Harpers

[undeadsteak]

Ive just been wondering, do all harpers need to know magic to be a harper agent? not take the prestige class, im just talking about FR Lore. Because i want to create a harper, but im not sure if they have to know magic to be a Harper agent.

[undeadsteak]

AWw cone on.. nobody knows the answer?

[Ichbin]

AWw cone on.. nobody knows the answer?

I have just about every book BUT FR. I feel ashamed of myself, but eh, Im happy with my Eberron and Ravenloft.

[undeadsteak]

well, then, ill just give it up.

[Ethereal Edge]

Sorry, I got your answer. As per the Player's Guide to Faerun, Pg. 58, Harper Agent:

REQUIREMENTS

To qualify to become a Harper agent, a character must fulfill all the following criteria.
Alignment: Any nonevil.
Skills: Diplomacy 8 ranks, Knowledge ([any one region] local) 4 ranks, Sense Motive 2 ranks, Survival 2 ranks.
Feat: Negotiator.
Special: The candidate must be sponsored by a member in good standing of the Harpers and win approval from the High Harpers.

[Corran]

While many Harpers are bards and rangers and fewer are wizards or clerics it is not needed to know magic.

The Harpers are more interested in your intentions than your abilities. They have a number of fighters and barbarians among their members.

[Hoar]

Some informations that will, hopefully, be of any use. It is an excerpt from the original TSR sourcebook "The code of the Harpers".

?What?s a Harper? A good question, like most good questions, it has a lot of right answers. As many, in fact, as there are Harpers...and if that?s too cute an observation for your liking, then you have my condolences. A mind so closed can only find life a small, sad cage.?
-Tanthlin Starshann, Bard of Berdusk

Many definitions of the term ?Harper? have been made down the ages. Some of them have even been printable. Most folk in the Realms know what the Harpers stand for, more or less (which is about what most Harpers know), but there have always been rumors of a secret code of laws or rules that define Harper membership and behavior. The truth is that there are and there aren?t. (That phrase describes a lot of truths about the Harpers.) The disorganized and secretive nature of the fellowship of Those Who Harp makes it hard to define what a Harper is (and sometimes, who is and who is not a Harper), and what Harpers do and may not do.

Who Wears the Silver Harp
Men and women of all ages and crafts are Harpers as well as half-elves, elves, and a few halflings, gnomes, dwarves, and intelligent woodland beings (notably swanmays, dryads, and centaurs). The first three races named are the most numerous in the Harper ranks, and most of these Harpers are bards or rangers. Other classes are also well represented, from mages and thieves to priests. Most druids in the North of Faer?n are Harper allies rather than members, but clerics of many faiths (notably Azuth, Deneir, Eldath, Lliira, Mielikki, Milil, Mystra, Oghma, Selune, Silvanus, Tymora, and the elven deities) wear the silver harp proudly. In some cases this causes tension between Harpers and higher-ranking clergy, but it never seems to cause tension between Harpers and the deities themselves, or among deities. Lone wolves (misfits, solitary adventurers, the disfigured, or the brilliant but unbalanced) are tolerated in the ranks of the Harpers, perhaps even encouraged. This adds many crazies and difficult folk to the ranks of the Harpers, but it also brings some very powerful individuals into the fellowship, giving them friends and a direction in life.
The elusive, mysterious, and for purposes of defining, describing, or fighting them-very difficult quality of the Harpers is their lack of organization. This has also been their strength, the flexibility that allows them to melt away before a powerful foe into nothingness (complete lack of organized activity, sometimes for many years) instead of standing strong as a visible army and being smashed by a Zhentarian (or Thayan, or Luskan, or Amnian, or Scardalean, or whomever the petty tyrant may be this season) attack.
The complete story of the Harpers may never be told, because it?s not that sort: of organization. Nothing is clear, nothing is formal-and nothing is ever finished. Wise Harpers know this only too well. In the absence of armed might, it?s all that?s enabled them to survive as a group, in the face of Zhentarim assassins and the soldiers of a hundred rulers, great and small.
Harpers do not gather in large armies to do battle with evil in the glorious clash of arms.
Instead, more often than not, single Harper agents slip into places that have fallen under the sway of various shadows, from the halls of kings to thieves? dens-and do all that one being can do to thwart the ruling evil. Not a few have given their lives. As the Harper Caledan put it, isn?t that how the Harpers operate? They send one person to slip in and do a job where an army couldn?t go. If the agent fails, they?ve lost only one. But if the agent succeeds . . .

When asked what sets Harpers apart from other secret societies (and self-interested cabals and brotherhoods who don?t bother with secrecy) in the Realms, Elminster said that Harpers were the only such folk who habitually worried about the effects of their actions on others. This explains why most senior Harpers favor caution and temperance in the use of their influence on the world. As Khelben Blackstaff Arunsun once put it, ?Do what is needful, but no more, lest the doing become more important than the deeds.? That has become a Harper watchword, and such watchwords define the written Code (such as it is) of the Harpers.

If there is any specific point you need informations about, let me know, and I will look what I can do.

[Ethereal Edge]

Eh, I was more posting the prestige class just to denote it's not a requirement anywhere in there... meaning harpers probably don't need to.

[undeadsteak]

oh, okay cool. thanks guys.

[VFoxcraft]

On the subject of Harpers, I consider the actual prestige class to be underpowered. That said, I intend to make up for their lack of combat prowess with certain rp benefits, such as an information network or perhaps insightful tidbits of knowledge about quests the Harpers would provide their own with.

[Ethereal Edge]

That's a good idea, because many prestige classes give the character nothing more than, well... prestige amongst a certain faction. Most of the Harper classes seem to fall into that category.

[Clutch]

Harpers rock with traps though =)

[undeadsteak]

Yes, i understand the prestige class is underpowered, and i would still take it, IF it didnt require the magic requirement. that was just annoying as heck.

[Earind]

Yes, i understand the prestige class is underpowered, and i would still take it, IF it didnt require the magic requirement. that was just annoying as heck.

They are not like the Harper Scouts of NWN1 who were weak almost to the point of unplayability.

[GodBeastX]

They are not like the Harper Scouts of NWN1 who were weak almost to the point of unplayability.

Euniana can tell you stories about that. She had a 20 rogue remade 15 rogue 5 harper in NWN1 for her own RP benefit, and then kicked herself for it.