This message was last edited by the GM at 07:19, Sat 19 Mar 2022.

This is good.  I want to know more about Kursak's family.  Half-goliath is an interesting mix.  How did that affect Kursak's upbringing?  How much contact did he have with his mother's side of the family?  What were they like?

Vassalheim's a great big city -- the oldest in the known world.  Where in Vassalheim did Kursak hang out?  What did he do with his spare time?

I'm very interested in Shirin -- a pirate in the midst of a family full of law-officers and soldiers?  How did that happen, and what was the reaction within the family?  What's Kursak's persona opinion on the subject?

Same deal with that Assassination attempt.  That's pretty big, so tell me more about it.

Connection with other characters:  Frilia grew up on Issylra, there's a possibility there, if you choose to explore it.  I don't see much opportunity to interact with others once he's on the Blightshore, so we should get those connections in early, if we can.

---

https://criticalrole.fandom.com/wiki/Vasselheim

Being a half-breed often has its pros and cons. Finding friends among the goliaths was more difficult, as even though he grew quickly, he did not keep up with them in height or strength. For those, and his having a human father, his goliath peers often referred to by the nickname, Thricecursed. Still, his growth rate easily outpaced most of the other children and already looked like a human teenager by the time he was eight years old. The goliaths may have looked down on him, but the others still looked up, and were often happy to have larger friend for protection or for getting into things (or trouble) that they could not on their own.

Kursak had more contact with his mother's side of the family when he was young, before his brother was born. Around that time, it became apparent that the children would not reach their full potential in the eyes of her family, and despite Kursak's father being a proven warrior both respected and feared, he and his children did not belong with the tribe. It did not break family ties, but it did strain them. From that point, contact grew increasingly rare over the years to come.



Most of his time was spent in The Duskmeadow and the Abundant Terrace. When there was a match to see at The Crucible, he would attend when possible. He and his friends often enjoyed roleplaying as Bastions, or as warriors fighting against various monsters. Unsurprisingly, he often ended up having to play the role of the monster, being so much larger than the other children, but he didn't usually mind.


Kursak's father was a privateer in his youth, where he became known as Kirken the Black, and he still loves to tell the tales to this day. When he returned to port to find Vaenmi was pregnant with Alisi, he gave up his sea legs, but the stories inspired Shirhin enough to live that life herself. Kursak and his family only know that she's a sailor, the pirate part is fairly new and not something she's bothered to tell them. I imagine love is going to be her reasoning for that change, but I've not explored that yet.


A lot of the details here I haven't worked out yet. She was trying to kill a noble, important but not prominent.


I'm going to read through everyone else's stuff tomorrow, so I will look into that.

The aunt's story is certainly open to change. Skargol being a rival for me letting his father die, I like. I didn't want Skargol's mother to be dead, but I wanted a reason for her to be out of the picture and unaware of her husband's death for the time being.

What if we drop Blightshore and move his studies to an established academy somewhere? He could have attended the Soltryce Academy instead, and just focused his studies there on life and death magic, for example. I know there are other schools too, I'll look those up after lunch to see if any fits more than the others.

I'm ok with having met Kursak before we had to flee to Wildermore, Frilia was outside as much as she could and she lived near a trading town so there are possibilities

Well, there's a surprising lack of detailed information on the places of study, so I don't know if there's a better option for that or not. Soltryce Academy looks like it could work, and would put me in the regions of Wildemount/Rexxentrum during my teens, which would also make it easier for my sister to make her way to the Menagerie Coast, and make the ties to other players much easier to establish.

The man who taught Frilia how to fight could have been my father instead, or Harris Griswat could be one of the men who had trained under him. My father could have taken me along for one of the training sessions, or as a practice partner that she wasn't used to facing to see how she did in a new situation with a new opponent she didn't know anything about. Knowing the purpose was training and learning, and being a strong believer in fate, Kursak wouldn't have had any bad feelings toward her for getting his butt kicked, he'd have searched for lessons to be learned from the experience instead.

I actually love the Blightshore angle.

I wouldn't worry too much about the lack of connections to other players once you've moved to to Rotthold.  We can say (with Frilia's consent) that Kursak and Frilia became strong friends.    Not everyone's a social butterfly, and the life of a researcher can oftne be more lonely than most others.

As for the place of study?  Make it up!  Give it a name, and a location (I'd suggest Cairn Hill), and go with it!

Lets go with Cairns Cradle for the name, and it can be located in the Cairn Hill quarter.
This message was last edited by the player at 04:20, Sun 20 Mar 2022.

