Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Tytalus 08-29-06, 06:15 AM	I'm trying to come up with something more original than "<creatures> killed/destroyed/enslaved my parents/wife/town" or as a reason why a character would choose a particular favored enemy. In particular, I'm looking for a reasoning for choosing "evil" as a favored enemy (e.g., gained through Harper Paragon or Stalker of Evil prestige classes). Maybe: the PC in question has a dark past and was once evil himself (or well on the way there), but caused some traumatic evil event that made him repent. (As an aside: having been evil himself seems to be a neat way to explain the mechanic benefits associated with having a favored enemy) As a consequence, he now either loathes evil (and what he almost became), or is just very afraid that it will tempt him again the way it once did (and he therefore seeks to destroy it). What do you think? Too cliche?
Fithero 08-29-06, 07:59 AM	For something different, why not make it that the fav enemy did nothing at all to the character? Instead, they learnt how to hunt them in a formal academy (if its the harpers fav enemy of "evil") or from another, more experienced ranger (this would work for goblins... and if the more experienced ranger hated goblins.. and had the usual reasons for hunting them) Hope this helps some. Peace
Shaggy_Shaggs 08-29-06, 08:28 AM	Just having intimate familiarity with the favored enemy could do it, too. The creatures you know best are of course the ones you're best able to exploit vulnerabilities to hurt. Hence my CG goblin ranger having goblinoids as his own favored enemy. :smirk:
Sikyanakotik 08-29-06, 10:37 AM	The favoured enemy ability does not denote any particular enmity against a group, merely an extensive familiarity with them. This can be born of obsessive hatred, of course, but formal instruction, the requirements of a job (such as Favoured Enemy: Human for a detective, or Favoured Enemy: Animal for a hunter), or even an intense love for such beings could impart the same knowledge. Not that love typically comes into play when trying to justify Favoured Enemy: Evil, but there you go.
Tytalus 08-30-06, 12:39 AM	Ah yes, that all makes a lot of sense. I guess the familiarity idea comes into play with a "dark past" background. Love ... maybe love drove him to the dark side (ugh) in the first place, but she then betrayed him / he killed her / etc. Anything else?
erbmjw 08-30-06, 01:46 AM	There's a class that can choose "evil" as a favoured enemy? Wholely snot eating munchkinism! Please tell me I misunderstood and there are no classes(prestige or otherwise) that can choose "evil" ( or similar) as their favoured enemy :weep: ******* On another note - a while ago I had a Ranger that choose a rare bird type which she spent a great deal of time/effort trying to nuture and protect as her favoured enemy - the GM allowed that the Feat's effects could be used to assist me in my efforts to protect and nuture the species. So your familiarity with your favoured enemy could have come from a similar vien - long time in their company - you know their habits because you once spent so much time with them. Why try to destroy what you once almost were? Just as a suggestion - instead of only death/destruction also use your favoured enemy ability for redemption attempts where possible ... that should make for more interesting role-playing. Plus it means that instead of just loathing evil your chracter has other reasons to adventure. Of course that's dependent on your GM's take on the favoured enemy ability.
erbmjw 08-30-06, 02:03 AM	Working with Syk and your take on love - rather than "her betrayal"; her love(sacrifice) for him resuced him and drove him to seek redemption. So now for a horrible plot summary of a potential background on that theme ;) 1) bad boy and bad girl fall in love with one another 2) nasty but not horriblely evil things happen along the way 3) bad boy and bad girl get involved with really evil group 4) bad boy starts to become almost-evil-boy because of time spent(efforts) with the evil group 5) almost-evil-boy gets himself into a signifigant dire situation 6) because bad girl is not evil and still loves almost-evil-boy she tries to protect/save him 7) almost-evil-boy is redeemed by bad girl's action(s) /behaviour 8) could be a big cheesy effect -- bad girls is gone (missing/dead/enslaved/sent to limbo/in coma) 9) redeemed-boy uses his intimate knowledge of the group provided by his time with them as the rationale for the Favoured Enemy feat
dragonheart 08-30-06, 10:27 AM	not bad. one posibility similar to the love theme is simple fascination. I have a ranger that is fascinated with dragons, for his second favoured enemy he took dragons and has used some of the bonuses from later additions to improve his knowledge there. At this point he both helps good dragons and hunts evil ones so it gets used both ways. one thing I noticed is that the second favoured enemy is a great place to put in such role recurrent pieces. At level one you want something like orcs or goblinoids to get the edge in survivability, by 8th level yoru starting to take on significantly deadly monsters and again need that edge but at level 4 your still normally facing the humandoids and a few other relatively weak monsters (dangerous enough of course but not drow (in any numbers), giants, demons, devils, aberations, etc. where you need every edge you can get.) You have also adventured enough to perhpas have some new backstory to fit things like hte love sequence in.