Profile: Grail

[The Deserted Grail]

Somebody pointed that they like to keep their profiles short and neat. Some say it's far more important to experience the character, than to write long profiles, history or stories. I don't disagree with any of those, but Grail's profile simply happened to end up this way.

I don't know if one should call this a very good example of what a character's profile should look like, granted it's more informative than most I've seen. I probably couldn't read through all of this amount of text if it had been written by somebody else...


This thread has been divided to several parts/posts (the links open in a new window, although the posts are in this very thread. you can just scroll downwards to find these posts):

• Post First: Grail the Grim (basic information about the character)
  
• Post Second: The Elemental Plane (story about Grail’s absence, the time I spent in the army)
  
• Post Third: Behind the Character (Fun facts, historic notes, RP gear with pictures, and stuff)
  
• Post Fourth: (Forthcoming RP stories)

NAME: Grail
(Has yet to adapt a last name. Nickname “the Grim” is something he has carried from his childhood due certain physical restrictions. Many think he's just grumpy.)

GENDER: Male.

AGE: Around 27.

TOTEM ANIMAL: Spider.

RELATIVES: None that he would care knowing of. The closest person to him would be Haagen Shieldheart whom he found at the Southern Barrens and traveled with for years.

RESIDENCE: Various caves around Azeroth and Outland that allow the peace to speak with the Spirits and consult the Elements. Most often seen in Stonetalon Mountains, and in Thunder Bluff.

OCCUPATION: Shaman, Spirit Speaker, Combat Instructor. Practices skinning, cooking, leatherworking and has done research on quite a variety of different arts - both magical and physical - many shunned by other tauren.

LIKES: Order, obedience, respect, convenience. Rarely seen without a wolf mask.

DISLIKES: Disorder, opposition, disrespect, inconvenience, druids and critters. Also doesn’t seem to make any distinction between males and females (treats both equally as harshly and doesn't generally react to any kind of sexual advances).

PHYSICAL RESTRICTIONS: The nerves in his face have grown (or broken) to the point that he’s unable to neither smile nor grin. When he tries, his face distorts into a bare-teethed glare and his eyes look like they’re bulging out from their sockets. Laughing seriously hurts his throat and forces his voice deeper so that he can only mutter for a while.

BAD HABITS: Snorting, the same way quillboars do. Cracking his neck. Glaring. Muttering.

GOOD HABITS: Forgiving misbelievers. Even if he appears angry, grumpy or hostile, he’s not quick to initiate an actual quarrel or a fight.

WEAPON OF PREFERANCE: Maces with sharp or pointy elements (horns, nails, spikes and the like).

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: Grail's color of fur, face markings and figure of horns indicate that he appears to be a Grimtotem, although the whiteness of his horns suggests that he's most likely a half-breed.

A young tauren couldn't look more serious. No sense of humor whatsoever can be sensed from either his speech, actions or reactions. Although his mane and hair reveal that he can't have lived for any longer than few dozens of years, the look on his face as he observes others or his surroundings is constantly that of a father who is ready to whip his only son for committing a serious sin.

His voice is extremely deep and his snorting sounds like that of a quillboar, except heavier. When muttering his voice is even deeper and can only be heard from close-up.

He seems to have quite a few leather scrolls and pouches tucked in his belt. From the sounds you can deduct that none of them contain any money.

HISTORY: A lost child found at Thousand Needles, Grail was brought to Barrens to a camp near Lushwater Oasis.

Spawn of the vile and cruel Grimtotems. Discarded by most, the calf whose smile resembled an eye-bulging glare and who was self-practicing a rather hostile form of shamanism, was brought up by several families for several years, until he decided to leave the camp at a young age to return back to his roots to the Thousand Needles. Fate had her say and led Grail to meet a tauren warrior named Haagen in southern Barrens. Young and rash but accepting, the two became brothers in arms.

