Smike — Roleplayer Guild

posting here to not lose what little i have
Thozna Scrapblast-of-Norplain

Race, Age, Time in the Caravan:
Thozna is a Gnoll, one of the hyenafolk that live in the plains, swamps, savannahs and deserts. While specific cultural practices vary from clan to clan they're a generally nomadic people, living a lifestyle of hunting, herding and raiding. Gnolls can be found in a variety of environments, their thick pelts and hardy constitutions making them well-suited for mercenary work. Indeed it's not uncommon for a petty lord to hire on a band of them for use as shock troops or terror squads.

While they can reach the age of 120 or even past that in rare cases they generally die far earlier to illness or violence. Scrapblast is fairly old for one still fighting, estimating herself to be somewhere past eighty years old. She had an earlier stint with the caravan of about four months, and her second tour has just passed the two-year mark.

Appearance:
Gnolls are much taller and much broader than humans are, and Scrapblast is no exception. She weighs in at a stocky three hundred and eighty pounds, standing seven feet and eight inches tall while hunched over in the trademark Gnoll slouch. Her thick pelt is colored in a range of browns, the fur on her back having a reddish tint while that of her front lightens into a creamier shade. 

While she has a range of scars across her body the vast majority of them are hidden by the tunics and capes she's taken a liking to, save for the wound running down her muzzle. The nasty gash left by a falchion strike tends to dry out and irritate her, so it's not uncommon to catch her running her long tongue up the channel.

Thozna tries to dress presentably by "civilized" standards on a day-to-day basis but feels she is under no compulsion to do so when she puts on her armor for whatever reason. Her war gear was designed to induce fear as much as it was to provide protection, almost deceptively crude. Harsh, rugged steel plates are layered over thick mail, her helmet hugging close to her skull while leaving her jaw free to bite people with. 

History:
Thozna was born into the Norplain pack, a Gnollish tribe occupying, unsurprisingly, the Norplain region of the Asvenkal Savanah. At that time the Norplainer gnolls had two main industries: the herding of livestock, mainly cattle and sheep, and raiding. Of course there were other professions such as healers to care for the sick or blacksmiths to produce tools but by and large, they slaughtered animals and enemies. Thozna's mother was a noted warband leader while her father was somewhat infamous in the nearby human settlements for his skill with a javelin, and thus her fate was decided.

Gnolls mature quickly compared to humans, becoming adults at around ten years of age. Even before then Thozna accompanied her parents in the field, scoring her first kill in a fight against a party of dog-like Ainok. Thozna likely would have gone on to an impressive but ultimately ordinary career as a warrior, save for one thing.

Gnolls believe that magic is the realm of Mus the Weaver, the mysterious many-eyed patron of seers, tacticians, and clothmakers. Those marked by her lead auspicious lives and it's considered bad luck to not nurture her gift. Thozna first began to unconsciously levitate objects as a cub. starting with nails before moving knives and pots. 

As she got older and gained more control over her magic she chose a personal name in the Gnollish tradition, Scrapblast. It reflected her preferred method of fighting: spraying the enemy with shards of jagged metal. With this power she set out to make a name for herself, battling against rival warbands and raiding the nearby Human and Ainok settlements.

As she got older Scrapblast got bigger, faster and more magically empowered. The months of experience turned into years and the years into decades, Thozna outliving her parents and many of her peers. While Gnolls are naturally long-lived the lifestyle tends to cull the pack, especially those who find themselves on the front. Scrapblast's band, formed when she was fifteen, had seen a complete turnover of members two times over by the time she was thirty.  	

She was an extremely talented soldier, one with enough stolen wealth to happily retire. But Scrapblast found herself growing bored. The Norplainers had gone through a series of small disasters during her third decade, droughts and outbreaks of disease and pyrrhic victories all adding up. As quickly as they reproduced the pack was still hemorrhaging manpower and those that survived were more cautious. Why throw their lives away when people needed them at home? Scrapblast couldn't blame them for this subtle shift in sensibilities but she couldn't stand by either.

As an accomplished raid leader she had the right to gather a small band of friends, family and various connected men-at-arms, Scrapblast sewing together her banner and leading them to seek their fortunes in service of others.  The various headmen and warlords of the Asvenkal always had a need for hired blades and were none too picky about where they came from. Even those whose territory Scrapblast had pillaged in the past were happy to have her on their side.

