Brandoch 'Brandy' Marigold's page

Brandoch
Endurance - 21/21
Hope - 17/17
Fatigue - 10 (8 equipment, 2 travel)
Standing - 0
Titles - Burgess (Lake-Town)
Standard of Living - Prosperous

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Culture, Calling and Background

Culture: Hobbit of the Shire
Cultural Blessing:
Hobbit Sense - Hobbits possess a cheerful spirit and a friendliness that makes them good companions. Additionally, they have learned their place in the world a long time ago, and a deep-rooted sense of proportion has found its place in their hearts. No visions or wild fantasies can tempt them, as they do not seek power or control over others.

Each Hobbit character in the group increases the company’s Fellowship rating by one point. Additionally, when making a Wisdom roll, Hobbits can roll the Feat die twice, and keep the best result.
Languages: Common Speech
Specialties:
Cooking - You know how to prepare food, from simple bread to your folk’s special dishes.
Tunneling - You are accustomed to the difficulties of moving in passages dug under the earth; for example, you do not easily lose your sense of direction while underground.
Background Package: Too Many Paths to Tread
Favored Skill: Travel
Distinctive Features:
Adventurous - Your spirit is attracted by new experiences and challenges, especially when they seem perilous enough to put your mettle to the test.
Clever - You are ingenious and smart, quick to learn and able to make intuitive leaps.
Small - You stand half the height of a grown man and are easily overlooked.
Calling: Burglar
Favoured Skill Groups (and Skills): Movement, Perception (Athletics, Search)
Calling Trait:
Burglary - This venerable talent includes pickpocketing, lock picking and, in general, any shadowy way to get hold of the possessions of others or access protected areas. Treasure-Hunters are generally skilled burglars.
Weakness:
Dragon-Sickness - Adventurers who find themselves on the road to seek lost riches run the risk of catching the age-old disease capable of turning a pile of enchanted gold into bitter ashes. As the shadow tightens its grip on their hearts, the world shrinks around them and their closely-guarded possessions.

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Attributes

Body 4 (6 favored), Heart 5 (6 favored), Wits 5 (8 favored)

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Common Skills
Favoured skills in Italics.

Athletics - 1
Awareness - 2
Courtesy - 3
Craft - 2
Hunting - 1
Insight - 2
Persuade - 2
Riddle - 2
Search - 2
Song - 2
Stealth - 3
Travel - 2

Weapon Skills

Bow - 3
Short Sword - 1
Dagger - 1

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Gained AP:

Personality: 1
Movement:
Perception: 1
Survival:
Custom: 2
Vocation:

Stored AP: 0
Spent AP: 16
Stored XP: 0
Spent XP: 16

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Valour and Wisdom

Valour- 3
Wisdom- 3

Rewards:

Bow of the North (bow)
One of the oldest stories told in the Shire remembers how a company of the best archers that the Shire could muster went north to aid the King in battle. They never returned, but a number of very strong bows are said to have been recovered from the battlefield and preserved to this day.

When making a ranged attack using a Bow of the North Downs, add to your rolls a bonus of +3, or your Valour rating (whichever is higher).

Fell (Bow of the North)
(weapon, unique)

Hard and straight, a piercing blow from a fell weapon is stopped less easily by a suit of armour.

The weapon’s Injury rating is raised by two.

This upgrade may be applied only once, to any one weapon type.

Virtues:

Fair Shot
You have spent a great deal of your time practising with all sorts of throwing games, and your accuracy is exceptional.

When you make a ranged attack, you can roll the Feat die twice and keep the best result.

Small Folk
You have learnt how to gain an advantage in a fight from being smaller than most of your opponents.

When you are being attacked in close combat by a creature bigger than you (very often), your basic Parry rating is calculated using your favoured Wits score, instead of your basic Wits.

Outside of combat, you gain the ‘Small’ Trait, and can invoke it using the usual Trait rules (see the Traits chapter for details).

