Outcasts - What they are & How to play them

[Aelryn Bloodmoon]

Is my understanding that on your tenth death you automatically roll as the character is deleted flawed for the Marks? Whether the deletion is automatic because it's the 10th death or not, you're still functionally deleting a character, not sure why that wouldn't proc a roll at the appropriate levels.

Maybe give a "Life Counter" rather than a Mark of Despair, if the penalty of a roll not occurring is due to the Mark of Despair normally being reserved for punishments- same function without the extra tap in the sack when the character dies.

P.S. While I wish the change hadn't been necessary, I'm one of the people that thinks this change was starting to wander into the territory of overdue, and I appreciate the work that went into it.

[KT28]

I like this list. Gives me some ideas for future outcasts that I'll be inevitably rolling up someday. Outcasts are fun!

I'm glad that outcasts don't necessarily have to be evil. Not all neutral outcasts are necessarily striving for some kind of 'redemption arc', nor are all neutral outcasts trying to be accepted on the surface, nor are neutral outcasts necessarily even trying to challenge the status quo. Some of them are just trying to survive and retain some semblance of their humanity while living in a hive of scum and villainy for whatever reason (and this is exactly the kind of dynamic that attracts me to outcast RP in the first place). If the "tragic/poor me/redemption" trope does become prevalent and problematic it should be dealt with on a case-by-case basis, in my opinion.

I also just wanted to add, on the topic of whether being "insane/mentally ill" is enough to be driven from the surface - I think that all of the options in the list require some creativity on the player's part in order to be successful, and insanity is no exception. Is just "being insane" enough to go off of to justify your character being an outcast? No, of course not - not on its own. Something must have happened, due to your character's insanity, to make him infamous enough to be recognized by NPCs. This is where your creativity comes in and you get to come up with a fun, impactful backstory that you think would be fun to explore in-game. The same goes for any option on this list, really. Every single item on this list could be executed extremely well or extremely poorly depending on the creativity and skill of the player.

[Durvayas]

but I would be greatly concerned if it became entirely commonplace.

Isn't this what caused the recent shift in NPC/settlement mechanics against them? If not then uh. Yikes. You've a knack for coincidences I guess because yes that's Very commonplace.

Its not at all uncommon for outcasts to be neutral in action, and if they are allowed to be neutral in alignment, you can be sure that a fair number of them will be simply because it invalidates Paladin and CoT smiting.

[Cerk Evermoore]

Medium reward to make a good outcast? Seems fitting because it is the same reward level as neutral pale masters.

[Ebonstar]

this whole shift is to make up for What I see has been an abuse of the system. For the past it was an honor system, now after everyone takes advantage its being enforced mechanically.

Face it outcasts are evil in some sort of fashion. there should be no reward to play a good or neutral one. Which is why redemption arcs are under DM supervision and earn the MoD. There are penalties to actions.

[Kuma]

Medium reward to make a good outcast? Seems fitting because it is the same reward level as neutral pale masters.

i mean technically this already falls under the "good monster" reward tier but i would honestly never want to see it

[Sea Shanties]

It would probably make more sense to be able to use an award to start as a good slave in the UD instead of outcast.

[Subutai]

Which brings up the tangential question, why is starting as a good slave restricted in the first place?

[Irongron]

Which brings up the tangential question, why is starting as a good slave restricted in the first place?

I think I didn't want slavery in the UD to be a 'constant rebellion' deal, with paladin slave leaders smiting their way through Andunor.

PvP is a lot of fun, in moderation, but I didn't want to have vast good aligned community in Andunor making the city a battleground. I also think the theme of the city would be heavily undermined if it was a starting location for good aligned surfacers.

[Aodh Lazuli]

I really do think the entire "outcast" thing is a mistake - We've run ourselves into a strange little hole and don't quite seem to be able to climb back out... partly through player weirdness, and players wanting to shut the castle doors and make it so only their vision is workable, and partly through a long period of silence on certain matters from those with authority, leading to some people perhaps getting some mistaken ideas about those things.