Okay, let's add some more colour to his history:

Kersak was kidnapped by pirates while traveling to Rotthold.  While captured, he met an old thief who helped him escape.  You have proficiency with thieves’ tools and proficiency in the Stealth skill.

Microstory this.  How did it happen?  Is there a connection to Shirhin, or not (both options are valid)?  Who was the thief?

Aboard the Swirling Mists
Kursak sat on an overturned water keg as he marked his place in a book with his left hand and took notes in another book with his right. He had studied everything he could find on the Blightshore before making the trip, but now he was about to take his reading and analyzing, and put it into practice in the real world. In a part of the real world, specifically, that was known to drive people insane simply for being there. If the land itself, roaming undead, the fallout from the Calamity, or pirates didn't kill you first, of course.

As Kursak dipped his quill once more, shouting came from above deck, drawing his attention. He had grown accustomed to the ship's normal sounds, including the shouting of orders, and long since learned to tune them out as unimportant. These shouts were entirely different, and he could tell they meant trouble.

He closed the reference book, stopped the inkwell, and spread sand over the notebook page before setting the other book across the top of the pages to hold the second book open. His eyes went to the locker near his bunk, in which he had stowed his armor. If it wasn't an attack, the armor would be a waste of time. If it was a storm, the armor would actually increase his risk rather than the opposite. After a moment, he dismissed the idea of donning his armor and made his way above deck. There he saw members of the crew scrambling to various positions on the boat, while the captain and officers were all gathering together.

The crew already knew what their jobs were once the order was given, it seemed, as no further orders had been called out. Kursak looked around for signs of what had caused the alarm, but saw nothing. He looked up at the captain, shielded his eyes with a hand above his brow, and followed the captain's gaze, but still he saw n--

A section of water and sky was moving, but not with the rest of the water and sky around it. It bobbed and swiveled like someone had cut a piece of water and sky out of the world and then set it afloat in the sea. He looked back toward the captain, confused, but reality aligned in his mind just as he heard a nearby crewman speak the very same thought. "Damn ship's wrapped in illusion!" Kursak's head swung back toward the illusion, and with confusion no longer making him blind to the other details, he saw it perfectly. A ship wrapped in shifting illusions, moving to intercept them.

The masked ship moved too fast for the Swirling Mists to outrun them, and the first officer ordered everyone aboard to take up arms as they prepared to face a ship that obviously held a magic-user. Kursak had been practicing magic for only a few months, and though he was capable of producing some of the effects, they only worked some of the time. He knew things about magic, but illusion was one school he had little interest in, and had put almost no time or effort into studying.

---

Aboard a Pirate Ship

The pirate ship clearly outmatched the passenger vessel, and the captain had called for surrender as soon as that fact became clear. Still, two crewmen had been killed, several wounded, and the pirates had begun making prisoners of everyone under twenty-one years of age, Kursak included.

As he and the others were lead across a plank to the other ship, which still looked like a shifting portrait of sea and sky, he had no idea what to expect as he passed through it. He could see the illusion getting closer with each step, and he braced himself for...whatever awaited him when he touched it, but he passed through like it didn't exist at all. He knew that it wasn't real, the concept of illusions was not lost on him, but he expected to at least have felt the presence of the magic itself, but there was nothing at all.

Once he had passed through, the pirate's ship came fully into view. He turned to see what it looked like from this side, and was rewarded with a rough jab to the back of his shoulder, forcing him to face forward again. Still, he saw enough to know that this side could be seen through almost completely. Colors were a bit muted, perhaps greyed-out a bit, but otherwise you could see through it just fine. (Paused for sleep.)
This message was last edited by the player at 07:50, Sun 20 Mar 2022.

Kursak and the other prisoners were lined up in two rows on the deck of the hidden pirate ship, while a seemingly-human woman, with white hair evaluated each of them in turn. While the woman was going over prisoners further down the line, Kursak saw a number of the other pirates bringing stolen items over from the other boat, piling things up along the starboard rail for others to sort through. Some items they were clearly impressed by and passed down to a grizzled old dwarf who wrote something down for each item before packing it into a large chest. Other items were tossed overboard unceremoniously, or mocked a bit before doing the same.

