Name: Odran Stormweaver
Gender: Male
Age: 46
Race: Dwarf - Hadhodrim

Physical Description:
Odran is a stout and sturdily built dwarf, with a bold stance and an intimidating disposition for one so short. Forged by wine, battle, and song, Odran's girth and thick trunk of a body belies a surprising amount of deft and dexterity in his hands and fingers. Standing at a height of four and a half feet, he often stands no higher than the chest of other mortal beings. Despite his diminutive stature, he's often denser than most humans, and certainly weighs an amount comparable to a human upwards of six feet in height.

His body is composed mostly of muscle and bound within the diminutive frame of his race, and his face is adorned with a short, rough beard, and the ruddy orange hair over his head is shaved into a mohawk. This thick dwarf dresses in a combination of padded cloth, chain, leather and steel, and his short legs stomp on the ground with purpose and weight as he walks. Upon his face sits a wide, fat nose, with a crooked angle from many a fistfight, and hard eyes of steel gray. His face is often adorned with a broad toothy grin, and a camaraderie-filled twinkle in his eye.

Personality:
A loud and boisterous soul, like many a dwarf of the Middle Ranges, Odran much like other dwarves is a stubborn, but honorable, hard headed bloke who prefers ale and song to politics and trickery. Blunt, straightforward and to the point, Odran is rarely afraid to speak his mind and tell things exactly as he sees it. Untrusting of magic and the unnatural, Odran will not hesitate to express his unease over the use of such elements but nevertheless admits their usefulness in many situations. Despite his jovial demeanor, Odran has surprising amounts of depth to his thoughts, his loud cheers and alcohol laden breath a visage for a more logical, intrinsically calculative mind. Odran has a very solid understanding of architecture, engineering, and warfare, and a well developed moral compass.

While Odran is vocal and friendly, and quick to throw the title of comrade around, it isn't until another's character has been demonstrated does Odran truly begin showing trust. Odran carefully observes those surrounding him, judging the character of others even whilst he makes jokes and exchanges story and drink. Odran honorable and relatively unselfish, though if given the choice, he would prefer him and his own success over others.

Despite his carefree attitude, Odran fears what the future has in store for his lot, the Mad King's armies suddenly turning what he thought would be assured victory into near total route. His thoughts often drift to his family, his wife and daughter hiding in the mountain ranges, and his son and comrades, burned to ash by dragonfire. He does not take insults to his family lightly, and even in these trying times, can be easily brought into a fury at the condescending mention of his son's death.

History:
A career soldier, engineer, siege specialist, and tinker, Odran was born the 6th child of the Stormweaver family, a powerful crafts-family of some repute, well known throughout the north for their weapons, with many Hadhodrim, and even Glamhoth warriors seeking pieces of armor of weapons crafted by his family. With little to look forward to in the form of inheritance, Odran and many of his siblings instead went about a different way to seek their fortune. Some took to trade, others took to craftsmanship, and one even took to exploration. Odran took to the sciences- the military sciences, to be precise. His childhood was hectic and loud in the great halls of his clan, and Odran spent much of his early days learning what many other Hadhodrim dwarves learned in their childhood. Letters and basic craftsmanship, as well as drinking, fighting, and the importance of honor. Apprenticing himself to a workshop belonging to distant relative of his clan, in the Afangrim Kingdom, Odran learned what made a weapon deadly, and how to best apply different types of weapons to different types of defenses.

Of all the types of weapons Odran learned, he took most to the handgun. Rarely seen outside of Anfangrim, the weapon operated in similar fashion to a crossbow, yet with the ability to cut an armored man in half, Odran honed his marksmanship from a young age, and built his first gun by the age of 17. However, Odran never forsook his practice with more traditional weapons, and while his skill with the gun and crossbow gleamed above all, his proficiency in hand to hand combat was not something to be taken lightly, easily besting his Anfangrim cousins in single combat. In the workshop Odran spent most of his teen years, building, training, and bettering different weapons, machines, and inventions. Upon finishing his apprenticeship, Odran, had taken the Anfangrim matchlock design, and made his own variation of it- resulting in his prized weapon, named Thydris. At the end of his apprenticeship, Odran was a talented craftsman in his own right, and could have easily opened his own forge had he sought a life of trade and building. But instead, Odran sought a life of adventure and battle, like the stories of the warriors of the clan halls. So with his family's blessing Odran joined the Ironborn Free Company.

The Dwarven Free Companies were founded long ago in some of the earliest centuries of recorded Dwarven history. These were bands of warriors whom had developed intoxicating thirsts for battle and as a result became mercenaries, usually hired out by the one of the many Merchant Houses to escort the Dwarven caravans across the realms to the other Dwarven Cities for trade. They repulsed invaders, fought off monsters and bandits, and often engaged with Glammoth barbarians to the north. For many a dwarf joining a free company was a last option if all other plans failed and they still wanted to preserve even a single shred of honor in their blood. This was because the free companies were regimented and orderly, adhering to a strict code of morals and discipline despite their battelust. As the centuries passed they proved their skill time and time again and even if the profession was not as glorious as say one of the king's royal guards, it was still better than cleaning up the shit after the mules.

