Ramblings on Character: Wendell When
In the debut episode of Character Building with Logan on our Twitch channel, I made a character within game very familiar to me. From that stream came this delightful little Pooka, whom I named Wendell / When. Now, typically I tend to skew more towards the Noble side of things with Changeling, but I wanted to change my methods up a bit for this.
I am sure that I will say this many more times in the future, but I would love to play this character. I think he would start out so assured of the “rightness” of his values, but over the course of play I hope he would learn that control without true friendship is… pretty worthless. I fully admit that this angle in conjunction with him being Seelie might at first glance be odd; but the thing is, he truly wants to do the RIGHT thing. He knows best, after all. And that is the darker side of the Seelie court. It maintains the status quo and keeps the world orderly, often at the expense of itself (not that the Unseelie court is right about everything they both kinda miss the overall point).
His idea of control is a slippery one though… With a legacy of Squire, he ultimately desires to serve. But I wonder: what, or who does he serve? Ultimately, it is order. What little he knows of the changeling courts probably is skewed heavily Seelie due to the influence of his mentor. I am deeply curious to see how his frailty of Untruths manifests in these situations. I sort of envision that he leaves things out or delivers data with a remarkable lack of context to suit his, or those he is helpings (read: serving) needs. And now we see how the rake aspect works. That’s the beauty of character creation honestly. You get to see these connections build and blend together just by filling out a page. I find that the characters you make when you purposefully build against your instincts come out far more interesting and nuanced than you could ever expect. It’s what happens with me at least, and it is certainly true for Wendell.
I think When would be well suited in a game where he has older characters to show him a new path. He is a Grump, but he knows so little of the world and sees it in terms of back and white; good and evil. What would happen then, were he forced to question those perceptions and realize? What role would he take in the game? Is he a traditionalist? Or would he become an anti-noble radical? I’m afraid, that can’t be answered yet. I’d like to think he would find a middle path but anything past this would become entirely dependent on the plot a storyteller presents. Maybe someday i’ll get a chance to find out.
Here is his sheet. I give broad brushstrokes for his description and identity for two reasons. One: You might view him differently than me, and two: Leaving aspects of him open to this point lets you more neatly put him into your setting. If you ever get a chance to play him, I would truly love to know!