Characters

New Character Starting Wealth

PERMANENT ITEMS: 9th: 1, 8th: 2, 7th: 1, 6th: 2

CURRENCY: 350 gp

LUMP SUM: 2,300 gp 

New Character Backgrounds

When creating your player character, consider selecting one of the following new character backgrounds, each of which was designed specifically for this adventure. Instead of encapsulating your life before you became an adventurer, these backgrounds represent your motivation for entering the tournament.

Abadar's Avenger

Background

Hao Jin really has some nerve for a supposed disciple of Abadar. First, she dares to start a collection of trinkets in hopes of emulating the great Abadar’s unsurpassable First Vault. As if that weren’t enough, she also sets up a contest to give away her most powerful treasures to anyone who can throw a punch! Abadar hasn’t directly told you as much, per se, but surely this kind of hubris can’t sit well with your beloved deity, regardless of Hao Jin’s own supposed ties to the Master of the First Vault. At the very least, someone’s got to check out this shoddy imitation of the First Vault and write a report for the church of Abadar—and you’ve decided that someone is you.

With or without the blessing of an actual priest of Abadar, you’ve taken it upon yourself to investigate Hao Jin’s “wondrous” vault by winning her Ruby Phoenix Tournament. You read a few flyers about the tournament’s home city and joined the first team that could handle your righteous zealotry, but any more preparation would be a waste of time. You clearly have the divine will of Abadar on your side (but again, no actual proof of this), which is all you’ll need to win this tournament and dispel any notions of Hao Jin’s ties to your patron deity.

Choose two ability boosts. One must be to Charisma or Wisdom, and one is a free ability boost.

You’re trained in Religion and the Goka Lore skill. You gain the Assurance skill feat with Religion.

Attention Addict

Background

A roaring crowd chanting your name. Your face plastered all over the city. Fawning fans begging for your autograph. Jealous rivals. Endless fame. The promise of all this and more is what drove you to enter this year’s Ruby Phoenix Tournament, and with your prodigious star power it’s no wonder why they selected you for the prequalifier on Danger Island. You’ve got champion stamped all over you. Obviously, the organizers knew a winner when they saw one.

It’s already clear that you’ll be named Ruby Phoenix Champion—the challenges leading up to your prize ceremony are mere formalities, but you’re happy to indulge the impassioned masses. After all, the people want a show, and what kind of celebrity would you be if you denied them? You might even deign to compete in some fights, too, as long as your hair doesn’t get mussed.

Choose two ability boosts. One must be to Strength or Charisma, and one is a free ability boost.

You’re trained in Performance and the Gladiatorial Lore skill. You gain the Impressive Performance skill feat.

Newcomer in Need

Background

You’re a Gokan native in a bad spot, and you’re going to need a miracle to get you out of your current fix. Miracles are in short supply, but the title of Ruby Phoenix Champion might just do the trick.

Maybe you need the prize money to pay for a relative’s expensive operation or to free your family from debt to Golden League gangsters. Or maybe there’s a particular prize in Hao Jin’s vault that could literally save your life—an amulet you can use to flee to the farthest corners of the multiverse or even an artifact that could resurrect you if you die, just like the Ruby Phoenix.

The tough circumstances of your upbringing in one of Goka’s more downtrodden neighborhoods—such as industrial Oldtown, the slums of the Scales district, or even the crime-ridden undercity—taught you lessons of self-reliance and how to quickly make friends in unlikely circumstances. You’ve scraped together an entry into the Ruby Phoenix Tournament’s prequalifier with a team you can trust. Now all that’s left is to pull off the impossible and win this thing once and for all.

Choose two ability boosts. One must be to Constitution or Dexterity, and one is a free ability boost.

You’re trained in Society and the Goka Lore skill. You gain the Streetwise skill feat.

Ruby Phoenix Fanatic

Background

Rare

Have you heard of the peerless sorcerer Hao Jin, also known as the Ruby Phoenix? Of course you have! You’re her biggest fan! She’s got amazing powers of self-resurrection, her hair is as red and fiery as a phoenix, and she has a huge vault full of the most incredible treasures in the multiverse. Now she’s finally back from a mysterious 300-year quest on the plane of Axis so she can host this year’s Ruby Phoenix Tournament—and you can’t wait to meet her!

