OOC- Rhett's Bio, With Spoilers Attached

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Kincaide
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OOC- Rhett's Bio, With Spoilers Attached

Post by Kincaide »

Name: Rhett Courier
Age: 25
Race: Human
Hometown: Aegis in the Northern Confederacy
Occupation: vagabond/courier/unwashed barbarian

Appearance: Rhett is a tall man, well into the range of six feet and five inches with plenty of lean and wiry muscle. He wears a mop of dark blond hair in a very short ponytail and shaves infrequently, usually resulting in more than a little scruff. His eyes are a startling shade of dark green which can be both intimidating and remarkably innocent. He has a strong jawline and longish neck.

He usually dresses in a long, olive overcoat of heavy and durable canvas with a removable wool lining. Anyone familiar with the Northern Confederacy's military will recognize the coat as out of date infantry gear, about fifty years old, without any unit or rank markings. Under that is a simple and cheap tunic, a pair of cargo pants, a braided leather belt, and a reliable pair of traveling boots. He almost always wears a pair of leather gloves that reach up to mid-forearm due to the fact that his hands and forearms are flecked with bits of what looks like gray stone. The strange condition is thickest at his hands and thins out farther up his arms. The condition gets worse along his spine and back.

History: Rhett Courier is... well, a courier. He makes sure certain valuable goods get from point A to point B. Don't let his relaxed demeanor fool you, his past is a checkered one though. Some speak of him in conjunction with a team of mage hunters in the north who hunted down mages that their magic made them rulers of men but those are just rumors and rumors should be taken with a jaundice eye. Rhett Courier was in the Confederate army for a time until his dishonorable discharge. After that he left the Northern Confederacy having obtained his sword and an interesting skin condition.

He took up the family trade. The Couriers had long been running messages and packages across the north, thus the name. They even had a part to play in the organization of the tribes into the Confederacy. The reliable channels of communication the Couriers provided helped unify the tribes. It was this trade Rhett took up in the south. Of course, the warp gates make his services next to obsolete but there will always be sensitive packages that need the professional care of someone like Rhett. He is also not opposed to taking a bit of mercenary work or the occasional odd job to scrape by.
Spoiler: show
Rhett's career as a mage hunter was an interesting one he and his team investigated and handled reports of mages abusing their powers in the less civilized areas of the Northern Confederacy. Sometimes this meant killing them and sometimes it meant bringing them in to be retrained and used by the Confederates themselves. His career abruptly ended after the investigation of what appeared to be a cult that had dug into some of the relatively safer Dwarven ruins out in the Wastes. Rhett's team contracted the Farrelian aerial guild, Sylvan, with their own funds to transport them out to the site since the big wigs would not fork over money for it.

Captain Ritter set Rhett's team down a little way from the ruins. After an embarrassing entrance they were greeted with open arms by the occupants of the ruins. It appeared as though the entire thing had been blown out of proportion and that the cult was merely an enclave of harmless nuts that were happy to live out in the Wastes.

Until Rhett stumbled into an area he was definitely not spposed to go.

