Backstory

Joe Talls while born in the Talenta Plains, hails from Breland, where he went early on in his life to pursue his interests in Artificing.

At first, he found life hard in Breland, struggling to find an apprenticeship until one day, a company of Gnome elemental engineers took him on after he was made homeless in Sharn. While they guarded their knowledge of elemental binding and grafting from him, he learnt much about Artificing and picked up a few elemental languages.

Unfortunately, his brief time on the streets, and his time doing whatever work was available to feed himself in the seedier, darker parts of Breland took their toll and he developed a slight greedy, selfish streak and had little compunction about conning people for his own personal gain. Using his association with the gnomish engineers, he managed to get head-hunted by a criminal syndicate interested in elemental binding and grafting for their own nefarious purposes. Of course, Joe wasn’t particularly interested in helping them, in fact, he didn’t really have any knowledge of actually performing any elemental binding as the gnomes had always kept that secret, but the syndicate wasn’t to know that where they?

He spent a few years doing research for them, making some progress at developing binding techniques from scratch all the while siphoning off as much money and magical items as he could get away with into his own private stash. However, the syndicate where getting somewhat impatient and so he decided to make his exit. Leaving wasn’t as option, so he had to escape, and with a combination of spells, trickery and blatant lying, he convinced his employers to acquire an elemental flying vessel so he could reverse engineer it, since he was so close. As quick as he could afford he got his stash loaded onto the craft and flew off.

He spent the next few years on the run. It turned out the syndicate had some ties with some of the larger Houses, and they weren’t just going to let him get away with it. After a few years of running and a couple of close calls, his paranoia was well developed and he decided to try and make a flight over the sea away from Khorvaire to anywhere that will keep him out of the Houses or the syndicates clutches until everything blew over. Unfortunately, his rudimentary, flawed skills at using elemental vessels led to disaster and a crash in the open sea.

About Joe

Joe is a tinkerer at heart, he loves playing with things and making devices of questionable intent and use. One of his favourite designs is the tower bomb, a grenade that can create an instant blockade of defence towers – never mind that their position can’t be perfectly controlled so horizontal and upside-down ones are quite likely… He has a great love for constructs and plans to surround himself with as many as possible for which he needs money. Lots of money. Not afraid to lie, cheat or steal his way to riches, Joe wants to find a way to retire safely with a bunch of constructs at his beck and call, away from the clutches of the Houses and the syndicate. While basically a good guy – he doesn’t want anyone to get hurt or evil people to win the day – he rather come up with crazy contraptions and equipment to help the real heroes while he relaxes behind an army of constructs!