A Baker's Dozen of Pathfinders

As an artist by temperament, I have drawn pictures of most of the characters I've played over my 30+ years playing RPGs (and rather less consistently, quite a few NPCs for games I've GMed). However, for the first two years I after I joined Pathfinder Society, I did not draw any of my organized play characters, despite having nearly a dozen of them to choose from. That changed back in October, when I drew my sorcerer Mahesh as part of #Inktober2018. By the end of that month, I had also drawn Cassilda Tillinghast, a campaign mode PC created for a module. Since then, I have drawn the rest of my stable of characters, as well as one each of my kids' and wife's PFS characters, and a couple other friends' characters. All of those drawings can be see in my DeviantArt gallery here, but I wanted to collect and share them in this blog, too. (I'll just be sharing my own PCs here.)

Character number isn't the best way to order these portraits, as I've had a couple of slots reserved for quite some time before I started playing the character assigned to them (and in a couple cases, those characters changed name and concept entirely when I had an idea I liked better). I also drew these portraits very much out of order, with my "dash-one" being one of the last ones I did. With that in mind, I decided to present my characters in roughly the order I started playing them. (Click on an image to see it full-sized.)

Ansari Zolta was my first-ever PFS character. He is a human rogue, the son of a Qadiran merchant. He was raised paying lip service to the Dawnflower, but during his apprenticeship to a dwarf brewer, he became a follower of Cayden Cailean. Ansari thanks Cayden for his many narrow escape, and has been initiated into the hero-god's priesthood (a single level dip, which he's unlikely to add to). 

Ansari is aware of the fractured politics within the Pathfinder Society, but has never considered joining any faction besides the Grand Lodge. His loyalty--and his relative trustworthiness for a professional sneak-thief, have earned him the notice of the Decemverate, and he has recently achieved Seeker status.

Raudabjorn Kjallaksson is more simply known as "Bjorn" among his fellow Pathfinders and members of the Ungrounded mercenary company, because most non-dwarves find his full name difficult to pronounce. This stonelord paladin of Torag is a much-decorated soldier of the Mendevian Fifth Crusade (and the Silver Crusade faction), and now bears a fiend-bane waraxe named Zakrukrul, "The Axe My Foes Fear." 

Despite his zeal for the cause, he sometimes finds himself at odds with other crusaders who have become jaded by fighting a seemingly endless war. He survives by never letting himself forget why he became a paladin: to protect the defenseless, to help the afflicted, and to raise up the downtrodden. 

Mahesh Imar A'zun is a nagaji serpentine sorcerer from Tian Xia. Not long after his arrival in Avistan, he earned a minor title in the nation of Taldor. Improving his standing among the noble class has become a full-time job between his missions for the Pathfinder Society. At the same time, he takes pains to make himself useful and likable, as he is keenly aware that, even with his new status, a nagaji will always be an outsider in Taldor. 

Mahesh has a viper familiar named Zuku, who has become quite spoiled by his master's pampering.

Mariko Snowtop is an undine white-haired witch from the port city of Goka, in Tian Xia. Despite her frail form, she always carries a heavy magical aquarium ball that contains her king crab familiar, Fiddle-De-Dee. Besides her skills as an arcane spellcaster, Mariko is also a very successful merchant with many contacts within the Exchange faction. She has allies in many far-flung places, including the Snowmask clan in the far north, the Ekujae elves of the Mwangi Expanse, and the Saltroot druids of Bloodcove. Most of her business affairs are currently focused on the Bloodcove and Kaava regions, where she has developed quite a reputation for sabotaging Aspis Consortium operations, and profiting from those victories.

Neferanu is an Osirian oread brawler who was trained as a temple guard. He joined the Scarab Sages in order to recover the lost lore of his homeland, and to learn forgotten martial arts techniques. He has had some notable success in that pursuit: he recently earned the right to become a living monolith, which allows him to increase his size and strength in combat.









Jalon Greenbottle, was the bastard son of a human mercenary, Macario Ross, and a Kyonin elf woman. His half-sister, Saadet, was born several years later, to an orc woman during another of his father's numerous affairs. When Ross died on a mission to free halfling slaves from Cheliax, the half-elf and half-orc were adopted by the Greenbottles, one of the many halfling families that their father had saved. This family history made the Liberty's Edge faction a natural fit for the siblings. Jalon trained to become an inquisitor of Gorum, and still wears his father's simple, highly worn wooden holy symbol.

Saadet [my wife's character], on the other hand, is a skulking slayer rogue. Her brute strength and dirty fighting style are complimented by her brother's finer grasp of tactics, subtlety, and ranged weaponry. As a Gorumite, Jalon is no master diplomat, except in comparison to his sister.


Nar-Lok is a half-orc heavens shaman. He wears a hat and robes festooned with stars and astrological signs, and has numerous tattoos in the same vein, in order to better advertise his profession as a fortune-teller. As a member of the Dark Archive, he repeatedly risks life and limb to recover priceless sources of magical knowledge.

Nar-Lok's first spirit animal was Stella, a thrush, but after one too many adventures in the infamous Blakros Museum, he will soon be acquiring an Improved Familiar, the wyrmling nightmare dragon, Daosvaria.

K'Chaw is a tengu cavalier who learned horsemanship in part from the Hon-La nomads of the interior of Tian Xia. She is a knight who has sworn to protect the common folk (order of the shield), and has joined the Silver Crusade out of admiration for their ideals.

K'Chaw currently rides a horse named Nene, but will soon be trading her for an axebeak mount earned on one of her earliest adventures. (I have only played K'Chaw once so far, but she is nearly 4th level thanks to GM and pregen credits.)

Volutus [left] is a sylph sky druid who worked as a sailor before joining the Pathfinder Society. 

Milo Nimblefingers [right] is a halfling cleric of Calistria. When not adventuring, he works as in a temple-operated brothel. 

Milo is my one and only Core Campaign character. He was designed to provide the roguish skills in an all-cleric party for our PFS home game, but has only played one adventure so far.

Atticus Nox is a tiefling investigator who frequently works as the partner of Nephrael Tharix, an aasimar cleric of Asmodeus. Over the past year, my wife and I earned both earned a GM boon in order to play these two characters, who belong to races not normally available for play in PFS. I have very recently completed the last tier of that boon, which allows me to give another player the ability to play an aasimar or tielfling, so now our two children will be starting to play their tiefling characters very soon.

Atticus also started with a couple promotional boons that improve his Knowledges and some other skills--very useful to an investigator!

Cassilda Tillinghast, a human mindblade magus, started out as a character created to play in a Pathfinder module in campaign mode. (See this column.) We haven't quite finished that module yet, but I've already decided that I want to rebuild her from 1st level for regular PFS play. She's currently one of my "GM babies" (a character with XP solely from earning GM credit) until after we finish The House on Hook Street, because I don't need two versions of "alternate universe Trick" competing for attention with each other!

Mumbly Peg is a kitsune hunter from the wilderness of northern Avistan. Peg was inspired by the fact that one of the We Be Goblins! series of modules grants access to an owlbear animal companion. My home group played all five Goblins adventures over the Christmas holidays, and we plan to replay the one with the owlbear boon so that we can earn it for characters who can make proper use of it. That's why Peg is shown here with an owlbear, though she will have to settle for an ordinary bear until 2nd level, and only a Small bear/owlbear until 4th. However, she's only just earned her first XP--a GM credit--last month, and will probably remain a "GM baby" at least until the owlbear comes online.