But by that point in her career, she found those battles boring. Most of the time the band was deployed against disobedient peasants and bandit gangs, only occasionally called to fight against the armies of a rival lord or an outside force that dared to intrude on the Dragon-Sultan's lands. The pay was solid enough to keep her crew interested but Scrapblast was too old to be bought by baubles alone.

So she walked out of the Asvenkal and into wider Alwyne. Scrapblast haggled with merchants in the bustling temple-cities of Velkinir, and searched for abandoned treasures in the ghost towns of the old Costal Elf homelands. One day she was part of a hunting party high in the Ironpeaks hunting for roc eggs, the next she was a guest of a giant who dwelled in a cavern of quartz. 

It was freeing in a way, but still the passage of time needled at Scrapblast. She was about fifty when she decided to return to the Norplain, having spent so long away from home that she had almost forgotten what it looked like. Her homecoming was awkward, most of those she met having been born too late to know of her save for stories from their elders. 

Moreover, in her absence the pack had elected to settle down entirely. The series of setbacks that they had suffered decades before had put them in a precarious position, forcing them to cooperate more with the nearby settlements. At some point the group stopped traveling their circuit of hunting grounds to move into the outskirts of a trade post, given a place to raise their flocks in exchange for serving as an auxiliary defense.

Once more Scrapblast found herself alienated from her people with no one to blame but poor circumstances. Her half-hearted attempts to form a new warband failed, and she said her final goodbyes. 

She planned to make her way to one of the other, more traditional Gnoll tribes and seek entrance on the strength of her storied career but each time she encountered one she couldn't bring herself to pop the question. She had left her pack, yes, but she was still too fond of it to renounce her allegiance. So Scrapblast went back to wandering, working as a mercenary at some times and a simple brigand at others.

She never once considered putting her weapons down. In her eyes it would have been a disservice to her legacy to die quietly in a bed somewhere, someone as experienced as she was deserved to die with axe in hand. Her quest for a noble death continued through her sixties and into her seventies, coming to a pause in a twist of fate.

A cunning, underhanded merchant had passed a tip onto her as part of her payment for services rendered: a competitor of his would be traveling through a relatively empty part of the Sheepshead Isles, and with him he'd have a good stash of gold and some valuables. If Scrapblast were to hit said competitor she'd get his loot and the merchant would have one less problem to deal with.

So hit him she did. It was a simple matter to lay an ambush, his guards merely local toughs he had equipped for that leg of the journey. What complicated matters was the fact that the trader had been accompanied by his family. He and his wife were killed in the initial charge while his eldest child was cut down when she attempted to slash Scrapblast with a razor. 

That left the youngest, a boy of not more than two or three years. While Gnolls don't take much issue with the killing of outsiders they're not actively genocidal. Thozna's raids were nearly always smash-and-grab affairs, fatalities would occur but not enough to doom a bloodline or a village to extinction. Leaving the boy to the elements wasn't an option and there was no orphanage around that would take kindly to a bloody Gnoll dropping off the survivor of its raid.

She named him Ryt-kiltu-Sheepshead (roughly translating to "Ryt, found in Sheepshead") and raised him as her own. Scrapblast never hid Ryt's origins from him and he didn't outwardly question her actions, although as he grew up she detected some unspoken angst. Raising a human boy meant settling down again, the pair moving into a small farming community named Alstow.

Scrapblast found work as a rancher, having grown up with animals as a cub in the Norplain. The humans she lived among were understandably cautious of her but she proved her good nature the first time a bear strayed too close to the village. After that she was treated with some amount of respect and allowed to raise Ryt in peace. As soon as he was old enough she placed him under the tutelage of the old 'witch' who lived just outside of Alstow.

Another decade passed, Scrapblast finding herself on the wrong side of eighty and once again plagued by restlessness. In her eyes Ryt was an adult, a young man capable of surviving life on the road. There was no need for them to stay huddled up with pigs, not anymore. So they gathered their things and set out in search of his future and her glorious death, whatever forms they would take. 

The Pilgrim's Caravan was a natural fit for them, Scrapblast had in fact traveled with it in the past. Rejoining was as simple as falling into line.  

