Ayaga tor-Zhan Medium humanoid (orc), lawful good Armor Class 15 Hit Points 14 (1d12+2) Speed 30ft. STR 17(+3) DEX 13(+1) CON 14(+2) INT 10(+0) WIS 12(+1) CHA 10(+0) Saving Throws +5/+1/+4/+0/+1/+0 Senses darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 13 Languages Common, Orc, Goblin
Aggressive. As a bonus action, you can move up to your speed toward an enemy of your choice that you can see or hear. You must end this move closer to the enemy than you started. Rage. Enter a rage as a bonus action. Gain advantage on Strength checks and Strength saving throws, +2 to melee damage rolls with attacks using Strength, Resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage. Lasts 1 minute.
War Pick.Melee Weapon Attack. +5 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 1d8+3 piercing damage. Handaxe.Melee or Thrown Weapon Attack. +5 to hit, reach 5 ft., range 20/60 ft., one target. Hit: 1d6+3 slashing damage. Javelin.Thrown Weapon Attack. +5 to hit, range 30/120 ft., one target. Hit: 1d6+3 piercing damage.
Appearance: Ayaga is not a very unique or visually striking orc, all things considered. He possesses all the physical hallmarks of his species- greenish skin, pronounced lower canines like tusks, sloping brow, short nose, round facial features, and a generally thick build. His hair is straight, black, and shoulder-length. His body is covered in deep blue tattoos. Geometric patterns and totems or animal motifs predominate. His body is healthy and his face is somewhat youthful, but his pale grey eyes appear quite old, right down to the growing crow's feet. His voice sounds deeper than it actually is, because he often speaks with a slight croak or grunt, as if he never quite has the air to get his words out with.
Ayaga is also covered almost from head to toe in a vast array of bones. Most of them are quite tiny, such as finger or toe bones threaded together like beads in his hair and on his meager clothing, which consists of a hide vest and a waistcloth. Other mortal mementos include tusks hanging from a necklace, a girdle of ribs around his waist, a bracelet of hyoids, and skin piercings made of ear ossicles. They total well over a hundred bones, and each one is a memento from another dead orc. They are clean, dry, white, and treated with a resin against degradation. Ayaga handles them and any articles made from them with the utmost reverence.
Personality: Ayaga is gentle. Ayaga is quiet. Ayaga is tired- very, very tired. Back home, he was used to a fairly orderly lifestyle structured around animistic practice and communal cooperation under the guidance of family chiefs and shamans. Being bereaved of that has strained him and turned him inward somewhat. While he has reservoirs of anger, they are deeply suppressed and kept below the surface. He is more likely to try and stay peacefully unobtrusive in his dealings with the world and the people in it. At least part of this is defensive, for the bedrock of trust he once relied upon is gone, and he is left apprehensive around so many strange people in strange lands. It is as if he already considers himself a ghost prepared to move onward, tied down to earthly concerns only by the weight of death still resting upon his shoulders.
He believes with all his heart that the mementos he bears hold the souls of their owners. For centuries his people interred 'vessels' of their dead in hollows and shrines, but most of these were lost in the chaos of their exile, the souls of the dead scattered to the winds just as their living descendants are. Ayaga has informally taken on the role of shaman, though he entirely lacks any and all supernatural talent (so far). He cares for each memento like a pet, speaks to them, and even 'feeds' them a symbolically sacrificed portion of his every meal. His belief in this holdover from the old days has grown only more fervent the more the present has pressed him. The dead have to reside in these bones, he insists, or else the living have no hope for the future.
7 Step Background
Ayaga is from a mostly flat, grassy region further inland. His people simply referred to it as 'their land', but someone with a knowledge of maps might know it as the Strath of Yotanni. It is a wide, flat river valley characterized by plains broken up by river meanders and oxbow lakes.
His people, the Reta tor-Zhan ("Descendants of Zhan"), formed a more-or-less Copper Age society, herding animals and farming or fishing along the riverbanks. Ayaga was a hunter, as well as a bone-carver by hobby. He took his duty very seriously, and his hunts were characterized by extensive ritual with an eye for orthopraxy.
A strange sickness fell upon the tribe one month, as well as their animals, and even the land around them. Nausea and headaches quickly gave way to bloody vomit, severe disorientation, hair loss, coma, and ultimately death. It devastated their numbers to the point of social collapse. When the human and halfling towns they had once been distantly cordial with also began to succumb to the same sickness, they blamed the orcs as its cause. By the time anyone knew about the toxic materials being secreted onto the land by feckless mages, it was too late.
The tribe utterly collapsed under disease and mounting pressures from their neighbors. The other orcs of the strath believed them cursed by the spirits for some transgression, and shunned them as untouchables. Ayaga and the others finally set to wandering, and dwindled until only he remained.
Now he walks through lands that are far more overtly hostile to orcs than he had ever know in his life. His life has been put at risk more than once in his flight. He carries skeletal mementos of his entire tribe with him, and seeks a spiritually pure place in which to bury them.
Ayaga wants to find a safe place where he can enshrine his deceased tribe in perpetuity, and that means carving out a home first.
I want Ayaga to have a moment where he is aided in battle against encroaching xenophobes or another major threat by a storm of ghostly friends and family.
Ayaga was convinced early on during the outbreak that the malady was being inflicted upon them by the spirits for breaking some unknown taboo. He fasted for days to help them attune. He also discouraged several of his kin from leaving home. Now, he blames himself personally for their deaths.
Ruuti-padi: A goblin shepherd recently relocated to the forests. Ayaga aided him in clearing out enough woodland pasture to graze his sheep, in return for temporary food and board. He also gave the goblin the goat he had brought with him from his homeland.
Tozora: A minotaur armorer in the employ of Yddraixl. Ayaga used his skill in bone-carving to decorate her horns with intricate patterns for good luck, and she furnished him with a basic weapon and shield when he entered the Viridescent One's service.
Luroucis Tilsamp: The pinkskin (actually more of a tannish beige, like most of the other humans from Ayaga's home region) merchant and sorcerer who abused the good standing between the tribe and the nearby human township to dump arcane waste from a wizard school in their water supply on the down-low for cheap.
Ayaga is not ambidextrous, but there is a vast and seemingly random assortment of tasks he has a different dominant hand for.
He enjoys the sound of a distant trip hammer spilling water and grinding food. The low thunks and the steady intervals helped him sleep as a child.
He talks to the bones on his person constantly, whether they respond to him or not. Given the varied 'personalities' of the mementos, this has caused some awkward and amusing situations for Ayaga.
Personality Trait: I watch over my friends as if they were a litter of newborn pups. Bond: I am the last of my tribe, and it is up to me to ensure their names enter legend. Ideal: Greater Good. It is each person's responsibility to make the most happiness for the whole tribe. (Good) Flaw: I am slow to trust members of other races, tribes, and societies.
Young people talking of war and vengeance against mankind makes him despair for the future. Conflict was the final nail in his people's "coffin", as the people who bury their dead in boxes like weirdos like to say.
He despises the smell of horseraddish and other pungent herbs. In the legends of his people, its sudden presence always heralded the coming of malicious spirits. Even though he now knows that truly evil spirits are invisible and odorless, he carries some baggage still.
He takes a bittersweet sort of delight in other people taking interest in his tribe's customs. His people may be dead, but not every part of them has to be.
Writing is a strange and fascinating concept to him, coming from a strictly aliterate culture. Words that stay give him hope, and give him something new to learn and distract himself with.
Pilcro: He is amused by the energy and excitement of the little thing he's seen running around the area of late, though he wonders at the trouble he could cause or fall into. Rat was a common food for lean times among his people, so he will have to be careful not to catch any that may 'belong' to the goblin.
Rhakkeg: The bigger of the two beaked people he's encountered as of late- though this one is definitely different, somehow. Ayaga tried to impress upon them the importance of his bone talismans once, but it didn't work.
Bront Wildboar: Ayaga has heard rumors of the would-be warlord and his belt of ample skulls. He empathizes with him deeply, but worries about the path this would lead him and any of his followers down.
Small: The nervous little thing reminds Ayaga of a meek child he knew back in his village. His fearful displays sadden the orc. Though to be fair to him, bravery didn't save anyone when the plague rolled through, either.
Woppa: He always thought that the tortoise was a slow-to-anger totem animal of peace and quiet deliberation. This one walking on two legs is downright fiery, however. Perhaps he has more the spirit of a snapping turtle...
Baruuk Talonface: His personality strikes him as almost as rough and ragged as the scars adorning his face- but they are very handsome scars, and they attest to his surviving much. Ayaga affords him the cautious respect of a warrior.
Gristle: There was a dog a little bit like this one in Ayaga's village, once. It managed to tree itself in a swamp somehow. The orc expects to shake his head and sigh often when this little one is around.
Vrazzk: Red dye was not known to his people, so seeing a garment in that color has always been a striking thing for Ayaga. The tattered, smiling goblin is a striking sight indeed. He wonders what spirits he speaks to when he sits cross-legged like that.
T.F.B.: Deep scars. Deeper than the flesh. Bone-deep, possibly deeper still. The anguish is not difficult to sense, or at least the orc seems to think so. He wonders what he's seen, done, and had done to him.
"Tigs": Perhaps all of the scaly ones have that same... mentally absent look about them by default? At least this one seems easier-going. The way it tilts its head all the time is off-putting, yet intriguing. Ayaga is curious.
Haskiter: Now this little lizard has one of those books he's heard so much about. Perhaps if he provided a suitable offering, it would teach him how to write his people down.
Dirti Snow: Albinos were considered touched by the spirits to Ayaga's people, sacred and separate to the point of being untouchables. He can't fathom how damaging this same treatment has been to the kobold's development.
Stink: Ayaga knows the stench of decay all too well. He also knows the unexpectedly pleasant, mellow, and sickeningly sweet notes of certain types of rot. He is mostly unphased by the goblin's unique 'flavor'. Her childlike fascination with snails is endearing to him.
Ayaga tor-Zhan: A vessel for the spirits. A walking husk.
G'toat Rush: So many of the scaled ones abound in this place! This one's eyes are very different from the others, however. They seem clever- too clever by half, in fact. Ayaga feels a vague sense of relief that he doesn't own anything of great material value when the Git' is around, though he still holds his bones close just in case.
Harp Strum: The smaller beaked one Ayaga has met in his time here. This one has not been any easier to get a read on than the last one, but for the opposite reason: instead of an impenetrable mask, she is everywhere and saying everything in every voice but her own. She is like keeping track of an entire group of people. Still, blue is an auspicious color. And that harp would be nice to harmonize with...
Kaira Irontusk: Strong arms and a withering gaze- she would have had many suitors back home where Ayaga comes from, even if she is of partial human blood. He has elected to keep a respectable distance.
