If you're a true D&D player, you have probably dozens of backup characters. Sometimes, when you're making another character, you think of a brilliant idea. You're so proud of it that you might be willing to sacrifice your current character to play it.
So - what was something that you loved so much about your characters, whether it be their name, backstory, or abilities?
I'll start: Last year, I was making a character for a one-shot. Gnome cleric. It was Christmastime, so I wanted a Christmas-themed name. I thought of "Tinsel". That's where the name "Alister Tinsel" came from, and it's my favourite character name yet. I also made up "Digby Lockjaw" and "Lucien Peregrine".
Created the character semi-randomly. Int was a fixed 18, other stats were rolled in order. I ended up with str 2 and con 18. Interesting combo.
So I decided to go M Dwarf for str and con boost. I had a 20 con and 4 str, so I wanted to be OLD.
But what about the con!? So old that he's not far away from natural death, but more resilient than most young warriors.
That's where the scribe school comes to play. I created a mage order founded by Bran's master. Together they unlocked the secrets to sentient spellbooks that allowed amazing powers.
With the help of his pupils, Kravok, Bran's master, created the Master spellbook and transferred his living soul into it, reaching immortality.
The other mages in the order then proceeded to bind their own spellbooks to Kravok, creating a sort of a hive mind / network of forbidden knowledge. So spells like Legend Lore or Comprehend Languages were thematically knowledge borrowed from the hive.
Fast forward. Branbadur was a great scholar, but not an amazing mage. Maybe lvl 9 at his peak, before he retired and forgot many of his more difficult spells. With levels he at first relearned his old spells and then later would have been granted knowledge of new ones by Kravok, but we didn't get that far.
Now the con: Bran didn't seek immortality, but he did want to live out his life healthy and well. So he learned how to bind his lifeforce into his own sentient spellbook, which explains why his health and resilience never faded.
Unfortunately the spell failed to conserve his muscle mass, which is currently the subject of study for Bran's own apprentice. Hopefully he will succeed.
I had a fun character named Griggory Logperch who was a divine soul "human" sorcerer. Griggory actually was just a normal frog living in a pond, when he angered the homebrew celestial Oothret who was the Lord of Knowledge, by eating the last specimen of a feyfly while Oothret was studying it. Oothret decided to punish this frog with the worst possible curse to lay upon any amphibian, he granted him humanity. Because a god transformed him, he was also gifted with divine soul sorcerer powers. Griggory now searches the world in the hopes that one day he would be able to transform back into his true form, a frog. He may work for Ooothret in order to appease him and have him turn him back into a frog. I have only played him in one one-shot, but I really want to play him again. He could play the banjo, and had a bunch of frog themed spells, like jump and toll the dead (loud frog croak instead of a bell), and he wore a lily-pad as a hat.
I also had a Satyr charlatan bard. He had incredibly high deception, but incredibly low wisdom, so he would always try to sell people random and weird things. For example, he would go up to someone with a jar of lard, and try to sell it to them saying it was beard cream, and then turn to another person and claim it was a magical ointment that would cure any rash, but his wisdom was so low that he really didn't know what it was and to him it could have been anything. He made a lot of money.
Lyria Adagio, Dwarf Barbarian who enjoys singing as she leaps into the battlefield. Faithful follower of Haela Brightaxe, the Lady of the Fray, deity of luck; Lyria threw herself into all sorts of bad decisions in the service to her goddess…good thing she was a Zealot Barbarian; otherwise she’d have been dead a dozen times over.
