*outdated* Sigil - City Of Doors In Nutshell

[*Mr_Otyugh]

Resting

Resting will mostly be non-restricted. You won't require camp sets or food to rest and you may rest as often as you wish... exception of some areas have prevented resting all together, this is mostly caves in dungeons making them especially dangerous and forcing you to use your spells more responsibly, waste your potions and scrolls (after all, why collect them if you never use them?).

[*Mr_Otyugh]

For Level Adjustment Races

In SCoD there are few major changes regarding level adjusted races. (planetouched, yuan-ti, drow, duergar, svirfnebli...)

• Unlike in original NWN 2, the level adjusted races will need 'same amount' of experience to get to same level as non-level adjusted races. (in other words, for level adjusted +1-3 race [tieflings/aasimars/duergars..] to get to level 2, they need the same 1,000 experience as a normal human does instead of higher amounts of experience.
• Though before getting overly thrilled of that, experience gain for them will be slower, as the LA (level adjustment) is count to their level when it comes to spawning monsters, rewarding experience (so you'll gain slightly less experience in the start).
• Level adjustment races will not gain to higher level than 30 - level adjustment. Drow with level adjustment +2 can max get to level 28, planetouched with +1 level adjustment to 29... and so forth.

[*Mr_Otyugh]

Roleplay Rewarding Systems
In SCoD we have two different ways of handling rewarding the roleplay... DM Reward Pool and RP Reward Pool, how do they work? Read below!


DM reward pool:

This pool is filled with rewards DMs have given you personally. It is dealt out once per day when you log in (300 + 100*level xp each time, modified for your characters ECL). [/li]

RP reward pool:

This pool is filled when you roleplay with other people ingame (specifics on exactly how it works we'll keep in the dark to try and lessen chances of abuse). The xp from this pool is dealt out when you kill monsters. It gives up to 100% bonus on xp from each kill until you have exhausted the pool. [/li]

Styx and the xp pools:

When you use styx water to remove levels from your character (either styx oarsman in ooc room or the styx water in festhall), 25% of your removed xp is placed into the DM reward pool and 25% into you RP reward pool. This will make it faster for you to regain levels, without making rebuilds completely free. [/li]

[*Agony_Aunt]

Druidic backgrounds and wildshape forms

When creating a new Druid, you have the option of taking a special background which affects which shapes your wildshapes are.

In addition, instead of seeing Wildshape, Bear for example, you see Wildshape, Strength Form, as this was the easiest way to handle the many possible forms. You'll see this change even if you don't take a special background and stick with the regular Wildshapes.

The 4 shapes are now called: Strength, Dexterous, Resilient, and Special, corresponding to Bear, Wild, Boar, and Badger. The original forms were loosely based around these concepts and i adjusted their stats a bit to reflect this better as originally the Bear was by far the best form and the Badger was a waste of time.

Also, do not be dismissive of the special forms. Many of them have weaker attacks, but something special added to their attacks or some other property. Also, the special forms have the most balanced stats with DEX being slightly higher than average and STR being slightly weaker.

As an extra bonus, all dire level forms (ie: level 12) get the Multiattack feat.

If you are wondering why there is no planar Druid, or Celestial or Infernal, well, basically for the moment couldn't really think of enough good forms apart from making Celestial/Infernal animals, which just didn't seem right. A later update may consider these further.

On with the backgrounds and their forms. First form listed is the basic form, the second one is the "dire" form obtained at level 12.

Druid of the Woods
Similar to the regular forms, but keeps the standard shapes when he should get Dire forms but with the Dire forms stats.