Nicothoe: The frantic and flitting little silver one does not have a beak, which confused Ayaga at first. Now he just smiles and nods, and hopes she can find something to channel that idiosyncratic energy into.
"Dagg": Ayaga knows an illusion when he sees one. This fierce and ambitious woman is clearly ten feet tall or bigger, and only appears short as some new cunning ploy. He has elected to keep a safe distance.
An'mal: What a well-groomed and temperate bugbear. Ayaga has heard his drumming, and finds it agreeable. He would wish to accompany him with his bamboo bass flute someday.
Renyra SwiftThunder Some of the humans in the townships rode those giant mutant muscle-deer that they call "horses". Ayaga very easily mistakes centaurs for a rider and horse at first glance, and it still unnerves him. This one's annoyance isn't leveled at him, at least.
Daradukk: Quite the handsome orc. Ayaga has only ever seen the same energy and bearing in orc men aspiring to become chieftains, or leaders in some other sense. Their people need ambitions like that to survive, but he wonders what is guiding it right now.
Laban Maverick: Ayaga's people have no word or concept of a 'demon' in the traditional sense. The closest approximate is a fel spirit, made angry and manifest. This, he suspects the pale man with horns to be. He may smell pleasant, but all Ayaga thinks he can smell is the reek of horseraddish.
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I am The Furtive Goblin. I fill my blog with fantasy world-building ideas, and the occasional lo-fi anxiety attack. I also have a Ko-fi. Buy a cup, give me a writing prompt, receive a post or two!
Last edited by Grozug; Nov 30th, 2020 at 11:17 PM.
Reason: Added in a piece of art by a friend because apparently that's a thing now!
Relevant Equipment: Longbow, Shortsword x2, Scale Mail
When you make a melee attack on your turn, your reach for it is 5 feet greater than normal.Long-Limbed | You count as one size larger when determining your carrying capacity and the weight you can push, drag, or lift.Powerful Build | If you surprise a creature and hit it with an attack on your first turn in combat, the attack deals an extra 2d6 damage to it. You can use this trait only once per combat.Surprise Attack | Choose or randomly determine your inheritance from the possibilities in the table below. Work with your Dungeon Master to come up with details: Why is your inheritance so important, and what is its full story? You might prefer for the DM to invent these details as part of the game, allowing you to learn more about your inheritance as your character does.
The Dungeon Master is free to use your inheritance as a story hook, sending you on quests to learn more about its history or true nature, or confronting you with foes who want to claim it for themselves or prevent you from learning what you seek. The DM also determines the properties of your inheritance and how they figure into the item's history and importance. For instance, the object might be a minor magic item, or one that begins with a modest ability and increases in potency with the passage of time. Or, the true nature of your inheritance might not be apparent at first and is revealed only when certain conditions are met.
When you begin your adventuring career, you can decide whether to tell your companions about your inheritance right away. Rather than attracting attention to yourself, you might want to keep your inheritance a secret until you learn more about what it means to you and what it can do for you.Inheritance | Choose one of your skill proficiencies. Your proficiency bonus is doubled for any ability check you make that uses the chosen skill.
You can also speak, read, and write two additional languages of your choice. (Tasha's Cauldron of Everything optional class feature, replaces Natural Explorer)Canny
Ranger When you hit a creature with an attack roll, you can call on your mystical bond with nature to mark the target as your favored enemy for 1 minute or until you lose your concentration (as if you were concentrating on a spell).
The first time on each of your turns that you hit the favored enemy and deal damage to it, including when you mark it, you can increase that damage by 1d4.
You can use this feature to mark a favored enemy a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, and you regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest. (Tasha's Cauldron of Everything optional class feature, replaces Natural Explorer)Favored Foe [ ][ ]
Appearance: Vacant, glassy eyes that look too big for his skull, which an onlooker might swear are looking in two slightly different directions at any given time. Perhaps a result of his subterranean upbringing, but more likely a serious byproduct of inbreeding. He is birdlike in stature and in his movements, spindly-limbed and wiry. His scales are mottled red and copper.
Personality: If you took a golden retriever, dropped its IQ by a few points, and gave it opposable thumbs, you'd have Gristle. He has no idea what's going on, but he's ecstatic to be included in it, whatever it is. He throws himself wholeheartedly into whatever task is asked of him-- There's no need to be smart as long as you just try hard enough. Or, barring that, if you can just stab something good enough. Joining this new clan is going to be great-- He just knows it. Yddraixl is very big and strong and smart, and the other people are very big and strong and smart, and being among big, strong, smart people is a great idea when you are small and have bones that snap real easy. Gristle is used to following a pack of other kobolds, and now that they're not around anymore, he's honestly just happy to not be alone.
7 Step Background
Step 1:
1) Gristle was born and raised in a long-forgotten section of sewer beneath a large human city. The ruined chambers of the sewer were almost entirely closed off from the world above, likely due to some past earthquake or flood, trapping his ancestors there decades ago. While inhospitable to most humanoids, it was a surprisingly ideal home for rats, algae, the occasional slime, and kobolds.
2) Like most of the kobolds in his clan, Gristle has no idea which of his clanmates are his actual parents. He hatched from his egg in That Big Pit of Dirt That's Less Likely To Have the Ceiling Collapse On It just like everyone else, and he spent his childhood in That Room For Hatchlings Where There's Prob'ly Only One Sewer Gator These Days like everyone else. He assumes his parents were important, however, since his clan had always given him the most important jobs: The "Stand Way Over There And Make Lotsa Noise So The Gators See You And Not Us" job and the "Go Poke That Thing With A Stick To See If It's Alive And/Or Gonna Kill You" job.
3) As it turns out, a lot of problems can be solved by hitting things with sticks to make noise. Hitting a rusty metal sheet with a stick scares off creatures that might eat your food, or you! It can let other kobolds know where you are! It can warn other kobolds of danger! All very useful things! Gristle found his calling: Making the Noise! If the elders needed to call a meeting, they called Gristle and he could make The Noise to summon the others. If there was danger, Gristle could make The Noise and warn the clan. If the hunting party needed some motivation before a hunt, Gristle could make The Noise, which, honestly, didn't do much, but it was nice that he was so enthusiastic about it and that sort of made people feel better. Things were great.
4) Then suddenly, things were Not Great. One day, The Wall That's Mostly Broken Bits on the western side of their home moved. A hole appeared as a group of tall, scaleless bipedal things with swords and armor started moving rocks on the other side. Gristle got his metal sheet and made The Noise, summoning all his clan to keep the Tall Scaleless People out. Apparently the Tall Scaleless People did not like this. Something hit Gristle in the head, and when he woke up, the cave was quiet again. He looked around. Hm. The Tall Scaleless People were gone, but so were all of his clanmates. That was odd: Kobolds always stay in groups so they're less likely to all get eaten. Where did they all go? There was a lot of blood and meat and stringy bits laying around, kind of like when the kobolds had a big food party, but Gristle didn't think they'd have a food party without him. Also, the meat and bits looked kind of... koboldy. Well, that's not right. They should look Tall Scaleless People-y, right? Why do they look koboldy? Why would the Tall Scaleless People's bodies look like kobold bodies when his kobold family clearly should have torn them to tall, scaleless shreds? This was far too confusing for Gristle. So he did the one thing that made sense. He would just make The Noise. His family would always come when he made The Noise. That was the rule.
Gristle made The Noise.
Nobody came.
5) It has been about 4 months since this event. Gristle eventually followed the new tunnel left behind by the Tall Scaleless People, hoping to find his clan, but instead found a terrifying place called the surface which is full of Tall Scaleless People and where the ceiling is called The Sky and it changes color and sometimes bleeds water. His clan must be here somewhere, but the Tall Scaleless People mostly just scream and throw things at him when he asks. It's not very nice.
Step 2:
Gristle's Goal: Find his clan. They're clearly still alive and totally didn't all die back in the sewers. He can't possibly be in denial because he doesn't know what that word means!
My goal: To make Gristle useful and likeable to the party, and keep his character lighthearted without damaging any of the weight or drama in the story or presented by other characters.
Step 3:
1) He has a small collection of objects (metal coins, bits of colorful glass, an acorn) he's been taking from every place he visits, so he can show his family when he finds them.
2) One of his clanmates survived. He escaped further into the sewer system opened by the adventurers, while Gristle unknowingly went the opposite direction, to the surface. He's still down there. Gristle has no idea.
Step 4: Bonemeal: Gristle's cousin. He was bigger and a few weeks older than Gristle, and Gristle followed him around like a particularly ugly puppy throughout their childhoods. Between them, they possessed about three quarters of a braincell.
Crackle: A kenku thief who for some reason took pity on the bumbling Gristle after he kept getting kicked out of every Surface building he entered. Crackle took the kobold under her proverbial (and literal) wing and pushed him in the direction of Yddraixl's camp.
Achuak: (enemy) Apparently, just because a lizardfolk is part of the same camp as you, they will still get very angry and decide to eat you if you pester a them constantly about whether or not they're a very large kobold, even after you try and play an Apology Noise on your new drum. Weird.
Step 5: Memory: One of the few positive interactions he's ever had with humans lead to him acquiring his drum. He had tried asking a merchant where the humans (apparently the Tall Scaleless Folk are called that) kept their Noise Metal, so he could try and call his clan. The merchant stared blankly at him as he chattered on and on about The Noise and hitting things with sticks. Finally, the merchant raised an eyebrow and asked if Gristle meant a drum. She pulled a small, round object covered in painted leather from behind the counter. "It's very inexpensive, if you'd like it," she said hopefully. Gristle had no idea what that word meant but replied that it was very nice, and he did like it, so later that night he went back and took it while the shop was empty. For some reason the door was closed and all the lights were off, but that was fine-- he climbed through the window.
Mannerism: He has difficulty keeping still. He's always moving or fiddling with something.
Quirk: Gristle can't sleep under the open sky-- He has to at least cover his head with something. He spent his entire life underground, and he still isn't quite used to this big "sky" thing with its weird lights and colors and complete emptiness. He finds it eerie and unpleasant.
Step 6: Trait: I'm oblivious to any etiquette or social expectation outside of my own. Bond: Nothing is more important than helping the pack, except maybe for saving your own skin. Ideal: Kobolds together, strong. Kobolds plus things BIGGER than kobolds, together, very much strong. Flaw: Dumb as a stone and prone to distraction.
Step 7: Two Things Gristle Fears:
1) Rain. Look, he spent his whole life underground. When things fall on your head down there, it usually means a cave-in that could kill everyone. You're now telling him that water just sort of naturally falls from this "sky" thing all the time?! And nobody cares?!
2) Dogs. Tall Scaleless People have these big, noisy, toothy creatures that can chase you and smell where you hide, and look like they could bite your head off. He's been chased by dogs once or twice when he's stolen from the wrong people. He didn't enjoy it.
