How did your Character Concept come about?

[Rel]

We just got done with a Mutants & Masterminds campaign and I thoroughly enjoyed my character. His origin was his name: Dr. Dark.

Dr. Dark was an actual doctor (a neurosurgeon) whose inability to save a couple of critically ill patients plunged him into a depression filled with "dark thoughts". That's when his mutant powers emerged and he realized that he had control over darkness, teleport from shadow to shadow, could shoot bolts of darkness, and could even detach his shadow and have it perform independant actions.

Dr. Dark genius quickly turned to criminal pursuits. He was a criminal mastermind who assembled a team of other individuals with powers to aid him in pulling off his diabolical plans.

Criminals being how they are however, this assembly of lackeys soon felt that they could get along without Dr. Dark. They conspired to leave him holding the bag for their next crime, leaving him with all the blame and them with all the glory. Dr. Dark's shadow overheard this plan however and Dr. Dark begat a triple cross!

He contacted an emerging group of "superheroes" and gave them the exact time and location where his lackeys would be in exchange for amnesty and allowing him to be part of their capture. It went as planned and his ex-compatriots were taken into custody. A side effect was that nobody in the criminal underworld would trust him any longer so he had little choice but to band together with the heroes and turn to the cause of good.

(That was his backstory.)

I had originally intended Dr. Dark to be this sort of brooding genius who was having a hard time using his powers for the forces of good. In practice he was more like an ascerbic dick. He was always quick to insult others, promote his own glory and generally be a gigantic public relations nightmare for his superteam.

It was, in short, hilarious and awesome. My fellow players took it in stride and ran with the idea, going to great lengths to avoid letting Dr. Dark talk to the media. The governmental organization that sponsored our team required that Dr. Dark undergo periodic psychological evaluations. Most of these he skipped, letting his Shadow stand in for him, sit there and tell them "how he felt".

Perhaps my favorite rivalry that developed was between Dr. Dark and "Myrmidon", the erstwhile leader of our team ("Vigil"). Myrmidon was a sort of Iron Man-esque dude in a power suit that was also a genius. In fact he was slightly more of a genius than Dr. Dark in terms of intelligence score. But Dr. Dark managed to beat Myrmidon in a memorable game of Chess, which I lorded over him ever after.

On the last night of the campaign, I had a few leftover power points to spend on my character before we engaged in the final big battle. I spent them to boost my Intelligence so that it was officially higher than Myrmidon's.

Spite for the win!

 

[EricNoah]

The concept for Vangkor, my half-orc wizard (for a Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil), came, oddly enough, after watching a documentary about black astronauts. The interviewees seemed to agree that they had to go above and beyond their white colleagues in knowledge and ability in order to just be on an even playing field within their careers.

So when I was putting together a "guild wizard" type character (you know, a dusty academic type who never thought he would be an adventurer), I envisioned this 29-year-old half-orc with aristocratic type clothing (frilly shirt, gold monocle) who already looked middle-aged (and indeed, was one year from hitting middle age!) to his human colleagues. I imagined a guy who had to work harder, and smarter, than everyone else in his academy just to stay afloat. I imagined a guy who saw his own mortality staring him in the face, knowing that he could well die of old age much earlier than his human counterparts, and that he might die not knowing some of the greatest secrets of magic. And I imagined the satisfaction he would get when at first his mission appeared to be routine grunt work but instead embroiled him in the greatest event in his professional life -- and indeed, the history of his world.

 

[justanobody]

I start with a persona I want the character to have. adjust that and then give them an alignment, then pick a race and adjust the persona and start adding the background, then pick a class that this persona might be most acceptable with. Lastly I scour websites for bits of words to make a name out of.

Then I break out the dice and get ready to put things on the character sheet.

 

[Vaslov]

My last character was a Eladrin Warlord. We were trying out 4.x and I really didn't have a feel for the character. All I knew is he was Eladrin far from home in the human realms.

Early on when we reached the village that served as our hub for the module we were in an Inn trying to get in touch with the local sage about some things we had heard about. He was pointed out to us in the corner of the inn talking up a pretty young lady. I decided I didn't want to wait to ask my questions and to open up the conversation I walked up to the table and said "Forgive me for intruding on your mating ritual, but I understand you are the town sage and I have need of your services."

When he leveled up I quickly dropped all his points in diplomacy relied on intimidation, which was great fun when talking with the local Duke who did not like our new goblin companion. The Eladrin Wizard with us took up a snooty attitude and between the two of us caused all sorts of grief for our PR department. The Snooty Twins were great fun to play.

 

[Mallus]

I apologize beforehand...

... my current D&D character is Sir Yatagan Fracas, a Dragonborn paladin whose Divine Challenge involves marking opponents with his semen, expelled, discreetly, from his cloaca onto his sword during battle. He's also a poet, specializing in an ancient form of Dragonborn romantic poetry that combines lyricism with barely-veiled threats of violence. He sounds --when I do the accent correctly-- a little like Patrick Stewart, specifically, Patrick Stewart addressing a crowd of people he believes to be ST:TNG fans, but aren't.

