Tina of Ophir

Tina of Ophir
(circa "The Black Stranger")

Human Female Commoner
1st Level

Hit Points: 3
Initiative: -1
Speed: 30 ft.
AC: 9 (Dex)
Attacks: Unarmed Attack -3
Damage: Unarmed Attack 1d4-3
Face/Reach: 5 ft. by 5 ft./5 ft.
Saves: Fort -1, Ref -1, Will +3
Abilities: Str 5, Dex 9, Con 8, Int 12, Wis 16, Cha 11
Skills: Swim +3, Listen +9, Spot +9, Gather Information +3
Feats: Skill Focus (Swim), Alertness

Climate/Terrain: Zingara, Pictish Wilderness, Ophyr
Challenge Rating: 0
Treasure: Standard
Alignment: Lawful Good
Advancement: by Character class

"A young girl came running over the low, sandy ridge, quite naked, her slight body dripping, and her flaxen hair plastered wetly on her small head. Her wistful eyes were wide with excitement ."

~Robert E. Howard, "The Black Stranger"

Tina is a young waif rescued by Belesa from a brutal master over a year ago. The child has an uncanny understanding of Belesa's inner thoughts and feelings.

Combat

Tina, as a child, is an ineffective combatant.

Robert E. Howard completed twenty-one Conan stories during the four years that he wrote them. Of these, seventeen were published in Weird Tales. The other four, rejected by Farnsworth Wright, the editor of Weird Tales, remained unpublished until many years after Howard's suicide. "The Black Stranger" is one of these four completed stories.

After it was rejected, Howard made an unsuccessful attempt to salvage the story as a pirate yarn, substituting his pirate hero, Black Vulmea, for Conan, and calling it "Swords of the Red Brotherhood."

L. Sprague de Camp later found the original draft of the Conan version of the story and severly edited it so that the story would fit better into his personal idea of Conan's chronology. This rewrite was titled "The Treasure of Tranicos." De Camp changed the ending of the story: In the original, Conan decides to take up piracy again. In De Camp's alteration, some Aquilonian nobles divine Conan's location and go there to pick him up so he can lead a revolt against the King of Aquilonia. De Camp also changed the identity of the Black Stranger, changing it unnecessarily from a demon from the outer dark to Thoth Amon. He further changed the names of some characters. Strom became Strombanni in De Camp's recension.

Howard's original tale, unedited, was first published in paperback in 1987 in Karl Edward Wagner's "Echoes of Valor". It has since been published in Millenium Press' "Conan Chronicles Volume 2", which was recently released and is still in print.

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