Reno
2017-07-29, 07:41 AM
Hello, everyone.:smallsmile:
As someone in my group have volunteered to DM a game in 5e, I have decided to make a character in the system. As it is the first time I dabble in 5e (the last time I played D&D is shortly after 4e hits the bookshelves), some advice on both fluff and crunch will be greatly appreciated.
The DM in question has not really divulged a lot about the setting of the world, though it is known that the campaign will begin with lv 1 character, and he thinks it would be "a bit too fast" if we hit lv 2 by the end of the first session. After some conversation he also agrees that necromancy is not inherently evil in his world, so that helps.
Race: Elf (Wood Elf)
Class: Cleric (Death Domain)
Ability Score: Standard array
Str: 10
Dex: 14+2
Con: 13
Int: 8
Wis: 15+1
Cha: 12
Alignment: Lawful Good (Yes, see fluff for my attempt to justify)
Background: Custom ("Vigilante")
Spells (Cantrips, rather):
Chill Touch (class domain)
Guidance
Light
Thaumaturgy
Proficiency:
Insight (class)
Medicine (class)
Perception (race)
Stealth (background)
Survival (background)
Tool Proficiency: Cook, Herbalist (both background)
Equipment: Purchase with starting wealth
Rapier
Shield ("buckler" per character image design, bears the holy symbol)
Leather Armour
Common Clothes (maybe Costume Clothes would be more fitting thematically? Also see robes)
Robes (as per character appearance)
Holy Symbols (amulet and emblem)
Explorer's Pack
Signal Whistle
Cook's Utensils
Herbalism Kit
Iron Pot
Money: 25.45 GP (starts with 100)
Name: Au'nosta Celeb'fanya
Age: 108 (being elf)
Sex: Female
Height: 5' 6" (rolled)
Weight 148 lb (rolled)
Hair Colour: Ash-blond
Eye Colour: Cerulean
Skin Colour: Copper
Personality Traits:
Eager to Help - If someone is in trouble, she is compelled to lend help as much as she should.
Serene - No matter the disaster, she always keeps her composure.
Ideals: Fairness - all are born equal, and deserve to be treated the way they deserve.
Bonds: Protector of the Weak - She protects those who cannot protect themselves, sometimes against those who refuses to do so.
Flaws: Trust Issues - It is an old wound, but the perceived betrayal in her past makes her less trusting than she would be otherwise, even to the rest of her team and those she helps.
A wood elf of slightly toned build, Au'nosta has a pair of sharp, cerulean eyes. Her chest-length pale blond hair is often concealed by a grey cloak. As part of her training as acolyte, many part of her smooth copper skin is decorated by pale, stylised curves tattooed onto her.
When she is performing her duty, Au'nosta dons herself the costume that symbolises death, the Great Equaliser. Using the ashen cloak as a mantle, a bovid skull is used as her headgear, either as a hat or as a mask. Au'nosta arms herself with a rapier and a buckler, both bearing the same pale white tone of death. On her buckler she bears the holy - of a given value - symbol of her deity: a humanoid skull holding a scroll with its jaw and a quill with its opened skull cap.
Although a wood elf by birth, Au’nosta is not raised in the wild woodlands of her kind. Deeply buried within her dreamy trance, she faintly recalls herself alone and lost within the dark woods, before being carried to the warmth of her adopters. It was a humble little inn, offering a simple place to rest for weary travellers through the rural land, demanding little more than what the small house needed to continue its service. She remembered little of her first adopters but their hearty and gentle care, who taught her kindness and how to manifest it through her cutlery.
The simple life, however, did not last long, as least for an elf. Despite their modest lifestyle, the brawny men who were offered shelter by the household decided to outstay their welcome. Perhaps it was because the tavern stood beyond watchful eyes of the law, or that it was useful to lure unsuspecting travellers, or that the elven child proved to be quite desirable for them, they opted for occupying the roadhouse in the middle of the night. By dawn, Au’nosta had lost those who cared for her, instead being ruled over those who only seek to exploit her.
Restraints and threats were enough to keep the devastated girl in their service, posing as façade of hospitality for the bandits to prey on travellers who made the mistake of staying here for a night, only to have it prolonged to eternity beneath the soil nearby. As their tool, she was forced to take part in all their operation and to satisfy them by their whim.
