About Haelador "Hal" FaervelWhat follows is the medical transcript of a psychiatric consultation between Dr P. Bahram and Haelador Faervel:
Habe's Sanatorium, 2nd of Abadius, 4709
Dr Bahram: "Orderly, what is this? Why have you drugged the patient? You knew he was due an interview. It was on the schedule." Mr Jansen: "Oh, we didn’t give him nothin’, doc. He ain’t drugged. This is what he always looks like." Transcript note: Patient appears distant and bemused, almost dazed. He does not look at the doctor opposite him, instead staring at a corner of the room. He is smiling. Dr Bahram: "... Right. Mr Faervel, do you think you could give me your full attention? We've spoken before, do you remember? I wanted to talk about your progress here at the sanatorium." Haelador: "Færvel." Dr Bahram: "Hmm?" Haelador: "My name is Hælador Færvel. We should all take care to honor names. They are the last part of us to die." Dr Bahram: "Yes. Right. Apologies, my Elven is, eh... rusty. Actually, this is good as I wanted to discuss this matter too - this recent preoccupation of yours with death and whatnot... Mr Haelador, could you look me in the eyes when we're speaking?" Haelador: "I'm sorry. I'm watching the dust, over there, by the window. It's dancing in the sunlight. It’s very beautiful." Dr Bahram: "Really now, Mr Faervel. I don't think prioritizing your doctor over some fleeting dirt is asking too much of you." Haelador: "But isn't that all you are? Fleeting dirt?" Transcript note: Patient looking the doctor in the eyes now. He is still smiling. Dr Bahram: "I beg your pardon?" Haelador: "Fleeting dirt. That's all you are. How old are you, doctor? Thirty? Thirty-five? So short ago, not even long enough for a tree to mature, there was no you and now you have at most another fifty-sixty years left on this world. A blink of an eye in my own lifespan. Then you're gone. Puff. Born in grime and buried in dirt on an uncaring earth oblivious to your existence. Dust to dust. Why do you deserve my attention over some filth? The only difference between yourself and that constellation of dust particles dancing in the sunlight is time. Well, that and the fact that they manage to amuse me." Dr Bahram: "..." Haelador: "I mean, they at least seem to know how to have fun. When was the last time you went dancing, doctor? Do you enjoy dancing? I enjoy dancing." Dr Bahram: "This is exactly what I wanted to talk to you about. The staff informed me of this recent preoccupation of yours, this... this fatalistic humbug you insist to go on about. You’re upsetting the other patients and..." Haelador: "Good. They should be upset. Their days are numbered." Dr Bahram: "Stop that! What’s gotten into you, Mr Faervel? We’d made such progress since you were first admitted and now this? Where is all this coming from? I cannot believe that you would go from your quiet self to... to... preaching death and futility without some outside influence." Transcript note: Patient goes into laughing fit. Haelador: "Preaching! That’s exactly it, isn’t it? I suppose that’s what I am now: a preacher. Proselytizing for a god whose name I don’t even know. How wonderfully silly." Dr Bahram: " Mr Faervel... Are you saying you’ve found some faith?" Haelador: "Is that concern I hear? Worried about what god one finds in an insane asylum? That’s a reasonable fear. I’ve you to thank, really. I suspect that all you really hoped to achieve by doping me was to stop my incessant screaming, but it really wasn’t the soundest decision medically. All that time in that drug induced haze... I was dead to the world, you see. Just lying there, drooling onto the floor of my cell. I was just me and my thoughts. Which, you know, were the whole reason I was screaming. Not the best idea to leave me alone with them." Dr Bahram: "Mr Faervel... You suffered a severe emotional trauma before coming here. What you went through..." Haelador: "Doesn’t matter. None of it matters. That was exactly my realization, my epiphany in my drug addled stupor. Locked in a room both metaphorical and very literal with my own diseased thoughts crawling through my being like so many flesh-eating worms, I... Well, when I could not bear it anymore, I stopped looking inward and began looking outwards. Mental and physical confines being one, I tried expanding my mind to better escape myself. Over the months, I’m telling you, that cell became a near-infinite void. An entire universe with myself just one tiny insignificant speck of nothing. It made it so much easier to dismiss the pain. Except I wasn’t alone in the void. No, I found something there. Someone. The Harbinger of the Last Days. The sight of him, the implications... He helped me overcome my pain. Because I don’t matter. I’m insignificant. I’m like you, you see – just a speck of dust in waiting. And if I don’t matter, then my grief doesn’t matter. Heh. It’s all perfectly logical. I feel much better upon realizing this. " Dr Bahram: "This... Mr Faervel, this is not a healthy line of thought. And certainly not something I want you to upset the other patients with." Haelador: "I'm sorry. I don't want to upset people, truly. I want them to make the most of their time. The end is nigh, you see. It always has been." Dr Bahram: "Hold on, stop." Haelador: "The inevitable death of ourselves and even the world, the meaninglessness of our existence... Don't you see? This is nothing to despair over. Quite the opposite! We should be celebrating! All this means is that our time is precious and that we should strive to be happy. That's what I've realized. That's how I want to help people. You think I’m crazy because I don’t care. But I do care. I’m crazy because I know I shouldn’t. In fact..." Transcript note: Patient rises from his seat. Haelador: "Doctor Bahram, I am hereby discharging myself. I have overcome my trauma and intend to become a missionary, helping people achieve happiness." Dr Bahram: "Mr Faervel, please, sit down! I must strongly advise you against this. Your..." Haelador: "She likes you, you know." Dr Bahram: "What?" Haelador: "The young lady sitting there, writing all of this down. I've seen you together before. She keeps looking at you when you're not watching. She's doing it now too; had trouble concentrating on the pen this entire time. I think she respects your professional relationship too much to express her feelings. Trust me, I can tell these things." Dr Bahram: "What?!" Haelador: "Everybody is going to die, nothing matters, and the end is nigh. So please, invite her out. Go dancing. Fall in love. Have sex. Procreate. Grow old together Or don't. Whatever makes you happy. That's all that matters. It's all that matters. Please, be happy. I think she likes your bottom." Transcript note: Patient is giving me a thumbs-up. He is smiling.
