Ollie the Half-Orc Druid

ollie the half orc druid dungeons and dragons 5th edition character sketch

Ollie (short for Olive) is a half-orc druid I’m currently playing in my D&D 5E group.

And BOY is she a lot of fun to play as.

(Everything she says in the sketches above are things I’ve said in character as her. Like I said, she’s fun).

The thing about Ollie is: she’s wise…but she’s not smart. Her wisdom HAS to be high to be effective as a druid, and it IS high. Currently her wisdom score is at a 16.

Her intelligence is 8.

For the uninitiated, if your skill score is below 10, that means that when you roll a dice to determine how successful you are, you have to subtract a number from what you rolled. If your skill score is ABOVE 10, you add a number to what you rolled.

So any intelligence-based check Ollie makes, I have to subtract 1 from what I roll. Any wisdom-based checks I make, I get to add 3 to what I roll.

This not only makes the mechanics of the game more interesting… this also means more fun in my roleplay.

Imagine this scenario: you’re in the woods, and you see a pack of wild dogs running off a cliff. Only, there’s something magical happening: the dogs are floating down, their paws still kicking in the air, and then they touch the ground below, unharmed.

What does Ollie do?

She runs to the top of the cliff and runs off the edge to see if this is an area-of-effect spell.

(I learned the hard way: no. It is NOT an area spell. The dogs were just magical).

But this is the kind of personality Ollie is: she learns from experience, not from books. In fact, if anything, classes put her to sleep.

She is also charismatic as heck. Her Charisma score is at a 16. So that means she’s REALLY good at making friends with people. Her typical greeting anytime she enters a room is, “MY DUDE!”

She calls bullshit when she sees it (hence the “passive aggressive” quote above). And she’s handy to have around to diffuse a tense situation.

More often than not, though, if something gets too tense, and she thinks people are going to make a fatal, terrible decision, she will physically pick them up and carry them out of the room.

(Hey, she’s still a half-orc. Half-orcs are strong, yo).

I hope you enjoyed Ollie as much as I enjoyed sharing her with you. I hope to draw more of her soon!

Thank you for reading.

You. Are. Awesome.

King Luxon IV – A Sketch

king luxon iv original character dungeons and dragons warlock pact with the raven queen

King Luxon IV was a good king. Many in his land would say he was the best leader their kingdom had ever known.

However, one day, King Luxon welcomed a stranger into his palace. This stranger revealed himself to be a vampire – and the vampire killed everyone in the palace.

Almost everyone.

A loyal advisor to the king led Luxon out through the secret tunnels, allowing Luxon to escape. Luxon attempted to return to the palace, but discovered too late that the vampire had taken over the kingdom completely. The vampire’s legion of monsters overran everything in less than a day.

So Luxon wandered through the countryside, lost, confused…and hurt. Until he came to a graveyard. There, he saw her:

The Raven Queen.

The Raven Queen watched over the souls of the living, ensuring that their transition into the afterlife was peaceful. Luxon soon learned that the Raven Queen hated the undead, and those who would raise the undead, as they are a violation of nature.

So Luxon swore his loyalty to the Raven Queen. She gave him the power he sought to fight the undead – and now he fights to reclaim his lost kingdom.

…So this is an original character I cooked up for Dungeons & Dragons.

The origin for the idea of this character is a long story, but it boils down to this: ultimately I asked myself, “What if an actor, who’s known for playing melodramatic characters, created a character of his own for a Dungeons & Dragons campaign?”

I was surprised that Luxon IV came out. Because I normally don’t play dramatic D&D characters. And I ESPECIALLY don’t play magic users.

Luxon is actually the first warlock I’ve designed.

If you’re curious, I’m using the Unearthed Arcana version of Warlock, specifically the pact with The Raven Queen. This particular subclass gives you benefits that the usual Warlock doesn’t get, and acts a bit more like a cleric with a vengeance.

However, unlike cleric, this is a Charisma-based build (because it’s not like we have a lot of charisma-based magic users in D&D, BWAHAHAHA). This makes sense for his power to be based on charisma, given his background.

