For the Fellmyr game, I tried an experiment around a potential villain who had re-emerged in the game. Aden Wretch was someone the PCs had killed in their first ever adventure when they raided a known base of The Ravens and cut his head off. Seemingly inexplicably, while infiltrating another location the PCs saw Wretch again… and the reaction was electric!

A good friend of mine is an artist. MJ Hiblen is an illustrator and comic book artist so I commissioned him to create an image of Aden Wretch. I sent him a list of facts we knew from the gaming sessions and a few of the unanswered questions the players had raised. A few days later he sent me this image:

For me, receiving the illustration was exciting and inspiring. I was in the process of creating the character in more depth from what we knew, and even going so far as to stat him out for the potential battle that was looming in the next session. The illustration added some details that I hadn’t considered and lifted my whole mood about the game.

At the session, I showed the illustration at the table. The players took a look and then almost immediately moved on. They didn’t say it but I got the impression they thought, “Pretty picture but let’s get down to business.” Ho hum.

We had a cracking session involving them scouting the church location, working on a plan to infiltrate the shrine beneath, and extract the item they came for. Then they did something I didn’t quite expect: the PCs decided to go stop Wretch and his “evil cultists” from completing their “summoning ritual”.

An ambush was staged and a hot raid on the church was initiated. Things did not go to plan, in part because of the non-static nature of the encounter (some PCs moved during the 40 minute planning session so their plan was impacted) but also because they under-estimated the abilities of Wretch and his bodyguard. And they were super unlucky with the dice. I mean, painfully so.

Last session, we dealt with some of the fall-out from that encounter with Wretch’s gang and, yes, he is becoming the villain he always had the potential to be. He has become more real and tangible to run as an NPC and I’m enjoying the play… even if I am strongly aware of the need to hold on to him lightly. They can kill him at any time… and they eventually will.

But the best thing is that illustration. It was a total experiment for me. I have never considered doing such a thing for a single NPC in an RPG campaign. Even though the players were not particularly moved, the fact is that Aden Wretch was brought to life for me as the GM. That was worth the effort alone.

Will I do it again? I don’t know. I mean, illustrations aren’t cheap as illustrators – especially top-notch folk like MJ – have to pay the bills and deserve all they charge for their services. But it was so much more meaningful for me as a gamer than knocking out some AI image or just relaying my own imagination in words.

Aden Wretch has a life of his own now. And he has reason to hate those meddling adventurers.

Game on!