Two Things that Give Gristle Hope:
1) Darkness: It was nice and dark underground. This "sun" thing is horrible, but night-time, with the exception of this "stars" business, reminds him of home. It's nice to see that the darkness exists up here on the surface too. It's comforting.
2) Other Kobolds: He had no idea that other kobolds existed outside of his sewer! He is eager to make friends with any other kobolds he meets. Maybe they know his clan! If they can survive up here, then so can he and his family!
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I have taken the Oath of Sangus.
Last edited by Pseudonymous; Nov 30th, 2020 at 07:33 PM.
Appearance: Feathers black as a silhouette cast at the end of an empty alleyway cover Harp Strum from head to toe. Some are tattered, sliced and torn by everything from a well-honed blade to a snarling beast's fangs, while a couple on her right arm are burnt down to the nub where you can see her mottled grey flesh, scarred by a close-call with a Burning Hands spell. Of the feathers she managed to keep in good health, they have reached full maturity, with the exception of a few tufts of down feathers that peek in and out from the plumage on her chest. Her baby feathers are the only glimmer of youthful innocence still left in the scarred and beaten Kenku lass beyond her bright and optimistic eyes.
She stands a few inches over five feet, Harp Strum fairly tall for her feathered kin as well as woefully thin. Despite how squat most Kenku are, Harp Strum is incredibly lanky, with limbs that are long and gangly, and a frame that is surprisingly lithe for a Kenku of her height. It makes her quick on her feet and twice as likely to get away from trouble, but any medicine man would know it is far from healthy. Years of malnourishment and neglect has made a mockery of the potential she could have reached had she had been given the same opportunities as the pink men that dot the land. Not that Harp Strum thinks as such. She considers herself lucky; after all, she’s never met a Kenku thief that’s lasted longer than eighteen years like her.
Harp Strum rarely wears anything but a heavy layer of clothes over herself. Tunics, vests, and wraps-- whatever she managed to snatch away from unguarded clotheslines-- were thrown over herself until very little of her Kenku traits are seen. Harp Strum preferring garbs that were dark in color like her feathers. Grey, blacks, and if she was lucky, blues. Those were her favorite as they reminded her of the brief time she was a stowaway on a boat. The sea rocking her to sleep while the night sky sparkled like a sapphire drifting at the bottom of a pond. On her back, she carries a banged up, Or rather fifth-hand.second-hand harp. It's seen better days. Its body scuffed up with scratches and its strings discolored, some newer than others. Harp Strum loves it dearly and is never seen without it. The Kenku often spotted trying to find a way to make the same pleasant notes she mimics so easily on its strings.
But the most notable feature of Harp Strum is her beak. Halfway down her upper bill is a fierce and nasty crack where an adventurer's hammer came crashing down. A permanent fixture, just like most of her injuries, as Harp Strum never had access to anything as wondrous as magical healing. Sometimes when she feels like grossing people out, she’ll stick the tip of her tongue through it.
Personality: Harp Strum is a Kenku of pleasant temperament in that she doesn’t think to immediately rob people, mostly she just waits to see if you are mean first. Pleasantries mean everything to Harp Strum, from hellos to goodbye to your welcomes, as she likes how it makes her feel to talk like the fancy bards she’s spied on through tavern windows. Like she’s someone important and beautiful rather than your everyday Kenku thief that looked like a broken down feather duster. Play along with her peculiar vernacular and you’ll have a best friend for life. Don’t, and you’ll be mugged, but politely, as Harp Strum will happily ask you for your money with a bubbly ‘please’ before she sticks you with her ruby-handled dagger.
Harp Strum’s lived a fairly harsh life even by Kenku thief standards, but it’s hardly stopped her from being a beacon of positivity. Her motto for down-and-out days where she’s barely scraping by is a simple idea that a few copper coins in the hand today could lead to a fat purse of gold coins tomorrow. There is no point to stew on what can’t be helped when opportunity is always just around the corner, waiting to be shaken down. And so far that’s been a belief that’s worked out swimmingly for Harp Strum, especially when she heard the tale of Yddraixl the Viridescent. At the time, Harp Strum was homeless, friendless, and goalless, but in an instant, two-out-of-three of those worries vanished in a puff of smoke. With results like that, it is clear that the key to success is blind determination and the audacity to defy life when it tries to kick you down-- not luck as so many would be quick to suggest.
On a personal level, Harp Strum is very easy-going and uncomfortably friendly, almost desperate for approval. She likes to fill silence with idle chatter and music, or on rare occasions, entertain with a Like orc snores, hobgoblin farts, and drunken Woppa swears.hilarious assortment of noises she knows how to mimic. She is a little intimidated by the larger and fiercer races that make up Yddraixl’s nest, but Harp Strum isn’t against the idea of living and working with any of them. She just hopes she can measure up to their particular standards, and them to hers. Granted, her standards are fairly low. All Harp Strum is really interested in is someone who she can call a friend, but in the Age of Pink Men, friends are hard to come by, and harder to keep, you know, alive. But still she is willing to try, no matter how many bodies the pink men will make her bury!
That said Harp Strum does struggle with forgiveness. Maybe it is just a natural Kenku instinct but Harp Strum doesn’t believe that forgiveness should be freely given, but earned through cold hard punishment. Punishment that she’ll happily deal out in a day, a week, a month, or a year from now-- whenever the time is right to make you regret ever slighting her and her chosen flock. They say a Loxodon never forgets, but it is the Kenku that never forgives.
I. Background
Key Concept: Family. Hiss hatched to a huge family of Kenkus nested outside of a large human town that was surrounded by apple orchards. Hiss had Eight. Maybe nine. She never learned how to count. She just knew that it took three tables for them to gather together for a family meal.tons of brothers and sisters growing up who were just as rambunctious as her and wild as her. They fought and played together almost every day. Often irritating their father with countless pranks that were "too dangerous for hatchlings like them", while their mother smothered them with affection, coddling each and every one while she worked hard to put food on the table. It was an easy, carefree childhood for Hiss, where the only hardship she knew was the turmoil of a scraped knee and a harsh lecture for Scream told her all birds could fly. She didn't know Kenkus didn't count.pushing her siblings out of trees.
Key Concept: A New World. Eventually, Hiss and her siblings reached the mature age of nine and were pushed out of their nest to venture off into the wild world beyond their makeshift little farmstead. For a while, Hiss traveled with her two older sisters, Snap and Splash, while the rest of their siblings went their separate ways. Snap, Splash, and Hiss were three peas-in-a-pod growing up, and they didn't see any reason to change that after becoming 'adults'. None of them willing to admit their new life was scary and that they felt better with familiar faces at their side. The trio explored several human cities on their journey for a new home, learning to steal and out-run furious stall merchants while slowly grasping the dangers pink men laws offered them. They knew they’d get in trouble if they were ever caught, as they’d seen pink men drag off thieving pink men in shackles to a nest called jail. Which to them was a weak punishment, as having a roof over your head sounded far more like a reward to them. But they thought that maybe pink men were just silly like that, not realizing that human laws didn't work the same way for beastmen like them. An ignorance that led them to act carelessly in the city of Waterdeep.
Key Concept: A Taste of Death. Their nest was ransacked while Hiss was out stealing down by the docks. The silence that invaded her home was deafening, as she didn’t hear Splash’s chortling laugh or Snap’s gross jokes welcome Hiss home. Instead Hiss walked into a room painted red with her sisters’ blood. Their bodies were mutilated by blade and magic to the point Hiss couldn’t tell who was who. It broke Hiss, as she cried for hours, begging to every god and entity that could hear her to wake her from her nightmare. But no one answered. No one cared. And Hiss knew it to be true when the guards did nothing to help her. Hiss left Waterdeep that night, hardened by her loss, and truthfully, the next few years were a blur for Hiss. Lost in grief, she traveled from city-to-city with little purpose beyond basic survival. She joined a couple of Kenku flocks now and again, Hiss preferring company over loneliness, but she struggled to find that spark of life she once had. Her optimism buried in a cloud of grief she just couldn’t shake. But like sunlight breaking through a storm cloud, Little Song appeared, and changed everything.
Key Concept: Little Song. Little Song was what was right about this world. She was a bright and cheery Kenku who was different from any other Kenku Hiss met. She didn’t steal or shake down humans in the streets but played music. Words couldn’t describe the sound that flowed from her lute when she played but it was warm and sweeter than any kiss from a fair maiden could be. The two became fast friends, despite their drastic differences, as Little Song didn't mind that Hiss was scarred and a thief, but excited to make a friend who didn't judge her for her curious ways. Little Song liked pink men things, and while she knew little about human locks and fancy gems, she knew a lot about the hidden joys of life. Little Song was the first person to introduce Hiss to the many wonders that exist in human cities. Cold, crisp apple ale. Warm, buttery bread. And the music she showed her--it was something else. It was not like bird songs. Music came in many forms. From lively, playful tunes that made her and Little Song dance on tavern rooftops to mournful ballads that left Hiss weeping like a child in Little Song’s arms. Each song more different than last and yet they easily made Hiss feel things she never knew she could feel. It was nothing short of magical in Hiss’s eyes. The music, and Little Song. They spent years together, living life to the fullest in Durpar. and it was on their third year together, that Little Song gave Hiss a new name when she finally joined her in song in the city square. "Harp Strum." Little Song called her. "You are as lovely as a harp strum."
Key Concept: The Cruelty of Pink Men. Harp Strum didn’t know why they did it, why they chose Little Song out of all Kenkus to slay for their bounty in Durper, but they did. They cornered her while she was alone, and they broke her, left her dying in a cold, rainy alleyway. Her lute destroyed. Her coin stolen from her hat. Hiss found her just as they finished their work. Little Song's voice was weak, distant like a whisper carried on a dying wind, but somehow Little Song stayed alive long enough to speak her last words to Harp Strum. They were just three words. Three little words. But they meant more to Harp Strum than any treasure in the world. Little Song died in her arms that terrible night, and Harp Strum stayed with her long after her body grew cold, singing to her.
Key Concept: Revenge. They didn’t hear Harp Strum when she slipped into their room. Not a single one stirred as she crept up to their beds with knife in hand and slit their throats in their sleep. One-by-one, they died. The soft gurgle of blood that filled their throat was quickly drowned out by the party downstairs. The joyous laughter of drunken men dooming their kind to Harp Strum's revenge. By the time Harp Strum was finished with her terrible deed, dawn was breaking. And it was at the first trickle of light peering into the bedroom that Harp Strum fled through the closest opened window. A bunch of humans who stood outside the tavern front door spotted her and bloodied dagger as she jumped down past them. She heard them call for the guard but Harp Strum left the city before they could even find the adventurers’ bodies dead in their beds.
