What was your favorite AD&D characters...

[DM-Rocco]

For those of you who have played the orininal, and in some ways the best, AD&D game, what where/are some of your favorite characters. Here are a few of mine, not complete with details, but a few details...

Calamar the Dark, Drow Elf, 23rd level Druid (Hierophant of the Cabal)/29th level wizard (Arch-Mage) The DM thought that racial limits sucked and made no sense but wanted to respect the rules, so after questing for the Gods, they allowed him to break the 18th level limit for Wizards in the Original Unearth Arcana. As a high level character he has many resources at his disposal but he loves his glowing ruby staff of Asmodeus the most. Over the course of many years he has lost it to the Arch-Devil only to gain it again at a later date. It is almost a game to get it back, currently he has it

Kronn the human 16th level barbarian. He rolled an 18/98 for his strength and a 17 on his CON, good rolls and then one day he drank two potions at once, a regenerating potion and a potion of heroism. Back in the AD&D game, if you drank more than one potion, you had to roll on a chart to see what happened. He didn't get the 00 for his STR roll, but he did for the drinking of two potions, which meant that one of them became a permenet effect, we rolled randomly, he ended up with 5 regen per round, vice nice. He also had a two handed axe that was curse, drove him insane, very fun to play, for me anyway.

Grogg, son of Grogg, 21st level half-Ogre. Half-ogre first appeared in an old dragon magazine and Grogg had a -4 CHR back in the day when a negative number meant you scared the hell out of people and didn't die. Just an all around fun character to play cause you could clear a small village just by staring at them.

Robillard, Human, 15th level assassin (Grandfather Assassin)/ 22nd level Thief (Master Thief), hey, who doesn't love a good thief?

Corrzzell, human, 7th level Fighter/8th level Thief/ 22nd level bard - this guy was a pure tank, nothing he couldn't do, except gain the last bard level, the campiagn folded before we could max him out.

Veenotheb, human, 31st master illusionist, a great trickster.

What are some of your favorites?

 

[Pants]

Hm, I don't get to play as much as I like and when I do, the campaigns usually die out rather quickly. So, I'll throw in my 3.0 characters for good measure.

Anyways...

Jurosh, 5th Level Human Fighter, AD&D 2e. He was a crass, Chaotic Good, drinking machine. Honestly, pretty cliche, but he was one of my first characters. He helped to cause a wildfire that almost destroyed a city, got thrown into a desert world through a planar vortex (which subsequently mutated him into a bizarre lizard-like human), caused some trouble on another Prime World, and got eaten by Vrocks in the end. I loved that character.

Orlend, 2nd Level Fighter/3rd Level Ranger, Elf, D&D 3.0. He was an antisocial, arrogant elf who knew that he was smarter than most everyone else and he flaunted it. Most arguments ended with him calling everyone else an idiot. He traveled through time, across distant seas, and in the end, he was bitten in half by a Cavern Hag. He was a blast to play. He was so unlikable, but so good at what he did.

Burlson, 8th Level Dwarven Cleric of Pelor. D&D 3.0/3.5. He replaced Orlend and he couldn't have been any different. He had suboptimal stats, and, until level 6 or so, he wasn't very good at anything. He was a goody-goody at heart and he helped bring down the cult of Mormo. Afterwards, things were looking good until an army of Half-Dragons invaded. He was the last member of the group standing against two very wounded Half-Dragon Fighters. Alas, he bit the dirt as well.

 

[EvilGM]

In no particular order...

Seelours, male human Fighter 21st lvl, AD&D. A madman and tactical genius. He led many successful raids and ended up conquering and expanding a nation with his numerous loyal followers. He fortified the heck outta his territory by funding castles and watchtowers in every conceivable location. He ended up going insane which led to the loss of his kingdom and his eventual demise.

Sarrfin, male human Magic-User 27th lvl, AD&D. A quiet, reserved man. He took it upon himself to learn every spell and research many more, but he only used magic when it was absolutely necessary - fearing the "balance" may be tipped. After a long adventuring career that took him across many worlds and planes, he retired to his studies and was never heard from again.

Gendarr, male human Thief, 17th lvl, AD&D. Started out homeless and ended up the guildmaster of one of the most powerful thieves' guilds in the campaign. He had no compassion for anything living - the only thing that brought him happiness was collecting more and more treasure and increasing his power base.

Lorelei, female drow Cleric, 19th lvl, AD&D. Heartless, cruel and calculating. Very powerful and she knew it. She destroyed everything she could. Her nihilistic attitude and aggressive attacks drew the ire of many heroes - which she killed mercilessly. Eventually, she was destroyed by the combined might of the Sun God's clergy and holy knights.

