Woman With A Lockpick

Many, many years ago, I used to travel up to Cardiff every few months to visit my friends Owen and Alex. I’d stay in their house and generally make a nuisance of myself for a couple of days. Because I worked on Fridays, I’d get a late train and arrive at all sorts of weird and unhelpful times.

Once, I showed up while they had friends around, I think to play a game. I didn’t want to interrupt, so I started reading a Dungeons & Dragons manual that happened to be around (the Third Edition Players’ Handbook, to be precise). Flicking through, I stumbled upon the picture below.

It’s one of a set of pictures of example characters, who are depicted with various upgrades and specifications to demonstrate what can be done with the rules. This particular person is Lidda the Halfling Rogue, but I didn’t know that at the time.

It's interesting what prompts you (ie me) to write. Whatever subconscious reason there might have been, I looked at this picture and thought “This is the kind of person that I want to write about”.

What strikes me about this picture is its practicality. I don’t only mean the lack of exposed flesh, but the sense that this is a real person, with real problems. She’s peering at a lockpick (at least I think she is), and the end of her nose has gone pink, as if she’s got a cold. Things like that didn’t happen to fantasy characters when I was young, outside comedy.

And of course, the outfit. Actually, it’s not all that practical, and it seems to be largely made out of random off-cuts strapped together, but it looks warm and it’s got pads. After all, if you’re going to be picking locks and squeezing through windows, having reinforced gear is a pretty sensible idea. There’s also the interesting fact that her hair is rather elaborately braided, which hints at something other than practicality - vanity, or religious observance perhaps. If there are cyberpunks in fantasy, this is what they would look like.

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The heroine – or maybe protagonist is a more accurate word – of Up To The Throne doesn’t look much like Lidda, to be honest. Giulia is human, for starters, and rather more “normal” looking in terms of outfit. There are half a dozen other ways she differs, but I still look at this picture from time to time, to remind me of what this thing is all about. It’s about that sense of improvisation and pragmatism, of credible people behaving logically within a weird, impossible setting. 

I don't know who drew this. I've looked but, as with a lot of rulebook art, unless it's by one of the three or four people whose work I recognise, it's very hard to track down. So, if you do know who drew Lidda the Halfling Rogue Looking At A Lockpick, let me know. In the meantime, thanks, mystery artist.

Next time, some thoughts on noir. And maybe I'll tell my Games Workshop anecdote.