In order to get as close to Hao Jin as possible, you've researched everything there is to know about the Ruby Phoenix's home, her planar escapades, and her competition. You've also trained your body to prove yourself a worthy champion. When Hao Jin’s committee invited you and some friends to take part in the tournament’s prequalifier, you just about fainted from excitement. Is your dream of meeting the Ruby Phoenix about to come true? As long as you win enough matches to get into the actual tournament, it just might! Just try not to act too star-struck when you finally get a chance to talk to her, okay?

Choose two ability boosts. One must be to Constitution or Intelligence, and one is a free ability boost.

You’re trained in the Axis Lore, Gladiatorial Lore, and Goka Lore skills. You gain the Dubious Knowledge skill feat.

Second Chance Champion

Background

Uncommon

You competed in the last Ruby Phoenix Tournament 10 years ago, though you didn’t make it to the end. One wrong step, one mistimed punch, one blocked spell—whatever it was, that was all it took for your opponent to get the upper hand and knock you out of the tournament. Well, maybe it was a simple mistake or maybe you just weren’t up to snuff, and you’re too headstrong to admit it.

Now, after training for a decade to ensure you don’t repeat any of your prior mistakes, you’ve joined forces with a team of fellow fighters in order to maximize your odds of making it all the way to the finals. Whatever happened before, you’ve vowed to return to the ring in Goka for an epic rematch, and this time you’re not walking out until you’ve been named Ruby Phoenix Champion.

Choose two ability boosts. One must be to Dexterity or Strength, and one is a free ability boost.

You’re trained in Acrobatics and the Gladiatorial Lore skill. You gain the Cat Fall skill feat.

Undercover Contender

Background

Gangsters and cheats seem as drawn to the Ruby Phoenix Tournament as piranhas to a bloody hippo, and you’re dead set on making sure this tournament is as scandal-free as possible. Your reasons are your own—maybe a high-ranking official in Goka has tasked you with the case, or maybe foul play led to losing someone dear to you in the last tournament. Maybe you just hate to see fair fighters get knocked out by crooked contenders. Whatever your motives, you’ve promised to be in the ring in case anyone tries to derail the contest. The Golden League crime syndicate is the most obvious suspect, what with their meddling in the Ruby Phoenix Tournament a decade ago, but maybe there will be others—unscrupulous contenders trying to pull one over on Hao Jin, perhaps, or an entirely new devious conspiracy hoping to hijack the event for their own evil purposes. In any case, you’ll be around to deliver the hammer of justice.

You’ve told a small squad of your closest confidants about your mission, and you’ve managed to secure a spot in the tournament’s prequalifier along with them. You and your team have to win fights to stay in the competition long enough to make sure things go smoothly. If that means you end up being the Ruby Phoenix Champions, all the better.

Choose two ability boosts. One must be to Charisma or Dexterity, and one is a free ability boost.

You’re trained in Deception and the Underworld Lore skill. You gain the Lengthy Diversion skill feat.

Suggested Character Options

Whether you’re building a new character from scratch or you’re retraining an existing character with this adventure in mind, the following notes might come in handy.

Ancestries

The Ruby Phoenix Tournament attracts people of all ancestries and from all places, and there are no restrictions for entering the contest. No one particular ancestry would have a distinct advantage or disadvantage in the competition, as long as they can survive in daylight and are capable of communicating forfeiture. Because of this year’s addition of a pre-qualifying tournament in Minata, an archipelago located in almost the exact opposite corner of Tian Xia from Goka, the diversity of entrants is even greater than usual. Any Pathfinder ancestry option will fit in just fine. That said, certain creatures are still more common than others at the event, and so selecting a character of one of these ancestries could give you one more element in common with some of the non-player characters you might encounter.

Perhaps unsurprisingly since the contest is held in the largest city in Tian Xia, humans of Tian heritage—particularly people of Tian-Shu ethnicity, who predominate most of Tian Xia thanks to the expansionist efforts of the now-defunct Lung Wa Empire—represent most of the entrants to the Ruby Phoenix Tournament. Humanoids of other ancestries more common in Tian Xia, such as kitsune and tengus, also make up a fair share of the competition’s entrants. This pattern is largely due to proximity and convenience; it’s simply easier for fighters from Tian countries to secure travel to Goka. Likewise, stories of worthy Tian fighters have a greater chance of reaching the ears of the tournament’s organizers, which also impacts who receives an invitation to the event. Since the prequalifier this year is being held in Minata, Tian-Sing people, who have called the Minatan isles home for countless generations, are also strongly represented.

