"Nor stony tower, nor walls of beaten brass,
Nor airless dungeon, nor strong links of iron,
Can be retentive to the strength of spirit." -- Wm. Shakespeare (iconic bard)
Last edited by Lalato; 12th September 2003 at 01:00 PM..
Well, this description was picked for the final 26 for the Todd Lockwood contest but didn't win, so lets see what you guys can do with it
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As a towering pillar of muscled darkness, Zanatose Everhate stands a massive 15 ft. tall, draped in midnight robes of his station as the Arch Necromancer of the Realms. Being in posession of a body carved from obsidian, the Arch Necromancer appears to be an obsidian golem shaped to look like an battle hardened drow male (with a more human-looking body than the graceful elven form). His old body, that of a dessicated drow lich, lies encapsuled inside the stone that now contains his life essence and serves as his body.
His head, containing no decoration appearing as hair, is smooth, shiney, and covered in runic carvings which spill lavender and black flames all along his head and shoulders. This 'shadow mantle' crackles constantly, but doesn't seem to affect any of his clothing or items that might be around his head. His eyes are two large blood rubies which seem as expressive and pliable as living eyes. His face is sharp and angular (being made of hard to carve volcanic glass, one can expect that) with his chin being a flat chisled plain. A smile never crosses this creature's face, but it isn't known whether or not if it was carved like that or if he is just never satisfied with his own 'imperfections'. Unlike golems, Zanatose Everhate still moves as a living creature having no noticeable segments at the joints suggesting the body he possesses is fake at all.
His clothing is a volumous robe which remains open most of the time to show his chiseled chest and abdominal muscles (Think of the way Yul Brenner dressed in the 'King and I'). The robe itself seems to move as if in pain from touching its wearer. Faces, tortured and silently screaming, often form within its folds as he moves. When light shines upon it, noticeable runes can be seen floating and moving along the cloth. A belt of human and humanoid faces (sewn together at the sides) wraps his waist like a sash, holding spell component pouches in their sewn shut mouths. His massive legs are wrapped from his waist to just above his 'ankles' in black strips of cloth reminescent of a burial shroud (made to capture bodily fluids during mummification). His 'feet' aren't feet at all, but were completely carved to resemble boots.
Zanatose's weapons are a staff which is more than 20 ft. in length called 'Archimedes of the Huddled Masses', his spells, and the foot long razor claws which tip each of his unnatural fingers. Archimedes is a adamantite shaft decorated with thousands of precious black gems. The far end of the staff ends in a massive killing fork weapon and the three dimensional illusion of a skull which floats at the top of the staff spins and cackles manically in hundreds of different voices (thus, the 'Huddled Masses' title). This intelligent weapon never leaves Zanatose's possession and can always be seen within at least 30 ft. of the god of necromancy. The weapon is quite insane, being embeded with souls from when Zanatose was still 'mortal' and used it in combat. These souls often become the staff's dominant personality and annoy the lich-god to no end. His last weapon is a massive spellbook which is seemingly tied to his left hand by a thread of darkness. This book contains all necromancy spells which exist and those that will be created in the future of the Forgotten Realms. It has no specific appearance, as it constantly changes to resemble each and every book in which a new necromancy spell is penned. When a new spell is created, the book instantly changes to appear as the first book it is placed in.
__________________ Shawn "KingOfChaos" Muder
Fire Controlman 3rd Class, United States Navy
Founder, Realms of Evil Games and the Realms of Evil Network
My character is a female dwarf, with long blonde hair. She pulls her hair back into a ponytail, and has it braided (it's about hip length, braided). No beard on this lass, but she's got some noticeable side-whiskers. She's of a very stocky build, which is considered attractive by dwarf-standards.
She wears dwarven full plate mail armor (no helmet), and weilds a greatsword, which is wreathed in flames (She's a Cleric, and has cast Continual Flame on the blade, in honor of her deity, Haela Brightaxe). Kilona wears a dark cape (blue outside, dee red inside) over her armor. She has a Heward's Handy Haversack on, which has the rest of her stuff in it.
She was originally based off of this mini, for some inspiration. The link has a few different views of her.
TIA!
__________________ You wouldn't like me when I'm angry.
Let's see what you can do with my first Feng Shui character.
One Eye Tsui is a character in a Feng Shui game on these boards, a game that is looking rather defunct right now. He's your basic action-movie maverick cop -- an authority figure who has some major problems with authority figures. He lost faith in the criminal justice system long ago, and now uses his Colt Python Elite to deliver his own brand of justice to the scum on the streets.