The cult was a front. The leaders, a pair of twins, were actually manufacturing a narcotic inside the bodies of their congregation using their magic. They then used Sylvan to export the product to Farrel and Tsuiraku. By the end of the fighting, only Rhett and two others of his team were found alive. Rhett hauled his companions out while clutching the newly found Gram in hands that were gradually turning to stone. Captain Ritter got them back to civilization for medical care, which Rhett badly needed to save the use of his hands. Afterward, to avoid an international incident, Rhett and Ritter were discharged and their claims dismissed.
Weapons: He carries a lever action repeating rifle but keeps it in a carrying case until he needs it, which is rare since "Bullets cost a damn fortune," and also because the quality is great enough to warrant unwanted attention, especially from the people he took it from. He mostly favors a worn looking bastard blade that has the dwarven characters for Wrath inscribed on one side of the blade and in an ancient elven dialect on the other (Gram and Balmung respectively). While there are some interesting stories revolving around a blade matching this description most people dismiss Rhett's sword as a copy. He also carries several daggers at any point in time.
Spoiler: show
Rhett's Sword is, in fact, the original Gram. A sword thought to be thrust into the trunk of an ancient tree grown underground by strange dwarven technology since the war between Tsuiraku and Veracia. Though its power is greatly diminished, this dwarf-forged blade actively disrupts the flow of magic around it by some unknown means. This is likely an effect of the strange metal it was forged out of, which defies magical analysis. Currently, it only rarely causes magical weapons to malfunction and only after direct contact. The metal looks like simple steel but holds an edge for a very long time and does not rust.
Abilities: Rhett is an accomplished fighter, excellent with a sword and alright with a rifle. He has no innate magical abilities but the condition affecting his hand and arms can stop blades at times. His sword, which he refers to by the dwarven name Gram, may be somewhat magical in nature, Durus Flamma weapons have a tendency of breaking against the apparently cheap metal imitation of a famous sword.

Religion: Worships a family deity from the Northern Confederacy called Lady-Who-Walks. He has a few interesting rituals that resemble superstitions more than anything.
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Viking-Sensei
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Re: OOC- Rhett's Bio, With Spoilers Attached

Post by Viking-Sensei »

All in all, I see nothing overtly game-breaking here. GB, your say?

Also, should Lucas or Sasha ever manage to get back into the game, I'm curious what Gram woudl do their hands. Lucas has the innate ability to warp or turn magic (even his own) into different types of magic, whereas Sasha functions much like Gram - she's a null, magic can't effect her directly and she can usually disrupt most magical devices by touching them.
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Kincaide
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Re: OOC- Rhett's Bio, With Spoilers Attached

Post by Kincaide »

I've been thinking about finding a way to repower Gram as a plot device later on and make it into a strong anti-magic weapon. Currently a good barrier will stop it but I would not recommend trying to fight Rhett with a Durus Flamma weapon if you want to keep the fancy toy intact.

Also, Lady-Who-Walks is totally going to show up later.
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Re: OOC- Rhett's Bio, With Spoilers Attached

Post by Graybeard »

Viking-Sensei wrote:All in all, I see nothing overtly game-breaking here. GB, your say?
Rhett himself has been busy doing stuff and obviously has no problems fitting in. (In fact, congratulations on how rapidly you were able to graft onto an existing cast. It doesn't always work that way.) There is an exquisite bit of irony associated with one of the spoilers ... but it won't interfere with playability, and promises interest when certain to-be-revealed things start to happen.

As for "Gram," I don't see a concept problem, but be aware that these dyads where a powerful item and a human (or humanoid) character go together have something of a mixed record. When the item is like a "familiar" -- consider the term generic, including henchman, sidekick, offspring or parent, etc. -- things can work very well. If the human IS the familiar and the item is the "character," questions of playability begin to arise. Most of the PCs that started that way have now dropped out of the game. It would be unfortunate if a character as interesting and well handled as Rhett were to do the same.

That sound right to you, V-S?
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Kincaide
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Re: OOC- Rhett's Bio, With Spoilers Attached

Post by Kincaide »

Don't worry, Gram is mostly going to be a tool. Currently its effect is pretty weak, a good barrier will stop the blow but when used against something like a Durus Flamma blade then the effect can cause it to start falling apart. Its use over the years has worn it down, but I may recharge it as a plot device. If I do that I may give the weapon a sort of alien intelligence if anything. I might have it do things like prevent Rhett from drawing it under certain circumstances but not really give it an actual voice.

I'm also going to have Lady-That-Walks show up eventually. My idea is that several local Northern Confederacy deities work similar to both Luminosita and Ian. They were probably human once but figured out a method to move beyond that using magic. Each time Rhett or another worshiper performs a ritual or blessing related to a specific deity a bit of the naturally occurring magic in the area is drained and sent to that deity. It also draws the deity's attention to the worshiper which can be a mixed blessing.
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