Key Concept: Picking Herself Back Up Again. Harp Strum didn’t know what to do after Little Song’s death. Going back to her flock in Durpar seemed impossible after what she’d done in her anger, but she also knew the other human cities in Faerun would only offer the same kind of cruelty. In the end, she wound up traveling on the road, guiding kobolds, goblins, and other hunted races through populated human territories, as the company of people who suffered like she suffered made it easier for her to deal with her grief. She even started playing music again when a half-orc called Rog gave her a harp she mugged off a weasley gnomish bard. Harp Strum wasn’t any good at it but just hearing a note play on its bright and brilliant strings was enough for Harp Strum to push forward for tomorrow. A feeling that carried her all the way to the day she first heard of Yddraixl the Viridescent and her promise to all beastmen harmed by the pink men that they’d have a home with her. For Harp Strum, it sounded like her prayers were finally answered, and she quickly made her way to Ingeronto Forest, feeling strangely optimistic about the new life she was about to forge.
II. Goals
Harp Strum’s Goal: Stability and friendship. Harp Strum’s been pushed from home to home, city to city, for years, and she’s lost more friends than she dares to count, let alone wants to remember. She’s tired of scraping by. Tired of having anything she’s built get snatched away by the pink men. She wants something more concrete in her life. Something that’ll last. And she thinks Yddraixl can provide that. She knows it won’t be easy, and sometimes she worries she won’t fit in-- but it is all she has left to try. Also, she'd like a dog. And a fancy hat. Big ones. The dog and the hat.
My Goal: I have always enjoyed character exploration, mostly because I normally don’t go into a game beyond an idea of what they are like, and with Harp Strum, it is no different. My plan is to watch her grow organically as she interacts with other characters and the environment around her. I don’t know what she’ll be like down the road, but that’s half the fun for me, letting her experiences from the story guide her somewhere I can’t begin to imagine. That said I have humored the thought she may try to dabble into the Bardic class, mostly because it fits her past desires. Oh, and friendship. I want goofy friendships, hijinks, and dumb jokes, lots of dumb jokes.
III. Secrets
(Unaware) Daethie Virmyar is still alive and she hasn’t forgotten the Kenku who took everything from her. Currently, Daethie is using her family’s fortune to hire scouts to search for a Kenku with a broken beak. It doesn’t matter how much gold it’ll cost to find her-- Daethie would burn her estate to the ground if it meant satisfying her thirst for revenge. Additionally, she wants Harp Strum brought back to her alive, Daethie eager to slay her herself, but she’s made it clear to every adventurer that's accepted her task that anyone who stands in their way is expendable to her cause. Be they beast or men.
(Aware) Harp Strum isn’t the name Little Song gave her all those years ago. Harp Strum’s name was Little Song. After her beloved friend died at the hands of pink men, Harp Strum couldn’t bear the thought that she wouldn’t hear her name again. That in time no one would ever know who she was besides Harp Strum. So...she let Little Song be the one to die that night. Harp Strum taking on the name of her perished friend to immortalize her forever. It was the only thing Harp Strum knew to do to honor her.
(Aware) You know how everyone thinks the Kobolds are responsible for eating all the sweets the merchants brought back to the castle? It is not true. It was Harp Strum. It has always been Harp Strum. She framed the Kobolds. And she kind of feels bad about it but not enough for her to come clean. In fact, she’s pretty sure she’ll take this secret to her grave.
IV. Ties
(Friendly) Stump-Leg Grrall -- Gnoll Cook. Stump-Leg Grrall is one of many cooks in Yddraixl’s nest but he’s without a doubt Harp Strum’s favorite. He spends most of his time in the kitchen, preparing meat for the rest of the flock before the other cooks take it off his hands. He doesn’t move much from his bloodied spot in the back due to the fact he doesn’t have much of a right leg to stand on. It's just a stump below the knee with a wooden peg haphazardly attached in an attempt to help steady his balance. He’s never told Harp Strum the story to how he lost it but the days where she works beside him, deboning fish and yanking out deer guts, Stump-Leg Grrall entertains her with stories about far off lands, strange beasts, and his many victories against the pink men. Some of the other cooks say he’s full of dung, that he’s nothing more than a reject from his original clan, but he’s won Harp Strum over enough that she joins him in pegging anyone who dares to badmouth him with intestines.
(Friendly) Braska Storm-Eater -- Orc Trouble-Squasher. Braska Storm-Eater is an orc of an orc. Bigger than a house and more muscular than three orc warriors put together. Her job in Yddraixl’s nest is to stomp out trouble before the whole place is turned into a smorgasbord of violence between the various races that fill up the castle. Harp Strum doesn’t know how to feel about her, mostly because Braska Storm-Eater is the first person to show up when Harp Strum is seconds away from sticking someone with her knife for a slight. Their meeting always ends the same way. Harp Strum tries to enact her revenge. Braska stops her. And then Harp Strum spends the rest of the day carried around wrapped in a blanket under Braska’s arm until she “learns to behave”. The humiliation has done wonders for Harp Strum’s temper. As for why Braska puts in the effort with Harp Strum, it’s because she thinks she’s cute. Like an adorable, stabbing baby.
(Hostile) Daethie “The Silent” Virmyar -- Half-Elf Noble. Daethie Virmyar was once a renowned bardic adventurer who traveled across the land in search of fame and recognition beyond her noble title as Baroness. She traveled with several adventurers, inspiring them to fight harder with her songs of hope and heroic strength as they slayed beasts of every kind. Orcs, kobolds, minotaurs, and flocks of Kenku that infested her favorite cities. Daethie never thought the beastmen were anything more than dangerous animals that needed to be put down. That they were unthinking, naturally evil beasts incapable of emotions like her-- until one night she awoke to the sound of her throat getting slit. The baleful eyes of a broken-beak Kenku forever burned into her mind. Her whole party was killed while they slept, including Daethie’s betrothed. Daethie survived by chance, but she was forever changed. Her voice lost. Her love gone. All she had left was the cold comfort of revenge.
V. Quirks
(Mannerism) Harp Strum speaks very formally. She likes to call people “sirs” and “misses” and will pepper her sentences with “pleases” and “thank yous” to an almost excessive amount. She knows that makes her odd since only pink men talk like that but she doesn’t care. She likes how it makes her feel. Big and important-like. Just don’t make fun of her for it otherwise she'll greet you with a knife next time you meet. The voice she uses for her formality is a bubbly female voice that belongs to a Tabaxi bard from Durpar who is known for her infectious pep.
(Quirk) Harp Strum is compelled to horde pretty blue things. She doesn’t know why or when it started. It's just something she’s always felt since she was a hatchling. But the immense joy she feels when she admires her stash of shiny blue rocks, silky cobalt sashes, and pleasantly teal stationary is undeniable. Sometimes she’ll sneak off from the flock to play with her blue treasures. She’s yet to let anyone join her Ritual of Appreciation.
(Memories) She couldn’t get the stench of blood out of her feathers. No matter how hard she scrubbed she could still smell it. Taste it on her tongue even as she celebrated with her flock and ate rich savory cakes that had always been her favorites. The sweets strangely bitter. The other members of her gang told Harp Strum she should be proud of her first kill. That it wasn’t easy to take down a human of that size. But Harp Strum was quick, they cheered proudly, she was fast and smart and cut him where all humans were weakest-- at the soft center of their belly. She tried not to think about it. Tried not to remember the look of fear that crossed the pink man’s face as his shirt grew wet with crimson. ’He would have hurt us first.’ Harp Strum told herself, but for some reason, she couldn’t shake the feeling what she had done was…wrong.
VI. Who Am I
Personality Trait One: Flattery is my preferred trick for getting what I want.
Personality Trait Two: I'm a snob who looks down on those who can't appreciate fine art.
Bond: A powerful person killed someone I love. Someday soon, I'll have my revenge.
Ideal: Beauty. When I perform, I make the world better than it was.
Flaw: I remember every insult I've received and nurse a silent resentment toward anyone who's ever wronged me.
VII. Fears and Hopes
(Hope) Kenkus were never meant to make sounds of their own. They were mimickers. Copy-cats who stole the voice of others to communicate. But Harp Strum feels like she found a way to speak as herself through music. She’s not very good at it. The notes were confusing and hard to play with talons like hers but she’s passionate about it. More so than anything else she’s ever done in her life. She hopes that one day she’ll be good enough that she could tell her stories through music and maybe inspire people to find their own voice.
(Fear) Silence. It is a sound of its own. An eerie quiet that settles in the air. One that slowly suffocates. It is a sound that promises ruin to those unfortunate enough to experience it, and Harp Strum has. She's heard it twice in her life. Both times led her to the discovery of her home destroyed and her loved ones dead. Events so traumatic that Harp Strum’s chest siezes up every time she’s exposed to silence for too long. Panic swallows her whole and despite what rational thought demands of her, she’ll do anything to break the silence, even if it means throwing herself headfirst into danger.
(Hope) Harp Strum wants nothing more than to find friends amongst Yddraixl’s nest. She’s not picky. She doesn’t care what race they may be or what they have done in the past. She just wants a friend who she can talk freely with and rely on when her peppy optimism slips. Maybe even cuddle with her during long, cold nights in the castle. She knows that’s a silly goal to have considering what Yddraixl promises to carve out for everyone in her territory-- but Harp Strum is determined to make at least one friend who values that silly part of her.
(Fear) Harp Strum can’t swim. She never learned how since most of her life was spent in city streets instead of the wild. She’s got a vague grasp on how to do it--flail your limbs about and keep your head up-- but she’s hesitant to try it out in practice, especially since she’s heard a lot of stories about pink men and orcs drowning in large bodies of water. If they can’t do it, what chance does she have?!
Finesse
When Making an Attack with a finesse weapon, you use your choice of your Strength or Dexterity modifier for the Attack and Damage Rolls. You must use the same modifier for both rolls.
Light
A light weapon is small and easy to handle, making it ideal for use when fighting with two Weapons.
Rogue - Sneak Attack
Beginning at 1st level, you know how to strike subtly and exploit a foe's distraction. Once per turn, you can deal an extra 1d6 damage to one creature you hit with an Attack if you have advantage on the Attack roll. The Attack must use a Finesse or a ranged weapon.
You don't need advantage on the Attack roll if another enemy of the target is within 5 feet of it, that enemy isn't Incapacitated, and you don't have disadvantage on the Attack roll.
The amount of the extra damage increases as you gain levels in this class, as shown in the Sneak Attack column of the Rogue table.
Finesse
When Making an Attack with a finesse weapon, you use your choice of your Strength or Dexterity modifier for the Attack and Damage Rolls. You must use the same modifier for both rolls.
Light
A light weapon is small and easy to handle, making it ideal for use when fighting with two Weapons.
Rogue - Sneak Attack
Beginning at 1st level, you know how to strike subtly and exploit a foe's distraction. Once per turn, you can deal an extra 1d6 damage to one creature you hit with an Attack if you have advantage on the Attack roll. The Attack must use a Finesse or a ranged weapon.