Druid of the Elements
This Druid likely grew up on one of the elemental plains. Genasi are highly likely to be this sort of Druid.
Strength: Minor Earth Elemental/Weak Earth Elemental
Dexterous: Minor Air Elemental/Weak Air Elemental
Resilient: Minor Water Elemental/Weak Water Elemental
Special: Minor Fire Elemental/Weak Fire Elemental

Druid of the Jungle
Perfect for a Druid that plans of having a Dinosaur animal companion
Strength: Deinonychus/Megaraptor
Dexterous: Python/Anaconda
Resilient: Bombardier Beetle/Giant Stag Beetle
Special: Young Panther/Adult Panther

Druid of the Desert
Strength: Young Giant Scorpion/Adult Giant Scorpion
Dexterous: Young Leopard/Adult Leopard
Resilient: Young Fire Beetle/Adult Fire Beetle
Special: Young Basilisk/Adult Basilisk

Druid of the Underdark
Highly suited to Drow, Deep Gnome, and Duregar characters.
Strength: Young Umber Hulk/Adult Umber Hulk
Dexterous: Young Giant Spider/Adult Giant Spider
Resilient: Young Carrion Crawler/Adult Carrion Crawler
Special: Giant Rat/Dire Rat

Druid of the Cold/Mountains
Strength: Young Mountain Cat/Adult Mountain Cat
Dexterous: Young Snow Leopard/Adult Snow Leopard
Resilient: Young Arctic Wolf/Adult Arctic Wolf
Special: Wolverine/Dire Wolverine

[*Agony_Aunt]

Faction Badges

On SCoD, when you join a faction, you now get a "Faction Badge". This faction badge stores your faction rank, any influence you have within the faction (Faction Points), and provides a number of functions related to factions.

The idea came from several things, but overall, the long term issue of tracking who is what rank in what faction, and how to appropriately recognise characters in game as being faction members, especially high ranked ones.

Hopefully, they will add to interest in people roleplaying their faction or getting involved in one.

Mechanical Information

Getting a badge: To obtain a badge you need to go to the Mimir in the OOC room and select a faction. If you already have a faction, do not worry, just speak to the Mimir and you will get one given.

Using the badge: When you go to use the badge you will notice 3 modes of use (doing from memory so actual words may be different):

• Self - use this to target self.
• Touch - use this to target another PC (or NPC) at close range. If you are far away you will walk to close range before it activates.
• Long Range - Can target anything within sight and you will not move.

Having three modes was a bit of a hack to try and setup different ways of dealing with things. It was partially sucessful, so left it like that. What actually really matters in terms of functionality is what you target:

• Target Self - this will start a conversation from which you can use the various badge functions.
• Target another PC - This will display to them privately your faction and rank. RP it appropriately (see the section on RP below)
• Target anything else - This will display your badge publically for all to see (again, see the section on RP below).

Badge Functions: When using the badge on yourself you have a number of functions available. Some factions have one or two extra functions but most are common. They range from checking on your faction status to summoning allies for RP or Combat.

Faction Points: These are awarded by DMs when they note that someone is making faction based RP. They can be used to petition for promotion or for summons. Maybe in the future we will expand their use. We may even accept trading in faction points in return for faction based RP (not mechanical) benefits, but that would be up to the DM. See the RP section below about Faction Points.

Promotions (and demotions): If you achieve enough Faction Points for a promotion you can petition a DM for a promotion. Please note, this is entirely at DM discretion. They may want to RP with you an event that shows your dedication to your faction or ask you to do something before the promotion is granted. Demotions can occur if you do something against your faction or their philosophy.

Faction Summons: These cost faction points to call.

• RP Summon: 1 point will summon you a random factioneer that you can use for RP. They are set to level 1, so don't take them anywhere too dangerous. there are 3 per faction.
• Combat Summon: These are set to level and gain magical boosts which are based off your faction rank. So, summoning one if you are an epic char, but still a Namer will result in a weak summon, but if you are a level 1 char who is a Factor, then get yourself to Baator with a few invisilibity potions and you'll level quickly. ;)

Due to game engine issues we are limiting these to one at a time. Yes, i know, it would be good if you could call upon more at times, but it would lead to many potential problems with the coding.

You can talk to your NPC faction members to tell them to draw their weapons (or sheath them) or to dismiss them.

Quitting a faction: If you quit a faction (or are booted by a DM) then you can never join another faction (it is blocked via script). Factions are for life. In certain situations a DM may allow a character to join another faction or rejoin the original one, but there would have to be good RP reason. Without DM approval the only way to do this requires a full deletion and recreation of a character, like making a full rebuild.

RP use

The Badges: First off, let me make this clear.

