D&D avatars

We were able to finally game again last night so expect a post from Cyn soon, but right now I wanted to share the cute Gaia avatars I was able to make of the characters using this avatar generator (and some color editing in Paintshop). I'm amazed Gaia had the items I needed. :)

First up, Cyneric and Fox:

I edited the robe to be red and the fox looks a bit silly, but otherwise, yup, that's Cyn. :) He's holding his shield and quarterstaff, if you're curious.

SwampFox:

I'm not sure if that plate armor is exactly like what he has, but I figured it was close. In his hand is a battle axe.

And now onto the two characters who make Cyn jealous because I love them, too. ;)

That's Aldalion Kalmir: my flamboyant grey elf bard from a previous campaign. He's wearing a quiver, lute, and his black cat familiar.



And this is my most recent character- so recent I haven't even started playing her yet; she's going to be my character in the game I'm running soon. She's an elfling (half halfling/half wood elf) fighter/wizard; she has spent the past 70 or so years of her life as a regular wood elf, but recently has been getting training as a wizard and she's not at all comfortable with that yet (she's not even used to being indoors). She has green tattoos on her face, chest, and arms and paints on more for camouflage whenever she's in wood elf mode. I haven't decided on a name for her yet, but I'm leaning towards calling her Merily since she's pretty much my alter-ego (if not that, she'll be Meren Eryndiriel).

~Meri

Thoughts from the road

May 8th, 708CC, 1st day of Brightmoon

As always, most of my narrative can be found in this entry I just penned in our group's journal.

-I'm slightly frustrated that my knowledge of religions has failed me; I'm fairly certain that the moon shield we found at the gnoll camp is related to Artemis, but since the Older Gods are waning in this part of the world, it's extremely difficult for me to learn more about this. Fortunately Armand knows someone who knew some old priests, so I'm going to find the man and see if he can give me more information on this subject.

-Gating is rather terrifying, especially when parts of it explode when you're going through it. I'm quite thankful that it was not me who was shot out of the Gate! (Honestly, I think Shocko enjoyed that...) It's just scary to trust your life to a jar. It is nice to be able to get from Joven to Woodland in a matter of minutes, though!

-I'm proud of SwampFox; he spoke some Common the other day, which is great! The more Common he learns, the less he'll have to rely on me or Linora to translate for him. I don't mind, of course, but there are some situations where he's separated from us Orcish speaker, but has to know what's going on around him.

-It's strange to have so many animals around. I love animals, but two dogs, a fox, a cat, and a parrot (a parrot? Where'd Mags find a parrot, anyway?) means there are almost as many four-legged and winged members in the party as two-legged ones. ... actually, now I'm wondering if I should start casting Speak with Animals more often.

Crafted spell things

Digging through my Flickr account I realized that I never posted the clay spell components and spells that Josh and I made for Cyneric last year, either. I have no idea how I forgot to blog about all these things here! At some point I'll make non-out-of-character posts. ;)



In no particular order:
-Berries for the "Goodberry" spell
-Holly for "Invisibility to Animals"
-Tangled vines for "Entangle", "Plant Growth", "Snare" and "Spike Growth"
-Blue bottle for "Water Walk", "Create Water", "Resist Cold", and "Water Breathing"
-Red bottle to represent potions or whatnot
-A staff/rod for "Augury" and to represent the "Rod of Beguile" that I have
-A rock/lodestone for "Locate Object", "Meld Into Stone", and "Stone Shape"
-A mirror for "Sanctuary" (or as Josh says, a frying pan for cooking or hitting over the head)
-A shamrock for "Shillelagh" and whenever I need an herb or plant
-A piece of iron for "Heat Metal", "Hold Person"
-A bowl of incense/smoke for "Pass Without Trace", "Protection From Evil", "Glyph of Warding", "Speak With Dead", etc
-A piece of parchment for "Detect Poison" and whenever I have a message to deliver
-A tree for "Barkskin" and "Tree" (where it would be used instead of my figure)
-A shiny sphere/globe for "Charm Person/Mammal", "Command", "Detect Magic", "Enthrall", and whenever I need to do a divination spell or charm someone.
-A flaming sword for "Flame Blade"
-A ball of flame for "Fire Trap", "Produce Flame", "Resist Fire", "Flame Walk", "Pyrotechnics", and any other fire spell
-A tornado-looking thing for my air elemental and for "Dust Devil"
-A snake for "Snake Charm", "Hold Animal", "Messenger" or any other animal spell
-A piece of wood for "Trip", "Shillelagh", "Warp Wood" or any other wood spell
-Cyn's Holy Symbol of a winged fox (not the best version- the one on the doll's shield is better).