You don't need advantage on the Attack roll if another enemy of the target is within 5 feet of it, that enemy isn't Incapacitated, and you don't have disadvantage on the Attack roll.
The amount of the extra damage increases as you gain levels in this class, as shown in the Sneak Attack column of the Rogue table.
Range
A weapon that can be used to make a ranged Attack has a range in parentheses after the Ammunition or thrown property. The range lists two numbers. The first is the weapon’s normal range in feet, and the second indicates the weapon’s long range. When attacking a target beyond normal range, you have disadvantage on the Attack roll. You can’t Attack a target beyond the weapon’s long range.
Thrown
If a weapon has the thrown property, you can throw the weapon to make a ranged Attack. If the weapon is a melee weapon, you use the same ability modifier for that Attack roll and damage roll that you would use for a melee Attack with the weapon. For example, if you throw a Handaxe, you use your Strength, but if you throw a Dagger, you can use either your Strength or your Dexterity, since the Dagger has the finesse property.
Ammunition
You can use a weapon that has the Ammunition property to make a ranged attack only if you have ammunition to fire from the weapon. Each time you attack with the weapon, you expend one piece of ammunition. Drawing the ammunition from a quiver, case, or other container is part of the attack. At the end of the battle, you can recover half your expended ammunition by taking a minute to search the battlefield.
If you use a weapon that has the ammunition property to make a melee attack, you treat the weapon as an Improvised Weapon. A sling must be loaded to deal any damage when used in this way.
Range
A weapon that can be used to make a ranged Attack has a range in parentheses after the Ammunition or thrown property. The range lists two numbers. The first is the weapon’s normal range in feet, and the second indicates the weapon’s long range. When attacking a target beyond normal range, you have disadvantage on the Attack roll. You can’t Attack a target beyond the weapon’s long range.
Two-Handed
This weapon requires two hands when you Attack with it.
Beginning at 1st level, you know how to strike subtly and exploit a foe's distraction. Once per turn, you can deal an extra 1d6 damage to one creature you hit with an Attack if you have advantage on the Attack roll. The Attack must use a Finesse or a ranged weapon.
You don't need advantage on the Attack roll if another enemy of the target is within 5 feet of it, that enemy isn't Incapacitated, and you don't have disadvantage on the Attack roll.
The amount of the extra damage increases as you gain levels in this class, as shown in the Sneak Attack column of the Rogue table.Sneak Attack, During your rogue Training you learned Thieves' Cant, a Secret mix of dialect, jargon, and code that allows you to hide messages in seemingly normal conversation. Only another creature that knows Thieves' Cant understands such messages. It takes four times longer to convey such a Message than it does to speak the same idea plainly.
In addition, you understand a set of Secret signs and symbols used to convey short, simple messages, such as whether an area is dangerous or the territory of a thieves' guild, whether loot is nearby, or whether the people in an area are easy marks or will provide a Safe House for thieves on the run.Thieves' Cant, At 1st level, choose two of your skill Proficiencies, or one of your skill Proficiencies and your proficiency with Thieves' Tools. Your Proficiency Bonus is doubled for any ability check you make that uses either of the chosen Proficiencies.
At 6th level, you can choose two more of your Proficiencies (in Skills or with thieves' tools) to gain this benefit.Expertise
Features and Abilities: Common, AuranLanguages | Simple Weapons, Hand Crossbows, Longswords, Rapiers, ShortswordsWeapon Proficiencies | Thieves' ToolsTool Proficiencies | Light ArmorArmor Proficiencies | MediumSize | 30 Ft.Speed | You can duplicate other creatures' handwriting and craftwork. You have advantage on all checks made to produce forgeries or duplicates of existing objects.Expert Forgery | You are proficient in your choice of two of the following skills: Acrobatics, Deception, Stealth, and Sleight of Hand.Kenku Training | You can mimic sounds you have heard, including voices. A creature that hears the sounds you make can tell they are imitations with a successful Wisdom (Insight) check opposed by your Charisma (Deception) check.Mimicry | You can read and write Common and Auran, but you can speak only by using your Mimicry trait.Kenku Curse |
You can always find a place to perform, usually in an inn or tavern but possibly with a circus, at a theater, or even in a noble's court. At such a place, you receive free lodging and food of a modest or comfortable standard (depending on the quality of the establishment), as long as you perform each night. In addition, your performance makes you something of a local figure. When strangers recognize you in a town where you have performed, they typically take a liking to you.Background Feature: By Popular Demand | -- | -- | -- | --
Race:Volo's Guide to Monsters - Pg. 119Bugbear, Female
Class:My Plan is to go Kensei Monk and, possibly, multiclass into either Fighter or Rogue down the line. Astral Monk, then Psi Warrior, and Beast Barbarian (if allowed of course).Monk
Appearance:Light Brownish-Red Fur covers brown skin.
At first glance, many people mistake her for an orc... But, the elongated arms and reddish mane of fur framing her face are a dead giveaway!
She is short for a Bugbear, standing at 5' 8" tall, but her wide shoulders and stocky frame more than make up for whatever underestimations levied against her.
She gives off serious Viking vibes with how she dresses, acts, and carries herself.Daggonae has always stood out among her kind. The Bugbears prized brutality and strength, but Daggonae took things a step further. She employed cunning and tactics to her strategy for success. The sides of her head are shaved and the remaining mane of hair was either wild and unkempt or meticulously braided. Her eyes are a golden brown and her musculature is a testament to a lifetime having to prove herself to be stronger, faster, and smarter than her male counterparts. Standing at 5' 8" tall, she is shorter than most of her kin, but still commands respect among those that know her reputation.
Personality: Daggonae prides herself on Action, not words. Given her upbringing, she has come to the conclusion that you can learn the truth about an individual based on their actions alone. Therefore, she watches... She observes... This, oftentimes, leads her to travel to places that she shouldn't. But, if it means learning a shred of truth, or maybe a key piece of information that she can use to her advantage, she feels it's worth the risk. However, for all her schemes and calculations, she realizes that mind-games alone will only get you so far. Eventually, you have to act. It takes a lot of work to out-think and out-perform your opponents... And, unfortunately for her, Daggonae has a lot of opponents to play against. However, As she calls it'Playing the Game' has afforded her several traits that prove quite useful in navigating everyday life. She is slow to anger and thinks logically about her problems. She doesn't, often, act on impulse and can remain focused on a single task for an extraordinary amount of time.
Step 1: Write 5 background and concept elements that you feel are important to your image of the character. One of these should include where they are from.
1.) Dagg is on a relentless pursuit of power! Growing up in Bloodmarsh, the Bugbear Tribes were all arranged on a heirachal structure. Those that were weak or sickly were made SlavesThralls, destined to do grunt work around camp. Those that were strong, on the other hand, were made WarriorsThanes.
2.) Her mother was a Thrall... Her father was a Thrall... Her sisters... Her brothers... The Bloodbane Clan had fallen from grace a few generations back and never recovered... Until now. While serving The Bloodmarsh ChiefBorkskull and Borskull's sonGrotchuk at the A convening of all the Bugbear Clans to discuss trade and shared interest. It also serves as a time that the various Clan Leaders can declare war or settle minor disputes among one another.Conclave, she saw someone that would forever influence her life. Shazbog Twin-Hammer, of the Blueblade Grasslands Clan, was the first female to ascend to the rank of Chieftess in over a century. Her clan loved her and the other clans either hated or feared her. Her very name invoked a sense of pride, or dread, depending on who you asked. The crowds parted as she walked through to honor the other Chiefs. In that moment, Dagg's life was changed forever. She knew, in her heart, she was not destined to the life of a lowly Thrall. She was destined for more...
3.) As soon as they returned from the Conclave, Dagg got to work. During the day, she would watch the Thanes bare-knuckle training sessions. While carrying out her duties, she would push herself. She'd carry more logs for the fires. She'd run everywhere she could. She would watch... wait... listen... At night, she would try to replicate what she saw in a clearing north of their camp. She learned to throw measured, precision strikes instead of wild haymakers. She learned to move and dodge, rather than stand in front of her opponent. She learned patience... and cunning... and timing... Days turned into weeks before the night finally came. Braag-Feast, a night of celebration and open challenges. On this night, anyone can challenge anyone to a A one-on-one fight to the deathViskur without fear of retribution. Mostly, the challenges were only issued by Thanes wishing to move up the ranks. Every so often, a Thane would challenge the Chief for the right to rule. So, naturally, the entire meade hall came to a halt when Dagg stared into Grotchuk's eyes and said the word; "Viskur!" It wasn't just the Thanes that she had been watching all these weeks. She needed to pick a target that would make an impact. Someone that was sure to gain Borskull's attention. She kept circling to his left and focused her attacks on his shoulder and ribs. With every blow, she could feel the life draining out of him. The longer the fight drug on, the more fear and hatred she saw in his eyes. It was the same look that the other chiefs gave to Shazbog Twin-Hammer. His chest was heaving and he could barely lift his arms... She smiled as she blocked his pathetic attempt at a haymaker. Locking the arm, she wrenched to the side and her smile grew as his cries of pain drowned out the snapping of bone. He fell to his back, and she mounted his chest, unleashing all her years of rage on his face. With every punch, blood splattered her face and her smile grew wider. The meade hall went silent... Several Thanes had to look away... and when she was done, and couldn't lift her arms anymore... Borkskull's heavy footsteps could be heard as he descended from his throne, glared down at her with hatred in his eyes and spoke the words... "Daggonae Bloodbane is victorious. I, hereby, name you... Thane."
4.) As the years went on, Daggonae had to try much harder than the other Thanes to keep her position. Every year at Braag-Feast, she would spend the entire night fighting challenger, after challenger, after challenger. The evening usually ended with her bloody and bruised, but still alive. The rest of the year wasn't much better. Every time there was a particularly difficult hunt, Borskull would send Daggonae. Every time they needed to protect the clan from the Other (non-monsterous) humanoid racespink-meats, Borskull would put Daggonae on the front lines. He clearly wanted to enact some form of retribution for her killing his eldest son, but the law would not allow him to do so directly. Daggonae was smart. She knew that challenging Grotchuk during the Braag-Feast would upset the Chief, but if she won... Her, and her family, would be safe from revenge by the Chief's hand, words, or actions. Silently.... Secretly... Both Daggonae and Borskull vowed a blood-debt and one day, the bill would come due.
5.) Unfortunately, their feud would have to be put on hold. In recent weeks, the pink-meats have been encroaching further and further into Bloodmarsh Territory, causing the skirmishes and raids to increase dramatically. The threat to their clan from these pink-meats has gone from minor, to immediate. Rumors began to spread throughout the camp about how communications have been cut off with some of the scouts and border lookout settlements. Several Thanes were now looking to Borskull with doubt in their eyes. They doubted that he was still fit to lead and, it would seem, he knew it. She locked eyes with him from across the longhouse and smirked. There was blood in the water... She wondered what his move would be to ensure that his biggest threat didn't capitalize on the chaos.