Barry Cade, human sword and board fighter (it started here) Silver Starstrider, in 1st edition my DM allowed me to play this cleric as a centaur. he died and, when reincarnated as a troll (which hurt more than the death), I renamed him Huey Green Herb Potter, druid I reused Barry and Herb in in 5e and went on with: Friar Nuther, cleric with cook's utensils proficiency Sheldyn Roundback, Tortle, circle of the stars druid Austin Taye-Shouss, dragonborn paladin (whose backstory had him being initially fooled into coming to the "City of Phandalyn", the site, he was told, of a greatly historical training school for paladins) Tor Highlands, Firbolg druid in Icewindale that I envisaged as originating from a mountainous region Anne Geller, warlock fey following the golden fish tale (succeeded Tor in Icewindale after he graduated, alt: Anette thrower) Mau Glee, halfling barbarian in Chult, was originally named Max but the wolves who raised him had difficulty with that pronunciation Stu Pendouse, custom lineage (gnome from a family of scribes and affected by experimental magic/medication that resulted in him becoming 7ft tall) +rune knight and set to multiclass as a sorcerer for Enlarge, looks and acts like Hagrid (alt: Jack Tupp)
planned/imagined (Fairy) Nuff, protection-oriented abjuration wizard (wizard because I'd like a frog familiar called charming) Carrie Oakey/Thea Tree-Call, half-elf (wood of course) entertainer background, warlock with mask of many faces and actor feat at 4th (and basically all the other characters and more, alt: Thea Trickly might work as a bard-rogue or similar) Will Power, enchanter Horace Cope, diviner (alt. Justin Time) Miles Prower, mobility build Semour Sites, far-traveller Gail Warner, weather related Justin Sane, (incase Thea opts for a maddened personality) Justin Case, perhaps a skills build Doug Down, pos earth genasi build inc. mold earth cantrip... or a necromancer Anna Conda, a Yian-ti Arty Pfizer, an artificer Al Fresco, an unencumbered barbarian
Thea Tree-Call (who will probably go by many other names) is the character I'm most excited about but hopefully Stu Pendouse still has lots of life in him.
My Bards are all named for a musical term; Staccato, Cadenza, Bene Timbre, Largo, Andante
My Druids are named for a plant species; Pinus, Conifer, Cyprus ...
My Rangers are named for animal species; Puma, Vulpes, ...
My Clerics are usually named for biblical figures; Bartholomew, Solomon, ...
Paladins are named for movie and literary paladins; Rodrigo de Vivar, Don Diego, Sir William Wallace
Stuff like that.
As for back story, my characters grew up in a frontier town on the road between this nation and that nation. They were the race of the dominant race in the home nation, but because it was a frontier town they saw and met many people from other races and cultures traveling between their nation and the other nation. They were happy and had a good family but displayed special talents. Eventually they met a role model that traveled through their town often and this person recognized their talent and elected to sponsor them for further development of their talent. This led to them becoming an adventurer. Nothing tragic but good bond with their community and family.
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Cum catapultae proscriptae erunt tum soli proscript catapultas habebunt
Back in 1987 I had a drow antipaladin named Venom Everhate. The group I was in was made up of outcasts...an orc shaman of Shargaas, a half-ogre barbarian, a goblin jester, and a kobold magic-user (we played a lot of classes and races out of the older Dragon magazines). My antipaladin had pissed a matron mother off and was in fear of doing the same to Lloth by pissing the matron mother off. As a way of smoothing things over he was sent with a group of undesirables to lead incursions into the upper world to gather resources and do whatever the matron mother requested. The only reason he got a second chance was because his house held a lot of power in the Underdark's twisted politics. He, being a drow and the superior "race" out of the group was the leader of course, but he was a little thick in the head. Eventually he and his group realized that the surface world wasn't as bad as they were led to believe and they did not return to the Underdark.
I had been playing DnD(Basic and Advanced) since 1983 and this was probably the first time I had a character with a backstory where no family members or a lord or master had died to cause me to go adventuring!
I made a random deity named Seminarium Lord a while back, and I started with him literally because I thought Seminarium (a mix of the words planetarium and seminary) sounded cool for a name. I eventually created a character, a Bard named Lord Seminarium Retriaan, who I have spent several years revising and editing his backstory. He's by far my most worked on character, and the one I'm the most proud of. Overall, Lord Sem the Tiefling Bard is super fun to play, and I absolutely love him.
Backstory (shortened version)
Sem was born to a high house of a respected lord, who was high enough in court to have the ear of the king. The family fortune was built and maintained by a firm hand sunk deep into several markets, including food, furniture, and clothing, as well as rarer things like magical artifacts, enchanting, and the like. Sem, who was born promised to another wealthy family by marriage, and expected to run the family business and go into wizardry. As far as Sem was concerned however, his calling was music.
Sem ran away from home at 17, before the marriage could take place and he was sent away to school. Following his heart, he joined a Bard College, until the age of 21, when he decided to play for the world. In doing so, he joined a group of adventurers.
I made the backstory open so I could play multiple variants of Sem, and I've played him in several campaigns. By far my favorite character/backstory I've ever made. This is the simplified version.