He's basically a scruffy-looking Asian guy, and a rather big one at that, being about 5'10". He has a five o'clock shadow thing going on his face, which is usually in a bit of a scowl, and he has short and slightly messy black hair which partly covers his scalp. He's mainly a plainclothes cop, and dresses in a casual style, involving blue jeans and a jacket which makes him look cool and acts to conceal his big Python revolver, which he carries in a shoulder holster on the right side. He typically uses the Python in the left hand for reasons outlined in the next paragraph.
The reason this guy is called One Eye is because he lost his right eye in his first shootout with his brother and mortal enemy Johnny Tsui, with whom he has quite a history (see the Rogues Gallery thread for an explanation of what I'm talking about). He wears a pirate-style eyepatch over that lost eye.
EDIT: Looks like the game is back in session! YEE-HAW!
__________________ If I don't have lava in at least one aspect of my campaign I consider it a failure. - Wild Gazebo
Last edited by rbingham2000; 21st September 2003 at 09:13 AM..
And since he didn't get picked, I think I'll have a go at him. Its too bad, It would've been really awesome to see Lockwood do his version of him. Anyways, again...I'm not on Lockwood's artistic level, but I'll give it a try.
Sorry I haven't posted any new sketches in a long time. RL work has been keeping me busy day and night. I'll try to have some new stuff up when I get a breather.
And since he didn't get picked, I think I'll have a go at him. Its too bad, It would've been really awesome to see Lockwood do his version of him. Anyways, again...I'm not on Lockwood's artistic level, but I'll give it a try.
Sorry I haven't posted any new sketches in a long time. RL work has been keeping me busy day and night. I'll try to have some new stuff up when I get a breather.
Yay!
I don't care if you're as good as Lockwood or not All I care about is seeing varying artist's interpretation of what Zan looks like.
I have added a 3D rendering a friend of mine did of Zan's staff, Archimedes to this thread. It should help anyone who wishes to draw him to know what Archimedes should look like (but you can add your own spin )
__________________ Shawn "KingOfChaos" Muder
Fire Controlman 3rd Class, United States Navy
Founder, Realms of Evil Games and the Realms of Evil Network
I am posting this to provide further inspiration to any artist who wishes to render Lord Everhate under their hand. Warning, the following tidbit of this character's long history is not for the weak stomach. Evil is never pretty and should never be illustrated as such in fiction.
A Seed of Evil
Chapter One: The Annuals of Pain Forgotten
It's when the whip begins to feel like a feather caressing your back that you know you're about to pass out from the pain. The sickening sound of leather straps beating against pulpy flesh becomes a mere whisper in your ear and your assailant's insults are lost within the fuzzy echo of the searing agony inside your head. You hardly notice the steady trickle of blood from your torn back winding its way between the cheeks of your ass on its way to its destination; the vampire beast that is the cold marble floor beneath you. Tied to the ceiling by bloody links of chain, you only wish for death.
I spent much of my child hood in such agony, inflicted upon my naked and crippled body by my own family. I was the youngest son out of 35 children birthed by my mother, the slut Matron of House Everhate. I was the only son ever birthed by the bitch that bore me and she frequently rued the fact I ever slipped out of that slimy hole between her fat legs. I was seen as a failure for House Everhate, the legendary blessed House of Mordnessar. However, I was not the only one bore that night. My sister, Zandra, was also born and was in fact, the first child to see the lightless and cold world we live in. I came later, after the birthing had been thought, over as a pile of black and withered flesh which dropped to the floor as my sisters eased my mother into her bed to rest. I was left on the cold floor next to her bed for a day and a half before I was finally noticed when my cry of hunger broke the silence of the room and the smell of the rotting placenta around me could be tolerated no longer.
Once found, I was given to one of our derro slaves to suckle from her crusty nipple for the first year of my life. Halordra had just lost her own child when one of my older cousins had raped her with a short sword. She could now no longer have children, because the damage to her body had been so extensive that she had barely survived the experience. Since I was offensive to my mother, I was to be raised by this beaten and submissive creature who would most likely be slain before I reached the age of speaking. Truth be told, the old dwarf woman cared for me as she would have cared for her own child, had it lived I was left for days in a filthy crib made of rothe bone and hay that smelled of mold, with little or nothing to eat and no one to interact with. My sister, on the other hand, was completely pampered as all females born to House Everhate were. She was given everything she needed, and because of this, I survived the harsh conditions of my own young life. We shared something more than just simple kinship. A spiritual connection existed between Zandra and myself, one so strong that I literally stole life from her body more than 7 stories above in her silken crib.
