Player: Deathless One

Party Role: Tank

Class(es): Monk 2 / Barbarian 2 (Lion Totem)

        Projected Build: Monk 2 / Barbarian 3 / Fist of the Forest 3 / Deepwarden 2 / Ninja of the Crescent Moon 10

Character: Griffith Silveraxe

Race: Dwarf

Gender: Male

Age: 47

Portrait:  Character Picture 

Sheet:  Character Sheet 

Description:

The dwarf before you stands 4ft 5inches and weighs a hefty 204 pounds for his squat size.  His hair is dark brown and his beard is riddled with random strands of red.  He has eyes the color of granite and his skin is hard as cobblestones.  He carries himself with an air of pride and a stance that hints towards a noble house.

He wears simple clothes. Earth colors and tones are the majority of his attire though when one looks closely, the fabric of which the clothes are made are top quality.  Griffith wears a simple robe of linen, that despite its uniform appearance, is made of the finest quality cloth. 

Like most dwarves, Griffith is slow to make friends, as no dwarf truly calls another being friend until they have fought side by side for at least a decade.  Unlike most dwarves, Griffith is quick to form alliances with other creatures and immediately gives others the benefit of the doubt unless he has been shown sufficent evidence to the contrary.  Griffith is passive at times, like the earth beneathe his feet, happy to live life as it leads him, but at other times, when his ire is raised and the bastard won't desist, Griffith can be like the earthquake, wild, explosive and all over you.

Griffith enjoys sparring in good faith and loves the occasional battle to get his blood pumping.  As much as he loves battle, he is a tactican, knowing when he should back off and when he should push the subject.  He was gifted with better than average intelligence though his common sense and charisma leave something to be lacking.

Background: 

Griffith Silveraxe is one of the many children born to the Silveraxe clan, the fifth of eleven children. Life as a child was not always fun and games, but he, out of all the children, found ways to enjoy himself away from all the others. Instead of staying around the clan hall with the other children, playing War and Honor, he would find a nice and quiet place to be alone and think. His parents thought him strange. Nearly all of the children they had ever been around were lively, loud, playful and jolly, but Griffith was a calm, collected and all around gentle dwarf.

Growing up, Griffith did not take to drinks like the other dwarves and instead chose to visit church. He grew wise in a short time, realizing that violence was not the way but could be a means to an end when another would not listen. He sought to temper himself and found an inner strength he had not know before. He pledged himself to the church and made a journey to the human lands, to train in one of their monastaries.

Upon emerging from the monastary years later, Griffith was a changed dwarf. His time among the humans had shown him that as bad as dwarven traditions had seemed, with all the drinking, questionable behavior and swearing, that humans could be even worse. They were short lived, hasty and all around unpredictable. Griffith made his way home.

Upon arriving, he was witness to the destruction left behind by a raid. Bandits wielding powerful weapons had laid waste to much of his homeland. His family was nearly eliminated, with only five of the eleven children left alive, including himself. A rage built inside of him, unlike anything he had ever known before. His vision became a red haze as the power of the anger built within him and even with all of his training as a monk, sworn to the peace of mind and body, could not have prepared him for the emotions that ripped through him.

He left that very night, tracking the bandits to their hideout. The majority of the bandits were away, with only a skeleton crew, five in all, guarding the loot from their previous raid. They never knew what hit them. Charging in, almost blinded with rage, Griffith wielded his family weapon, a dwarven waraxe, and set himself to slaughter the lot of them. Somewhere between the rage and the training, a connection took hold, fueling his rage into pure strength and agility. Trained as a monk, he had learned to evade certain types of spells, and suddenly, in the midst of his frenzy, that ability was empowered, making it possible for him to leap past the exploding balls of fire and bury his axe into the chest of the bandit sorcerer.

Ripping the axe free, a sixth sense warned Griffith a fraction of a second before an arrow struck. Reflexes trained within the monastary took hold and he batted the arrow from the air with his left hand while twisting to the side to avoid the blade of a scimitar that would have severed his right hand from his body. Using the momentum built up from his turn, he spun around and sunk the head of the axe into the neck of the scimitar-wielding bandit, not-so-cleanly removing the head form his shoulders. Another arrow struck, embedding itself in the meat of his left shoulder. The pain fueled his rage, and a charge brought him right into the face of the archer. The archer, unskilled in wielding a bow in close combat dropped his longbow in an attempt to draw his sword but never got the chance. The archer stood blinking for a few moments, eyes trying to focus on the axe that was embedded into his skull, center right between his eyes.

Griffith, chest heaving with his exertions, watched as the archer slowly fell back. Grabbing the arrow with his right hand, Griffith ripped the arrow from his body and proceeded to pull the axe free. The other two bandits were on him by then, thinking him helpless without his axe. Fists hardened by years of punching wood and solid rock lashed out and drove the nose of the first bandit to reach him, directly into his brain. The other bandit managed to land a blow with his mace, but using his sixth sense, Griffith was able to take the blow to his shoulder, rather than his head.

It was two days later that Griffith found himself back at his clan hall, still drenched with the blood of the bandits he slew. He had managed to retrieve his axe but could not recall his journey back. The rage had changed him and he knew that he could never again take up the mantle of the monk. Still, his training had stayed with him...

Build: