Althea Stormsoro

Althea Stormsoro

Maluana · Maluan · Althea

Character

Status Departed First seen s15 Last seen s16 Player Maliwana Faction Sevryn's recruits, All Hammer devout

Althea Stormsoro is a 3-foot white-scaled kobold cleric/paladin of the All Hammer (the Hammer-of-Forge / iron god, possibly homebrew, with no canonical pantheon name beyond “All Hammer”), played by Maliwana from session 15 to the present. She is from Khaldun Forgehold ^[13] — the DM confirmed Althea and Vasquez are the only two who recognised the Aurelian flare-signal “because they’re from Khaldun”). She joined the party in the forest clearing outside Eldwythe ^[2]+), fleeing into camp pursued by an Aurelian patrol who wished to inspect the silver-and-golden gorget she wears at her throat — a runic piece with a bright burning gem at its centre, which she had refused to surrender. The gorget’s significance is unrevealed. Her deities and incantations are forge-coded: “By hammer, by fire, by the ring of creation, to grant them strength” is her standard Bless flavour, and she invokes Draconic Cry, Sacred Flame, Toll the Dead, Cure Wounds, and Channel Divinity (Turn Undead). She filled the seat vacated by Maliwana joining session 15 to replace Mordane (who had been removed from the table between sessions 14 and 15); Ruin’s scripted execution in the same session ^[11] cleared the in-fiction seat.

Appearance and personality

Althea is a 3-foot white-scaled kobold with deep blue eyes. She wears a simple full-on dress and jacket and an oversized pointed hat with a skull emblem. Her defining piece is the silver-and-golden gorget with a burning gem set into a runic carving at the centre — the item that put her in flight from the Aurelian patrol that introduced her to the campaign.

She is nervous around new people, observant, and devotional in cadence. Her in-character incantations are forge-coded: “By hammer, by fire, by the ring of creation, to grant them strength” (s15, recurring as a Bless flavour). Her combat patter is brisker than her social register: “Fuck you, kill those guys” ^[5] is her Draconic Cry. By session 16 she had begun reading rooms with situational awareness — “There was something we shouldn’t fight right now up there” ^[6].

The player who plays her introduced themselves at the table thus: “My name is Maluana, also known as Maluan. Not much of a talker, more of a listener. But I’ve been playing the game for like five to six years, maybe more” ^[1].

Background

Devout of the All Hammer, the Hammer-of-Forge / iron god — a deity referred to only as “All Hammer” in transcript and not yet given a canonical pantheon name by the DM. The deity is possibly homebrew. She channels divinity to Turn Undead.

The reason for the Aurelian pursuit at her introduction is the gorget — Aurelians wanted to inspect it; she refused; she ran. The significance of the gorget remains unrevealed as of session 16.

Build history

• s15-current: cleric/paladin of the All Hammer. Spell list to date: Bless, Sacred Flame, Toll the Dead, Cure Wounds, Identify (10-minute ritual cast), Draconic Cry. Channel Divinity (Turn Undead). 2nd-level slots used for upcasting Bless. Player handles: cleric flavour primary, paladin features touched on.
• Joined at character level 4 (matching the party’s level after they hit 4 at end of s14).

Equipment

• Silver-and-golden gorget with a bright burning gem — the runic piece at the centre of her introduction. The item Aurelians wanted to inspect. Significance unrevealed.
• Oversized pointed hat with skull emblem.
• Standard cleric/paladin holy symbol and divine focus.

Campaign role

Althea joined the party in session 15. Her arrival was concurrent with Ruin’s execution: as the Aurelian patrol entered the clearing, Mharos whispered to Vasquez to “blame the arcane on her” ^[10]; Vasquez refused and took the blame himself; the chain-master Aurelian responded by snapping a chain around Ruin’s neck and pulling his head off without a save ^[11]. Althea cast 2nd-level Bless on Terry, Vasquez, Hugo, and Caelumn ^[4] and opened her Draconic Cry bonus action.

