Belvarax "Gobsmack" Allimander¶
"Yes, some goblin tribes do torture their victims. That's not what I'm condoning. I'm asking, what did the mayor do with the last goblin they captured?"
A paladin who read the fine print and realized "protect the weak" might mean the goblins, not the mining companies paying his order's bills to displace them. Now he's an unwelcome reminder that the oath answers to sincerity, not the rules of the order. Meanwhile the goblins keep dying while he's busy asking questions.
Character overview¶
- Race: Dragonborn
- Class: Paladin (Oath of Devotion) lv 5
- Background: Farmer
- Age: 38
- Alignment: Lawful Good
- Party Role: Tank, Face, Secondary healer, Party conscience
Quick Intro
At the Table
- Patient to a fault, never raises his voice even when getting ripped off or bullied. Has a big tell: his nostrils glow once his patience wears thin or the rare occasions when he gets excited
- Always sits closest to the fire, then shuffles aside when he realizes he's hogging the heat
- Prime candidate for party dad, emotional regulator and returner of overdue library books; not great at managing his own unresolved messes
- Overthinks rather than undercares: his flaw is analysis paralysis, not apathy. Thinks he's too boring to inspire others or find a mate, and is probably at least half right
Backstory (Short Form)
Belvarax was a gallant paladin who battled goblin raiders, until he discovered the "raids" were desperate attempts to feed starving families displaced by mining companies that donated big money to his order. He retreated to the mountains and returned changed, reinterpreting his vows to serve his heart, not his order. Many now call him "Gobsmack" and consider him a coward. Other paladins scorn his constant indecision, yet his Paladin power remains undiminished. The Chapter can neither explain it, or accept it.
Playing Belvarax
- Combat: Experienced warrior who protects allies and possibly also enemies. Toolkit leans battlefield control, tanking and buffing.
- Roleplay: Speaks with quiet conviction, receives and delivers threats in the voice of an overworked accountant. Doesn't know how to dance. If he ever tried to sing, it would curdle all the ale in the tavern. Feels good about ordering things in rows and then sweeping them away.
Deep Dive
Full Backstory¶
Belvarax began as a farmer on Adlerfield, where he once dreamed of a simple life with his childhood friend Mariel, though he never found the words to win her heart. When goblins raided his fields, he took the Paladin oath. He was gallant back then. He's not considered gallant anymore, because he chose honor over pride.
He spent a long time battling goblin raiders and rooting out local bandits, believing each act of violence would push the world toward order and light. One early morning, he confronted a goblin stealing potatoes, only to spot the starving child clutching a rag doll behind her. When he briefly lowered his pike in confusion, the goblin mother saw the opportunity and bolted.
He traced the raid back to their village, Belvarax confronted the Goblin Matron Shatrag, and finally learned that the goblins had their lands claimed by mining and lumber operations of the Satriani merchant's guild. Their "raids" were desperate attempts to feed their young.
Meanwhile, the corrupt mayor Ozello rose to power in the wake of the roads he kept clear by the sweat of his brow. The ruthless mining tycoon Colette Satriani was honored with a statue for her contributions and mercenary companies bashing vulnerable goblin camps. Any "greenskin" captive faced cruelty and ridicule in the town square.
Meanwhile, Belvarax was the guest of honor at a grand banquet in the Satriani villa. He watched whole platters of meat and exotic fruits scraped into bins.
His oath had turned into a tool of oppression in the hands of politicians and businessmen. In silence, he rose from the table and left. He could have turned against them all, but was that truly the Paladin way? For lack of clear answers, Belvarax retreated to the mountains, only returning several months later, as a changed man.
Now, many call him a coward and hypocrite. Other paladins scoff at his constant indecision. He's been more or less cast out of the order. Many locals refer to him as "gobsmack" since he's become so paralyzed because of his "goblin love".
Some Paladins have gone even further. Satine Boyard, Dean of the Chapter, calls him an infidel and regards him as an affront to the order. The last time they met, her blade left its scabbard. Although he was pressed, Belvarax held his ground without retaliating. She was finally forced to withdraw by the Chapter Librarian physically intervening with his body.