I try to make my next character after a catch phrase or saying that was said from a recent party. So my most prized is a full blood orc named; Wynaut. (Why not) he is kind of like the party’s gentle barbarian dog. When someone is contemplating or agrees…or anything that leads to someone saying “why not” Wynaut thinks he is being talked and sometimes feels guilty because what if someone was talking to him and he was ignoring them? Which often leads to Wynaut agreeing or disagreeing to things that do or do not make sense. Wynaut: "what? Oh, with my huge boot. That’s how." But what was said before that?
I've had many characters, but one of my favourites was Scrap Yeekon, a goblin alchemist Artificer. The group didn't really have a session 0 and the campaign was much less serious than I had realised, so his backstory and personality didn't really fit, prompting me to make a different character and use Scrap somewhere else.
Scrap escaped his tribe after they tried to kill him for being too squeamish (he couldn't stand the sight of blood). For a couple of years he travelled around the land, where he would scrounge up enough money to buy a room in the cheapest taverns and inns he could find, wherein he would invariably yet kicked out after his ancestry was discovered. At some point, he came across a badly-damaged rogue Monodrone, who he fixed up over the course of a year or so, discovering his love for tinkering. His goal was to eventually start up a workshop where he could work on his alchemical experiments somewhat safely.
I googled way too much information about the flammability of mayonnaise for my character. Don't ask.
"Baby-book" names. Names an expecting parent would pick in the ancestral traditions instead of deterministic or prophetic names.
"Everyperson" characters. Never intended to be adventurers or heroes but became one anyway.
"Anyone can be a hero." My favorite was a "janitor" (custos from a destroyed monastery that had a vow of silence—lazy and illiterate and never even knew the name of the monastery and was avoiding chores by sleeping in an outhouse outside the monastery when the monastery was destroyed, waking up to the aftermath with no survivors and no clues). Got tangled up with adventurers chasing the villains responsible for sacking many places including the monastery. Became a hero despite all intents to the contrary.
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Human. Male. Possibly. Don't be a divider. My characters' backgrounds are written like instruction manuals rather than stories. My opinion and preferences don't mean you're wrong. I am 99.7603% convinced that the digital dice are messing with me. I roll high when nobody's looking and low when anyone else can see.🎲 “It's a bit early to be thinking about an epitaph. No?” will be my epitaph.
The one I named my account after: Penscritch the Kenku Eloquence Bard. He's a romance novelist under the half-elf pen name Aldrich Tinderheart (Charlatan background), but he's looking to bust into the Young Adult Fantasy genre (because that's where the money is) and adventures for material he can use in his next book. Constantly makes new aliases and identities for himself (using disguise self) and his companions- including Lucius Omenthorpe, Tiefling manager of top gladiatorial talents Tigerclaw the Magnificent and Steve the So-and-So, and Spanks Mackenzie, Half-Orc city investigator with his dwarven partner, Detective Spud.
A close second is my newest character: Snurk the Kobold Juggler (Swashbuckler Rogue / Battle Master Fighter multiclass w. Thrown Weapon Fighting Style). He's exactly how he sounds: wears a jester costume, likes throwing sharp pointy things through the air, etc. Got picked up by a traveling circus one day after they noticed his talent for knife-throwing, taught him how to juggle while balancing on a red rubber ball, then fell off the circus caravan on its way to Baldur's Gate.
I've been itching to play my Kenku ranger in something more than just a one shot:
Crash Gullcry, a kenku with a mutation that makes his feathers colorful instead of black. He was kicked out of his nest/tribe, and adopted by a pirate ship. His name is the sound of crashing waves over the ship, while seagulls cry overhead. When he mimics that to people, though, generally they just call him Crash.
A kenku parrot pirate! And he only speaks in pirate jargon!! Har, how fun!
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I know what you're thinking: "In that flurry of blows, did he use all his ki points, or save one?" Well, are ya feeling lucky, punk?
Lawful Evil dark knight who was betrayed by his lords and was raised up by Zariel. Polite and pragmatic.... has no problem executing the will of his master or even helping others, but for him the mission comes first. He has a sense of honor as he will protect and help his comrades as he understands that the mission cannot be achieved alone and sometimes granting honors to others goes further. He is not an edge lord but a very open and conversational person who is willing to talk first but has no problem burning a village to the ground if the action is called for.
His downtime gig was actually becoming a Blacksmith, feeling to be a better and much more effective warrior one must take whatever advantage he can in making his weapons and armor better.
Got involved with a Neutral Barbarian and giant killer who might end up being the tipping point for him as he ended up developing mutual respect and now feelings.
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"You are a beginner once, but a student for life." - Firearm Instruction Adage.