After one too many night of abuse, her sorrowfulness and anger finally overwhelmed her dread. Using the cutlery that bore the final connection to better days, she delivered the reckoning that the bandits deserved, and rewarded herself with the first full meal she had had for a very long time. No longer wishing the tainted memories of her to haunt the world, she had the stove undertook its final duty and left the engulfing flame behind.
The young elf wandered the dark woods, subsisting on whatever the land mercifully offered, before being inducted by a noble and carried back to his demesne. Receiving care and warmth she has not experienced for a long time, Au'nosta was later inducted into the priesthood residing within the noble's family crypt.
Her then-undeveloped mind did not fully understand why her patron was wary of formally adopting an elf who had a much longer lifespan than many other races, but the clergy did care for her and taught her many skills and knowledge. The noble, being their patron, also took his time to visit Au'nosta and serve as her adopted parental figure, rekindling the warmth that she had lost once, and perhaps something more.
The crypt priests dedicated themselves to a long-forgotten god of death as the Great Equaliser - the eternal tranquillity that embraces all regardless of wealth or power. Although the forgotten god bestowed upon them the power to manipulate life and death, their power has long since waned, and the priesthood dedicated themselves to impassive documentation of fated death of the mortals past and present.
Yet, the alluring power to cheat death has long been irresistible for mortals. As the young noble aged, dread of mortality took hold of his ailing mind. The scriveners were requested to invoke their long-forgotten god to extend his life beyond the fated time - in the expense of his subjects in the demesne.
Partly out of duty and partly out of gratitude, Au'nosta did not answer the terrible echoes within the crypts that had since drowned the corridors. However, it soon manifested itself in her daily trance - as the Great Equaliser. Confronted by where her loyalty should lie, the wood elf endured an internal struggle that felt as long as eternity itself. However, ultimately clarity dawned in her mind, and she became determined to do what she has to.
At that fateful dusk, Au'nosta donned herself a skull and a long, grey shroud - the embodiment of her god. Concealing herself, she presented herself before the senile noble in her new identity as "Death's shroud", intending to make the noble pay for all the life his action had cut short.
Her skill in manipulating the power of death is more than enough to compensate her lack of experience in combat. Soon, the noble was reduced to a rotting corpse. However, in his last moment, the embrace of tranquillity offered his mind clarity, and he identified his assassin, mustering his last breath to her.
Are they words of hatred, condemning her of her ingratitude, that she repaid his kindness and patronage with blood? Or are they words of remorse, atoning the sins he has commanded when his judgement was clouded by fear? Or are they words of love, confessing his ultimate intention to be achieving a long life like her, so that they could share their life with each other to the fullest? No one knows, and, perhaps, it ultimately does not matter.
She escaped the demesne that very night, leaving all her past behind. The only thing she carried with her is the silvery shroud and the skull, the holy symbol of the Great Equaliser. Since then, she has wandered the mortal world, intending to protect those who cannot protect themselves from untimely death, as well as to deliver retribution to those who wished to cause such death:
Death has come for them, and she is its shroud.
The character concept originated from several guides I stumbled upon when researching about the system, in particular the marvellous guide The Devout and the Dead: a guide to Clerics by Yorrin. After clearing with the DM that I can, indeed, play as a Lawful Good Death Cleric, I start piecing elements from what I found interesting with backstory to justify it, with the above paragraphs as the final product.
In terms of the core of her backstory, I believe that her first life experience in the adopted inn should instil her with a strong sense of justice, of what the order of things should be, as well as the will to enforce it herself personally to right what is wrong. Despite the cathartic closure of that part, its self-motivated nature results in me deciding to give her a second reinforcement manifested in her second life experience in being taken by the local noble and inducted into the clergy serving his family crypt.
Although it is only implied, the priesthood is designed with Jergal in mind, but probably with some liberty in interpretation. Her internal struggle between her own will of seeing justice be delivered (vaguely "good") and the values she is taught in their care ("lawful", as per the Lawful Neutral alignment of the clergy) finally results in her choosing to enforce her own kind of justice - the noble might be the lawful authority of that small patch of land, but his unjust laws force her to take direct action to uphold what she sees as good.
