#disruptive design for kimmuriel

[mayamint]

Bregan D'aerthe (pre-Servant of the Shard)

If enough people like this I might do Artemis

[lawful-evil-novelist]

Design Notes: Kimmuriel Oblodra

This one's by request, a few people asked about him so I figured I'd share. This is mostly going to detail Kimmuriel’s design in Bag of Memories, which is a slightly more developed version of his design in The Smiling One.

Kimmuriel is a somewhat young drow in Bag of Memories.  I put his birth year at roughly 1088 DR in Bag of Memories, so he’s about 277-278 during the story.  He’s small, standing at barely five feet, and very thin.  He has muscle mass but it’s kind of negligible compared to literally everyone around him.  It’s enough that he can put up a decent  fight but not enough to really affect his body type.

I describe Kimmuriel’s face as catlike, specifically referring to his features as sharp but attractive.  He looks a lot like his father, Tsabanor, but he doesn’t have many features in common with K’yorl.  However, he does have some features in common with Jalynfein Oblodra, K’yorl’s older half-brother.  Make of that what you will.  

Kimmuriel has dark gray skin with a cool undertone, which is fairly normal for House Oblodra.  While I never designed these characters with Lolth’s Embrace in mind, I did end up notating their markings eventually because I am kinda fond of natural skin patterning.  Kimmuriel’s markings have a silver cast like all Oblodras, but his markings are extremely faint.  The most visible markings are around his eyes.

Speaking of Kimmuriel’s eyes, they’re a very dark red-violet, kind of a wine color.  They still glow a normal crimson color in the dark, but they do look a lot more purple in certain lights than, say, Rai’gy’s eyes.  Kimmuriel doesn’t have super long hair, he keeps it roughly chest-length and ties it back in a high ponytail to control it.  He habitually decorates it with little Githyanki braids, a habit he picked up from one of his childhood tutors, Kyn.  Kimmuriel also wears a very thin framing of dark blue kohl around his eyes.  Nothing fancy, and the dark color serves a further purpose of blocking sun glare on the surface.

Kimmuriel has three sets of piercings:

A set of astral silver hoops notating his formal entrance into House Oblodra at fourteen.

A pair of earrings made from Illithid bones, carved into needle-like points, made by Kyn to commemorate Kimmuriel completing his formal psionics training (Kimmuriel literally killed the illithid Kyn got the bones from).

A set of small gold studs shaped like spiders, formerly these belonged to Rai’gy, and Kimmuriel wears them as a tribute to him.

Another habit Kimmuriel picked up from Kyn was incredibly simple clothing.  I like keeping to the open skirting of drow clothing we saw in the visual dictionary, and kept that with Kimmuriel’s robes, making them very modest in comparison to most drow, with a higher collar, but more practical three-quarter length sleeves.  Generally I think he wears simple leather gauntlets to cover his hands and most of his upper arms.  Underneath he wears leggings and practical boots with a low heel.

Kimmuriel doesn’t wear any open jewelry other than his earrings, but wears his father’s amulet of catapsi under his clothes.  The amulet functionally disrupts all psionics that aren’t his own.  It’s a silver amulet set in the center with a fairly large piece of purple jasper.  It’s mostly a nice little memento, since Kimmuriel rarely uses it.

Kimmuriel wears some leather armor but only if he knows he’s going to get into a fight.  He dresses in mostly black, but his robes have some small hints of dark blue to them.  Kimmuriel still owns his House Sigil, but he almost never wears it.  He doesn’t need it to levitate so he keeps it hidden away in his room with other mementos.

Though he doesn’t seem to carry any weapons outwardly, he carries Kyn’s other gift for him: the dagger Draa’zviir (Kyn named it).  Draa’zviir is made from the tip of Kyn’s old greatsword, an astral silver blade with a dragon-bone hilt that is imbued with chaotic elemental magic.  Kimmuriel doesn’t use it often.