Hey friends, welcome back, and thank you for joining me again this week! I know, I know, it’s two weeks in a row that I’ve missed my Thursday deadline, sorry about that. My roommate decided to start up a new D&D campaign and we met (virtually, we’re still under quarantine here in Michigan) for our ‘expectation-setting’ session last night. So now I’m part of two different campaigns (once quarantine gets lifted and we can meet in person again for the other one), and that brings me to the topic of this week’s blog post!
I know I’ve written quite a bit about D&D the last few weeks, and I apologize if that isn’t your jam, and I promise this will not evolve in to a D&D-based blog. It’s just that it’s what I’m into at the moment, and it’s giving me both a creative outlet as well as an escape from the bummer of the real world right now. So please bear with me, and I promise that next week will be non-D&D related.
So what I wanted to do with this week’s post is to introduce the characters that I will be playing in each of the campaigns, and give a bit of character backstory. I figure this will help on two fronts: it will get me another ‘creative writing’ post, and it will also help cement for me some details about my character(s) and how I want them to act. The first character I would like to introduce you all to is . . .
Aramil Helder
This is the character that I will be playing in a home-brewed campaign that my roommate is creating. Aramil is a Half-Elf. His mother is a High Elf who renounced her family’s nobility and decided instead to follow her heart and marry a Human who is but a humble mine worker. Aramil and his family live in the bustling port town of Miner’s Port. Though there are no ‘schools’ as we traditionally think of them (we are in the equivalent of late Medieval Times), Aramil’s mother works in town as the Medieval equivalent of a grade-school teacher. Aramil’s father is a quintessential blue-collar worker. He goes to work in the mines north of town every day to earn enough money to support his family and does so without complaint, even though each day exhausts him. His father is old (for the times – think like late 30’s – early 40’s, which today isn’t old at all but back then was near death) but still quite powerfully built from years in the mines.
Aramil is 19 years old. He has fair skin (thanks to his mother’s High Elven heritage), despite the fact that he has followed in his father’s footsteps and also works in the mines. He has light brown hair, kept short, and piercingly green eyes. Though his mother pesters him about it all the time, he also maintains a close-cut beard and moustache. He is 6′ tall, and a powerfully-built 180 pounds.
Aramil’s parents have always been incredibly involved and supportive and loving and caring – pretty much everything ideal parents could be. Despite this, Aramil often finds himself getting in to fights (most often after he’s had a few too many ales at the pub after work) and lashing out at people, and it’s gotten him in a couple of scrapes with the law – that his parents never failed to bail him out of. The reason for Aramil’s lashing out is because, despite the fact that he was brought up in an extremely loving and supportive household, and the fact that, while far from wealthy, he had never had to struggle for much or wonder where his next meal was coming from, he is very dissatisfied with his lot in life, but feels powerless to change it.
Living in a port town, Aramil has seen many travelers pass through – merchants bringing exotic goods from faraway lands, bards bringing tales of brave adventurers and deadly monsters, diplomats seeking council with the town burgomaster to request any volunteers to aide foreign militaries, even wizards passing through on their quest for powerful magical artifacts and lore. All of these travelers have opened Aramil’s eyes to the vastness of the world outside of Miner’s Port, but he lacks the self-confidence to pursue anything more than what he believes his given lot in life to be. He has never been considered a particularly intelligent individual, so the thought of pursuing a path of magical learning is beyond him, and his self-described lack of people skills keeps him from latching on with any of the travelers passing through. He feels resigned to live the same day-to-day mining life as his father, and his father’s father before him, and the dissatisfaction he feels accompany that resignation is what causes him to lash out at others and get in to fights more frequently than he should.
The other thing that has always kept Aramil from seeking bigger and better things despite an deep desire to do so, is Eleanor. Eleanor is the daughter of Rickmond, the owner of the town’s mine where Aramil and his father both work. Eleanor and Aramil met when they were 16 and Aramil started working in the mines. They were instant sweethearts, despite them representing a “Lady and the Tramp” type of relationship – with him being a lowly mine worker and her being essentially town royalty, with her family having owned and run the mine for generations. Eleanor was Aramil’s opposite in most every way. She was gentle and intelligent and charismatic and endearing. Every quality that she possessed were qualities that Aramil felt himself lacking, and he felt that because of this, she was the yin to his yang. Likewise, she admired Aramil’s work ethic and strength and willingness to ‘protect her honor’ – a few of the scraps he had found himself in were a result of a traveler making a pass at Eleanor in the pub. However, Eleanor was also driven to strive for bigger and better things, and Aramil was not. This eventually led to them separating (about 6 months prior to the start of the campaign), with Eleanor leaving town to pursue study at Mage’s College.