The age of the Free Company changed drastically as the dwarves increasingly began interacting with man and elf. The Free Companies began to find much more work being hired by both sides in their constant wars and generally more people went more people that wanted other people dead. They readily interacted with Mûl mercenary companies, and often times fought against or fought with their elven counterparts, and even began taking some into their ranks, along with humans, and even the redeemed surface dwarf. They were some of the first groups on the continent to accept members of all races, genders and outlooks into their ranks, following in the tradition of persisting off of volunteer service that they had started in the Dwarven cities. All that mattered was that you could hold up a sword - one didn't even need to know how to swing, as they would teach you all of that, and a deathwish. But as time progressed and more professional armies were established, the Free Companies started to slowly fall apart. They were either assimilated into the ranks of new armies, killed to the last man in combat, their standards forever forgotten on old battlefields long since grown over into fields and forest, or turned to thievery, marauding and banditry to survive as jobs became more and more hard to come by. By the age of King Baelnorn, the ways of the Free Companies were near forgotten and their stories mostly left to legends and tales of the histories.

The Ironborn Free Company stood an the exception to that rule. Somehow through the perilous grind of history they had persisted- if a little worse for wear. The last recognized Free Company, their ideals and culture remained intact and they stood as a living relic of a time long since gone by. A time where mercenaries and sellswords held common blood with one another and followed codes and regulations as opposed to being your standard mercenary rabble that many see these days. But the years had not been kind a force that in its height measured 12,000 strong had now been reduced to a mere 2,000. Still, they remained a small but brutishly effective force moving with a vicious professionalism of warriors trained over the years. If you needed a job done and you needed it done right the first time the Ironborn were the people to call. People still join mostly through volunteer service- peasants who would rather die by the blade than starve in their village or city dwellers looking for adventure and finding it in the grim faced individuals reeking of blood and sweat.

Odran joined the Ironborn Free Company as a combat engineer in its service. With his technical prowess, as well as his skill in combat, it was only natural that Odran advanced rapidly through the ranks, becoming a trusted sub-leader of his squad commander by the end of his first campaign in the north. By the end of his second campaign, Odran was given command of his own squad, and by the end of his fifth campaign, he was the commander of the Ironborn Company's Corps of Engineers, and a notable veteran in his own right. Between these campaigns, Odran also wooed a beautiful She-dwarf named Rurora Stonehardt and eventually married her, bearing a stout son, and an intelligent daughter. His son would eventually join his father's trade, and joined the Ironborn Free Company as well, while his daughter joined his wife as a nurse.

Eventually, King Baelnorn called upon the Great Dwarven King Bofkral, and the Ironborn Free Company were among one of the first Dwarven military units to be mustered to join the fight against the Mad King. The Ironborn Free Company became well known throughout the combined forces for their valor and efficacy in combat, despite their dwindling numbers. Fighting alongside human and elven armies, the Ironborn Free Company were among many of the combatants present at the Battle of the Fields of Amarillis. When the Mad King's dragon and monsters poured forth from the mountain, the Ironborn Free Company were among those near the front. Holding the line as they aided their allies in retreat, the Ironborn Free Company perished in waves of dragonfire and monster claw. Witnessing the death of his own son, Odran and little more than a dozen of his comrades managed to escape the slaughter. Their forces routed and their standard lost, the Battle of Armarillis marks the end of the last Dwarven Free Company.


Equipment:

• Thydris [+]

  
  Thydris is Odran's prized possession. A variation on the Anfangrim matchlock, Odran's Thydris is shorter than the standard matchlock, and is capable of serving as both a carbine rifle or a shotgun. Capable of firing both large ball ammunition as well as buckshot, the weapon itself is finely crafted wood and steel, with brass inlays on the stock and barrel. In addition, the bottom of the barrel has a rod for Odran to attach his dirk, allowing him to transform his gun into a short spear in a pinch. In his pack, Odran carries tools for cleaning and maintaining his weapon, kit with a mold, among other materials for crafting ammunition, and a stock of saltpeter, charcoal and sulfer for mixing more gunpowder. In a separate satchel, Odran keeps a supply of generally fifteen paper shot-and-buck cartridges, along with another five buckshot cartridges.
• Hand Axe [+]

  
  A gift from Odran's older brother is painstakingly crafted hand axe. Useful as a tool and a weapon, the axe has a straight edge along the top and a point in the back for piercing plate, as well as a leather wrapped handle for comfort and control. The blade of the axe is engraved with a design, and is made of some of the highest quality steel in the middle ranges.
• A steel breastplate over a shirt of chainmail and leather lamellar
• A plain dirk
• A light crossbow with a container of 20 bolts
• A leather rucksack containing travel supplies and rations, alongside his firearm kits and other supplies.

Other:
- Odran's family name, though not necessarily his own name, is well known throughout the men and dwarves across the north for their acclaimed craftsmanship of both weapons and armor.
- A capable engineer, able to accomplish a variety of tasks, from designing siege engines, to bolstering fortifications to mending weapons- given the right resources of course.
- Odran is fluent in common and dwarvish, and has an impressive understanding of Glamhoth language, though is better at understanding the language than actually speaking it.