For her skill proficiency, apart from perception which is from her race, I chose insight both because of her high wisdom that implies her being good at it, and her early days working in an inn (and later under occupying bandits) makes her life depends on it. Stealth and survival were chosen because I imagine she spending most of her time between her two stories (and between them and the "present" of the campaign) in the wild, where her relatively weak body mandated her to be good at surviving in the wild and avoiding attention from beasts and bandits alike. The last, medicine, is related to her proficiency in herbalism and cooking.
Both of her tool proficiency (herbalism and cooking) originates as her knowledge in cooking for the rural inn during her first story. It is quite likely that her first adopters taught her about using local herbs to make better food for the travellers, given how infrequent supply from market would be. On a darker turn, it is likely that she utilised some of those knowledge when being forced to cook for her captors to weaken them before defeating them. While not exactly a Lawful Good behaviour, if the campaign does go south, she might, in desperation, uses some of the more morally questionable aspect of her cooking skill to enhance her team's (fluff, at least, depending on whether the DM wants to grant mechanical consequence of it) performance for the greater good.
Several questions on my part remain, though, both in crunch and fluff of this character. In terms of crunch, I would like to know if my choices would be good in functionality (not burdening the team, at least, and hopefully being able to save the day occasionally when the circumstance requires) and justification (some of them are admittedly picked because they are considered "useful" in usual campaigns). Suggestions for future character development in crunch will also be greatly appreciated. A more specific question is that whether I should swap Str and Int score? On one hand, Strength feels marginally more useful than Intelligence, but on the other hand, I feel that her character upbringing suggest her strength would be weaker than her intelligence, so I am a bit conflicted on that.
As for fluff, apart from question of whether my design makes sense, any suggestions on either modifying the original design, as well as pointers on how to roleplay her accordingly would be greatly appreciated as well. :smallbiggrin: A particular concern of mine is that, while the DM has greenlit it, her alignment. Would my justification be enough to put her in Lawful Good despite being more or less a vigilante and a practitioner of necromancy? While it will be a while before she is able to cast Animate Dead (and the GP cost can be prohibitive from the look of it), I do not intend her to reject that possibility entirely. Would it be compatible with her alignment? What approach in roleplay and usage would make it more compatible?
As someone in my group have volunteered to DM a game in 5e, I have decided to make a character in the system. As it is the first time I dabble in 5e (the last time I played D&D is shortly after 4e hits the bookshelves), some advice on both fluff and crunch will be greatly appreciated.
The DM in question has not really divulged a lot about the setting of the world, though it is known that the campaign will begin with lv 1 character, and he thinks it would be "a bit too fast" if we hit lv 2 by the end of the first session. After some conversation he also agrees that necromancy is not inherently evil in his world, so that helps.
Race: Elf (Wood Elf)
Class: Cleric (Death Domain)
Ability Score: Standard array
Str: 10
Dex: 14+2
Con: 13
Int: 8
Wis: 15+1
Cha: 12
Alignment: Lawful Good (Yes, see fluff for my attempt to justify)
Background: Custom ("Vigilante")
Spells (Cantrips, rather):
Chill Touch (class domain)
Guidance
Light
Thaumaturgy
Proficiency:
Insight (class)
Medicine (class)
Perception (race)
Stealth (background)
Survival (background)
Tool Proficiency: Cook, Herbalist (both background)
Equipment: Purchase with starting wealth
Rapier
Shield ("buckler" per character image design, bears the holy symbol)
Leather Armour
Common Clothes (maybe Costume Clothes would be more fitting thematically? Also see robes)
Robes (as per character appearance)
Holy Symbols (amulet and emblem)
Explorer's Pack
Signal Whistle
Cook's Utensils
Herbalism Kit
Iron Pot
Money: 25.45 GP (starts with 100)
Name: Au'nosta Celeb'fanya
Age: 108 (being elf)
Sex: Female
Height: 5' 6" (rolled)
Weight 148 lb (rolled)
Hair Colour: Ash-blond
Eye Colour: Cerulean
Skin Colour: Copper
Personality Traits:
Eager to Help - If someone is in trouble, she is compelled to lend help as much as she should.
Serene - No matter the disaster, she always keeps her composure.
Ideals: Fairness - all are born equal, and deserve to be treated the way they deserve.