The root of the problem isn't much to do with outcasts, really, and more that there is no clear statement on how much roleplay crossover should exist between surface and UD. On one hand, we're told it is a trading hub, a place where barrier between surface and UD is thin. On the other, we're being told that outcasts should have little to nothing to do with the surface... And that surface humans being below ground is somehow poor RP.

This nonsense with monster races, outcasts and restrictions on where they can and cannot be, is only an issue because the level of interaction and crossover there is supposed to be between these two worlds is unclear. If that could be clarified and explained, it would go a long long way to resolving the issue.

Is that a statement that can be made, or is the policy and creative direction in this regard actually a little bit undecided? Ambiguity is fine, provided the nature of that ambiguity is intended, and its reasoning can be properly communicated.

On a related note... I think the name "outcast" is a mistake. I don't think we should (on the whole) be confined to the expectation of "most UD humans in andunor are local arelithians". instead we should probably do away with the entire notion of "outcasts", and instead just have "underdark human"... A far broader concept which likely reflects the nature of Andunor slightly better, that accommodates a much wider field of character concepts... Concepts which have been rendered unworkable by recent changes and announcements, despite being valid and positive contributions to the RP landscape of both the surface and Andunor.

Once again, this most recent set of changes to Outcasts seems to be another case where people consider mechanical solutions to problems that are either not-really-problems, or that can be better resolved through communication and observation/response to context - instead of broad-brushstroke mechanical enforcement.

[Nitro]

And that surface humans being below ground is somehow poor RP.

I don't think I've ever seen any of the staff say anything remotely like this.

[sarithia]

I'm not really sure what the whole outcast war lately has been about. I'm just seeing a lot of negativity towards it, and that's fine; player opinion is awesome, but somehow I get the feeling that even if one thing is tweaked mechanically, there's always going to be some people who aren't happy. Bottom line is, I'm of the understanding that if you choose to play an Outcast, you choose to play mostly in Andunor. I don't understand why not being allowed to freely roam the surface is being severely question; you're a bad guy, you actively chose something that is seen by the majority as something that is bad. Granted, the concept of 'outcast is bad' is a relative notion, but overall, outcasts are, for all intents and purposes, bad guys. It's sort of, to me, like choosing to roll a gnoll and then complaining because the Grove won't accept you as one of their besties.
Perhaps I'm misunderstanding here, but this retort is based on what I have read on the forums so far and what I've come to understand myself.

[Subutai]

I do think some better guidelines not on how Arelithians should view Outcasts, but on how Arelithians should view Andunor living or visiting surfacers could be a very effective solution to this problem, perhaps more than a mechanical one.

When I played Arelith for a while many, many years ago, it wasn't uncommon at all to see surface drow cuddle parties in Cordor, with good Drow running all over the place giggling and skipping through the streets. It seems, however, that Arelith's stated guideline that surfacers do not trust Drow has been effective. A drow who shows up on the surface won't be instantly in the middle of an adoring flock of hugs and praise. They'll probably be run right out of town, and if they wanted to be accepted, they'd have to go through a tremendous amount of work just to not be murdered on sight by most people.

This is what seems to be lacking for Andunorian-friendly surfacers. Before the change, it was common to see outcasts who many people knew hung out in Andunor wandering around just fine, with no questions, and even when it was revealed that they spent time in Andunor, it seemed to be fairly often that no one really cared. As long as they weren't openly summoning demons or enslaving elves, they might as well have been any other surfacer for all the thought people gave them.

I think this is where some relatively strict drow/monster race-type guidance could come in more useful than a mechanical ban. A strong suggestion, "Andunor is known by people throughout Arelith and the surrounding islands to be a wretched hive of fiend summoning, slavery, and torture, where drow and monsters roam the streets and murder is unrestrained and unpunished, where good and right surface dwellers are thrown into the arena for sport, or tortured to death for fun. Anyone known to spend time there will be assumed to be just as despicable as the drow, and shunned everywhere. Even rumors someone is an Andurnorian or enjoys visiting the vile city are enough to find someone extremely suspect."

