Rosie Gwenyth: Lawful Neutral, Fiend Warlock with Pact of the Chain, LVL 5. Haunted One Background.
Backstory:
Rosie was once an ordinary villager, living a peaceful life in the village of Oakenview. The town was known for its public witch burnings, which happened on a weekly basis. Rosie did not particularly care about this event, preferring to tend to her fields, that is until the town's witch hunters falsely accused her of being a witch and imprisoned her. While in her cell, she overheard the guards talking to the mayor, and learned a terrible truth: there were really no witches at all. The mayor had been scapegoating and burning innocent victims so that he could earn money off of the viewings and to make him look like a hero to the townsfolk to secure and boost his political standing.
The day of the weekly burning came. Rosie was quickly tied to a pole and gagged as oil-soaked wood was piled around the base of the pole. The corrupt mayor made his usual speech and statements about the "wickedness the witch brought to the village" to the giddy crowd. He then ordered his men to light the fire. As the wood was set ablaze, Rosie closed her eyes in preparation of what was to come.
Time passed, but Rosie felt no pain or heat. After a bit, she peeked open her eyes to see why. But what she saw shocked her.
The whole town around her was burning. The flames from the pyre she was standing on had spread outwards into the village. Rosie saw the corrupt mayor attempt to run, but the flames, as if they had a mind of their own, chased him down and engulfed him. The crowd, who had once eagerly awaited the burning of another innocent soul, screamed as they tried to avoid getting burned. But the flames had surrounded the whole village and killed the crowd one by one till there was no one left. But the most unusual thing that happened was that no matter what, the flames never even got close to Rosie. Soon, the only things in the village left standing were Rosie's house (which the flames also avoided) and the pole, with Rosie being the only survivor. This sight would be forever engraved into her mind, and it still haunts her nightmares.
Rosie was still tied to the pole, so she struggled against the rope for a few minutes, but to no avail. Then, an imp emerged from one of the remaining fires, approached Rosie, and removed her gag. Introducing himself as Jacques, he explained what had happened. Rosie's parents (who had moved out of the town when she was young, and were dead by the time of the incident) had struck a deal with Asmodeus to keep her safe. They did not trust the witch burnings in the first place, so they had also stated to protect her from the flames if she was ever selected to be burned. Asmodeus did so by turning the flames into malevolent fire elementals, which killed everyone responsible.
Jacques then offered her a deal of his own, stating that if she accepts, Asmodeus can grant her the power to save others from the same fate. Still too traumatized to fully understand the deal and its consequences, she accepted. She felt unfamiliar power flow through her as Jacques helped untie her. After gathering her belongings from her house, she left the charred remains of Oakenview for good.
She has since then bonded with Jacques and became friends with him. He helped her master her new powers and even eventually agreed to become her familiar once she grew powerful enough. She doesn't know what Asmodeus want's with her, but one thing is clear: he saved her life, and she would follow his will to the ends of the earth, as she now commands the very hellfire that tore through her village.
Ok... I normally don't do these kinds of things, but I can't sleep, and well last year I made a Background story for a small campaign, the DM set a bunch of strange homebrew restrictions, but allowed me to make this Artificer Character. Technically my Oldest Character still on DNDB.
And the Short Story I wrote (something I hate doing normally, but I was encouraged to do so by the DM. So I down so Mt Dew Baja Blast and got crazy.
A day in the life of a Gnome, the Bhuem KaBhuem edition.
Once upon a time, in a small corner of a forgotten portion of a forgotten land buried deep beneath the earth, hidden from all eyes was a colony of six thousand Rock Gnomes, who worked for a Leader who’s stated purpose was global domination, and the subjugation of all life on the surface world to bring about an age of Gnomish peace and prosperity. The Ubiquitarissiah, a self-described Machine God, and overlord over the “evil lair” that the gnomes worked, lived, and died in. Had ruled the colony of gnomes for many thousands of years, none of the gnomes had ever seen the Ubiquitarissiah in person, as it was hidden deep within the “evil lair”, always giving rules, judgements, and maintaining power through the use of clockwerk gnomes that he used to control the population. None could hide in the face of such an overlord. The Gnomes under his rule have never known a life outside of the evil lair, the “evil lair” which was also called “The Evil Lair” was an underground structure with 15 levels and covering a square mile footprint with 15 square miles of indoor space, with no known entrances or exits.
This story has nothing to do with him, his plans, or even his leadership. Instead, it’s about one lowly gnome in his employ. Bhuem KaBhuem she works in the engineering department, and science labs, as a Gnomoid Clockwerk Scientist, dealing in clockwerk mechanisms and their related parts and fuels, these clockwerks are then used for multiple purposes, ranging from bomb disposal to gathering samples in distant lands, to working as enforcement units. The field uses a symbiosis of mechanical engineering and magical theory formulation not too dissimilar to how a Wizard would design new spells. To the outside world this field would simply be called an artificer, to the uneducated they would be called wizards. To her, she was just an engineer, sure her education and field met all the requirements of being a scientist, but she felt more grounded than a flighty scientist with their head in the ceiling.
Bhuem loved designing new alchemical fuels to power clockwerks. Her favorite fuel design being Hydrogen three Carbon, hydrogen two carbon chains ending in dual carbon oxygen linked to an oxygen linked to a carbon hydrogen three. As it can not only be used as a fuel, but it lubricates and cleans at the same time. Ironically many other gnomes like the chemical because it smells nice “kind of like fruit”. However nice the smell, it would be meaningless to her if it didn’t work as a fuel source and lubricant that also cleaned. Her love of it as a fuel however had its risks as it had a relatively low flash point, so it was not good to use the fuel with clockwerks working around heat, but it worked well with room temperature clockwerk use, however it was actually a food safe fuel source as it was made from fatty acids diffused in alcohol and heated under pressure devoid of oxygen. Which was what the other half of her current project was, designing new food dispensing clockwerks so she would never have to talk to a specific Food Service Gnome, because the Ubiquitarissiah really gave few orders on what they were specifically making to dominate the world, so most of the engineering and scientific staff had free reign with design work and projects. Bhuem was going to remove the possibility of interacting with a specific gnome, then she would have the luxury to pursue her greatest ambition, design the largest explosion possible, she was sure that using the right combination of radioactive material in compression with a properly distributed blast pattern across it’s surface she could cause atomic fission, the long sought-after dream of many a gnome before her.
[beep, beep, beep] the alarm went off, [The time is thirty minutes past the fifth shift hour, beep, beep, beep (repeat every second for a minute), the time is thirty-one minutes past the fifth shift hour] eventually after several minutes, Bhuem KaBhuem woke, she hated mornings, she needed a nice greasy cup of overly caffeinated, overly sugared, and lightly creamed coffee to greet the shift, she hated working the early shift, but it allowed her the least amount of family interactions. Bhuem was not anti-social, but she just hated interacting with gnomes who knew her before, she would just forget that other person that she was had ever existed. She was a woman, and that was final, she took the potion to fix any doubt, she was nothing but girl, as it should have always been. But no, her family, those fifty filthy brothers and sisters of hers, always deadnaming her, as if she even looked like that anymore. Her female parental unit was the worst of the lot though, it seriously peeves her to have come from a being of such mindless dedication, insisting she was just a phase, she would want to return to being that which came before. As if. So, to minimize her family, she refuses to remember them, she ignores their existence in the same way they ignore her right to being herself. But him, the food service gnome, he is the one existence she hopes to never see, her youngest sibling. Uhgh.
Slowly she went to the water unit and cleaned her body and hair, then after drying off she did her hair in her trademarked style of twin buns. She then went to her uniform storage unit and took out her overalls and protective armor. Then she checked her personally issued firearm, and affixed the powder, caps, and balls to their special pockets on her belt. She then activated her personal grooming reflection unit, to check herself in a three-dimensional view. She really loved her figure. She looked in the hologram and then added a light coat of makeup to bring out her green eyes which perfectly contrasted her naturally pink hair.
“You go girl!” she said looking at the hologram of herself. She then spun on her toes of her heavy work boots, the skirt of her plate armor “went spinny” she made happy gnomish sounds as she left her personal sleep cubical.
The cafeteria was on the level between her sleep cube and her work cube space, so she walked in saw the annoy-o-gnome serving greenslop, she huffed, grabbed a food tray from the large stack, hit the first station got her triple expresso with extra sugar and steamed cream, while sipping on her caffeine infusion, she went to the green slop window, as she loved the nutritional value that the green slop provided, it was a mix of boiled algae and floral fungus roots blended into a nice smooth green slop. It had twice the vitamin content and triple the daily required iron intake. Most gnomes however preferred the orange slop made from the root plants grown in hydroponics. They had good vitamins, but were overloaded with carbohydrates, meaning with her new female physiology if she ate that she would balloon up to the next overall size, and she liked being a size minus 8. Her birth unit was a size minus 5, of course she also had multiple litters of kids over the years, and worked in the medical unit, and was a cleric of the ‘Original path of the Ubiquitarissiah’ the conservative religious faction of gnomes, who believed that unless Ubiquitarissiah specified something than the logic value was zero. They felt a gnome should remain unchanged unless ordered by Ubiquitarissiah, as if, she needed the change, she asked Ubiquitarissiah for help, he sent an enforcer clockwerk with the potion of permanent gender change. She might not have been ordered to change, but Ubiquitarissiah did send her the potion when she asked for it. As for her, that was all the confirmation she needed that hers was the right choice in the eyes of their overlord. Of corse she didn’t actually believe that Ubiquitarissiah was a god as described in the educational portion of her youth. Ubiquitarissiah didn’t exist on some plane of existence separated from the world. So, by the basic descriptions of divine ranks, Ubiquitarissiah, could be no more than a divine rank 0 through 4. Ie a demi-god. She was fine with this line of thought. Of corse she mostly forgot everything she schooled in besides the subjects relating to her actual passions. She passed the corse of study on gods and divine ranks, she passed the course on history and geography, and promptly forgot about them as they were meaningless to her life, she got full honors in math, mechanical engineering, drafting, chemistry, and gnomebotics. She excelled in her magical formula studies, and her applied magics. She graduated at the top of her class, so she was allowed to pick her own lab, and research what she wanted. Other lesser gnomes had to either work as lab assistants, or work in support drone functions, most of her family units were support units, she wished them well, but hoped they would just vanish to other levels. Which is why she picked a lab on the topmost level on the outer ring, her sleepcube was placed on the uppermost sleep dorms. Closest to her labs. Unfortunately, the floor between was services and support units. Which was why the cafeteria was there, and her idiot youngest sibling was serving her green slop, and chatting away at her saying things like, “…so brave…”, “…being yourself…”, “…hero...”, “…workers unite…”, wait what?!, ah nevermind.
As he finished talking looking expectantly at Bhuem, she said the words she said every day she got food from him, “Thank you food service drone.” And walked a way so she could eat, and recharge on her caffeine. When done, she filled a large fluid container with more creamy caffeine-sugar and went to her lab.
She entered her lab area; the space was divided into three enclosed cubicles. In the front cubical was her drafting tables, abacus and slide rules, with stacks and stacks of papers and designs, in the middle airtight cube was the chemical lab and gnombotic construction area with a viewing window for the third cube, the experimental lab. The front lab was perfectly clean white walls, white floors, and white ceilings with light cubes set into the ceilings. On one wall was the daily orders screen which gave out assignments and orders from Ubiquitarissiah, on the screen all you could see was a clock timer that said:
Minute(s) since the last work-related injury:
[2 minutes]
Work safe, Work smart, Work for world peace and power for Ubiquitarissiah
Current shift [6th shift 00 minutes]”
She was hoping today the food service bot would be ready, the last 5 exploded while cooking green slop. She was sure this time she could do it, and then her annoying brother would be reassigned, away from her, and what the hell was a “union” anyway? And why did he want her help making one?
Over the course of the day she, repaired the bot, built a new fuel containing housing mixed a new batch of her biofuel, she was thinking of calling this mixture Esther diesel, since it was frustrating and was starting to annoy her just like her mother. On paper it should work, but it kept exploding when she didn’t want it to. Sure, she loves big booms, it’s why she named herself Bhuem KaBhue, that and her dead name pissed her off it was not her at all. But no, she would not call her work of the last 3 weeks after her mother. No, she would name it like she named everything.
Fuel Unit 3, triglyceride, biodiesel for Food Service Unit 4.
She then filled the newly repaired food service clockwerk with fuel, placed it in front of the cook pot, set the activation matrix, left the lab, and watched the bot turn the heat on, it then grabbed the oversized metal stirring and serving spoon used to make and serve slop, the bot started to stir the pot at the correct speed. She then activated the customer bots she made for the experiment, the bots were simple gnome bots designed to queue in line then receive the slop on the trays they held, then walk away as if finding a seat, they would then clean their slop into the slop recycle bin and rejoin the queue. The slop recycle bin of course was then used by the food service bot to resupply when it was out of slop.
She needs all the bots to continue without fail for 8 shifts.
They made it 6 shifts when the service bot failed, and exploded violently, shredding everything in the experiment lab.
“So close, just needed to make it 2 more shifts.” She slumped in the observation seat, and looked to the time, it was the 22 shift. She decided to call it a night, better luck the next day. On the way out of her lab, she received a personal call on her screen, she answered it to see one of her idiot siblings, one that had joined the red shirt defense brigade, he said to her, “…(deadname) … run …. monster … No one can stop it, the horror, save yourself” She hung up, no one calls her that word, never, the nerve of him.
She went to the lift down the hall from her lab. She pressed the call button, when a violent explosion ripped the doors off, knocking her back, she lost consciousness at Shift 22, and fifteen minutes, on the last day of work in “The Evil Lair”.
End of the Short shorty and background of Bhuem KaBhuem
(Note: in the saved Document, the font used is Dot Matrix 11pt, because this is a story that should be read in Dot Matrix)
BTW the next time she woke she was on the surface world, with no memory of how she got there, she met up with a future party member, and went to the next village where the rest of the players also met up. Everyone had to write a background short story for the game.
Igne [ihg-nee] (Igneous might be changed to Ignatius or combined into Ignetius)
leonin, monk, (Way of the Four Elements, Earth)
Igne always knew she was different, though she didn’t exactly understand how and, unfortunately, that was the problem. Igne was born slow-minded in the Wastes of Xhorhas, where life was too hard to let live anyone who couldn't be relied on to pull their own weight, so her tribe left her to die as a child. Instead, she found a couple of powerful earth elemental relics and formed an attachment to rocks. Ten years later, she now wanders the world accompanied by an earth minimental attracted to her relics, trying to collect one of every kind of rock and visit the Earth Elemental Plane, if only she didn’t believe clay workers & glassblowers were earth mages, glass was a special kind of see-through rock, and lava was earth blood.
(must be read in a snooty, arrogant tone or you’re doing it wrong)
As a babe, I was chosen amongst all other infants in the clan for an arranged marriage to ensure continued peace between warring factions, and thus was given luxurious care and exorbitant schooling to become a most excellent companion for my Intended. Between lessons, my every whim was indulged and every wish fulfilled, until one season before my wedding, when my Hatfield fiancé suddenly died, leaving me without any support since I now served no purpose to Clan McCoy. My entire life, everyone in the clan told me I was special and destined for greatness, and now they want to throw me away! Before they could take back everything they’ve ever given me, I grabbed as much of MY stuff as I could and ran off in the middle of the night, vowing to return one day to show them how I had managed to achieve my great destiny without them. Instead of recognizing how wonderful and special I am, everyone I meet keeps calling me ridiculous or spoiled rotten, and if even one more tavern drunkard says, “Just shut up, bard, and play another song!”, I swear I’ll have Mittens, my elephant companion, squash them, even if it gets me banned from yet another tavern!
Mountain dwarf, Monk (Way of the Ascendant Dragon)
A violent storm left ten-year-old Jasper clinging to wreckage as the ship full of his ransoming kidnappers sunk beneath the waves and, had a dire shark not attacked the large dolphin that seemed to be ferrying him safely back to shore, no one would have ever known that his rescuer was actually a shapeshifted bronze dragon!
Unsurprisingly, the events of that day had a profound and lasting effect on the young boy: the terror of being kidnapped and at sea for the first time in a storm, the awe of being in a dragon’s presence and feeling the very air around him vibrate with the power radiating off it, the glory of flight, watching everyone near the docks flee in terror at the nearing dragon before cautiously returning as they watched a child slide off its back, the single scale that same, very amused dragon gifted the tiny dwarf boy brave enough to ask for it, and the dreams he continues to have about his dragon savior to this day.
From then on, Jasper aspired to be like a bronze dragon in all aspect of his life, from his appearance to putting an end to all injustice and cruelty he encountered, and now that his ailing father has finally passed and his youngest sister has married, he can begin his quest to right the wrongs that exist outside his town.
The travelling circus who adopted and raised Thea found her as a half-starved and feverishly delirious, eight year-old wandering through the woods, the sole survivor of gnoll attack. Horrible though it was to say, Thea didn’t miss her parents, who were abusive alcoholics & violent thugs, very much at all and thought was better off without them, and she thrived in this new environment. Thea never forgot what it was like to wander through the woods frightened, confused, and injured, and devoted her studies to healing and the pursuit of knowledge.
When she was almost thirty, a couple of boys from noble families snuck into the circus at night and were injured, causing the circus to be shutdown, its ringleaders arrested, and everyone else to go their separate ways. Having spent most of her life in an ever-changing, colorful sea of organized chaos, Thea found she was unable to happily settle down with a safe and normal job in a boring, everyday-is-the-same town, so she hit the road looking for adventure and camaraderie.
Mine is the classic fairytale: mother died when I was a very young and father died the season before my 12th birthday, but not before remarrying to my wicked stepmother. After father died, she became a source of unending torment with idea after idea of how to cleanse the Tiefling-ness from my veins (like beating or starving the evil out of me). It became habit for me to spend increasingly longer periods of time in the woods to avoid being at home, and one day, I realized I didn’t need to go back: I knew which berries and nuts were safe to eat and where and when they grew; how to make spear, rope, and net out of natural materials; where to place my snares; how to prepare and cook rabbit and fish over an open fire; which clouds meant rain was coming; how to make the roof of my hut rain-proof, what each animal’s call sounded like, how to make a bed that wasn’t itchy, and more. The forest embraced me, became my new home and new family, and I never looked back, wandering far and wide, eventually making a name for myself as someone who could guide travelers or transport packages through the most remote, dangerous, inhospitable of wildernesses.
