What will Charname be remembered for?
mjs
Member Posts: 742
I always wonder what charname is best known for by the everyday commoner in the Forgotten Realms. A lot of what's done probably went unnoticed. I imagine only a select number of people might know that he killed Bodhi and stopped the vampire threat in Athklata and how many non-elves would know that charname stopped Irenicus and saved Sussendelar for example.
If you only consider charname's actions in-game and not what is achieved after the event in ToB (whether that be godhood or remaining mortal), what do you think is the most memorable achievement that charname is best known for by the majority of people. Not including account the epic slaying of Reevor's rats of course.
Reasons are welcome
If you only consider charname's actions in-game and not what is achieved after the event in ToB (whether that be godhood or remaining mortal), what do you think is the most memorable achievement that charname is best known for by the majority of people. Not including account the epic slaying of Reevor's rats of course.
Reasons are welcome
- What will Charname be remembered for?96 votes
- Resolving the iron crisis/freeing the cloakwood slaves/solving the nashkell mines demon mystery16.67%
- Purging the Sword Coast of bandits1.04%
- Stopping Sarevok/preventing the war on Amn21.88%
- Becoming the Hero of Trademeet6.25%
- Defeating the Cult of the Eyeless0.00%
- Destroying the vampire threat/killing Bodhi0.00%
- Killing Irenicus/saving Sussendelar9.38%
- Battle at the Oasis4.17%
- Achieving or rejecting Godhood/defeating the Five/stopping Amelyssan27.08%
- Other13.54%
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Comments
I'm guessing that an evil Bhaalspawn ascending to Godhood and laying waste to the known world would lodge pretty firmly in the zeitgeist...
For a good charname, things like Trademeet, Umar Hills, vampire battles and the Unseeing Eye are a bit too parochial... Especially with the first two (and even Saradush) it might be a bit "Jayne of Jaynestown".
Saving the Sword Coast from Sarevok is definitely a big deal... Stopping a war, ending economic crisis & re-opening international trade would impress the average "man in the street".
Unless the man in the street happens to be an elf... In which case slapping Irenicus into shape would probably take the biscuit.
The elves will remember him/her as the savior of Suldanesellar.
A ranger is liked to work a fan base out of the Umar Hills.
The 'Hero of Trademeet' title and accompanying statues are universally the most recognizable testament to the hero's accomplishments.
Single-handed murderer of the Tethyrian army may be another, assuming that your name isn't ever cleared for the deed.
I'd probably pick Hero of Trademeet, however, as it is a constant that does not really rely on alignment, race, class or companions to be recognised. I assume everybody, good or evil, completes this quest before they finish SoA.
Nashkel and Beregost are pretty small and don't get many visitors. It's basically the industrial area of the Sword Coast, mostly populated by local workers and farmers. There's no particular reason for travellers to visit and stay in a tavern. Trademeet, as the name says, has a big market and attracts visitors, suppliers, traders, buyers, who will likely stay in the Inn, probably ask about the statues they saw, and since not much of interest happens in the town, the story of charname will be told.
Baldur's Gate and Atkathla are big cities that have more interesting things to tell a few months later - and there many taverns with many bards, each trying to find a newer and more exciting tale to entertain than the competition. Charname's achievements become "one tale of many" after a while.
...though finding Hull's longsword was pretty epic.
I think that Charname will be remembered for all those things, not just for one of them, for all of them, together.
"What about NOW, huh?!!???"
There's an exception to that. If CHARNAME does choose to ascend and become God, obviously their choice to become a god/beating Bosslessiyan will be the thing most remembered. But my characters rarely become Gods, so I didn't choose that.
Stopping the war with Amn - A couple problems with this one. First, war was prevented. People don't tend to remember the wars that DON'T happen. JFK and the Bay of Pigs is pretty much the only moment like this that springs to my mind as memorable, and that's because both sides were posturing towards war. The Iron Crisis isn't exactly the Cold War. Second, the only person who's really going to be remembered for that is Sarevok. I really expect that Charname ends up a footnote in the infamous Sarevok story (After his schemes were brought to light by Charname, Sarevok disappeared, never to be seen again). If you got really buddy-buddy with Duke Eltan, maybe you get your proper due. Otherwise, not so much.
Saving the elves from Irenicus - The elves will remember you, but again, I think it's as a footnote in Irenicus' story. He's the one with the history there. His corruption, his banishment, his return, the destruction... Fortunately a group of adventurers showed up and saved the day!
Defeating the Five/Ascending to Godhood - If you choose Godhood, this wins. Period. The people in the Forgotten Realms know their gods, and this becomes BY FAR the most memorable thing you can do. But if you reject Godhood, it all gets a bit murkier. For starters, how much do people know about the Bhaalspawn and the Five? If they know, then coming out as the Highlander of that fight is memorable. But if ToB is still like BG1, where the Bhaalspawn drama is hidden behind a curtain and people only recognize the more overt actions, then you have two things working against your legacy. #1, it's still you showing up to foil other people's plots, and being a part of somebody else's story is less memorable than being remembered for your own story. It only becomes YOUR story when you take all the separate events together into a larger arc. But that brings us to problem #2, the impossible logistics of it turn your legacy into an implausible fairy tale. There was a lot of stuff happening at pretty much the same time - how could one person have been involved in all of it when it's happening miles upon miles apart? Are people going to believe there's a guy with his own pocket plane that can teleport him anywhere at any time? If your name becomes a "Kilroy was here" type of folklore, who knows what you'll actually be remembered for - probably a bunch of stuff you didn't actually do.
And that brings me to:
Trademeet - It's not a huge accomplishment, but you get statues. Statues about YOU. With an engraving talking about something you actually did. Ironically, it's a tiny drop in the bucket of your actual accomplishments, located in a backwater town, but it's the one thing that Charname is actually likely to be remembered for.