And yet his powers remain. The Chapter cannot explain it—cannot accept it. A paladin's might flows from the oath itself, from the sincerity of conviction. Belvarax's reinterpretation and radical doubt should have severed that connection. It didn't. Either his heresy is not heresy at all, or the oath answers to laws the Chapter has never understood.
Personality¶
As a Golden Dragonborn with Fire Resistance, heat is home. Belvarax gravitates closest to the campfire, the hearth, the sunny patch on the floor. Then he catches himself hogging the warmth and shuffles sideways with a quiet "ah, apologies." He stays polite even when he's being ripped off, played for a fool, or bullied—but not even a saint can stay patient forever. He never raises his voice, but he doesn't have full conscious control of his fire breath. His friends have learned to tell by the glow in his nostrils when his patience is being tested.
He knows his way around a hammer. Every autumn, a crate of well-balanced wooden training swords arrives at the Chapter house. No note. Satine probably knows it's him, and hates that she can't bring herself to refuse them. Belvarax remembers how many practice swords he broke as a cadet, how the quartermasters complained, how the splinters got into everything. His beef is with the leadership, not the cadets. He has a terrible singing voice but a magnificent drill-sergeant bellow, which he uses maybe once per adventure. And then it's gone, and he's back to his quiet murmur. He could command. He has the voice, the presence, the tactical mind. But he doesn't trust himself with that kind of power anymore.
Belvarax never told Mariel how he felt. He walked away from the banquet but didn't stay to fight the mining companies. He advocates for the goblins, protects them when attacks arise, but hasn't committed to their cause. Somewhere along the way, not acting became the safe harbor. People respect him, listen to him, feel safe around him—but none of that translates to a real spark. He's the person everyone wants at their table and no one thinks to invite to the dance. He made peace with this decades ago, or convinced himself he did.
Now, he believes in compassion and disciplined doubt. Every story has another side, even if it takes years to find. He won't berate the party for every pub brawl, he remembers cadet life well enough. Now he prefers to be the shepherd in the back: He never leaves an ally to face the storm alone. When he does step in, it's because he believes there are real values to defend. He'll protect whoever he believes are the weak in times of crisis, but he won't be the aggressor or run anybody's errands unless he's sure the cause is justified. In his mind, any truth that feels simple is probably incomplete. He's not so much self-effacing as deeply pessimistic about anybody's chances of doing real good in the world. The fact that he still tries may be the ultimate proof of commitment to his oath.
The Reinterpreted Oath¶
Ultimately, Belvarax chose not to become the leader of a goblin resistance against the greedy mining companies. He also chose not to take the Oath of Redemption. That choice came with a set of hard moral obligations. He returned to Oath of Devotion's tenets and found the Chapter had been reading them to serve power rather than principle. He's a farmer, not a philosopher, with no head for politics, but even so he chose to make new interpretations and live by them.
Oath: "Let your word be your promise." Interpretation: Words are empty in a world of actions, and therefore you should never make a promise. Promises depend on circumstances beyond your control, and breaking a promise poisons the wellspring of conviction from which a paladin draws strength.
Oath: "Protect the weak and never fear to act." Interpretation: This is not a license to act with impunity. Who are the weak? Action without investigation is not bravery, but reckless conviction of your own infallibility. That is a hallmark of an evil-doer. Therefore, investigation is the necessary first part of any legitimate action of protection.
Oath: "Let your honorable deeds be an example." Interpretation: This implies there are also dishonorable deeds. Therefore you must be careful to not set a bad example. It's more important to not do wrong: A life takes many years of constant love and nurture to grow, but only a moment of force to undo. Therefore, growing and sheltering a life is the most honorable deed.
Sample Quotes¶
"Let the world scorn me, call me coward. I've made peace with being misunderstood. If I defended myself, I'd be serving my pride, not my oath."
"Groats again? Oh, I'm not complaining... But didn't I contribute 20 gold to the food budget last week? Those are lovely new boots, by the way."
"While I've no idea what's going on here, I'm going to ask all of you to calm down. If you want to get to this girl, whatever harm she's done, you're going through me. And I breathe fire."
"No, I don't subscribe to the children's-book morality where you just smite the evildoers and then celebrate in the town square. That's fairy tale logic. Dealing death is easy, growing life is hard. Being a Paladin is about never choosing the easy way."