Aramil knew he could not hope to follow Eleanor to the Mage’s College – he wasn’t the smartest individual, and the College was all about learning the art of magic through study and practice. As luck would have it though, the week after Eleanor left, a new guild opened in town, recruiting new adventurers! His desire to seek bigger and better things in life was still shackled by self-doubt, but the abrupt loss of Eleanor also instilled a wild recklessness in him that splintered those shackles enough for him to apply to join the Adventurer’s Guild.
To enter the Guild, prospective members were given a series of tests tailored to the type of adventurer that they hoped to be. Being self-aware of his strengths and weaknesses, Aramil decided to forego the tests focusing on puzzle-solving, subterfuge, persuasion, deception, performance, charisma and the like, and instead chose the path of physicality. He breezed through most of the tests, but his final test was to defeat one of the Guild members in one-on-one combat. Having been a veteran of many a pub fight, he was very confident in his ability to pass this final test and become part of the Guild, until he was presented a wooden sword and a shield. He had never taken up arms before – his fights had all been fisticuffs and occasionally a barstool or tankard. The fight started, and the next thing he knew, Aramil woke up staring at the ceiling of the Guild with a splitting headache – he had been handily dispatched in a matter of seconds. Because of this, he was turned away from the Guild, and was told to come back after some practice if he still wished to join.
Feeling angry and dejected, and with a splitting headache, Aramil ventured to his favorite pub for a drink. After downing a couple of pints rather quickly, he overheard a couple of other patrons swapping stories about fights they’d been in and come out victorious. Feeling angry with himself for blowing his opportunity with the Guild, and wanting redemption for being so handily beaten, he approached and interjected himself in to the conversation with a couple of quick insults. He got the reaction he was looking for, and a two-on-one fight ensued. He gave as good as he got, and by the time the bartender and other onlookers broke it up, all three men were sporting new cuts and bruises and one of the pair that had come in together had even lost a tooth. The bartender knew Aramil well, and instead of throwing all three of the fighters out, only decided to throw out the two newcomers instead, but warned Aramil not to come in purposely starting scuffles anymore, or he’d have to find a new pub.
As Aramil sat silently drinking a new pint of ale and nursing a sore jaw, he was approached by a man who had been sitting in the corner and witnessed the whole scene. As it turns out, the man was a merchant passing through town and had been looking for a bodyguard-for-hire to accompany him on a particularly dangerous shipment (he had crossed this client in the past and was not likely to be welcomed warmly) and wanted to hire Aramil. It was to be a one-time job that would pay handsomely.
Seeing an opportunity to satiate his desire for travel and adventure, albeit temporarily, Aramil agreed and set off with the merchant. While on the seas, Aramil discovered that the man was not simply a merchant, he was actually an accomplished swordsman, but weapons were not allowed where they were going, and the man was not much of an unarmed fighter, which is why he needed Aramil’s help. Their destination was a few weeks’ journey away, so Aramil began to learn swordsmanship. The sword felt clunky in Aramil’s hand and he found that he was not dexterous enough to use a weapon that required such precision, but the man told him the same fighting concepts could be applied to other weapons as well as swords, and provided Aramil with a battle axe. The axe was much more suited to Aramil, being a heavier weapon that could be wielded less precisely and still be effective, and could be used either in conjunction with a shield for extra protection, or as a two-handed weapon for maximum carnage. Once he swapped the sword out for the axe, Aramil began to excel in his learning of this new skill.
The weeks passed and they reached the town where the sale was to take place. Aramil and the man took residence in the local tavern for the night, with the sale to go down in the morning. They shared pints of ale, the man informed Aramil of the type of people they were dealing with and what they were selling. They went to bed and Aramil woke early (his internal clock was set to wake early every morning to go to the mine before sun up) and when he woke . . . the man was gone! There was no sign of struggle, but the man was nowhere to be seen. The innkeeper did not see him leave, and when Aramil went back to the ship, all of the goods were gone as well! He had not been told where the deal was to take place, or even any of the names of the people they were to be meeting with. After two days of asking around for the man, with not much information to go on, Aramil was starting to feel hopeless. He had not been paid for the job – he was to be paid upon completion – and he was stuck in a strange land with virtually no money and no leads on where his employer had gone off to. With his options running thin, and the fact that his employer had not seemingly been taken anywhere against his will (again, there had been no sign of struggle), Aramil convinced himself that his best course of action at this point would be to take what little money he had left and charter a ship back home. The man had probably left him on purpose as some kind of cruel joke that he didn’t understand anyway. And so, Aramil heads back to Miner’s Port to resume his day-to-day life in the mines. But then again, he has a bit of training in weapon fighting now; maybe he’ll try to join the Adventurer’s Guild again? . . .
