Simple-shaped Crumevan spirits my beloved

With color variations + matching backgrounds for funsies:

Featured character: Mora (she/they)

(Please don’t repost, but do reblog!)

Comm done for @karlobears, hugs for the piggies!!

You know what's fun, for me, sometimes?  Making D&D characters.  Sometimes I make character sheets for my various OCs.  I do that for funsies sometimes, and today I was in the mood so I thought about who I should do?  And the answer was "All of them."  But that's too ambitious so I settled on the slightly less absurd "all 22 I used for that tarot thing I did a while back."

I'll probably be doing them five or six at a time, here's my deal: --These are D&D 5E characters.  For their stats, I'm using the standard array of 8, 10, 12, 13, 14, and 15 (before racial bonuses and increases for level-up). --I'm building them in D&D Beyond, so I'm only using sources I have there.  I am using playtest and Critical Role content, as well as some optional rules like feats, multiclassing, and custom backgrounds for some characters. --Character levels are based on the character's strength/competence within their original setting and narrative.  Levels 1-5 are characters who really shouldn't be going on adventures.  Levels 6-10 are reasonably capable, but there are still threats in their setting that are distinctly out of their league.  Levels 11-15 are ready for the most serious threats their narratives have to offer.  I don't have any planned, but levels 16-20 are for larger-than-life deus ex characters that exist in stories that don't threaten or challenge them.

Fiera Evenshine Half-Elf Cloistered Agent (Custom Sage) Rogue 6 (Inquisitive)/Monk 5 (Way of Shadows) STR 10 DEX 18 CON 12 INT 14 WIS 14 CHA 10 Feats: Alert Proficiencies: Acrobatics, Athletics, History, Insight, Investigation (Expertise), Perception (Expertise), Sleight of Hand, Stealth (Expertise), Thieves' Tools Race and Class Features (Highlights): Darkvision, Sneak Attack, Cunning Action (Disengage), Uncanny Dodge, Slow Fall, Unarmored Movement Spells (Highlights): Darkness, Pass without Trace

Clarent Changeling Charlatan Bard 4 (College of Glamour) STR 10 DEX 12 CON 8 INT 16 WIS 13 CHA 18 Feats: None Proficiencies: Acrobatics, Deception (Expertise), History, Insight, Performance (Expertise), Persuasion, Sleight of Hand, Cook's Utensils, Disguise Kit, Forgery Kit, Drum, Dulcimer, Pan Flute Race and Class Features (Highlights): Change Appearance, Jack of All Trades, Mantle of Inspiration, Enthralling Performance Spells (Highlights): Vicious Mockery, Silent Image, Faerie Fire, Charm Person, Enthrall

Isabelle Pham Human Latchkey Kid (Custom Urchin) Warlock 8 (Hexblade, Pact of the Blade) STR 8 DEX 14 CON 12 INT 10 WIS 14 CHA 18 Feats: Spell Sniper, War Caster Proficiencies: Acrobatics, Arcana, Deception, Insight, Intimidation, Perception, Persuasion Race and Class Features (Highlights): Hex Warrior Spells (Highlights): Eldritch Blast, Detect Magic, Dispel Magic, Counterspell, Hex, Elemental Weapon

Chloe Sonnier Water Genasi Outlander Wizard 4 (Necromancer) STR 8 DEX 10 CON 14 INT 17 WIS 14 CHA 14 Feats: None Proficiencies: Arcana, Athletics, Medicine, Survival, Flute Race and Class Features (Highlights): Amphibious, Grim Harvest Spells (Highlights): Shape Water, Chill Touch, Witch Bolt, Create/Destroy Water, Gentle Repose

Iematsu Temmeji Air Genasi Street Thug (Custom Urchin) Monk 15 (Way of the Four Elements) STR 12 DEX 18 CON 15 INT 8 WIS 18 CHA 10 Feats: None Proficiencies: Acrobatics, Athletics, Intimidation, Perception, Cook's Utensils Race and Class Features (Highlights): Unending Breath, Martial Arts, Flurry of Blows, Deflect Missiles, Fist of Unbroken Air, Evasion, Purity of Body, Diamond Soul, Unarmored Movement Spells (Highlights): Thunderwave, Gust of Wind, Levitate, Fly

I blame Critical Role for this, but it is a good and fun idea so it’s all good, uh, I started making playlists for my characters!  But not on Spotify.  Spotify does not always have the music selection I want, Youtube works better for me.

But there’s really no point in making a bunch of playlists and not sharing them with anyone is there?  So here’s what I’ve got so far...

Fiera Evenshine’s playlist, Stabdaughter

Ryan Aries’ playlist, Errant Red

Gabriel Silva's playlist, A Smile Like The Sun

Lienna Rieza’s playlist, Broadway Artemis

Nelson Ricci’s playlist, Requiem for a Boytoy

Clarent’s playlist, Living Defect

It is time I think to talk about what sort of life my OC Nelson Ricci has had, that turned him into such a mess of a boy.  Or, more specifically, I'ma talk about the people in his life.