Key Relationships
Marielthra "Mariel" Cinderwing: Dragonborn woman of deep green scales, steady hands, and a laugh that still makes Belvarax's stomach knot. They grew up side by side on neighboring farms in the Amberfield valley. Where Belvarax was cautious and deliberate, Marielthra was bold, larger than life, singing while she worked, haggling at market stalls, and daring him into mischief. Belvarax never managed to confess his feelings. His oath, his battles, and later his exile kept him at a distance. Today, he knows little of what became of her, but she made a hell of an impression.
Satine Boyard, Dean of the Chapter: An Aasimar of impeccable lineage and legendary tactical mind, Satine believes the Paladin oath is a covenant of action, and hesitation is invitation to defeat. She watched her mentor die an unnecessary and brutal death on the battlefield because someone in the chain of command second-guessed an order. She will not allow that mistake to play out again. Satine isn't angry at Belvarax, but deeply unsettled by him. If his wild interpretations are valid, if the oath still flows through him despite his analysis paralysis and radical doubt, then everything she's built her whole identity around is arbitrary, and the order has no monopoly on what the Oath even means, and she is no better than Belvarax herself. The last time they met, she drew steel. If she could provoke him to fight back, she could prove he was just another apostate hiding behind sophistry. He didn't oblige, only defended masterfully. She walked away more terrified than before.
Matron Shatrag: An elderly goblin woman with a missing eye and a body scarred from decades of field work, Shatrag leads what remains of the displaced Thornback clan. She saw through Belvarax instantly that morning he came to her village, but knew better than to place trust cheaply. A paladin with tears in his eyes is still a paladin with a pike. But she also recognized a man whose world had just shattered. She took a calculated risk and told him the truth of their situation. She got what she wanted, but now she's stuck with a protector who only reacts to threats as they arise, and never actually deals with the problem. Her patience grows thin. "You're a good man, Belvarax. But my grandchildren can't eat your good intentions."
Brother Kavaphak, Chapter Librarian: A rare Goliath scholar, in his sixties, with ink-stained fingers and a pronounced limp: A birth defect that ended his place in the clan before it began. The Chapter took him in, and he's been in the library for forty years, outlasting three Deans and seven doctrinal controversies. Kavaphak was the one who physically stepped between Satine and Belvarax in their confrontation, because he knows what it looks like when the strong decide the different are defective. To him, Belvarax's "crime" is that he refuses to perform strength the way the institution demands, so the institution has decided he's broken.
Kavaphak sends short notes warning Belvarax when Satine has called a council session, or strategically mentions the eastern archive has a reading alcove no one uses. He makes sure Belvarax has access to records that might otherwise be "misplaced." His quiet solidarity is unsentimental, and worth more than any number of allies who only show up when the cause is fashionable.
Notes for the DM
Dramatic Questions¶
- How does Belvarax react when his patience with lies and misunderstandings leads to tangible consequences for his friends?
- What happens when Belvarax is confronted by goblins who ask why he never lifted his lance against the villages and the logging companies even though he thinks they're in the wrong? When they point out that Belvarax can afford to be passive, while they can't?
- Does Belvarax really like himself?
- If Belvarax dies, what happens to the Thornback goblins who've come to see him as their only advocate in the human world? Does he have a responsibility to train a successor?
- When the party encounters a situation where someone else does the violence Belvarax won't—and that violence solves the problem—how does he reconcile with allies who point out his clean hands came at the cost of their dirty ones?
Plot Hooks¶
The Thornback Petition: A desperate Matron Shatrag has sent a formal petition to the Crown, bypassing local authority entirely, claiming the Thornback clan's ancestral lands under an obscure treaty signed three centuries ago. Back then, the goblin tribes were military allies, albeit briefly, against a common enemy, and not seen as mere vermin to be cleared. The treaty is real, whether it's enforceable is another question. A Crown assessor has been dispatched to investigate, and suddenly the Satriani guild has a problem. If the assessor reaches the Thornback village and sees the conditions firsthand, the political embarrassment alone could cost Colette her monopoly charter. So the assessor needs to have an accident. Or one of the goblin tribes (not necessarily the Thornback Clan) need to do something violent enough to void any treaty claims before the assessor arrives. Shatrag reaches out to Belvarax and asks him to ensure neither happens...