And that is where the backstory of Aramil ends, and the campaign that Aramil will be a part of begins. Will he make it in to the Adventurer’s Guild? What happened to that man that employed him? Will he ever see Eleanor again? I don’t know the answer to any of these questions, but I’m genuinely excited to find out!
The other character that I would like to introduce you all to is . . .
Gronkniac
This character will be being played in a pre-built campaign called Storm King’s Thunder. Gronkniac is a Goliath, and is 20 years old. As you might be able to infer from his name, he is huge. He is roughly 7 1/2′ tall, and weighs 295 pounds. Goliaths are a nomadic race that generally reside high up in mountains away from the hustle and bustle of society. As such, evolution has caused Goliaths’ skin to take on a greyish hue to help blend in with the surroundings they often find themselves in and make hunting and foraging easier. Gronkniac’s eyes are a cold grey, but at times, when he gets particularly angry, his eyes turn in to black pits, which contrasted with the light tone of his face, is rather unsettling.
You may be wondering why Gronkniac has no last name. Well…among Goliaths, you generally take the surname of your clan…and Gronkniac was banished from his clan.
Among Goliaths, there are very few ‘official’ written rules or laws as they exist in most societies, but there are some unwritten rules that they are expected to live by. One of the main rules that all respect and are expected to follow regards combat. Combat is not forbidden, or even frowned upon – for males or females – but it is expected to be kept fair and honorable, whether amongst each other, with other Goliath tribes, or against any outsider that may wish them harm. There are to be no multiple-on-one fights, or fights wherein one party is armed and the other is not. The problem is that within Gronkniac, there lies a burning, primal, inexplicable rage. By and large, he is actually a very docile being, despite his imposing nature. It’s not that he can’t fight – on the contrary, he was one of his clan’s most accomplished combatants – he just doesn’t like to fight, and wished that there were more diplomatic peaceful ways to settle disagreements. His docile nature means that the rage within him actually terrifies him, and he is often able to control it and keep it at bay, but there were two instances where he was unable to do so.
The first time it happened, Gronkniac was challenged to a battle by a clan member (Keothi) who did not like that Gronkniac had been selected to go on hunting missions more often than he was and wanted to prove that he was better suited by defeating Gronkniac in combat. During the fight, which was an unarmed combat, Gronkniac found himself getting beaten pretty soundly, and his rage overtook him. He blacked out and when he came to, he was standing over Keothi’s body, which had a hunting knife driven through the heart. He was almost kicked out of the clan right then and there, but Gronkniac’s father was one of the clan elders, and was able to keep him in the clan with promises that it would never happen again.
The second time Gronkniac lost control was almost a year to the day after the Keothi incident. Keothi’s sister, Ageali, wanted to avenge her brother’s death and challenged Gronkniac to armed combat. The fight was quite evenly matched – in Goliath society, males and females do not fall in to ‘typical’ roles held in society (especially in Medieval-type times) and anyone can be a hunter or fighter or blacksmith or whatever they are best suited for, and Ageali was quite a fighter. At one point though, Ageali got the better of Gronkniac and slashed him across the chest and accompanied the slash with a taunting jab. Whether it was survival instinct that kicked in, or simply his pride being damaged, Gronkniac’s rage overtook him again, and he blacked out again. Later, to his horror, he would have to admit to himself that unlike the Keothi incident, he didn’t fully black out while fighting Ageali. Instead, his mindset was much worse against Ageali. He no longer was fighting to win a battle…instead he just wanted to inflict as much pain as he could while leaving her alive to suffer it. He feigned surrender and instead threw sand in her eyes to temporarily blind her, and proceeded to break her leg to incapacitate her and then broke one of her hands before he was subdued by others in the clan. His promise had been broken, and he could no longer be trusted to battle with honor and integrity, and therefore was banished from the clan.
