Wednesday, September 17, 2008

My *favorite* AD&D character

My *favorite* AD&D character (1st ed. with some house rules mixed in, from '83-85-ish - high school):

class: Paladin
race: Human (no other option for Pallies back then)
name: Eridon

Ran this guy thru a yearlong (or more) campaign back then. That was such an amazing time for creativity and just getting into the game....and no, we never went down into the steam tunnels up at MSU, either...we weren't *that* kooky.

He has since been re-birthed over and over again, in various games (Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale, NWN, D&D Tactics, DDO, etc).

Back then, tho ('83-ish), he was a strict by-the-book Pally. Funny I played by-the-book on this one, after that Lizard-man a couple years earlier, eh? 10 magic items max, consisting of: 1 suit of armor, 1 shield, 4 weapons, and 4 other magic items. That's it! 10% tithing to the church. And better watch those role-playing decisions...LG is LG, dammit!

He had 18/?? STR, I wanna say 18/42 or so, and a 17 CHA. Somewhat low CON if I recall, but DEX, INT, WIS were all decent, just not uber...in the 10-13 range, IIRC. Tough stat restrictions on those ole boys back then. You either got lucky on those die rolls or you were just a Fighter....ha!

We eventually quested (one *Hell* of a quest, BTW) for a +5 Holy Avenger (yes!) for him, and he had a Girdle of (hhmmmnnnn....) Frost Giant Strength (STR=21 ?), IIRC, a Ring of Fire Resistance, and a Warhorse as a mount (which I don't ever recall us using...crazy).

I seem to recall the Maul or the Mattock of the Titans, as an uber weapon that one of us wielded for a while. That was badass too. Oh and I used to love those sweet magical swords that were like +1 Longsword (+3 vs Undead), etc....cool stuff back then. Never had a Vorpal, but the sword that I thought was sweet (still noone ever had one in our campaigns) was the "Sword of Sharpness."

The rest is just plain blurry to me now.
Gotta dig up those old character sheets. I have so much old D&D/AD&D/GammaWorld/StarFrontiers/TopSecret/GangBusters/etc crap, it's kinda silly. I still thumb thru the old hardcovers, and the old issues of Dragon magazine...so much fun to rekindle those old fires, now and again.

1 comment:

Darius Whiteplume said...

One of my favorites was a paladin too. Sir George deGaulle. He was remarkably old-time knight like in that while mounted, he was the baddest thing on the field, but as soon as he was off the horse, he was just a punk-ass rich kid who can't fight.

I forget how strict we were on the rules, but since our DM never gave out magic items or gold, I lived a fairly devout life. Like the ugly boy who wants to be a virgin, it was not hard to do.

Two of my favorite memories are:

When in town, all the characters would try picking up women, rolling reaction to see who got the best looking one. I had an 18 charisma, so not only did I get the best looking ones, I stole theirs as well. Then to twist the knife, he would not sleep with them, but recite poetry about epic battles and the fair maidens' beauty. Boy, did that tick people off!

Second, I figure paladins are very class conscious, so when fighting "lesser" creatures, or people of low station, I would not use my sword, but rather a pick or mace. "You are not worthy of my blade, sir!"

I have another AD&D charater in mind. Maybe I'll do that on my blog?