Personality:
Scrapblast is old in a profession and species that generally die young, so she likes to think that she has a handle on things. Age has tempered her aggression into something more akin to a dry, morbid sense of humor. While she isn't interested in bloodshed for its own sake she is hardly opposed to it either. She prefers practicality to honor, because what good is being righteous if you're dead?

Thozna misses the vivid storytelling of her people and thus is drawn to bards, griots, and poets of all types. This love of story extends to art in all its forms, a good painting or interesting sculpture being quick ways to grab her attention. 

She has no time for cowards and, despite her being one herself, doesn't care much for mercenaries. In her eyes most sellswords are people who lack purpose, else they would be fighting for a lord or cause they believed in. 

Also, she eats corpses. Gnolls are scavengers to the extreme, as far as Thozna is concerned a dead human is basically the same as a dead pig. She isn't dumb enough to hunt two-legged game for the sake of it but if someone happens to cross her and she's left with a body? Snack time. 

While she has the good grace to keep from just ripping into a freshly slain stranger while others are watching sometimes it's best not to question what sort of meat she's eating. 

Motivation:
Boredom. Scrapblast has lived long enough to watch the rest of the Norplain Gnolls die or become sedentary, giving up pillaging for farming and laboring in the burgeoning human settlements nearby. While she can hardly blame her people for choosing a safer path she does find it dreadfully uninteresting. The Caravan represents an opportunity to keep moving until she finds her final battle. Until she's slain in glorious combat she can make a little money trading odds and ends. 

Skills, Strengths and Weaknesses, and Tools:
Gnolls are as intelligent as any other sapient species, capable of building tools and making art. But physically and culturally they are still very much wild animals. Thozna is far larger than any man and stronger than all but a rare few, capable of running down animals and stripping their hide from their flesh with her claws alone. She's built to survive harsh environments and is quite content to trudge through blazing deserts or frozen tundras. 

Her relatively long life has also given her plenty of time to develop skills suiting a professional ravager. Like pretty much every "wild" Gnoll out there she was trained to fight since birth, mastering the use of simple one-handed weapons like hammers, axes and knives. Where she differs from her spear-chucking peers is her training with heavy armor and shields. She can track game and navigate by the stars, has enough first aid knowledge to keep herself from bleeding to death after a fight and has a keen eye for the value of items she comes across in her travels.

But while Scrapblast has a lifetime of experience in the field she's never spent a day in any classroom. She is, by the standards of the civilized world, entirely uneducated. While she can read the common tongue if given time and is capable of the basic arithmetic required for cash transactions don't expect her to chew through epic poems or perform complex calculations. While this wasn't a problem when she's roaming through arid plains and rundown city slums she does suffer a great deal when she has to admit her lack of schooling.

Scrapblast has yet to really understand the civilized world, and she doesn't really care to. She grew up robbing trespassers and forming raiding parties, spent her adult life seeking bigger and bigger bounties and is now looking for a bloody death so that her corpse can feed the carrion birds and other scavengers. This unrepentant might makes right mentality is reigned in for the most part when entering occupied territory but it can lead her to conflict with those who take offense.  

Thozna is nearly entirely incapable of handling accusations of dishonesty, disloyalty or cowardice. If someone were to call her any of the above she'd handle it the Gnoll way: knocking them over and stomping their face in.  

Her real talent is the magical gift she's worked to nurture throughout her career. Her chosen name of "Scrapblast" reflects her chosen arcane art: the manipulation of magnetic fields. She naturally manipulate objects to her will, pulling them closer to her or launching them away. In combat she makes use of this by disarming opponents and using their own weapons against them, ripping swords out of the enemy's hands before plunging them into their necks. 

While such magic isn't strictly limited to ferrous metals that sort of material is much easier to work with. She can lift a few hundred pounds of steel or pig iron without much difficulty and could conceivably lift up a couple tons of the same (provided it was all one solid object, and with great strain) but her capacity is limited with non-metallic objects.

