Hope Amcathra

I joined my first DnD session recently at the tail end of an official campaign. I'm happy to say Hope Amcathra made it all the way to the end of the story, giving his life to stop a group of wizards from summoning the mother of all dragons... However in the first few sessions, the tanky fighter wasn't doing as well as I had hoped. Turns out that 4 extra points in dexterity to up my AC was bunking up Hope's dicing dual wielding dreams... Then another player tells me about finesse weapons. So Hope goes from dual wielding long swords clumsy as you please to swinging rapiers like a kitchen blender. It felt good to bloody a dragon in one turn.

Anyway, Hope's official story is that he was the least favorite son of the head of Waterdeep's royal house of Amcathra, famed for their legendary weapons. Hope didn't much care for the titles he had earned growing up, so he made a plan. He would become a famous adventurer! But how? Well Hope decided to try training as a royal guard... And failed... However his father was happy to have the pipsqueak out of the house so he ordered them to let him try again... And again... And again... Until, finally nine years later, he passed.

Hope finished training just in time too, as an infamous party of adventurers had just passed through town to try and persuade a local dragon out of some treasure or another. Grabbing his chance Hope took a trip to the dragon's lair, and arrived just after the adventurers that he decided would help him in his dreams of making daddy proud. Over eager, hope lost his footing and tumbled down into the icy lair of an adult red dragon, that liked super heating itself and diving into the super cold water.

After attempting to persuade it, the magic users dumped a good amount of cieling on the dragon and then an earth golem. Hope got in one slice and then they chased a now wingless dragon into it's lair and killed it before it could ensnare them in it's traps. Hope took a horn as a trophy and mounted it to his helmet, like a mohawk, he also got some half plate plus one to up his total AC to 20.

So the adventurers forged on while Hope stayed behind to write a letter home to pops. His father sent him a gift sword that lights up when he says a magic word. He caught up to the adventurers in a bar, where they got waisted and foiled an assassination attempt... The bar didn't survive. So the group continued on to a cave, where Hope got lost, finally finding the party after a while at a tower full of wizards. Sadly one party member has lost his life in some epic way or another, but the world hungers not for reasons to adventure, and they were soon joined by another.

In the wizards tower the party solved a maze puzzle killing a mechanical minotaur over and over and over again, and explored a teleportation mechanism. One of the members were taken by wizards and tortured... And hope got hopelessly lost while the party dealt with elementals. They met again In a nice bedroom, where Hope killed a single wizard, miraculously not hurting anyone else in the process. After which he realized he was too tired to be of any more help. He dove under the bed until the action was over and stayed behind to write home to pops.

The next time Hope found the party it was by following a trail of burning bars. He had also gone to a trainer to learn why he couldn't cut a melon in half most of the time and found out that his clumsiness was a byproduct of his lack of strength, not because he was... well... clumsy. So he bought a couple of rapiers.

After joining the party in a town under siege by occultists and a young red dragon Hope proceeded to chase the dragon around the map. First he climbed a building, that caught fire because reasons, not totally unrelated to the fiery destruction of a bar, jumped off the far side of the building, on fire, having his fall cushoned by a generous occultist, who was then slain. He was then loaned a magic stone that allowed him to breathe under water, so he jumped in the shallow town well/ fountain to douse himself, climbed out, then went ham on the dragon, in seven strong strokes he carved Hope into the beasts hide. With his high hit points he distracted it as the party finished it off. He then stayed behind to carve out the portion of the hide that he decorated, found someone to cure it and sent it home with a letter to pops.

Finally on the last leg of his journey, Hope catches up to the party outside of a volcano, with some noticeable upgrades, where the occultists we're all set to summon Timat, mother of dragons.
The party fast tracked it to the final encounter, slowly picking off the super wizards one by one until there weren't enough to complete the ritual. They were them mobbed by angry occultists and killed. I like to think there is a small section of a museum in Waterdeep that has the treasures and letters that Hope sent home on display, and a statue in his family home of the bar burners, heroes to all... Except tavern owners. On it: a plaque that reads; to Hope, I am proud of you son.