A D&D Adaptation of DC Comics’ Aztek (Nayela Constant)
Working my way through Indigenous DC Comics characters and reflecting that I had not drawn enough Jaguar Knights, I was pleased to come across the newer character of Nayeli Constant, or Aztek.
Human-Paladin-Oath of the Jaguar Knight
In Maztica, Nayeli is a Paladin (Oath of the Jaguar Knight), as described in the Maztica Alive guide available from DM’s Guild. A Paladin to a dark god, she nonetheless champions her homeland and fights against greater evils – including the minions of the Maztican sun god Tezca.
Get to Class
Aztek’s “fourth dimensional” helmet and accompanying powers (so Grant Morrison), and her connection to the Fourth World make Paladin a no-brainer.
I would use the Knight of the Order background to reflect her membership in the Jaguar Knights. It provides Persuasion and an Int -based skill that I would fill with Religion.
Further Thoughts
I think very highly of Grant Morrison, but writing a generic white dude (or at least a not specifically Indigenous dude) as (the first) character named Aztek and wrapping it in Aztec myths is not super sensitive to the fact that Indigenous religions, myths, and stories have been plundered by white people for hundreds of years with no compensation or relationship with the peoples themselves.
I am partly guilty of this myself, as I think is the estimable Jon Hild, who has authored many of the DM’s Guild True World titles. I have consulted with numerous Indigenous people as part of this project, but I fully admit that I have not done enough.
A new version of the Aztek character appeared in the late 2010s as a supporting character. Nayeli Constant let me draw a woman, a Jaguar Knight, and an Indigenous DC character.
The new Aztek
Nayeli (Human-Paladin-Oath of the Jaguar Knight)
The Distinguished Anchorome Series imagines DC Comics’ Indigenous characters as D&D PCs and NPCs from the Forgotten Realms “True World” setting of Anchorome, Maztica, and Lopango. See also my Marvelous Anchorome Series and soon to come Random Anchorome Series.
Namely that the Maztica Alive materials simply have the New Waterdeep and Trythosford colonies disappear or naturalised. I prefer to think of a darker fate.
Since my campaign will deal a bit more harshly with the evils of Colonialism, I imagine that these colonies were twisted through the transition to Abeir and back. As a result, the colonies are full of undead of various types – dark places of evil sorcery. (The exceptions will be Fort Flame and New Amn, the reasons for which the PCs will have to discover for themselves).
That doesn’t mean that some heroic PCs couldn’t emerge from these places.
Hayden vs Psycho-Pirate
It doesn’t seem likely that Psycho-Pirate, a DC villain, would be among them. He’s sort of a creep. But his golden mask made him a good fit for The Returned, an undead race from the Theros sourcebook that DM’s guild has made a player race.
College of Whispers Bards are the best fit for emotional manipulation on the arcane scale caused by Hayden and his Medusa Mask. I couldn’t find a background that fit perfectly so maybe just make your own for Deception and Insight skills.
Hayden (Returned-Bard-College of Whispers)
InMaztica, Hayden of Trythosford was a minor Bard and consummate ne’er do well. When the colony was cursed with undeath during the Blue Breath of Change (Spellplague) he was driven mad. Too cowardly to be an arch villain he nonetheless was driven by evil. As a Returned he can feel emotions but only muted and shrivelled. He is addicted to using his magic to cause intense feeling in others, through the College of Whispers.
DC’s Morgan Le Fey, a killer Kirby design, might also work as a Returned NPC.
Brand vs Deadman
In DC comics, Deadman, Boston Brand, is a former Circus aerialist and ghost, and sometime holder of the Ring of a White Lantern. I’ve made Brand a Revenant rather than a ghost. He definitely has a high Dexterity. The White Lantern angle made more sense to play with than the possession power, so I’ve also made him a Life Domain Cleric. Use the Entertainer Background for Acrobatics and Performance Skills.
Brand (Revenant-Cleric-Life Domain)
InMaztica, Brand was an acrobat and entertainer in New Waterdeep when the Blue Breath of Change (Spellplague) occurred and the colony was devastated. All inhabitants awoke to the horror of undeath, but the God Qotal rescued Brand’s soul and made him an agent of divine good. He continues to try to make up for the evils done by his fellows, and tries hard not to lose his sense of humour either. As an ally he can try to help cleanse his homeland..and perhaps save himself in the process.
Further Thoughts
And yes, even if New Waterdeep and Trythosford didn’t engage in some of the canonical horrors of New Amn, but they are nonetheless worthy of being used as Colonial examples in my story. Namely, Lands of Intrigue suggested “Unlike New Amn, New Waterdeep did not claim more land than it needed at the time, and when new land was acquired, it was done through purchase or mutually beneficial sharing with the locals. Mazticans received irrigation and technology from New Waterdeep as well as protection.” This is a nice story, but nice stories don’t always make for good campaigns.
It’s worth mentioning briefly that it is not my intent to have all the colonisers in the True World undead. Gar Atkins pointed out that when you turn some of history’s worst villains into monsters, you can sometimes miss the very real human failings that lead to them.