Fairy, reluctant rogue (Swashbuckler or Soulknife)
Just months ago, after years of hard work, I was living my dream: working as the renowned, well-esteemed head chief of an important noble household, then I was framed for poisoning a visiting Duke and imprisoned for my so-called crime. Very recently, I escaped and am now on the run as a wanted fugitive trying to clear my name & determine who framed me & why.
Lucky F Boone If you must know, the F stands for F*cker.
Shadar-kai Halfling, rogue (Thief/Phantom)
cursed via homebrew Shadow Mastiff version of Hell Hound Cloak to be shadar-kai halfling who polymorphs into ‘shadow hound’
I was a common street urchin who made a living by lightening the purses of folks traveling through my turf of the city until the day I robbed this dandy wearing a pith helmet. He told me not to, saying something about curses, but his words were too similar to those spoken by a thousand other marks, so I ignored his warning not to don the fancy cloak I stole from him, and now.... No matter how sneaky you are, it’s really freaking hard to get away with crimes when you’re the only person in a thousand miles who looks like a walking corpse, so I had to hit the road and become a wandering thief as I try to figure this mess out. My name is Lucky F Boone and I'm shadow-cursed. (If you must know, the F stands for F*cker.)
I would have been accepted without issue if my powers were normal – I mean, our village priest is a tiefling, so it’s not like they weren’t accepting folk – but no one had even heard of powers like mine, and I didn’t have the best control. Still, it wasn’t until the gnolls attacked and I was able to dispatch half of them singlehandedly that my fellow villagers realized just how dangerous I was, so when the dust settled, they tearfully demanded I stay away until I could guarantee the safety of my neighbors. Joining an adventuring party might just be the best way for a smalltown homebody to get all the practice they need without endangering innocent folk and maybe return home with a bit of coin in my pocket, too.
Tribecka’s egg hatched on a ship named Shore Thing that was sailing to the rich collector who’d purchased her and, if Tribecka had been the wyvern that the rich merchant thought he was buying, then the ship would have been in trouble, but since she was a tortle, only Tribecka was in trouble. Disgusted at being swindled, the collector who purchased her egg cast her aside without care, but the crew of the Shore Thing had grown attached to her during their journey together and happily adopted her.
Tribecka had a wonderful childhood on Shore Thing, learning how to man the sails, batten the hatches, transport cargo, tie all sorts of knots, fight off the occasional pirates, and navigate using the stars. Tribecka loved nature, the stars, the sea, and her life on Shore Thing, in that order, but ship’s only need one navigator, so when Shore Thing was sent to dry docks for extensive repairs after striking a reef, Tribecka was unable to find work on any of the same ships as her favorite crewmates so decided to engage in the common tortle pastime of wandering and, since she ended up alone, the crew gave her the ship’s mascot, Gulper the pelican, to keep her company. It took less than week for her to figure out how she’d make coin for her travels, and all it took was catching and turning in the unlucky scoundrel who’d tried to pick her pocket. Now she spends her time wandering from town to town, hunting down fugitives and bringing them to justice.
Calderash was an orphan of unknown origin, rescued from the wilderness as a toddling foal by a travelling caravan and given into the care of a temple-run orphanage. Ash found that sad, incomplete story of his origin an unremarkable bit of trivia in a childhood otherwise filled with excitement, mischief, the love of a few caretakers and many friends, and too many boring lessons and chores.
The one shadow in his life was that the other children used his fear of the dark to torment him but, despite that fear, Ash was no coward, possessing steady hands and an iron stomach even in the face of blood and gore that made grown men turn green. This interest and natural aptitude steered his lessons toward the healing arts, which required stitches and bandages until the evening his healing powers first manifested and he accidentally healed a grievous injury on the young son of a noble whose family was sheltering in the temple from a violent storm.
The grateful noble father became a patron of the orphanage and, upon inquiry of an appropriate personal token of gratitude, gifted Ash with Goggles of Night. After gaining the dark vision bestowed by his gift, Ash’s fear turned into a newfound fascination that guided the course of his clerical studies into becoming a Twilight Cleric.
Now Ash has come of age and must leave the orphanage to find his way in the world and forge his own destiny.
Callie had fond memories of growing in a merchant caravan and it taught her many useful skills (how to haggle, how to recognize when a deal was good or bad, and how to handle the dangers encountered on the road), but that life ended when a sickness swept across the land, killing most caravan members, including her parents.
By the time the pandemic had run its course, Callie was left penniless, friendless, and alone in a strange land with only one item not stolen: the family’s heirloom magic ring that allowed the wearer to wild shape like a druid into felines.
At first, she resisted the efforts of the local street kids and gangs that encouraged her to steal (she knew the value of hard work and had been raised to hate thieves) but a girl’s gotta eat, and she eventually became an expert cat burglar (pun totally intended) with the help of her family ring.
Now that she’s old enough to earn a proper wage, Callie is trying to leave her thieving ways behind her, but bad habits die hard. Maybe if she joins a travelling adventure group, she can satisfy her sticky-fingered and excitement-craving urges while doing honest work.
Mountain Dwarf with gigantism, barbarian (Path of the Ancestral Guardian)
My family loved me, really they did, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t also a source of embarrassment to them and, sadly, I can’t say I really blame them: a dwarf with gigantism sounds like a bad joke, and any dwarf pushing 6 feet tall is a freak of nature!
It wouldn’t have been such a big deal if we lived in a more diverse area, but in a 99% dwarven city, there was no disguising or accommodating my differences. (Oh! How I envy those who don’t need to be careful crossing thresholds lest they smack their head against a doorframe and I couldn’t even stand up straight in the older buildings!)
I couldn’t be a craftsman like half of my family because my hands were too big to fit the tools, nor a miner like the other half since I was too big to fit in the mines, so I became a salesman instead, except I wasn’t any good at that either.
When the business I put my heart and soul into failed, I left town to seek my fortunes on the road. Even for non-dwarfs (like elves and humans), I’m a big guy; maybe it’s time I stop holding back my temper and really let loose like my warrior ancestors used to.
As a young child, Frosty was the sole survivor of a shipwrecked vessel who then grew to adulthood alone on an uncharted, tropical island — at least that’s what the crew who finally found the runty, half-feral, adult, white dragonborn managed to piece together from the wreckage as they plundered it.
The deeply superstitious captain, felt that the gods had used a storm to push his ship far, far off course but saved it from smashing against the same reef that had sunk this other vessel because they, in their divine wisdom, wanted the dragonborn (named Frosty by his crew) to be taken from the island and brought back to civilization, but the captain felt his responsibility ended there and abandoned the dragonborn once they reached port.
The crew wasn’t as heartless as their captain and, during the journey back to port, gave Frosty lessons on how to talk and wear clothes, important concepts like money and property ownership (because he kept stealing their stuff and destroying things), and basically how to be a person.
They scraped together a few provisions for him to have and found an adventuring party for him to join, since he was obviously a skilled at fighting and wilderness survival and was clearly unnerved by the multitude of unfamiliar sights and sounds in the busy port.
minotaur, warlock/fighter (The Great Old One / Purple Dragon Knight or Champion or Cavalier)
Once upon a time, I was a humble human who lived, and eventually died as a soldier for my local lord. Good news is, I didn't stay dead. Bad news is, I didn't stay in my original body either. Worse news is, if I stay here, then the evil cultists trying to resurrect their dead leader (whose body I inhabit) might just succeed and bring about an apocalypse.
kobold, crystal; wizard of Graviturgy or Evocation school
Daja was a shy kobold with humble aspirations and simple desires, but it seemed everyone around her had plans and goals for her that had nothing to do with what she wanted:
Her mentors wanted her to use her intelligence and arcane skills to rise through the ranks of the clan
Her clanmates wanted her unusual coloration to mean she would be the next clan leader or shaman
The shaman wanted her to perform the duties & rites overseen by their dying priest
The dying priest wanted his apprentice to inherit his position rather than Daja
The clan leader wanted her dead because he felt threaten by the unwanted popularity that her intelligence, arcane aptitude, and crystal scales garnered her
The head of the neighboring gnoll tribe wanted to wear her scales as a fancy cloak to cement the new tribe-clan alliance
Daja didn’t learn about those last two goals until it was almost too late and barely escaped the trap set for her. She ran for her life, with only the contents of her pockets to help her survive her travels, and headed for the only place that would be safe from her own kind, gnolls, and the monsters of the wilds: the nearest humanoid city.
Tiefling, paladin Oath of Vengeance or Oath of Glory
Before my birth, the name chosen for me was Sebastian Kerredy del Teuscher von Brundāis III of Korenth, then I was born a tiefling. I was thrown away to avoid confirming that the rumors concerning the royal family’s dark dealings were true, and then stolen back and mutilated a decade later to impersonate my dead, twin human brother. A decade later, with the wail of my newborn brother ringing in his ears, I was forced to flee for my life and vowed that, one day, through vengeance or justice, I would stand on the Brundāis throne and rule Korenth.
Sky Song Kleetk aka Song Birthname: Kleetk Druid Name: Sky Song
half-dwarf Aarakocra, barbarian
My father was a dwarf with delusions of grandeur and my mother was the unlucky aarakocra caught by his sellswords to be forcibly bred at his leisure. After she managed, eventually, to break free of her chains and escape, pregnant, back to her home, the elders ignored my mother’s pleas to be rid of my egg because our colony was small and they believed she would grow to love me in time, but they were wrong and my mother’s hatred only grew with time, going from unable to tolerate my presence to unwilling to tolerate my existence.
I still remember that day so vividly: I was lying on the soft grass, my wings still small and covered in down, playing with toys of stitched cloth and carved wood when the angry lady who only ever looked at me with glares landed beside me, scooped me up and took flight, telling me why she always glared at me as she flew, and then, when we were high over the forest and far far from the colony nest, let me go to smash against unforgiving tree branches and the ground. Nearby druids heard my screeches as my fluffy, down-covered body fell, saved me, and welcomed me into their tribe, but being unable to understand each other at first, nicknamed me Sky Song, before they knew I was a crippled bird who would never fly.
They did their best to heal my mangled body and traumatized child’s soul, but they could only do so much: my body is covered in scars, my wings are bent and broken, incapable of supporting flight, and the same anger that ruled my mother now festers within me also. I am an aarakocra with no colony, a being meant for the skies yet chained to the earth; calling what I feel ‘anger issues’ doesn’t really cover it.
I stick to the woods because new people stare at me as an object of fascination and pity, but my tribe has asked me to go on a quest for ___ and I will, because they have always made me feel accepted and welcome, and even cried alongside me after the tribe healer admitted she could never heal me enough to fly. I will do this for them. I will risk my life, face the inevitable hardships and dangers of the road, and endure the whispers and less-than covert glances of those I encounter, then I will return home and never leave our tribal woods again.
Bruce ‘the Brute’ Talvar (is Bruce a Giff?) Stirge, Kren, Kep(ke), Gibbz Talvar
Changeling, fighter (Battle Master)
As a toddler, my parents recognized the uniqueness of my abilities and patriotically entrusted my care to the military and my future to ensure the continued greatness of the Emperor. Brainwashed extremist? Hah! They gifted me with a purpose by training me and then sending me behind enemy lines in deep cover! I excelled for years until I grew too cocky and got caught, interrogated, and then thrown in a fighting pit as that night's entertainment.
I barely managed to kill my opponent with innate fighting skill I didn't realize I had, but still would've died that night had the pit champion not liked the idea of having a changeling for a bunk *****. He nursed me back to health, taught me to fight, introduced me to more than a few experiences that offended me, and even more new concepts & ideas that shattered my world perspective, and then the bastard died during a mass prison escape. Doubting everything I thought I knew, purposeless and adrift for the first time in my life, I assumed his identity and now wander the land as I try to figure out who I am and what I want in life.
This is my first post here, so I'd love feedback!! I wrote this a long time ago, but it's something I'm super proud of. Sol, Lunae, Vali, and Lemon are all characters from a previous campaign. Thank you for reading :)
Pre-Campaign
Deep in the maze of the hollowed mountains, Malakai Florian Eschaton was born into a dark village inhabited by humans and a few select Drow. The village had resided for a long time here, first organizing in order to escape the destruction of Alhalmaret thousands of years ago. While small in numbers, the village worked extremely well together in order to protect their home. They came up with complicated watches, sketchy (however effective) security systems, and a schedule to live by. The village was very adamant about following these set things in order to survive such a dangerous place. So much so, they went to absolute extremes. Malakai’s father, Rowan, had quite the ability to invent. Having the odd talent of imbuing items with magic, he created and bestowed a security onto the village. In its simplest terms, it was a self-destruct mechanism. While seeming extreme, most every villager agreed that if their home were to go down, everything they had was going to go with it. Any documentation, any memory, everything they had created would die with them.
Malakai grew up as well as any child would in a secluded, scared, and secretive town. He was terrified of anything outside his home, never daring to even look outside. He spent a majority of his time with his mother, Cathline, which led him to later adopt a more feminine attitude. The village didn’t have many children, nonetheless any his age for him to bond with, but he didn’t let this stunt his social growth. As he grew, he took a great deal of interest in people. He thought it intriguing how different people reacted differently to the same stimuli, how internal and external situations could provide different responses, and simply their expressions and potential in general. Watching people was one of his favourite things to do, and he loved to listen to stories about people via his mother or others. Because of this obsession with people, he was quite social despite having no one his age around. He was comfortable, despite the scene.
Living in the hollowed mountains, the village knew they were in danger most, if not all of the time. This came to be known to Malakai when he was eight. He of course knew about the securities in place, as he had seen people direct them before. The village was no stranger to monsters and magic, but one day an enemy approached that most no one was familiar with. Known to us as Mind Flayers, Malakai ended up knowing them as the Psychics. The Psychics readily inhabit the hollowed mountains, yet for some reason the village hadn’t come into much contact with them in their thousand years. A group of them ambushed the small village, sending it into absolute chaos. The Psychics seemed to want most of the villagers alive, readily capturing them while eating others.
Seeing this terrible scene, Malakai panicked. Being so young and untrained, all he could do is watch as his village was destroyed. For a while, he hid. He hid until he remembered the failsafe his father had created. Nothing to this extent had ever happened, and he assumed this was the end. As Malakai began to make his way towards the device, he was met face to face with a Psychic, his mother in it’s tendrily grasp. He watched as the monster devoured her brains, and every second he stood there he felt more and more intense emotions than he ever had before. Her body dropping to the floor broke him from his trance, and he was able to make it to his father’s machine.
It wasn’t even a minute after he reached it. Malakai didn’t hesitate to detonate it. A gigantic blast of fire and gunpowder filled the small village, taking down every building, every form of documentation, and everything with it. All the humans and elves were completely decimated, Malakai potentially being the only survivor. Malakai had gotten the least amount of the blast, and fell into a coma, having been shielded by the blast by falling debris. Some of the Psychics had perished, but others had remained. Having lost their companions, and all of their victims, the party of monsters aggressively searched for the cause. They took Malakai and brought him back to their hive. Despite their losses, they still had a chance to experiment. Taking his body, they let an experimental tadpole be implanted into him to see what would happen. As the parasite took over, there were some obvious discrepancies from a normal mind flayer. His body didn’t transform into a mind flayer as quickly as normal, and he began to show signs of physical attributes before the process was finished.
The parasite moved incredibly slow, and because of this, Malakai still had his sense of self. He woke up about a month after, and catching the Psychics off guard, he was able to flee from the hive, however with the parasite still in him. Having never been outside of his village, he had absolutely no clue where he was going. Malakai wandered through the caves with no sense of direction, and no hope. What happened was hard for him to understand, and at that point he didn’t know what the Psychics had done to him. He didn’t know if anyone in his village had survived or not, and although he didn’t know where he was headed, he desperately wanted to stumble across his village. While having taken the least damage compared to the others in his village, he was still left with bad scarring and burning.
About a week after the ordeal, Malakai was found by an underground traveller, a middle aged drow, named Velk Albarn. Velk was a well put together character, a librarian who was out doing field research. Malakai refused to give him any information, but Velk refused to simply leave him by himself, and decided he would bring him back to the surface. Velk gave Malakai a white cloak to cover his scars, saying he needed to keep them covered. He helped tend to Malakai’s wounds, trying to earn a bit of trust with him. The boy didn’t completely trust Velk, but as he needed an adult, he went along with it, hoping he’d help him find his home. As the two travelled, Malakai came upon the realization that normal food wasn’t satisfying him completely. He was having odd cravings, and would trail away from Velk during rests in order to hunt down rats. He really liked the brains of the animals, but he knew that wasn’t normal, and didn’t say anything about it to his guide. It only took a month to reach the exit, as Velk knew where he was going.
Upon seeing the surface for the first time in his life, Malakai became completely overwhelmed. He was taken over by a sudden burst of violence and an unbearable headache. He found himself unable to control his sudden need for food, and the only option around was his guide. A person he had indeed come to trust. A quiet voice, the parasite, spoke directly to him. ‘Kill.’ ‘Eat.’ ‘Now.’ Malakai barely even heard these as he attacked Velk out of nowhere. Despite getting a good maul in, Malakai was still a child, and was easily pinned down by Velk. After he had calmed down, Velk fell silent. Presumably contemplating, Velk gave Malakai an ominous look before dropping a small bag next to him. Without words, Velk teleported away, leaving him in the cold of the Blackstone Clifftops by himself.
Inside the bag were two items, which Malakai thought familiar, but he could never place why. The items are both of the same aesthetic, one being a pair of glasses, and the other being a dagger. Both being seemingly antique, Malakai found them both very useful in his adventures. The two items have a red and gold palette, and are encrusted with vine patterns, each having metal roses adorned on them. The glasses have a chain with red beads that attaches the ends, so it can be worn as a necklace. Malakai wears these when he needs to read, finding himself farsighted without them.