This is a backup character for the campaign I'm currently in that I'm hoping to cause Mischief with >:) For backstory:
In a cursed magic shop, our bard bought a terrifying puppet named Lil' Gus who spoke to him in his head, and ended up persuading him to stab a guy and he went to jail and we had to break him out and it was a whole thing. The puppet has since been exploded, that being said-
Gus was a toymaker who owned a very successful toy shop. After a controversy dampened his reputation many many years ago (I've yet to decide what but i think he probably lost his temper at a kid for something stupid), he decided he must take action to never do something like that again. So he made a doll, a dummy, and siphoned all of his rage and negative thoughts into the thing every night, in order to keep a positive face for the guests of his shop. One day, relatively recently, the doll disappeared. He doesn't know if it was stolen, or just walked away, or what, but it is of UTMOST importance that he gets it back, because he has lived without anger for a long time, and he doesn't know what to do with it now that he can't put it anywhere. Gus doesn't know that Lil' Gus has been destroyed, and when he hears the news he will be both devastated and Very Worried (however, our DM has promised that this is not the last we've seen of Lil' Gus, and that his spirit is still out there...). Also, i specifically chose Forest Gnome because 1. i like the idea that he can charm and persuade not only people but animals, and 2. so that he can have a mild wood grain pattern to his skin and give the rest of the party flashbacks the second i introduce him gfhdsfjd
Lawful Evil dark knight who was betrayed by his lords and was raised up by Zariel. Polite and pragmatic.... has no problem executing the will of his master or even helping others, but for him the mission comes first. He has a sense of honor as he will protect and help his comrades as he understands that the mission cannot be achieved alone and sometimes granting honors to others goes further. He is not an edge lord but a very open and conversational person who is willing to talk first but has no problem burning a village to the ground if the action is called for.
His downtime gig was actually becoming a Blacksmith, feeling to be a better and much more effective warrior one must take whatever advantage he can in making his weapons and armor better.
Got involved with a Neutral Barbarian and giant killer who might end up being the tipping point for him as he ended up developing mutual respect and now feelings.
And THAT, my friends, is how you play an evil character. Evil characters aren't just murder-hobos, they're an opportunity to make a truly unique story.
Could you paint a clearer picture of how this is an evil PC?
Doing one's duty doesn't sound evil. Having a sense of honor doesn't sound evil. Or is it the mission he receives are clearly evil and he has no moral compass?
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Cum catapultae proscriptae erunt tum soli proscript catapultas habebunt
Could you paint a clearer picture of how this is an evil PC?
Doing one's duty doesn't sound evil. Having a sense of honor doesn't sound evil. Or is it the mission he receives are clearly evil and he has no moral compass?
Well one of his main quests was to execute a Merchant. This came directly from a fellow Blackguard, this was in order to secure his Blackguard blade and become a Knight of Hell. He did so, as the merchant was just one man, clean kill. The man was a father, and Craykard had attempted to do the kill cleanly and quietly. However, it turns out the man's children while innocent now would someday be champions of the Abyss. Craykard made the argument for their lives saying he would try and foster them, perhaps turn them away. But the orders were clear cut - they had to die. So, Craykard ended up killing these youths, painlessly, but he did so. Now while it was true they were fated to be champions of the abyss as the Abyss sent some heavy hitters to get Craykard for this - after all, when did Demogorgan or Orcus ever avenge the innocent, Craykard still did kill innocent lives even though it did spare the world.
He has often been employed by the group to put enemies to the question. While Craykard takes no pleasure in doing so, having been a Knight in a few wars, he was no stranger in saying men and women being placed on crosses or being broken at the wheel.
In short, he is a voice of reason or can be, but like Darth Vader or Lord Soth will not hesitate to putting folks to the sword if they stand in his way. Evil is not always followed by a laugh but by those who are willing to do the unspeakable in the name of law and order. Craykard serves Zariel because he feels that while hell is evil, it is taking a proactive approach to the abyss and it was abyssal forces that corrupted the heart of his knightly order and had destroyed his men.
If you're a true D&D player, you have probably dozens of backup characters. Sometimes, when you're making another character, you think of a brilliant idea. You're so proud of it that you might be willing to sacrifice your current character to play it.
So - what was something that you loved so much about your characters, whether it be their name, backstory, or abilities?
I'll start: Last year, I was making a character for a one-shot. Gnome cleric. It was Christmastime, so I wanted a Christmas-themed name. I thought of "Tinsel". That's where the name "Alister Tinsel" came from, and it's my favourite character name yet. I also made up "Digby Lockjaw" and "Lucien Peregrine".
