You hail from the city LLORKH in the GRAY VALE region. You come from a poor family of ARCHEOLOGISTS that excavate in the GRAYPEAK MOUNTAINS. Your family is originally from the MENZOBERRANZEN, but your mother and father fled from there to escape the LOLTHITE RITUALS, as well as the drow’s
disconnected family culture.
You have a FLIGHTY BROAD SISTER named DRADA who tends to the house as a SECOND MOTHER. She also specializes in caring for the family’s DANGEROUS PETS. Occasionally, your parents come across OLD DWARVEN ARTIFACTS in their projects, which they sell to make a lot of money
so that they don’t STARVE.
Llorkh is currently run by a DOUCHECANOE and his HENCHMEN. Your family sent you to CANDLEKEEP ACADEMY to have a better LIFE than theirs.
You own a small, trained SPIRETOP DRAKE named BECQUEREL. BEC enjoys SHINY THINGS, such as jewelry or gold. Together, you make the perfect THIEF DUO.
But you’re not a thief. You are a dedicated SWORDMAGE.
You have learned to hone MAGICKS into your blade and KILL ENEMIES. You STUDY very hard at the academy to become as knowledgeable about the WORLD as your father. Your PACIFIST FATHER did not want you to go to Candlekeep because the world is so condescending of your race,, but your mother, your father’s PERSONAL MUSE, won the argument, and here you are!
Their relationship NEVER MAKES SENSE to you.
You have very few friends because of your DARK LINEAGE as a drow, as well as your constant distrust towards anyone willing to call you “friend”. During the first few weeks of school you have had your share of BLACK EYES from all the RACIST PUNKS in the academy.
> [S] Sol: Have an adventure.
Too awesome to not keep going with this.
ReplyDeleteFew things.
ReplyDelete-The Gray Vale is not technically a province (I assume you meant province and not providence). It's merely a region, occupied by independent lordships, villages, towns, cities, and settlements.
-Drow aren't "from" the Deep Maw, as it's merely an opening in the Earth connecting the surface world to the Underdark. The nearest drow civilization to the Deep Maw, as far as I was able to equate, is Menzoberranzen, where the Spider Queen Herself resides.
-Drow don't customarily have anything close to the personality outlines you came up with. They are naturally distrusting of others and rarely make permanent allies, even with other drow. Exceptions are unheard of; this is simply the way their society functions. However, since Sol didn't grow up in drow society, you'd have little reason to distrust your colleagues.
-It's likely your family is good off--for drow. One thing for certain, they don't have to worry about improving their standing by associating with evil priestesses, or about getting poisoned by other drow that want to improve THEIR standing. Surface-dwelling criminals and low-lives tend to fear the drow, and I mean fear in both the modern and biblical sense. It's possible their lives really aren't that bad and the only reason they live in Llorkh is that it's pretty much the only society in that region that would accept them, or at least leave them at peace. That, and it's nearer the Graypeak Mountains than Loudwater, which is probably where your father goes to get appraised and trade off his finds.
-To a drow, nuclear families are highly unusual. Drow upbringing is very much in the shadow of how a spider would rear her young--on her own, and only until they could fend for themselves. An outstanding drow citizen never shows compassion for other drow, not even to blood relatives. This is what I propose: Your mother had to sacrifice her first child to Lolth in order to show fealty to the priestesses. As she did, she felt a part of her die as well. For years she had nightmares of being hacked into pieces. Your father comes along, she feels a oneness with him, he feels the same, they have you, and they flee to the surface. You're raised in the mild quietness of a practical anarchist town that leaves your family pretty much to themselves. You grow up with no friends to speak of except your pet drake, and you spend your lonely childhood studying the arts of magic and swordsmanship from books that your father brings home from Loudwater. You wish to continue your studies as well as get a more solid education, and you're sent off. Just an idea, take it or leave it, but it makes a bit more sense of what you've so far come up with.
-It could be that the reason your parents' relationship NEVER MAKES SENSE is because drow society is matriarchal, based on honoring a female deity...so, naturally the female of the species has the more authoritative stance. The only reason I can think of for your father disapproving is the fact that drow aren't exactly welcome in most civilized places.
-No. Just, no. It's very uncharacteristic of a drow to go around trying to give people a good impression of the drow as a whole. Drow themselves don't trust the drow. In fact a character like yours who spends a lot of time to himself probably genuinely doesn't care what others think of him, let alone about making friends.
There's a lot of stuff to chip off before this character is fleshy enough to make an impression. Work with me some more, read about the drow and about the Gray Vale, etc.
Though there's something I care more about than your origin story and that's Sol's personality. He doesn't feel real to me yet; part of that is because his backstory still seems a little like nonsense, but a lot of it is you not bringing him out during sessions. You really need to work on that.
Wow. Thanks for the...constructive criticism. Really helps.
ReplyDelete