As to how he came about... well, it started innocently enough. I created him for a campaign meant to test out the 4e rules, so I choose one of the new races and a class that I never liked the implementation of in prior editions. At that point I began thinking about ways to characterize him; something bold, simple and memorable. I was also reading various ENWorld discussions on what 'marks' were supposed to represent... and then it just all came together (pun semi-intended). So my paladin's mark would involve the use of his bodily fluids. His Divine Challenge was partially biological in nature, like something a Larry Niven alien might do. Thus the idea of the Radiant Seed of Justice was born, something Yatagan carries in both his heart and other organ systems. Somewhere in the back of my mind of I was probably thinking of Immaculata, the character from Clive Barker's Weaveworld whose magic manifested itself as a silvery metaphysical menstrual blood called the menstruum.

After that, it was just a matter of filling in the details; Yatagan was very charismatic, but also repellent. He was overweight. He was both fearless and clueless, he didn't realize what non-Dragonborn thought of him. He was without anger or rancor. I also began to see him as a take on Don Quixote, seeing as he operates primarily in a world at some remove from the real one . I went to far as to give him a romantic interest, a nihilistic elven waitress (who belongs to a cult that worships a Sphere of Annihilation) named Dulsynada.

As for his name, it comes from two perfumes that my wife likes to wear simultaneously. That fact that 'yatagan' is actually the name of a kind of Turkish sword is pure serendipity.

When I described my character concept to my group most of then broke out laughing. A few managed to exclaim "WTF!". At that point I knew I had a winner. Character should be entertaining to everyone at the table.

 

[Shemeska]

Well, the concept I started out with (a moon elf druid of the Emerald Enclave from FR, curious/worried about the Phaerrim induced destruction of the land in Netheril-era Netheril) rather changed when you look at the character now (very old shadow dragon druid with much the same interests, but a bit more covetous for obvious reasons, and slowly growing more so under the influence of another dragon). Along the way he was briefly a vampiric half-shadow dragon, then a half-shadow dragon elf, and for a few days a female song dragon (don't ask). Interesting times doesn't begin to explain the whole of it.

And to think, I started out with a primarily spellcasting druid in order to differentiate them from a druid/shifter I played in an abortive RttToEE game years ago.

 

[Dragonwriter]

Well, my latest character is an monkey-man Cleric (D&D 3.5) that is always talking about and working on improving the banana. I created him as, essentially, a joke. I was thinking about a way to play one of this race, (Called Hanara, +2 Int, +2 Wis, -2 Str) and thought about, because of the Int bonus, playing a Wizard. Wizards craft items and I remembered the variant on potions in Complete Arcane which was potion-fruit. And what do monkeys love (in the cartoons and stereotypes)? BANANAS!!!

Then, it got even sillier. I got a possible scene running in my head, something like this:

Ftr is dying, after a battle. Clr stuffs a banana down his throat to heal him. Ftr wakes up.
Clr: "Me heal you with banana!"
Ftr: "But I'm allergic to bananas!" *Goes into allergic reaction and dying again*
(When I told my DM about this, he helped out, adding more)
Clr: "IMPOSSIBLE! No one can be allergic to bananas. You just need more to feel better! MORE!!!"
Clr continues stuffing bananas down the Ftr's throat, bringing to life, then dying over and over, with the Rog watching the whole thing for hours with sadistic glee.


Now, I have a custom magic item in the works... The Bag of Endless Bananas! It just generates bananas for my character to eat or pass around to his friends/allies. Things will keep getting crazier with this banana-obsessed monkey-man until someone can find a way to put a stop to it.

 

[WalterKovacs]

Jack Styles: Bard/Chameleon The name was basically directly connected to the concept of the character, and his character was in many ways similar to the character from Jack of all Trades, but with the magical flair added. If nothing else, he'd constantly flirt with the female NPC that was added to the party, and was a bit of the foil to the party's paladin, not so much confronting him, as being the second in command of the group, and generally mediating the animosity against the more CN members of the party and him, often playing the role of distracting him. His character ended up partially getting pulled into a later character that was a swashbuckler/rogue (with the feat to make the two classes sort of merge) and played closer to the routes of the characters name. The personality is fun to play, and on occaision he did some ridiculous things, such as using his whip on multiple occaisions to trip creatures that he probably had no right in tripping. The most interesting thing about him was probably that he was pretty mediocre, with a 14 in every stat but CON (10) and CHA (16), making him very reliant on magic items and his chameleon bonus to be competant.

Quella Gorgammin: Fighter/Ghost Faced Killer

Probably one of my most elaborate characters. I got invited to join a relatively high level campaign, so I took advantage and took a really cool prestige class I'd probably never be able to take with a stricter DM (and at lower levels). So I went with the Ghost Face Killer. One problem of course, was that it meant I had to be evil. The point where I'd be joining the party was in the middle of a vampire based adventure. They were visiting the southern continents that are ruled over by vampires, who have a number of living servants that keep them fed by capturing villages, etc.

