Fledgling Pathfinders

6 Comments

1. Here’s the first of the Pathfinder hopefuls.

   Tokunbe Ola-Olorun: Mwangi (human) Cleric of Desna

   • Voice of the Forest: Tokunbe received training in childhood by his village’s witch doctor. He is sensitive to, and respectful of, the spirits of the forest. He would generally avoid wholesale forest destruction, and might occasionally get an inkling concerning a danger to the forest. He might also interpret the interplay of animals on trees, shadows dappling the leaf litter, etc. as a message from the forest spirits, and thus be distracted.
   • Rapid Eye Movement: Tokunbe’s eyes are always in movement, roving and jumping from place to place, always trying to see all that is going on around him. When he is asleep, his extremely vivid dreams result in his eyes moving almost continuously under his lids. Tokunbe might notice details that others would miss. He might be interpreted as fidgety or dishonest due to a failure to look someone straight in the eyes for an extended time period. The transition from sleep to wakefulness will be difficult and confusing for Tokunbe. Desna sometimes chooses to speak to Tokunbe through his vivid dreams.
   • Landlubber: As a survivor of a sinking ship who spent 11 days afloat at sea, Tokunbe has no desire to take another sea voyage. While he adores traveling, and may realize deep down that at some point he may find no alternative to ship-borne travel, he will always try to find some other path. Tokunbe would be nervous and uncomfortable aboard a ship, especially if it were going beyond view of the coast. Whining might occur in some instances.
   • Hero Worship: Bart “Iron-Hand” Ellesmere: The merchant who fished Tokunbe out of the sea was staked his seed money by his beloved uncle and MIA Pathfinder, known as “Iron-Hand.” This colorful figure, missing for 10 years now, was a successful Pathfinder in every sense of the term until he failed to return. Tokunbe has been regaled by hours and hours of tales of Iron-Hand’s exploits, and has consistently felt some kind of resonance with this person. Tokunbe has been known to stare at a portrait of Iron-Hand for hours, and often feels that the portrait is looking back, trying to communicate something.
   • True Believer: After completing his basic training as a Priest of Desna with a 28-day Dream Quest, Tokunbe has forged a personal connection with his goddess. He will always attempt to follow a path he feels she has laid out for him. He will cheerfully serve those around him as a tribute to Desna.
   • Talespinner: Nights around the campfire, the dinner table, etc. have filled Tokunbe with a love of story-telling. He is always eager to learn new stories, and delights at trying to tell his own stories, as well as those he has learned, in such a way as to heighten the enjoyment of his audience. Some priests of Desna host concerts, others operas–Tokunbe would tend to view a shared evening of (sometimes tall) tales as a delightful way to have fun, meet people, and serve Desna all at the same time.
   • Curse of Kho: The chunks of translucent green and blue in which Tokunbe toiled as a child were parts of the fabled “Ruins of Kho,” a crashed Shory sky-city from the Age of Destiny, although Tokunbe does not know that. His weeks of digging amongst these remnants from an earlier age have left him with a strange connection to Kho, among others a piece of the curse that tends to follow those who disturb such ruins back to their everyday lives. Any contact with relics from Kho would tend to resonate strangely with Tokunbe, and he would certainly be intrigued by such resonances. Of course, this could be a fatal attraction…