Of the various player character ancestries, the following options may offer you some interesting roleplaying opportunities. For your convenience, this list also includes the sourcebook and page number where you can find the full rules for each ancestry.

• Catfolk (Pathfinder Advanced Player’s Guide 8)

• Hobgoblin (Lost Omens Character Guide 48)

• Kitsune (Pathfinder Lost Omens Ancestry Guide 120)

• Ratfolk (Advanced Player’s Guide 20)

• Tengu (Advanced Player’s Guide 24)

Classes

The Ruby Phoenix Tournament draws contenders from all walks of life, from spell-slinging magic practitioners to sword-wielding knights errant to mercenary-minded scoundrels. That said, some classes of competitor are seen in the ring more often than others.

Chief among the most common tournament entrants are, perhaps unsurprisingly, fighters. Monks, barbarians, and swashbucklers are also typical entrants. All of these martial masters practice close-range mortal combat as a way of life and are expertly suited to fights in the arena. The tournament’s team-on-team format also favors rangers and rogues, who boast numerous talents and specialties that create openings for their teammates or otherwise exploit the chaos typical to the fighting ring.

Among the magic-wielding classes, wizards, witches, and other spellcasters who prepare their spells daily (as opposed to tapping into some innate power) have an advantage here. Because of the Ruby Phoenix Tournament’s predictable schedule and frequent opportunities to rest (often an entire night) between bouts, these spellcasters can change their spell repertoire frequently and zero in on just the right selection of spells for the arena. Of course, the sheer variety of the other teams competing in the tournament—not to mention the unpredictable arenas of the intermittent exhibition matches—means that it can hardly be taken for granted that a wizard or witch will excel where a sorcerer will not. Indeed, sorcerers—as well as alchemists and druids—have many other abilities at their disposal besides spellcasting that make them more than formidable in the ring.

As always, bards, clerics, and paladins make for excellent teammates. To say nothing of their healing magic in the midst of bouts, characters of these classes are also great mascots, promoters, and cheerleaders for their teams both within and outside of the ring. Although divine casters might not find much use for fiend-slaying powers during the Ruby Phoenix Tournament, rumor has it that Danger Island is home to a fair number of undead, and, as usual, there is no shortage of powerful evildoers vying for the tournament’s grand prize.

Of all the classes, investigators and oracles are perhaps the most unlikely adventurers to be found entering the Ruby Phoenix Tournament. Although the events and challenges of the tournament are far from predictable, the structure of the competition is formalized enough that there are few riddles to solve or mysteries to unravel. That said, for all its structure and attention to detail, nothing ever goes exactly as planned at the worldwide event, and enigma-seeking or case-busting adventurers might just discover that there is more going on behind the scenes than anyone suspects...

Languages

As opposed to the Inner Sea region, where the predominant language spoken and written by humans is Taldane, the continent of Tian Xia has its own common tongue, called Tien. Because many Pathfinder adventures take place around the Inner Sea, if you’re playing a preexisting character in this adventure then it’s possible your character doesn’t speak Tien. Depending on your group’s preferences, this might have a considerable effect on how your character interacts with other people throughout the events of the campaign. Many of the Ruby Phoenix Tournament’s organizers and participants are fluent in both Taldane and Tien, but certain non-player characters might speak only one or the other (or, in rare cases, neither—contestants come from all around Golarion, after all.) To mitigate any advantages this might bestow on native speakers, the tournament’s organizers freely offer each team of entrants an interpreter who can deftly translate official tournament information to the team.

If your fellow players and your Game Master don’t want to deal with the implications and confusion that might arise from potential mistranslations or reliance on interpreters, then you can all simply ignore any language disparities and roleplay as if all the player characters and non-player characters shared a common tongue—the tournament’s near-unlimited magical resources provides an easy in-world reason for how the language barrier might be explained away. While the Ruby Phoenix Tournament is a global event that unites people from many cultures, cross-language communication is not intended to be a major theme of this adventure, so you won’t be missing out on anything by foregoing such details.

On the other hand, some groups might enjoy the occasional social challenge of encountering a formidable rival, potential ally, or other important figure who doesn’t share a language with one or more members of the party. In this case, everyone should be onboard with this idea since it can have a considerable effect on roleplaying encounters, and all the players should take special care to remember which languages their characters can and cannot understand. Your Game Master, in particular, will have to take on a considerable amount of work to keep track of which non-player characters speak which languages. One of the players might be able to keep track of this information to alleviate some of the Game Master’s load, but either way, if your Game Master is not interested in running this type of game then you should graciously respect their decision.