I hope to see even better names and backstories!
If anybody would like my GMing playlists
battles: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2mRp57MBAz9ZsVpw895IzZ?si=243bee43442a4703
exploration: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0qk0aKm5yI4K6VrlcaKrDj?si=81057bef509043f3
town/tavern: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/49JSv1kK0bUyQ9LVpKmZlr?si=a88b1dd9bab54111
character deaths: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6k7WhylJEjSqWC0pBuAtFD?si=3e897fa2a2dd469e
Branbadur Bartobar, dwarf scribe wizard. Starting lvl 5.
Created the character semi-randomly. Int was a fixed 18, other stats were rolled in order. I ended up with str 2 and con 18. Interesting combo.
So I decided to go M Dwarf for str and con boost. I had a 20 con and 4 str, so I wanted to be OLD.
But what about the con!? So old that he's not far away from natural death, but more resilient than most young warriors.
That's where the scribe school comes to play. I created a mage order founded by Bran's master. Together they unlocked the secrets to sentient spellbooks that allowed amazing powers.
With the help of his pupils, Kravok, Bran's master, created the Master spellbook and transferred his living soul into it, reaching immortality.
The other mages in the order then proceeded to bind their own spellbooks to Kravok, creating a sort of a hive mind / network of forbidden knowledge. So spells like Legend Lore or Comprehend Languages were thematically knowledge borrowed from the hive.
Fast forward. Branbadur was a great scholar, but not an amazing mage. Maybe lvl 9 at his peak, before he retired and forgot many of his more difficult spells. With levels he at first relearned his old spells and then later would have been granted knowledge of new ones by Kravok, but we didn't get that far.
Now the con: Bran didn't seek immortality, but he did want to live out his life healthy and well. So he learned how to bind his lifeforce into his own sentient spellbook, which explains why his health and resilience never faded.
Unfortunately the spell failed to conserve his muscle mass, which is currently the subject of study for Bran's own apprentice. Hopefully he will succeed.
I absolutely love this char..
Finland GMT/UTC +2
I had a fun character named Griggory Logperch who was a divine soul "human" sorcerer. Griggory actually was just a normal frog living in a pond, when he angered the homebrew celestial Oothret who was the Lord of Knowledge, by eating the last specimen of a feyfly while Oothret was studying it. Oothret decided to punish this frog with the worst possible curse to lay upon any amphibian, he granted him humanity. Because a god transformed him, he was also gifted with divine soul sorcerer powers. Griggory now searches the world in the hopes that one day he would be able to transform back into his true form, a frog. He may work for Ooothret in order to appease him and have him turn him back into a frog. I have only played him in one one-shot, but I really want to play him again. He could play the banjo, and had a bunch of frog themed spells, like jump and toll the dead (loud frog croak instead of a bell), and he wore a lily-pad as a hat.
I also had a Satyr charlatan bard. He had incredibly high deception, but incredibly low wisdom, so he would always try to sell people random and weird things. For example, he would go up to someone with a jar of lard, and try to sell it to them saying it was beard cream, and then turn to another person and claim it was a magical ointment that would cure any rash, but his wisdom was so low that he really didn't know what it was and to him it could have been anything. He made a lot of money.
Lyria Adagio, Dwarf Barbarian who enjoys singing as she leaps into the battlefield. Faithful follower of Haela Brightaxe, the Lady of the Fray, deity of luck; Lyria threw herself into all sorts of bad decisions in the service to her goddess…good thing she was a Zealot Barbarian; otherwise she’d have been dead a dozen times over.
Her best moment was befriending an ogre.
