Since we are a roleplay-focused community in this game, try to be creative and come up with thematic encounters or ideas for your character, rather than just powerful magic items. Would you like to put levels in a currently unavailable prestige class? Maybe you'd like to put your character through an exotic change, like acquiring a template; or, you'd like an in-character scene that will allow you to demonstrate or explain how you acquired a new feat or class feature. It could even be something like a change in the storyline—an important NPC goes missing, or a trusted friend turns out to be a betrayer, creating plenty of opportunities for even more great roleplaying!
Applicants should work with a GM to come up with a wishlist for their PC during the application process. Wishlists should be three items long—no more, no less. This ensures that the administrative staff can devote proper time and attention to the wishes of all PCs and deliver quality returns on players' efforts without facing empty hands and a shrug from some and dozens of enthusiastic and detailed requests from others. Too many wishes becomes burdensome to the game, and the story stops progressing as plots are bogged down with attempts to fulfill everybody’s differing desires; too few, and Freehold is relegated partway back to that category of adventures where the GMs control everything and the players have little or no say as they are railroaded from point to point. Three wishes is the magic number, after all, and this requirement provides both variety and opportunity for players and GMs, alike.
What Goes on a Wishlist?
Almost anything can go on your wishlist. If you want to keep it simple, you can make requests as broad and mundane as "I’d like a chance for my PC to acquire a powerful magic sword." You can also be more specific and spectacular, as in "I'd like for the rival sorcerer from my PC's backstory not just to show up and menace me again, but to have gained levels in the mystic theurge prestige class since we last met and to bring a party of evil adventuring comrades with him when he comes."
There's nothing wrong with either simple or complex items on a wishlist; both have the opportunity to become more or less than what you envision, through the planning of the administrative staff and your own roleplaying. In fact, sometimes a more nebulous wish can be better, because it not only enables the GMs to play around and be creative with your request, but it also means that things can be more of a surprise for you when they manifest. Likewise, detailed and specific wishes could potentially become whole adventures, with supporting characters, recurring villains or allies, and your PC in the spotlight. Since we allow three items, take advantage of that to present us with a mix of both extremes.
It's okay for wishes to be big enough to potentially affect other PCs and NPCs, or even all of Freehold. You might ask for the opportunity to combat a powerful monster that's threatening the region, to collect bounty on a wanted criminal who's harassing caravans, for a natural disaster or other catastrophe to strike Freehold or the region nearby, or even that other powers take an interest in your new home. A plague or famine, a flash flood, an aggressive nomad warlord, and a haunting in the ruins close by are all viable options that could easily result in other characters becoming rapidly involved by being forced to respond, without directly harming or negatively influencing their interests or development. It doesn't always have to be combative or even something bad, either—a wishlist could include a desire for Freehold to be visited by friendly fey, for a mysterious treasure or place of power to appear nearby, for a visitation or blessing from a divine being, or for your character to make a friend among the thri-kreen or the catfolk.
All wishlist submissions should either directly affect your PC, or directly affect Freehold and indirectly affect other characters. Broad-spectrum or far-reaching requests should remain restricted to the game area. A good rule of thumb is: The bigger the wish, the closer to home it should be. You could reasonably ask that something happen outside the game region which requires your PC's attention, and thus travel to get there, but that sort of thing is best kept along the lines of, say, an ill befalling a character from your PC's backstory, one who isn't a part of Freehold. A dragon attack, the emergence of a tomb filled with ancient secrets, or a monsoon should all happen in or close to Freehold.
As clear examples, here are a few of our favorite wishlist items we've seen from players:
- The opportunity to roleplay the acquisition of a special mount gained through appropriate class features, when the ability becomes available, rather than simply having one magically appear at the proper level.
- The chance to bear and raise a child with the PC's spouse.
- An encounter in which the PC's secret identity, hidden since Freehold's founding, is discovered by enemies or allies.
- An experience that helps lead a godless PC to find a new religion that is meaningful to them, in the face of old scars and the traumatic memories of their previous faith.
- For the PC's familiar to get caught up in mating season, since it is still an animal by nature—and for the PC to be faced with any possible consequences.
- To discover a way to achieve lichdom without using evil methods.
What Doesn't Go on a Wishlist?
We prefer players don't request things that might drastically alter the entire canon lore or setting; for example, don't ask that a unique or signature magical item in the possession of an officially established character (the Hornblade, the Crown of Horns, Crenshinibon, etc.) wind up in your PC's hands. Don't request that large-scale events (catastrophes, natural disasters, war) occur outside the bounds of the game area. Don't ask for deus ex machina mechanisms—things that would be highly unlikely to happen outside of GM fiat, like a kingdom toppling or an invasion driving people toward or away from Freehold. Finally, don't make requests that specifically affect other, existing characters ("I want X to fall in love with my PC" or "I’d like something to happen that greatly inconveniences Y"); you’ll have to save goals like that for in-game interactions and machinations—something for you to work toward.