-Armor and Shield: She doesn't actually adorn herself with grisly trophies...usually.
-Weapons: Has her axe and a variety of knives for skinning people and animals alike. In addition to proper blades, she likes to carry a grab bag of metal shards and a pair of solid iron ingots to pelt the enemy with. 
-Net: A blanket of steel rings that she can launch at someone to disable them, now more commonly used for mundane fishing.
-Bedding
-Mess Kit
-Money: A variety of coins, most of them looted or stolen.
-Moron: An Elkitir, a magically-bred cross between horse and elk originating with the druids of the Tildretti forest. At twenty hands tall he's pretty much the only equine big enough for Scrapblast to ride and he's as smart as any donkey. The problem is that he's just as stubborn to boot, thus the name.

What They Most Want: For Ryt to find purpose before she finds a proper death.

If They Had a DnD Alignment, It Would Be: Chaotic Neutral 

Three Likes: Stories, strong drink, those who are bold

Three Dislikes: Being bored, coffee, cowards

Do They Follow Their Heart or Their Mind?: Her heart

Worst Fear: Dying peacefully 

Favorite Color: Brown

Most Like The Animal: Unsurprisingly, hyenas
That is, which animal they are most like- not which one they like the most.

Favorite Time of Day: Dawn and dusk, Gnolls are naturally crepuscular. 

How They Dress: Practically. 

Favorite Season: Summer

What Gods/Spirits/Whatevers They Worship (If Any): Primarily Mus the Weaver and Tel the Hunter
No, M., Jesus isn't an option

Ryt-kiltu-Sheepshead

Race, Age, Time in the Caravan:
Ryt's actual age is unknown, his best guess is somewhere between 12 and 14. He's a half-Orc, a somewhat rare and not always liked crossbreed. He's been traveling with the caravan with his 'mother' for the last two years.

Appearance:
Ryt's mother was an Orc but his father was a Halfing, and it shows. He's only four feet tall, barely weighing above sixty pounds soaking wet. He looks young for his age, much to his chagrin as he tries to grow up  into a proper man. 

History:
Ryt doesn't know his parents' names. He doesn't know where they lived, how they met one another, if they had any family or close friends nearby. He couldn't even tell you if has any surviving relatives. All the information he has is the information Thozna gave him: they were merchants who threatened the local monopoly of some rich trader, the trader had her take them out. His mother, father and older sister all died within minutes of each other, and she adopted him. The sole survivor.

Wherever he was from originally, his home was Alstow. A quaint farming town, the vast majority of which was human. While there were some Halflings and the odd Dwarf here and there a Gnoll and her Orcish charge stood out. Ryt's earliest memories are of being the Other, not shunned by his peers but regarded with curiosity. 

Despite his odd circumstances, Ryt did have a relatively normal childhood. His adoptive caretaker was employed as a ranch hand on one of the larger farmsteads and he helped her with her chores, namely feeding the chickens and mucking out the stalls. When Thozna allowed him to knock off from work early (which was often) he played with his peers, his strangeness not enough to exclude him from circles.

The interesting part of his upbringing was his education. Thozna, embarrassed by her lack of book smarts and wanting better for her charge, arranged for him to be educated by the white witch who lved on the outskirts of Alstow. Old Lady Moira, or Miss Moi as she preferred, was a druid and alchemist. She was the town's healer in addition to providing blessings for the crops, a well-liked if not quite understood figure. 

Ryt learned mundane skills like reading and herbalism but was also given instruction in Miss Moi's brand of magic, a subtler, kinder art than that which Thozna practiced. Most of Ryt's lessons were based on working with the flow of magic as opposed to muscling it into doing what he wanted, gently coaxing it into closing small wounds or invigorating sickly animals.

He was a quick study, almost too quick. He was only eleven or twelve when he had learned all that Moi could teach him, the rest would he would have to pick up from more experienced teachers and practice in the field. Thozna, already anxious to be on the move, packed up their things without a second thought.

Since joining the caravan Ryt has continued to work on nurturing his gift, supported by an approving Thozna. But as he gets older he chafes under her guardianship. Now a man by the old Gnoll's standards he can't help but feel bitter over his circumstances. Time will tell what, if anything he does about it.
 
Personality:
For a boy raised by a crusty old mercenary with few qualms or compunctions Ryt turned out remarkably well. He's soft-spoken and polite as can be, greeting most people with a smile. He's mature for his age, sober-headed and careful to avoid confrontation.