Since I was sick most of the time, Zandra too felt the ill effects of my treatment as her body weight dropped slowly and she became listless and feverish. It was when we were both close to death that my uncle, a powerful necromancer, discovered the connection between me and my sister. In order for Zandra to survive, he explained before my sisters and aunts, I had to as well. My uncle explained that we shared one soul between two different bodies and that I had been an anomaly in our conception, an accident that should never have happened. The fact that I had been born with two club feet, black hair, and was seemingly blind seemed to back up his theory perfectly. I was quickly fetched by my cousin to be brought from the slave quarters far beneath the house compound back to the living quarters where my sick sister slept, but not before my derro caretaker had used me as a fleshy mace against the man who had violated her with a sword and had ruined any and all chance of her ever bearing a true child of her own. She had rather me die than give me up and she was prepared to ruin my cousin's life in the process by killing my sister as well. Luckily, I was taken away from the deranged dwarf as two house guards arrived and subdued her. I watched with milky white eyes as my cousin struck the only mother I had ever known to the floor to have his way with her a final time before relieving her abdomen of its contents with a final strike of his sword.
My child hood improved drastically after that point. I was moved to my sister's room where I was given a small crib in a darkened alcove normally meant to be a closet. There I stayed, fed some horrible substance by a kobold nanny whose name I never knew. My healthy slowly improved with frequent feedings and I was even bathed once or twice a month afterwards. However, I was never held, never talked to and generally ignored, even when my mother came in to see Zandra. When that rare event happened, the curtain to my closet was always closed and my light extinguished as not to make my presence known to the visiting mother. I knew, even then, not to cry when this happened lest I be gagged and bound in my bed by the kobold who shared the closet with me.
When I came to be of speaking age, it was apparent that I was mentally retarded, adding even more insult and injury to the mother whose face I never saw. I was ordered beaten at least once a day, not including any additional thrashings I got from ‘misbehavior'. I never learned how to speak correctly, always mixing up words or using them entirely wrong. I was told I often spoke backwards with a voice that a child my age should never possess. I was eventually forbidden to ever speak in the presence of others at the threat of physical harm.
I eventually was taught how to drag myself across the floor using only my hands. For my 25th birthday, I was given a piece of square surface wood with rickety wheels attached to the bottom of it. I used this ‘land raft' to get around the house for the next 10 years of my life, often fleeing my frequent beatings on the board so that it became stained in my blood time and time again. By the time I reached age thirty, the board was completely blackened with the substance and smelled of a copper mine, bearing the scars of that pain as much as my own backside did. The beatings were long and harsh and I was never spared the snake-headed lash even for the simplest of mistakes. I was disfigured even worse than I had originally been when I was born, with the hunch on my back very nearly cleaved from my shoulders during one such lashing and even had a useless eye put out as an inexperienced sister struck me across the side of the head with her whip from behind. I lost most of my nose and half of my face when one of my cousins, a chubby bastard named D'lorth, set his lizard mount on me as I listened to them train one evening. I very nearly died in that attack from the blood loss and infection if not for the order of protection granted to me by my sister's predicament. After being healed, I was again beaten senseless by my aunt for making her waste a spell on my unworthy and deformed flesh, my garbled pleas for mercy going unheeded for what had to be the thousandth time. When I was 30, my privates were removed with a blazing hot dagger and fed as a delicacy at a party that night being held as a morbid celebration as the sister born two years before us was granted the title of priestess and given her first snake whip, which I knew would find its first taste of blood from my back.
What amazed me later on in life after I regained my perfect mind is the fact that my sisters knew Zandra could also feel every lash, every piece of flesh knocked or sheared off my body, but continued to beat me anyway. When my 40th birthday neared, I was little more than black scar tissue with patchy black hair, one blind eye, and three fingers on my right hand. When she returned from Oloarsa'ticnilith as full priestess of the Spider Queen, she was instructed to care for me herself now and that no longer would I be fed or cleaned by anyone else other than her. It was her punishment for the ‘evil' I had brought when born and I knew she was going to beat me continually for what I had inflicted upon her just by existing. It never happened.