6.) While attending a Raid Council, Dagg overheard Chief Borskull whispering with A Thane that took up the mantle of Borskull's right hand when Grotchuk died. Sabbraxis was also Grotchuk's Blood Brother since birth, meaning that he had every bit as much of a reason to hate Dagg as Borskull did.Sabbraxis Blackraven. The Bloodmarsh Clan would be sending a Thane to Ingeronto Forest to meet with Dagg had heard this woman's name before, always spoken in venomous whispers by the other Thanes. Apparently shes an orc that's recruiting people to join in the fight against the pink-meat's! Another strong woman rising to prominence in a world dominated by men...Yddraixl, The Viridescent. Dagg smirked as she made her way back to her hut. 'So, this is his play! Send me away and hope I die under Yddraixl's command.' She packed her rucksack and sat at the edge of her bed... waiting... It wasn't more than an hour later that Sabbraxis Blackraven barged in. "Dagg.... Oh!" His expression of delight melted when he was met with an already packed and ready-to-go Daggonae. "Cheer up, Sabbraxis!" She chuckled, standing and throwing her bag over her shoulder; "At least you'll be rid of me for a while!"
Step 2: List 2 goals; one should be your character's goal. The other should be a goal you have FOR your character.Survival shouldn't be it.
Character Goal: Daag actually has 2 goals. She wants to learn from powerful people, particularly women. She'll track down any rumor or lead on anything, or anyone, that would give her an edge, or teach her to be a more powerful warrior. Books, weapons, armor, or magic. Power is all that consumes her thoughts and guides her actions. Everything else is worthless. -- Her second goal is to return the Bloodmarsh, defeat Borskull in a Viskur, and take her place on the throne as Chieftess of the Bloodmarsh Clan.
Player Goal: I would like for Dagg to grow as a person. To realize that there is more to life than power and one-upping your opponents. Maybe even find a sense of peace.
Step 3: List 2 secrets. One your character knows, one they do not.
Known Secret: "Though neither of them can voice their intentions, both Daggonae and Borskull are fully aware that they are trying to kill one another."
Known Secret: "Daggonae has never shared the secret of how she knew how to defeat Grotchuk. As always, it came down to watching and waiting. She was charged with cleaning his hut one day and found freshly used bandages hidden under the rug. She knew that Grotchuk had recently come back from a hunt, but no one said he had been injured in the process. She watched him over the next few days. When he thought no one was looking, he would wince and clutch at his side. He was also favoring one shoulder over the other. He would get winded easier and easier in the sparring pit. She snuck into his room a few more times and, every time, she'd find more bandages. Whatever wound he had suffered was not healing quickly. At this rate, it definitely wouldn't be healed before the next Braag-Feast... And that was the type of information she could use to her advantage."
Known Secret: "Watching and waiting is a strategy that has always served Dagg well... Especially when it comes to Borskull. She followed him as he stumbled off drunk one night. He walked for miles, finishing off an entire bottle of hard liquor along the way. Finally, he arrived at a solitary hut just over the border to the Magpie Bog, south of Bloodmarsh. At first, Dagg thought it was a mistress that Borskull was keeping stashed away. But, as they argued, she was able to make out one phrase that made her smile; 'You will always be my daughter...' Every couple weeks, Dagg would travel back to the hut and observe the girl from a distance, never engaging her directly. It seems she has a penchant for magic... Interesting."
Unknown Secret: "Word of Daggonae's victory over Grotchuk has spread throughout several of the other Bugbear Clans, even gracing the ears of her idol, Shazbog Twin-Hammer, of the Blueblade Grasslands Clan. Whether Shazbog sees this information as a welcome change to tradition, or a threat to her honored position as the only Chieftess, is unclear."
Step 4: Describe 3 people that are tied to the character. Two should be friendly. One should be hostile.
Friendly #1: Dog - A stray black wolf that hung around Bloodmarsh. Dagg would feed it at night while she trained and enjoyed staring up at the moon with it.
Friendly #2: The Bloodbane Clan - Dagg's clan are still Thralls under the rule of Borskull. Dagg has a Mother (Greska) and Father (Saagmund), as well as two sisters (Borla and Velnii) and two brothers (Ornoff and Tulk). Daggonae is the youngest of all the siblings and the only one to escape their life of bondage.
Hostile #1: Though he's not actively violent towards her, Borskull's attitude and actions towards her can definitely be seen as hostile. He is forbidden from directly, or indirectly, taking out his vengeance on her, however he repeatedly puts her in harm's way in hopes that she'll die a horrific death. He yearns for the day that she challenges him so that he will have a legal reason to cut her down.
Hostile #2: The Thanes of Bloodmarsh - Several have attempted to kill her throughout the years, but (so far) none have succeeded. They view her as in illegitimate Thane, not worthy of the title. In their eyes, she is still a Thrall and should be treated as such. Some have gone so far as to break Clan Law and attack her without provocation.
Hostile #3: Sabbraxis Blackraven - Blood Brother to the late Grotchuk Ashbane, Borskull's son. Sabbraxis became Borskull's de-facto general when Daggonae killed Grotchuk in the Viskur. While he has flourished in his new position, Sabbraxis is a proud bugbear and has always felt a deep shame for how he obtained this position. Always a pillar of honor and tradition, Sabbraxis faithfully carries out his job with unmatched focus. To be honest, Dagg could probably count on one hand how many times she'd ever seen the man smile. In a way, she admired him. His drive... His focus... His commitment to his duty and the clan. Unfortunately for Daggonae, he didn't return her admiration. Beneath that facade of the stalwart soldier, Sabbraxis secretly longs to see the day when the light fades from Daggonae's eyes.
Step 5: Describe 3 memories, mannerisms, or quirks that your character has.
Daggonae's most cherished memory was the night before she challenged Grotchuk. It was a full moon and she was meditating in the clearing she used for training. She could hear the gentle blowing of the wind and smell the familiar scent of Dog as he emerged from the nearby trees. She didn't even open her eyes. She simply held up her hand, and Dog rested his large canine head in her lap. Resting her hand on his head, she breathed in deeply, and just existed in that moment. For that brief moment in time, it seemed that her world was at peace.
Daggonae prefers nighttime over daylight. She understands that this sentiment is not often shared by others, but she truly loves the night and is more likely to open up/let her (emotional) guard down at night.
Daggonae has a kinship with wolves, and other canines, and will not harm one unless she absolutely has to.
Daggonae dislikes being bored and will oftentimes fidget with her hair, work out, meditate, or volunteer to keep watch/do recon/do research just to keep from being bored.
Gaining her title of Thane in the manner she did, Daggonae has been fighting to retain her position ever since. Naturally, this has bred a healthy bit of skepticism and paranoia in her mind. She's slow to trust and repeatedly views things through a lens of either; "What does this person want from me?" or "How can this person/thing benefit me?"
Daggonae doesn't, personally, harbor any ill will towards the pink-meats. They raid the bugbears... The bugbears raid the pink-meat's.... Round and round the cycle goes. However, lately, the pink-meat's have become more dangerous in their tactics and violence. Clearly, they've learned and gotten stronger... Daggonae doesn't harbor any ill will towards the pink-meats... no... But whatever this power is that they have access to? She will acquire it by any means necessary.
Step 6: List your character's personality trait, bond, ideal, and flaw.
Personality Trait = "I judge people by their actions, not their words."
Bond = "My I assume it would be ok to substitute the word "Tools" for the word "Chains" in this instance. She carries around the, literal, chains that she used to wear when she was a Thrall. They serve as a constant reminder of the life she left and a driving force that continues to propel her forward.tools are symbols of my past life, and I carry them so that I will never forget my roots."
Ideal = "If I become strong, I can take what I want ----- What I deserve!"
Flaw = "I have trouble trusting in my allies. I view them as tools... Useful tools... But tools nonetheless. They serve as a means to an end. And that end, is my relentless pursuit of power!"
Step 7: List 2 things that make your character afraid and 2 things that give them hope.
Fears = Failure and Bondage - Daggonae isn't necessarily afraid of failure, she just really REALLY despises it. She views failure as a weakness. As for Bondage... Daggonae will die before she ever lets anyone put her in chains again. There is nothing she fears more.
Hopes = Power and The Moon - Daggonae craves power. She will do anything to get as much of it, in any form, that she can. As far as the Moon is concerned, Daggonae has always felt a spiritual connection to the moon. She could see it from the clearing where she trained as a child and always viewed it as a driving force. She is never more at peace than she is when staring up at a full moon on a cloudless night!
Optional: Give me a sentence or two about the other applicants. How does your character feel about those characters?NOT how do you feel about another player!
Day 1:
No sooner had her longship landed on the embankment of the forest river she'd been traveling along, was her company set upon by a band of out-riders. Judging by their demeanor, Dagg was certain that word of their arrival had gotten 'Dagg suspects that Borskull never sent word of their arrival in the first place. Possibly in hopes that Yddraixl's warriors would attack on sight, killing her in the process.lost' in transit. Fortunately, Dagg was quick to defuse the situation;
"I am Daggonae Bloodbane, of the Bloodmarsh Clan. We have heard tale of forces gathering under the banner of Chieftess Yddraixl! Our Chief, Borskull Ashbane, has sent me to join the effort as a sign of our potential partnership and alliance against the pink-meats."
After a few moments of deliberation, and a search of her person, the tension seemed to fade as one of the out-riders nodded and they led her to the encampment. It was a sight to behold. Yddraixl was rebuilding, and refitting, an old abandoned castle to fit her purpose.
As they traversed the encampment, undoubtedly on the way to her first duty station, Dagg did what she does best. She watched... and listened;
They passed a Bront Wildboarlarge orc male. Green skin... Rippling muscles... minimal clothing and lots of scars. He was a warrior of some sort. One of the more savage fighters. All rage and anger and brawn. She'd met his like before... Deadly if not handled properly.
Standing next to the orc was a race that Dagg had minimal exposure to. Though, this one looked different? The tortles of the Boglands were more reminiscent of snapping turtles, while Woppathis one looked... different... An absolutely massive framework of muscles and claws was housed behind a thick grey-green shell. He was moving at a slower, more careful pace than his orc partner... but his actions had deliberate meaning. Interesting.
As they continued to traverse the encampment, Dagg's eyebrow raised slightly as they passed another one of her kin... Baruuk TalonfaceA bugbear, but not one hailing from any clan she could immediately identify. A mane of brown fur surrounded his gaunt face. His extremities were thin and long... even for a bugbear. His dress and armor are simple, yet functional. He was an intriguing enigma worthy of further study, if given the chance.