In fact he's too careful for Thozna's liking which is a point of contention simmering between them. She's never once apologized or even acknowledged wrongdoing in slaying Ryt's family, and he's grown to quietly resent her for it. Thozna knows he does, he knows she knows he does, but she refuses to give him what he wants without him demanding it of her. This attempt to make him man up has failed thus far, only serving to slowly poison their still-loving relationship.

All this to say, he clings to friends. Whether or not he can say it aloud Ryt desperately wants a family of his choosing, not one that's forced on him. Being snatched away from his peers in Alstow had a profound effect on him so any new friends he makes can expect to be doted on. 

Motivation:
Purpose. He's still hanging around Scrapblast because, as much as he wishes he never met her, she's the only constant in his life. Until he finds something else to devote himself to he'll just keep tagging along.

Skills, Strengths and Weaknesses, and Tools:
He's a pretty good herbalist and a remarkably talented druid, for his age. While he can't get detailed information out of them he's able to communicate basic thoughts and feelings with animals, a useful trick since he's small enough to look like a snack to a wolf. 

He's also extremely tricky to find when he doesn't want to be. His halfling blood has given him near-silent steps and an eye for hidey-holes while his orcish endurance means that he can probably outrun whoever's chasing him if stealth fails. 

But being nimble and sneaky means little when you can be hoisted with little trouble. Ryt has all the strength of a particularly ornery kitten, just about capable of carrying small creatures that aren't struggling too much. He'd lose a wrestling match against any reasonable healthy child his age, and if it's an adult grabbing him he's done. Being a child also means that he lacks life experiences, his worldview still fairly naive.

Sometimes in situations of extreme stress, he can regress into the primal fury used by Orc berserkers, lashing out like a cornered animal. This can be a good or bad thing depending on the circumstances. Best case scenario the mugger or whatever is warded off by a flurry of scratches and bites. Worst case, they get angry and mash his head against the nearest wall. 

The druid-in-training can't perform much in the way of big, showy spells yet, instead relying on more mundane but still useful magic tricks. With a little bit of focus he can restore life to failing crops or sick creatures, giving them some extra strength with which to fight on. Small cuts and gashes can be healed with a little song, and he knows how to produce a number of useful tinctures and tonics. 

In an absolutely worst-case scenario, he can instinctively call upon nature to defend him, although he has little control over the shape it takes. A cloud of flies might suddenly buzz out of nowhere to blind an attack, a shower of sparks might singe their hair or they might find the solid ground they walk on is now a quagmire. 

And while he's not hurling around armored knights like Ol' Scrapblast he is really good at skipping rocks. Like, magically good. Sometimes he can bounce one ten times in a row. That counts for something, right?

-Buford: Ryt's pet and almost-familiar. Buford is still a bit too obstinate to really be an assistant but his connection with Ryt does make the boy's magic a little more potent when he's around.
-Knife: Designed for pruning plants and sawing through small branches as opposed to fighting but Thozna makes him wear it on his belt anyway.
-Druid's Kit: Put together by Miss Moi as a parting gift. Contains a mortar, pestle, measuring spoons, vials for samples, seeds and various other bits and pieces.
-Money: Thozna gives him a little pocket change her and there.
-Trelawney: Thozna's giant horse-deer thing is too smart and stubborn to pull the cart so it falls on the smaller, stupider mule to do so. Sometimes carries Ryt in addition to a million other bits and pieces.

What They Most Want: A family of some kind. 

If They Had a DnD Alignment, It Would Be: Chaotic Good

Three Likes: Animals, fresh air, Thozna

Three Dislikes: Cruelty, bullies, Thozna (it's complicated)

Do They Follow Their Heart or Their Mind?: Mind

Worst Fear: Depending on the day, Thozna being disappointed or proud of what direction he takes.

Favorite Color: Purple

Most Like The Animal: Badger
That is, which animal they are most like- not which one they like the most.

Favorite Time of Day: Twilight

How They Dress: In simple, loose peasant's clothes

Favorite Season: Spring

What Gods/Spirits/Whatevers They Worship (If Any): A variety of nature spirits and Mus the Weaver
No, M., Jesus isn't an option
Smike Member

Status

Bio

Most Recent Posts