Whew, that's a lot. I think he has a few more spells not included in these (note to self: put a small dragon in the spell box for "Wyvern Watch").

~Meri

Silly sketch of Cyn and SwampFox

I've been bugging Josh (the DM) to draw me a "kinda cute drawing of my D&D characters", and I guess he got annoyed with me asking all the time, so he drew this:

I think it's adorable and looks like something from a children's cartoon. I know I'd watch one starring an orc! ;)

I'm going to start posting little ficlets/memoirs- or, rather, Cyn will be writing them. I talked character development with the DM, and I think I want to give Cyneric some hobbies. The first one I thought of is writing since he's already scribing his journal and group blog, but I'd also like to expand on his backstory and maybe have him write something for SwampFox, as well. (And darnit, I miss ficlet writing!) Look for those at some point soon. :)

~Meri

More D&D dolls - OOC

Ye gads, have I really been neglecting this blog so much over the past fewmany months that I never posted about the recent plushies I made from the campaign? What kind of artist am I, not pimping my wares whenever and wherever possible? ;)

So without further ado, here are the dolls of characters in the campaign world (click the images to see them larger). First are the group dolls I made as Christmas presents for all the players:

Clockwise from top center: Ayman (human wizard), Ghost (elf ranger), Dallas (gnome thief), Linora (human fighter), and Caleb (gnome fighter).

Next up is Fox, Cyneric's ...er... fox. Yeah, he's not too creative with names.

Isn't he an adorable little fat fox? Cyn must be feeding him too many table scraps. ;)

Now for Dwight, the man who was once a member of the travelling party and is now a duke and a paladin:

I learned that beards look strange on dolls with no chins, and gauntlets and boots look strange when there are no fingers or detailed hands or feet.

And lastly, the one I'm still working on- SwampFox, Cyn's henchman, bodyguard, and friend:

He's been in the "to finish" pile for a while, mainly because all that's left to do is give him armor and I need help on sculpting that. *looks at the DM and gives big puppy eyes*

Next up will be finishing SwampFox and working on a Shocko plushie. Yay for being able to combine art with my favorite dorky pastime!

~Meri

Some thoughts as we rest from a battle in Joven

May 1, 708CC, 1st day of Gladmoon

Most of my narrative of recently events can be found in the journal entry I just penned for the group, but I would like to add a few thoughts.

-I have found that I do enjoy being called "Senior Brother". I'm not normally one with a large ego; I had to pause for a moment before I realized the Messenger was referring to myself. It feels like just yesterday I was Called by Hermes; I suppose I don't really think of myself as "senior" yet. I mean, I'm just a Messenger.

-Random appearing and disappearing tattoos are disconcerting. If it hadn't been put there by someone I trust (and, frankly, it was a great honor for Khrom-Vel to call us his Champions!), I think it would have bothered me even more.

-I am going to miss our crazy ballistics gnome. Rest in peace, Caleb.

-I may not mention this enough, but I very much appreciate my friendship with SwampFox. As I witnessed yesterday when he prevented an orc from attacking me as I was engrossed in a spell, he always has my back.

-I am a bit worried that these Gates will make travelling so easy that ... well, Messengers will not be as respected as we are, and that people will begin to take us for granted. I likely have no reason to worry, or perhaps the real reason for my worry is that I enjoy travelling so much and I would not like to lose that. I will have to talk about this with Armand, or possibly the Head Messenger in Joven.

Yet another out of character/in character letter

((I'll write a serious, in character post as Cyn soon, but right now I wanted to continue this silliness. ;) ))

To Meri, my annoying writer-
I see that I'm stuck being the comic relief of the party, which I guess is okay in principle since I do love mischief and fun, but you're taking it a bit too far. I mean, having me turn into a tree so that the rest of the party can hide under me to escape wyverns is fine, but letting the gnome girl climb me and hide in my hair… er… branches is embarrassing. And then you had me help clean the dragon's lair which was also fine, but you joke about me carrying a feather duster and wearing an apron, and how it looked so nice with my “dress” and accentuated my hips. It's a robe, for Hermes' sake! And then the DM joins in and mentions SwampFox wearing a French maid's costume, too! Fortunately, he didn't understand what you two were talking about, and I wasn't about to translate that insanity into orcish. Sheesh! I'm going to go hide in the cavern somewhere and see if I can be granted any spells that would work well against you; do you think "Summon Insects" or "Trip" could cross worlds to get there?

No love,
Cyneric Conroy, Order of the Fleet Fox