Barry Cade, human sword and board fighter (it started here)
Silver Starstrider, in 1st edition my DM allowed me to play this cleric as a centaur. he died and, when reincarnated as a troll (which hurt more than the death), I renamed him Huey Green
Herb Potter, druid
I reused Barry and Herb in in 5e and went on with:
Friar Nuther, cleric with cook's utensils proficiency
Sheldyn Roundback, Tortle, circle of the stars druid
Austin Taye-Shouss, dragonborn paladin (whose backstory had him being initially fooled into coming to the "City of Phandalyn", the site, he was told, of a greatly historical training school for paladins)
Tor Highlands, Firbolg druid in Icewindale that I envisaged as originating from a mountainous region
Anne Geller, warlock fey following the golden fish tale (succeeded Tor in Icewindale after he graduated, alt: Anette thrower)
Mau Glee, halfling barbarian in Chult, was originally named Max but the wolves who raised him had difficulty with that pronunciation
Stu Pendouse, custom lineage (gnome from a family of scribes and affected by experimental magic/medication that resulted in him becoming 7ft tall) +rune knight and set to multiclass as a sorcerer for Enlarge, looks and acts like Hagrid (alt: Jack Tupp)
planned/imagined
(Fairy) Nuff, protection-oriented abjuration wizard (wizard because I'd like a frog familiar called charming)
Carrie Oakey/Thea Tree-Call, half-elf (wood of course) entertainer background, warlock with mask of many faces and actor feat at 4th (and basically all the other characters and more, alt: Thea Trickly might work as a bard-rogue or similar)
Will Power, enchanter
Horace Cope, diviner (alt. Justin Time)
Miles Prower, mobility build
Semour Sites, far-traveller
Gail Warner, weather related
Justin Sane, (incase Thea opts for a maddened personality)
Justin Case, perhaps a skills build
Doug Down, pos earth genasi build inc. mold earth cantrip... or a necromancer
Anna Conda, a Yian-ti
Arty Pfizer, an artificer
Al Fresco, an unencumbered barbarian
Thea Tree-Call (who will probably go by many other names) is the character I'm most excited about but hopefully Stu Pendouse still has lots of life in him.
"Ikram Sahir ibn Malik al-Sayyid Ra'ad, Second Son of the House of Ra'ad, Defender of the Burning Sands."
And yes, he introduced himself to people with that whole thing. He was basically Jafar, from Aladdin, in the body of a brass dragonborn.
Anzio Faro. Protector Aasimar light cleric. Lvl 18.
Viktor Gavriil. White dragonborn grave cleric. Lvl 20.
Ikram Sahir ibn-Malik al-Sayyid Ra'ad. Brass dragonborn draconic sorcerer Lvl 9. Fire elemental devil.
Wrangler of cats.
My Bards are all named for a musical term; Staccato, Cadenza, Bene Timbre, Largo, Andante
My Druids are named for a plant species; Pinus, Conifer, Cyprus ...
My Rangers are named for animal species; Puma, Vulpes, ...
My Clerics are usually named for biblical figures; Bartholomew, Solomon, ...
Paladins are named for movie and literary paladins; Rodrigo de Vivar, Don Diego, Sir William Wallace
Stuff like that.
As for back story, my characters grew up in a frontier town on the road between this nation and that nation. They were the race of the dominant race in the home nation, but because it was a frontier town they saw and met many people from other races and cultures traveling between their nation and the other nation. They were happy and had a good family but displayed special talents. Eventually they met a role model that traveled through their town often and this person recognized their talent and elected to sponsor them for further development of their talent. This led to them becoming an adventurer. Nothing tragic but good bond with their community and family.
Cum catapultae proscriptae erunt tum soli proscript catapultas habebunt
Back in 1987 I had a drow antipaladin named Venom Everhate. The group I was in was made up of outcasts...an orc shaman of Shargaas, a half-ogre barbarian, a goblin jester, and a kobold magic-user (we played a lot of classes and races out of the older Dragon magazines). My antipaladin had pissed a matron mother off and was in fear of doing the same to Lloth by pissing the matron mother off. As a way of smoothing things over he was sent with a group of undesirables to lead incursions into the upper world to gather resources and do whatever the matron mother requested. The only reason he got a second chance was because his house held a lot of power in the Underdark's twisted politics. He, being a drow and the superior "race" out of the group was the leader of course, but he was a little thick in the head. Eventually he and his group realized that the surface world wasn't as bad as they were led to believe and they did not return to the Underdark.
I had been playing DnD(Basic and Advanced) since 1983 and this was probably the first time I had a character with a backstory where no family members or a lord or master had died to cause me to go adventuring!
I made a random deity named Seminarium Lord a while back, and I started with him literally because I thought Seminarium (a mix of the words planetarium and seminary) sounded cool for a name. I eventually created a character, a Bard named Lord Seminarium Retriaan, who I have spent several years revising and editing his backstory. He's by far my most worked on character, and the one I'm the most proud of. Overall, Lord Sem the Tiefling Bard is super fun to play, and I absolutely love him.