Cincuas, male and/or female (long story) Illusionist (+some), 37th lvl, AD&D. The Trickster who, in the end, tricked himself. Cincuas was fanatical about magical experimentation - and not all would go the way they were planned. Many of his awesome powers are a result of this experimentation. He has many wondrous abilities, including a multitude of rays/beams originating from the eyes and hands. He can be either male or female at any given time. Time does not operate normally for him. He is able to alter reality (on a limited basis) to suit his will. He is still alive, as not much can really affect him.

There are many more (ya, that's all we did for a looooong time), but that's enough for now.

 

[Wormwood]

Romulus Bloodbane, vampire drow 13th level fighter/magic-user.

In the heady days after Unearthed Arcana, all things seemed possible.

Sadly, killing Lolth proved to be an unattainable goal.

I still hate that ****.

 

[DM-Rocco]

I only listed the highest levels guys here too, we used to play 16 hours a day, alsmot every day. We had a lot of time on our hands


One of my lower level guys was Lord Pendrynn, Human, Paladin 13th level. I had to make him a Paladin, got lucky and rolled an 18 for CHR He often spent time redeming himself for alingment violations, DM was very strict about alignment, for Paladin inparticular. He died trying to gain a Holy Avenger sword from an Evil Wizard. His soul is trapped in a gem right now, still hope I guess.

I did have one character that was a wild elf fighter/cleric/rogue. God I can't remember his name, but he was roughly 5th level across the board. Fun to play but he was turned to stone by a demon in the abyss, a medusa/maralith combo thing.

 

[Stormrunner]

First memorable character (AD&D 1ed): "Snakey" the lizard-woman magic-user. Her actual name was Saanekii but humans always mispronounced it "Snakey" and she got tired of correcting them. Her brother "Sneaky" (a thief) died early on, but Snakey survived many adventures and I later "resurrected" her for The Fantasy Trip (precursor to GURPS), where she joined a group marriage with six other lizardfolk, and ended up dying as lizard shishkabob due to a charging, spear-wielding barbarian (darn those low initiative rolls).
Her replacement in TFT was Stormrunner the centauress, essentially a ranger/druid (though those classes per se didn't exist in TFT). I had a lot of fun with Stormy, and still convert her to various systems when I get the chance.

 

[The Great Bear King]

Kya, our party's idiotic druid. Her purpose was to cast healing spells, blessing spells, and animal spells. She didn't shape shift, though she could. Instead she let her animal companions fight for her, like her floating carp Magic Carp, who only knew three spells. The spells were, Wish, Summon the Great Whale, and Fish Shooter, and all of them at will (in 3rd edition terms). She also had as an animal companion, a 60 foot statue of the Egyptian cat goddess Bast. The druid was at level 16. We were fighting the wizards of Thay in second edition.

 

[Wolf72]

my drow ranger that I made right after Unearthed Arcana came out ...

died/ressurected 4 times (con went down to 11) ... had a cloak of displacement, but it was so darn effective against bad guys, lightning struck a tree which promptly fell on me and destroyed my cloak (we all laughed hard at that, very funny moment) ... fought with two longswords.

the best part was when I was down to my last 15 or so hp, I turned in to a dice rolling superstar ... the DM couldn't hit squat and I'd roll 20's and 19's all over the place.

 

[Mokona]

Kamire; a half-dwarf Pathfinder 12 (a Ranger kit). He was a former sailor and worshipped a minor patron of streams and rivers. A member of the adventuring company known as Fool's Followers. He was grouchy and demanded to be called by a procession of nicknames: ogreslayer, giantslayer, and finally Kamire Dragonslayer.

Fought to restore the queen and went to Hell to bargain for the queen's brother's soul from a pit fiend. Interestingly the pit fiend's daughter (a tiefling Bard we picked up in Sigil on our way to Hell) was an NPC in our party for many years afterwards.

 

[Bloodstone Press]

Glenshadow: Not one of my characters, but one I DMed for several years. He was at times NE, CG, and CE. He’s the central character to my homebrew. He’s a human wizard with a very high Intelligence, Charisma and Dexterity. His entire life has been played out in the game sessions. We’ve covered his life from 7 to 70 years old, from his early days as a homeless street urchin, to his days as the mighty sorcerer king, to his fall and very violent exit from the world. He has slain demons, and stood against gods. He shrugs off even the most powerful spells and has access to a nearly unlimited list of spells of his own. He ate Azlan (of Ravenloft) for lunch and later became a lich himself. He sold his soul for power, then wasted his life away, becoming bitter in the end and filled with rage.