The Grimtotems refused to accept a half-breed who traveled with a misbeliever back to their ranks. The two were chased all the way to Feralas. Having no home to go back to they ended up striding across Kalimdor and Eastern Kingdoms.

A dozen of years later adopted by the Mistrunner Tribe. Haagen eventually rose to the position of the Chieftain. Grail first attained the title of the Champion and was later elected to the Elder Council. A few months after Haagen had left the Chieftain's headress to Aroh, it would be passed onto Grail.

But before any of that happened, lackeys came bearing a message that Magatha Grimtotem herself was looking for young shaman to revive an old shamanistic ritual, corresponding the Emerald Dream of the druids except being shorter and a lot more vigorous. Haagen left on a journey, and Grail would fall into a deep trance for a year.

[The Deserted Grail]

Much like a dream this story of Grail's absence from the tribe isn't supposed to make sense or open up on the first read-through. You have been warned.



~The Elemental Plane~


“I’ll kill you.”

“Turn your back on me so I can kill you.”

Whatever it was, Grail had his left hand tightly around its throat. His right hand clenched into a fist, struck and mashed many, many times into what he expected to be its face, until it became limp and stopped speaking.

Grail let the figure fall down and watched it being engulfed into the rocky ground. He cast a quick look at his right fist that didn’t seem to have any blood stains. With a snort he started traveling upward what seemed like a mountain. From the top he could see where he was.

The nearby areas were all mountains and endless wasteland. It wasn’t an unfamiliar sight. Not too different from the Barrens or Thousand Needles. After a moment of thoughtless observation, he placed some nearby rocks on the top in the shape of a sign and started climbing towards the next mountain.

A few weeks later the view was all the same and Grail was starting to run out of signs. He could feel his legs and hooves dripping blood, but he had to run forward. Stopping might mean an inevitable death, a risk that couldn’t be taken, and there was nowhere to go but forward. He vaguely remembered where he was, and it allowed him to remember that he would need neither food nor rest to carry on.

Grail ran faster and faster. As fast as a little creature with four paws possibly can, and the wolf behind him was running even faster. The green plains don’t have too many places to hide into. Just one would be enough to survive today. He could feel the grass and soil under his soft paws. Digging into the ground wasn’t out of the question, but the wolf would quickly dig the hole open behind him. Just one.

The falling leaves are not always as slow as they are thought to be. This one was falling with the vigor and might of an anvil. Deeper and deeper, falling, only to slam onto the ground eventually. When falling there is generally little you can actually do but enjoy the ride and have your life flash before your eyes. A pleasant fall, and a swift death upon landing. It was out of option. The leaf called out to every single element of air it could remember on the short notice. Pleading, begging, asking, commanding. Many answered. Few helped. It was enough. The leaf was saved.

“I’ll kill you. Right now.”

“Tasty, tasty entrails.”

Grail pushed aside the rock he had used to smash the creature’s face. The skull was reduced to rubble and its insides were pouring out. Bugs, slime and maggots. Few of them had crawled up the rock and squirmed to Grail’s hands as he touched it. He calmly crushed them between his fingers, letting them fall onto the creature’s body, and resumed to examine the corpse. A worgen. The type he had seen in Silverpine Forest some years back. Manbeasts fueled by their lust to one half of the Great Earthmother’s gaze. Only half is what they want, but even just that one half is too much.

Inspired, the little pebble decided to write a letter to An’she. Happily it rolled across the green summer plains, and behind it followed a trail that the pebble formed in the shape of letters. Every now and then it stopped to look back at its writing, only to be displeased at its own style of writing, chosen words or grammatical mistakes. Having nothing to erase its text with, the pebble rolled onward, creating new as it went. Eventually the green plains turned into sand, into snow, rocky hills, barren wastelands, slimy bottom of the sea... and the pebble wrote.

