Let’s Play D&D With the Sparrows from ‘Umbrella Academy’
We’re back in the Hargreeves mansion, only this time things are a little different. We’re playing D&D with the Sparrow Academy.
Nearly two years ago we took a trip to the Hargreeves mansion to play D&D with the entire Umbrella Academy in an exhausting two-part marathon of character-sheet making. And what we ended up with was a group of adventurers who would probably be slightly more functional in your next D&D campaign than the characters are on TV. But only slightly; we all know how we get at the D&D table and we all owe our DMs an apology.
This season The Umbrella Academy has been kicked out of their home to make room for the new and much more professional Sparrow Academy. And we’re going to welcome them into the timeline the only way we know how. This week we’re playing D&D with the Sparrow Academy
Ben Hargreeves
Ben is back (sort of) and much more alive! But when it gets to the nitty gritty powers part of his character, there really aren’t any changes. He’s still a guy who can shoot tentacles out of his chest like some sort of eldritch horror. He’s still very Great Old One Pact Warlock, in my book. So he’s keeping his same sheet as last time with a few necessary changes. Namely to his alignment were he’s slipped from chaotic-but-mostly-good to a total-jerk. Jerk isn’t a real D&D alignment, but when it comes to gameplay it’s about as meaningful as real alignments usually are.
Fei Hargreeves
Fei was probably my run-away favorite new character of the season, and she has some of the most interesting powers. She can’t see with her eyes, but will erupt a flock of birds to see for her from any angle. She’s shown to be a good fighter, but she doesn’t really need to be if the birds can do her violence for her.
I went with a Swarmkeeper Ranger for her. Swarms of birds already come with the territory so there’s no alterations necessary. And with spells like Beast Sense and Animal Messenger she can easily have birds tell her everything she needs to know about the battlefield.
Fei is pretty limited in weapons, and we don’t see her fight with many in the show, but I hate not giving characters at least one weapon unless it makes absolutely no sense. The Quarterstaff felt like something that she would have learned as a matter of course in the dojo.
Christopher Hargreeves
I’m going to be real with you, I didn’t make Christopher’s sheet. Or, I didn’t finish it. I got about half way through and realized it was too much for any player to wield. This wouldn’t be fair to your DM and no DM in their right mind would allow this character in their game.
With that in mind, Christopher was built off of a mixture of Gelatinous Cube and Beholder stats. That covered everything from what the character looked like and how he communicated to his flying, to his heartiness. On their own Gelatinous Cube was too unintelligent, but Beholder was far too strong so we met somewhere in the middle. And as a player character I made him a Wizard. Christopher’s abilities include lowering temperatures in rooms to freezing and paralyzing foes with psychic fear which all would have been spells. But if a DM wanted to incorporate this character into their next session, a square, friendly-ish Beholder is the way to go.
How would you make the members of the Sparrow Academy for D&D? Who was your favorite new character this season? What show, comic, game, or movie would you like to see sheets from next time? Let us know in the comments!
Happy Adventuring!