I was cared for by my sister as a human woman might care for her child. She defended me when my other sisters and aunts came to beat me and she even crafted me three new fingers from adamantite for my right hand. We had a bond that no other dark elf in existence shared with another and she considered us to be one creature, cruelly split a part into two bodies by whatever taskmaster had inflicted us with being born drow to begin with. I couldn't talk to Zandra, but she always seemed to know what I was thinking or wanted to say, but couldn't. When in the presence of others, she would often be forced to treat me poorly, but I knew in what heart I had left that it was an act that she had to continue for us both to remain safe. I eventually learn to walk on the sides of my feet, painfully, with her help and was gifted my first quarterstaff by Zandra to help me get around. The staff was enchanted and gave me the ability to hover a few inches off the ground and to move slowly forward, backward and side-to-side with a thought. Truth be told, I still preferred my land raft to the staff, as it was quicker and I had become quite adept at speeding down the halls on the contraption to avoid the painful whips of my sisters who would try and strike me to simply see if they could. It became a game to the females of my house and whoever could strike me with their whip as I jetted by them would win a small betting pool of gold pieces and small magical trinkets. I was fast though, and had learned how to dodge the strikes of weapons on the land raft and the pool was lost only once or twice before they became bored with it and forgot it. Eventually I was ambushed in the hallway outside my sister's room and my land raft was hacked a part with swords as I watched in what could only be described as abject horror. I screamed gibberish in my mourning as the younger children of my house vanished, giggling, down the hall. I had just watched my legs for the last 20 years be hacked to pieces and it felt like an old friend had just died in my arms.
My mind shattered then as something so terrible welled up from inside my guts that I could literally feel my skin begin to burn. Like a wraith, I flew from the floor and scrabbled down the hall after the sounds of retreating feet and laughter. That laughter turned to frightened screams as the house whipping boy came around the bend in the hall at a speed meant only for men who had legs that worked. I grabbed the nearest sister of mine, lifted her 20 year old body from the ground by her hair, and slammed her face repeatedly into the black marble stone that made up the walls of our compound. Only did I stop when I could no longer hear the squeals of pain escaping her crush face. Her brains now covered my hand as more of it landed on the floor than was now contained inside what was left inside the oddly shaped skull now hanging from the bloody hair entangling my fingers. Instantly what strength had been summoned into me quieted, causing me to drop to the floor into my younger sister's brain and bloody spinal fluid. I looked around and heard the sound of many armored footsteps heading my way and that is when I screamed Zandra's name in perfect drow for the first time in my life before passing out from the adrenaline convulsing through my broken body.
__________________ Shawn "KingOfChaos" Muder
Fire Controlman 3rd Class, United States Navy
Founder, Realms of Evil Games and the Realms of Evil Network
BTW, Chainlightning, if you're looking for possible paying work, you can contact me at RoETyrant@aol.com. I think your work is perfect and deserves publishing
__________________ Shawn "KingOfChaos" Muder
Fire Controlman 3rd Class, United States Navy
Founder, Realms of Evil Games and the Realms of Evil Network
I like them both! They are great! You got the look down. Of the two, the second picture seems more fitting....though it is hard choice to choose.
Thank you....it's wonderful work
No problem -- sorry about the dealy due to holidays. I am normally conspicuously prompt! If there is anything you were prefer ammedned, added or removed, now is the time to say so. I want to get it right after all!
No problem -- sorry about the dealy due to holidays. I am normally conspicuously prompt! If there is anything you were prefer ammedned, added or removed, now is the time to say so. I want to get it right after all!
I like it how it is....a very accurate portrayal of him. He even has that androgynous fey look I could not quite describe.
Is it okay for me to post it on a website when you are done? I would, of course, credit you and provide a link to your site...
__________________
Quote:
But "Evil" spelled backwards is "Live"...and we all want to live, don't we?
I always thought it would be cool to show off my character and the NPC that travels with him (DM's fav NPC that he wants to play as an actual character if he ever gets out from behind the screen), but I can't draw for beans, so hopefully someone can do me a favor and do a sketch of one (or both) od the following.
Hindel Lightfoot
Human Fighter/Rogue
Lawful Evil
Inflicted Were-rat
Height: 5'9" Weight: 140 lbs
Blind and wears a strip of cloth over where his eyes are
Wears long robes with a hood so he can hide his 'condition'
Wiry and nimble
Currently has a shaven head and a scruffy full beard and moustache
Cheeks are slightly gaunt (been a LONG while since this character has been able to stop moving around and eat properly)
Prefers to sneak around and strike with surprise with his rapier or one of his many daggers.
Doggen Goldblood
Dwarf Cleric of Dumathoin
Chaotic Neutral (I Believe)
Average Dwarven Height, Overweight
Loves To Drink
Wears Gem Encrusted Full Plate
Uses a Bash Axe (Dwarven Battle Axe at one end, warhammer head on the other) that is made out of crystal. occasionally uses a large shield.
Likes to swing first, swing hard, and swing often.
Often travels by portal.
__________________ "Life IS but a dream, but some dreams are nightmares" - Sean Scott
I'll try to have some new stuff up when I get a breather.
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