I like to imagine that as a Rider or a Berserker Roland would have far more unusual NPs, from his years wandering as a Knight Errant, but hopefully Saber Roland, whilst choosing pretty draw-by-numbers Phantasms, has something worthwhile in how they operate beyond just "lol summon an army".
Name: Roland of Brittany
Class: Saber
Other Classes: Rider, Berserker
Parameters:
Strength: B
Endurance: A
Agility: B
Mana: C
Luck: C
Background:
Roland was a Frankish knight, the nephew of the great king Charlemagne and youngest of four children. Having noble blood, and being one of the favoured of Charlemagne’s family, Roland was groomed for the role of a knight from his childhood, an honorable and respected career for someone of his social stature. When he was thirteen Roland’s sister was stolen away by the king of Elfland, a nightmarish mystical realm which the king ruled over from his grand fortress, the Dark Tower. Both of Roland’s older brothers, also knights-in-training but older and more experienced than himself, ventured into Elfland and were captured, leaving Roland to venture into the distorted nightmare land himself. Heeding advice from a sage druid, Roland was able to cross swords with the King himself and defeat him, saving his siblings and signalling the great potential he had as a knight.
When Roland was a few years older Charlemagne’s armies marched against the forces of the Saracen king Agolant at Aspremont, but despite accompanying them to the site of the battle Roland was ordered by his uncle not to fight, due to his youth and inexperience. When Charlemagne is about to be killed by the son of Agolant at the height of the battle Roland intervenes, defeating the Saracen prince despite his possession of an enchanted sword, and claims the sword, Durendal, for himself alongside the horse Veillantif, a horse with Phantasmal Beast heritage running through its veins. Roland was showered with accolades for his precocious victory, and the ire and jealousy of his bitter stepfather Ganelon. A year later Roland and his friend Oliver were approached by an angel of the Lord in the midst of a feud fuelled by their uncle and father, respectively, ordering them to save their strength for an impending Saracen threat. So awed by the angel and so overcome by religious fervour, Roland became a zealot to the Christian cause, removing the hilt of his prize blade Durendal and replacing it with a blessed hilt containing sacraments from multiple saints to make it a powerful holy blade. After this event Roland, still just a young man, was all set to marry Olivier’s sister, but this was not fated to eventuate, as the day before the marriage Charlemagne was advised of another intrusion by Saracen forces, and he and his army rode out to face the threat.
On this battlefield Roland encountered the paladin Ferragut, who bore upon himself an aegis from his Lord, rendering him invulnerable even to Roland’s holy blade. The intent of the Saracens was to capture the land of Carthay and claim the princess Angelica as a prize. The battle was furious but Ferragut managed to kill Angelica’s brother, forcing Roland and Oliver to intervene so that she could escape. For the next few days Roland pursued Angelica through a magical forest alongside his rival Renault, who came to hate the princess by drinking from a magical stream, while she fell in love with Renault in an unfortunate turn of fate. During this adventure Roland fell in love with the beautiful Angelica by his own will and chased her endlessly, fighting Renault and refusing to return to assist Charlemagne’s army fight against the invading Saracens. Roland disgraced himself by complying with assisting his country in battle only when Angelica’s hand in marriage was promised to the man who battled most bravely against the invaders. During the battle Angelica fell in love with a wounded Saracen warrior she tended to and eloped with him, denying Roland her love. The young Roland, still immature and ill-equipped to deal with the pain of a love lost, flew into a deadly rage and single-handedly forced back the Saracen forces, causing even Ferragut to retreat. After the battle was concluded Roland ran rampant across Africa and Europe, unfettered any longer by consideration for his family, his country or his reputation. Despite the protests of Ganelon, who was most overjoyed by Roland’s terrible behaviour, Oliver employed the brave knight Astolfo to fly to the moon and retrieve Roland’s sanity.
