Ability Score Generation: 36 pt. buy (DMG p.169) Character Wealth: 150,000gp Max. Value of any single item: 50,000gp
1) All entries must be submitted with a complete stat block of any format or length, (so long as the stat block is complete, including content like equipment, skills, special abilities etc.) accompanied by a character background also of any format or length.
2) All entries must be submitted by the date and time given by the Coordinating Judge; any entries submitted late will not be judged but they are still allowed to be commented on by other users/judges, and may provide a valuable resource to other players out there. The time given for any competition is likely to be within 2-3 weeks; the exact times and dates will be stated by the Coordinating Judge during the contest's start.
3) After submitting an entry, a 30-minute grace period is allowed to edit your work, in the case of mechanical or formatting errors, typos, and the like. Editing your work after 30 minutes is considered breaking the rules. Hence, we urge you to revise your entry thoroughly prior to submitting it, to save hassle. Making use of the preview button in the post window will help you catch most errors before posting.
4) One Entry Per Contestant, and that creator must be the submitter (meaning that all work has to be original, and not stolen from someone else.) Also, do not post an entry if you do not want it to be officially judged.
5) At the start of each competition, the coordinating judge will state a single theme around which to base your entry. There are no restrictions based on the character theme itself; it is merely a suggested guideline, but following it in a creative and interesting way will give merit to your entry.
6) There are other restrictions, however. Material in the three core books is allowed. Any material found in the following books is also permitted: Complete Adventurer, Complete Arcane, Complete Divine, Complete Warrior, Complete Mage, Complete Scoundrel, Complete Champion, Magic Item Compendium, Spell Compendium, Tome of Battle: Book of 9 Swords, Complete Psionic, Expanded Psionics Handbook, Races of Stone, Races of Destiny, Races of the Wild, and Races of the Dragon. The use of Psionics, Item Creation rules, Epic Characters, and anything else in the Official SRD is permitted. For this specific contest, no other material may be used, including any variant rules in Unearthed Arcana.
7) Additionally, the character must be created with the wealth parameters discussed above, with average hit points per hit die (eg-2.5hp for d4, 3.5hp for d6, 4.5hp for d8, 5.5hp for d10, 6.5hp for d12; Max hit points at 1st level), using the 36 point-buy system, as discussed in the DMG pg169.
For those who do not have access to the DMG, the following sample arrays of scores have been set up for your convenience: 18, 16, 14, 10, 10, 8 18, 18, 10, 10, 8, 8 16, 16, 12, 12, 12, 12
8) One special rule regarding Crafting: When crafting a magic item from your character, you may pay the 50% gp cost and ignore the XP cost. However, your character must still meet all prerequisites in spells, minimum level requirements, etc., or account for the cost of hiring a spell caster to cast the spells for you.
9) Judges reserve the right to disqualify entries that do not follow the above rules, as they see fit.
Points will be awarded for how well the judges think the character is made and expanded on. Entries from each of the judges will be added up to give a final score. The highest-scoring entry will win gold, second-highest silver, third-highest bronze.
The judges may also give a single entry each one bonus point for whatever reason; this bonus point is merely to make out an 'honorable mention' of the competition, and is not likely to make an impact on the results themselves. The judges are expected to be very stingy about their bonus point, meaning that it is possible for no entries to get one in a competition.
Special awards will be given to the entry that performs the best in each of the four categories (detailed below), determined by a majority nomination among the judges and/or the highest average score in that category. These awards will have no effect on the total score of each entry.
Additionally, the judges reserve the right to post comments on entries, and any contestant may ask to have their scoring (and/or comments) sent to them via PM.
Each entry will be scored according to four categories: Thematic Creativity (10 points), Background Content (10 marks), Rules Use (10 points), and Clarity (5 points), for a total of 35 points.
-Thematic Creativity is a measure of how well the entry fits with the theme of the contest, decided by the coordinating judge at the start of the competition. It is also a measure of how creative the entry is when fitting in with the theme, meaning that taking the most obvious class for the theme may or may not be the best idea.
-Background Content measures how well-written the background of the entry is, and how creative it is. Including plot points, events that shaped your character, and so on, will earn you high points here.
-Rules Use is based on how well your character is made mechanically, as well as for how well your entry follows the RAW. Is his attack bonus correct? Has she spent all her skill points? Is all the gold in the sheet accounted for? And the like. Powerful characters will earn at least some points in this category.
-Clarity is a measure of how well we can read everything. This includes correct grammar (No leet über txt), and legibility of the entry's stat block. We want to be able to find what we need to judge the entry.
This is not a competition to see who can make the most optimized character. It is a competition to find who can create the most creative and interesting character; one that you would love to see played in a gaming group. Of course, optimized characters can still be creative and interesting, but optimization is not the sole focus of the competition.
Please consider your format before submitting an entry. As judges, we want to know exactly where you got that +3 in Tumble, or how you've laid out your ability scores. If we are helped in this endeavor, it reduces the chances of us (as well as you) making mistakes, and points may be earned for Clarity.
For example, you could lay out your modifiers to everything, from AC to Skills to Abilities. If your +3 in Tumble came from 3 ranks, 13 dexterity and a check penalty of -1, point it out to us. If your Strength score of 16 comes from a base of 13, a +2 racial bonus, and a +1 boost at fourth level, point it out to us.
Also, gold is a big hassle, so if you show how much everything costs, it saves us the trouble of going IRS on you.
Consider including a chart or something that shows the complete level build-up of your entry, in case of cross-class skills, stacking class features and other such stuff that would be otherwise difficult for us judges to detect.