Backstory (shortened version)
Sem was born to a high house of a respected lord, who was high enough in court to have the ear of the king. The family fortune was built and maintained by a firm hand sunk deep into several markets, including food, furniture, and clothing, as well as rarer things like magical artifacts, enchanting, and the like. Sem, who was born promised to another wealthy family by marriage, and expected to run the family business and go into wizardry. As far as Sem was concerned however, his calling was music.
Sem ran away from home at 17, before the marriage could take place and he was sent away to school. Following his heart, he joined a Bard College, until the age of 21, when he decided to play for the world. In doing so, he joined a group of adventurers.
I made the backstory open so I could play multiple variants of Sem, and I've played him in several campaigns. By far my favorite character/backstory I've ever made. This is the simplified version.
I try to make my next character after a catch phrase or saying that was said from a recent party.
So my most prized is a full blood orc named; Wynaut. (Why not) he is kind of like the party’s gentle barbarian dog.
When someone is contemplating or agrees…or anything that leads to someone saying “why not” Wynaut thinks he is being talked and sometimes feels guilty because what if someone was talking to him and he was ignoring them? Which often leads to Wynaut agreeing or disagreeing to things that do or do not make sense. Wynaut: "what? Oh, with my huge boot. That’s how." But what was said before that?
I've had many characters, but one of my favourites was Scrap Yeekon, a goblin alchemist Artificer. The group didn't really have a session 0 and the campaign was much less serious than I had realised, so his backstory and personality didn't really fit, prompting me to make a different character and use Scrap somewhere else.
Scrap escaped his tribe after they tried to kill him for being too squeamish (he couldn't stand the sight of blood). For a couple of years he travelled around the land, where he would scrounge up enough money to buy a room in the cheapest taverns and inns he could find, wherein he would invariably yet kicked out after his ancestry was discovered. At some point, he came across a badly-damaged rogue Monodrone, who he fixed up over the course of a year or so, discovering his love for tinkering. His goal was to eventually start up a workshop where he could work on his alchemical experiments somewhat safely.
I googled way too much information about the flammability of mayonnaise for my character. Don't ask.
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"Baby-book" names. Names an expecting parent would pick in the ancestral traditions instead of deterministic or prophetic names.
"Everyperson" characters. Never intended to be adventurers or heroes but became one anyway.
"Anyone can be a hero." My favorite was a "janitor" (custos from a destroyed monastery that had a vow of silence—lazy and illiterate and never even knew the name of the monastery and was avoiding chores by sleeping in an outhouse outside the monastery when the monastery was destroyed, waking up to the aftermath with no survivors and no clues). Got tangled up with adventurers chasing the villains responsible for sacking many places including the monastery. Became a hero despite all intents to the contrary.
Human. Male. Possibly. Don't be a divider.
My characters' backgrounds are written like instruction manuals rather than stories. My opinion and preferences don't mean you're wrong.
I am 99.7603% convinced that the digital dice are messing with me. I roll high when nobody's looking and low when anyone else can see.🎲
“It's a bit early to be thinking about an epitaph. No?” will be my epitaph.
The best character I ever came up with was my first character Glug Huggins who was a peace-loving but gruff circle of the moon druid.
Coffee is a must, sleep is a must, and DND is a must, in that order.
The one I named my account after: Penscritch the Kenku Eloquence Bard. He's a romance novelist under the half-elf pen name Aldrich Tinderheart (Charlatan background), but he's looking to bust into the Young Adult Fantasy genre (because that's where the money is) and adventures for material he can use in his next book. Constantly makes new aliases and identities for himself (using disguise self) and his companions- including Lucius Omenthorpe, Tiefling manager of top gladiatorial talents Tigerclaw the Magnificent and Steve the So-and-So, and Spanks Mackenzie, Half-Orc city investigator with his dwarven partner, Detective Spud.
A close second is my newest character: Snurk the Kobold Juggler (Swashbuckler Rogue / Battle Master Fighter multiclass w. Thrown Weapon Fighting Style). He's exactly how he sounds: wears a jester costume, likes throwing sharp pointy things through the air, etc. Got picked up by a traveling circus one day after they noticed his talent for knife-throwing, taught him how to juggle while balancing on a red rubber ball, then fell off the circus caravan on its way to Baldur's Gate.
I've been itching to play my Kenku ranger in something more than just a one shot:
Crash Gullcry, a kenku with a mutation that makes his feathers colorful instead of black. He was kicked out of his nest/tribe, and adopted by a pirate ship. His name is the sound of crashing waves over the ship, while seagulls cry overhead. When he mimics that to people, though, generally they just call him Crash.