With his sanity returned and his love for Angelica vanquished, Roland had to deal with the shame of his actions, and he became a knight errant, wandering the countryside and doing good deeds to atone for his shameful display. During his wanderings he converted a giant to Christianity, befriended a philosophical demon, was offered a chance to become king of Spain and ventured to the Holy Land to battle his rival Ferragut for three days straight before finally killing him by stabbing him in the one vulnerable part of his body, his navel. Having achieved this task Roland rejoins Charlemagne’s army, redeemed in his uncle’s eyes, and became the First of Charlemagne’s Twelve Paladins, his greatest warrior, enraging his stepfather even further than he had once been. He fought in many battles against the Moors and the Muslims until only one city remained standing, Saragossa. After an extended siege a peace offer was made by the Saracens if the French army returned to its home country, and Charlemagne agreed to this, sending Ganelon as the peace envoy at Roland’s suggestion. Bitter at his stepson and fearful of being murdered in a court full of violent pagans, Ganelon betrayed Charlemagne and Roland, telling the Moors the ideal place to ambush the rearguard of the French army, a small band of great warriors led by none other than Roland. When the ambush struck, outnumbering Roland’s warriors by a huge margin, Roland was left as the last man standing, watching his best friend Oliver and the remainder of his Twelve Peers die. Only then, near death himself and with no hope of salvation left, did Roland blow his war horn to call back Charlemagne’s army. He blew the Oliphant so hard that his temples burst, killing himself, but allowing the returning army to seize the city of Sargossa, which ended up bare of defenders after the ambush against Roland’s knights.
Personality:
A jovial and laughter-filled man for the most part, Roland is an honourable warrior with a drive to fight endlessly. In truth, his mad rage after losing the love of Angelica still haunts him, and it is this that drives him to throw himself recklessly into situations without thought for how they might end. He is also optimistically stubborn, cheerfully claiming that odds don’t mean a thing and that his battle is guided by God Himself. This is the other main aspect of Roland’s nature, his highly pious faith that steps past devotion and into the realm of zealous fervor. He is quick to strike out at those who blaspheme against the Lord, though his honor dictates that he always give the offender a chance to repent and make good of himself. Being both faithful and optimistic, Roland is incredibly trusting, perhaps too much so, and strives to find the good in everyone, even those he fights wars against. All in all, most people consider Roland to be a likeable man, as long as religion is not involved, as he can be incredibly overbearing in his preaching and attempts to convert others to the way of Christianity.
Class Skills:
Riding (B): Roland is able to ride natural beasts of any sort, but cannot ride any sort of Phantasmal Beast. Roland is also quite capable of driving mechanical vehicles.
Magic Resistance (C+): Cancel spells with a chant below two verses, and is exceptionally good against magic with its roots in Muslim faith or Middle Eastern mysticism. Cannot defend against Magecraft on the level of High-Thaumaturgy and Greater Rituals.
Personal Skills
Protection of the Faith (C): The absoluteness of Roland’s faith in his king’s divine mission and in The Lord Our Saviour prevents most types of mental interference and reduces the effects of pagan or unholy attacks against Roland to a reasonable degree.
Battle Continuation (A): Makes possible to fight even with deadly injuries and can remain alive so long as one does not receive a decisive fatal wound. It is the strength of vitality for predicaments. Also, the ability to withdraw from combat and reach allied territory alive after being defeated.
Guardian Knight (B): As the leader of Charlemagne’s rearguard in his return to France, Roland gains a Rank Up in Endurance and Strength when protecting another in near combat in order to allow the protected person to retreat to safety.