Bonds: Protector of the Weak - She protects those who cannot protect themselves, sometimes against those who refuses to do so.
Flaws: Trust Issues - It is an old wound, but the perceived betrayal in her past makes her less trusting than she would be otherwise, even to the rest of her team and those she helps.
A wood elf of slightly toned build, Au'nosta has a pair of sharp, cerulean eyes. Her chest-length pale blond hair is often concealed by a grey cloak. As part of her training as acolyte, many part of her smooth copper skin is decorated by pale, stylised curves tattooed onto her.
When she is performing her duty, Au'nosta dons herself the costume that symbolises death, the Great Equaliser. Using the ashen cloak as a mantle, a bovid skull is used as her headgear, either as a hat or as a mask. Au'nosta arms herself with a rapier and a buckler, both bearing the same pale white tone of death. On her buckler she bears the holy - of a given value - symbol of her deity: a humanoid skull holding a scroll with its jaw and a quill with its opened skull cap.
Although a wood elf by birth, Au’nosta is not raised in the wild woodlands of her kind. Deeply buried within her dreamy trance, she faintly recalls herself alone and lost within the dark woods, before being carried to the warmth of her adopters. It was a humble little inn, offering a simple place to rest for weary travellers through the rural land, demanding little more than what the small house needed to continue its service. She remembered little of her first adopters but their hearty and gentle care, who taught her kindness and how to manifest it through her cutlery.
The simple life, however, did not last long, as least for an elf. Despite their modest lifestyle, the brawny men who were offered shelter by the household decided to outstay their welcome. Perhaps it was because the tavern stood beyond watchful eyes of the law, or that it was useful to lure unsuspecting travellers, or that the elven child proved to be quite desirable for them, they opted for occupying the roadhouse in the middle of the night. By dawn, Au’nosta had lost those who cared for her, instead being ruled over those who only seek to exploit her.
Restraints and threats were enough to keep the devastated girl in their service, posing as façade of hospitality for the bandits to prey on travellers who made the mistake of staying here for a night, only to have it prolonged to eternity beneath the soil nearby. As their tool, she was forced to take part in all their operation and to satisfy them by their whim.
After one too many night of abuse, her sorrowfulness and anger finally overwhelmed her dread. Using the cutlery that bore the final connection to better days, she delivered the reckoning that the bandits deserved, and rewarded herself with the first full meal she had had for a very long time. No longer wishing the tainted memories of her to haunt the world, she had the stove undertook its final duty and left the engulfing flame behind.
The young elf wandered the dark woods, subsisting on whatever the land mercifully offered, before being inducted by a noble and carried back to his demesne. Receiving care and warmth she has not experienced for a long time, Au'nosta was later inducted into the priesthood residing within the noble's family crypt.
Her then-undeveloped mind did not fully understand why her patron was wary of formally adopting an elf who had a much longer lifespan than many other races, but the clergy did care for her and taught her many skills and knowledge. The noble, being their patron, also took his time to visit Au'nosta and serve as her adopted parental figure, rekindling the warmth that she had lost once, and perhaps something more.
The crypt priests dedicated themselves to a long-forgotten god of death as the Great Equaliser - the eternal tranquillity that embraces all regardless of wealth or power. Although the forgotten god bestowed upon them the power to manipulate life and death, their power has long since waned, and the priesthood dedicated themselves to impassive documentation of fated death of the mortals past and present.
Yet, the alluring power to cheat death has long been irresistible for mortals. As the young noble aged, dread of mortality took hold of his ailing mind. The scriveners were requested to invoke their long-forgotten god to extend his life beyond the fated time - in the expense of his subjects in the demesne.
Partly out of duty and partly out of gratitude, Au'nosta did not answer the terrible echoes within the crypts that had since drowned the corridors. However, it soon manifested itself in her daily trance - as the Great Equaliser. Confronted by where her loyalty should lie, the wood elf endured an internal struggle that felt as long as eternity itself. However, ultimately clarity dawned in her mind, and she became determined to do what she has to.
At that fateful dusk, Au'nosta donned herself a skull and a long, grey shroud - the embodiment of her god. Concealing herself, she presented herself before the senile noble in her new identity as "Death's shroud", intending to make the noble pay for all the life his action had cut short.