2. Shiva the Cerulean Witch: Eladrin Wizard

   • Sea Legs: Her parents being seafaring merchants, Shiva is very comfortable at sea. She would often pilot her parent’s ships into the numerous ports of call and navigate while on long sea voyages. She is fluent in nautical terminology and even has some experience avoiding pirates. She has been known to predict weather and she is also familiar with the night sky.
   • Cosmopolitan: Shiva has experienced many different cultures from her travels with her parents. Her thirst for knowledge started at an early age. She would soak up much of the languages and customs of each port she visited. She would do her best to socialize with the locals and even attempted to read books written in foreign tongues. She is eager to share this knowledge when warranted.
   • Humanitarian: As a young girl, by her people’s standards, Shiva cherished all livings things. She was not only fond of the animals that inhabited the many places she visited but she was also quite fond of humans. Many of her race found her fondness of humans to be a fault. She once risked her live to save that of a young boy from drowning while traveling the seas near Oppara. This boy was a Taldan from the House Talan.
   • Chilled to the Bones: While navigating one of her parent’s ships in the north a nasty arctic storm capsized her ship. Near death from the fringed climate, she was found and enslaved by a Linnorm. The Linnorm was in constant contact with the fey of the fey wild which helped to manifest some mystical powers within Shiva among other things. After spending time in those hostile environments she became adjusted to bitter climates and psyche.
   • Unbridled Passion: While enslaved by the Linnorm, the fey manipulated her into believing that she could earn favor with her captives by performing sexual acts. She enjoyed the sensation of control and the ability to manipulate situations. Little did she know, it was her captives that were in total control. If a situation arises were she can us her feminine faculties in her favor she will.
   • Women Scorned: After a good number of years enslaved Shiva was finally saved by an Ulfen tribe that in turn captured her captor. Upon her return to freedom she earned respect from the men the best way she knew how. This led to her eventually mothering a child by one of the Ulfen elite. She cherished this relationship among all others and she felt that motherhood suited her well. Until one day the father of her child in his bitter old age decided to seek revenge for her many indiscretions and with his dying wish asked their son to disown her. This act of jealousy by the man and the willingness of her adult son to comply left her confounded. She now has a cynical outlook toward relationships.
   • Fates Intertwined (Ottar): A short time after the death of her husband, a young Ulfen man, Ottar Brandrson, came to visit her seeking the truth of his fate reading at his birth. Shiva, after much coercing, preformed a reading of the skies (a trick she learned while in captivity) one by night and another by day and both revealed to her that her fate was entwined with that of this young man. From that moment she knew her only chance of finding the brightness was through this Ulfen youth. She is now committed to see that he fulfill his destiny.

3. Ohm: Exiled Dragonborn Rogue (Dragonborn are also known as Doragon Kora).

   • Rebellious Teenager: Ohm grew up under his father’s (and brother’s) iron rule. After being beat for questioning ideas and later for having personal ambition, Ohm is sometimes unpredictable with his open-mindedness to uncommon ideas and sometimes seems sensitive to the idea of being ruled or bullied through a system of fear.
   • Indoctrinated with Racial Pride: Even though Ohm disagreed whole-heatedly with the Doragon Kora’s idea of honor and social hierarchy, he still does feel a tremendous amount of pride for the history of his race and their collective accomplishments. He is very proud to be a member of the Doragon Kora, even if they expelled him from Edo.
   • Professional Soldier: Being a son of a member of the Royal Guard, Ohm was trained at the Academy in the art of warfare, historical exploits of the Doragon Kora, and simple techniques in formation and fighting. “A soldier is only as good as his plan to win!!” (a common Doragon Kora maxim)
   • Quest for Personal Honor: Ohm made a calculated decision to break his family’s oath to serve the Lord and the people thus resulting in his public shame and exile from Edo. Believing in his decision, Ohm is determined that he can find something or some status that will vindicate him and show his people that honor is something to be earned, not born into.
   • Conflicted Machiavellian: Although ingrained from a young age in the Doragon Kora’s personal code of honor, because of Ohm’s personal disagreements with it and his imposed social situation due to the exile, Ohm is still trying to figure out how far he will go to achieve his goal.
   • Scratch my Back, I’ll Scratch Yours: Ohm is not one to usually give himself to a cause apart from his own. There is no greater ethic (he thinks). And charity is rarely accepted.
   • Member of the Dragons of Shadow: The Varisian that started the gang chose Dragons to help instill pride in the Ulfens that joined it. The irony just pissed Ohm and the other Doragon Kora off. He was certain that Eccletel, the Varisian leader, used the “Dragonborn” to help recruit more thieves but it wasn’t his gang and Ohm had no choice but be a mascot. After being chased out of Elidir by some of his former peers for killing Eccletel, he knows of only one non-member that knows of his former allegiance. Hopefully, they just return to Karlsgard and forget Ohm’s face.