He made his way down the mountains alone, lost without direction in this entirely new world he was thrown into. He was wary of just about everything, surviving off of small animals he could take down. Malakai eventually figured out that he didn’t have such awful outbursts after eating the brains of animals, and since he hadn’t yet eaten a humanoid’s brain, this was acceptable to the parasite. As time went on, different things started to happen to Malakai. When he would cut himself on accident, he found that his blood had become a bit silvery. Some days he would float a few inches off the ground when he wasn’t paying attention. His nails began turning black, growing longer than they had before, and his teeth seemed to sharpen out of nowhere. He didn’t know what the cause of it was, but he wasn’t hurting anyone anymore, so he didn’t care all that much.
Malakai was found in the Crimson Empire around the age of nine outside of Lunae's doorstep. Being skeptical of others, Lunae couldn't get any information out of him, so he hadn't any clue where he came from or anything about him. However, he already had more than he could handle on his plate. Lunae reached out to his sister, Sol, and requested her to take in this child. She was unamused by the offer, but eventually accepted, as she knew Lunae needed the help. It took a bit to warm up to the idea, but Sol conceded with Lemon’s help. She was able to keep a level parenting style when raising him, and ended up being a chill parent. Lemon definitely thinks her kid is better than any other kid. She's that mom. Sol finds herself a bit more distant than Lemon, but still cares for him.
Malakai claimed to remember nothing of his past, despite it being quite clear to him. With his animal fix, he was able to keep any violent outburst down, and he did all he could to hide the fact he was different from the people he knew. The hardest thing to deal with was the parasite speaking, but he ended up getting a bit more hold on that as well. Lemon and Sol raised him as they went on adventures with Vali, and as Malakai grew up, the two weren't completely oblivious to him being off. Lemon noticed when he scampered off in the dead of night by himself, coming back with the scent of blood lingering. Sol heard how he would have a one way conversation with no one when he thought he was alone. As he grew, he began to cover up more and more of his skin as it turned purple, wearing gloves as his hands grew talons. They knew something was up.
No one took any action until Malakai broke. He had gotten comfortable with his new family, and had gotten too comfortable in his ability to withhold the parasite. Around sixteen, Malakai was staying in Northrost for a bit with his moms. As they had spent time there before, Malakai had made a few friends already. Estel Celeborne, a human, and Ophelia Aestra, a half-elf, were his best friends. Estel and Malakai liked each other a lot, and eventually became a couple. The group was inseparable, and that would come to be their downfall.
Malakai was seventeen on the night of Estel’s eighteenth birthday. The three were out late, playing games and having silly conversations, until they decided to head to Malakai’s home. Sol and Lemon were waiting to make sure they had gotten back safe, and upon arrival, something struck Malakai internally. He hadn’t felt such a strong urge in such a long time, and the parasite began yelling in his mind so loudly that it drowned out the rest of the room. ‘KILL.’ ‘EAT.’ ‘NOW.’ Malakai took Estel to the ground, bashing her head open and feasting upon her brain in front of everyone. The house went up in chaos as Ophelia tried desperately to help her dead friend, Lemon doing her best to hold Malakai down and away. Sol did her best to heal Estel, but she was definitely too far gone. Ophelia disowned Malakai as a friend very quickly, not caring to hear an excuse or figure out what happened.
After this event, Malakai came clean with his past. Sol had a few disbeliefs, but her son had just eaten a girl’s brain in front of her, so it wasn’t terribly hard to convince her. After having his first taste of a humanoid, he found animals less appetizing, however he made it work for as long as he could. In the beginning, Lemon and Sol did all they could in order to help, finding various criminals for him to feed on while they racked their brains to figure out what to do. Sol ended up contacting Lunae, as he was more versed on creatures than her.
Present Day
Malakai is able to keep his urges under control most of the time, generally taking to the outskirts at night to take out a straggler thief when needed. Animals can work, but they only do so much for him, and despite it sedating him for a bit of time, he will always eventually need something more. Malakai is very particular in keeping his lineage a secret. He will go out of his way to make sure people don’t see him do anything suspicious, and tends to do his business in the dead of night. If he starts to bleed, he will quickly cover himself to hide the silvery substance. If he hears the parasite speaking, or develops a migraine, he will vacate the area immediately, knowing that means he might end up attacking someone.
He finds it hard to make new connections because of what has happened to people he's loved in the past, and replaces that need for socialization with watching people. As he did when he was a child, he spends a good amount of time studying others and what they do. Malakai, simply put, has two rather distinct personalities. His public one is charming and outgoing, as he pretends he's this charismatic folk hero determined to woo the populous. The only attention he wants is positive attention, hoping that it will make him feel more human. This is a complete one-eighty to his private personality, which is closed off and foreboding. He is extremely apprehensive about almost everything, and dislikes talking about anything involving himself.
Malakai is currently nineteen years old, visiting his Uncle Lunae in the Crimson Empire. Despite Lunae being busy, he is doing his best to help Malakai figure out what to do. He's been in the empire for about half a year under Lunae and Feno's supervision. Any plans thought up to fix him have been unsuccessful thus far. While trying to find different ways to take care of his issue, Malakai has also been acting as a babysitter for him and Feno for their youngest, Ali.
While in the empire, Malakai created a disguise for when he had to hunt. Calling it ‘The White Rogue,’ Malakai would dress himself in the white cloak Velk gave him, and white mask that covered most of his face, hoping to keep himself a secret, while covering the discrepancies most humans lack. Even if he was seen this way, people wouldn’t have much to go off of, so it made him feel a bit more comfortable with his endeavours. This then turned into something he did more often as he saw crime in the empire. He realized he could help the town at the same time by taking out petty criminals he saw during the day, instead of stalking around at night for himself. The White Rogue was a perfect out for what he had to do in order to survive, while giving him the positive attention he wanted. Anytime he had to be seen by others aside from his uncles, he would adorn his costume.
Fun Facts
Malakai’s name means “My Angel, Flowering, The End of the World”
He likes to stare at people to make them uncomfortable. It is a game to him.
Malakai is left-handed.
His worst fear is the hollowed mountains.
He is also scared of storms. He didn’t grow up with them, and thinks they’re weird.
Malakai can play the violin! He’s okay at it, it’d be better without his monster claws.
Appearance
What makes Malakai most recognizable is his deep red eyes, obviously not being the norm for humans. Given he isn't in sunlight, his pupils will look normal, however if he finds himself in the sun, they will dilate to a slit, resembling a cat. His right eye is glossed over, and he is partially blind in it. This eye is also more silvery than red. He has auburn coloured hair, which frames his face in messy curls, a small braid on the left side of the style. Having lived underground the beginning half of his life, his skin is quite pale compared to other humans, but parts of it have been affected by the transformation. Half of his face and other sections of his body are a greyish purple, spreading because of the parasite. His teeth have become considerably sharp, more rows of them growing in and all around his throat in a circle. Malakai’s hands have grown longer, his fingers growing long black talons that he tends to cut off.
Malakai is more than likely to wear his White Rogue outfit, which has a fancy, but simple aesthetic. Velk’s white cloak is long and silky, having red accents near the bottom, rising up in swirly patterns and shapes. His mask matches the white and red aesthetic and covers everything except his left eye, being held to his head by a thick red ribbon. His rapier has white and red ribbons on it, with a rose tied to the handle. He wears bandages that cover his lower arms, ankles, and neck to hide where his clothes may show his purplish grey skin.
Under his White Rogue attire, he tends to wear flowy clothes that help him move around easily. Generally it's a men's renaissance shirt with an upturned collar, long flowy sleeves and ruffles along the neckline. He wears skintight leather pants with ribbon lacing up the sides, the rose themed dagger strapped to his leg. He has fancy brown boots, and black leather gloves to finish off the look. Malakai has multiple burn and blast scars from the explosions, and prefers the longer clothing in order to hide it.
Malakai is adorned with quite a few pieces of jewelry. He wears many pairs of earrings, most of which are black, including studs and cross latch backs. Another is the pair of glasses he brought up from the hollowed mountains. He usually wears it around his neck, but on occasion wears them to read. Over his gloves, he wears gold and silver rings of different types, which help his gloves stay on his inhuman hands.
Here's a relatively short one, set up for a one shot. I don't think this session is technically Christmas themed, but, we are doing it during the Christmas season.
For my Twilight cleric, Corryn.
On a dark, cold night soon before the winter solstice, Corryn's mischievous brother Perrytyn snuck out of the house. Not long after, Corryn heard yelling and mayhem. He never saw his brother after that, but, along with the faint scent of oranges and chocolate, he heard a sound of chains and small bells ringing. He caught a glimpse of a huge, dark, horned beast, with a gray beard, lumbering toward the village. He was making an odd laughing sound, and banging a birch rod against the chains that were draped over his shoulders. Looking up, the beast froze when his eyes locked onto Corryn's, fearfully peering over the edge of the windowsill. With a menacing, fanged smirk, he touched a hook-clawed finger to the side of his nose, and vanished in an inky cloud of sulphurous smoke.
Hatched into slavery, beautiful and hairless, with iridescent skin that at times seemed change or pulsate different colors like the cuttlefish. She had been hand picked by the Nereids of the Cerulean Shore for one purpose, to be trained and sold as a courtesan of kings and queens.
Seeing great potential in her, the Nereids began her courtesan training as a young nymph with teaching the arts of music, dance, and hostessing. As her talents grew, they taught her the ancient art of somatic dance casting and polyphonic singing that could hit arcane frequencies that vibrate the spheres themselves, enabling her to manipulate space and matter but more importantly, influence others. All these talents were instrumental to further weaponize her beauty.
In her teens she was sold to the highest bidder to date to the captain of the Lusty Crustacean, an opulent pleasure barge, to be their shining pearl. In time, the Captain had fallen greatly in love with her. But more than love, Opa desired to be free of slavery and live life on her own terms. With great love for her, wanting nothing more than to see her happy, the captain gave her the freedom she had never known to explore the new world. The Nereids had taught her too well.
Deacon The G̴̡͎͇͎̗̿̀͛͑̂e̷̗͚̗̮̰͛͘n̵̨̆̍̑ť̴̰̌̓̕͠ŗ̵̧͖͔͛̀̚i̷̮͗ͅf̴̨̪͔̈́͒̊͠i̸̫̗̗̿̍̄̕͝eŗ̵̧͖͔͛̀̚
Reset (Born Again) Peripheral of Primus
Warforged Cleric - Knowledge Domain
Reset and rise again under the watchful eye of the unblinking celestial Primus!
Witness him!Defrag and format to personal perfection by becoming closer to The Cog.
Brothers and sisters, are you ready to testify?
-A reading from the Manual of Instructions of the God Machine -
“Primus the God-Machine is far beyond mortal comprehension. It cannot be reasoned with, appealed to, or appeased. For there to be order, certain deeds need to accomplished, no matter the cost. Like nature, it can be cruel, unforgiving and necessary. These necessary goals can range from the mundane to the catastrophic and can appear as evil, but always are in the pursuit of perfect order. “
I have a character named Varus, who this Sunday, will be in the final session for Storm King's Thunder.
Hailing from a small village called "Redstone" (named for the "red stones" that are common in a nearby cave), Varus was desperate to get out of the town that held no future for him, other than being a farmer who believed the old legend that the "red stones" was the blood of the gods that battled in the heavens long before man was on the world. Running away at a young age, Varus was once a mercenary for hire who followed where ever the gold took him. This resulted in getting into battles when the pay was right - as such, he saw things that he was never ready to see. He has since changed his ways, and become a more honorable mercenary, helping those in need when he can, offering his services for cheap, sometimes even helping people, free of charge if the situation was desperate enough for those in need.
This is the story that “Varus” tells everyone. In truth, this is a mixture of what is truth and a lie. The young man who claims to be “Varus Oathblade” is actually a young man named Deran Tully hailing from Redstone which was a small community, rarely even noted on most maps in Faerûn. Varus Oathblade was the son of Bran Oathblade, who was said to have once been one of the members of the Purple Dragon Knights, serving Cormyr. When Varus was old enough, he left Redstone to follow in the steps of his father. Deran, eager to escape Redstone ran away at a young age, and lived off the streets, until one day, making the mistake of picking the pocket of a knight – which happened to be none other than Varus Oathblade.
Recognizing Deran from Redstone, he took him under his wing as a squire, hoping to one day prove that Deran could be redeemed in the eyes of Cormyr and become a member of the Purple Dragon Knights. During a goblin ambush, Deran found himself in peril, and Varus rushed to his side, to save his squire. In doing so, Varus left himself open, perishing in the ambush, but saving Deran’s life. Deran took up Varus’ greatsword, and with renewed vengeance, slaughtered the onslaught of goblins in blinding fury. How he had overcome over twenty goblins, he could not say. Everything had happened so quickly, and when it was all done, he stood over Varus’ body with the bloody bodies of goblins strewn about. Deran decided to honor Varus the only way he knew how to – he adopted Varus’ name, and has set out in the world to make Varus’ name one that bards will sing of, forgoing and forgetting his own name in the process.
Personality Trait: I’ve lost too many friends, and I’m slow to make new ones. This is a reference to actually losing Varus, who was the only person who ever truly showed any belief that Deran could be more than just a farmer and a petty street thief
Ideal: When people follow orders blindly, they embrace a kind of tyranny This comes from what he learned from Varus, who frequently stood up for him, when others believed that Deran would never amount to anything. This has caused a slight, rebellious streak in Varus.
Bond: Someone saved my life on the battlefield. To this day, I will never leave a friend behind. This is obviously a reference to Varus sacrificing himself so that Deran might live, during the goblin ambush.
Flaw: I made a terrible mistake in battle that cost many lives—and I would do anything to keep that mistake secret. Again, this is another reference to Varus giving up his own life for Deran.
Draconia is a world ruled by The Dragons. Split by the Order of Six, the Draconians that rule the world are Ancient Dragons of Red, Green, Blue, Bronze, Gold, and Silver. Though the Dragons claim that there is no “good” or “evil” among the Dragonkin, only a desire to maintain order and peace – there is an old saying among my people, “It is not power itself that corrupts, but the fear of losing such power.”
Those the Order of the Six maintain that they have only peaceful intentions, I am full of doubt. Ancient texts speak of Dragons of Old, whose avarice for gold could be compared to a dehydrated man’s thirst for water.
Most who have been to Shallow Hills, know the name Greenhills. My family is one of the wealthiest among the Halflings. They gladly harvest food for the Armies of the Green Draconian, and hand over their hard work and harvest to their armies, in exchange for fancy bobbles and sometimes even coin. I was destined to do the same, but that is not the life I wanted for myself.
I did not want to work – almost borderline slave away – for another, for simple trinkets and toys. Despite my family’s background and wealth, I left that life behind and did what so few of my kind do – and ventured into the World.
It did not take long for me to soon discover that the World outside of Greenhills was not an easy one. Human Cities sprang about the land like jagged stones, with their towering walls in an attempt to safe guard themselves, marring the land and twisting it to their needs.
But it was within these human cities, that smelled of sewers and filth that I had to learn to survive. Being as small as I was, it was easy to move about, and acquire certain things I had needed to survive. I wasn’t pleased with myself, lowering myself down to stealing in order to survive. But I did not want to live off my family’s money. I wanted to make it on my own. But among humans, Halflings seemed to have little use.
My pride forced me to refuse the idea of ever returning home. Not until I had gone out into the world and left my own mark.
So I spent weeks like this; surviving by stealing. I learned to be quite good at the skill, until I was caught – but not by the one whom I had stolen the fruit from; but another. He introduced himself as a human by the name of Avathan. He explained that I did not have to be alone; there were others, like me, whom society had deemed to turn their backs on, who were forced to survive as I had.
He led me through a maze of alleyways, and side doors, through ancient buildings, that appeared as if they might collapse with just the slightest breeze, until we reached a small sewer entrance. Within there, we walked in the dark for several hundred feet, before he tugged on what appeared to be a rusted ladder. I heard a series of clicks and whirls, and suddenly, part of the concrete slid away, revealing a passage within.
Despite the entrance into this lair, the inside was lined with beautiful rugs, and glistening objects. Avathan explained that this was the Thieves Guild; or as he romantically calls it, “The Adventurer’s Hall.” Here, there were people of all walks of life – of every race, of every color – from other Halflings, to humans, to elves, half-elves, even Tieflings – and one dwarf (though I could not tell if the Dwarf was male or female; a common problem I have with Dwarf-ilk).
As there was a mixture of races among the Thieves Guild, there was also a mixture of personality as well as reason for stealing. Someone stole, simply to survive. Some stole, because they enjoyed the thrill. Some stole, simply because they could not fight the impulse. All of them, however, made payments to the thieves guild in some form or fashion – whether it was food, trinkets, or gold. Those items, were then recycled back into the Thieves Guild – to pay for Thieves to do specific jobs, should they choose to accept it.
After several weeks of doing various jobs for Avathan, he finally approached me and explained that he had another job for me – one that took me out of Stonepeak – and into the city of Ancor. There was a Guild Master there by the name of ‘Teacher.’ (Somehow I doubt that was his real name; but he respected his privacy enough not to want his name known, even among the Circle of Thieves and Rogues – after all, there is a saying among them here that, “There Is No Honor Among Thieves” and “Every Secret Has Its Price – One Need Only Find It.”)
I agreed to go to Ancor to meet this ‘Teacher.’ My first day out of Stonepeak, I met with another caravan of would be adventurers, that seemed to range from warriors, holy soldiers, and outdoorsmen. Our first night, we stopped at an Oasis, where – in the awkward silence, several spoke to make conversation. I met Alek Redmont, who was a Human Ranger; Kalamitee Wolfsmoon, an Eladrin Cleric; and Zerkorza Zaidai, a Tiefling Warrior, who sat nearest to me.