The pond woke up in stabbing pain, as a figure stepped into it. The pond stirred its senses, and observed the intruder. The sweet-smelling sweat on the dark purple skin glittered in the moonlight, forming white lines on her curves. Her mysterious eyes glowed light blue, the tip of her nose and mushy lips irresistible. Long white hair fluttered calm, as if wind itself were combing it. An amazon with just enough meat on her body that hid her developed muscles and revealed only the perfect feminine shape. And as she descended deeper into the water, the pond pushed her face-first into its slimy bottom, suffocating the pathetic kal’dorei female.

“Please.”

“Be gentle.”

With a long but swift wave of his arm, Grail sent the creature that had grabbed a hold of his arm flying and immediately proceeded to run after it. The mist was heavy and he would lose the sight of it if he were to allow it to move further than a few meters away from him. The creature mashed against a wall and the following Grail threw his head at its torso, piercing its chest with his right horn. He placed his palms on the wall, on both sides of the creature, and vigorously pulled his head to the left, pulling his horn out through the creature’s rib. It fell onto ground and began to gasp for air. His palms still against the wall, Grail looked down. She looked back, and for a moment, her eyes were filled with tears, fear of death, plead of mercy and help. Her expression changed quickly. She smiled, while still gasping for air. Her eyes were tear-filled, but calm and happy, her lips as if she were waiting a kiss from her lover. Her right hand lied limp behind the intestines that poured from the deep cut in her body. Left hand moved towards Grail, whose hoof crushed her head against the wall. The hand dropped limp.

The stick was on fire. Literally. Its wooden skin cracked and popped as fire colored it black and grey. But the stick didn’t mind. It had decided to be a rock. And rock doesn’t burn.

The rock was on fire. Figuratively. Two small flaming spots hopped on it to become its eyes and the rock raged onwards. It rolled uphill on top of a mountain and jumped down. Straight into water where it cooled down. The rock lay there on its back, looking at the sky and calmly its surroundings. It had dropped into what seemed to be a moonwell. A figure approached the well. The mother of none.

“You must have been lonely.”

“Me too.”

She would pick up the rock and it would absorb the sweet nectar from her bosom. And it was bliss.

Feasting with the nectar, the rock decided it wanted to feel more. Its skin grew soft and it grew several joints: two arms, two feet, two eyes, a nose, a pair of ears, and a mouth. For the first time, the rock would feel the warmth of a caring person. In return it would allow the caring lady to call herself a mother of one.

Time went on, and eventually the caring lady would pass on. Its child had gone through many transformations. It had felt and seen much, but it wasn’t sad. The passing of those around oneself is inevitable – something it had acknowledged a long time ago. It was neither sad nor cruel, just unfortunate. Perhaps it would find another busty bosom to feast from some day. Perhaps not.

Expressing naught whilst hiding visibly, the colorless green ideals sleep furiously. The expectations believe in most. Neutralized mind drives a fork for inbred barrel. Nature wrestles in peace on love. Lo, envoy. This is a swell spot at the finish.

~I Think I Might Be Back~

At the end was a bigger room. The leading characters and only ones clothed were Magatha herself and three of her shamans. All of them were shamans, most wearing nothing but a loincloth. Many of them were Grimtotems or half-breeds who opposed neither Cairne nor Thunder Bluff. Seventeen figures had traveled down a small but long passage through a huge maze of caverns. Nobody spoke.

“How long ago was that?”

“How far did I travel?”

Six bodies lay in a line on the rocky floor. The stench would have been unbearable if Grail had not already stood within it for so many months. His feet had crumbled a long time ago. If his hands weren’t tied with heavy ropes hanging from the ceiling, he would be lying on the ground face down as well.

The other shamans who didn’t lie on the floor were all over the room in various uncomfortable positions. Forced into unnatural huddling, tied to the walls with ropes, chained on spiked mattresses, left inside wooden variations of an Iron Maiden.

