Hoo-boy. Time to fire up the WAY-BACK machine.
So, I befriended (I like to tell people he is one of my best friends that I’ve never met) a Webcomic artist back in... 2008, I think (Damn I’m getting old...). His name is Derrick Ravey (named with his permission) and he had a Webcomic called “Everyday Decay”.
It was basically “Survivalist and Prepper Porn” with zombies and I loved it. He had to stop publishing it on account of real life personal matters were draining his love for creating new content for all us “Wannabe Survivalist Arm-chair Quarterbacks”. More about Derrick at the very end.
We kept in touch on an off through the years until me and my tabletop gaming friends decided to play a Dresden Files AU (That’s Alternate Universe for all you Non-tumblrs). I bought the book for the Dresden Files RPG (Role Playing Game) but the rules confused and frightened us. One of our group members had a Doctorate in the World of Darkness rule system so he volunteered to GM (Game Master) the play sessions.
Enter: Wolfgang “Runner” Braxis
He was a “Focus Practitioner” that was good at Electricity Magic. A self-proclaimed Mettallicamancer(I felt SO VERY clever when I thought that up).
His concept was that he felt compelled to be the foil to the other “Serious Business” people he met in the world. He would sass the good guys. He would sass the bad guys. He made dumb Star Wars references at the most inappropriate occasions (Mostly in combat) and was annoyingly obsessive compulsive about doing the right thing.
In hindsight, I MAY have channeled Harry Dresden a bit too much in Runner’s character concept. But who can blame me, I just finished reading “Cold Days” and the mother trucker (Spoilers) punched Santa in the face then made one of Cthulhu’s henchmen blink in a metaphorical staring contest before plugging him with a Remington Lever Action Rifle. For the especially astute, you probably took note of the flannel shirt.
Jack the Plaid (He’s like Gandalf, but wears a plaid wizard’s robe and is addicted to porn) from the Webcomic Zebra Girl (Click the link and enjoy yourself) is, in my humble opinion, the best subversion and re-inversion of the “Powerful Wizard Character” trope on the internet.
Could I have been more original with his character concept? Sure
Could I have been more original with his character design? Yeah
But by doing what I did with both, I got to pay homage to the great works of both Jim Butcher and Joe England.
Rounding this up, Derrick drew this piece for me at quite an affordable price and you should TOTALLY hit him up for your art commissions at [email protected]. I’ll be posting quite a bit more of his work in the coming weeks and months because at the time, I seemed to have more money than sense at my old job.
Nich