The small caravan was broken into several small circles of strangers talking amongst themselves. The four of us agreed to make a rotating watch for the night. Zerkorza apparently awoke to hear the sounds of chanting; she woke Kalamitee – and before we knew it, we found ourselves attacked by some form of religious fantatics. I was rendered unconscious only to awaken who knows how much longer – by the cleric who had snapped my ropes.
Neither the Ranger nor the Cleric knew where the Warrior had gotten off to. Was she already taken? The stone beds we were tied to had ridges for bloodletting. Where ever we were, it was not a good place. (But then, when is it a good place when they knock you out and tie you up to a bed unwillingly?) We searched for clues within the room. The walls were lined with and endless row of skulls, whose empty sockets seemed to be watching with hatred.
One door had the sound of chanting coming from it; the other had a strange odor – the third door was open, leading down a hallway where we could see a light. There was no sounds coming from that direction. It seemed to be the safest of choices – I took the front, searching for traps or anything along the hallway.
Much to our surprise, we found the Warrior rummaging through the room. “Were you trying to escape without freeing us?” I asked.
The startled Warrior turned, looked surprised, “No,” she said rather quickly. “I was looking for our weapons and armor.”
I watched her expression. She was lying. She was trying to escape without even getting the rest of us out there. I wonder, would I have done the same? Awakened in a strange place, with skulls, and a stone tablet that had bloodletting ridges?
No. I would have awaken the others. If there’s one thing I have learned, is that the Lone Wolf will die without the Pack.
We continued to rummage through the room – the only thing of interest was a small icon – that the Cleric recognized as being a symbol of the god, Bane. Kalamitee, somewhat familiar with the evils of Bane, explained he was a God of War. However, his intention was not for warriors to call upon him during times of battle; but rather, to one day rule over all of the world himself, and crush all those who oppose him and believe in anything other than him, beneath his fiery heels.
I stared at the symbol of Bane and sneered in disgust. He was worse than the Order of the Six Draconians. At least they allowed everyone to believe what they wanted, so long as it did not interfere or conflict with their own ideas. Bane wanted everyone snuffed out, if they did not swear allegiance to him and him alone.
We left the room and returned to the bloodletting room, where we could still hear chanting down one hall. We continued down the third hall, until the scent of copper became extremely strong. This wasn’t going to go well – I could already tell. It was the smell of blood.
Upon opening the door, Alek immediately began to vomit. The entire room was covered in blood splatter, and there were bodies whose heads had been severed and the flesh of their bodies peeled back.
It was in this room, we recovered our weapons and armor and made our way back up to the bloodletting room, where I peered through the shut door and saw six occult members standing around a sconce. None of them seemed aware of our presence; I quickly explained, I would sneak in first and back stab the one closest; as soon as he would yell, the other were to charge in.
Stealthfully moving through the shadows, I approached the first one and dug my short deep through him. I abhor the idea of taking one’s life – but seeing the horrors I had seen today – I knew that there was no other choice. These men were vile – evil, down to their very core, without any hope of redemption.
The others immediately charged into the room. We moved, for the first time, as a cohesive unit. We were aware of one another’s presence, and made the best of every attack. Perhaps because the dark summoners were so entranced with their chanting – which turned out to be some kind of summoning spell, because as the last one fell, a demonic hand reached through just before it closed – a deep, chilling voice, screaming in denial as the mystical doorway sealed.
We made our way further through the room and discovered a hallway that led out. But as I peered outside, I suspected there was more to these three men and their small caravan. After all, why would they be camped right outside the cave’s entrance – unless they were a part of the cult – or if they were the mercenaries that delivered us to the Cult of Bane.
When we stepped outside, Kalamitee tried to be diplomatic – trying to find out who they were and why we were captured; but by the shocked expression by these men, they clearly had no interest in speaking and wanted to silence us. Immediately another fight broke out, and as the others concentrated on the two warriors, my eyes focused on the one who appeared to be a mage – or some dark summoner.
The mage used a number of spells to stun us and disorient us; but that did not slow me down. He had struck me with several spells as I pursued him through the forest, leaving me close to death. Just as it seemed my last breath would escape my lungs, I heard Kalamitee behind me whisper a prayer to her goddess; and a light filled me. My wounds healed, and the mage, who had been cut and beaten, finally surrendered.
He explained that he had been paid by the Cult of Bane to capture us and bring us to them. They had been awaiting payment outside the Cult’s cavern when we came out and surprised them. We debated leaving the mage to die, tied to a tree – but knew it would be better to bring him with us, alive, to the city of Ancor.
We arrived in the City and turned the Mage over to the local authorities who were well of aware of his actions, but had never been able to catch him. Even more interesting – they offered us a job to work for the city cleaning up similar riff raff.
Things, I feel, are only just beginning to get interesting…
Hello. I have the beginning of an idea for a Ranger. What do you think?
One day, a green dragon went to sleep in his lair. She thought it was only for a short time, but actually a couple of centuries passed.
When she awoke, she found most of her forest gone and a city built above her lair (that luckily was not found. Same for the hoard).
As the lair and the hoard were safe, her first impulse was not to kill everybody. Instead she established herself as a personality of note in the city, set on gainig control of it while rebuilding the forest.
The Ranger was found by the dragon (or by her agents) and brought into her service.
That is a good bond to drive your ranger, whether they are totally willing or not. It would be fun to explore if the dragon forced them to become a ranger, or if they subtly influenced them into it. Maybe your ranger was a gardener or some kind of dreamer who chose to be a ranger of their own accord and the dragon just stumbled upon them as a useful pawn.
My latest character is a satyr named Brocephalus. He comes from a mixed village of satyrs and people from the material plane. This odd community started when a bunch of fey crossed over to fight in a Great War a century before, and some decided to remain.
Bro grew up on those stories of Fey Warriors and Green Knights. As he grew up, he exercised and trained obsessively, combining fighting ability with fey trickery and showmanship. His goal is to make a name for himself and join those legends of old.
but he is tied to his home in a way. He is leading visiting fey through adventures in the material plane as something of a tour guide, trying to live out his dream while keeping his even wilder fey cousins in line to avoid trouble for his people.
I like situations where a chromatic dragon is not the good guy, but maybe the better option or the lesser evil.
The whole deal started with a young Copper Dragon: he wondered long over the perfect prank he could play to the older and more powerful Green inhabiting the land he was interested in conquering.
After years of thinking, he found the answer: steal the land from the Green and make it his own!
Taking advantage of the sleeping Green, the Copper took the shape of a wealthy mortal and convinced humans and dwarfs to settle the region, seeking precious metals. The mining settlements that soon rose deforested most of the land and hills, leaving only the wildest mountains green as they were.
Luckily for all of them, they never found the lair and the hoard of the Green, so when she eventually woke, she was surprised and outraged, but not to a murderous extent.
She was also at a loss over her next move.
She knew she could easily destroy the younger copper, as well as destroy and sack the towns and using spells to make the forests grow lush once more.
Yet, she was also intrigued.
For all her scorn, she couldn’t help admiring a good intrigue when she saw one. The Copper had played his cards well. Well enough for her to feel the beginning of admiration. Just enough for her to think that she owed him not to simply fly and bite his head off. At least, not yet.
One day, they met in the largest of the mining towns, the oldest and the closest to a proper city. They were in their human shapes and enjoyed a meal in a luxurious inn. They made a bet and agreed to terms.
They bet that they could drive the other from the region using only mortal agents. The victor would win the loser’s hoard and be the sole owner of the region.
Dragons play chess with bleeding pawns.
Another idea I had for the Ranger was more or like this:
In a desert region, an ancient Brass Dragon is the Grand Wazir (the local Jafar) and the true power behind a monarch. While he keeps the reign stable and prosperous and the people happy, his politic is an aggressively colonizing one. On his order, the army spreads to conquer the region, bringing back riches and knowledge. Peculiarly, the dragon considers the city he reigns over as his lair and the whole kingdom he is conquering as his hoard.
The first thing the Brass Dragon ordered, was the slaying of the local family of Blue Dragons; the original owners of the desert. For this, he hired several mercenary groups, sacrificed several regiments of the army and joined the fight he himself. Despite everything, he was only almost successful. The ancient Blue patriarch was the first to go; a treacherous spell imprisoned him in a bauble. The two adults were killed after a long and bloody fight.
However, the two young females managed to flee in the deepest desert where the mortals could not follow, carrying with them the last egg.
The Blues swore vengeance and started to plot it, but the first thing they were forced to acknowledge was that they were not enough, yet, to win over an ancient Brass at the heart of the kingdom he now owned.
Therefore, they started building their own realm. They started seeking the tribes of the desert-dwellers. For those they found, with their lightning breath, the dragons created craters of glassed sand. Then, using Create or Destroy Water, they filled them for the thirsty mortals. The glass oasis were soon regular part of their lives and it was only few years before the nomads started bowing to the dragons, some considering them allies, some considering them closer to gods.
When the wyrmling, a male, hatched from the last egg, the Blues decided it was time to bring their plans to the next step.
The tribes were called and an alliance formalized. The tribe leaders carved their names on the horn of the dragons, binding themselves to fealty. On their end, the dragons offered themselves as allies and sovereigns, promising a better future.
Young mortals started undertaking a pilgrimage to the dwelling of the Blues. Those who survived and came back, years later, were changed (Gift of the Chromatic Dragon, Blue Draconic Sorcerers, Drakewardens).
"I will weed out those who wish to control the minds of man, I am Noxus Nailo. I am an Assassin." Noxus was born and raised in Baulders Gate. When he turned 17, His Father and 2 Brothers were hung for "Crimes against The City." But this wasn't true. The People responsible for their deaths were Templars. Noxus's Uncle took him, his mother, and sister in at his castle, Where Noxus Swore to Serve in the darkness to protect the light. He became an assassin. 8 years later, Noxus Fell in love with and married the Bard Jackie Nailo, and had a Son Named Aries. While Noxus Still serves the Creed, In his off time, he can (If he chooses) Be found in Phandelver, Shopping with his family, or dosing off under a tree.
“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat." -Sun Tzu
[Created for a specific world setting, used at a table I was invited to join.]
At a fireside or tavern table chat between this character and the rest of the party, you learn this:
"As I told you once, back under the mountain, I am Dachniana, of the lost tribe of Yaaxché, the blood children of Caesinjach The Green, and direct kin to Kurtulmak and Kuraulyek. I follow the ways of IO [Dach pronounces it eeoh], The Impartial One. That vowrequires that I maintain complete neutrality when dealing with dragons. I can never willingly play a role in harming one. Because of this vow, I and others like me are trusted, or perhaps more precisely, underestimated to the tribe's benefit, by all dragons.
"I hatched in the creche of the once powerful tribe of Yaaxché, in the form of a Rock Kobold, those who had emerged from the stones first touched by the willing blood sacrifice of Caesinjach.
"During my Rite of Passage, when upon emergence, I would be recognized as 'sorcerer' by my tribe, we were attacked by a powerful band of giants (human and demi-human warriors, etc.,). I dug out of my isolation, only to find my tribe destroyed, and my home looted. I had nowhere to go. Tribe Sip-ché took me in and gave me work. I never revealed my powers to this tribe; meditating and practicing my magic in secret. Because of this, it has taken medecades to achieve this skill.
"The survival and prosperity of a tribe outweighs any personal ambitions of any member. Upon that law, all actions taken for personal gain, at the expense of the tribe, find a foundation of nothing but sand. For until we agree otherwise, I will accept you all as part of my tribe, Yaaxché."
I have this beginning of an idea for a setting. Opinions?
The Whitening is an area of the Elemental Plane of Air; it is an expanse of clouds and fog as wide as wide as an average nation. Many visitors from the Material Plane described it as an ocean of white.
Scattered among the clouds are several motes of earth, varying in size between an atoll and a mountain. Most of them are inhabited and cultivated
Mahmeesha
The female Djinni called Mahmeesha is the second highest authority most in the Whitening would recognized. A very powerful Genie, Mahmeesha found the Whitening after a long wandering in her cloud-born castle. She considers the Whitening her personal dominion. So far, she has been able to back these claims.
Mahmeesha craves variety in the slaves she takes and she is an avid collector. The only ones allowed to live in her castle are the most exotic or those she was most impressed or smitten with. Several of those are the parents of Air Genasi. Some of the longest lived slaves helped to generate whole bloodlines of those.
The only exception to this rule are Mahmeesha’s Air Genasi descendants. She is not outright dismissive of them, but they need to try so much harder to impress her. Greatness is in Mahmeesha’s blood after all; as they share her blood, they have an unfair advantage over other races.
Inhabitants
Despite its desolate appearance, the Whitening was always inhabited. Elementals seem to thrive among the clouds, Rocs and Harrowhawks are common sights. Mephits, on the other hand, are too numerous for anyone’s liking. Spotting a Silver Dragon is not unheard of.
The most impressive dwellers, however, are the Elder Tempests, of which there are several.
After Mahmeesha made it her domain, however, the population of the Whitening grew to the point that some of the largest earth motes now hosts little towns, while most of the other are home to farms.
Indeed, most of the population descends, one way or another, from Mahmeesha herself. The creatures from the Material Plane, those native and not those who stumbled upon a portal, descends from Mahmeesha’s slaves, while the Air Genasi (the single largest ethnicity represented there) started as the scions of Mahmeesha herself, long before they became a self-sustaining folk.
Notable Regions and Landmarks
Mahmeesha’s palace, floating on solid clouds, is the informal capital of the Whitening. By itself is a thriving little city, there resides the Genie’s court, slaves and attendants, of which marvels are told. Actual sightings of the palace are rare, as the majority of Mahmeesha’s businesses are done with the intermediation of trained servants. Several mote-dwellers go on pilgrimages hoping of finding the palace and being allowed to join those who live there. How many actually find it or are allowed inside it is unclear.
The Cult of the Winged Tempest
Arable land is few and scattered, so it is of the utmost importance that crops grow as abundant as possible. The passage of an Elder Tempest causes the clouds to release rain that, when the elementals pass the correct distance, are just strong enough to water the crops and fill the water reservoirs. If they are too close, on the other hand, destructive storms happen. As regular as possible, the dwellers try their best to lure the Elder Tempest toward the inhabitated earthmotes, just at the right distance. It is a dangerous but essential part of the life in the Whitening.
These hunts most often took a ritualistic flair, while festivals were held as celebrations. Minor cults often appeared, mainly composed of those believing that prayers and sacrifices to the Elder Tempest would grant protection from the elementals.
In the centuries after the coming of Mahmeesha, the cult grew in importance and prevalence, while also changing its basic precepts. The faithful started referring to the Elder Tempests as ‘Al Isifa’, bringers of rains for their crops and steeds of the Great Mother Mahmeesha. Those who embarked to lure the elementals eventually became the first clerics.
Indeed, in the years after the birth of the cult of Al Isifa, sightings of Elder Tempests became more common while the elementals themselves grew slightly less aggressive.
Actually, the cult was part of a scheme of the Genie’s. To standardize the cult and place herself at its summit was as good a way to exercise control over the population as any, and better than most. Furthermore, she was also curious to find out what would happen to the Elder Tempest themselves as more and more people started actively worshipping them.
It is also Mahmeesha’s discreet plan to become an object of worship herself, as ‘She Who Sends the Rain Bringers’ and the ‘Mother of the people in the Whitening’.
This is the backstory for my Dragonborn Bard, Azastel. Hope you like it.
Born into a nomadic Dragonborn clan, I grew up amongst warriors. My name was Razakar, the son of the clan’s Chief, Akkash. My father raised me to lead the clan one day. He taught me to be a proud and strong dragon. But on the day of my 15th birthday, the day a wyrmling becomes a man, something horrible and miraculous happened. It was a dark and cold day. I was chilled to the bone. I just wanted to be warm. To my surprise, a small flame formed in my hand. When the clan saw, they were furious. Years before, magic users were forbidden when my mother,Akra, was killed by a sorcerer. My father began to hate magic and all who used it. With anger in his eyes, he banished me from the clan. Oh sure, we can shoot fire out of our mouth all the livelong day but when I make a small flame in my hands, then there’s a problem.
I wandered for months, foraging and keeping warm with my very weak magic. One day I heard the most beautiful sound I have ever heard, I followed it as best as I could, going by volume alone. Eventually I found a man sitting by a tent, playing some strange instrument. This man made the most beautiful music I had ever heard. I couldn’t bear to move from my spot. Eventually he spotted me watching him. Instead of fleeing, he asked me to come over for a better listen. I learned his name was Belmont and he said he was something called a Bard. A music weaver.
I told him my story and for whatever reason he decided to take me in. Over the next two years he taught me everything he knew. He taught me to sing, to dance, and to perform. He helped me strengthen my magic through music. He also taught me more interesting ways of making money, through games of chance that were always rigged in our favor. He also taught me to escape when people caught on. Those were some good times. But it had to end at some point.
One day Belmont scammed the wrong man. The son of a crime boss called the Green Terror, a Half Orc who liked to bludgeon people and drown them in their own blood. There was no way Belmont wouldn’t escape his terror. Instead he told me to run, to get away. He gifted me his lute, Loreli and told me to flee. The last I ever saw of him was him being led away by the Green Terror’s goons. I ran. I got on a ship with most of the coin we had made. I also forged some documents for a new identity, a very useful lesson from Belmont.
I have a new name now. I am Azastel, Azzie to my friends and I’ve decided to live the good life like Belmont taught me! Bring it on!
Rosie Gwenyth: Lawful Neutral, Fiend Warlock with Pact of the Chain, LVL 5. Haunted One Background.
Backstory:
Rosie was once an ordinary villager, living a peaceful life in the village of Oakenview. The town was known for its public witch burnings, which happened on a weekly basis. Rosie did not particularly care about this event, preferring to tend to her fields, that is until the town's witch hunters falsely accused her of being a witch and imprisoned her. While in her cell, she overheard the guards talking to the mayor, and learned a terrible truth: there were really no witches at all. The mayor had been scapegoating and burning innocent victims so that he could earn money off of the viewings and to make him look like a hero to the townsfolk to secure and boost his political standing.
