OOC Group Character and Backstory Development

Here we’ll talk about party build, character crossover, and anything you want to share or have everyone know about your characters.

Everyone was in the city of Neverwinter (for there own reasons) when their dwarf patron (perhaps friend), Gundren Rockseeker, hired them to escort a wagon to Phandalin. A town on the Triboar Trail. Gundren has gone ahead with a warrior, Sildar Hallwinter, to attend to business in the town while the characters follow with the supplies. The characters will be paid 10 gp each by the owner of Barthen’s Provisions in Phandalin when they deliver the wagon safely to that trading post. Gundren also eluded that he might have more work for them if they proved trustworthy. The group headed out from Neverwinter and traveled on the High Road together for two days.

I am a Green Dragonborn Wizard, raised in the luxury of Waterdeep with my adopted family of the Noble Grifstone House.
I am also a competent physician with a healer's kit (Healer Feat) so I can do my best to keep people going as a sort of combat medic.

Greetings, hail, well met, good fortune to you, yours, and all for whom you care. I am most gratified and obliged to meet you all. I hight Alexander Simonnet Natalis de Bertier du Puy, but please feel free to call me Alex; just don't not call on me. How will I contribute to our quest? Oh, in so many ways. I am an avid dancer in the great foxtrot of life. I have rubbed elbows with the high and might of our fair city and have drunk the vilest of brews with the rankest of companions in its gutters. Of course, wearing different clothes. Here Alex brushes and straightens his cuffs. I can cross blades with the best, drink them under the table, and juggle their coin pouches once they pay off their bets. I can seperate a merchant from his purse and return it to him whilst he still quaffs at the bar. I have been known to broker negotiations between the stoutest of foes or arrange "misunderstanding" between the fairest of friends, when needed. I can act as a…procurement agent…if the need arises and the cause is just. Or at least not evil.Here, Alex smiles , looking slightly abashed. Tymora is my mistress and I worship her dutifully, and I am enthused, enthralled, enraptured by the thought of traveling with such a group of stout and hardy folk. Here, Alex stops for a moment and looks around. Is there a carafe of wine anywhere? Such declamations raise a mighty thirst.

I am completely up to date on all the gossip and rumors of Waterdeep, from the most elegant to the deeply sordid, of course. And when I am not, I fake it until I make it!

@MaJunior, feel free to let me know how much of your past you think is appropriate for me to know.

@Arrcher101, for that matter, how much of Alex's backstory would you consider basically public? I figure the origin and current status of the family is public, as well as what Alex does for a living, since he is a fixture in various inns and taverns when he is trying to supplement his income in the more public manner. I'm happy to post as much as is needed for story development and cohesion.

Gossip word has it that hard working Sildar sprung jail bird Surge out to aid needing Gundren. 100% chance Surge is a con. What wouldn't he do. Then again gossip says nothing of why he was jail bird in the first place. Who cares he is con with those beady shifter eyes.

Gundren seems to trust him and makes no notice of his background. Surge has been much a quiet log while traveling mostly.

-- Surge has shown that he has magical aptitude of a fashion. With simple waving of his hands and note on his pan flute, he can generate up pictures of stuff that he tries to explain. Who knows what else he can do.
-- He also has a pan flute which has played but most for himself. His voice tends to have a powerful sounding to it when he speaks.
-- He always keeps his distance from everyone. As most know it is always best not to anger a wolf shifter as they carry a lot of that werewolf in them they say.

It's pretty well-known that Alex's great-grandfather, the last Baron du Puy, somehow entered a series of horrifically bad investments, completely lost the family fortune, and was forced to sell the manor (near Amphail) and the title to his creditors. The family moved to Waterdeep where they became merchants.

It's also pretty well-known that Alex is a bit of a ham (or perhaps, an entire herd of swine) and loves the limelight. He makes pocket money by performing dashing deeds of derring-do in local inns and taverns, such as knife juggling, blindfolded sword routines (often with a partner), using strange weapons such as nets and cloaks, etc.

What is somewhat less well-known to the public (but whispers reach those who have known of him more than a passing fashion), is that he can act—under the right circumstances and for reasonable remuneration—as a "procurement agent", for example, to restore stolen items to their rightful owner without the hideous bureaucracy of the City Watch; or a "negotiator", or an "agent provocateur". All with plausible deniability, of course. He is very selective about which jobs he takes, but has a reasonably good track record.

What few words that crossed between ham 'Alex' (As wolf'ten Surge has now called him by. Perhaps an attempt to be friendly.) that strange him too had done some bit acting per say but doesn't really release why he took some parts. Obviously, it wasn't for entertainment. With accords to what he says that he as good at it too.

If pressed he even has some of the old costum'ing he used with him. He doesn't own much and hasn't given them up. Surge's ability use his disguise kit is much lesser than ham Alex.

Raven is a commoner and a farm boy, coming from some very small village far below the notice of most of the other members of the group. Apparently Raven's father organizes the trading of the village harvests and has done some business with Gundren in the past. Interested in doing some travelling and extremely talented with animals, Gundren accepted the young man to help manage the oxen pulling the cart, rather than being a guard.

Raven tends to stare unblinking at people and does not talk often with people, whether by choice or just social awkwardness. He has however been talking with the ox most of the trip, along with other random animals which have crossed the path of the group or wandered near any of their camps.

Raven has likely heard of the various noble family names, but would have no association with those circles. Likewise he might have heard stories of Decklan's criminal group, but not have any first hand experience with individuals. Perhaps he has seen some of the performers in a popular tavern, but there would be no reason for them to remember him being there.

Folk Hero

The entertainers of the group may have heard this story from a number of years ago:

Late one evening a group of farmers were traveling home near a more wild section of forest. The group was beset by a large group of wolves and many men were quickly injured. Things looked bleak when an angry howl erupted not from the wolves, but from the group of farmers. The wolves stopped their attack as a scrawny young boy walked boldly out to stare the alpha wolf in the eye. The two exchanged growls and barks for several moments, when the wolf turned away and the pack left the farmers in peace.