Saturday, June 7, 2008

Heroes of Falcon’s Hollow.

I made 5 characters for the Pathfinder adventure modules D0: Hollow’s Last Hope and D1: Crown of the Kobold King. I hope to run the modules in the next couple of weeks and post the results of the adventures. The backgrounds for these characters were meant to weave the heroes into the community of Falcon’s Hollow and/or explain how they came to choosing their class.






Eja Clayborne is close with the Eavewalker Family. Idris was an old friend of her father and became like a father figure to her. Idris taught her the skills of a ranger. They even saved the townsfolk from a menacing owlbear once. Idris knew the lumber barons would see any heroics as a possible threat. He warned Eja to always help the town in a clandestine way.

Idris left two years ago with a group of adventurers and has not been heard from since. Eja has remained a close friend of Idris’ wife Kitani and his daughter Kimi who calls her “Auntie Eja”.

Eja works at Goose’n’Gander, Falcon’s Hollow’s general store. She works for the only civilized gnome in the region, Brickasnurd Hildrinsocks. He is an honest but frugal business man. Asia has worked for him since before her family went back east. The gnome considers her family and worries about her moonlighting as Falcon’s Hollow’s resident defender from the wilds. (Human Ranger 1st level)

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Bjorn was born to proud parents Wolfried and Hildegard Hammerstein. Bjorn worked along side his father in the lumber yards most of his adolescents. The little dwarf family scraped out a living under the oppressive Lumber Consortium.

Than one day a missionary from the Church of Light brought news of Iomadae, the goddess of valor and justice. Bjorn heard the preaching of the human cleric. She spoke of a deity that blessed the courageous, who gave gifts to her faithful to defend the weak, free the oppressed, and champion for justice. The missionary told the people if they gave worship to Iomadae then the town would flourish and its people would be filled with the grace. For the large part, the people of Falcon’s Hollow rejected the missionary and her goddess. The Hammerstein’s, like most in Falcon’s Hollow, wanted nothing to do with organized religion. They were happy to live life however they felt fit and be able to change with the situation instead of being restricted a set morality. However, there were a handful of people that wanted to hear more. And no one wanted to hear more then young Bjorn, who deep in his soul longed for justice.

It was not long after the small group of worshippers pooled their time, talent, and treasures together and built the Temple of Iomadae. Wolfried was furious the day Bjorn quit the lumber yards to join the Order of the Sons of Iomadae and become a cleric. After a few years Bjorn reconciled with his father and even rid the lumber yard of a terrible poltergeist, which had claimed the lives of several workers, by invoking the intercession of Iomadae. Many of the lumber workers turned to worshipping the powerful goddess who had saved them through her servant know to all as Bjorn “Ghostsbane” Hammerstein. (Dwarf Cleric 1st level)

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Sangilak Ek-Chua made his way to Falcon’s Hollow over 20 years ago. Described by many as a quiet man known for his love of books. Few know he is a half-elf and none know of his pursuit of arcane knowledge. He hides his passion for the mystical. Magic-users not in the direct employ of the Lumber Consortium are viewed as highly potential threats and are usually run out of town.

For years he has worked as a records clerk at Hollows Tribunal, the local court house. Sangilak has been a silent confidante of Magistrate Varmos Harg for many years. Sangilak is one of the few people that know the magistrate’s shame, loneliness, and thirst for true justice.

Other then himself, the only resident student of the arcane that he knows of is Sharvaras Vade. Sangilak suspects Vade to be a dark wizard perhaps dabbling in necromancy. To complicate matters Sangilak befriended Savram, Vade’s son, hoping he can gently influence the boy to explore more benevolent magical disciplines.

Sangilak knows that only through live application of his spells will he excel in his craft. He waits patiently for an opportunity to help the community with his mystical powers.


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Eilo Buckram was raised by his widowed father. It was hard working long hours at the paper mill and trying to look after a young motherless Halfling son.

Eilo was never accepted by the other neighborhood children. He was ridiculed for being small and often picked on and bullied. It started as a game when the “bigger kids”, mostly humans, teased him saying he was “too small” to go with them. He would quietly follow them and every time they caught him he just got better the next time.

As adolescence came, the kids began getting into petty crime. Eilo was disgusted by them hurting the elderly, vandalizing property, and stealing from people. He started staking them to foil their plans, making noise to give them away when they were sneaking, steal back whatever they stole and give it to it’s rightful owner, etc. He learned to fight because he wasn’t always sneaky enough but he got tough, fast, and smart.

As they grown into young adults, his once playful rivals aspired to join the Redrock Guild, an organized crim syndicate. Eilo spent so much time sabotaging the plots of the Redrock Guild that his father had become convinced that Eilo was now a member of the gang. He couldn’t make his father believe he was actually fighting the real criminals.

Out of concern for his father’s anxiety, Eilo obtained a job as a bookkeeper. The work was honest enough for his father to believe his son was no longer a criminal. Also his work spared him physically so that at night he could pursue the task of keeping Falcon’s Hollow safe.

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Surinder Murali’s father left when he was young. Why? He could never be sure; the story would change with his mother’s sobriety. The questions concerning his father stopped to matters as much when the Goblin Wars begun. He was of age at the time and was carted off with nothing more then a pitchfork to fight wild goblin warriors. Soon he was assigned to a particular soldier who treated him fairly decent.

Among the trees the soldier that accompanied him was taken down by a single crossbow bolt. The seasoned goblin warrior thought he would “play” with the human youngling before killing it. Unbeknownst to the goblin, or anyone including the young peasant boy, was the rage that had swelled inside him. From the abandonment by his father, the apathy of his mother, and shame of his inescapable poverty, fueled a boy of twelve to erupt and stab his pitchfork deep into the laughing goblin warrior. With his soldier dead, Surinder donned the fallen man’s helmet, picked up his short sword and trek further into the woods.

By dawn the sergeant had thought the soldier and his boy dead or had deserted until he saw the boy emerge from the forest. Surinder dropped the fifteen goblin scalps at the feet of the sergeant and sat by the fire without a word. Four years later the war was over and the boy was returned to Falcon’s Hollow like discarded military equipment. His mother had died while he was gone and years of fighting had left him without a purpose or hope. He began to drink.

His drunken brawls eventually landed him in the town jail. In the morning his throbbing headache was interrupted by Sheriff Deldrin Baleson giving him a sermon about a “purpose filled life”, “the greater good”, and “direction for his anger”. Somewhere between the coffee and the early afternoon Surinder began to listen to the Sheriff. By that night he had given up drinking and after a month of training with Sheriff he was deputized.