Gruntz

Gruntz is a half-orc fighter in The Faultless Arrow.

Facts

He joined the party in Dragons of Feyburn campaign as a Lawful Neutral hired guard of the caravan. He was clearly not an adventurer before, but got the hang of it pretty quickly. At first, he was trying to remain loyal to the authorities and local gods (Rhaegos), but in the consequent Terror on the High Seas campaign his views on slavery turned out to be not in line with the laws of the Kingdom.

By the end of The Beast of Dewport he straight-up slaughtered a few higher-ups in the local government, which made him lose his Lawful alignment and multiclass into barbarian. He was personally against it, but he respected the decision of the majority in The Faultless Arrow. He cares about his team more than about morals.

His high physical fitness gives him tons of energy to waste: he's a very active member of the party, sometimes straying off on his own and making eccentric requests to the local merchants. He's keen on collecting trophies, magical and just weird items, and has a wagon to store what is too cumbersome to carry. Gruntz has recently started to care about his fame, so he's often found challenging local champions to a duel, be it a little kid or an orc gladiator. He also often bugs Ravagella to sing a song about party's exploits. He fears magic, especially being disintegrated or mind-controlled, because of an incident where he almost slaughtered the whole party under the spell of a mind flayer.

He only had 17 skill points in his entire career, so all he knows is war, thus his god is Moradin. By the end of the Dwarrownight campaign, he turned 30. Age took more toll on him than on other half-orcs: now he's easily winded (quirk), and can't fight as long as during his peak. He's not as disciplined as when he was just from the army, and is easily tempted (quirk) by distractions of all sorts, primarily shiny magical items, harmless random effects and decorating himself. His most recent fashion statement is purple skin.

Unconfirmed

Is he really a half-orc? His skin was originally yellow, and the shape of his skull is somewhat dissimilar to that of other demihumans. All in all, he looks more like a toad than like an orc. Upon questioning he just shrugs it off, saying he's from "distant lands" and that's how orcs look over there.

Gruntz tried to tell his origin story to the party a few times, but with his poor storytelling and tons of inconsistencies no one really paid attention to what he said. Either K or Ravagella still have Gruntz's former lord's business card, someone by the name of Haggen Von Diakkonov. According to Gruntz, he was assigned important missions of stealing sheep, being a thug collecting fare for a ferry, and feeding the dragon(?), until Von Diakkonov was accused of poisoning another lord, the cowardly pacifist Axel Von Vallenrod.

He was also a part of a military campaign by Von Diakkonov's comrades in arms, devastating the land of the fairies (?) and storming some castles in East Cascadia - that's the only geographical reference in his story that sounds at least remotely grounded. By allying with dwarves there, Gruntz was introduced to Moradin and immediately converted - the idea of a special Hall of Fame and paradise for best warriors was dear to his heart.

When asked about fairies, he digresses into telling stories of noble knights getting their blessings from fairies of the woods and lakes, rescuing princesses from towers and ruling the land around a castle on the hill by riding dragons. Some of these stories are clearly just children's fairy tales from Rubia. There is one curious detail though: fairies in his stories tend to spend their free time casting love charms on different unattractive characters, and having good laughs while they chase each other. That may be how Gruntz's mixed blood came to be.

Retirement

The valley of the Dwarrownight campaign felt familiar to Gruntz. He recognized some of the fairies (especially the half-naked nymph), and it brought back memories of the military campaign against them he was part of. Good thing he was disguised by a cloud so the Fairy Queen did not recognize him. Gruntz started to wonder what became of his former lords - the dragon knights. He thought it was just a formal name, and some of them just happened to have dragons living in the caves under their castle. Only now, after fighting the dragonrider from Imperium, Gruntz put two and two together and realized his lords must have been dragonriders.

The dragonriders reside in castles that are hidden in the mountains, only accessible to those who know their location and can fly. So the next time the party went outdoors, he convinced Calenor to cast fly on him. Dissatisfied with the speed and the altitude he could achieve with that spell, Gruntz set a goal for himself to find a way to really learn how to fly. It's been awhile since he learned anything (17 skillpoints barely took care of swim, climb and intimidate), so he thought he's gonna be smart about it. Calenor got a handful of pricy items after defeating his teacher, so Gruntz called one of headbands of intelligence +6 as his share of the loot.

After putting that on, newly-born intelligent and sophisticated half-orc exclaimed "What have I been doing with my life?". Brilliant ideas (Int 15, so not really brilliant) popped up in his head one after another. (i) He always had the ability to fly via the Santa's present - Damos's boots. He just needs to rise high enough and take the boots off, ideally holding some kind of huge kite. (ii) Haeraldor's shop in Surajabazar became an inspiration for Gruntz. He decided to start his own tourist attraction: tandem kite jumps. He would take one person up into the sky with the boots, then take them off, then both glide down over the scenic landscape around the city until close to the ground Gruntz puts the boots on again and stops the fall. (iii) While experimenting with kites at high altitudes, he has a chance of meeting celestial creatures, and maybe even running into one of the dragon knights flying around in the sky.

Gruntz tested the boots immediately at the winefest of Surajabazar, holding unfinished bottle of wine. The view of the sunset from the clouds captivated him. Party was not able to find him since.