Appearance & Personality:
Hal is a nihilist. No, not that kind of nihilist. This kind of nihilist. He believes that existence is without meaning, nothing has inherent value, and that the multiverse is destined to end without the least sign of anyone who ever lived there. And that's fantastic. If everything is without meaning, then mortalkind is completely, totally and wonderfully free. Free to do anything and be everything. Free to make their own happiness. So what makes Hal happy? Helping others mostly. Whether it be through offering spiritual advice or healing cuts and bruises, he delights in alleviating the suffering of others. Sure, this is of course just as meaningless as everything else, but this is the entire crux of the elf's faith: that a person's pursuit of happiness is just that - personal. Hal is a doomsday prophet. He reminds whoever will listen that everyone's life is finite. He does not preach a certain way of life or morality because he recognizes that what gives him fulfillment will not necessarily work for anyone else. Especially seeing as he is tiny bit mad, which he fully acknowledges. Instead, he encourages people to break routines, consider their lives, and prioritize whatever gives them joy, both in the moment and long-term. Of course, this isn't easy when Hal's words largely focus on death, the end of all things and fear-mongering, and even less so considering his somewhat unnerving appearance. While elves are known to be tall and thin, Hal's frame borders on parody. Standing almost 6'8'' with long spidery limbs, he has adopted a great arching stoop to his back now that he travels through human lands, slouching down to speak to the shorter races. His long pale stringy hair will therefore often hang down free from his shoulders, making him appear unkempt, especially in conjunction with his ill fitting clothes, clearly made by human tailors not accustomed to clothing someone of the cleric's dimensions. His mouth, perpetually set in a bemused little smile, is the final proverbial nail in the coffin that is Hal's social image, as it seems, at best, incongruous with his ominous sermons, and at worst condescending to the shorter-lived races. This is a great shame as the elf is personable and enjoys conversation. In fact, he seems to derive some deranged enjoyment out of just about anything. He has been observed watching insects climb trees, taking great enjoyment in the perseverance of nature, and challenge him to watch paint dry and he just might. Life is endlessly amusing to the elf. In fact, the only thing that really gets him riled up is one person infringing on the freedom and happiness of another. He views this as a violation of the ultimate meaninglessness of the universe that everyone should be free to navigate themselves for good or ill. In the same vein, Hal views it as his clerical duty to oppose anyone who threatens to unleash some great cataclysm or apocalypse. The God of the End Times himself, Groetus, is the only one with the authority to command such mass destruction, and as such other instigators are to be considered false prophets. The world will end whenever Groetus jolly well wants it to, and not one second earlier. However, this also represents the one dark facet to the elf's otherwise benign nature. At the end of the day, he is a servitor to the Harbinger of Last Days. And should his god command him (however unlikely seeing as Groetus is completely uncaring, perhaps even oblivious of his worshipers) to bring about the apocalypse, Hal would obey. We are all living on borrowed time, after all. Every second we live is not just a joy, but a privilege and when that time is up... well, that's that. Hope you had fun.