The day of the weekly burning came. Rosie was quickly tied to a pole and gagged as oil-soaked wood was piled around the base of the pole. The corrupt mayor made his usual speech and statements about the "wickedness the witch brought to the village" to the giddy crowd. He then ordered his men to light the fire. As the wood was set ablaze, Rosie closed her eyes in preparation of what was to come.
Time passed, but Rosie felt no pain or heat. After a bit, she peeked open her eyes to see why. But what she saw shocked her.
The whole town around her was burning. The flames from the pyre she was standing on had spread outwards into the village. Rosie saw the corrupt mayor attempt to run, but the flames, as if they had a mind of their own, chased him down and engulfed him. The crowd, who had once eagerly awaited the burning of another innocent soul, screamed as they tried to avoid getting burned. But the flames had surrounded the whole village and killed the crowd one by one till there was no one left. But the most unusual thing that happened was that no matter what, the flames never even got close to Rosie. Soon, the only things in the village left standing were Rosie's house (which the flames also avoided) and the pole, with Rosie being the only survivor. This sight would be forever engraved into her mind, and it still haunts her nightmares.
Rosie was still tied to the pole, so she struggled against the rope for a few minutes, but to no avail. Then, an imp emerged from one of the remaining fires, approached Rosie, and removed her gag. Introducing himself as Jacques, he explained what had happened. Rosie's parents (who had moved out of the town when she was young, and were dead by the time of the incident) had struck a deal with Asmodeus to keep her safe. They did not trust the witch burnings in the first place, so they had also stated to protect her from the flames if she was ever selected to be burned. Asmodeus did so by turning the flames into malevolent fire elementals, which killed everyone responsible.
Jacques then offered her a deal of his own, stating that if she accepts, Asmodeus can grant her the power to save others from the same fate. Still too traumatized to fully understand the deal and its consequences, she accepted. She felt unfamiliar power flow through her as Jacques helped untie her. After gathering her belongings from her house, she left the charred remains of Oakenview for good.
She has since then bonded with Jacques and became friends with him. He helped her master her new powers and even eventually agreed to become her familiar once she grew powerful enough. She doesn't know what Asmodeus want's with her, but one thing is clear: he saved her life, and she would follow his will to the ends of the earth, as she now commands the very hellfire that tore through her village.
Ok... I normally don't do these kinds of things, but I can't sleep, and well last year I made a Background story for a small campaign, the DM set a bunch of strange homebrew restrictions, but allowed me to make this Artificer Character. Technically my Oldest Character still on DNDB.
And the Short Story I wrote (something I hate doing normally, but I was encouraged to do so by the DM. So I down so Mt Dew Baja Blast and got crazy.
A day in the life of a Gnome, the Bhuem KaBhuem edition.
Once upon a time, in a small corner of a forgotten portion of a forgotten land buried deep beneath the earth, hidden from all eyes was a colony of six thousand Rock Gnomes, who worked for a Leader who’s stated purpose was global domination, and the subjugation of all life on the surface world to bring about an age of Gnomish peace and prosperity. The Ubiquitarissiah, a self-described Machine God, and overlord over the “evil lair” that the gnomes worked, lived, and died in. Had ruled the colony of gnomes for many thousands of years, none of the gnomes had ever seen the Ubiquitarissiah in person, as it was hidden deep within the “evil lair”, always giving rules, judgements, and maintaining power through the use of clockwerk gnomes that he used to control the population. None could hide in the face of such an overlord. The Gnomes under his rule have never known a life outside of the evil lair, the “evil lair” which was also called “The Evil Lair” was an underground structure with 15 levels and covering a square mile footprint with 15 square miles of indoor space, with no known entrances or exits.
This story has nothing to do with him, his plans, or even his leadership. Instead, it’s about one lowly gnome in his employ. Bhuem KaBhuem she works in the engineering department, and science labs, as a Gnomoid Clockwerk Scientist, dealing in clockwerk mechanisms and their related parts and fuels, these clockwerks are then used for multiple purposes, ranging from bomb disposal to gathering samples in distant lands, to working as enforcement units. The field uses a symbiosis of mechanical engineering and magical theory formulation not too dissimilar to how a Wizard would design new spells. To the outside world this field would simply be called an artificer, to the uneducated they would be called wizards. To her, she was just an engineer, sure her education and field met all the requirements of being a scientist, but she felt more grounded than a flighty scientist with their head in the ceiling.
Bhuem loved designing new alchemical fuels to power clockwerks. Her favorite fuel design being Hydrogen three Carbon, hydrogen two carbon chains ending in dual carbon oxygen linked to an oxygen linked to a carbon hydrogen three. As it can not only be used as a fuel, but it lubricates and cleans at the same time. Ironically many other gnomes like the chemical because it smells nice “kind of like fruit”. However nice the smell, it would be meaningless to her if it didn’t work as a fuel source and lubricant that also cleaned. Her love of it as a fuel however had its risks as it had a relatively low flash point, so it was not good to use the fuel with clockwerks working around heat, but it worked well with room temperature clockwerk use, however it was actually a food safe fuel source as it was made from fatty acids diffused in alcohol and heated under pressure devoid of oxygen. Which was what the other half of her current project was, designing new food dispensing clockwerks so she would never have to talk to a specific Food Service Gnome, because the Ubiquitarissiah really gave few orders on what they were specifically making to dominate the world, so most of the engineering and scientific staff had free reign with design work and projects. Bhuem was going to remove the possibility of interacting with a specific gnome, then she would have the luxury to pursue her greatest ambition, design the largest explosion possible, she was sure that using the right combination of radioactive material in compression with a properly distributed blast pattern across it’s surface she could cause atomic fission, the long sought-after dream of many a gnome before her.
[beep, beep, beep] the alarm went off, [The time is thirty minutes past the fifth shift hour, beep, beep, beep (repeat every second for a minute), the time is thirty-one minutes past the fifth shift hour] eventually after several minutes, Bhuem KaBhuem woke, she hated mornings, she needed a nice greasy cup of overly caffeinated, overly sugared, and lightly creamed coffee to greet the shift, she hated working the early shift, but it allowed her the least amount of family interactions. Bhuem was not anti-social, but she just hated interacting with gnomes who knew her before, she would just forget that other person that she was had ever existed. She was a woman, and that was final, she took the potion to fix any doubt, she was nothing but girl, as it should have always been. But no, her family, those fifty filthy brothers and sisters of hers, always deadnaming her, as if she even looked like that anymore. Her female parental unit was the worst of the lot though, it seriously peeves her to have come from a being of such mindless dedication, insisting she was just a phase, she would want to return to being that which came before. As if. So, to minimize her family, she refuses to remember them, she ignores their existence in the same way they ignore her right to being herself. But him, the food service gnome, he is the one existence she hopes to never see, her youngest sibling. Uhgh.
Slowly she went to the water unit and cleaned her body and hair, then after drying off she did her hair in her trademarked style of twin buns. She then went to her uniform storage unit and took out her overalls and protective armor. Then she checked her personally issued firearm, and affixed the powder, caps, and balls to their special pockets on her belt. She then activated her personal grooming reflection unit, to check herself in a three-dimensional view. She really loved her figure. She looked in the hologram and then added a light coat of makeup to bring out her green eyes which perfectly contrasted her naturally pink hair.
“You go girl!” she said looking at the hologram of herself. She then spun on her toes of her heavy work boots, the skirt of her plate armor “went spinny” she made happy gnomish sounds as she left her personal sleep cubical.
The cafeteria was on the level between her sleep cube and her work cube space, so she walked in saw the annoy-o-gnome serving greenslop, she huffed, grabbed a food tray from the large stack, hit the first station got her triple expresso with extra sugar and steamed cream, while sipping on her caffeine infusion, she went to the green slop window, as she loved the nutritional value that the green slop provided, it was a mix of boiled algae and floral fungus roots blended into a nice smooth green slop. It had twice the vitamin content and triple the daily required iron intake. Most gnomes however preferred the orange slop made from the root plants grown in hydroponics. They had good vitamins, but were overloaded with carbohydrates, meaning with her new female physiology if she ate that she would balloon up to the next overall size, and she liked being a size minus 8. Her birth unit was a size minus 5, of course she also had multiple litters of kids over the years, and worked in the medical unit, and was a cleric of the ‘Original path of the Ubiquitarissiah’ the conservative religious faction of gnomes, who believed that unless Ubiquitarissiah specified something than the logic value was zero. They felt a gnome should remain unchanged unless ordered by Ubiquitarissiah, as if, she needed the change, she asked Ubiquitarissiah for help, he sent an enforcer clockwerk with the potion of permanent gender change. She might not have been ordered to change, but Ubiquitarissiah did send her the potion when she asked for it. As for her, that was all the confirmation she needed that hers was the right choice in the eyes of their overlord. Of corse she didn’t actually believe that Ubiquitarissiah was a god as described in the educational portion of her youth. Ubiquitarissiah didn’t exist on some plane of existence separated from the world. So, by the basic descriptions of divine ranks, Ubiquitarissiah, could be no more than a divine rank 0 through 4. Ie a demi-god. She was fine with this line of thought. Of corse she mostly forgot everything she schooled in besides the subjects relating to her actual passions. She passed the corse of study on gods and divine ranks, she passed the course on history and geography, and promptly forgot about them as they were meaningless to her life, she got full honors in math, mechanical engineering, drafting, chemistry, and gnomebotics. She excelled in her magical formula studies, and her applied magics. She graduated at the top of her class, so she was allowed to pick her own lab, and research what she wanted. Other lesser gnomes had to either work as lab assistants, or work in support drone functions, most of her family units were support units, she wished them well, but hoped they would just vanish to other levels. Which is why she picked a lab on the topmost level on the outer ring, her sleepcube was placed on the uppermost sleep dorms. Closest to her labs. Unfortunately, the floor between was services and support units. Which was why the cafeteria was there, and her idiot youngest sibling was serving her green slop, and chatting away at her saying things like, “…so brave…”, “…being yourself…”, “…hero...”, “…workers unite…”, wait what?!, ah nevermind.
As he finished talking looking expectantly at Bhuem, she said the words she said every day she got food from him, “Thank you food service drone.” And walked a way so she could eat, and recharge on her caffeine. When done, she filled a large fluid container with more creamy caffeine-sugar and went to her lab.
She entered her lab area; the space was divided into three enclosed cubicles. In the front cubical was her drafting tables, abacus and slide rules, with stacks and stacks of papers and designs, in the middle airtight cube was the chemical lab and gnombotic construction area with a viewing window for the third cube, the experimental lab. The front lab was perfectly clean white walls, white floors, and white ceilings with light cubes set into the ceilings. On one wall was the daily orders screen which gave out assignments and orders from Ubiquitarissiah, on the screen all you could see was a clock timer that said:
Minute(s) since the last work-related injury:
[2 minutes]
Work safe, Work smart, Work for world peace and power for Ubiquitarissiah
Current shift [6th shift 00 minutes]”
She was hoping today the food service bot would be ready, the last 5 exploded while cooking green slop. She was sure this time she could do it, and then her annoying brother would be reassigned, away from her, and what the hell was a “union” anyway? And why did he want her help making one?
Over the course of the day she, repaired the bot, built a new fuel containing housing mixed a new batch of her biofuel, she was thinking of calling this mixture Esther diesel, since it was frustrating and was starting to annoy her just like her mother. On paper it should work, but it kept exploding when she didn’t want it to. Sure, she loves big booms, it’s why she named herself Bhuem KaBhue, that and her dead name pissed her off it was not her at all. But no, she would not call her work of the last 3 weeks after her mother. No, she would name it like she named everything.
Fuel Unit 3, triglyceride, biodiesel for Food Service Unit 4.
She then filled the newly repaired food service clockwerk with fuel, placed it in front of the cook pot, set the activation matrix, left the lab, and watched the bot turn the heat on, it then grabbed the oversized metal stirring and serving spoon used to make and serve slop, the bot started to stir the pot at the correct speed. She then activated the customer bots she made for the experiment, the bots were simple gnome bots designed to queue in line then receive the slop on the trays they held, then walk away as if finding a seat, they would then clean their slop into the slop recycle bin and rejoin the queue. The slop recycle bin of course was then used by the food service bot to resupply when it was out of slop.
She needs all the bots to continue without fail for 8 shifts.
They made it 6 shifts when the service bot failed, and exploded violently, shredding everything in the experiment lab.
“So close, just needed to make it 2 more shifts.” She slumped in the observation seat, and looked to the time, it was the 22 shift. She decided to call it a night, better luck the next day. On the way out of her lab, she received a personal call on her screen, she answered it to see one of her idiot siblings, one that had joined the red shirt defense brigade, he said to her, “…(deadname) … run …. monster … No one can stop it, the horror, save yourself” She hung up, no one calls her that word, never, the nerve of him.
She went to the lift down the hall from her lab. She pressed the call button, when a violent explosion ripped the doors off, knocking her back, she lost consciousness at Shift 22, and fifteen minutes, on the last day of work in “The Evil Lair”.
End of the Short shorty and background of Bhuem KaBhuem
(Note: in the saved Document, the font used is Dot Matrix 11pt, because this is a story that should be read in Dot Matrix)
BTW the next time she woke she was on the surface world, with no memory of how she got there, she met up with a future party member, and went to the next village where the rest of the players also met up. Everyone had to write a background short story for the game.
Igneous Lithopeter [ihg-nee-uhs]
Igne [ihg-nee] (Igneous might be changed to Ignatius or combined into Ignetius)
leonin, monk, (Way of the Four Elements, Earth)
Igne always knew she was different, though she didn’t exactly understand how and, unfortunately, that was the problem. Igne was born slow-minded in the Wastes of Xhorhas, where life was too hard to let live anyone who couldn't be relied on to pull their own weight, so her tribe left her to die as a child. Instead, she found a couple of powerful earth elemental relics and formed an attachment to rocks. Ten years later, she now wanders the world accompanied by an earth minimental attracted to her relics, trying to collect one of every kind of rock and visit the Earth Elemental Plane, if only she didn’t believe clay workers & glassblowers were earth mages, glass was a special kind of see-through rock, and lava was earth blood.
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config=506279386/
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Evangeline ‘Karen’ Aristos de’luca McCoy
Aasimar, bard (College of Glamour)
(must be read in a snooty, arrogant tone or you’re doing it wrong)
As a babe, I was chosen amongst all other infants in the clan for an arranged marriage to ensure continued peace between warring factions, and thus was given luxurious care and exorbitant schooling to become a most excellent companion for my Intended. Between lessons, my every whim was indulged and every wish fulfilled, until one season before my wedding, when my Hatfield fiancé suddenly died, leaving me without any support since I now served no purpose to Clan McCoy. My entire life, everyone in the clan told me I was special and destined for greatness, and now they want to throw me away! Before they could take back everything they’ve ever given me, I grabbed as much of MY stuff as I could and ran off in the middle of the night, vowing to return one day to show them how I had managed to achieve my great destiny without them. Instead of recognizing how wonderful and special I am, everyone I meet keeps calling me ridiculous or spoiled rotten, and if even one more tavern drunkard says, “Just shut up, bard, and play another song!”, I swear I’ll have Mittens, my elephant companion, squash them, even if it gets me banned from yet another tavern!
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config=506279058/
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Arem ___
Mountain dwarf, Monk (Way of the Ascendant Dragon)
A violent storm left ten-year-old Jasper clinging to wreckage as the ship full of his ransoming kidnappers sunk beneath the waves and, had a dire shark not attacked the large dolphin that seemed to be ferrying him safely back to shore, no one would have ever known that his rescuer was actually a shapeshifted bronze dragon!
Unsurprisingly, the events of that day had a profound and lasting effect on the young boy: the terror of being kidnapped and at sea for the first time in a storm, the awe of being in a dragon’s presence and feeling the very air around him vibrate with the power radiating off it, the glory of flight, watching everyone near the docks flee in terror at the nearing dragon before cautiously returning as they watched a child slide off its back, the single scale that same, very amused dragon gifted the tiny dwarf boy brave enough to ask for it, and the dreams he continues to have about his dragon savior to this day.
From then on, Jasper aspired to be like a bronze dragon in all aspect of his life, from his appearance to putting an end to all injustice and cruelty he encountered, and now that his ailing father has finally passed and his youngest sister has married, he can begin his quest to right the wrongs that exist outside his town.
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config=506525522/
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Theadora Thain
verdan, cleric (Knowledge Domain) ***** fortune teller
The travelling circus who adopted and raised Thea found her as a half-starved and feverishly delirious, eight year-old wandering through the woods, the sole survivor of gnoll attack. Horrible though it was to say, Thea didn’t miss her parents, who were abusive alcoholics & violent thugs, very much at all and thought was better off without them, and she thrived in this new environment. Thea never forgot what it was like to wander through the woods frightened, confused, and injured, and devoted her studies to healing and the pursuit of knowledge.
When she was almost thirty, a couple of boys from noble families snuck into the circus at night and were injured, causing the circus to be shutdown, its ringleaders arrested, and everyone else to go their separate ways. Having spent most of her life in an ever-changing, colorful sea of organized chaos, Thea found she was unable to happily settle down with a safe and normal job in a boring, everyday-is-the-same town, so she hit the road looking for adventure and camaraderie.
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D506557788/
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Hazel Forster
Tiefling, ranger (Drakewarden of acid drake)
Mine is the classic fairytale: mother died when I was a very young and father died the season before my 12th birthday, but not before remarrying to my wicked stepmother. After father died, she became a source of unending torment with idea after idea of how to cleanse the Tiefling-ness from my veins (like beating or starving the evil out of me). It became habit for me to spend increasingly longer periods of time in the woods to avoid being at home, and one day, I realized I didn’t need to go back: I knew which berries and nuts were safe to eat and where and when they grew; how to make spear, rope, and net out of natural materials; where to place my snares; how to prepare and cook rabbit and fish over an open fire; which clouds meant rain was coming; how to make the roof of my hut rain-proof, what each animal’s call sounded like, how to make a bed that wasn’t itchy, and more. The forest embraced me, became my new home and new family, and I never looked back, wandering far and wide, eventually making a name for myself as someone who could guide travelers or transport packages through the most remote, dangerous, inhospitable of wildernesses.