This would allow a human or someone else who lives or spends time in Andunor to come and go as they please, as long as they're extremely careful not to be found out. Once they are, and their name is passed around, they might suddenly find themselves pariahed all over the surface, and shunned by many, since discovering they're from Andunor might as well be discovering they torture children for fun. Sure, a lot of Andunor might not actually be as irredeemably evil as all that, but for all the average surfacer should know about it, the halls might as well be lined with victims chained up to the wall, for Andurnorians to torture as they walk by on the way to the shop.

This would also allow for human and other surface races to live in Andunor as something other than as outcasts who have done something so awful as to be kicked out. It's entirely reasonable, I think, for particular types of people, especially the morally bankrupt and more evil, to simply move their of their own accord, without ever doing anything so heinous as to be forever banned from every surface settlement. It would also avoid the difficult RP situation we face with outcasts now.

[Aodh Lazuli]

And that surface humans being below ground is somehow poor RP.

I don't think I've ever seen any of the staff say anything remotely like this.

No. That's mostly been players. But player-culture is extremely influential. That sentence was more tied into the "players wanting to shut the castle doors and make it so only their vision is workable" bit.

[Aelryn Bloodmoon]

And that surface humans being below ground casually, without treating it like it is the home of many of the awful nightmares and stories the average child is frightened with/by, is somehow poor RP.

I fixed this. Not to tell people how to RP, but to apply a bit of (opinionated) rationalism to the sentiment. Neither extreme is good, and I suspect the extremes are the true nature of the complaint on both sides - as well as the motivating factor behind the mechanical change.

[Aodh Lazuli]

And that surface humans being below ground casually, without treating it like it is the home of many of the awful nightmares and stories the average child is frightened with/by, is somehow poor RP.

I fixed this. Not to tell people how to RP, but to apply a bit of (opinionated) rationalism to the sentiment. Neither extreme is good, and I suspect the extremes are the true nature of the complaint on both sides - as well as the motivating factor behind the mechanical change.

This "fixing" of the statement does not reflect the nature of andunor, which is seemingly intentionally and notably cosmopolitan, diverse, and closely tied to the surface.

This is evidenced in the largely human facilitators and organisers of Andunor's slave trade (go have a look at the NPCs), who are a core and central structural part of the city's economy. The former wharftown waymen guards at the ogre fist, and so on...

"The home nightmares" is a question of who is doing the dreaming.

We could fix and counter-fix one another's statements... and that is precisely my point.

[Aelryn Bloodmoon]

This "fixing" of the statement does not reflect the nature of andunor, which is seemingly intentionally and notably cosmopolitan, diverse, and closely tied to the surface.

This is evidenced in the largely human facilitators and organisers of Andunor's slave trade (go have a look at the NPCs), who are a core and central structural part of the city's economy. The former wharftown waymen guards at the ogre fist, and so on...

"The home nightmares" is a question of who is doing the dreaming.

We could fix and counter-fix one another's statements... and that is precisely my point.

Your argument that the nature of Andunor doesn't match up with my view of it centering around slave traders who just happen to be human reinforces the point in its entirety.

When discussing who is doing the dreaming, it is clear we are discussing the ordinary commoner who farms or maybe sells paper for a living, NOT a flesh peddler who more than likely has a different definition of terrifying nightmares than you or I can properly conjure up. The people who usually thrive here are not good people.

Andunor is in the underdark, and the underdark is a dangerous, scary place, where if the monsters don't eat you, your own kind might make you a slave and sell you to one of them. Yes, you can go buy a keen sword of pointy death plus three there as a human, but it's not a casual trip, it's a trip into the underdark where you might be taken slave in the midst of a city full of monsters.

No one's telling you your character has to be afraid of the underdark - however, the setting very clearly reinforces that the average, non-evil surface human is, and that's the view the masses (the NPC's underscored by this change's mechanics) tend to take.

I'm not referencing anything that hasn't been mentioned before by the administration in terms of the atmosphere, but I believe your sentiment that there is room to "interpret" the gravity of this atmosphere is a shadow of the spirit that necessitated mechanical change. Everyone has a reason why gravity shouldn't apply to them- until gravity slaps them in the face with hard, solid ground, at speed.

[Aodh Lazuli]

A polite snipping of your post in the quote so you get the notification

Dude.