Noble Phantasms
Durendal
The Peerless Sword
Type: Anti-Unit/Anti-Army/Anti-Fortress
Rank: C - A+
Description: The weapon that Roland wields is the great blade Durendal, a single-handed “Viking sword” style blade that was commonly used at the time. Won from a great Saracen warrior, this holy sword contains within a golden hilt the tooth of St Peter, the blood of St Basil, the hair of St Denis and cloth from the sacred raiment of the Blessed Virgin, all gifted to Charlemagne by an angel of God. The sword is near to indestructible and will maintain its sharpness no matter how little prana its user may possess. Sealed within the blade are three holy miracles, each able to be used a single time. The first miracle is La Brèche de Roland, the powerful earth-notching blow that carved out a notch in a mountainside when Roland attempted to destroy Durendal. A single incredibly powerful blow is unleashed, providing a temporary Double Rank Up to Roland’s Strength, and the attack is treated as Anti-Fortress, ranking down any defensive Phantasm used against it by two ranks for the attack’s duration. The second miracle is Vitalité de l'Esprit Fidèle, a divine spiritual rejuvenation that will completely heal all of Roland’s wounds and restore his prana reserves to their maximum after a short three-line prayer. The final miracle sealed within Durendal is the judgment of the divine Lord himself, Radiance du Vrai Dieu. A singular blast of light is unleashed from the tip of Durendal’s blade as a Rank A+ Anti-Army/Anti-Fortress attack, similar in manner to a blast from the faerie blade Excalibur.
Oliphant
Sound Off at the Setting of the Sun
Type: Anti-Magic
Rank: A
Description: A finely-wrought battle horn created from an elephant’s tusk obtained by Roland during a hunting trip in India, the Oliphant is a last-ditch Phantasm with several seals placed upon it. To blow upon the horn and invoke its effects, Roland must meet all three criteria. First, he must be defending another in battle, invoking his Guardian Knight skill. Secondly, he must be grievously wounded, so that only his Battle Continuation sustains him. Third, he must have expended each of the miracles contained within Durendal, such that no hope for victory remains. Once these three conditions are met Roland can choose to blow on the Oliphant, unleashing a violent sonic wave of concussive force omnidirectionally. Old beliefs in the anti-magic properties of the elephant have manifested in the Oliphant’s trumpeting, as the wave of sound possesses the ability to strip prana away from anything it passes over within a 50 metre radius. The sound itself pushes the prana away, rendering the land barren of mana and stripping the magical od from living creatures, rendering them exhausted and unable to utilise magecraft. Within a half meter radius of the horn’s sounding any prana is completely converted to a pure form before expulsion, being so close to the source of the sound, and as all Servants and their Phantasms are at their most basic level familiars made manifest by materialising prana the Oliphant will instantly disintegrate any Servant within that small radius. Roland himself is not exempt from this effect, and so perishes upon use of the Oliphant, though the Oliphant itself remains, being the source of the effect, and will stay manifest for up to an hour. Beyond that small half meter radius anything made of materialised prana is forcefully flung away, buffeted by the wave of sound to at least the edge of the 50 meter radius, and potentially far further and much harder if the Servant’s Magic Parameter is high.
Like all things magical energy cannot be destroyed in a true sense, and so all the magical energy from within the range of the Oliphant is pushed to the edges, compressing around the perimeter in a dome-shaped formation of dense prana. Obviously, the more magical energy that is pushed away by the Oliphant, the denser the barrier it will form. In particularly magically-rich areas the density of the magical energy compressed in upon itself may cause it to become unstable and explode, detonating the entire dome in a spectacular manner, but even in more regular areas the prana will remain densely packed and will block attacks or attempts to penetrate it with further magic, which only risks destabilizing the barrier further. The only way to pass through it is to slowly and deliberately push through, and until the barrier fades any magical energy within the object or person passing through will be stripped and added to the barrier, rendering any magus essentially a normal human when passing through. This is the ultimate shield of Roland, guarding his Master from enemy Servants and magi as long as they are within the barrier, but there is a final usage for the prana barrier if Roland’s Master sounds a trumpet on the Oliphant after Roland has used it. In doing so the Master invokes the concept of “Roland’s Reinforcements”, but folds the concept in upon itself, making the concept of "Roland's Reinforcements" become "Reinforcement that Roland provides to those who come after him". This causes and inversion of the intial effects of the Oliphant, drawing the entire magical barrier inwards, through the Oliphant and into the Master, filling him or her up with all of that prana, often topping them up well beyond their normal limits as the Oliphant’s charms Reinforce the physical body far beyond what it should be capable of, allowing the Master to briefly handle that excess of prana with no difficulty.
Originally Posted by Mcjon01
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