Captain Jasmine Drake (Riptide Concept Art)

Jazz was magically conjured together by the ultimate pirate artist, Wyvern. They also created Aga, Kai, and Pickle (originally name Prickle, but pickle made me laugh harder so I changed it.)

Legend has it that Aga & Kai were denizens of Edison Kingdom! They grew up in the Sunnyside Slums, eventually setting out to sea to steal things from pirates and RAFT and then sell it back to them! They happened to stumble on Pickle, who was added to this small crew of clever tradesmen. Eventually, one of their victims was the lone Jasmine Drake, who proceeded to chase them for weeks, until he finally caught up and asked them to join his pirate crew!

Back in March or so, I saw an OC designed by Wyvern and told them I'd put them in the world! I'm a man of my word so after reading their backstory document, I thought long and hard of where they'd be now, and one day the idea of Captain Drake hit me! The ideas started flowing, and it was the perfect crew for these OCs!  Since this honestly, I've asked some more friends about their Riptide OCs and have added them to the world! Hope they all show up one day.

Captain Drake

The idea came to me in the gym as I was getting yolked on September 18th... I wanted to create a captain who had the ability to steal and/or mimic abilities from other people? That's kinda where it started, but then I thought like, what if it had to do with a musical kind of ki? You know where he's able to read arcane rhythm by physical touching someone or something crazy like that. I've mentioned an island powered by sound and music before when The Empress was an antagonist, and I've always WANTED a reason to go back, so having another character from the same place that could be an ally or need assistance in the future, or just invite them to the battle of the bands festival would be sick! Anyways, you can see I started thinking a lot about this character & got really stressed out when the boys were light-heartedly on a murderous path to kill him. LOL, to be fair that rolled was a super late night & I had a flight in just a few hours. I figured it out though, as one does.

Anyways, I won't get into the backstory and stuff, but I knew this character would be a POC because a good portion of Dal Segno, his hometown island, is. Of course, real life races don't exist in D&D, and this fact makes me feel a bit less concerned portraying non-player characters with brown complexion. They're just human in Mana. Or Fish. The only two races. Humans and Fish. Okay there are also bird people, dog people, cat people, and giants. But still. Humans. And. Fish. That said, I will do my best to make you guys that watch the show feel comfortable, represented, and respected!

I've also been sitting on design idea and potential of vitiligo on characters. I think in Jazz's case it's considered segmented, just one side of the body. I could be wrong, but that's what I researched. I also asked for specific spots on Jazz's body because of the research. I know the disease really effects people and especially their mental health, so I wanted to show a character with a similar condition that represented it, who is infinitely confident in their own skin, and went through a lot to earn that confidence. Even though such a thing could be cured in a fantasy world, and maybe not even exist, Jazz chose to keep it apart of themselves. Also yes, it does stylistically resemble a skull on their face, which may be unrealistically awesome, but I love it, okay? LOL

Another fun fact, Jasmine Drake is trans.  In the world of Mana, and possibly other fantasy worlds, there is magic that allows one to completely alter their physical form. Transmogrification is a spell that does just this, but permanently. I first witnessed it during campaign 2 of Critical Role and was like, holy shit yes this should just EXIST. Unfortunately the real world isn't as magical, but for Jazz it is, and they found the means to undergo this transmutation ritual to put them in the body they wanted.

I recall messaging a lot of this to Wyvern, and them saying they loved every single word and watched like a 5 episode show in their mind LOL. I really enjoy creating NPCs that make the world alive.

Final fun fact, Captain Drake is a name I've been wanting to use since its inspired by real life pirate Francis Drake. How could I not use it for a musician when Drake is a real word famous rapper. The parallels are too funny. Did you guys know that the rapper drake is into hentai

Okay, with all that out of the way. How do you think all this effected the design?

DESIGN

Just based on description and backstory, Wyvern created a perfect face and expression of Jazz within a day. From there I described distinguishable facial features, and researched a good descriptor for the skin color which we landed on "claret," although a bit warmer than what you get by googling that. Essentially a warm brown, with red undertones.

Afterwards I had a joyride of searching through Pinterest for reference of hairstyles, and they are all genuinely so fucking cool. I was looking for shaved sides and braids that were either tight cords (box braids I think?) or locs. Also asked for them to have beads, brackets, or other accessories to the hair.

Because Empress Malice was an inspiration to Jazz, and their eye color was red, I wanted Jazz to have red in their hair.

After this I described the height build, short king with acrobatic muscles, and then talked about tattoos. Because there are no surgery scars, my idea was to have the tattoo on their exposed arm wrap under the chest, just for symbolism. Wyvern is the one who designed it to be a musical staff with Jasmine flowers. Which by the way, is genius, and makes me a little emotional haha. Just really good ideas all around.

The clothes were a little difficult because I wanted Jazz to have his own unique swag and basically pioneer a look that you wouldn't otherwise see. Of course, also wanted it to fit his martial art brawler fighting style and still fit within the pirate theme of the world. Sorta like a modernization of a pirate outfit. I wanted you to look at Jazz and think, "god damn he loves himself, and god damnit he should."

I sent pictures of crop tops with varying cut outs, tall buckled leather boots, leather pants, etc. Pinterest is just a great place to look for reference, by the way.

Wyvern told me my outfit ideas were an unusual combo, but then they nailed it anyways so idc I win! Wyvern added a lot of their own ideas to this design as well, such as the Jolly Roger, the jacket, the spiked glove!

With the initial ideas sketched out, I picked my favorite combination of them, and he was pretty much finished!

SORRY FOR THE NOVEL

If you have any questions about Captain Drake, please let me know! If its not a spoiler, Ill do my best to answer.

Please look forward to the next break down of a design or concept art process! They may not happen every episode, but I will try my best.

- Grizzly