A kenku parrot pirate! And he only speaks in pirate jargon!! Har, how fun!
I know what you're thinking: "In that flurry of blows, did he use all his ki points, or save one?" Well, are ya feeling lucky, punk?
Craykard Alhazred - Blackguard Paladin
Lawful Evil dark knight who was betrayed by his lords and was raised up by Zariel. Polite and pragmatic.... has no problem executing the will of his master or even helping others, but for him the mission comes first. He has a sense of honor as he will protect and help his comrades as he understands that the mission cannot be achieved alone and sometimes granting honors to others goes further. He is not an edge lord but a very open and conversational person who is willing to talk first but has no problem burning a village to the ground if the action is called for.
His downtime gig was actually becoming a Blacksmith, feeling to be a better and much more effective warrior one must take whatever advantage he can in making his weapons and armor better.
Got involved with a Neutral Barbarian and giant killer who might end up being the tipping point for him as he ended up developing mutual respect and now feelings.
"You are a beginner once, but a student for life." - Firearm Instruction Adage.
This is a backup character for the campaign I'm currently in that I'm hoping to cause Mischief with >:) For backstory:
In a cursed magic shop, our bard bought a terrifying puppet named Lil' Gus who spoke to him in his head, and ended up persuading him to stab a guy and he went to jail and we had to break him out and it was a whole thing. The puppet has since been exploded, that being said-
Gus, TN Forest Gnome Enchantment Wizard, Guild Artisan, lvl 8+ (we're lvl 8 right now)
Gus was a toymaker who owned a very successful toy shop. After a controversy dampened his reputation many many years ago (I've yet to decide what but i think he probably lost his temper at a kid for something stupid), he decided he must take action to never do something like that again. So he made a doll, a dummy, and siphoned all of his rage and negative thoughts into the thing every night, in order to keep a positive face for the guests of his shop. One day, relatively recently, the doll disappeared. He doesn't know if it was stolen, or just walked away, or what, but it is of UTMOST importance that he gets it back, because he has lived without anger for a long time, and he doesn't know what to do with it now that he can't put it anywhere.
Gus doesn't know that Lil' Gus has been destroyed, and when he hears the news he will be both devastated and Very Worried (however, our DM has promised that this is not the last we've seen of Lil' Gus, and that his spirit is still out there...). Also, i specifically chose Forest Gnome because 1. i like the idea that he can charm and persuade not only people but animals, and 2. so that he can have a mild wood grain pattern to his skin and give the rest of the party flashbacks the second i introduce him gfhdsfjd
:)
And THAT, my friends, is how you play an evil character. Evil characters aren't just murder-hobos, they're an opportunity to make a truly unique story.
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Could you paint a clearer picture of how this is an evil PC?
Doing one's duty doesn't sound evil. Having a sense of honor doesn't sound evil. Or is it the mission he receives are clearly evil and he has no moral compass?
Cum catapultae proscriptae erunt tum soli proscript catapultas habebunt
Well one of his main quests was to execute a Merchant. This came directly from a fellow Blackguard, this was in order to secure his Blackguard blade and become a Knight of Hell. He did so, as the merchant was just one man, clean kill. The man was a father, and Craykard had attempted to do the kill cleanly and quietly. However, it turns out the man's children while innocent now would someday be champions of the Abyss. Craykard made the argument for their lives saying he would try and foster them, perhaps turn them away. But the orders were clear cut - they had to die. So, Craykard ended up killing these youths, painlessly, but he did so. Now while it was true they were fated to be champions of the abyss as the Abyss sent some heavy hitters to get Craykard for this - after all, when did Demogorgan or Orcus ever avenge the innocent, Craykard still did kill innocent lives even though it did spare the world.
He has often been employed by the group to put enemies to the question. While Craykard takes no pleasure in doing so, having been a Knight in a few wars, he was no stranger in saying men and women being placed on crosses or being broken at the wheel.
In short, he is a voice of reason or can be, but like Darth Vader or Lord Soth will not hesitate to putting folks to the sword if they stand in his way. Evil is not always followed by a laugh but by those who are willing to do the unspeakable in the name of law and order. Craykard serves Zariel because he feels that while hell is evil, it is taking a proactive approach to the abyss and it was abyssal forces that corrupted the heart of his knightly order and had destroyed his men.
That's the best way I can explain it.
"You are a beginner once, but a student for life." - Firearm Instruction Adage.