In the Eldwythe sewers she Turned Undead against the rat-swarm / flame-skull / needle-blight encounter, succeeding once after a failed first attempt. In session 16 she ritual-identified the Hat of Disguise for Vasquez over ten minutes and improvised a thrown-cowbell-from-onyx kill on the last creature in the closing combat. She made the call to avoid a particular hostile encounter the party did not need to fight ^[6]. She voted for the White Lantern Shrine / Aurelia route at the boat-departure debate.

Status at session 16

Alive. Aboard the skiff with the rest of the party toward White Lantern Shrine. Gorget still on her, still unexamined.

Session 17 retcon — captured (departed offscreen)

At the opening of session 17 the DM laid out a framing retcon of the end of session 16: rather than continuing onto the skiff with the rest of the party, Althea and Vasquez split off at the sewer mid-point, were forced back into the sewer when Aurelians closed in, and the party had to choose between fleeing and rescuing them. The party chose to flee. Althea and Vasquez were captured by Aurelians ^[8], restated for Caelumn’s player at ^[9]. The Hat of Disguise Vasquez had attuned the previous session was destroyed in the escape ^[12].

Status: departed (offscreen). Althea is not expected to return. The capture is the in-fiction send-off for the player Maliwana leaving the table; per Chris’s note after session 17, the rescue arc the recap initially treated as an open quest is not the campaign’s direction. The character’s last known location is in Aurelian custody, the gorget she refused to surrender presumed taken or being inspected, but her fate is offscreen and unresolved by design rather than as a hook. Future agents should treat Althea as a departed PC, not a captured-and-rescuable one. She is grouped with Cholmondeley, Harvo, and Ruin as former party members rather than as an active thread.

The real-world meta — Maliwana’s departure — is documented in the Maliwana player handle article; it is intentionally not surfaced in any in-fiction article.

See the session 17 recap and the s16 Retcon block for the framing.

Player

Played by Maliwana (Discord handle, “Mally” colloquially) from session 15 to the present. Joined as Mordane’s replacement at the table after Mordane was removed for toxicity and Ruin was scripted-executed.

Notable quotes

“By hammer, by fire, by the ring of creation, to grant them strength.” — Althea, recurring Bless invocation, s15+

“Fuck you, kill those guys.” — Althea, casting Draconic Cry, ^[5]

“There was something we shouldn’t fight right now up there.” — Althea, ^[6]

See also

• The All Hammer
• Mordane — the seat at the table she fills.
• Ruin — Mordane’s prior character; killed in Althea’s introduction session.
• Hat of Disguise — Althea identified it for Vasquez.
• Aurelian forces — the patrol that pursued her into the party’s clearing.

References

1. ^ Session 15, line 19 — "My name is Maluana, also known as Maluan." — player intro.
2. ^ Session 15, line 14 — First in-fiction appearance, fleeing into the forest clearing.
3. ^ Session 15, line 40 — Aurelians wanted to inspect her gorget; she refused.
4. ^ Session 15, line 260 — Casts 2nd-level Bless on Terry, Vazquez, Hugo, and Caelumn.
5. ^ Session 15, line 853-855 — "Fuck you, kill those guys." — Draconic Cry.
6. ^ Session 16, line 1588 — "There was something we shouldn't fight right now up there." — warning tone.
7. ^ Session 16, line 159-160 — Identifies the Hat of Disguise via 10-minute ritual.
8. ^ Session 17, line 130 — s16 retcon — Althea and Vasquez split off at the sewer mid-point, were captured by Aurelians; party fled and left them behind.
9. ^ Session 17, line 785 — DM restates the retcon for Caelumn's player (catching up post-break).
10. ^ Session 15, line 111 — Inline citation.
11. ^ Session 15, line 100-119 — Inline citation.
12. ^ Session 17, line 134-136 — Inline citation.
13. ^ Session 15, line 211 — Inline citation.