After some time of wandering the mountains, it quickly became apparent that without the aide of his clan, he would not be able to survive for long. He could hunt but building shelter and cooking were not his strongest suits, and heaven forbid he came down with some sort of illness or injury…medicine might as well have been magic to him. Despite knowing he would likely not be welcomed warmly (Goliaths didn’t have many relations with the ‘civilized’ world, though his father as the clan elder had taken in a few adventurers that had stumbled through their encampments from time to time), he decided to head toward the nearest town to seek whatever refuge he could find. Perhaps he would be able to find an adventuring party that he could learn new survival skills from, but he would make sure to leave them as soon as they could to protect them from his rage.
He made his way in to town and was surprised at the warm reception he received. This town seemed to be full of all different folks – there were Dwarves and Elves and Humans and Orcs and Aarakocra and Halflings and Dragonborn and others – and they all seemed to live and work together in harmony. Nobody seemed to look at other races differently at all and instead beings were judged by their nature and their actions rather than how they were born. This seemed like a perfect place for him to settle in! He’d be accepted and maybe able to learn some new skills, and for the first time in a very long time, he didn’t feel any of that lingering rage bubbling inside him.
All was well for a few months. He found an apprenticeship at the local blacksmith that allowed him enough coin to pay for a room at the tavern, as well as keep himself fed. With his free time, he sought out the town healers and apothecaries to try to better himself in the ways of medicine, but was not very well-suited for it, and quickly abandoned that goal. He didn’t need it anymore anyway! He wouldn’t have to protect these people from himself, because he no longer had the rage burning inside him.
Nearly a year after he came to town, fate decided to laugh at his happiness and show everyone who he really was. A band of 4 travelers made their way in to town and it was clear from the moment they entered town that they were up to no good. They were rowdy and brash and seemed to be looking for trouble, but the residents of the town were of the mind that if they played along, the travelers would be on their way after they got some food and drink. They made their way to the pub and proceeded to get quite drunk. While Gronkniac was on his way back to the tavern after the blacksmith had closed up for the day, he happened upon the 4 travelers harassing a woman making her way home from the market. She tried ignoring them and walking past, and one of the travelers grabbed her by the arm and pulled her in to them. Gronkniac absolutely was not going to stand by and let this happen, so he went over and made his presence known, and kindly asked the drunken travelers to let the woman go and be on their way. As you might suspect, this did not go as planned, and the travelers began attacking Gronkniac. Well…the rage that had been quiet for so long didn’t slowly bubble over this time, it erupted in a magnificent way, and this time, when Gronkniac came to, he was covered in blood, holding an arm of one of the travelers, and standing in a scene of total carnage. The woman was unharmed, but was absolutely rooted to the spot in pure terror. Horrified at what he had done, Gronkniac didn’t speak a word to the woman, and instead fled the town before he could do anyone any more harm.
So at this point, this is where I have to get beyond the “backstory” part of Gronkniac and dive a little bit in to the planned future of the character. He will end up meeting up with the adventuring party and, at level one, he will be of the Barbarian class, but will not have any weaponry with him, because he does not trust himself with weapons, as he is afraid of hurting his party members. When he gets to level two, my plan is to have him slink away from the adventuring party in the night, to go off on his own and live out the rest of his life in isolation. Helm, the god of protection, will come to him in a vision as he is walking through the forest and offer to help Gronkniac suppress his rage if Gronkniac agrees to become a Cleric of Helm. He will return to his adventuring party and will from then on take all levels as Cleric, but will have the one level of Barbarian.
In combat, Gronkniac will refuse to use any spells offensively to directly harm any of his foes. He will buff his party members to help them harm foes, but by not directly attacking them himself, Gronkniac will be able to ‘keep his hands clean’ and his conscience clear. However…the one level of Barbarian still within him means that whenever he takes half or more of his hit points in damage, he is liable to fly in to a rage, and anything can happen from that point. I don’t know why, but Gronkniac is the character I am the most excited about playing as. I’m very excited to see how a pacifist Barbarian/Cleric is to play!
Thank you again for joining me this week, and I hope you found this entertaining. I’m sorry that this post was so much longer than my normal posts, and I’m sorry again for making this another D&D-based post. I promise I’ll have something non-D&D related next week. Feel free to leave any comments below!
See you all next week! 🙂
Musings Of A Struggling Creator 