Read carefully. At no point did I say "it should be taken lightly". Nowhere did I use the term "casual" for surface trips to the UD. I do not know why you are behaving as if I did.

YOU inserted that into my post.

[msterswrdsmn]

my current character has modified himself to such a distressing degree well beyond "disfigurement" that by this definition he should be an outcast, but that's not the case.

Stop. Stop it~ Why do you constantly end up making your characters modify themselves/modify other people?!

On topic....

I've played two outcasts, Null the Yuan-ti smuggler and hired hitman and Gein, the pacted conman. So this is going to be based on my experienced playing these two characters.

Null, aside from being a Yuan-ti, was an assassin, infiltrator and poisoner who used people as test subjects for various poisons and killing techniques. He was a terrible person and any one of these things would get him labeled as something civilized society would want nothing to do with. Yuan-ti in general are typically sent out in small numbers to infiltrate societies to undermine them, so being a yuan-ti alone is enough to be considered an "outcast", murderous tendancies aside.

Null didn't have a "visible" outcast mark, as he constantly covered himself from head to toe so no one knew what he actually looked like. Null was also a shapeshifting disguise master, so he would pose as a literally anything (He had something like 4 alter egos and could shapeshift into 6 or 7 different creatures) or something similar when wandering around towns. Unless you had a really high spot score, you weren't going to know Null was an outcast. Or a Yuan-ti, for that matter; most people just thought he was a skinny human.

Gein is a Night Hag pacted conman who uses wordplay and deception to get what he wants. He's pacted, pro-slavery and an apathetic social manipulator. He's relatively new, so I haven't done much "evil" on him yet per se, but manipulating people for personal gain with no regard for what happens to the other person is more or less what landed him down in Andunor. And being pacted.

Unlike Null, he does have a visible mark; unsettling magic circles tattooed on both his palms. I need to brush up on his description, but having tattoos with spirarling abyssal runes and a big creepy eye in the center is probably good enough for "not welcome in civilized society".

I don't think your origin as to why you're an outcast is something you'd want to overthink too much? Come up with something reasonable and roll with it? I've never been a huge fan of coming up with super-detailed, elaborate backstories, as getting too caught up in a backstory can actually be detrimental to character growth.

What you want your "outcast mark" to be seems pretty up to interpretation. I'd imagine there are things that would be universally recognizable as "nope, we don't want that".

[Kuma]

my current character has modified himself to such a distressing degree well beyond "disfigurement" that by this definition he should be an outcast, but that's not the case.

Stop. Stop it~ Why do you constantly end up making your characters modify themselves/modify other people?!

On topic....

this thread has been necro'd so hard it rose me from the dead

at least my current character isn't a body modification freak

[The GrumpyCat]

Unsure of context but just for clarity.

We have 3 different sorts of MoDs

1) Mark of Destiny - Generally placed on by player choice (I believe there's a command for it, or you can ask a DM) Gives you 10 lives, but also grants you +20 xp per tick. Must be applied early in a characters career (I forget the level cap, will edit in when I've time) and when you run out of lives, your pc deletes but you still get an award roll.

2) Mark of Dauntlessness - Same as MoD but without the +20 xp. Meaning that you get the role at the end. I believe that this is what we give out to Outcasts who want to 'redeem' themselves. Or we give it out to people who are over leveld for Mark of Destiny, but still want some sort of countdown of death on their character. Skal characters who choose to stay on skal post level 16 may also (after a talk with a DM) be given this.

3) Mark of Despair: Same as above, but without xp benefit and without a roll at the end. This is generally given out as a punishment, especially for those players who refuse to respect death/the threat of death, in any way at all. Reserved as a punishment. Can sometimes be removed.

[xf1313]

I hope there are a bit more info, can they be pirates? Like...that seems to fit right? Would skal have them sign up, since it is lawless...these things

[Apothys]

I hope there are a bit more info, can they be pirates? Like...that seems to fit right? Would skal have them sign up, since it is lawless...these things

Outcasts always start in the underdark city of Andunor, They cant be official pirates, but they could join the andunors navy or join a pirate crew regardless of not having the official pirate tattoos.