Fast James "Jimmy" Deric is a gnome with a gambling problem. For all the grief this has given him, it has also caused Jimmy to learn skills he never would have learned otherwise. His homelessness has taught him to live off the land and survive with little more than the clothes on his back. He has also learned better than to bet his possessions after losing his precious rifle. With no resources, he was hired cheap by
Captain Eugene Reynolds as the Venture's helmsman, which he is quite skilled at (so long as he has his handy stepstool). He continued to serve in this capacity on the Venture II until a remission of a childhood illness hospitalized him and forced him to remain in the
Church of Kelemvor's care to recover.
Table of Contents
History
Forced into Adventure
Jimmy had worked with Captain Reynolds for several months when the Venture made it's maiden flight, only to be attacked by the Argus Pirates. Jimmy destroyed many of the attacking Gunkers before the damage forced him and the rest of the crew to jump ship. Landing on a jungle island below, he led the party through the brush as they headed towards the crash site. When the party came across a panicked civilian with a pistol, Jimmy snuck up on her from behind and violently disarmed her. He demanded she surrender the gun and all the ammo she had, only to discover her only bullet was the one the gun was loaded with. At Althea's prompting, he returned the ammoless firearm after the woman demanded a parley.
After parting ways with the civilians, he finished leading the group to the crash site and from there to a nearby beach by following Captain Reynolds' tracks. After the group caught Captain Reynolds up on events, Jimmy and Bakris Tarak were berated by the Captain for their behavior towards the civilians. At the Captain's insistence, the group headed back to ensure the civilians were not harmed by the pirates roaming the island. When they tracked the pirates to their cave hideout, Jimmy got a few early hits in but was forced to retreat after being wounded by a sniper. Hiding outside, a displacer beast stalked him but left him alone since he'd been killing wild animals it could then eat.
Following a brief detour to heal their wounds, the party returned to the cave and met the Bagiennik. It rewarded the party with potions for clearing out the pirates and they followed blood trails leading into the jungle. Along the way, they spotted a field of flowers that bloomed under the moonlight. Jimmy harvested 50 of them, hoping to sell them later. Continuing to follow the trail, they found themselves in the den of a displacer beast that attacked when Guu the Slime ignored its warning growls and tried to steal its food. Jimmy fired on it from afar with his arrows until the beast fled. Striking the displacer beast, which was actually a sacred beast of Selûne, the Moon Goddess, caused the flowers in his pack to wilt in a showing of the goddess' ire. Shortly thereafter, the group used makeshift rafts to leave for a new island.
Earning a New Ship
The Venture Boys found themselves in Mirebol Village which had recently been attacked by fishmen. Jimmy promised an angry villager they would exterminate the fishpeople and rounded up his friends. When an overzealous kuo-toa (one of the fishpeople) led the group to his people's village, Jimmy was the first to strike the kuo-toa in the entrance room. When the group met Gibbidubbus, the deity viewed Jimmy as an old friend and embraced him. Once the party was back in the village, Jimmy managed to gamble his way into getting his hands on a musket.
Leaving the village, the party hopped on a merchant ship bound for Nassau Town and took a job mining magic crystals in the belly of a beached kraken. When they encountered Vypra inside, Jimmy used his expert marksmen ship to wound her several times before landing a killing shot. Shortly thereafter, the group took a job to deliver a time-sensitive package to a wizard. Jimmy once again proved to be a deadshot when an unexpected trip to the Feywild found the party on the receiving end of a wolf fey's fangs and claws before Jimmy managed to put a bullet through its throat. And again when he and Lucky the Drake destroyed angry animated furniture the party found in an old bunker a treasure map led them to.
Jimmy then found himself thrust into the role of negotiator when the party investigated an old ruin on behalf of N28. A group of kobolds had moved in and Jimmy, as the only draconic speaker, was forced to play translator. A few well-placed lies led to the kobolds trusting him and rewarding the party for eliminating the demons infesting the inner ruin. Meeting the kobolds again, he challenged their leader to a 1-on-1 duel and killed the kobold champion in single combat, winning a horde of treasure the kobolds pilfered from a nearby mausoleum. Throughout this adventure, he lied on many occasions & faked faith towards various gods, which did not go unnoticed by several deities.
Shortly thereafter, he accompanied Guu and Althea to search for a missing person in the woods. After gunning down a pair of owlbears, the group followed the trail to find a group of Sea Devils preparing to attack the town. Guu and Jimmy raced back to town and narrowly stopped a bomb from destroying the local sea fort before hopping onboard the Venture II and taking the battle to the pirates. Jimmy acted as lookout from the crow's nest, allowing the ship to outmaneuver and sink the Sea Devil frigate. After spending a night of merriment being rewarded by the townsfolk, they set sail for the trade city of Aliisyos.
Jimmy's Secret
As the Venture II approached Aliisyos, Jimmy's friends were surprised to find he had fallen deathly ill. They speculated his exposure to the Abyssal Shard or the kraken's insides may have caused his condition, seeing as Jimmy is the only member of their group susceptible to illness. In truth, Jimmy had long since had his disease and kept his condition private from his friends. The sudden resurgence left him too weak to explain the situation to his comrades fully.
Captain Reynolds sent the rest of the group ahead in a rowboat (and on Guu's back as a giant toad) while he docked the Venture II and N28 offered to take them to the Church of Kelemvor for medical treatment. An examination by a healer priest stabilized a now-unconscious Jimmy, who explained to the rest of the group that Jimmy would be bedridden until they could determine exactly what was wrong with him. Guu opted to stay by Jimmy's side and watch over him, and so the two privateers left the Venture II's company until Jimmy could recover.
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