When the white-haired woman reached him, Kursak looked up into her eyes, and he nearly fell over. It felt like her eyes were a gateway into another world, drawing him in toward them. The woman's hand shot out and grabbed him by the jaw, in a grip so firm that he felt like she could actually break it with a squeeze if she wished. She didn't look strong, but there was no mistaking she was very much a woman of power. Those eyes stared into his own, and thoughts flew through his mind so quickly that he could grasp none of them. It was like the noise of a crowd was inside his head, but all he could do was stare at the woman's eyes and marvel.

When she released him, Kursak felt like he'd just done two days worth of sparring in a matter of seconds, and his legs were suddenly weak. A guard behind him kicked Kursak's knee from behind, and unable to support himself on one wobbly leg, Kursak dropped to a kneeling position.. The woman turned without a care, to analyze another of the prisoners. Mocking laughter caught his attention, and he turned his head to find the source. The men going through the spoils from The Swirling Mists were holding up the armor that his father had had made for him. It was well crafted, but in the rugged style common in Vasselheim, not what the people here in these warm climates, nor those who lived life on the sea would ever risk wearing for fear of drowning if they were to ever hit the water. Kursak had barely had time to consider what it was that might have drawn their laughter before he watched them casually throw the armor overboard. He was still weak from whatever the woman had done to him, but he moved without thinking.

Kursa's head jerked to the side and he heard a hollow thumping sound as the world went black. The pirate standing above him tossed the belaying pin he'd hit him with to another pirate, and then lifted Kursak up by his arms and dragged him down below deck.

In the Hold of a Pirate Ship
Kursak woke to a painful headache, causing him to sit up and hold his head against the pain. When he did, the world swam and he vomited onto the floor. Each time his stomach heaved, the pressure in his head made it feel like it was literally going to explode, and the pain was incredible. As the nausea faded, exhaustion had set in once again, and he rolled back over onto his back once more. When he did, his bruised head bumped the metal bars he'd not managed to even notice. The shock of pain interlaced with his exhaustion, and the world went black once more.

...

The next time Kursak woke, his head throbbed, something had caked his eyelashes together, and vision was blurry. He heard two people arguing nearby, but found words hard to focus on.

"...dies...kill you..." The voice sounded...concerned.

"..damaged goods...care...dump...done with.." The other voice did not.

The boat came down on the far side of a wave he'd not noticed, causing his head to bounce slightly from the change in speed and direction. Pain flared, and once again everything went black.

(OOC: The concerned voice is Shirhin, she knows it was him, but he didn't know it was her, and his only lasting memory of this now is that there was an argument when he woke, and then he blacked out again.)

In a New Haxon Warehouse
When at last Kursak awoke and did not immediately vomit or pass out all over again, he found himself inside a warehouse, in a cage with another man. Kursak was weak and tired, but he managed to sit up and take in his surroundings. Little information was gleamed from the warehouse itself, as nearly all of the boxes and crates within were closed.

(Break for the sake of break)

The man who shared his cell, however, smelled...wrong. He smelled sweet, but not like candy; sweet like a dusty, wrinkled apple sitting in the grass for two days and beginning to split. Yet at the same time, he smelled like boiling bones when his mother would make bone brother for a patient complaining of pain in their joints of stomach. As he took in the man's look, a few things stood out rather distinctly. First, the man had a scar across his left cheek that ran from ear, just below the cheekbone, clear through his upper lip, and into the bottom lip as well. It would take a vicious blow from an axe, which clearly would have killed him, or he would have had to spin away from a slashing sword too slowly, causing it to slice far more of his face that it would have had he not moved at all. Either way, it had clearly not been treated or bandaged whatsoever and grown infected, for the scarring was absolutely horrible. [private to dm: The thief is a hollow one.]

Second, the man was missing his right hand all together, and the look of that wound suggested it had also been the result of battle. It had been treated, clearly, but not by someone with much skill. Kursak himself could have done better, and even if he did not much look it, he was still a child. It was an old wound, obviously, even older than the man's face. Lastly, was the look in the man's eyes. Those eyes said that this man had known neither hope nor happiness, for years. If ever.

It did not do well for lifting Kursak's spirits in regard to his current situation.

"Welcome to hell, kid. Those bars ain't moving, and there's not a single thing in reach for use as a tool, weapon, or means to end your miserable suffering and boredom. Get comfortable, and do me a favor and keep the noise down while you're here, eh? Oh, and if you try to hug me 'for comfort', like the last guy," his face scrunched up and his voice raised as he mocked the words, "I'll smash your face into those bars until you don't have a face left. You hear me?"