Backstory:
I am about to disappoint the GM as Haelador Faervel has no backstory. What he has is a catalyst, namely the death of his entire family including spouse and children. The how and why ultimately don't matter; what matters is that this was entirely too much to bear for Hal the lone survivor who was institutionalized after attempting to take his own life. Medieval practices regarding the mentally maladjusted being what they are, Hal did not find much help at Habe' Sanatorium. He did, however, find religion. Due to some curious combination of his own mental state and the asylum's drugs, the elf's mind proved receptive to Groetus's influence, and more amazingly still, the realizations that come with the God of the End Times did not drive him into further despair, as they are wont to do, but instead helped him recover. Hal already felt such unspeakable grief that the implications of Groetus's existence did not, could not add to his misery, but instead sent him to a sort of despair event horizon. He crossed it and came out the other side cured. Hal was so overcome by his grief, and yet the world didn’t seem to care. The grass kept growing, the clouds drifted along merrily and the world kept turning. The one thing that could console him was exactly the only thing Groetus had to offer: apathy. If nothing had meaning, then neither did his grief. It was just him, after all. Just one insignificant speck of dust among a billion billion other insignificant specks of dust, soon to be extinguished. Groetus literally wasn't even aware of his existence - or of the entire elven race. He didn't matter. His birth, life and death did not matter. And thus, his grief doesn’t matter.
Upon his discharge from the sanatorium, the new cleric set about travelling Varisia to spread his gospel of joyous oblivion, wonderful futility, and the ecstatic insignificance of our every action. You won't be surprised to hear that he was not well received. Partly out of the obtuse and paradoxical nature of his faith, the dark implications of a god of the apocalypse, and the elf's odd manners and poor social skills, Hal has so far largely failed as a missionary, despite his ideas for others really only revolving around personal happiness. He now finds himself in Roderic's Cove where the locals are about as open to his thoughts as everyone else he has met on his travels, which is to say not at all. He has however found a friend in fellow elf Audrahni, the morose grave-keeper of the town. Being naturally attracted by quiet, empty places as a cleric of Groetus, the two met very soon upon Hal's arrival to Roderic's Cove just a few weeks ago. In her he sees a kindred spirit, someone who also carries some personal tragedy, and the cleric desperately wants to help her. He understands that she has her own faith, but conversion has never been Hal's goal: only personal fulfillment. And so he spends his days in town praying in the morning, proselytizing for the people (rather unsuccessfully) in the afternoon, and conversing with Audrahni in the evening, this routine only being broken by the occasional plea for minor magical healing from townsfolk desperate enough to ask the odd elf for aid. Hal is of course very happy to help. There is only one last thing to say about Haelador Faervel, and it relates to the clerics of Groetus as an organization. They are a varied bunch and rarely meet together, but they do have one common signifier: they are all stark-raving mad. The reader may have come to the conclusion that Hal, while certainly not without his quirks, is relatively more well-adjusted than his colleagues. He doesn't hear voices. He doesn't speak to people who aren't there. He isn't violent. Hal would certainly like to think he's better off than the average Groetan. But this isn't the case.
Crunch:
Haelador Faervel Male Elf Cleric 2 (Divine Paragon) 201 Years of Age CN Medium Humanoid (elf) Init +3; Senses: low-light vision; Perception +7 -------------------- Defense -------------------- AC 18, touch 13, flat-footed 15 (+5 armor, +3 Dex) HP 17/17 (2d8 + 1 Con x2 + 2 FC) Fort +4, Ref +3, Will +6 [+2 vs enchantment] -------------------- Offense -------------------- Speed 25 ft. Weapon: dagger, +4 attack, 1d4 damage, 19-20/x2 crit, slashing or piercing Weapon: sling, +4 attack, 1d4 damage, 20/x2 crit, bludgeoning -------------------- Statistics -------------------- Str 11 (+0), Dex 16 (+3), Con 12 (+1), Int 12 (+1), Wis 17 (+3), Cha 7 (-2) Base Atk +1; CMB +1; CMD 14 Feats: Weapon Finesse Traits: Audrahni’s Ally [+1 Fort; Calm Emotions, Cure Moderate or Lesser Res]; Magical Knack [+2 CL, never exceeds HD]; Beacon of Faith [+2 CL to domain power 1/day] Skills - (6 points; armor penalties not included):
Skills - background: Craft (sculpting) +8, Lore (Groetus) +6 Languages: Common (Taldane), Elven, Celestial
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Vision of Madness (Sp): You can give a creature a vision of madness as a melee touch attack. Choose one of the following: attack rolls, saving throws, or skill checks. The target receives a bonus to the chosen rolls equal to ½ your cleric level (minimum +1) and a penalty to the other two types of rolls equal to ½ your cleric level (minimum –1). This effect fades after 3 rounds. You can use this ability a number of times per day equal to 3 + your Wisdom modifier. --------------------
Sihedron Hero::
I really have no opinion on this part. The inclusion of previous heroes in the AP seems a bit mastubatory on players' (and Jacobs's) part, but who am I to deride some good old self-flagellation. Guess I'll toss a vote in for Amiri the Barbarian? She's kinda fun. |