As far as the sketch? I’ll polish it up a bit more eventually, but I wanted to share it as-is. I’ll post again when I ink (and maybe even color) this bad boy.

Thank you for reading!

You. Are. Awesome.

Adventures in Moving: An Updates on Searching for an Apartment

Adventures in Moving is my latest blog post series, where I share updates on my search for a new place to live.

Today I’ll share what I’ve discovered so far, which is this:

SOME places are willing to make exceptions regarding pet policies. You just have to ask.

See, my potential roommate and I are totally ok with sharing a place. However, our rooming together would make us a 3 cat household. (She has 1, I have 2.)

Most places, I have discovered, have a 2 pet limit.

That said, some places are willing to make an exception, but you have to ask about it.

Also it may depend on other factors. Like:

  • is the landlord sitting on a lot of empty properties that need filled? Or are places scarce (as in, only 1 or 2 places are available for move-in)?
  • are the cats indoors exclusively? (Which, ours are).

I also suspect it depends on how good of a credit score you have, as well as your past renting history. I don’t know though – I haven’t had a credit report pulled on me yet while searching for a place.

Anyway, there’s at least 1 place in the Columbus, OH area that looks promising. But there are also a lot of places in Toledo that fit our budget better.

I haven’t toured the Toledo places…yet. But I will this weekend.

Yep, I’m out of town again. This time it’s not for a convention – it’s to visit friends and tour some potential apartments and houses.

Wish me luck, yo.

That’s all for now. Thank you for reading!

You. Are. Awesome.

Post-Convention Comics-Making (A LiveStream)

In today’s livestream(s) I share some post-convention news and get some comics-making done.

The stream is so nice, I did it twice – in a part-1 and part-2-type stream.

The next livestream will be Wednesday, December 11 at 1 pm EST. Hope you can make it! If not, no worries – livestreams will return to Saturdays on December 21.

Thank you for watching!

You. Are. Awesome.

Dragons: A Sketchbook Coming Soon

lady dragon watercolor marker sketch for inktober 2019

My newest book – Dragons: A Sketchbook – is coming to KickStarter soon. As in, in the next few days.

The trend of these sketchbooks started with Witches: A Sketchbook, which collected all of my Inktober sketches of witches from 2017. (Inktober is the artist challenge to draw with ink every day during October. Usually there’s an official prompt list. I ignore all of them.)

Last year, I followed this up with Gods & Spirits: A Sketchbook, collecting all of my Inktober sketches of gods and spirits.

This year for Inktober, I’ve been drawing dragons and nothing but dragons. And I’m loving it.

dragon fantasy art inktober 2019 sketch

And soon, they’ll be in a sketchbook.

In previous years, I ran a KickStarter campaign to fund book printings AFTER Inktober wrapped up.

This year, I wanted to start the pre-order ball rolling sooner, because November is going to be a bit of a schedule whack-a-mole for me.

So here’s the deal: email newsletter subscribers are the first to get the news of the Dragons: A Sketchbook KickStarter launch. If you are NOT an email subscriber yet, get on that ASAP. There will be early-bird backer rewards available, and the best way to get them is to be on the newsletter.

Then – I’ll be at New Dimension Comics this Saturday for Halloween ComicsFest. If you check out my table there and back the KickStarter campaign on the spot, you’ll get some goodies from me in person.

After that, I’ll be posting links to the KickStarter campaign on social media on Monday.

How long will the KickStarter campaign last? You’ll have to see the campaign when it launches to find out.

The initial asking goal will be to cover the basics to make this book project happen. Stretch goals after that include:

  • a KickStarter backer-exclusive miniprint
  • a baby dragon sticker sheet
  • an appearance at a large comicon (hopefully near you)!

In short…

Get on the email newsletter if you want to back this KickStarter ASAP and get your hands on an early copy of this book.

If you’re broke, though, don’t stress – just share the link to the campaign when it finally launches. Every share helps more than you know.

Thank you so much for your support!

You. Are. Awesome.