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D506406361/
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Vervain Cornucopia
Fairy, reluctant rogue (Swashbuckler or Soulknife)
Just months ago, after years of hard work, I was living my dream: working as the renowned, well-esteemed head chief of an important noble household, then I was framed for poisoning a visiting Duke and imprisoned for my so-called crime. Very recently, I escaped and am now on the run as a wanted fugitive trying to clear my name & determine who framed me & why.
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D506293473/
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D506278500/
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Lucky F Boone If you must know, the F stands for F*cker.
Shadar-kai Halfling, rogue (Thief/Phantom)
cursed via homebrew Shadow Mastiff version of Hell Hound Cloak to be shadar-kai halfling who polymorphs into ‘shadow hound’
I was a common street urchin who made a living by lightening the purses of folks traveling through my turf of the city until the day I robbed this dandy wearing a pith helmet. He told me not to, saying something about curses, but his words were too similar to those spoken by a thousand other marks, so I ignored his warning not to don the fancy cloak I stole from him, and now.... No matter how sneaky you are, it’s really freaking hard to get away with crimes when you’re the only person in a thousand miles who looks like a walking corpse, so I had to hit the road and become a wandering thief as I try to figure this mess out. My name is Lucky F Boone and I'm shadow-cursed. (If you must know, the F stands for F*cker.)
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D506276636/
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Ezra Shepherd
Wild Magic Sorcerer, human Mark of Handling
I would have been accepted without issue if my powers were normal – I mean, our village priest is a tiefling, so it’s not like they weren’t accepting folk – but no one had even heard of powers like mine, and I didn’t have the best control. Still, it wasn’t until the gnolls attacked and I was able to dispatch half of them singlehandedly that my fellow villagers realized just how dangerous I was, so when the dust settled, they tearfully demanded I stay away until I could guarantee the safety of my neighbors. Joining an adventuring party might just be the best way for a smalltown homebody to get all the practice they need without endangering innocent folk and maybe return home with a bit of coin in my pocket, too.
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D506472672/
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Tribecka Shore-Thing Tribecka (of Ship) Shore Thing
Tortle, druid (Circle of the Stars)
Tribecka’s egg hatched on a ship named Shore Thing that was sailing to the rich collector who’d purchased her and, if Tribecka had been the wyvern that the rich merchant thought he was buying, then the ship would have been in trouble, but since she was a tortle, only Tribecka was in trouble. Disgusted at being swindled, the collector who purchased her egg cast her aside without care, but the crew of the Shore Thing had grown attached to her during their journey together and happily adopted her.
Tribecka had a wonderful childhood on Shore Thing, learning how to man the sails, batten the hatches, transport cargo, tie all sorts of knots, fight off the occasional pirates, and navigate using the stars. Tribecka loved nature, the stars, the sea, and her life on Shore Thing, in that order, but ship’s only need one navigator, so when Shore Thing was sent to dry docks for extensive repairs after striking a reef, Tribecka was unable to find work on any of the same ships as her favorite crewmates so decided to engage in the common tortle pastime of wandering and, since she ended up alone, the crew gave her the ship’s mascot, Gulper the pelican, to keep her company. It took less than week for her to figure out how she’d make coin for her travels, and all it took was catching and turning in the unlucky scoundrel who’d tried to pick her pocket. Now she spends her time wandering from town to town, hunting down fugitives and bringing them to justice.
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D506394780/
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Calderash (aka Ash) like the word caldera
centaur, cleric (Twilight Domain)
Calderash was an orphan of unknown origin, rescued from the wilderness as a toddling foal by a travelling caravan and given into the care of a temple-run orphanage. Ash found that sad, incomplete story of his origin an unremarkable bit of trivia in a childhood otherwise filled with excitement, mischief, the love of a few caretakers and many friends, and too many boring lessons and chores.
The one shadow in his life was that the other children used his fear of the dark to torment him but, despite that fear, Ash was no coward, possessing steady hands and an iron stomach even in the face of blood and gore that made grown men turn green. This interest and natural aptitude steered his lessons toward the healing arts, which required stitches and bandages until the evening his healing powers first manifested and he accidentally healed a grievous injury on the young son of a noble whose family was sheltering in the temple from a violent storm.
The grateful noble father became a patron of the orphanage and, upon inquiry of an appropriate personal token of gratitude, gifted Ash with Goggles of Night. After gaining the dark vision bestowed by his gift, Ash’s fear turned into a newfound fascination that guided the course of his clerical studies into becoming a Twilight Cleric.
Now Ash has come of age and must leave the orphanage to find his way in the world and forge his own destiny.
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D506398618/
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Rashelby ‘Callie’ Karwan
tortle, rogue (thief)
Callie had fond memories of growing in a merchant caravan and it taught her many useful skills (how to haggle, how to recognize when a deal was good or bad, and how to handle the dangers encountered on the road), but that life ended when a sickness swept across the land, killing most caravan members, including her parents.
By the time the pandemic had run its course, Callie was left penniless, friendless, and alone in a strange land with only one item not stolen: the family’s heirloom magic ring that allowed the wearer to wild shape like a druid into felines.
At first, she resisted the efforts of the local street kids and gangs that encouraged her to steal (she knew the value of hard work and had been raised to hate thieves) but a girl’s gotta eat, and she eventually became an expert cat burglar (pun totally intended) with the help of her family ring.
Now that she’s old enough to earn a proper wage, Callie is trying to leave her thieving ways behind her, but bad habits die hard. Maybe if she joins a travelling adventure group, she can satisfy her sticky-fingered and excitement-craving urges while doing honest work.
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D506560606/
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André Rusimovsky
Mountain Dwarf with gigantism, barbarian (Path of the Ancestral Guardian)
My family loved me, really they did, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t also a source of embarrassment to them and, sadly, I can’t say I really blame them: a dwarf with gigantism sounds like a bad joke, and any dwarf pushing 6 feet tall is a freak of nature!
It wouldn’t have been such a big deal if we lived in a more diverse area, but in a 99% dwarven city, there was no disguising or accommodating my differences. (Oh! How I envy those who don’t need to be careful crossing thresholds lest they smack their head against a doorframe and I couldn’t even stand up straight in the older buildings!)
I couldn’t be a craftsman like half of my family because my hands were too big to fit the tools, nor a miner like the other half since I was too big to fit in the mines, so I became a salesman instead, except I wasn’t any good at that either.
When the business I put my heart and soul into failed, I left town to seek my fortunes on the road. Even for non-dwarfs (like elves and humans), I’m a big guy; maybe it’s time I stop holding back my temper and really let loose like my warrior ancestors used to.
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D506521777/
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Frosty
white dragonborn, barbarian
As a young child, Frosty was the sole survivor of a shipwrecked vessel who then grew to adulthood alone on an uncharted, tropical island — at least that’s what the crew who finally found the runty, half-feral, adult, white dragonborn managed to piece together from the wreckage as they plundered it.
The deeply superstitious captain, felt that the gods had used a storm to push his ship far, far off course but saved it from smashing against the same reef that had sunk this other vessel because they, in their divine wisdom, wanted the dragonborn (named Frosty by his crew) to be taken from the island and brought back to civilization, but the captain felt his responsibility ended there and abandoned the dragonborn once they reached port.
The crew wasn’t as heartless as their captain and, during the journey back to port, gave Frosty lessons on how to talk and wear clothes, important concepts like money and property ownership (because he kept stealing their stuff and destroying things), and basically how to be a person.
They scraped together a few provisions for him to have and found an adventuring party for him to join, since he was obviously a skilled at fighting and wilderness survival and was clearly unnerved by the multitude of unfamiliar sights and sounds in the busy port.
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D506560606/
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Lynxander Welken
Lynx
minotaur, warlock/fighter (The Great Old One / Purple Dragon Knight or Champion or Cavalier)
Once upon a time, I was a humble human who lived, and eventually died as a soldier for my local lord. Good news is, I didn't stay dead. Bad news is, I didn't stay in my original body either. Worse news is, if I stay here, then the evil cultists trying to resurrect their dead leader (whose body I inhabit) might just succeed and bring about an apocalypse.
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Daja Shreeve
kobold, crystal; wizard of Graviturgy or Evocation school
Daja was a shy kobold with humble aspirations and simple desires, but it seemed everyone around her had plans and goals for her that had nothing to do with what she wanted:
Daja didn’t learn about those last two goals until it was almost too late and barely escaped the trap set for her. She ran for her life, with only the contents of her pockets to help her survive her travels, and headed for the only place that would be safe from her own kind, gnolls, and the monsters of the wilds: the nearest humanoid city.
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config=506346634/
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config=506614173/
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MY DARKEST CHARACTERS
Sabezian Madiera Noone
Bezi [bee-zee]
Tiefling, paladin Oath of Vengeance or Oath of Glory
Before my birth, the name chosen for me was Sebastian Kerredy del Teuscher von Brundāis III of Korenth, then I was born a tiefling. I was thrown away to avoid confirming that the rumors concerning the royal family’s dark dealings were true, and then stolen back and mutilated a decade later to impersonate my dead, twin human brother. A decade later, with the wail of my newborn brother ringing in his ears, I was forced to flee for my life and vowed that, one day, through vengeance or justice, I would stand on the Brundāis throne and rule Korenth.
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D506292735/
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D506276878/
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Sky Song Kleetk aka Song Birthname: Kleetk Druid Name: Sky Song
half-dwarf Aarakocra, barbarian
My father was a dwarf with delusions of grandeur and my mother was the unlucky aarakocra caught by his sellswords to be forcibly bred at his leisure. After she managed, eventually, to break free of her chains and escape, pregnant, back to her home, the elders ignored my mother’s pleas to be rid of my egg because our colony was small and they believed she would grow to love me in time, but they were wrong and my mother’s hatred only grew with time, going from unable to tolerate my presence to unwilling to tolerate my existence.
I still remember that day so vividly: I was lying on the soft grass, my wings still small and covered in down, playing with toys of stitched cloth and carved wood when the angry lady who only ever looked at me with glares landed beside me, scooped me up and took flight, telling me why she always glared at me as she flew, and then, when we were high over the forest and far far from the colony nest, let me go to smash against unforgiving tree branches and the ground. Nearby druids heard my screeches as my fluffy, down-covered body fell, saved me, and welcomed me into their tribe, but being unable to understand each other at first, nicknamed me Sky Song, before they knew I was a crippled bird who would never fly.
They did their best to heal my mangled body and traumatized child’s soul, but they could only do so much: my body is covered in scars, my wings are bent and broken, incapable of supporting flight, and the same anger that ruled my mother now festers within me also. I am an aarakocra with no colony, a being meant for the skies yet chained to the earth; calling what I feel ‘anger issues’ doesn’t really cover it.
I stick to the woods because new people stare at me as an object of fascination and pity, but my tribe has asked me to go on a quest for ___ and I will, because they have always made me feel accepted and welcome, and even cried alongside me after the tribe healer admitted she could never heal me enough to fly. I will do this for them. I will risk my life, face the inevitable hardships and dangers of the road, and endure the whispers and less-than covert glances of those I encounter, then I will return home and never leave our tribal woods again.
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D506324789/
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Bruce ‘the Brute’ Talvar (is Bruce a Giff?) Stirge, Kren, Kep(ke), Gibbz Talvar
Changeling, fighter (Battle Master)
As a toddler, my parents recognized the uniqueness of my abilities and patriotically entrusted my care to the military and my future to ensure the continued greatness of the Emperor. Brainwashed extremist? Hah! They gifted me with a purpose by training me and then sending me behind enemy lines in deep cover! I excelled for years until I grew too cocky and got caught, interrogated, and then thrown in a fighting pit as that night's entertainment.
I barely managed to kill my opponent with innate fighting skill I didn't realize I had, but still would've died that night had the pit champion not liked the idea of having a changeling for a bunk *****. He nursed me back to health, taught me to fight, introduced me to more than a few experiences that offended me, and even more new concepts & ideas that shattered my world perspective, and then the bastard died during a mass prison escape. Doubting everything I thought I knew, purposeless and adrift for the first time in my life, I assumed his identity and now wander the land as I try to figure out who I am and what I want in life.
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D506310763/
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D506407450/
Hold on, you have a litteral Karen Aasimar? That's grand
I am also here.
Am snek.
This is my first post here, so I'd love feedback!! I wrote this a long time ago, but it's something I'm super proud of. Sol, Lunae, Vali, and Lemon are all characters from a previous campaign. Thank you for reading :)
Pre-Campaign
Deep in the maze of the hollowed mountains, Malakai Florian Eschaton was born into a dark village inhabited by humans and a few select Drow. The village had resided for a long time here, first organizing in order to escape the destruction of Alhalmaret thousands of years ago. While small in numbers, the village worked extremely well together in order to protect their home. They came up with complicated watches, sketchy (however effective) security systems, and a schedule to live by. The village was very adamant about following these set things in order to survive such a dangerous place. So much so, they went to absolute extremes. Malakai’s father, Rowan, had quite the ability to invent. Having the odd talent of imbuing items with magic, he created and bestowed a security onto the village. In its simplest terms, it was a self-destruct mechanism. While seeming extreme, most every villager agreed that if their home were to go down, everything they had was going to go with it. Any documentation, any memory, everything they had created would die with them.
Malakai grew up as well as any child would in a secluded, scared, and secretive town. He was terrified of anything outside his home, never daring to even look outside. He spent a majority of his time with his mother, Cathline, which led him to later adopt a more feminine attitude. The village didn’t have many children, nonetheless any his age for him to bond with, but he didn’t let this stunt his social growth. As he grew, he took a great deal of interest in people. He thought it intriguing how different people reacted differently to the same stimuli, how internal and external situations could provide different responses, and simply their expressions and potential in general. Watching people was one of his favourite things to do, and he loved to listen to stories about people via his mother or others. Because of this obsession with people, he was quite social despite having no one his age around. He was comfortable, despite the scene.
Living in the hollowed mountains, the village knew they were in danger most, if not all of the time. This came to be known to Malakai when he was eight. He of course knew about the securities in place, as he had seen people direct them before. The village was no stranger to monsters and magic, but one day an enemy approached that most no one was familiar with. Known to us as Mind Flayers, Malakai ended up knowing them as the Psychics. The Psychics readily inhabit the hollowed mountains, yet for some reason the village hadn’t come into much contact with them in their thousand years. A group of them ambushed the small village, sending it into absolute chaos. The Psychics seemed to want most of the villagers alive, readily capturing them while eating others.
Seeing this terrible scene, Malakai panicked. Being so young and untrained, all he could do is watch as his village was destroyed. For a while, he hid. He hid until he remembered the failsafe his father had created. Nothing to this extent had ever happened, and he assumed this was the end. As Malakai began to make his way towards the device, he was met face to face with a Psychic, his mother in it’s tendrily grasp. He watched as the monster devoured her brains, and every second he stood there he felt more and more intense emotions than he ever had before. Her body dropping to the floor broke him from his trance, and he was able to make it to his father’s machine.
It wasn’t even a minute after he reached it. Malakai didn’t hesitate to detonate it. A gigantic blast of fire and gunpowder filled the small village, taking down every building, every form of documentation, and everything with it. All the humans and elves were completely decimated, Malakai potentially being the only survivor. Malakai had gotten the least amount of the blast, and fell into a coma, having been shielded by the blast by falling debris. Some of the Psychics had perished, but others had remained. Having lost their companions, and all of their victims, the party of monsters aggressively searched for the cause. They took Malakai and brought him back to their hive. Despite their losses, they still had a chance to experiment. Taking his body, they let an experimental tadpole be implanted into him to see what would happen. As the parasite took over, there were some obvious discrepancies from a normal mind flayer. His body didn’t transform into a mind flayer as quickly as normal, and he began to show signs of physical attributes before the process was finished.
The parasite moved incredibly slow, and because of this, Malakai still had his sense of self. He woke up about a month after, and catching the Psychics off guard, he was able to flee from the hive, however with the parasite still in him. Having never been outside of his village, he had absolutely no clue where he was going. Malakai wandered through the caves with no sense of direction, and no hope. What happened was hard for him to understand, and at that point he didn’t know what the Psychics had done to him. He didn’t know if anyone in his village had survived or not, and although he didn’t know where he was headed, he desperately wanted to stumble across his village. While having taken the least damage compared to the others in his village, he was still left with bad scarring and burning.
About a week after the ordeal, Malakai was found by an underground traveller, a middle aged drow, named Velk Albarn. Velk was a well put together character, a librarian who was out doing field research. Malakai refused to give him any information, but Velk refused to simply leave him by himself, and decided he would bring him back to the surface. Velk gave Malakai a white cloak to cover his scars, saying he needed to keep them covered. He helped tend to Malakai’s wounds, trying to earn a bit of trust with him. The boy didn’t completely trust Velk, but as he needed an adult, he went along with it, hoping he’d help him find his home. As the two travelled, Malakai came upon the realization that normal food wasn’t satisfying him completely. He was having odd cravings, and would trail away from Velk during rests in order to hunt down rats. He really liked the brains of the animals, but he knew that wasn’t normal, and didn’t say anything about it to his guide. It only took a month to reach the exit, as Velk knew where he was going.
Upon seeing the surface for the first time in his life, Malakai became completely overwhelmed. He was taken over by a sudden burst of violence and an unbearable headache. He found himself unable to control his sudden need for food, and the only option around was his guide. A person he had indeed come to trust. A quiet voice, the parasite, spoke directly to him. ‘Kill.’ ‘Eat.’ ‘Now.’ Malakai barely even heard these as he attacked Velk out of nowhere. Despite getting a good maul in, Malakai was still a child, and was easily pinned down by Velk. After he had calmed down, Velk fell silent. Presumably contemplating, Velk gave Malakai an ominous look before dropping a small bag next to him. Without words, Velk teleported away, leaving him in the cold of the Blackstone Clifftops by himself.
Inside the bag were two items, which Malakai thought familiar, but he could never place why. The items are both of the same aesthetic, one being a pair of glasses, and the other being a dagger. Both being seemingly antique, Malakai found them both very useful in his adventures. The two items have a red and gold palette, and are encrusted with vine patterns, each having metal roses adorned on them. The glasses have a chain with red beads that attaches the ends, so it can be worn as a necklace. Malakai wears these when he needs to read, finding himself farsighted without them.
He made his way down the mountains alone, lost without direction in this entirely new world he was thrown into. He was wary of just about everything, surviving off of small animals he could take down. Malakai eventually figured out that he didn’t have such awful outbursts after eating the brains of animals, and since he hadn’t yet eaten a humanoid’s brain, this was acceptable to the parasite. As time went on, different things started to happen to Malakai. When he would cut himself on accident, he found that his blood had become a bit silvery. Some days he would float a few inches off the ground when he wasn’t paying attention. His nails began turning black, growing longer than they had before, and his teeth seemed to sharpen out of nowhere. He didn’t know what the cause of it was, but he wasn’t hurting anyone anymore, so he didn’t care all that much.
Malakai was found in the Crimson Empire around the age of nine outside of Lunae's doorstep. Being skeptical of others, Lunae couldn't get any information out of him, so he hadn't any clue where he came from or anything about him. However, he already had more than he could handle on his plate. Lunae reached out to his sister, Sol, and requested her to take in this child. She was unamused by the offer, but eventually accepted, as she knew Lunae needed the help. It took a bit to warm up to the idea, but Sol conceded with Lemon’s help. She was able to keep a level parenting style when raising him, and ended up being a chill parent. Lemon definitely thinks her kid is better than any other kid. She's that mom. Sol finds herself a bit more distant than Lemon, but still cares for him.
Malakai claimed to remember nothing of his past, despite it being quite clear to him. With his animal fix, he was able to keep any violent outburst down, and he did all he could to hide the fact he was different from the people he knew. The hardest thing to deal with was the parasite speaking, but he ended up getting a bit more hold on that as well. Lemon and Sol raised him as they went on adventures with Vali, and as Malakai grew up, the two weren't completely oblivious to him being off. Lemon noticed when he scampered off in the dead of night by himself, coming back with the scent of blood lingering. Sol heard how he would have a one way conversation with no one when he thought he was alone. As he grew, he began to cover up more and more of his skin as it turned purple, wearing gloves as his hands grew talons. They knew something was up.
No one took any action until Malakai broke. He had gotten comfortable with his new family, and had gotten too comfortable in his ability to withhold the parasite. Around sixteen, Malakai was staying in Northrost for a bit with his moms. As they had spent time there before, Malakai had made a few friends already. Estel Celeborne, a human, and Ophelia Aestra, a half-elf, were his best friends. Estel and Malakai liked each other a lot, and eventually became a couple. The group was inseparable, and that would come to be their downfall.
Malakai was seventeen on the night of Estel’s eighteenth birthday. The three were out late, playing games and having silly conversations, until they decided to head to Malakai’s home. Sol and Lemon were waiting to make sure they had gotten back safe, and upon arrival, something struck Malakai internally. He hadn’t felt such a strong urge in such a long time, and the parasite began yelling in his mind so loudly that it drowned out the rest of the room. ‘KILL.’ ‘EAT.’ ‘NOW.’ Malakai took Estel to the ground, bashing her head open and feasting upon her brain in front of everyone. The house went up in chaos as Ophelia tried desperately to help her dead friend, Lemon doing her best to hold Malakai down and away. Sol did her best to heal Estel, but she was definitely too far gone. Ophelia disowned Malakai as a friend very quickly, not caring to hear an excuse or figure out what happened.
After this event, Malakai came clean with his past. Sol had a few disbeliefs, but her son had just eaten a girl’s brain in front of her, so it wasn’t terribly hard to convince her. After having his first taste of a humanoid, he found animals less appetizing, however he made it work for as long as he could. In the beginning, Lemon and Sol did all they could in order to help, finding various criminals for him to feed on while they racked their brains to figure out what to do. Sol ended up contacting Lunae, as he was more versed on creatures than her.
Present Day
Malakai is able to keep his urges under control most of the time, generally taking to the outskirts at night to take out a straggler thief when needed. Animals can work, but they only do so much for him, and despite it sedating him for a bit of time, he will always eventually need something more. Malakai is very particular in keeping his lineage a secret. He will go out of his way to make sure people don’t see him do anything suspicious, and tends to do his business in the dead of night. If he starts to bleed, he will quickly cover himself to hide the silvery substance. If he hears the parasite speaking, or develops a migraine, he will vacate the area immediately, knowing that means he might end up attacking someone.
He finds it hard to make new connections because of what has happened to people he's loved in the past, and replaces that need for socialization with watching people. As he did when he was a child, he spends a good amount of time studying others and what they do. Malakai, simply put, has two rather distinct personalities. His public one is charming and outgoing, as he pretends he's this charismatic folk hero determined to woo the populous. The only attention he wants is positive attention, hoping that it will make him feel more human. This is a complete one-eighty to his private personality, which is closed off and foreboding. He is extremely apprehensive about almost everything, and dislikes talking about anything involving himself.
Malakai is currently nineteen years old, visiting his Uncle Lunae in the Crimson Empire. Despite Lunae being busy, he is doing his best to help Malakai figure out what to do. He's been in the empire for about half a year under Lunae and Feno's supervision. Any plans thought up to fix him have been unsuccessful thus far. While trying to find different ways to take care of his issue, Malakai has also been acting as a babysitter for him and Feno for their youngest, Ali.
While in the empire, Malakai created a disguise for when he had to hunt. Calling it ‘The White Rogue,’ Malakai would dress himself in the white cloak Velk gave him, and white mask that covered most of his face, hoping to keep himself a secret, while covering the discrepancies most humans lack. Even if he was seen this way, people wouldn’t have much to go off of, so it made him feel a bit more comfortable with his endeavours. This then turned into something he did more often as he saw crime in the empire. He realized he could help the town at the same time by taking out petty criminals he saw during the day, instead of stalking around at night for himself. The White Rogue was a perfect out for what he had to do in order to survive, while giving him the positive attention he wanted. Anytime he had to be seen by others aside from his uncles, he would adorn his costume.
Fun Facts
Malakai’s name means “My Angel, Flowering, The End of the World”
He likes to stare at people to make them uncomfortable. It is a game to him.
Malakai is left-handed.
His worst fear is the hollowed mountains.
He is also scared of storms. He didn’t grow up with them, and thinks they’re weird.
Malakai can play the violin! He’s okay at it, it’d be better without his monster claws.
Appearance
What makes Malakai most recognizable is his deep red eyes, obviously not being the norm for humans. Given he isn't in sunlight, his pupils will look normal, however if he finds himself in the sun, they will dilate to a slit, resembling a cat. His right eye is glossed over, and he is partially blind in it. This eye is also more silvery than red. He has auburn coloured hair, which frames his face in messy curls, a small braid on the left side of the style. Having lived underground the beginning half of his life, his skin is quite pale compared to other humans, but parts of it have been affected by the transformation. Half of his face and other sections of his body are a greyish purple, spreading because of the parasite. His teeth have become considerably sharp, more rows of them growing in and all around his throat in a circle. Malakai’s hands have grown longer, his fingers growing long black talons that he tends to cut off.
Malakai is more than likely to wear his White Rogue outfit, which has a fancy, but simple aesthetic. Velk’s white cloak is long and silky, having red accents near the bottom, rising up in swirly patterns and shapes. His mask matches the white and red aesthetic and covers everything except his left eye, being held to his head by a thick red ribbon. His rapier has white and red ribbons on it, with a rose tied to the handle. He wears bandages that cover his lower arms, ankles, and neck to hide where his clothes may show his purplish grey skin.
Under his White Rogue attire, he tends to wear flowy clothes that help him move around easily. Generally it's a men's renaissance shirt with an upturned collar, long flowy sleeves and ruffles along the neckline. He wears skintight leather pants with ribbon lacing up the sides, the rose themed dagger strapped to his leg. He has fancy brown boots, and black leather gloves to finish off the look. Malakai has multiple burn and blast scars from the explosions, and prefers the longer clothing in order to hide it.
Malakai is adorned with quite a few pieces of jewelry. He wears many pairs of earrings, most of which are black, including studs and cross latch backs. Another is the pair of glasses he brought up from the hollowed mountains. He usually wears it around his neck, but on occasion wears them to read. Over his gloves, he wears gold and silver rings of different types, which help his gloves stay on his inhuman hands.
Here's a relatively short one, set up for a one shot. I don't think this session is technically Christmas themed, but, we are doing it during the Christmas season.
For my Twilight cleric, Corryn.
On a dark, cold night soon before the winter solstice, Corryn's mischievous brother Perrytyn snuck out of the house. Not long after, Corryn heard yelling and mayhem. He never saw his brother after that, but, along with the faint scent of oranges and chocolate, he heard a sound of chains and small bells ringing.
He caught a glimpse of a huge, dark, horned beast, with a gray beard, lumbering toward the village. He was making an odd laughing sound, and banging a birch rod against the chains that were draped over his shoulders.
Looking up, the beast froze when his eyes locked onto Corryn's, fearfully peering over the edge of the windowsill. With a menacing, fanged smirk, he touched a hook-clawed finger to the side of his nose, and vanished in an inky cloud of sulphurous smoke.
A Krampus related backstory, awesome!
Opa - Sea Nymph (Triton) / Bard
Hatched into slavery, beautiful and hairless, with iridescent skin that at times seemed change or pulsate different colors like the cuttlefish. She had been hand picked by the Nereids of the Cerulean Shore for one purpose, to be trained and sold as a courtesan of kings and queens.
Seeing great potential in her, the Nereids began her courtesan training as a young nymph with teaching the arts of music, dance, and hostessing. As her talents grew, they taught her the ancient art of somatic dance casting and polyphonic singing that could hit arcane frequencies that vibrate the spheres themselves, enabling her to manipulate space and matter but more importantly, influence others. All these talents were instrumental to further weaponize her beauty.
In her teens she was sold to the highest bidder to date to the captain of the Lusty Crustacean, an opulent pleasure barge, to be their shining pearl. In time, the Captain had fallen greatly in love with her. But more than love, Opa desired to be free of slavery and live life on her own terms. With great love for her, wanting nothing more than to see her happy, the captain gave her the freedom she had never known to explore the new world. The Nereids had taught her too well.
Discord: Tully#0286
Deacon The G̴̡͎͇͎̗̿̀͛͑̂e̷̗͚̗̮̰͛͘n̵̨̆̍̑ť̴̰̌̓̕͠ŗ̵̧͖͔͛̀̚i̷̮͗ͅf̴̨̪͔̈́͒̊͠i̸̫̗̗̿̍̄̕͝eŗ̵̧͖͔͛̀̚
Reset (Born Again) Peripheral of Primus
Warforged Cleric - Knowledge Domain
Reset and rise again under the watchful eye of the unblinking celestial Primus!
Witness him! Defrag and format to personal perfection by becoming closer to The Cog.
Brothers and sisters, are you ready to testify?
-A reading from the Manual of Instructions of the God Machine -
“Primus the God-Machine is far beyond mortal comprehension. It cannot be reasoned with, appealed to, or appeased. For there to be order, certain deeds need to accomplished, no matter the cost. Like nature, it can be cruel, unforgiving and necessary. These necessary goals can range from the mundane to the catastrophic and can appear as evil, but always are in the pursuit of perfect order. “
Discord: Tully#0286
I have a character named Varus, who this Sunday, will be in the final session for Storm King's Thunder.
Hailing from a small village called "Redstone" (named for the "red stones" that are common in a nearby cave), Varus was desperate to get out of the town that held no future for him, other than being a farmer who believed the old legend that the "red stones" was the blood of the gods that battled in the heavens long before man was on the world. Running away at a young age, Varus was once a mercenary for hire who followed where ever the gold took him. This resulted in getting into battles when the pay was right - as such, he saw things that he was never ready to see. He has since changed his ways, and become a more honorable mercenary, helping those in need when he can, offering his services for cheap, sometimes even helping people, free of charge if the situation was desperate enough for those in need.
This is the story that “Varus” tells everyone. In truth, this is a mixture of what is truth and a lie. The young man who claims to be “Varus Oathblade” is actually a young man named Deran Tully hailing from Redstone which was a small community, rarely even noted on most maps in Faerûn. Varus Oathblade was the son of Bran Oathblade, who was said to have once been one of the members of the Purple Dragon Knights, serving Cormyr. When Varus was old enough, he left Redstone to follow in the steps of his father. Deran, eager to escape Redstone ran away at a young age, and lived off the streets, until one day, making the mistake of picking the pocket of a knight – which happened to be none other than Varus Oathblade.
Recognizing Deran from Redstone, he took him under his wing as a squire, hoping to one day prove that Deran could be redeemed in the eyes of Cormyr and become a member of the Purple Dragon Knights. During a goblin ambush, Deran found himself in peril, and Varus rushed to his side, to save his squire. In doing so, Varus left himself open, perishing in the ambush, but saving Deran’s life. Deran took up Varus’ greatsword, and with renewed vengeance, slaughtered the onslaught of goblins in blinding fury. How he had overcome over twenty goblins, he could not say. Everything had happened so quickly, and when it was all done, he stood over Varus’ body with the bloody bodies of goblins strewn about. Deran decided to honor Varus the only way he knew how to – he adopted Varus’ name, and has set out in the world to make Varus’ name one that bards will sing of, forgoing and forgetting his own name in the process.
Personality Trait: I’ve lost too many friends, and I’m slow to make new ones. This is a reference to actually losing Varus, who was the only person who ever truly showed any belief that Deran could be more than just a farmer and a petty street thief
Ideal: When people follow orders blindly, they embrace a kind of tyranny This comes from what he learned from Varus, who frequently stood up for him, when others believed that Deran would never amount to anything. This has caused a slight, rebellious streak in Varus.
Bond: Someone saved my life on the battlefield. To this day, I will never leave a friend behind. This is obviously a reference to Varus sacrificing himself so that Deran might live, during the goblin ambush.
Flaw: I made a terrible mistake in battle that cost many lives—and I would do anything to keep that mistake secret. Again, this is another reference to Varus giving up his own life for Deran.
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The Journals of Morobunce Greenhills, Page 42.
Draconia is a world ruled by The Dragons. Split by the Order of Six, the Draconians that rule the world are Ancient Dragons of Red, Green, Blue, Bronze, Gold, and Silver. Though the Dragons claim that there is no “good” or “evil” among the Dragonkin, only a desire to maintain order and peace – there is an old saying among my people, “It is not power itself that corrupts, but the fear of losing such power.”
Those the Order of the Six maintain that they have only peaceful intentions, I am full of doubt. Ancient texts speak of Dragons of Old, whose avarice for gold could be compared to a dehydrated man’s thirst for water.
Most who have been to Shallow Hills, know the name Greenhills. My family is one of the wealthiest among the Halflings. They gladly harvest food for the Armies of the Green Draconian, and hand over their hard work and harvest to their armies, in exchange for fancy bobbles and sometimes even coin. I was destined to do the same, but that is not the life I wanted for myself.
I did not want to work – almost borderline slave away – for another, for simple trinkets and toys. Despite my family’s background and wealth, I left that life behind and did what so few of my kind do – and ventured into the World.
It did not take long for me to soon discover that the World outside of Greenhills was not an easy one. Human Cities sprang about the land like jagged stones, with their towering walls in an attempt to safe guard themselves, marring the land and twisting it to their needs.
But it was within these human cities, that smelled of sewers and filth that I had to learn to survive. Being as small as I was, it was easy to move about, and acquire certain things I had needed to survive. I wasn’t pleased with myself, lowering myself down to stealing in order to survive. But I did not want to live off my family’s money. I wanted to make it on my own. But among humans, Halflings seemed to have little use.
My pride forced me to refuse the idea of ever returning home. Not until I had gone out into the world and left my own mark.
So I spent weeks like this; surviving by stealing. I learned to be quite good at the skill, until I was caught – but not by the one whom I had stolen the fruit from; but another. He introduced himself as a human by the name of Avathan. He explained that I did not have to be alone; there were others, like me, whom society had deemed to turn their backs on, who were forced to survive as I had.
He led me through a maze of alleyways, and side doors, through ancient buildings, that appeared as if they might collapse with just the slightest breeze, until we reached a small sewer entrance. Within there, we walked in the dark for several hundred feet, before he tugged on what appeared to be a rusted ladder. I heard a series of clicks and whirls, and suddenly, part of the concrete slid away, revealing a passage within.
Despite the entrance into this lair, the inside was lined with beautiful rugs, and glistening objects. Avathan explained that this was the Thieves Guild; or as he romantically calls it, “The Adventurer’s Hall.” Here, there were people of all walks of life – of every race, of every color – from other Halflings, to humans, to elves, half-elves, even Tieflings – and one dwarf (though I could not tell if the Dwarf was male or female; a common problem I have with Dwarf-ilk).
As there was a mixture of races among the Thieves Guild, there was also a mixture of personality as well as reason for stealing. Someone stole, simply to survive. Some stole, because they enjoyed the thrill. Some stole, simply because they could not fight the impulse. All of them, however, made payments to the thieves guild in some form or fashion – whether it was food, trinkets, or gold. Those items, were then recycled back into the Thieves Guild – to pay for Thieves to do specific jobs, should they choose to accept it.
After several weeks of doing various jobs for Avathan, he finally approached me and explained that he had another job for me – one that took me out of Stonepeak – and into the city of Ancor. There was a Guild Master there by the name of ‘Teacher.’ (Somehow I doubt that was his real name; but he respected his privacy enough not to want his name known, even among the Circle of Thieves and Rogues – after all, there is a saying among them here that, “There Is No Honor Among Thieves” and “Every Secret Has Its Price – One Need Only Find It.”)