4. Andrzej Talan: Taldan (human) Fighter

   • You’re not better then me: Andrzej’s grandfather did not want his mother in his house or Andrzej when he was born. He threatened to disown his father and put it in his will that he looses everything. His older brother did not like him and did not want to have anything to do with Andrzej. He was never accepted by his father’s people and not accepted by those who he grew up with. He pretty much had his mother and his other brother.
   • Defender of Women’s honor: Andrzej’s mother was set up as a mistress by father. Other children he played with would make fun of him and call his mother a whore. He would fight whoever and be outnumbered. His brother Nicolas would defend him but not his brother Wilhelm.
   • Enemy of House Ramos: House Ramos attempted to kidnap his brother Nicolas, while he was at his house. They attacked his mother, she defended herself and Nicolas with the help of Andrzej’s father guard.
   • Cursed fate: Family was cursed by a cleric of Rovagug. A Very distant great grandfather, on his mother’s side of the family, thwarted Rovagug’s plan by killing his cleric, the cleric cast his death curse at his great grandfather but Desna, the goddess that looks after the Varisians, stepped in. She stopped the curse from killing his great, great grandfather but couldn’t stop the effect it had. From then on when there was an important decision to be made some kind of danger, or task for Desna to be made he described it like a big spinning wheel in his head, like the games of chance at the festivals, and when it stopped it felt like a great weight was lifted. However when it lands it could be the dragon (the highest) or the beggar (the lowest). Unfortunately this curse has been passed down to generation after generation.
   • Hunted and Alone: His father and his brother Nicolas were lost in a “shipping accident” Andrejz was forced to flee his brother “Wilhelm” for he fears that Andrzej is a threat to him as Lord of House Talan. Wilhelm has sent assassins after him, his mother tells him he needs to leave the city and sends hime to Harding Ellesmere, (a family friend) from Augustana.
   • Family Heritage: Having left his mother and the city he grew up in , Andrzej was staying with a friend of his mother/father. he met his friend Tokunbe, a Mwangi priest of Desna, with whom he shared many evenings of good food, and tales of “Iron Hand” the pathfinder.
   • Gambler’s tactics: His father explained why house Ramos is an enemy; besides wanting power and riches that would fall in their laps if House Talen would fall. Over ten years ago, House Ramos had a very lucrative shipping contract with the emperor and controlled a lot of bureaucracy options since the shipping had to go thru them. His father decided to gamble and contacted an agent of outside of Taldor who hired the Dragons of Shadow, a small thieves guild, to steal something off of one House Ramos ships that was bound for the emperor. The tactic worked however one of the gang members killed one of house Ramos sons. His father would tell him, “It was a sound tactic but now I think house Ramos has more information in our involvement, either one of the dragons of shadows gave them the information or some other form of investigation has led them back to our house. They must not have any positive proof or they would have gone to the emperor.”