Kursak didn't care for any of the things the man had to say, but the last part left him even more uneasy than the rest. His head still ached, but it was dull now, in comparison, and he had recovered some of his strength. He stood up and tested the bars on the door, as well as the lock that kept the cell shut.

"Sure. Don't believe me. Don't listen to what I have to say. What the hell do I know, eh? Pffft, what a joke. Go on, have a look around. Shake the bars some more. No, no. Go on. I'll wait." The man put his good hand behind his head and reclined as if to take a nap while he waited.

"It's not about trust. Alright? I just needed to see for myself how bad it was. How long have we been in here?"

"We? They dropped you off about three hours ago. Maybe four."

Kursak's stomach rumbled, and he realized he had no idea how long he had been unconscious, or what they had done to sustain him during that time. He was hungry, and he noticed for the first time that his throat was rather dry as well. "You've been here a while then, I take it? When was the last time they brought food or drink?" Kursak looked around, verifying that there was nothing at all within reach. There was an unglazed window about ten feet away, big enough for him to fit through, and low enough that he could reach it. How in the world he was supposed to free himself to reach it in the first place was another matter entirely.

(Paused to rewrite a chunk that was here in the middle that felt a bit flat. Ending relocated to my private game so I don't lose it. )
This message was last edited by the player at 06:47, Mon 21 Mar 2022.

The man let out a miserable laugh, "I haven't bothered keeping track of the days, kid. Two or three weeks. A bit more, maybe. Food comes every few days. There's not a schedule, and it's not much. Don't think about it, or you'll drive yourself insane. Trust me."

"Well, we'll find a way out. One way or another," Kursak wanted to look at the man for encouragement, but he knew the man would offer him no such thing.

"Sure, kid."

Kursak struggled against some of the bars, trying to push them, pull them, use the leverage of one to pull toward or against another, but the man was right. It was useless. The bars were solid, and there was nothing nearby but dust and each other.

Feeling defeated, Kursak sat down and leaned his head against the bars to rest. His head still hurt, and the pressure of the bars didn't help that much, but their cold temperature actually did help a bit to dull the ache. It didn't take them long to warm up from his being in contact with them, though, causing the ache to return. Kursak lifted his head and looked at the lock again. The back, on the inside of the cell, was completely covered, there wasn't so much as a tiny hole to try to peek through. He reached his hand through the bars to feel around on the front of it, but all he learned from that was the key seemed like it had to be pretty small. Certainly smaller than he was used to.

"No use there either, kid. That lock was made in Uthodurn, you couldn't break that thing off with a warpick. It..." The man sighed and waved his remaining hand dismissively.

The man's pessimistic attitude about everything was beginning to wear on Kursak, and he was starting to feel like giving up too. Negativity was easy, and that made it tempting. Especially in his already tired state.

More than an hour passed, with the two of them sitting in silence, staring off into the dusty floor.

Kursak was bored, and stood up in frustration, determined to try to make his way out again. The bars were all solid, no give whatsoever. They were spaced to near to one another for him to squeeze through, even if he were able to manage bending one out of shape, they were both too big to fit. "Look, kid. Unless you've got some picking tools hidden away, we're not-" Sudden sound outside the window caught their attention, and they both turned toward it. It sounded like a sail, or a flag, flapping in the wind. Sunlight poured in through the window, but a black silhouette rushed by the unglazed window sill, and their heard a light sound of impact as, whoever it had been, came to a soft impact beneath it.

Something small came in through the window, and Kursak reflexively moved his head like it was going to hit him if he didn't. He moved right into the direct sunlight, and temporarily blinded by it, he closed his eyes as a the thing smacked straight into his face, opening a small cut under his eye where the corner of it had punctured his skin. Kursak bend down and picked up the small leather bundle, while the man still stared up at the window, confused.

When Kursak opened it, an array of small metal tools were inside, each with odd designs on the end. The man looked back to Kursak, then down at the tools, back at Kursak, then shot back toward the open window.

The man raised his voice, "Unless you've got a sack of gems hidden away..." He was looking up at the window with a pleading look in his red-rimmed eyes.

Kursak touched his cheek where the thing had cut him. It stung, of course, but it wasn't bad and would heal on its own just fine. The man spoke, pulling him out of his confused state, "Listen up, kid. This bit is important..."

For the next ten minutes, the man gave Kursak a crash-course in locking mechanisms, and how to pick them. He talked about a couple of the tools, bt ignored the rest.

"You can't rake an Uthodurnian lock, so the rest don't matter. You need the lifting hook and a torque bar."

