I'm happy to present Brandt Dittmar, a young man of some skill and more potential.

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Brandt Dittmar was a young man just reaching his prime, and would be considered handsome by the reckoning of most. His height is a little above average, and he has a strongly muscled upper body that made him stand out from the lean farmers and rangy hunters found throughout the Empire. He cuts a brave enough figure in his armour - a breastplate with tassets, and his left arm plated from pauldron to vambrace - though it’s polish can’t hide that it’s seen many repairs. He wore practical fitted trousers and high traveling boots that had seen many miles of road. A satchel hung around his right shoulder and held his meagre belongings and a cloak hung around his neck; green with red trim, in the colours of Hochland. Sticking out from the cloak is the handle of a huge flamberge sword of the sword wielded by the famed Greatsword soldiers, its finely ornamented pommel and quilions speaking further of its origins.

Once he had apprenticed as a smith under Gerard Schmitt, a man of no real importance in life and less so since his passing, except that Brandt was unable to fully learn the trade. The apprenticeship had been halted by the Siege of Lorch; the culmination of a number of skirmishes that had taken place during a border dispute between the small but proud province of Hochland and its neighbour, the larger and more belligerent province of Talabecland. Brandt has been trapped inside Lorche’s small keep along with a small garrison of men and what few townsfolk had fled there for safety. They’d been holed up there fore months, repelling ineffectual proves of their defences and, more than anything, waiting for relief. Brandt had done his part, both by fighting and hammering out dented breastplates and helms once Gerard had been killed. The relief had never come.

The enemy had been reinforced instead by artillery, which had reigned metal down upon them and blasted the gates open. The meagre garrison had been butchered, and Brandt would have been as well, had he and a few others - including the young priest named Roderick Walch and an unladylike merchants daughter named Maria Fosdick - not been charged with escorting a young noble to safety. They escaped through a hidden postern and were pursued by the enemy and braved goblin infested woods. At length, Brandt and his companions completed their mission, though not without losses.

That had been nearly a year past, the border dispute long forgotten. Brandt has since given up on the life of a smith and has instead been enjoying life on the road, joining mobs of Free Companymen when he can, escorting merchants or travelers and trying to make a name for himself. Unfortunately, since the siege of Lorch, there have been few opportunities for true valour. Brandt hopes that might turn around here in Schartenfeld, where he and the massive flamberge sword he wields might earn some renown.
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