Faction badges are not always physical objects.

So, a Harmonium will have an item that identifies him, but a Rev League member will most definitely not.
Please treat the use of badges appropriately when using them to identify themselves. People will get messages saying "Shows their badge identifying themselves as a rank in the faction" that is the mechanical side, but RP it however is appropriate.

For example, a Xoascitec may RP it like "Stands on one foot waving some celery in the air", which would be a good identifier of their faction. If the sang "The Lady of Pain is my Lover" at the same time, you could probably mark them as being a Big Boss.

Revolutionary League may use a system of code words and hand signs to identify themselves to each other.

You get the idea?

Faction RP in general: Nothing here changes, the same rules apply as always. There are Faction specific guides to the factions and how to RP them.

Faction Points: How you view these depends on your faction. Generally speaking though they are like recognition, influence, favours, merits, gold stars, whatever, something that indicate you have done something for your faction and it was recognized. This can lead to promotion or the ability to call upon fellow faction members when you need to.

Faction Specific Info

Bleakers:
You can ask your badge to make your daily mood roll.
Harmonium:
Upon joining you will recieve a set of full plate, boots, and helmet in the Harmonium Style. Do not annoy DMs asking for replacements if you put enchantments on and decide you don't like, or sell them or whatever.
Mercykillers:
Upon joining you will recieve a set of full plate. Do not annoy DMs asking for a replacement.
Revolutionary League:
Oh boy, this is where it gets complicated, pay attention. This is going to be quite open to misinterpretation, so ill put some quotes further down which you can use directly with players who may have the wrong idea.

Infiltration (aka Cover Faction): Rev League members are the only ones who can have more than one badge. Two to be precise. Their Rev League one, and one other. These two badges are completely independent and your cover badge works just like a regular badge.

This represents a deep cover infiltration of that particular faction.

This does not stop you RPing infiltrating another faction.  Anybody can infiltrate a faction RPwise, even non-faction members.  They just have to go through the RP and make the rolls.

All it means is that the faction you choose to have as the cover faction is one you have had a long time connection with, or have spent extrordinary efforts into making your cover.

This is a once in a lifetime thing

You can never change your mind on this, unless you can get a DM to agree, and this will result in a wipe of all your faction related data and require the DM to restore your Anarchist points and rank, so its got to have really good justification.

So, what does it mean when compared with a regular RP infiltration?

Using a cover faction badge as infiltration means you are so deep in your cover that unless you give another faction member reason to suspect, they will never believe you are anything but what you appear to be.  You don't need to make bluff rolls or anything.  To all intents and purposes you are a member of that faction, with friends in the faction that you go drinking with, have graduated from the academy (or whatever) with, etc... until it is time for you to blow your cover.

And, at some point, you probably will want to blow your cover to strike that fatal blow for freedom. If you do this with flair and panache, you can expect a fair number of faction points and maybe a promotion.

So, let me make one thing clear that applies to all players

Not being able to show a faction badge does not mean that another faction member should be ICly suspicious. Remember, not every faction has some form of physical identification, and even if it does, they can probably be faked.  There are probably Indeps who make a business our of selling fake (or real?) Indep badges.... and maybe ID from other factions as well.  You infiltrate, make the right RP, make any required rolls, other faction members should accept you, until they are given reason to suspect

FAQ

Q: Can i become Factol?
A: No. It is highly unlikely we will ever change our minds on this.

Q: Can i quit my faction?
A: Sure, but you won't ever be allowed into another (without DM approval).

Q: I screwed something up, help!
A: Sure, just grab your nearest friendly DM. As long as its valid, we will help you out.

Q: I found a bug, what should i do?
A: Post it in the bugs forums like anything else.

Q: Will there be more features for factions?
A: Probably. We will see how the badges work out and see what suggestions come up.

Q: Will there be faction PrCs?
A: Highly unlikely. We like the idea of keeping the faction benefits purely RP (small exception being the combat summon) and not deciding on your faction based off a build idea you have.

Q: My Faction Henchman came but is stuck.
A: Use your faction badge. You should get the option to call them to your side (do not abuse this feature).