Let's start with his mother, Anne Ricci.  At any given moment, Anne is either drunk or hungover.  Whichever she is, she's never violent, or belligerent, or mean, she's just... absent.  She doesn't keep very good track of what's going on around her, and although she certainly notices tensions rising and fights breaking out, she never understands the causes, so she usually lacks useful input.  Still, she does try to keep the peace, mostly with a generous application of sloppy affection and vague encouragement.  It doesn't help much.

Considering how distant and out of it Anne is, it might be a good thing that Nelson's father Paul is such a hands-on parent.  But probably not; first he'd have to be like... actually good at parenting.  Paul is certain that what kids need above all is discipline.  Rules, consequences, consistency, stability.  It's not necessary, in his mind, for the rules to make sense or serve a purpose beyond creating structure in his children's lives.  "Because I said so" is his usual justification for any rule he imposes.

One of Paul's rules is "go to church every Sunday"; he's the sort of evangelical who is convinced that separation of church and state has gone too far in this country.  Nelson's older sister Nancy, on the other hand, is the sort of evangelical who is convinced that her brother wears black because he's possessed by a demon that's turning him gay.  She's against most scientific research and modern medicine.  It's all a conspiracy, you know.

Out of all these human disasters, though, the one Nelson has always found it hardest to live with is his younger brother, Daniel.  Daniel is a simple boy of simple pleasures: he just likes to upset people.  He thinks it's funny.  Any kind of negative reaction he can provoke feels like a victory to him--which means that all of his father's punishments serve to reinforce his behavior.  One of his favorite pastimes for many years has been to sneak into Nelson's room in the middle of the night and pee on his brother.  That always gets a reaction from more or less the whole family.

So I've thought about doing an OC writeup of Elijah the Black Key, and I still might, but for now what I'd like to babble about is this: what does that "the Black Key" bit even mean?

The short answer: a Key is a type of shapeshifter that acquires new forms by killing them.

The fine print: a Key is a soul bound to a metal skeleton key, which generates and possesses a living body.  If the body dies, or the main shaft of the key is broken, the Key will die.  Keys are born with one body, inherited from one of their parents, but can acquire up to twelve.  In order to acquire new forms, the Key must first find a living creature they would like to turn into and mentally designate that as their prey.  Doing so creates an of imprint of the creature and its current physical state--including things like injury, illness, hunger and fatigue.  The imprint is also partially affected by the creature's own perception of itself.  Things that the prey doesn't mentally distinguish from itself may become part of the imprint, including clothes, prosthetics, or even other living things such as stomach microbes.  However, forming an imprint does not necessarily mean the key can transform into it; to properly seal the form and access it, they must kill their designated prey without losing focus on that objective.  If they become distracted, even briefly, the imprint is lost and--assuming they still want the form--they will have to start over.

Once they have acquired at least two forms, which most Keys refer to as "gates", they can toggle between them with an extended magical girl transformation sequence.  They will always return to the form just as it was when they originally imprinted it, so with just two gates filled a Key has a potentially infinite lifespan.  However, most keep acquiring new forms when they encounter creatures whose bodies strike them as useful.  Once a Key has imprinted a form in one of their gates, they can't replace or get rid of it except through their reproductive process.

A Key can reproduce biologically if their form is capable of doing so; however, any offspring born this way won't be Keys.  For a new Key to be born, one or more Keys who have each filled all twelve of their gates must give up a total of twelve forms between them; one of these will become the new Key's first form.  This means a key can have anywhere from one to twelve parents--although a lone key would have to give up all twelve of their gates to have a child, and would die in the process, some Keys view this as a form of reincarnation, so it is not unheard of.  Still, like most reproductive processes, Keys don't have a one hundred percent success rate; sometimes their attempts to reproduce fail to create a new soul, resulting in nothing but an inert piece of metal.  The fertility rate is influenced both by the strength of the emotional bonds between the parent Keys, and the diversity of metallurgic composition in their skeleton keys.

Newborn keys are influenced by their parents' souls, and as a result tend to inherit some of their parents' understanding of the world--from knowledge of their own abilities as a Key, to practical survival skills, to deep-seated moral and cultural beliefs.  This allows them to be more independent than most creatures from birth, which is good because Keys very rarely take any part in raising their offspring.  Most Keys are left to fend for themselves from birth.

When the Clearview pack meets for eats, Remy frequently takes bacon or sausage links from other peoples’ plates while they’re not looking.  Sometimes he feels bad about this and surreptitiously puts like a piece of toast on their plate as payment, but let’s be real: at a table full of werewolves, bread for bacon is not a fair trade.

Basically the entire pack is down to share food* they just kind of wish he would ask?  But Remy is too shy.  But he Wants the Meats.  Such is the beast within he must struggle with.