Thar Shaddin

Player Name: Dariusrhun
Name: Darius Rhun (Hunter of Thar Lydera)
Age: 26
Race: Human
Height: 6’4”
Weight: 205 lbs

Physical Description: Tall, with darkly tanned light leather armor, and a dark cloak. Dark complexion, with piercing black eyes and short brown hair. Black leather boots and a large bone pendant. Darius has the bearing of his nomadic brethren, and bears the mark of his small tribe on his left hand.

Possessions: Blood grooved short sword, old chipped and scratched shield with a sun and moon crest. Curved Hunting Bow, and Iron tipped arrows. Grey Horse of Thar Lydera (Eothir). Simple blanket and pack.

Powers or Strengths:

Adept fighter- Life in the wild has sharpened Darius aim and his reflexes. Combined with his natural strength, and competitive nature of his people make him a quite capable combatant. Hand to hand fighting is his favorite, but he’s most capable with a short sword and a quick step.

Eye of the Hunter- A trained archer, whose skill comes from his need to eat, Darius is accurate and deadly with his simple curved bow.

Magical Bones- The blood of his mother gives Darius a limited ability to sense the use of magic, and on occasion determine its direction. This ability is hardly more then a feeling, as it is untrained and quite raw.

Clever Boy- Traps and tricks are part of Darius’ skills, and while he is not a genius nor is he much for book learning, he can create simple mechanisms and surprises for the creatures and people he hunts.

Weaknesses:

Ignorance of magic- He knows little of the use of dark arts, nor of how to stop them. His solution to most problems is physical, and occasionally brutal.

Limited Social Skills- Life on his own has hardened Darius somewhat, and his lack of proper education gives him a less then thorough understanding of the locals of Thar Shaddin. He struggles for words on occasion, and his gruff nature can lead to easy misunderstandings.

Paralytic Headaches- A gift from a magic user he killed his journeys, feelings of guilt or remorse are met with blinding pain and almost an inability to move. The spell was meant to torment the hunter into stopping his hunts… while the pain has subsided over time, Darius still suffers painful headaches daily.

Personality: A self reliant nomad, Darius is both defiant and confident. He fears death, but respects little but brutality and beauty. He is ever watchful, suspicious, and not prone to let his guard down. He is not fond of speech, for his accent is the source of some ridicule. He doesn't like unfair odds, unless they are in his favor, and has no qualms of defying the law if there is money to be made.

History:

Born to a small barbaric nomadic tribe, Darius Rhun is the youngest son of Haradius Rhun, Chieftain of Thar Lydera. His mother, Sarai, was a self exiled magic user, She was captured by the tribe and forced to marry Haradius. Rhun’s tribe was small and lived in the wastelands, existing off of the land and surviving the harsh environment living outside of the rules of normal society.

Raised as a wild prince, his father oversaw his training, and his brothers were merciless, shaping Darius’s childhood as both vicious and uncompromising. Darius’s older brothers, Wegram, Degran, and Horoth died from disease, dangerous hunts, and from vengeful tribal warfare. His sisters Dyna and Lyseme were married off as peace offerings. His oldest brother Fenn was to inherit his fathers title, and as the youngest, Darius was unable to claim his fathers place. He was faced with life as a useless member of his father’s court, or exile. He chose exile, wandering the massive empty ranges on his Grey horse Eothir.

His mother’s magic did not flow to him as she had hoped, instead he inherited his abilities as hunter from his father and his intrinsic caution from his tribes constant struggle to survive. Darius used these skills to make a living, hunting beings large and small, collecting the bounties and growing ever bolder in his pursuits.

One fateful day he was hired to hunt and kill a woman wanted for witchcraft near the town of Shim. It seemed a simple enough task, yet Darius found within himself a conflict, feelings which his people viewed as a weakness. He ignored them, and when He found his frightened prey, did what needed to be done. But before her death she bound him with a strange curse, powerful feelings of remorse rendered him powerless when he allowed his emotions to cloud his mind. Finally, he came to Marn, with hopes that he could overcome the witch's bonds, and return to the work that had comprised his living.

Hi Darius,

I like this. There are just a few things I would like to see addressed before your application is approved:

His ability to sense magic and its direction should be somewhat weak--for a new character, it should probably operate on hunches, or something similar . . . I'm thinking a canary in a mine, rather than a Geiger counter. You mention that this power is useful for exposing people--he might be able to use his hunches to tip off the authorities, but there's no guarantee they would presume he is credible in his claims.

Also, the idea of magical creatures (of the type one might hunt) isn't particularly well fleshed out in our setting. We have lots of background on sentient magical races, but with things like . . . unicorns and what have you, there is room for setting growth. He apparently hunts beasts and sentient beings alike, which makes for a pretty broad spectrum of hunting and tracking skills. Is he poor at hunting anything on which he can't use his magical sensing abilities? I think this would make a compelling weakness.

In your weaknesses, I would remove "disloyal" and "disrespect for the law." They're good to have as personality flaws in your character, but when it comes to weaknesses, we are looking for things that actually impair your character's ability to perform certain functions. Dirty Harry was disloyal and disrespectful to the law, but he was a freaking badass because of it . . . The other two, particularly the headaches, are good to list as weaknesses.

One last note: I'm confused with some of your wording. " . . . a hunter capable of tracking magical creature’s great distances." This reads to mean "the great distances of magical creature/s." Do you mean "capable of tracking magical creatures over great distances"?

Also, interesting syntactical stuff going on with the word "Thar." "The Thar" is a fine use of the term, since we use it to mean a nonspecific land formation. However, I'm not sure which Thar his father is the chieftain of, since there are several Thars (you can make up a minor one if you want him to come from some lesser Thar). "Horse of a Thar" doesn't make sense. It is a minor concern, but this is to avoid any future confusion surrounding the syntax of our, um, made up word.

Please let us know when you have made changes according to these considerations, by posting again in this thread.

Okay, so... I believe I've molded the profile to fit your concerns.

1. Reduced his ability sense magic to a very basic ability, not at all trained, and not a main feature of the character (at least for now)

2. Created Thar Lydera... an area far to the south and east of Thar Shaddin. It's remote enough to be known only by historians and map makers, and the most well traveled traders. It's not civilized, and Darius ability to speak the local language comes from his mother.

3. Removed both Disloyal and disrespect for the law.

4. Removed his ability to track 'magical creatures'.

Thanks for your thoroughness. Approved.

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