The Prodigal Knight: A young paladin named Ser Tomlin Greave has started calling himself "Belvarax's disciple" and preaching the doctrine of "patient justice" in market squares. The problem: Tomlin is an idiot. He's misunderstood everything, using Belvarax's philosophy to justify rank cowardice—refusing to stop a mugging, declining to rescue kidnapped children because "investigation takes time." Satine Boyard has publicly blamed Belvarax for creating this monster. Now the question: does Belvarax correct Tomlin (thereby admitting his ideas can be corrupted) or disown him (thereby proving Satine's point that his philosophy has no disciples worth having)?
Green Scale, Red Ledger: Mariel resurfaces, but as the wildly charismatic leader of a successful and feared bandit company called the Ash Talons, which has been systematically raiding Satriani supply caravans. She's not redistributing it to the poor, however, and certainly not to the goblins. She's not deaf to their cause, however. They just don't have anything to offer that she needs. When Belvarax finally confronts her, she asks the question he's been avoiding: "You became famous for walking away from a banquet, like a good boy who had a sad moment. I am burning that company down. Which of us is actually helping?" She offers him a place at her side. All he has to do is stop pretending his hands are clean.
Key Relationship Dynamics¶
Satine Boyard: The Chapter never granted Belvarax his abilities, which means they cannot revoke them. Excommunication, branding him apostate, turning public opinion against him, these are Satine's only weapons, and none of them touch his actual power. Satine knows this, even if she won't say it aloud, and it fills her with dread. If Belvarax is right, the entire hierarchy exists only by convention, and she's spent her whole life climbing a ladder that might not be leaning against anything.
Matron Shatrag: Use her to hold Belvarax accountable for his inaction. She's the living conscience he can't escape. When he hesitates, she's the one who asks: "And how many of my people died while you were thinking?"
Brother Kavaphak: What happens if Satine figures out Kavaphak has been helping Belvarax? The librarian is vulnerable in ways Belvarax isn't. He has no divine power to fall back on, just a position in an institution that could revoke it.
Mechanical build (lv 5) and PDF download
| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 16 (+3) | 10 (+0) | 14 (+2) | 8 (-1) | 12 (+1) | 16 (+3) |
Combat Stats¶
| AC | HP | Hit Dice | Speed | Initiative | Prof. Bonus |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20 | 54 | 5d10 | 30 ft. | +0 | +3 |
Saving Throws: Wisdom: +4, Charisma: +6 Resistances: Fire
Proficiencies¶
Skills: Animal Handling +4, Athletics +6, Insight +4, Nature +2
Armor: Light Armor, Medium Armor, Heavy Armor, Shield | Weapons: Simple Weapons, Martial Weapons
Tools: Carpenter's Tools | Languages: Common, Draconic, Goblin
Feats¶
- Tough: +2 to HP per level
- Sentinel: Attack of Opportunity reduces enemy Speed to 0, can perform when enemy in range attacks any other target.
Equipment¶
Splint Armor, Pike, Shield, Longsword, Holy Symbol
Suggested Magic Items
- Sentinel Shield (Uncommon, Advantage on Initiative and Perception rolls. For the watchful frontliner.)
- Cloak of Protection (uncommon, attunement, +1 to AC and saving throws. Simple, elegant, defensive.)
- Ring of Spell Storing (If the DM agrees to something more powerful. Rare, attunement, pre-load with Warding Bond to take damage for allies at range.)
Spellcasting¶
- Level 1: Bless, Compelled Duel, Cure Wounds, Divine Smite, Heroism, Protection from Evil and Good, Shield of Faith
- Level 2: Aid, Find Steed, Prayer of Healing, Warding Bond, Zone of Truth
Session Zero Considerations
Content Notes: Themes of institutional corruption, moral ambiguity, and the weaponization of religion. Explores colonialism, displacement of indigenous peoples (goblins), and systemic oppression. Contains references to starvation, cruelty to prisoners, and excommunication/religious persecution. No graphic violence described, but heavy moral weight throughout.
Representation Notes: Character explores reinterpreting religious oaths and questions institutional authority. May resonate with players who have experienced religious trauma or struggled with moral clarity in complex situations.