War Gear:

Weapons
Bow of the North - Damage 5 - Edge 10 - Injury 16 - Enc. 1 - Add +3 or Valour to attack rolls, whichever is greater
Short Sword - Damage 5 - Edge 10 - Injury 14 - Enc. 1
Dagger - Damage 3 - Edge G - Injury 12 - Enc. 0

Armor
Leather Shirt - Armor 1d - Enc 4

Traveling Gear/Personal Effects:

Spring/Summer travel gear (2 weight)
Pack mule (Winnie)
Flute
Lockpicks
Rope
Flint and Tinderbox
Bottle of brandy

Small but respectable, the Marigold family has been known for being made of honest, hardworking down-to-earth folk for as long as anyone in the Shire can remember. The family's members are millers, farmers, and shepherds for the most part, with a shiriff here and a couple bounders there. They don't gossip, they don't cause trouble, and most of all they don't go on adventures.

Brandoch has always been the exception to the rule.

Born to Bill and Brenda Marigold, Brandoch was the youngest of seven children. They were shepherds, and Brandoch was expected to help with that. He took keen interest in rock throwing and similar good hobbit sports at a young age, and started practicing with a bow as he got older. It seemed a queer interest to his family, but they allowed him that. But when they found him sneaking off when he was supposed to be tending to the sheep so he could go deep into the forest, his parents were understandably concerned.

Given his antics, they decided to go ahead and have him work for his uncle, the local innkeeper. Uncle Murdoch treated him fairly (albeit sternly) and made sure he had plenty of work to do: sweeping floors, serving patrons, cleaning dishes, chopping firewood, cooking supper for the guests... There was always more to do, always something else that needed to be done. In short, Murdoch made sure that his nephew couldn't escape. He raised him well, and everyone started to think that young Brandoch would be a proper hobbit in no time. Uncle Murdoch was even considering signing some papers so the inn would pass to his nephew when he died, so sure was everyone that Brandoch had been saved from himself.

Of course, his uncle couldn't keep Brandoch captive in the inn all the time. Brandoch would escape from time to time to go and practice hunting in the woods, or just to go exploring. He always made sure to come back at night so his uncle wouldn't suspect anything, and as he grew older his forays into the wilderness became less frequent. Brandoch finally admitted to himself that he'd never be able to go on any real kind of adventure.

Unfortunately for his family, working at the inn meant that Brandoch occasionally met some strange people, for the town Murdoch lived in was near the southern border of Southfarthing. He met a pair of Dunlendings, once, and they regaled him with stories of the treachery of Rohan and of what the mountains were like. Then another time an adventurer from Rohan came and told the hobbit about his wanderings, and provided his own stories about Rohan's glory. But the most interesting tale that Brandoch ever heard was that of a small caravan of dwarves traveling through the Shire and toward the Lonely Mountain: Erebor, they claimed, had been retaken, saved from the grasp of a terrible dragon, and one of the key heroes of that story was none other than a Hobbit!

Now, of course Brandoch had already heard a little about Bilbo's adventures, but everyone he knew had only bad things to say about such dalliances. But these dwarves had so much good to say: they told him of what Erebor was like before the dragon had come, of the riches it had held, and how they were traveling there to rejoin lost cousins who had settled the city once more. It was all so mystifying to Brandoch. He knew he had to join.

That was all the prompting Brandoch needed. He asked if he could join them on their adventures. Surprised, they agreed, and despite all the angry yells from his uncle and his mother and the shock of his friends, Brandoch took to the road.

Brandoch traveled with the dwarves for some time. In one stretch of their adventure they explored an old ruin near the Barrow Downs and discovered some treasure, including a bow which Brandoch claimed for himself. They fought a battle with a small band of goblins, and they chased off some wolves with arrows and stones. By the time Brandoch and the dwarves reached the Lonely Mountain, the Gathering of the Five Armies festival was already in full swing. The warmth of Dale and the splendor Erebor enchanted Brandoch. He knew he had to see more of the world, and that he had to find a new group of companions with which to travel.

As luck would have it, there was indeed a group of adventurous folk willing to take on another member. And it so happened that Brandoch had a keen eye, skill with a bow, and the right mixture of cleverness and handiness to earn himself a place in that band...