Grail’s body felt numb, especially his arms that were roped to keep him in the air only a few inches above the ground. The only thing he felt was a connection. An unbreakable oath. It gave strength beyond any physical limits. He raised his head to observe the scene.

With a single forceful pull he ripped the ropes broken and fell face first on the ground that was covered in slime, drool and vomit, struggling up to his feet with his body that shouldn’t have been able to move and could neither sense nor feel anything.

A year’s length state of pain and agony gone in a fluttering moment. His spirit had become powerful, and slowly it would carve traces into the body, memorizing everything learned in the past year into bone and muscle. His mind couldn’t remember much. Only bits and pieces. But it didn’t matter. The body remembers, and grows stronger. Stimulated by a mixture of feelings, happiness to be alive, expectances of the future and confidence to keep pushing forward, Grail let out a deep roar that shook the very foundations of cavern, bringing down stalactites and boulders from the ceiling.

Nobody reacted.

[The Deserted Grail]

BEHIND THE CHARACTER / FUN FACTS / HISTORICAL MOMENTS:

Grail’s name, as much as it reminds people of “the Holy Grail”, actually derives from the fact that I wanted an honest tauren name that would sound something like “Raul”. I ran around Bloodhoof and Thunder Bluff with my tauren warrior, Gebhard, looking for clues, then tested that one and some different similar versions, such as Rau, Ruul and even Gruul, only to find that they were taken. Grail is the first one to work, and while I did think for about 12 levels that I hope I won’t regret using the name, I eventually took liking to it.

Haagen and I were in the same party when Nemal was roleplaying with Haagen at Crossroads to recruit him to Mistrunner Tribe. I got angry at Haagen being busy and not answering me, so I flew there next to them, said “I’ll be going to drown in the sea... If I’m not back in half an hour, call for help.” and ran off to Ratchet. Haagen insisted that if he were to join the tribe, they would have to invite me as well. Nemal was horrified that he would get to take in one excellent roleplayer but also his utterly n00b friend, but decided to invite us both anyway. On 8.11.2005 Haagen and Grail join the Mistrunner Tribe.

Grail’s old RP gear (which I still have in my bank) was actually a troll shaman/shadow priest’s set, including one of those voodoo masks. Now that I look back at it, it's quite ridiculous on a tauren...



Grail’s new RP gear is finally looking more shamanistic and has some variations. The main importance is generally in the dark wolf mask and the totem-like mace. The only thing I don’t like in the set is the color-theme of the kilt. While the graphics are the same, the colors don’t match with the Stormstrike Vest.



The totem-mace in the first picture is Hand of Antu'sul that drops from Zul'Farrak. I ninjaed the mace in front of Nemal's troll rogue (mainly for RP purposes, although I think it was actually better than Grail's current one-hander back then).

The totem-mace I use nowadays (since it looks exactly the same as Hand of Antu'sul, but is better) is Preserver's Cudgel which can be bought from the Cenarion Post in Zangarmarsh at Honored reputation with Cenarion Expedition.



I actually didn’t really roleplay Grail all that much. The character was unfocused and plain, with no special traits. I don’t remember ever really speaking in the meetings or outside them, aside from OOC situations. I also leveled him with an odd PvP hybrid spec (improved shocks with shorter cooldown, improved ghost wolf form, then aiming for Nature’s swiftness at level 60, which I never managed to reach). Each and every single one of my equipment had +sta, +int and +spr. Nothing more, nothing less. I used a one-hander and a shield. If Windfury hadn’t been so imba back then, leveling would have been really painful due the bastardly spec.

I left to the army and moved to Ravenholdt, Horde side, to play orc warrior Gerrum Warsaw, on my holidays. It was our plan to start to play Alliance characters after Haagen got out from the army, and so we did. Then came The Burning Crusade. We lined with a few hundred other Finns at midnight in Kamppi, waiting for the shop to open so we could get ours. Haagen decided that we should see the Outland as soon as possible and went to check the good old Defias Brotherhood, only to find the Mistrunner Tribe well and active and filled with our old friends. So we moved back to playing Haagen and Grail, who were 58 and 50 at the time, respectively.

