Sidekicks & Sidequests

Building a world, one character at a time.

Moose

  1. This is a character that Matthew J. Hanson is rolling for randomly.
  2. What is this character’s name? - Moose.
  3. What is their ancestry (i.e. human, elf, dwarf, halfling, etc)? - Human. Originally a mortal woman from the material realm, she has spent centuries living in the Feywild.
  4. What is your job or role (i.e. farmer, hierling/mercenary, shopowner, bandit, etc)? - Dressmaker. Moose is a master tailor and seamstress explicitly bound to the service of the Fey Court. She sets the fashion trends for the high-ranking nobility and has access to abstract, dream-woven fabrics that she materializes into clothing.
  5. How old are you? - Immortal. Because time functions differently in the Feywild, centuries have passed in the mortal realm while she remains frozen in age.
  6. Describe your physical appearance. - She is a tall, lanky human woman with distinct, gangly proportions—a build that earned her the childhood nickname "Moose." Her formal court look features long hair styled meticulously into dramatic, antler-like patterns, a custom demanded by her Archfey captor. She works in a highly organized, vibrant studio surrounded by cryptographic sketches, cascading bolts of shifting fabric, and mirrors.
  7. Describe yourself with 3 adjectives. - Perfectionist, Resentful, and Longing.
  8. What is a valuable item/piece of lore/secret that this character possesses? Or do they value an ideal/concept or particular person (i.e. family member, guild member, honor, justice, love etc.) - Secret—Secretly Ill. Moose is plagued by a mysterious, chronic wasting disease that she kept hidden prior to entering the Feywild. While the magic of the fairy realm keeps the illness at bay, she believes a permanent cure lies hidden deep within the dangerous wilderness of the Feywild, a place she cannot explore while bound to the court.
  9. What is a particular quest you would be willing to recruit or hire the player characters to go do? - Buy My Freedom with a Worthy Tale. Under the laws of the fey, Moose can buy her release if she can present Queen Titania with a sufficiently legendary story. Lacking the life of a storyteller, she tasks the adventuring party with performing an incredible, grand chronicle of their own exploits before the Queen to earn her contract's release. Alternatively, players can spend downtime boosting her own confidence, helping her spin her own unique experiences as an artist into a narrative masterpiece.
  10. What would be their reward for succeeding? - Once freed, Moose creates custom, magical garments for the entire party. These specialized dresses or suits grant unique fey enchantments, such as temporal distortion that completely arrests the wearer's physical aging as long as the clothing is worn.
  11. What would be the consequence of failure or refusing the call? - If the players refuse the call, Moose remains politely imprisoned in the court, her secret illness ticking away quietly in the background. If the players attempt to perform the chronicle before Queen Titania but fail to impress her, the court views the intrusion as an insult, exiling the party from the realm or binding them to their own terms of temporary servitude until a new fey task is completed.

Optional Questions - not required

  • What are the goals and motivations of your character? - Her overarching goal is to secure her freedom from the Archfey so she can explore the depths of the Feywild and locate a cure for her illness. She is also motivated by a profound perfectionism in her craft, finding genuine solace in making flawless high-fashion statements.
  • How do these affect your general personality? - Her trapped circumstances make her bitter, wistful, and full of unexpressed longing. When working, her perfectionism manifests intensely—a single imperfect stitch or misaligned seam causes her to declare a dress completely ruined, forcing her to scrap the project and restart from scratch.
  • How do you normally interact with your family/friends/peers? With your enemies/rivals? With people who work for you/report to you? With player characters? - She is carefully deferential and polite to her fairy rulers, executing the refined manners required of a court servant. Conversely, she acts with blunt authority over her subordinate seamstresses. When dealing with an adventuring party, she avoids direct friendliness but calculates how to subtly win them over, viewing them as valuable problem-solvers who can advance her hidden agenda.
  • Do you have a particular accent or language? Any idiosyncrasies in how you act and speak? - She relies on heavy code-switching, effortlessly sliding into elegant, lyrical Sylvan for courtly fey functions, but reverting to a stiff, overly formal Common dialect with mortal guests. Because she has been displaced from time for centuries, her Common vocabulary features archaic, generations-out-of-date syntax and historical idioms. Her ultimate perfectionist quirk is an intense, sharp intake of breath the second she spots a flaw—she will completely freeze, yank a silver pair of shears from her belt, and ruthlessly rip apart a multi-week dress project over a single imperfect stitch.
  • What impact have you made on the world? How have you shaped the local area? - Within the Feywild, her designs dictate the overarching aesthetic of high society. In the material world she left behind, her historic mortal dresses remain perfectly intact, passed down as legendary heirlooms and studied by royal tailors as the ultimate paradigm of classical craftsmanship.
  • Do you have any current problems that prevent you from being a bigger player on the stage? - She is completely shackled by a magical court contract and a hidden biological time bomb. Moose is legally bound to the direct service of Queen Titania, meaning she cannot leave her studio or explore the dangerous wilderness of the Feywild without violating fey law. Furthermore, her chronic wasting disease is only being kept at bay by the local magic of the fairy realm—if she breaks her contract and escapes to the material plane without finding a permanent cure first, her frozen clock will instantly resume, and her illness will resume ticking away quietly in the background.