Building a better Alphinaud

[Vahlnir]

I kind of figured appealing to the crowd that's into Manly Men was what they had ShB-and-later Thancred for. He's in his 30s, reasonably tall (5'9'', which is the 50 mark for male Midlanders) and short-haired, tanks, has a kid he wants to protect (Ryne), picks up girls, and so on. The writer preferences for this game just don't seem to lean towards slab-of-muscle Manly Man, and I don't think that's a writing flaw.

Their "manly man" themes tend to play out frequently in the Manderville questlines. I get the impression that they prefer to use these sorts of characters for comedic relief over anything else, though that doesn't stop them from adding characters like this elsewhere. Bozja is a great example of this with Lyon the Beast King.