I agreed to go to Ancor to meet this ‘Teacher.’ My first day out of Stonepeak, I met with another caravan of would be adventurers, that seemed to range from warriors, holy soldiers, and outdoorsmen. Our first night, we stopped at an Oasis, where – in the awkward silence, several spoke to make conversation. I met Alek Redmont, who was a Human Ranger; Kalamitee Wolfsmoon, an Eladrin Cleric; and Zerkorza Zaidai, a Tiefling Warrior, who sat nearest to me.
The small caravan was broken into several small circles of strangers talking amongst themselves. The four of us agreed to make a rotating watch for the night. Zerkorza apparently awoke to hear the sounds of chanting; she woke Kalamitee – and before we knew it, we found ourselves attacked by some form of religious fantatics. I was rendered unconscious only to awaken who knows how much longer – by the cleric who had snapped my ropes.
Neither the Ranger nor the Cleric knew where the Warrior had gotten off to. Was she already taken? The stone beds we were tied to had ridges for bloodletting. Where ever we were, it was not a good place. (But then, when is it a good place when they knock you out and tie you up to a bed unwillingly?) We searched for clues within the room. The walls were lined with and endless row of skulls, whose empty sockets seemed to be watching with hatred.
One door had the sound of chanting coming from it; the other had a strange odor – the third door was open, leading down a hallway where we could see a light. There was no sounds coming from that direction. It seemed to be the safest of choices – I took the front, searching for traps or anything along the hallway.
Much to our surprise, we found the Warrior rummaging through the room. “Were you trying to escape without freeing us?” I asked.
The startled Warrior turned, looked surprised, “No,” she said rather quickly. “I was looking for our weapons and armor.”
I watched her expression. She was lying. She was trying to escape without even getting the rest of us out there. I wonder, would I have done the same? Awakened in a strange place, with skulls, and a stone tablet that had bloodletting ridges?
No. I would have awaken the others. If there’s one thing I have learned, is that the Lone Wolf will die without the Pack.
We continued to rummage through the room – the only thing of interest was a small icon – that the Cleric recognized as being a symbol of the god, Bane. Kalamitee, somewhat familiar with the evils of Bane, explained he was a God of War. However, his intention was not for warriors to call upon him during times of battle; but rather, to one day rule over all of the world himself, and crush all those who oppose him and believe in anything other than him, beneath his fiery heels.
I stared at the symbol of Bane and sneered in disgust. He was worse than the Order of the Six Draconians. At least they allowed everyone to believe what they wanted, so long as it did not interfere or conflict with their own ideas. Bane wanted everyone snuffed out, if they did not swear allegiance to him and him alone.
We left the room and returned to the bloodletting room, where we could still hear chanting down one hall. We continued down the third hall, until the scent of copper became extremely strong. This wasn’t going to go well – I could already tell. It was the smell of blood.
Upon opening the door, Alek immediately began to vomit. The entire room was covered in blood splatter, and there were bodies whose heads had been severed and the flesh of their bodies peeled back.
It was in this room, we recovered our weapons and armor and made our way back up to the bloodletting room, where I peered through the shut door and saw six occult members standing around a sconce. None of them seemed aware of our presence; I quickly explained, I would sneak in first and back stab the one closest; as soon as he would yell, the other were to charge in.
Stealthfully moving through the shadows, I approached the first one and dug my short deep through him. I abhor the idea of taking one’s life – but seeing the horrors I had seen today – I knew that there was no other choice. These men were vile – evil, down to their very core, without any hope of redemption.
The others immediately charged into the room. We moved, for the first time, as a cohesive unit. We were aware of one another’s presence, and made the best of every attack. Perhaps because the dark summoners were so entranced with their chanting – which turned out to be some kind of summoning spell, because as the last one fell, a demonic hand reached through just before it closed – a deep, chilling voice, screaming in denial as the mystical doorway sealed.
We made our way further through the room and discovered a hallway that led out. But as I peered outside, I suspected there was more to these three men and their small caravan. After all, why would they be camped right outside the cave’s entrance – unless they were a part of the cult – or if they were the mercenaries that delivered us to the Cult of Bane.
When we stepped outside, Kalamitee tried to be diplomatic – trying to find out who they were and why we were captured; but by the shocked expression by these men, they clearly had no interest in speaking and wanted to silence us. Immediately another fight broke out, and as the others concentrated on the two warriors, my eyes focused on the one who appeared to be a mage – or some dark summoner.
The mage used a number of spells to stun us and disorient us; but that did not slow me down. He had struck me with several spells as I pursued him through the forest, leaving me close to death. Just as it seemed my last breath would escape my lungs, I heard Kalamitee behind me whisper a prayer to her goddess; and a light filled me. My wounds healed, and the mage, who had been cut and beaten, finally surrendered.
He explained that he had been paid by the Cult of Bane to capture us and bring us to them. They had been awaiting payment outside the Cult’s cavern when we came out and surprised them. We debated leaving the mage to die, tied to a tree – but knew it would be better to bring him with us, alive, to the city of Ancor.
We arrived in the City and turned the Mage over to the local authorities who were well of aware of his actions, but had never been able to catch him. Even more interesting – they offered us a job to work for the city cleaning up similar riff raff.
Things, I feel, are only just beginning to get interesting…
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Hello. I have the beginning of an idea for a Ranger. What do you think?
One day, a green dragon went to sleep in his lair. She thought it was only for a short time, but actually a couple of centuries passed.
When she awoke, she found most of her forest gone and a city built above her lair (that luckily was not found. Same for the hoard).
As the lair and the hoard were safe, her first impulse was not to kill everybody. Instead she established herself as a personality of note in the city, set on gainig control of it while rebuilding the forest.
The Ranger was found by the dragon (or by her agents) and brought into her service.
That is a good bond to drive your ranger, whether they are totally willing or not. It would be fun to explore if the dragon forced them to become a ranger, or if they subtly influenced them into it. Maybe your ranger was a gardener or some kind of dreamer who chose to be a ranger of their own accord and the dragon just stumbled upon them as a useful pawn.
My latest character is a satyr named Brocephalus. He comes from a mixed village of satyrs and people from the material plane. This odd community started when a bunch of fey crossed over to fight in a Great War a century before, and some decided to remain.
Bro grew up on those stories of Fey Warriors and Green Knights. As he grew up, he exercised and trained obsessively, combining fighting ability with fey trickery and showmanship. His goal is to make a name for himself and join those legends of old.
but he is tied to his home in a way. He is leading visiting fey through adventures in the material plane as something of a tour guide, trying to live out his dream while keeping his even wilder fey cousins in line to avoid trouble for his people.
I like situations where a chromatic dragon is not the good guy, but maybe the better option or the lesser evil.
The whole deal started with a young Copper Dragon: he wondered long over the perfect prank he could play to the older and more powerful Green inhabiting the land he was interested in conquering.
After years of thinking, he found the answer: steal the land from the Green and make it his own!
Taking advantage of the sleeping Green, the Copper took the shape of a wealthy mortal and convinced humans and dwarfs to settle the region, seeking precious metals. The mining settlements that soon rose deforested most of the land and hills, leaving only the wildest mountains green as they were.
Luckily for all of them, they never found the lair and the hoard of the Green, so when she eventually woke, she was surprised and outraged, but not to a murderous extent.
She was also at a loss over her next move.
She knew she could easily destroy the younger copper, as well as destroy and sack the towns and using spells to make the forests grow lush once more.
Yet, she was also intrigued.
For all her scorn, she couldn’t help admiring a good intrigue when she saw one. The Copper had played his cards well. Well enough for her to feel the beginning of admiration. Just enough for her to think that she owed him not to simply fly and bite his head off. At least, not yet.
One day, they met in the largest of the mining towns, the oldest and the closest to a proper city. They were in their human shapes and enjoyed a meal in a luxurious inn. They made a bet and agreed to terms.
They bet that they could drive the other from the region using only mortal agents. The victor would win the loser’s hoard and be the sole owner of the region.
Dragons play chess with bleeding pawns.
Another idea I had for the Ranger was more or like this:
In a desert region, an ancient Brass Dragon is the Grand Wazir (the local Jafar) and the true power behind a monarch. While he keeps the reign stable and prosperous and the people happy, his politic is an aggressively colonizing one. On his order, the army spreads to conquer the region, bringing back riches and knowledge. Peculiarly, the dragon considers the city he reigns over as his lair and the whole kingdom he is conquering as his hoard.
The first thing the Brass Dragon ordered, was the slaying of the local family of Blue Dragons; the original owners of the desert. For this, he hired several mercenary groups, sacrificed several regiments of the army and joined the fight he himself. Despite everything, he was only almost successful. The ancient Blue patriarch was the first to go; a treacherous spell imprisoned him in a bauble. The two adults were killed after a long and bloody fight.
However, the two young females managed to flee in the deepest desert where the mortals could not follow, carrying with them the last egg.
The Blues swore vengeance and started to plot it, but the first thing they were forced to acknowledge was that they were not enough, yet, to win over an ancient Brass at the heart of the kingdom he now owned.
Therefore, they started building their own realm. They started seeking the tribes of the desert-dwellers. For those they found, with their lightning breath, the dragons created craters of glassed sand. Then, using Create or Destroy Water, they filled them for the thirsty mortals. The glass oasis were soon regular part of their lives and it was only few years before the nomads started bowing to the dragons, some considering them allies, some considering them closer to gods.
When the wyrmling, a male, hatched from the last egg, the Blues decided it was time to bring their plans to the next step.
The tribes were called and an alliance formalized. The tribe leaders carved their names on the horn of the dragons, binding themselves to fealty. On their end, the dragons offered themselves as allies and sovereigns, promising a better future.
Young mortals started undertaking a pilgrimage to the dwelling of the Blues. Those who survived and came back, years later, were changed (Gift of the Chromatic Dragon, Blue Draconic Sorcerers, Drakewardens).
"I will weed out those who wish to control the minds of man, I am Noxus Nailo. I am an Assassin." Noxus was born and raised in Baulders Gate. When he turned 17, His Father and 2 Brothers were hung for "Crimes against The City." But this wasn't true. The People responsible for their deaths were Templars. Noxus's Uncle took him, his mother, and sister in at his castle, Where Noxus Swore to Serve in the darkness to protect the light. He became an assassin. 8 years later, Noxus Fell in love with and married the Bard Jackie Nailo, and had a Son Named Aries. While Noxus Still serves the Creed, In his off time, he can (If he chooses) Be found in Phandelver, Shopping with his family, or dosing off under a tree.
Allies:
Antonio
Mario
Jackie
Aries
Organizations:
The Assassins Creed
Enemies:
The Knights of the Holy Templar
Allignment: Chaotic Good
“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat." -Sun Tzu
[Created for a specific world setting, used at a table I was invited to join.]
At a fireside or tavern table chat between this character and the rest of the party, you learn this:
"As I told you once, back under the mountain, I am Dachniana, of the lost tribe of Yaaxché, the blood children of Caesinjach The Green, and direct kin to Kurtulmak and Kuraulyek. I follow the ways of IO [Dach pronounces it eeoh], The Impartial One. That vow requires that I maintain complete neutrality when dealing with dragons. I can never willingly play a role in harming one. Because of this vow, I and others like me are trusted, or perhaps more precisely, underestimated to the tribe's benefit, by all dragons.
"I hatched in the creche of the once powerful tribe of Yaaxché, in the form of a Rock Kobold, those who had emerged from the stones first touched by the willing blood sacrifice of Caesinjach.
"During my Rite of Passage, when upon emergence, I would be recognized as 'sorcerer' by my tribe, we were attacked by a powerful band of giants (human and demi-human warriors, etc.,). I dug out of my isolation, only to find my tribe destroyed, and my home looted. I had nowhere to go. Tribe Sip-ché took me in and gave me work. I never revealed my powers to this tribe; meditating and practicing my magic in secret. Because of this, it has taken me decades to achieve this skill.
"The survival and prosperity of a tribe outweighs any personal ambitions of any member. Upon that law, all actions taken for personal gain, at the expense of the tribe, find a foundation of nothing but sand. For until we agree otherwise, I will accept you all as part of my tribe, Yaaxché."
I have this beginning of an idea for a setting. Opinions?
The Whitening is an area of the Elemental Plane of Air; it is an expanse of clouds and fog as wide as wide as an average nation. Many visitors from the Material Plane described it as an ocean of white.
Scattered among the clouds are several motes of earth, varying in size between an atoll and a mountain. Most of them are inhabited and cultivated
Mahmeesha
The female Djinni called Mahmeesha is the second highest authority most in the Whitening would recognized. A very powerful Genie, Mahmeesha found the Whitening after a long wandering in her cloud-born castle. She considers the Whitening her personal dominion. So far, she has been able to back these claims.
Mahmeesha craves variety in the slaves she takes and she is an avid collector. The only ones allowed to live in her castle are the most exotic or those she was most impressed or smitten with. Several of those are the parents of Air Genasi. Some of the longest lived slaves helped to generate whole bloodlines of those.
The only exception to this rule are Mahmeesha’s Air Genasi descendants. She is not outright dismissive of them, but they need to try so much harder to impress her. Greatness is in Mahmeesha’s blood after all; as they share her blood, they have an unfair advantage over other races.
Inhabitants
Despite its desolate appearance, the Whitening was always inhabited. Elementals seem to thrive among the clouds, Rocs and Harrowhawks are common sights. Mephits, on the other hand, are too numerous for anyone’s liking. Spotting a Silver Dragon is not unheard of.
The most impressive dwellers, however, are the Elder Tempests, of which there are several.
After Mahmeesha made it her domain, however, the population of the Whitening grew to the point that some of the largest earth motes now hosts little towns, while most of the other are home to farms.
Indeed, most of the population descends, one way or another, from Mahmeesha herself. The creatures from the Material Plane, those native and not those who stumbled upon a portal, descends from Mahmeesha’s slaves, while the Air Genasi (the single largest ethnicity represented there) started as the scions of Mahmeesha herself, long before they became a self-sustaining folk.
Notable Regions and Landmarks
Mahmeesha’s palace, floating on solid clouds, is the informal capital of the Whitening. By itself is a thriving little city, there resides the Genie’s court, slaves and attendants, of which marvels are told. Actual sightings of the palace are rare, as the majority of Mahmeesha’s businesses are done with the intermediation of trained servants. Several mote-dwellers go on pilgrimages hoping of finding the palace and being allowed to join those who live there. How many actually find it or are allowed inside it is unclear.
The Cult of the Winged Tempest
Arable land is few and scattered, so it is of the utmost importance that crops grow as abundant as possible. The passage of an Elder Tempest causes the clouds to release rain that, when the elementals pass the correct distance, are just strong enough to water the crops and fill the water reservoirs. If they are too close, on the other hand, destructive storms happen. As regular as possible, the dwellers try their best to lure the Elder Tempest toward the inhabitated earthmotes, just at the right distance. It is a dangerous but essential part of the life in the Whitening.
These hunts most often took a ritualistic flair, while festivals were held as celebrations. Minor cults often appeared, mainly composed of those believing that prayers and sacrifices to the Elder Tempest would grant protection from the elementals.
In the centuries after the coming of Mahmeesha, the cult grew in importance and prevalence, while also changing its basic precepts. The faithful started referring to the Elder Tempests as ‘Al Isifa’, bringers of rains for their crops and steeds of the Great Mother Mahmeesha. Those who embarked to lure the elementals eventually became the first clerics.
Indeed, in the years after the birth of the cult of Al Isifa, sightings of Elder Tempests became more common while the elementals themselves grew slightly less aggressive.
Actually, the cult was part of a scheme of the Genie’s. To standardize the cult and place herself at its summit was as good a way to exercise control over the population as any, and better than most. Furthermore, she was also curious to find out what would happen to the Elder Tempest themselves as more and more people started actively worshipping them.
It is also Mahmeesha’s discreet plan to become an object of worship herself, as ‘She Who Sends the Rain Bringers’ and the ‘Mother of the people in the Whitening’.
This is the backstory for my Dragonborn Bard, Azastel. Hope you like it.
Born into a nomadic Dragonborn clan, I grew up amongst warriors. My name was Razakar, the son of the clan’s Chief, Akkash. My father raised me to lead the clan one day. He taught me to be a proud and strong dragon. But on the day of my 15th birthday, the day a wyrmling becomes a man, something horrible and miraculous happened. It was a dark and cold day. I was chilled to the bone. I just wanted to be warm. To my surprise, a small flame formed in my hand. When the clan saw, they were furious. Years before, magic users were forbidden when my mother,Akra, was killed by a sorcerer. My father began to hate magic and all who used it. With anger in his eyes, he banished me from the clan. Oh sure, we can shoot fire out of our mouth all the livelong day but when I make a small flame in my hands, then there’s a problem.
I wandered for months, foraging and keeping warm with my very weak magic. One day I heard the most beautiful sound I have ever heard, I followed it as best as I could, going by volume alone. Eventually I found a man sitting by a tent, playing some strange instrument. This man made the most beautiful music I had ever heard. I couldn’t bear to move from my spot. Eventually he spotted me watching him. Instead of fleeing, he asked me to come over for a better listen. I learned his name was Belmont and he said he was something called a Bard. A music weaver.
I told him my story and for whatever reason he decided to take me in. Over the next two years he taught me everything he knew. He taught me to sing, to dance, and to perform. He helped me strengthen my magic through music. He also taught me more interesting ways of making money, through games of chance that were always rigged in our favor. He also taught me to escape when people caught on. Those were some good times. But it had to end at some point.
One day Belmont scammed the wrong man. The son of a crime boss called the Green Terror, a Half Orc who liked to bludgeon people and drown them in their own blood. There was no way Belmont wouldn’t escape his terror. Instead he told me to run, to get away. He gifted me his lute, Loreli and told me to flee. The last I ever saw of him was him being led away by the Green Terror’s goons. I ran. I got on a ship with most of the coin we had made. I also forged some documents for a new identity, a very useful lesson from Belmont.
I have a new name now. I am Azastel, Azzie to my friends and I’ve decided to live the good life like Belmont taught me! Bring it on!
Badass! I love rapier wielding/ three musketeers type characters. What class is he?
Soon to be DM.
Currently in a homebrew post-apocalyptic game.