A genuine enjoyment of the barbarian class, and a stubborn affinity for human characters combined a few years back into one of the most enjoyable characters I've ever played in a tabletop game. His name was Oak, full name: Oak Thirdson under the Wane Moon.
His father was reputed of legend as one favored of the spirit of the oak. His mother was foreign, of another northern tribe. Her people were guided by the spirit of the Amaranth. In blighted times, when the great oak tree at the heart of tribal lands was dying, Oak's father went forth, and sought healing magic. He fell in love with Oak's mother, and as she brought to the tribe the magic of the Amaranth, the great oak was saved.
The man's third son, he named Oak. It fell to Oak to voyage to the lands of the milkdrinkers as an ambassador and seek to develop ties with the men of stone walls. He chronicled his journeys thoroughly, and looked forward to the day he could return, his mission completed, and take his place in the tribe. He had been promised the right, upon his return, to ask the hand of the woman he loved. It was this that sustained him in dark times.
Oak fought bravely, though he mistrusted the strange and bookish magics of the lands he'd come to. He was eventually led by a dream to unite with others and seek out the lost city of Kadath. There they would all find Morpheus, and learn the meaning of their strange dreams.
They aided a prince among cats in rescuing his people from a tyrannical community. They clawed their way through spider infested caverns and ape infested forests of towering paralytic mushrooms, and finally reached the coast to seek their goal across the sea. Once aboard ship, they discovered a dark secret hidden by the captain, an eldritch horror beneath the planking which had been tortured to work the oars as the ship's motive power. A fight ensued and the party sailed what remained of the ship into harbor, loaded down with valuable cargo in the form of massive jewels.
Despite the party's best efforts the ship was seized by avaricious dock inspectors who pinned the horror related deaths on the party. The group slunk out of town in secret, and Oak vowed violent revenge on the town.
The group traveled for days from the town, until finally reaching an unnatural and forsaken plateau. Inside, they slew a great flying beast while it slept and crept through long corridors depicting ancient and unknown gods and devils. Finally, they reached a deep chamber, after descending an enormous staircase. After a fight with a lone and raving cultist, a veil withdrew, and Nyarlthotep sat sneering in the place of Morpheus. He spoke in riddles, and after a long fall in darkness Oak woke up. It was Boston in the 1920s, the hypnotist had left sometime after putting his guests in trance, and Catherine Fortier was beset with the memories of this "Oak", left wondering what was real.
This was where our 4E D&D campaign ended and switched over into the World of Darkness system. I'm sure at some point, this Alter Ego Archive will come back around to Catherine Fortier, but until then; happy gaming, all.
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