Through hatred, I gain strength.
Through strength, I gain power.
Through power, I gain victory.
Through victory, my chains are broken.
Through strength, I gain power.
Through power, I gain victory.
Through victory, my chains are broken.
-- Sith Code. (Exerpt, paraphrased)
First Name: Brokk (A pidgin understanding of common: "Broken")Last Name: Skul'i (A pidgin understanding of common: "Skull")
Appearance: A large (for a Dwarf), dusky-skinned, grumpy-looking Dwarf. He dresses in heavy armor, as any warrior worth his salt should. Slung across his back is a large round shield, with the insignia of Bregan D'aerth carved across the front, and the marks stained with dark red -- a true Company Man.
When not in battle, he is often smoking a stumpy, soap-stone pipe, carved in the image of a nude Drow woman, contorted in some obscene pose. The smoke encircles his head in a clinging, foul-smelling, poisonous haze. At the tavern, with a mug of thick, black ale at his side, he usually sits editing and updating a stack of papers and parchments scrawled edge-to-edge with tables and figures. While reading, he wears a pair of scuffed, badly damaged reading glasses.
Race: Duergar
Age: 55
Height 5'0" (1.5m)
Weight: 280lbs (127kg)
Eyes: Purple
Hair: Gray/white, with soot staining his beard and eyebrows
Facial Hair Style: A thick, sooty beard tied in several knots, ended with a silver bead.
Personality Profile: Brokk's personality is marked by apathy and callous cruelty. He fronts an attitude of Devil-may-care, up to and including his own well-being, but if enough care is taken to look further, he shows his emotions in more subtle ways. Behind everything is a certain loyalty and moral code that even he would have difficulty articulating, but none-the-less makes him one of the more honest denizens of the Underdark.
Lastly, Brokk is obsessed with debts and obligations. He remembers the day his clan sold him into slavery, and it has been a long road to freedom. Along the way, he learned the value of many things, but most of all, the value of a bond of agreement. The last debt he has yet to discharge is against his own people, in an act of righteous vengeance.
[NOTE: Despite his background, Brokk has no qualms or peculiarities about slavery, including his own time spent in chains. It was only the incurrence of The Debt (in his eyes) that moved him to action.]
General Health: Full, and at his prime, the toxic fumes of his pipe smoke do not seem to slow him, and he never, ever drinks to excess.
Deity: Deep Duerra -- The Axe Princess of Conquest set his people free from the Illithids, and he believes his prayers and sacrifices to her in the gladiatorial pits brought him the opportunity for freedom that he eagerly took.
Initial Alignment: Lawful Evil
Profession: Company Man (Mercenary) -- shortly after his arrival to Sshamath, he was picked up by an enterprising member of Bregan D'aerth. He has never looked back.
Base Class & Proposed Development: Fighter, leading to Dwarven Defender
Habits/Hobbies: Smoking -- Brokk is rarely seen without his pipe, which is clearly not of Dwarven make. Like most of his kind, Brokk keeps busy with whatever his skills and talents allow. Most of the time, that means standing in a door, keeping others out, but his skill-set is surprisingly varied, and he has shown aptitude in armor and weapon maintenance, architecture, and cartography. He also takes it upon himself to draft
contracts, and balance ledgers.
Languages: Common, Undercommon, Dwarf, Elven (though he has yet to give this knowledge away, even to the Drow he works with).
Weapon of Choice: Dwarven Waraxe -- the weapon of his people, and the tool of his vengeance.
Background:
Born into a clan that had come upon hard times, The Duergar was sold into slavery by the time he could walk, and carry a load of coal. He had learned by then the virtue of toil and hard work, and his time in bondage set him apart from the other slaves. He almost seemed determined to work himself to death, perhaps to spite his Masters, maybe to spite his Clan, or just to spite himself.
Sold to a rotund, sweaty, and opulent Drow Male, he was put to work for every and any menial task that required the strength and endurance of his kind. From this, he learned a little about many things, particularly masonry, architecture, and smithing, but also stable-mastery, book-keeping, and the drafting of contracts.
Years into his bondage, his Masters saw some promise of other reward, and entered him into gladiatorial combat. His first fight in his life was to the death. Stained in blood, with flesh between his teeth, he first felt the waxing of his own power. Scores of battles later, at a local championship, he was made a promise: "Win this for me, and you win your freedom, Ilbith". He did, and his reward was... nothing. But a debt was owed, and so it must be paid.
The Duergar clenched the tip of a broken blade in his teeth as he was dragged from the gladiatorial pits, fighting the gagging instinct to swallow it until his Masters were in what counted as their slumber. He sawed at his thumb with the broken iron blade until he could mash the flesh together, lubricated by his blood, and slipped his bonds.
The Guards found his Master dead in his own bed; head caved in with a cobble stone from the slave pens, and the Duergar missing. Among the missing not noticed, was the Masters intricately-carved soap-stone pipe.
Wandering through caves and forests of mushrooms, it was chance -- or maybe providence -- brought him upon a caravan, slaughtered to the last man, the rotting meat still wearing the gear they had died in. Brokk (as he was calling himself now), pieced together something resembling armor from the rotting remains, and armed himself with whatever he could carry.
He headed to his homelands, bent on vengeance -- there was a debt to be paid, after all --
but the road brought him to Sshamath, and once he'd hawked the wares scavenged from the slaughtered caravan, he bought himself a decent set of armor, some tools, and set about finding odd jobs. While sitting in the Gloura's Wings late one Cycle, his dour appearance, and perhaps more to the credit, the noxious smoke from his pipe, drew the attention of a particular Orc, and thus truly begins his tale...
Goals: Annihilation of the clan that sold him.
Possible Plot-Hook Ideas and Misc Facts:
Couple things here:
-- The Drow Master that had enslaved him: His House may still exist, and may still be looking for answers, or maybe not -- he was just a fat, opulent, coffer-draining Jaluk after all...
-- The Duergar Clan: Still exists, in whatever form the DM staff may choose. They probably aren't too far from Sshamath. Brokk intends to one day annihilate them to the last, and take their name as his own once again.
-- The Caravan: The goods Brokk fenced early on might have been marked, and might have been part of a caravan long-overdue, and much expected. Perhaps something valuable hidden among the carnage?
All this is at the DM's whim -- as far as Brokk is concerned, his future lies ahead of him, not behind. He has few ghosts in his closet, and regrets nothing up to this point.
