Thar Shaddin

Andy Smith
18 year old human

Andy is tall, lanky, and fairly handsome, with mud brown hair he keeps close cut and a patchy scruff of stubble along his jawline. Not of a prosperous upbringing, he wears a pair of old but well-kept leather boots, dusty brown pants held up by a thin rope belt, and a loose long-sleeved shirt that may once have been white. A sarcastic wit and a quick tongue often cause him more trouble than he needs, but occasionally he can talk his way out of a bad situation.

Possessions:
Clothing (Boots, belt, shirt, pants, socks)
crude rope/sack backpack
bottle of brandy
bottle of whiskey
hunting knife
15 Bishani


Powers:

Magic- Limited healing (broken bones, cuts, swelling; minor to intermediate physical injury)
Starting fires (set flammable materials ablaze, no throwing or control over fire)

Combat/other- Fist fighting/brawling experience
Good at fleeing on foot

Weaknesses:

Magic- Only when drunk

Combat/other- Terrible with horses


Background:

Andy came into the world inauspiciously enough, born son to a smith in the town of Shim. Raised to eventually take his fathers role, he grew to hate being in the smithy. The monotony and rhythm required to properly shape the metals escaped him, and it was soon clear that he held little promise in the craft of his birth.

The secret to his father's talent with metal lay in a small magical gift that he applied to his work, and after the years went by he tried to pass some of his arcane knowledge on to his son. Magic- exciting, dangerous, and unpredictable- appealed to Andy with a strength that smithing never had. Unfortunately, he soon discovered that he was even worse at magic than at crafting metals. In fact, he was so bad that he demonstrated almost no disposition whatsoever for the practice.

Failure at both of the talents his father attempted to pass on weighed heavily on Andy, who began to sneak out at night and distract himself with drink. His smart mouth got him into regular altercations, and he would come home early in the morning and nurse his bruises sitting and staring at the cold coals of his father's forge.

Often his frustration would drive him to futilely attempt to do something productive, iron or magical. His smithing talents grew not at all, but occasionally he would discover that the forge would light seemingly of itself, or that lumps, bruises, and cuts earned in nightly scuffles would fade away before his eyes. Andy blamed these events on his drunkenness; not remembering lighting the coals or imagining injuries that hadn't actually happened. But as these events grew more and more common- and more and more tied to his focus at the moment, he began to realize that he actually had a scrap of magical talent.

Unfortunately, his magic only came to him when he was drunk, and only came in full strength when he was very much so. Determined to no longer burden his father with his shortcomings or his vices, he packed a few things into a bag and left for Marn. He was well aware that his magic was illegal in the city, but it was a larger place than his hometown and it was his best chance to find someone who could help him learn to use his magic without first being hammered.

I would like to see some sort of limitation put on the magic in the addition to just being drunk. I'm thinking along the lines of the usual magic causing a drain in energy and making the character tired. Though I like the fact that this character has to be be drunk to cast magic, I would rather not see him repeatedly get drunk, get into fights with other characters, possibly set the other character and fire and then walk away with bruises or broken bones that he can magically heal so that he can continue to fight.

The idea is not to have the fire magic be at all incorporated into combat. The character is able to start campfires, light forges, etc. while drunk and focused on such a task. Engaged in combat, he would be concerned with causing (or preventing) physical harm using hands/feet/elbows rather than some attempt to light someone on fire.

Healing could be limited by resulting in a monstrous hangover that the character wishes to avoid, and so is simply reluctant to attempt magically healing himself.

Honestly I think that I might even want to ditch the idea of fire magic altogether and just go with the healing. I want magic to play a small part in the majority of what this character does, although his grand goals are ultimately tied to his talent.

I'm glad to read this. I don't want to sound rude or judgmental but I've seen more than a few people make characters that seem to be prone to fighting and they like to give them powers like an ability to start fires and heal themselves just so that they can take part in situations like I described, and I am glad to hear that that is not the case. Such characters don't really fit in here, but from what you have said of your character I think we can work with it.

I want to again say that I like this idea of him only being able to use his magic when drunk, it is something I have not seen before. I like the idea of this weakness and the fact that the character would have to drink so much just to be able to use his power and then as a result he would have to deal with the consequences of drinking so much the night before. Of course I would like to see the details of weakness further explained so that others reading the character sheet can see the full extent of how this effects him. Gaining magic at the expense of being wasted and having a harder time with social and motor skills.

I would also like to see the part about horses expanded on. Is he afraid of them? Has he had previous bad experiences with them? Is he just not a horse kind of person. Anything you add here will bring out more of a personality and it helps us all get to know him that much more.

I see in the history that Andy was raised in Shim. I want to point out that Shim falls under Marn's laws and if Andy or his father brought too much attention upon themselves with the fact that they were training in magic and using it in the work that they did, that it is possible that the authorities in Marn could be notified. Most of the villagers hate and fear magic as this evil power that corrupts people to do bad things (as their religion teaches) and I would hope for the sake of their business that they kept their use of magic a secret.