Backgrounds are very important in this competition, worth at least 10 points. While your entry's background doesn't have to be literary genius, you are advised to cover at least the basic stuff, like parents, friends, homeland, motivation, behavior, and at least one plot point that a DM can latch onto, such as probable antagonist for your character. In this case, covering most or all of the aspects of a character is more advisable than simply focusing on one or two aspects in great detail.
Don't worry, though, length is usually not an issue for us judges.
The Leadership feat is quite often a wonderful choice. It offers characters a lot of power, and provides for some excellent background exploration. If you opt to give your PC the Leadership feat, we don't need a full stat block for the cohort or followers; all we need is the cohort's name, race, class(es), and level(s). You can provide the same sort of information for important followers. Note that you can provide more information - but doing so only increases your chances of miscalculating something, and therefore lowering your score.
You are allowed to build characters with non-standard races, including Monster Races from the MM. However, please carefully consider this path before attempting it. You are creating a character of the appropriate ECL, and monster races have caused many contestants to stumble over the mathematics involved. Make sure you are prepared to walk this difficult road. It is also very helpful if you list the basic racial stats for such characters.
Our list of Eligible Judges are Doopliss, TheChilliGod, Zherog, jennibert, JasonOrlandoHawk, Heros_Backpack, DarkKitsune, Mercurius, Haruspex, Kit_the_Odd, edwardsobel, Magus888, wrecan, Dragoncat, and Endarrion.
The gold-medal winner of each Hero Craftsmen competition will be added to this list as a prize. Additionally, contestants who win multiple silver and bronze medals can also earn judge status. A contestant who earns 6 points worth of medals will also be added to the eligible judges list as a prize. (Medal point values: Gold: 6, Silver: 3, Bronze: 1.5)
After each competition, we will seek volunteers for the next contest from the list until we have three judges. It is a voluntary thing, so if you (as a recent gold-medal winner) feel uncomfortable with judging, or just don't have the time, that's fine with us.
Our judges for this contest will be jennibert, Endarrion, and Heros_Backpack. Zherog will be serving as a non-judging coordinator.
This contest starts when this post is posted, and is due to end at 11:59pm GMT on Sunday, April 6th, giving you a bit over two weeks to enter your characters.
If you have any concerns or suggestions to consider for the next Hero Craftsman competition, don't hesitate to post your comments in This Thread.
Finally, best of luck to all entries.
John Ling Freelance Writer/Editor PM for availability
Well, we tried to cover the "munchkin" part for everybody with the high point buy, extra cash, and big list of books to be honest. And as I said in the top, how you choose to meet the "cheese" requirement is entirely open-ended.
I've had this idea since April Fool's last year; I'm just glad the judges were interested in it!
John Ling Freelance Writer/Editor PM for availability
I have a question concerning a Ranger's Favored Enemy:
When I select "Humanoid" as a Favored Enemy, I am required to select a subtype. I was curious if I could select a subtype that appears in the allowed material, but is strangely absent from Ranger's Favored Enemy list. Specifically, can I select Favored Enemy: Humanoid (Shapechanger), since it is a subtype that appears in the Monster Manual?
FAQ (Jan 24 2008 version), page 22]Can a ranger take lycanthropes or humanoids (shapechangers) as a favored enemy?
Yes and no. A ranger who takes favored enemy humanoid (human) gets its favored enemy bonus against humanoid lycanthropes that have the human subtype, and a ranger who takes favored enemy giant gets the bonus on lycanthropes that are of that type, and so on, but there is no type or subtype combination available to rangers that encompasses all lycanthropes.[/quote wrote:
Can a ranger take lycanthropes or humanoids (shapechangers) as a favored enemy?
Yes and no. A ranger who takes favored enemy humanoid (human) gets its favored enemy bonus against humanoid lycanthropes that have the human subtype, and a ranger who takes favored enemy giant gets the bonus on lycanthropes that are of that type, and so on, but there is no type or subtype combination available to rangers that encompasses all lycanthropes.
John Ling Freelance Writer/Editor PM for availability
I have a question concerning a Ranger's Favored Enemy:
When I select "Humanoid" as a Favored Enemy, I am required to select a subtype. I was curious if I could select a subtype that appears in the allowed material, but is strangely absent from Ranger's Favored Enemy list. Specifically, can I select Favored Enemy: Humanoid (Shapechanger), since it is a subtype that appears in the Monster Manual?
Huh. I didn't realize it wasn't in there.
I don't see why that would be a problem.
EDIT: ninja'd by the FAQ. I still don't see a problem taking humanoid (shapechanger) as a favored enemy. That would just mean that it would only count against shapechangers who are also humanoid (elves, dwarves, orcs etc), right?
Oh, and one thing about entries. If anyone creates a grizzled, old veteran warrior who specialized in throwing weapons, specifically spheroid-shaped ones, and who come from "a land of cheese," I'm deducting points.
Hee hee hee. I like the cheesy munchkins. So much fun!
As for Jason's question, I don't really have a problem with it either, but since they have posted an official WOTC answer for it, feel we should probably stick with that. We've been relatively stickler-y about that sort of thing in previous competitions, so we should probably be consistent. (Though, like I said, I'd probably let it slide in a game of my own, as long as the player and I took the time to determine exactly what was and was not included so it didn't get out of hand!)
That said, I'll be out of town for a few days, so if any other questions come up that require judge consensus, I'll put my two cents in on Monday.
Oh, and Go Musketeers! (Sorry, can't help myself)
Look! I figured out how to change my sig!
Am I the only one wondering why "Preferences" aren't part of my Profile?