The backstory is basically that the character was offered up as some sort of sacrifice to the vampire lord, but had messed it up and the whole village was going to be punished. She made a Silver Surfer-esque deal, claiming to be more useful than just food, and proved competant in a fight. To control her, and to assist her task, she was given a mask. It was basically an intelligent/cursed version of the mask of lies. The curse made it impossible to remove, made her "default form" a sort of ghostly presence, and required freshly spilled blood to trigger the disguise part. The other half was the intelligence present was a former ghost faced killer. The mask basically pushed her down the evil path, etc ... and ultimately she ended up hunting down her own people as part of her job, having lost much of her identity in that she can't really "revert" to normal form.

Upon joining the party she eventually started fighting back against the mask, and thanks to "divine" intervention [some powerful person purporting to be a god that forced the party into a gladitorial competition] she was able to permanently rid herself of the mask. At that point, she began her road to redemption. She was still a bit extreme in how she did things, but it was mostly focused towards good goals. The fact that a fellow party member was a half-field who was attempting to redeem himself gave her hope that she could do the same.

All that changed when the artifact bracers the half-fiend and the fighter were sharing ended up being shared by her and the half-fiend. Basically, the artifact allowed the sharing of power, but also allowed the stealing of powers. The half-fiend came across a cursed bean bag, where each bean had some sort of effect. The character pulled one bean, that forced everyone to jump constantly. Later, he pulled a bean and fell in love with it. The group decided that getting the bag from him is a good idea. Quella stole the bag, the group brought him to a cleric, telling him he'd be getting married to the bean, and the cleric removed the curse. When back to his right senses, he demanded Quella return the bag. When told that the group didn't want him to have it, he used the bracers to sap Quella of nearly all her strength to take back the bag. The breach of trust, especially in that it involved a failed battle of wills, which is exactly the sort of torment put onto her by the mask. Soon after she invested in some magic items to return her undetectable allignment and mask her thoughts (a LG psionic joined the party). Needless to say, no one in the party were using the "brother bracers" anymore after the incident.

For the rest of the campaign, Quella went along with the groups plan, but mostly in that it served her purposes to do so. The group were infiltrating an evil cult to achieve good ends ... Quella felt that an opportunity may arise that she can turn her allies, especially the half-fiend, over to the evil cult and perhaps gain greater favor with them. When the party ultimately succeeded, she retired to her position as baroness and spymaster to work on slowly manipulating her fiancee (who she was unable to "fail to save" during the party's mission ) in a Lady MacBeth fashion to ultimately take over the kingdom. The evil covert mission was one thing, but it would be hard to keep going with an evil PC going forward. A new PC came in, but things didn't really go for very long before that campaign fizzled out.

 

[Henry]

The character I am currently playing in an alternate future Forgotten Realms game, I was inspired by the "In Hextor's Name" story hour. I liked the idea of a cleric who wasn't evil, per se, but served an evil god, and who walked a morally grey line for the "greater good." Therefore, enter Brom Tondrath, Half-Orc Crusader of Bane. (Score no points on originality for the name or concept )

Brom grew up in a world where Mystra had been murdered in a plot by Shar (keep in mind this campaign originated six months before 4E had even been announced!); the world was in constant turmoil, and Brom grew up a bastard child with no family. All of his sense of structure and self came from the regimented lifestyle of the Zhentil Keep Army, and from the Priesthood of Bane. He never seemed to have much calling for the priesthood, but showed aptitude for the semi-mystical powers of the Crusaders of Bane (Book of Nine Swords) and his life was spent in service to bodyguarding the Priests of Bane.

After travel all over the Sword Coast and the North, the forces of Red Wizards and the Zhentarim have joined to lay waste to the world with a massive army; Brom is having a crisis of faith now, as the organization he knew and idolized growing up as the only source of security in a chaotic world is now causing mass destruction and massacres across Faerun. He's always seen Bane as a source of order, and a source of protecting the innocent, as long as they obey their superiors. I'm not sure where I'll take him -- he might even change alliegences to Helm, God of Guardians in the end, or he might try to form his OWN sect of the True Teachings of Bane in his own image, and show people that Bane is the God of Security and Order in the end. Anyway, I'm having fun challenging the group's preconception's of what Banites are supposed to be like (all the while performing some rather questionable judge/jury/executioner acts behind the scenes that they don't know about )

 

[Mathew_Freeman]

Warforged Cleric named The Promise of Distant Thunder, 4e.

I hadn't really thought much about Warforged before 4e. I knew about them, but hadn't seen the stats or anything. When WotC produced the Dragon article about them it really sparked my interest.

Reading the 4e rulebook made me want to try out a Cleric. I always love the way in which faith in D&D is a concrete reality in the world - you ask favours of your God and they respond, granting you power. Plus, you can do a great job of striding into melee and laying waste with your divine power. What's not to love?

Finally, the name is heavily influenced by Iain M. Banks Culture novels. The interstellar ships in that all have impressive, if sometimes whimsical, names, and "The Promise of Distant Thunder" seems to invoke a nice sense of wonder.

Then, I spoke to my DM and we agreed that in his Norse campaign, Warforged were created to defend humankind, but that they had all disappeared a long time ago. So the campaign opened with the other players discovering my character trapped in ice and unaware of the passing of time - until they freed him. From then on, you can read what happened in the Swordlands Story Hour - link in my sig [/shameless plug].