After getting to Outland and doing a few dozen quests in Hellfire, I felt like I was utterly bored of Grail. I had no idea what he was like or how to roleplay him, and I had just come from roleplaying some (what I thought were) quite interesting and easy to roleplay Alliance characters. Not to mention enhancement shaman wielding a two-hander wasn’t all that fun, Stormstrike spam every 10 seconds, some shocks at times so I wouldn’t run out of mana, and a bit of healing here and there. So I devoted quite a bit of my time to my two alts, Rugum and Suiseiseki, and slowly, biting my teeth, leveled Grail towards 70.

For as long as I can remember, Grail's FlagRSP title was "Apprentice shaman". At some point, Haagen pointed out that it would be rather stupid of me to continue using that title forever, especially since Grail had gone through a year's length of some kind of training, and that he should be a rather potent seer or something alike by now. I had seen enough level 12 "Lords" and "Archmages" amongst the blood elves, and so my personal wish was to avoid making Grail look or sound too powerful even though he was already past level 60. So I kept using apprentice title.

It wasn’t until around level 68-69 that Grail’s personality started really developing. I used a person I know in real life as a template and started gathering interesting but easy-to-act-through attributes around it (muttering, cracking his neck, being serious, wearing wolf mask, being a combat instructor...). Other attributes grew around the character in meetings and events when something had to be done (hating critters, using leather scrolls to write down and check things, being unable to smile, hating druids...). I’d say that the decisive turning point was lack of people in our guild meetings at the time. There was finally room to speak things and use emotes, instead of simply listening to the Chieftain/Elders without any actions.

We had the Tribal Tournament, which I somehow managed to win. Lywon was the previous Champion but it seemed to me somehow that he wasn't giving the tournament his all. So Grail became the Champion and gained a hefty sum of gold that allowed me to buy a flying mount right after getting level 70. There was finally an actual reason to abandon Grail's old "apprentice" title and switch it to the "Champion of the Mistrunner Tribe". Oh was I proud of that.

Haagen suggested that I would attempt to join the Elder Council, but I was sick and tired in the meeting and thought that the title “Champion” would fit Grail’s persona better. Kugar (who actually wasn’t in the meeting due RL business) and Hornbow were elected. I felt relieved (but also a bit disappointed in myself) when Hornbow stood up and said he is willing to join the Elder Council.

Vulpius/Hrawah had gone to slumber in the Barrow Dens and Aroh had left for his personal great hunt. And so the next elections came, and the only person who had informed before-hand that he would attempt to join the Elder Council was Nodin, who had only joined two months earlier but was an active member and already proved to be an excellent roleplayer. In the actual meeting two other candidates rose to the challenge, Vorgas (due Anura’s request) and I (due Haagen’s request). Haagen had been away from the meetings for the last couple of weeks, and apparently the members who were present in meetings during that time had learned to know me from those few times enough to trust their judgement. A while later in the same meeting, Vorgas was promoted to a Mistrunner Brave.

Haagen had been ruling the Tribe for well over a year, and although the Tribe's members mostly felt that he had and was still doing an excellent job at it, Haagen himself had a feeling that he was being arrogant for keeping the title for so long (in fact, longer than any other Chieftain in Mistrunner history). During summer of 2008 he more or less insisted on giving up the title to give it to either Aroh or I. My summer was full of trips and journeys, so we decided that Aroh would accept the headress for the summer and we would come up with a reason to hand it over to Grail when Fall would come. The plan and the roleplay surrounding it was executed rather perfectly. In Fall 2008 Grail becomes the Chieftain and the tribe begins to move towards a more aggressive direction.

[The Deserted Grail]

<Post reserved for future expectansies that lurk in the past.>