5. Tatiana Zandu: Varisian (human) Warlock (Fey Pact)

   • Curiosity killed the cat: Tatiana has always been a very inquisitive, curious person. As she traveled frequently with her family there were a variety of places and things for her to explore, sometimes to her family’s chagrin. Tatiana’s curiosity sometimes leads her to throw caution to the wind and get herself into trouble.
   • Family first: [by the way, I’m open to other phrases for this] Tatiana was raised by a large family of her parents, grandmother, siblings, and close friends of her parents. She cherishes her family, even her brother (Tiberiu) who left the family’s caravan to join a Sczarni gang. She enjoys being part of a group that can explore, work, fight, and play together, and will work to protect members of her family (whether a group of close friends or blood relations).
   • Giada’s Guidance: while Tatiana’s grandmother Giada had begun teaching her how to read the harrow deck fairly early on, Giada began mentoring Tatiana intensively when Tatiana was 13. Giada taught Tatiana not only how to read the harrow deck, but the importance of reading people and understanding what they may be thinking but not saying.
   • Diplomatic (almost) to a fault: in addition to learning how to read others, Tatiana has seen and felt how easily words may hurt people. For example, in some towns that her family traveled by, other children were less than friendly and would make snide comments about Tatiana’s family and people being nothing but a bunch of thieves or con artists. While Tatiana does not advocate lying, she feels that if there is a more diplomatic/nicer way of saying something that needs to be said, that is the route to take. Unfortunately, this may sometimes not get her point across and she may have to get less diplomatic if a situation requires it.
   • Fey Mentor – Carillon: Tatiana first met this Summer Fey when she was 10 and was off exploring, a little ways off from her family’s caravan. Carillon appeared as a girl about her age, and they played and explored a cave together. Carillon has found Tatiana and they have spent quite a bit of time together over the years, with Tatiana forming a fey pact with Carillon, and being trained by Carillon and her fellow fey in warlock powers. Carillon maintains an interest in Tatiana’s life, and Tatiana’s time with Carillon and the fey has taught her to see the world in a different way than she had previously.
   • Don’t judge a book by its cover: Growing up traveling with her family and close family friends, and seeing the assumptions that non-Varisians would make about her family, lumping them together with stereotypes about the Sczarni, Tatiana tries not to be as quick to judge others. Her soft spot for her brother Tiberiu, despite his making a less than honest living with a Sczarni gang, has her looking beyond his con artist ways for the brother she grew up with and loves. While this tendency may be good in preventing Tatiana from making snap judgments about people she has just met, it may sometimes lead Tatiana to give someone too much benefit of the doubt.
   • Restless Soul: Having spent her life traveling from place to place without staying in one place for long, Tatiana very much enjoys the journey–seeing new places, discovering new things. Rather than asking “are we there yet?”, Tatiana might ask “are we ready to move on?” A few pathfinders have joined her family’s caravan at different times in her life, and Tatiana loved hearing about their adventures, all the traveling and exploring they did to find objects of wonder. These tales have encouraged Tatiana to pursue becoming a pathfinder herself, as the adventuring for adventuring’s sake will hopefully satisfy her wanderlust and her curiosity.

6. Ottar Brandrson: Ulfen (human) Warlord

   • Destined to Rule: Ottar’s destiny was determined at the moment of his birth. Though he doesn’t know what his destiny is, Ottar wants to be remembered as the heroes of the great sagas are remembered. Ottar tries to exemplify courage, generosity and pride.
   • Suffer the little children: Ottar doesn’t deal with people kindly that abuse children, or what he perceives as abuse. This has led to numerous encounters with Olaf, his older brother.
   • Sigvat’s Art of War: After Brandr died, Ottar was taken under Sigvat’s tutelage. With above average intelligence and a strong attraction to clan’s history and warfare, Ottar excels at tactics and troop movements.
   • Oath of the Shield-brother: The Ulfen military is made of groups of war-bands. In the war-band, nothing is more important than the shield-brother. Ottar will give his life for his shield-brother.
   • Ulfen Heroism: Sometimes the Ulfen sagas get the better of Ottar. Stowing away on a longship in the White Astrid’s fleet sounded like fun. Nevermind that there was a chance he could maimed or even killed. They don’t sing songs about you taking care of sheep.
   • Shiva, an ace up my sleeve: After finding a clue that was related to his fate, Ottar went to see the local witch, Shiva. The knowledge that she possessed about things mystical and arcane has led Ottar to believe she is important to his having a heads up on his fate.
   • Chasing shadows: Wanting to know what his future holds, Ottar finds himself investigating mysterious occurences and strange sightings. He can sometimes be too focused. A particular foray into a strange, unknown forest proved that these investigations sometimes pay off. The discovery of a document bearing a symbol that is a perfect match to his mark only fueled his habit of taking risks.