Darkblade statistics *interesting*

I agree, though it is arguable that Gygax et. al. had Moorcock's work in mind when they put Lawful and Chaotic in as alignments. Moorcock's work had a huge impact on the fantasy genre.

Amen. That's the reason I became involved in this thread in the first place. I have problems with the a lot of the Melnibonean mythos in Dieties and Demigods. I still don't believe that it is true enough to Moorcocks work. It's as if they only read the first three books.

IMO, if the Rune Blades (and there are more than two - at one point Elric summons a whole swarm of Stormbringer's relatives) are to be used in a D&D setting, they should be in the hands of an NPC the PCs need to aid in the completion of some epic quest. And they are definately not related in any way, shape or form to the Darkblades explained at the begining of this thread.

 

The life stealing thing works, though kind of on the Stormbringer level. For all but NPCs with actual class levels (and maybe even them) the life stealing ablility will kill with a single critical hit, and can give problems with trolls which are dead (-10 hp) but are still regenerating non-leathal damage (you get no experience for them and cannot target them with coup de grace - they just lay there and never go away).

 

Agreed. It worked for what I believe was intended, but I think most people used it as sort of a 'monster manual' to have things to kill & treasure to collect. The whole idea was to provide a framework (albeit an imperfect one) of ideas for the gaming public to use in expanding their own private campaign settings. Imagine bumping into someone (...an albino with a black sword?) while travelling to an alternate prime material plane in search of some rare extract for a spell component. Too bad most folks didn't get it...I think they would have enjoyed it a whole lot more.

 

thanks CtB good to know. Now @ the rest of you especially Lord Spike, give me stats so I can tweek the darkblade.

 

Here are some suggestions for all to discuss. I posted the original details at the start of this thread. I found this on the Internet where someone posted what a Dragon Magazine issue detailed, and I added suggestions, in this post, for us to discuss and iron out the details of what we think would be best.

 

Ok you guys talk and then I'll tell you what can and can't be done... to my knowledge.

 

I agree with most of you that translating Moorcock into a D&D game setting is obviously not what he had in mind, therefore by doing so you could never satisfy everyone. By what your suggesting Krunch are you then not going to include the level energy drain (aka soul sucking)? You know this raises another question, energy draining (draining levels) was actually an ability normally attributed to undead. Vampires are a classic example; in fact, Strahd von Zarovich, the incredibly powerful vampire lord which basically caused the existence of Ravenloft would drain 5 levels everytime he struck you. This, however, was due to the undeads direct connection with the Negative energy plane. Obviously, not the same as stealing one's soul, however in terms of game mechanics it seems to work the same. Upon death from an energy drain, you wouldn't lose your soul, you'd normally raise again as an undead of the type that killed you.

The demons which are in fact the swords are never actually classified. In AD&D terms you're right, it doesn't specify that any of the major tanar'ri or baatezu actually consume your souls, however, abyssal lords (for example Grazzt, who is coincidently Iuz's father. I could post his stats if anyone cares) have been known to actually make deals with mortals in which they would usually end up with their souls. This is specified in one of the small monster manuals from the Planes of Chaos box set. By taking their souls they would usually turn them into larva, some sort of lesser demon, or torture them for eternity in one way or another. As to actually consuming the soul, it could be possible, anyone who dies in the planes after having previously died before simply ceases to exist. This is of course only with Abyssal/Hell lords, Gods, and maybe Balor's(I'm not sure about that, DM's discretion).

 

I'm not familiar with 'darkblades' as such, only with Stormbringer, Mournblade, and Blackrazor. If you want more on the latter, please say so. Isn't there a sword of Life Stealing already in the game? Just boost it up a little into something new and surprise us.

Krunch: 'fade to black' would be better, imo.

 

No. The reference Lord_Spike provided shows that the Runeblades consuming spiritual energy is the draining of BOTH levels AND hit points, not just draining levels only where draining both to zero irrevocably kills the spirit of a person and is unrecoverable, ie., a character cannot be resurrected, reincarnated, or raised. With this I agree, completely.
Where I disagree with the author in Deities and Demigods is with him saying the spirit dies (is killed by the sword) and the soul is consumed (eaten by the demon).
I will leave this as it is at this point, a dead horse.

 

*Please* make the vampire question a different thread.

[EDIT]
Oh, I think I now see that you are talking about Darkblades draining levels. No, Darkblades were not written in the Dragon Magazine, as I found posted, to have level or hit point draining ability. See below.
[EDIT]

 

Please discuss the Darkblade statistics I suggested above. Do we want them? Do we want different stats? Do we follow Lord_Spike's idea? What are your thoughts?

Please input, more input, need more input! (Short Circuit, the robot movie)

 

Note: Darkblades are not Runeblades, and vice-versa. They are not related. They as in both families are completely dissimilar, except both are sentient, both are evil, both can hum (mostly), and both will return to the owner when called. I think that covers it.

 

just an opinion, but isn't using these swords in your game just like using Conan, Aragorn, or Tarzan. that dosn't mean you can't use them, but seeing as how they would be plagerized characters, SHOULD you use them?
just something to think about.

 

Well seeing as I'm a Metallicaholic, I'd recommend anything Metallica, so I'd guess I'd leave that up to you guys. But umm...Call of Cthulu and The Thing That Should Not Be seem to hold appropriate themes...

 

Crawling chaos underground...You'd like that, wouldn't you?