The sun was setting and fires were being lit around the camp. Dagg smirked slightly as she was shown to a guard post. It was a tiny hut hidden in the trees near the campsite. Inside she found a few loafs of bread and a jug of clean water. It seems that she was being placed on guard duty until she could work her way up into Yddraixl's inner-circle. Fortunately, she preferred the night... and from her perch, if the wind blew hard enough, she could see the moon peeking through the canopy of trees.
Day 2:
Dagg has been exposed to more of the people's inhabiting this place. She must admit, it's a rather strange army that Yddraixl is gathering. There was a lizardfolk that stood out among the others she saw. An unusually Small - The CharacterSmall one with an affinity for books, from what Dagg could observe. They sat by themselves during breakfast and appeared to be attempting to make themselves as unnoticeable as possible... Which only made her notice them even more. If she needed some research done in the future, this one could come in handy when navigating books and tomes.
Of course, Dagg would have had more time to observe the lizardfolk had the Gristleglassy-eyed kobold not gotten in the way. This tiny... person?... seemed overly excitable and, honestly, Dagg had no clue what to make of them. For some reason, she finds them... amusing... which disturbs her greatly.... She thinks; 'Note to self: I must meditate on this troubling realization later.'
As she made her way out of the shared eating space, Dagg noticed Drixual Tiguana "Tigs"another Lizardfolk. This one was more the appropriate height and build, compared to the ones in Bloodmarsh and the surrounding territories. He looked like a fighter, but she sensed something was... off... about him. A test was in order... Intentionally, she tripped and bumped into him as she passed. And, surprisingly, the brown and blue scaled lizardfolk caught her and assisted her regaining her balance. 'Far more friendly than the ones back home.' She thought as she gave a polite smile and nod before taking her leave.
Hours passed as Dagg continued about the various duties assigned to her. She was well aware that this kind of "grunt work" was to be expected of new recruits. It was common to have a "probationary period" when joining a new faction. At least there was some foliage that reminded her of home... Trees... Grass... Mushrooms...
'Wait a minute? Did that mushroom just move?' She thought, as she stared bewildered at Stinkthe goblin wearing a mushroom cape. It wasn't often that she saw something that made her face betray her thoughts, but this strange sight certainly was succeeding. A goblin that was actively observing the other fungus growing around them. 'I always thought their kind only cared about meat and shiny things? Hmm... Learn something new every day I guess...'
Day 3:
Rumors were beginning to spread today. Apparently, someone quit last night. A goblin named Vrazzk. Dagg overheard a gaggle of goblins and kobolds discussing it as she loaded the crates onto the back of a wagon. Apparently, this goblin was raised by one of the pink-meats... A human... The circumstances surrounding the nature of the relationship of this goblin and it's human counterparts was a point of disagreement among the rumor-mill... More importantly, however, was the fact that Vrazzk was taught hand-to-hand combat. Dagg shrugged; 'I wonder if he was a good fighter. I would've liked the opportunity to find out. Perhaps this, Vrazzk's time spent with the pink-meats could've imparted some knowledge of combat strategy that would've proved useful. Shame.'
As she continued about her tasks, she thought of her own martial prowess. She hadn't been taught to fight by some trainer or master... She had to learn everything the hard way... the natural way. Through violence, observation, and implementation... Repetition... She wondered if a trainer was a comparable substitute for experience.... She missed Dog.
Thrown
If a weapon has the thrown property, you can throw the weapon to make a ranged attack. If the weapon is a melee weapon, you use the same ability modifier for that attack roll and damage roll that you would use for a melee attack with the weapon. For example, if you throw a Handaxe, you use your Strength, but if you throw a Dagger, you can use either your Strength or your Dexterity, since the Dagger has the Finesse property.
Versatile
This weapon can be used with one or two hands. A damage value in parentheses appears with the property---the damage when the weapon is used with two hands to make a melee attack.
Monk - Martial Arts
PHB Pg. 78
At 1st level, your practice of martial arts gives you mastery of combat styles that use unarmed strikes and monk weapons, which are shortswords and any simple melee weapons that don't have the two-handed or heavy property.
You gain the following benefits while you are unarmed or wielding only monk weapons and you aren't wearing armor or wielding a shield:
You can use Dexterity instead of Strength for the attack and damage rolls of your unarmed strikes and monk weapons.
You can roll a D4 in place of the normal damage of your unarmed strike or monk weapon. This die changes as you gain monk levels, as shown in the Martial Arts column of the Monk table on PHB Pg. 77.
When you use the Attack action with an unarmed strike or a monk weapon on your turn, you can make one unarmed strike as a Bonus Action. For example, if you take the Attack action and attack with a quarterstaff, you can also make an unarmed strike as a Bonus Action, assuming you haven't already taken a Bonus Action this turn.
Certain Monasteries use specialized forms of the monk weapons. For example, you might use a club that is two lengths of wood connected by a short chain (called a nunchaku) or a sickle with a shorter, straighter blade (called a kama). Whatever name you use for a monk weapon, you can use the game statistics provided for the weapon in Chapter 5 of the PHB.
At 1st level, your practice of martial arts gives you mastery of combat styles that use unarmed strikes and monk weapons, which are shortswords and any simple melee weapons that don't have the two-handed or heavy property.
You gain the following benefits while you are unarmed or wielding only monk weapons and you aren't wearing armor or wielding a shield:
You can use Dexterity instead of Strength for the attack and damage rolls of your unarmed strikes and monk weapons.
You can roll a D4 in place of the normal damage of your unarmed strike or monk weapon. This die changes as you gain monk levels, as shown in the Martial Arts column of the Monk table on PHB Pg. 77.
When you use the Attack action with an unarmed strike or a monk weapon on your turn, you can make one unarmed strike as a Bonus Action. For example, if you take the Attack action and attack with a quarterstaff, you can also make an unarmed strike as a Bonus Action, assuming you haven't already taken a Bonus Action this turn.
Certain Monasteries use specialized forms of the monk weapons. For example, you might use a club that is two lengths of wood connected by a short chain (called a nunchaku) or a sickle with a shorter, straighter blade (called a kama). Whatever name you use for a monk weapon, you can use the game statistics provided for the weapon in Chapter 5 of the PHB.
Ammunition
You can use a weapon that has the Ammunition property to make a ranged attack only if you have ammunition to fire from the weapon. Each time you attack with the weapon, you expend one piece of ammunition. Drawing the ammunition from a quiver, case, or other container is part of the attack. At the end of the battle, you can recover half your expended ammunition by taking a minute to search the battlefield.
If you use a weapon that has the ammunition property to make a melee attack, you treat the weapon as an Improvised Weapon. A sling must be loaded to deal any damage when used in this way.
Thrown
If a weapon has the thrown property, you can throw the weapon to make a ranged attack. If the weapon is a melee weapon, you use the same ability modifier for that attack roll and damage roll that you would use for a melee attack with the weapon. For example, if you throw a Handaxe, you use your Strength, but if you throw a Dagger, you can use either your Strength or your Dexterity, since the Dagger has the Finesse property.
VGtoM Pg. 119
If you surprise a creature and hit it with an attack on your first turn in combat, the attack deals an extra 2D6 damage to it. You can use this trait only once per combat.
PHB Pg. 78 --- Beginning at 1st level, while you are wearing no armor and not wielding a shield, your AC equals 10 + your Dexterity Modifier + your Wisdom Modifier.Unarmored Defense, PHB Pg. 78Martial Arts, Martial Arts Die = 1D4
Features and Abilities: Common, GoblinLanguages | Simple Weapons, ShortswordsWeapon Proficiencies | Artisan's Tools: Woodcarver's ToolsTool Proficiencies | Land VehiclesVehicle Proficiencies | MediumSize | 30 Ft.Speed | You can see in dim light within 60 feet of you as if it were bright light, and in Darkness as if it were dim light. You can't discern color in Darkness, only shades of gray.Darkvision | Extended Melee Reach = +5 feet
When you make a Melee Attack on your turn, your reach for it is 5 feet greater than normal.Long-Limbed | Increased Carrying Capacity
You count as one size larger when determining your carrying capacity and the weight you can push, drag, or lift.Powerful Build | You are proficient in the Stealth Skill.Sneaky | If you surprise a creature and hit it with an attack on your first turn in combat, the attack deals an extra 2D6 damage to it. You can use this trait only once per combat.Surprise Attack | PHB Pg. 131
Since you come from the ranks of the common folk, you fit in among them with ease. You can find a place to hide, rest, or recuperate among other commoners, unless you have shown yourself to be a danger to them. They will shield you from the law or anyone else searching for you, though they will not risk their lives for you.Background Feature: Rustic Hospitality | -- | -- | -- | --
Name:An'mal Race: Bugbear Class: Barbarian Alignment: Unaligned Background: Entertainer Appearance: Hair carefully combed, oiled and scented like his perfectly trimmed beard. Teeth freshly brushed, perfectly white, perfectly sharp and breath fresh from morning chewed mint. Eyes are soft and warm pools of deep oranges, browns and reds. Standing at nearly 8 feet tall, An'mal's body is trim and lithe from regular exercise. No tub on this bod. Lovingly made leather thongs surround his neck with polished teeth of some of the more interesting things An'mal has eaten. Immaculately dyed leather straps surround An'mal's wrist's nearly all the way up his muscular forearms. The bright blend of colours matches the painted leather sarong around his waist that modestly hides his privates (No need to show off). The red hair on his legs has been dyed blonde at the feet and darkened around his powerful calves so as to look like hairy flames wreathing his stride. This colour scheme matches the red tufts that grow down his back between his magnificent broad shoulders. An'mal is both simple and spectacular in the same breath. Nothing about his look is accidental. He's a rock star. Personality: An'mal is the definition of chill. Nothing is a problem. 'She'll be right, mate' are words this bugbear lives by. There's a time to sleep (and godforbid anyone dare to disturb An'mal when it is time to sleep) and there's a time to shine. Life is a ballad and An'mal wants to learn all the lyrics and beat the crap out of it to some mad beats on what he calls his drum kit. If one isn't sleeping, then one should be adding to the life's music, making the world a cooler place to be, laughing with friends and family, eating deliciously made nutritional meals from the remains of the slain, singing and playing songs that demand you move to them, retelling epic stories that would make Hrughek and Ghrunkel proud, and looking good while doing it! An'mal loves sleeping and An'mal loves life! He sinks his teeth into both with a smile, though sometimes there is a sadness hidden beneath that smile which An'mal keeps to himself. And beneath that sadness there is a deep and violent rage that pray you never see ... but if you should, pray it is not directed towards you.
