Gabar

Character Art of Gabar and his familiar Grimm

# Gabar Galen Umpip Gamasatara

Gabar Galen Umpip Gamasatara, or Gabar for short, is a gnome wizard and a member of the Snow Drifters.

## Description

Gabar is short, even by gnomish standards, standing as 2' 6" tall. He has slick black hair, a heavily pockmarked face covered by a beard, and beady yellow eyes. He wears many pieces of jewelry, customary for the sailors of Luskan, most of which is completely worthless. When not covered in cold weather furs, he wears old wizards robes, once the attire of apprentice wizards of the Arcane Brotherhood, that have been tattered and torn, and sewed and mended, over the years. He wears a satchel containing all his loose wizarding notes that doubles as a spellbook and many pouches around his belt that carry his material components for his spells.

Gabar speaks in a high pitched, squeaky voice, which grows more prominent when agitated or frightened. He generally approaches situations with caution, and has often shown reservation to the Snow Drifter's desire to jump head first into dangerous situations. More often than not, when in dangerous situations, he chooses to stay towards the back of the fight, using his spells to help the Snow Drifters in combat.

Occasionally, he goes against his better judgement in his reserved nature when it benefits him directly, sometimes letting his ambition get the better of him or throwing caution to the wind if the reward is great enough. He is often impatient, which has caused issues with his ability to properly learn wizard spells and often times makes errors when copying spells.

## Relationships

Gabar is known to have a family back in Luskan. He has referred to his grandmother as 'Gam-Gam' when recounting tales she told him as a child, and has mentioned he has a younger sister named Fenpipe.

At one point, he had a wizard mentor in Luskan who he failed to mention the name of. He also was briefly a low ranking member of the Arcane Brotherhood, though details on his exit remain unclear.

Gabar is also known to have previously been a crew member aboard the Dark Duchess, a derelict pirate ship in the Sea of Moving Ice.

In Icewind Dale, Gabar grew close to Big Smile, and lived on Big Smile's couch for several years prior to responding to Hlin's job posting.

Gabar also has a balnorn bound to him by the name of Sahnar, though Gabar tries his best to treat him as a friend and ally instead of a servant.

Gabar also has befriended a young gnome, a member of the Terrible Troll Killers of Ten Towns, and an aspiring wizard, and often brings him books on powerful wizards or provides him simple scrolls with cantrips on them.

## Biography

### Pre-Icewind dale

Gabar was born and raised in Luskan to a sizeable, poor family. There he worked in odd jobs to help his family make ends meet but struggled to maintain constant employment. He was closest with his youngest sister Fenpipe, as he was often seen by his elder siblings and parents to not be pulling his weight in helping the family. Eventually, Gabar met a retired elven wizard, a former adventurer, who saw a spark of intelligence in Gabar and offered to teach him some wizarding spells. Eventually, he left the tutelage of this wizard to petition acceptance into the Arcane Brotherhood, and was accepted.

Eventually, he parted ways with the Arcane Brotherhood, and became a crewmember of the Dark Duchess, a pirating vessel based out of Luskan and flew the flag of Ship Suljack. Eventually, the Dark Duchess came to the Sea of Moving Ice, where the ship ran aground an iceberg and was subsequently abandoned.

### Arrival in Icewind Dale

After abandoning ship, the crew of the Dark Duchess, Gabar included, fled into the snowy tundra. Eventually, he was found in the Lonelywood, covered in blood and nearly dead, by Big Smile, who saved his life and brought him back to his home in Bryn Shander. Big Smile let Gabar stay on his couch, and the two of them grew close in the next few years, with Gabar continuing to sleep on what he now calls "his" couch.

During this time, Gabar tried to find honest work, but again struggled to maintain constant employment. As a result, he turned to using his basic magics and acting as a savant, "reading" people's fortunes for whatever coin they would give him. What he earned was mostly used to maintain his ever-growing tab at the Northlook Tavern.

### Joining the Snow Drifters

One day, Big Smile found a job posting for Adventurers, Mercenaries, Freelancers, Warriors, Investigators, Guards, Bruisers, Rat-catchers and Opportunists. Big Smile brought it to Gabar and the two of them met with Hlin Trollbane in the Northlook, where they met Sapphira, V, and Quintus. Eventually, Hlin arrived and gave them their first job, hunting down a yeti who attacked some dwarves outside town. The group failed to find the yeti but did find some goblin raiders, and in combat, found their abilities complementary and decided to stick together after the first job, thus becoming an adventuring party under the employment of Hlin Trollbane.

As the resident wizard of the Snow Drifters, Gabar often uses his abilities to identify magic items, locate objects, or teleport people around. His divination abilities oftentimes allow him to see alternate outcomes of events and warn his allies of an incoming attack, or direct them where to strike.

When the party arrives in Targos and goes to the Luskan Arms, Gabar becomes irritable when Big Smile is recognized by a local man named Biff and begins shouting about Big Smile, during which a hooded figure can be seen getting up and leaving the room. During this interaction, he also introduces himself to Speaker Naerth Maxildanarr as "Diallos," an obvious alias. Later, it is revealed to the party when they find a pair of wanted posters for Gabar and Big Smile in the zhentirim agent Spider's house, revealing the pair have outstanding bounties on their heads back in Luskan.

Gabar also reveals he used to be a member of the Arcane Brotherhood when the party encounters Trex, who wears a badge of the Arcane Brotherhood on his satchel. Gabar informs them that the Arcane Brotherhood's presence in Icewind Dale should be concerning as their goals are generally not altruistic in nature, and generally ambitious and selfish. When questioned, he claimed to have left the Arcane Brotherhood by his own decision.

In an elven tomb in the Lonelywood, Gabar found a magical brazier. Once it was properly lit, he stuck his left hand within the flame, and after several seconds his hand withered away, leaving him with only one hand. After, a nearby sarcophagus opened and a balnorn arose. The balnorn introduced himself as Sahnar, and is bound to the one who used the brazier to raise him from his rest. Sahnar now serves Gabar, acting as a healer, which Gabar gladly accepts but tries to acknowledge Sahnar as a friend and ally as opposed to a servant.

In their interactions with the Terrible Troll Killers of Ten Towns, Gabar took a liking to the aspiring gnome wizard Scoop, and often provides him with books and scrolls to help Scoop develop his skills as a wizard, acting as a sort of proxy mentor.

During a resting period, Gabar sent his familiar owl Grimm to investigate the Dark Duchess. There, he sees that a great white drake, who he believes to be Arveiaturace, has made it's home there. When the party learns of the Dark Duchess from Hlin, Gabar reveals he knew of the Dark Duchess all along and that he used to be a crew member of the ship, and that Arveiaturace now lives there, claiming the treasure as it's horde.

At one point, he gave Vellynne Harpell, whose motives were still unclear, a map to the Lost Spire of Netheril without telling the party in exchange for fine parchments and inks so that he could copy new spells into his collection. At the lost spire, when an argument about using a magical room to transform illusions into reality as the room was unstable and could be destroyed with every use, he, Big Smile and Ilikan wanted to use the room to create an abundance of riches (Big Smile and Gabar so they could pay off their bounties while Ilikan wanted diamonds as a component for a revivify spell.) The rest of the party, as well as Vellynne, refused to allow them to use it (Vellynne, V and Quintus wanted to study or try to repair it while Sapphira wanted to destroy it.) For this, Gabar became infuriated with the party, Vellynne most of all, believing her to only consider the Snow Drifters an expendable means to an end for her own personal agenda.