Kursak looked through the tools that were there and spotted a long, straight piece with a bit of a hook on the end, and held it up for confirmation.

"Aye, that's the one."

He looked at the others, with no idea what 'torque' even meant. After his eyes had clearly overlooked it multiple times, the man spoke up again, "It's the straight one there with both ends bent, facing opposite directions. No, not - yes, that one. Put it in first, with the handle pointed off to your left, so you can apply the torque. You're not trying to turn it yet - it's still locked, obviously - but you need that tension inside there so that each pin you release will stay there as you go. Without it, the pins will just slide back down and keep it locked. Don't put too much pressure on it, or you'll bend it, and you'll have killed the one shot we have at getting out of here. You hear me?"

The instructions made sense, even if he didn't fully understand what he was doing. The concept made sense, at least, and the instructions sounded simple enough, so he gave it a shot.

The first pin was easier than he expected, the second seemed like it was already loose, so he moved on to the third, getting a little excited. It took a little more work, but he got it, and moved on to the fourth. While he was focused on trying to get the hook in the right place to find the pin, he eased up on the torque bar and they both heard the pins fall back into place. "You have to keep tension on that torque bar, kid."

Kursak looked over at him and nodded his head, then went back to work again. The first pin stuck a bit this time, he took a while to even find the second one, which also stuck pretty bad. The third one was easy, but while feeling around for the forth one they heard the pins drop again. "Torque bar."

"I know, dammit. This isn't as easy as you made it sound." He threw the man an accusatory look, but he already had the torque bar back in place and was going back in with the lifting hook.

"Look, kid. I know you don't want to get stuck in here, and you're nervous because this is your first time, but if you don't slow down we won't be getting out that door at all, much less in the near future. Most people don't start on a lock that's facing away from them, having to deal with the lifting hook backwards. They sure as blight don't start on an Uthodurnian lock, either. It's hard, I get it, but you've already gotten further, twice, on your first two tries, than I did on my first lock all together." [private to dm: a nod to Minho's story. Let's see if she notices on her own.]

"Of course, I didn't have an amazing teacher like you, either. Suck it up, kid. Relax, and go again." Kursak took a slow, deep breath, and nodded.

"You have to keep the tension on the torque bar the whole time, or you lose everything you just accomplished. If you get in a hurry and ease up on it just a little bit, the pins will fall back down. Now calm down, and try it again. Torque bar in. Apply tension. Insert the lifting hook, feel around for each pin and push it up until it gets loose, then move to the next one. If it's already loose, then it's already in place and you can move on to the next one."

Kursak went through the steps again, focused on the work. First pin. Second pin. Third, and fourth. Fifth...the torque bar rotated as the sixth pin was pushed out of place, and Kursak looked over.

The man was staring at him, intensely, "Give it a full turn, kid. Full turn."

Kursak smiled at him as the torque bar turned, "Oh, Gods! Thank you! My name's Kursak, by the way." Kursak finished rotating the torque bar, and the lock clicked open.

The man inclined his head, "It's a pleasure to meet you, Kursak." Then he pushed open the door, stepping past Kursak. As he moved free of the cell, he closed his eyes and stretched his arms high over his head, luxuriating in the stretch for a moment before letting out a rough sigh.

He looked back at Kursak, a smirk on his face for the first time in years, "My name is..." The man paused, then grunted as he tilted his head slightly, "My name is my own." Without another word, the man bound toward the nearby window, hoisted himself up, and then out.

"I...uh..." Kursak grabbed the tools and shoved them back inside the leather case, "Okay then. Hold on." He tucked case into his shirt and hopped up to catch the window sill to follow suit. When he looked outside, there was no sign of the man, nor anyone else. As he leapt down from the window and dusted off his hands, he heard the flapping of a bird's wings and looked up, across the street, to see a black bird flying south. With no better idea of where he was, or where he should go, Kursak followed the bird.

---

Kursak took off after the raven, as she had hoped that he would. She counted to three before she slipped out from around the corner of the building and made her way to the street where Kursak had gone. She peeked around the corner to see that he was moving away from the building. They wouldn't bother looking for him for long, their actions weren't legal, even here. He would have to find own way out, and back to wherever it was that he had been going, but at least he would a chance. Even if it was only a small one. If he followed the shoreline, he would eventually find safety in Rotthold. If he veered west, he'd...well, his fate was his own now.

"Good luck, little brother." Shirhin turned and headed back toward the docks.
This message was lightly edited by the GM at 04:45, Tue 22 Mar 2022.