Be sure mindful as well of how you portray the speech of these characters at the table. The Ruby Phoenix Tournament brings together fighters from all over Golarion, many of whom will have different first languages than the player characters. While giving a character an accent can be a useful tool to build them out and enrich your roleplaying, keep in mind that it can be easy for an accent to become stereotypical, and that stereotypical portrayals can be harmful or hurtful. Everyone has an accent, even when speaking in their first language, and so a character’s accent should always be treated with respect, never simply played for laughs.

Other Human Languages: Naturally, Tien isn’t the only language spoken by the many different humans of Tian Xia. People from Minkai often speak Minkaian, Minata natives tend to speak one or more forms of Minatan, and so on. Just as is the case with many of the other human languages in Avistan and the northern half of Garund, however, these specific regional languages are typically spoken in the presence of those from the same culture or in remote locales where Tien hasn’t taken root. This adventure won’t take you to such places—nearly everyone you encounter will speak at least either Tien or Taldane—but still, there are few better ways to quickly make a strong impression on a stranger than by revealing that you share another language.

Non-Human Languages: Finally, there are the countless languages spoken by Tian Xia’s non-human inhabitants. Some of these languages might be familiar to Inner Sea region natives, such as Aklo, Aquan, Draconic, and Jotun—not to mention the usual planar languages like Celestial and Terran—and the similarities in dialects are similar enough to permit easy communication. Of these, Draconic is perhaps the most useful, as might befit a place sometimes called the Dragon Empires. Also present are the languages specific to particular ancestries, some of which are less known on the other side of the globe; these include Nagaji, Samsaran, Tengu, and Wayang, each of which is typically spoken by people of these same-named ancestries. Finally, there is Senzar, the language of Tian Xia’s most ancient spirits; Senzar is often spoken by oni, kami, and other beings of the natural order found primarily in Tian Xia.

Skills and Feats

Martial arts fascinated the rulers of long-fallen Yixing, the empire that forged what we now call Tian Xia, and so studies of strength and agility play a large role in cultures all across the continent. Goka, and thus many entrants to the Ruby Phoenix Tournament, are no exception to this trend. So, while anyone can enter the tournament, regardless of strength, intellect, and social standing, many contenders have honed their bodies at least to some extent. Those who abstain from physical training make up for this by mastering a variety of magical traditions. Although a silver tongue will get you far in Goka and can provide valuable motivation for allies in the arena, all the wit and guile in the world won’t save you from an expertly placed kick or punch.

How does this translate into character skills and feats? For starters, training in Acrobatics and Athletics provide essential foundations upon which you can expand your character's abilities. Feats that help with grappling foes or escaping tight situations in some of the tournament’s unusual arenas—like Cat Fall, Kip Up, Titan Wrestler, and Wall Jump—might prove invaluable. For magic, any skills and feats that enable to you to fling spells fast and furiously are useful, as is a feat like Quick Recognition, which can give a spellcaster the decisive edge in fights against fellow magic wielders. From a social standpoint, Deception, Intimidation, and Performance are all viable routes for feinting opponents, striking fear into a rival’s heart, and exciting the audience watching the fight. The Medicine skill, particularly when combined with Battle Medicine and other Medicine skill feats, can be a great boon for contenders patching up wounds between fights. As usual, a character who studies a relevant Lore skill (such as Goka Lore and Gladiatorial Lore) and info-gathering skills like Diplomacy and Society can gain access to a wealth of interesting and useful knowledge throughout their adventures. On the flipside, opportunities to use skills like Crafting, Stealth, Survival, and Thievery, while not nonexistent, aren’t typical during the fast-paced tournament.

Although many Ruby Phoenix Tournament teams specialize in one particular form of combat or another, a well-rounded team with a variety of skills and feats generally stands a much better chance of making it all the way to the end of the tournament. While a team of arcane-focused wizards or pugilistic fighters can make for an exciting campaign full of camaraderie and roleplaying (and you should absolutely create such a party if that sounds compelling to everyone at the table), you might discover some glaring gaps in your defenses if you end up fighting against opponents whose specialties counter or negate your own. Of course, if your fellow players and Game Master are up for this possibility, then it will no doubt be a fight to remember!