Effect of characters in novels on your game

[shaylon]

I just finished reading Keith Baker's Eberron novel The City of Towers and it had a profound effect on my opinion of the artificer class. Reading the Campaign Setting gave me a decent idea of what the class was able to do, but actually seeing a character in the actions of a novel gave me a much better perception of what they were capable of.

The question I pose is this. What character in a novel, or even a sourcebook description, gave you a better understanding or appreciation for that class?

Examples:

Lei -> Artificer-Dreaming Dark series
Arilyn Moonblade -> Harper-Elfshadow
Danilo Thann -> Bard-Elfsong

I hope this exercise proves interesting!
-Shay

 

[Flyspeck23]

I just finished reading Keith Baker's Eberron novel The City of Towers and it had a profound effect on my opinion of the artificer class. Reading the Campaign Setting gave me a decent idea of what the class was able to do, but actually seeing a character in the actions of a novel gave me a much better perception of what they were capable of.

As a sidenote...
It might well be that Lei isn't a "pure" artificer, but has levels of some other class(es) too (monk, for instance).
So take her actions as a typical artificer with a grain of salt.

 

[shaylon]

I agree, Fly, but I didn't want to give to much of the novel away. My point was, that when I read the description in the ECS, I thought of the Artificer as a mechanic for warforged. To me that was what the class was designed for, even though they had some cool abilities not directly related to warforged. After reading the novel, I felt like I had a better understanding of the class. Lei may be much more than she seems, but before her I hadn't thought of Artificers as being so versatile.

Much in the same way as Danilo, another example I left. I thought pretty lowly of bard's until I read those novels. Elfsong gave me a reason to buy the Quintessential Bard, and I would actually consider playing one after that. Before that novel, it wouldn't have crossed my mind.

Thanks for the response.

-Shay