Eilistraee's Warrior Armor
Benevolent "Bene," true name Kaeria, is my tiefling bard cleric character from Dungeons and Dragons 5th edition.
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BACKSTORY
Barely surviving in the forest on the outskirts of a town, Kaeria would use small tricks to distract people and steal what she needed before slipping away back to the forest. During one of her distractions, she caught the eye of a travelling drow bard named Sarana, who followed her back to her hideout and offered to take her under the drow's wing. Together, they gained notoriety as the Dark Sisters, performing the darker stories other troupes won't touch, as well as stories from their cultures. Any extra money past the Dark Sisters' needs was given to the less fortunate. Even small acts of kindness, such as giving away extra food, was second nature to the drow bard. Inspired, Kaeria chose to follow in her footsteps in her own way and adopted the Virtue Name of Benevolent, or Bene.
One day, she woke to a note in her tent of her teacher needing to leave for an unknown reason, leaving her pet pseudodragon in her care, Imruil. "Imruil always did like you best." Everything that wasn't Kaeria's was taken, save for a few of the drow's special trinkets: a rank insignia from a lost legionnaire; an alabaster mask; a fragment of a beautiful song written as musical notes on two pieces of parchment.
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ARMOR STORY
There's a group of Old Gods who aren't as present in the world anymore (Pelor, Saranrae, Eilistraee, The Raven Queen, and the Silver Flame) and instead a group called the Gods of Forces has taken their place. The story behind this armor is along the journey to find Sarana, Bene's group met a gnome cleric named Greenfoot, a worshipper of Saranrae. While traveling with Greenfoot, training under him opened her connection to Eilistraee, awakening her cleric abilities. Many more adventures later, the group is finally facing the Gods of Forces to take them down, consolidate the god powers into 3 people they know and trust, and then to destroy the Anchors giving these false gods life. This armor was created to represent Bene's acceptance to be a warrior and champion for Eilistraee, to become a vessel to safeguard the false gods' power until the Anchors are destroyed, and to protect the good actions in the world.
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COLOR NOTES
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Bene's cleric domain is the Twilight domain. Ironically, her color scheme from the beginning was gold, reddish pink, purple, blue, and black, colors experienced around twilight. I created her initial concept before I was aware of the Twilight domain and before it was official.
The emblem on her chest is silver, a nod to both her mentor and Eilistraee. Silver is symbolic of the moon, which works well with one of the domains of Eilistraee.
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Armor Albedo Map
Armor Normal Map
Armor Detail Map
Armor Albedo Map
Researching a bit into drow culture and lore, Eilistraee is one of the few, maybe only, gods of good alignment in drow lore. One of her domains is moonlight, so I created a simple symbol to represent Eilistraee, which was the insignia Bene received, shown below.
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The thought behind this was playing off of Eilistraee helping her people out of the darkness and into the light. The symbol incorporates a partial eclipse, which creates a natural moon shape, and the pointed elements turn the moon into a sun, representing the light and desired connection to return to the surface.
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For the armor, I wanted to redesign the symbol to incorporate more elvish elements as a nod to Eilistraee and to her mentor.
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