I did enjoyed playing him with the group I was part of then, but whenever roleplay kicked it (sadly not often with DnD 4th, but that's another post!) there was a mild difficulty with thinking as an evil male (totally not either of those things in real life).
I have found his character background and wanted to share it here:
Character Background
First Name: Filou
Surname: Coquin
Nickname (known on the streets as): Quin
Favoured Weaponry: Scimitar and/or Dagger
Quin never knew his parents. He was the second of unexpected
twins. His sister, the first born, was beautiful and bright; he on the other
hand, was dark haired and had an evil air about him. Their mother only ever
expected one child to be born that day, she recoiled in horror at the sight of
him, fearing the worst for his future.
Being a poor family she could not afford to keep both twins,
so her husband took him away and sold him on the streets to a traveling gypsy.
Under the guidance of his new family, Quin learnt many
tricks and was found to be quite adept at being light fingered and nimble on
his feet, he was quite popular in fact at being able to pocket a few extra
silver while folks were being entertained and distracted by the gypsies.
One day, as a young man of 12, he had an unfortunate
incident where he pick-pocketed the wrong man.
This man turned out to be a Nobleman, at least he was in the
public eye. In fact, he was actually one of the highest order of Bleak Disciple
Assassins there was, and he had come to investigate the Gypsies as some of his
Disciples had visited for some light entertainment and returned with a lot less
money than they should have done; he was far from impressed.
He caught this young scamp red handed that day. Turning
swiftly on his foot, he grabbed Quin by the wrist and gave him such a glare,
Quin should have been scared. However, the Nobleman was quite taken aback by
the steely look he received in return and promptly let go of Quin. The Nobleman
let the lad run off, but was intrigued by him. He soon realised what was taken
from him – a special coin from his Guild, identifying him for what and who he
truly was, with a grin he walked off...
Later that night, Quin awoke to find chaos in camp; there
was screaming comign from all directions. As he wondered about the camp, he saw
why – there were a few dead bodies about. He ran back to his tent and found a
bloody dagger beside his bed, pinning a note down on top of a bloodied piece of
white cloth. The note simply read “You are one of us now, we will contact you
again in due course”. Dagger in hand, he turned to be greeted by 2 burly guards.
Seeing him with the dagger in his hand they could only assume one thing. He was
prompted taken away and thrown into the dungeons.
He spent 2 years in prison, mulling over the mysterious
coin. Until one day he received a package. It contained a feather inside a
cloth – the same style of cloth he found that day back at the Gypsy camp. Upon
inspection, he realised the feather actually contained a long thin metal pin,
ideal for lock picking...
That night, whilst the night was at it's darkest, he broke
out of prison and skulked off into the night. As he got passed the gateway, he
heard a voice and then it went black – he'd been knocked out.
Hours later he awoke to find himself in a dark room, with
muttering voices around him. He knew it was them, The Bleak Disciples, the ones
that ransacked the Gypsy camp and killed those people. As he stood, a dagger
was thrown on the floor at his feet. He remembered this weapon. The simple
curved blade with the leather strapped handle. Light, nimble and swift – much
like himself. A man stepped forward out of the darkness and spoke “You are my
apprentice now. You will learn our ways and learn quickly. If you fail, you
will die. Make me proud and I can see you going far in our Guild”.
Quin then spent 10 years learning their ways, discovering
his strengths in his abilities originally learnt with the Gypsies – his ability
to steal but remain unseen, unheard, unknown. He also learnt to manipulate the
shadows to cause death to his victims in a swift and silent manner. He became a
deadly opponent. He became ever brooding and relished in the dark shadows with
his new found abilities. His Master favoured a Scimitar, so along with the
Dagger given as an initiation token, Quin also favoured the Scimitar to deadly
effect.
The guild favoured his skills and used him as an Infiltrator
– sending him out to gather information from their enemies and often collecting
items to sell on the black market.
One of the members of the Guild was jealous of this new,
young man that had joined their ranks. He started a rumour about a particularly
difficult task to collect some information from one of their biggest enemies.
Quin jumped at the chance to prove how good he was.
Unfortunately Quin was caught, yet he was suspicious at how
easy it was to get in and collect the goods. He knew he was set up, but never
knew who from.
He was immediately thrown into jail. Yet he soon found
himself one of the better off. He got fresh clothing, good food and given space
with a decent bed – or at least a bed, rather than a cloth on the floor. After
a few weeks, he soon found out why – he overheard guards gossiping one night
and they discussed how they only wanted to keep him healthy and well because of
what he found out and what he could ultimately do for them – they too wanted
information about The Merchant Navy he infiltrated. He could also give
information about the Guild but he vowed never to tell – even if one of them
had back-stabbed him.
After a few months he was released under one condition – to
collect more information about the group on his travels. He also vowed to
himself to discover the truth about who betrayed him. Hoping one day to meet
the unfortunate Guild member so he could take his revenge.
_______
The game started out where the group had all been taken and were part of a prison, where they would eventually get a chance to escape... but only after combat in an arena. Quin stayed in the shadows, choosing to stay up high to watch what was going on from the shadows. The group eventually got talking and events lead to them fighting and there being a breakout. So we had to run for it. A chase scene followed where we were on dinosaurs (yes really!). It was a lot of fun though and really well done by our DM! I don't remember much after that scene, only a room with a chasm in it which I believe Quin managed to get across fairly easily with his shadowy nimbleness.
My times with Quin were short however, as a new campaign idea came in and another character was to be created. One that had quite an impact on my TTRPG times since...
But that's for the next post ;)
Lady RPP x
