{"id":47350,"date":"2026-10-21T00:00:58","date_gmt":"2026-10-21T04:00:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.oafe.net\/blog\/?p=47350"},"modified":"2026-10-22T14:28:08","modified_gmt":"2026-10-22T18:28:08","slug":"bad-man-arkhan-origins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.oafe.net\/blog\/2026\/10\/bad-man-arkhan-origins\/","title":{"rendered":"Bad man: Arkhan Origins"},"content":{"rendered":"

What has been said about the background of Arkhan the Cruel<\/a>, and what can we piece together from that?<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

The earliest part of his life we've heard about was during Force Grey: Lost City of Omu - Episode 1<\/a> in November of 2017:<\/p>\n

\"He's a red dragonborn paladin who was Lawful Good for his first three levels until he hit third level and he was sucked back into the dark world of chromatic dragons and became a worshiper of Tiamat.\"<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But that actually took place eight months after<\/b> the CelebriD&D<\/a><\/i> episode that was the character's first public appearance:<\/p>\n

\"I'm Arkhan the Cruel, the red dragonborn Oathbreaker paladin and worshiper of Tiamat. I was a hired killer who joined a monastery to try to stop the drinking and killing and somewhere along the way I wound up breathing fire into a dark room, which turned out to be a group of unsuspecting sleeping goblin soldiers, and when I heard them screaming and running in flames, I'd never felt so alive in my life, and so started drinking and killing again, and worshiping five-headed dragon goddesses, and here we are!\"<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Okay, so those can work together: he got his three levels, then went to the monastery. But a later telling of his origin said he was kidnapped by a cult, and they tried to force him to convert to whatever it was they believed. So maybe he still tried to retire to a monastery, but it was less altruistic than it seemed, and was really a front for this cult? Sure, that tracks. But now the toy offers its own story:<\/p>\n

The lone survivor of a failed tomb raiding expedition into the lair of a powerful undead pharaoh, Arkhan escaped only to be arrested by local authorities who sentenced him to death. The dragon queen then appeared to him in a dream offering her help on one condition, his life would belong to her. Rather than be executed, he took her offer, and upon his escape from his captors, she transformed him into the bestial appearance of a half-dragon.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

How can we make all this information fit? Let's say he was a normal Lawful Good paladin having normal adventures, until his party went tomb raiding. (D&D does have a famous undead pharaoh, but that's in the Ravenloft<\/i> setting, while Arkhan is Forgotten Realms<\/i>.) When they were all killed, he tried to retire, but the monastery where he holed up was run by a cult (possibly one that served the pharaoh whose tomb he'd tried to rob, if you want to tie it all together) that counted among its members some high-ranking authorities in the region. When he wouldn't convert, they sentenced him to death, which is when Tiamat made her offer. He accepted, killed them all, and enjoyed doing it, and she turned him into a half-dragon so everyone knew who he worked for.<\/p>\n

How's that? Somebody find Joe and ask him how close we got.<\/p>\n

<i>And now, some more OAFEry:<\/i><\/H5>