Key Concept 1: An'mal comes from a loving family who fought to make a new life for themselves.An'mal was born to loving parents, Grohl and Jan Jhalpn, who wanted something different for their cubs. Tired of the relentless persecution of the Stubbards and Felfs that pushed their warband far from fertile pastures ripe with food where a bugbear could slay, feast and fork in the warm sunshine and snooze in the cool shade and restless beneath the rigid order of the hobgoblins who kept them camped in wetland ruins as they sought to rebuild a fragmented horde rife with infighting, Grohl and Jan gathered a few like minded individuals and fled to carve out a better place for themselves in a harsh world. Their gang ventured back to the edge of civilisation and made a home for themselves in a charming hamlet, previously know as Key Concept 2: An'mal's home was halfling hamlet in the hills on the edge of civilisation, redesigned by a clever hobgoblin and renamed GrahlstownHobbstone, where some very plump and tasty rodents had carved holes into the hills. The rodent homes proved far too small for the likes of Grohl and Jan's gang, but it wasn't long before they made Hobbstone a home, caving in the hillside rooves and building crude but sturdy structures over the top. Hobbstone was renamed Grahlstown. It was quiet. Food walked around in the fields nearby. The gardens were plentiful. The acoustics were great.
From the damp discomfort of rigid laws beneath the cruel iron hand of the warband, the Grahlstown Gang flourished in the sun. Key concept 3: An'mal's new life was built around music; everyone in the gang was part of making the music. It bound them together.This was a place a warband could just be a band. An'mal was only 11 winters old when he and his 3 siblings came to settle with his parents in Grahlstown. From shoddy sleep, bossy big mouths and constant conflict to days full of laughter and song, An'mal embraced his parent's vision of the world and threw himself into the music that the band made together. Jan just wanted to sing. Grohl loved nothing more than to beat out wild rhythm's for her on anything that would make noise. And they were not alone, Slaish, the rebellious hobgoblin who cared nothing for his kind's penchant for law and order, the prodigious mind behind the renovation of the Hobblet structures, was a talented hand with the lute, enhancing the sound with thrashing conjurations of his magical cantrips. Between Slaish's genius and the tinkering talent of the gang's one eyed goblin tracker, Raecharl, Grahlstown's auditorium was equipped with the most wonderful sound makers. And there was no distinction between adult and child in Grahlstown when it came to making music. Everyone played or sang or something that added to the music. An'mal's elder sisters (and identical twins), W'ggl and Shagg, crooned sweet racey harmonies to their mothers melodies. H'ndrek, his older brother would slam on the tinkling ivories built by Raecharl, an instrument the goblin fondly named the Kees. Key concept 4: An'mal learned the drums like his father. He played a goblin built drumkit made from different sized and sounding drums constructed from gruesome materials (skulls and the skin of the slain etc) An'mal himself followed in his father footsteps, beating out rhythms with his father on the drum kit, another of musical of invention crafted by Raecharl's clever hand, bringing together many drums of different sounds within a short space of each other, some raised to different heights and made of differnt materials such as the hollowed skulls of the slain. For a time An'mal was carefree and happy.
It was when the hills began to tremble that would spell doom for the happy life in Grahlstown. The gang thought nothing of it at first. But the strength of the trembles grew and one of the Hobblet homes collapsed in on itself burying Raecharl's two new borns and his wife alive. The music became one of mourning but things only got worse when the trembles broke the surface and a platoon of armed Stubbards emerged. Key Concept 5: Dwarves mining the area wiped out his gang ruthlessly, refusing to negotiate. An'mal watched the murders but did nothing, fleeing instead to save his own life.The Stubbards, clearly responsible for the trembles wrecking their home, destroying their peace and killing their people, would hear nothing of the gang's complaints. The Stubbards had found a vein of rich ore that run right through Grahlstown. Their reply to demands they mine elsewhere or at least far far below the surface was with steel and blood in the dead of night. An'mal watched his parents murdered before him. To his deep shame, he did not lift a finger. In fact, An'mal's mind was possessed for a moment by the dreaded Skiggaret. While his family, his gang, fought for their lives, An'mal fled like a coward. He survived but his deep sadness and shame would give seed to a deep rage within the young bugbear.
He returned to bury his loved ones and then An'mal left Grahlstown, still touched by Skiggaret's cowardice and fearing the Stubbards would return to finish the job they had begun. He took his father's drumkit with him and the heavy staff his father used to beat the big drum and began to wander, skirting around the edges where the wild met the civilised. An'mal swore Skiggaret would never touch him again. He moved through the night like Grangkhul's shadow, swearing the next time he found a place where a warband could be a band, surrounded by those he loved, he would make Hruggek proud. He would gather the severed heads of his foes and make the most maginificent drumkit the world had ever seen and make sweet music from their empty skulls. Some years later An'mal found himself deep in the ruins of a forest fortress, trying to forge a new home where he could be part of a band once more.
Goal 1: Avenge his family's murder, make his god Hruggek proud of him again and forgive him for allowing Skiggaret to make him such a coward Goal 2: to find a new gang, likeminded folk who love music, who want to form not just a warband ... but a band!
Sshh ... secret squirrel!
Connection 1:Khu'pa: Elderly orc merchant that An'mal saved from a lynching by an angry mob of pitchfork weilding Ewwmans after he left Grahlstown. Connection 2:Aleese: Half orc merhcant in her late forties that An'mal saved from nefarious acts while her husband was being lynched.
An'mal travelled for several years with Khu'pa and Aleese as their caravan guard and general helping hand. Khu'pa taught An'mal how to use his staff with skill not just for beating out rhythms. It was thanks to the couple that An'mal found Yddraixal. Aleese saw a business opportunity supplying the camp and so they sought it out. Khu'pa and Aleese are the closest thing An'mal has to family now.
Memory: An'mal and his siblings alongside Slaish's son, Morrello, had grand dreams of one day striking out into the world as a travelling band. They planned to emerge from their parents shadows and lead the music themselves. W'ggl and Shagg would dress them all up with bright, magnificent colours and paints, styling their hair and clothes. They would go deep into the valley where the acoustics were even more amazing than the Auditorium and sing and play for the stones. The branded themselves the Stone Rollers. An'mal remembers the conversations they had where they swore their music would bring the horde to them and they would raise up a city where laughter and light were the laws and music was the city's soul. Even the Stubbards, Felfs and Ewwmans would bow before their magnificence and accept their place in the world in peace.
Mannerism: An'mal is very meticulous about his appearance. He loathes filth and squalor. No wonder the Stubbards and Felfs think the races of the wilds are savages. There is no excuse for uncleanliness. It's just laziness! And if one is going to perform and bring music to the world, then one should be as colourful as their music. If you are going to light the world, begin with yourself!
Quirk: Getting a proper 12 hours of sleep is not laziness! A properly rested body is better prepared to face the rigors of the day. Bugbears have reputations as lazy sods because they sleep 12 hours and then wake up to lay about til it's time to sleep again. That is not An'mal's way. He squeezes every drop of life out of the other 12 hours! Now ... wake him before he has gotten his full 12 hours of sleep and you'll quickly see why bugbears have such fearsome reputations (if your head is still on your shoulders after waking them up that is).
Trait 1: No matter how bad the situation gets I project a carefree 'she'll be right' aura. Trait 2: Talking about family makes me tremendously sad so I change the subject to something light immediately. Ideal: No more regrets: Life is an intricate song, lose yourself in the music, don't miss your opportunity cos' you only get one shot. Bond: Make music with me and you are part of the band - any who threatens the band will have their heads added to the drum kit Flaw: My sadness hides a deep shame. My shame hides a deep fear. I battle cowardice with a terrible rage.
Hope 1: Music will unite the people of the wilds and we will build a maginficent city together Hope 2: Yddraixal will embrace the music to bind us all into a band, recognise the genius of the drum kit and allow me to have my own space to build it and play it Fear 1: I didn't bury everyone back at Grahlstown after the massacre; the unburied ghosts haunt my dreams Fear 2: Siggaret still resides in my soul. He will take my soul again when my band most needs me and they will die, like my family died.
Pilcro: Smells bad, looks filthy. The rats he plays with all the time look far cleaner. Wee fellah needs someone to teach him about soap and how to wash his clothes.
Rhakkeg: That's a cool mask. Seems like a loner though, not someone looking to be part of a band. But that metal smell ... Raecharl used to smell like that sometimes. I wonder if he's a tinker? Wonder if he could help me put together my drum kit?
Bront: I'd like to play those heads on his belt. I wonder if he has more of that paint he uses to decorate himself.
Small: He's been touched by Siggaret. Careful! You might catch it!
Woppa: That shell... what sounds that might make! Seems to take sleeping with proper seriousness and lives life hard. Maybe there's music in that soul
Baaruk: A brother bugbear. Why does he keep his distance from me but talks to the small ones? Not sure but if he keeps tossing and turning in his sleep like that we're going to have words.
Gristle: So much music for one so small! He gets it!
Tigs: Seems friendly. A bit lost. But freindly.
Snow: That's a lot of canvas to work with ... I wonder if he'd let me paint him?
Stink: Peww! That smell is unnecessary.
Ayaga: The bags under his eyes ... he's not sleeping properly. That's not healthy.
Gtaot: There's a fellow who looks after himself. Could do with some colour to spice up his look though.
Harp: Those sounds ... genius! I wish I had such talent. I wonder if she sings?
Dagg: A fine lass! I wonder if she wrestles? Yeah, she defintely wrestles.
VGtoM Pg. 119
If you surprise a creature and hit it with an attack on your first turn in combat, the attack deals an extra 2D6 damage to it. You can use this trait only once per combat.
Bonus Action; Advantage on Strength checks and saves; Gain resistance vs B/P/S damage. Cannot cast spells or concentrate while raging. Duration 1 minute or until KO; ends if you haven't attacked or taken damage at the end of your turn; may end as a bonus action
Features and Abilities: Common, GoblinLanguages | Simple Weapons, Martial WeaponsWeapon Proficiencies | DrumsInstrument Proficiencies | Disguise KitTool Proficiencies | MediumSize | 30 Ft.Speed | You can see in dim light within 60 feet of you as if it were bright light, and in Darkness as if it were dim light. You can't discern color in Darkness, only shades of gray.Darkvision | Extended Melee Reach = +5 feet
When you make a Melee Attack on your turn, your reach for it is 5 feet greater than normal.Long-Limbed | Increased Carrying Capacity
You count as one size larger when determining your carrying capacity and the weight you can push, drag, or lift.Powerful Build | You are proficient in the Stealth Skill.Sneaky | If you surprise a creature and hit it with an attack on your first turn in combat, the attack deals an extra 2D6 damage to it. You can use this trait only once per combat.Surprise Attack | You can always find a place to perform, (inn/tavern/circus/theater/noble's court. You receive free lodging/food: modest/comfortable standard as long as you perform each night. Your performance makes you something of a local figure. When strangers recognize you in a town where you have performed, they typically take a liking to you.Background Feature: By Popular Demand | -- | -- | -- | --