Her skill in manipulating the power of death is more than enough to compensate her lack of experience in combat. Soon, the noble was reduced to a rotting corpse. However, in his last moment, the embrace of tranquillity offered his mind clarity, and he identified his assassin, mustering his last breath to her.
Are they words of hatred, condemning her of her ingratitude, that she repaid his kindness and patronage with blood? Or are they words of remorse, atoning the sins he has commanded when his judgement was clouded by fear? Or are they words of love, confessing his ultimate intention to be achieving a long life like her, so that they could share their life with each other to the fullest? No one knows, and, perhaps, it ultimately does not matter.
She escaped the demesne that very night, leaving all her past behind. The only thing she carried with her is the silvery shroud and the skull, the holy symbol of the Great Equaliser. Since then, she has wandered the mortal world, intending to protect those who cannot protect themselves from untimely death, as well as to deliver retribution to those who wished to cause such death:
Death has come for them, and she is its shroud.
The character concept originated from several guides I stumbled upon when researching about the system, in particular the marvellous guide The Devout and the Dead: a guide to Clerics by Yorrin. After clearing with the DM that I can, indeed, play as a Lawful Good Death Cleric, I start piecing elements from what I found interesting with backstory to justify it, with the above paragraphs as the final product.
In terms of the core of her backstory, I believe that her first life experience in the adopted inn should instil her with a strong sense of justice, of what the order of things should be, as well as the will to enforce it herself personally to right what is wrong. Despite the cathartic closure of that part, its self-motivated nature results in me deciding to give her a second reinforcement manifested in her second life experience in being taken by the local noble and inducted into the clergy serving his family crypt.
Although it is only implied, the priesthood is designed with Jergal in mind, but probably with some liberty in interpretation. Her internal struggle between her own will of seeing justice be delivered (vaguely "good") and the values she is taught in their care ("lawful", as per the Lawful Neutral alignment of the clergy) finally results in her choosing to enforce her own kind of justice - the noble might be the lawful authority of that small patch of land, but his unjust laws force her to take direct action to uphold what she sees as good.
For her skill proficiency, apart from perception which is from her race, I chose insight both because of her high wisdom that implies her being good at it, and her early days working in an inn (and later under occupying bandits) makes her life depends on it. Stealth and survival were chosen because I imagine she spending most of her time between her two stories (and between them and the "present" of the campaign) in the wild, where her relatively weak body mandated her to be good at surviving in the wild and avoiding attention from beasts and bandits alike. The last, medicine, is related to her proficiency in herbalism and cooking.
Both of her tool proficiency (herbalism and cooking) originates as her knowledge in cooking for the rural inn during her first story. It is quite likely that her first adopters taught her about using local herbs to make better food for the travellers, given how infrequent supply from market would be. On a darker turn, it is likely that she utilised some of those knowledge when being forced to cook for her captors to weaken them before defeating them. While not exactly a Lawful Good behaviour, if the campaign does go south, she might, in desperation, uses some of the more morally questionable aspect of her cooking skill to enhance her team's (fluff, at least, depending on whether the DM wants to grant mechanical consequence of it) performance for the greater good.
Several questions on my part remain, though, both in crunch and fluff of this character. In terms of crunch, I would like to know if my choices would be good in functionality (not burdening the team, at least, and hopefully being able to save the day occasionally when the circumstance requires) and justification (some of them are admittedly picked because they are considered "useful" in usual campaigns). Suggestions for future character development in crunch will also be greatly appreciated. A more specific question is that whether I should swap Str and Int score? On one hand, Strength feels marginally more useful than Intelligence, but on the other hand, I feel that her character upbringing suggest her strength would be weaker than her intelligence, so I am a bit conflicted on that.
As for fluff, apart from question of whether my design makes sense, any suggestions on either modifying the original design, as well as pointers on how to roleplay her accordingly would be greatly appreciated as well. :smallbiggrin: A particular concern of mine is that, while the DM has greenlit it, her alignment. Would my justification be enough to put her in Lawful Good despite being more or less a vigilante and a practitioner of necromancy? While it will be a while before she is able to cast Animate Dead (and the GP cost can be prohibitive from the look of it), I do not intend her to reject that possibility entirely. Would it be compatible with her alignment? What approach in roleplay and usage would make it more compatible?