In respect to the WOTC “Ixalan” setting, he cautioned: “And while I appreciate the framing of these conquistadors as the villains they should be, I feel like there is a conversation to be had about this. Sometimes making actual monsters out of the perpetrators of a very human horror distances ourselves from the truth of the situation. It’s a lot easier to think of these people as unrepentant monsters than actual humans who were capable of terrible things. It’s easy to think that you would never be complicit in these sort of acts, but turn around and call the Water Protectors you see on TV thugs and criminals.”
The Distinguished Anchorome Series imagines DC Comics’ Indigenous characters as D&D PCs and NPCs from the Forgotten Realms “True World” setting of Anchorome, Maztica, and Lopango. See also my Marvelous Anchorome Series and soon to come Random Anchorome Series.
I’m currently working on a miniseries within a series. The In-Betweeners explores pop culture characters that don’t fit easily into an Indigenous/Non Indigenous Binary, and imagines them as small-r rangers called Borderers in Anchorome.
The Borderers of Fort Flame
DC comics doesn’t have a lot of great Indigenous characters. Some of them are so basic and uninteresting I don’t even think I can draw them (looking at you Will Power). But they do have a few characters raised by Indigenous people.
Speedy vs Swifty
In the comics Roy Harper aka Speedy is the son of a forest ranger who dies in a fire. Roy is adopted by a Dine (Navajo) Chief and raised in his community – which included traditional arts like the bow. He became Speedy, Green Arrow’s sidekick, joined the Teen Titans, got addicted to heroine, fathered a child with a villain, became a spy, became Arsenal, and eventually became Red Arrow. And a bunch more stuff after I stopped paying attention.
Human-Fighter-Battle Master
In Anchorome, the child who would become known as Swifty was orphaned when his father – a ranger for Fort Flame and secretly a Harper– was killed by a fire elemental. The ranger’s son was adopted by a Chief of the Dog People and raised among them. Eventually Swifty returned to Fort Flame, intending to take up his birth father’s mission to try to steer the Flaemish colonisers towards good and justice. Now he is a Borderer of the fort, and a master of many weapons – but also struggles with many of his own addictions.
Get to Class
I used Battle Master as a build (with archery as a fighting style, natch) because while Roy is primarily an archer, his transition to Arsenal emphasised his mastery of multiple weapons. He was even said to have learned the art of Moo Gi Gong, a branch of Hwa Rang Do – a martial art that emphasised turning any object to a weapon (probably the Tavern Brawler feat).
Folk Hero for a background gives Survival and Animal Handling, which will be useful as a small “r” Ranger.
Roy has had many costumes, many of them not good. I like this one.
Further Thoughts
White or non-Indigenous youth being raised by First Nations such as the Dine (Navajo) is a well know historical tradition. Roy Harper may be partially based on Herman Lehman, who became known as En Da, as well as Montechena. Lehman and figures like him could become valuable intermediaries (such as in the case of Pierre Radisson). Their Indigeneity is a fraught matter – as adoption and other traditions to incorporate outsiders into native nations are often controlled by non Indigenous colonisers who prefer blood quantum as a measure.
Adoptees are frequently featured in fiction and in films such as The Searchers and Little Big Man. sometimes the trope is used so that one can have a white protagonist with Indigenous cache, such as in Last of the Mohicans. Just native enough to be cool, but not so much that they’re different.
Speedy and Firehair are two sides of the same coin. Roy Harper has clearly chosen to embrace his white history while still honouring his adoptive father (Brave Bow, not his later adoptive father figure Green Arrow). Firehair seems to be a white character who chose to identify more fully with his adopted Indigenous culture. Look for Firehair to be added to this series soon.
Brave Bow is an unfortunate stereotype. He is Sioux here but later retconned to be Dine (which of course reminds us that white artists will put a headband and a feather on someone, figure that works for two peoples who speak entirely different languages and call it a day).
A D&D Adaptation of DC Comics’ Wildcat II + other Tabaxi
Yola, Sele, and a Poctecha
The Tabaxi (the felinoids) have always been known to be native to Maztica/The True World, but many have found their way to the Sword Coast and other more typical adventuring climes.
Tabaxi can be a challenge, I’ve drawn onlytwo before, but these new three were fun and easy.
Yola (Tabaxi – Monk – Way of the Living Weapon (Weretouched))
In Maztica, Yola is a Monk following the Way of the Living Weapon (Weretouched). Her fighting skills were taught to her by her godfather, and she uses them now in the service of good across the True World.
Yolanda Montez in the comics is Mexican by descent. As I have said before (e.g. Jaime Reyes), I am stretching my definition of adaptable comic characters to include some Latinx, due to the high level of mixedness in Central America. I chose not to include her bountiful red curls.
Yolanda’s hand-to-hand combat might also be represented well by the Way of the Open Hand. Her training as a boxer in modern DC might lend itself to the Gladiator background – with Acrobatics and Performance coming from a life in combat.
Sele
Next up, a loose interpretation of another DC Comics cat-themed character, Selina Kyle/Catwoman!
In Maztica, Sele began life as a successful Thief, but has dedicated herself to certain devious higher powers, becoming a Cleric of the Trickery Domain. She has begun to teach Tabaxi around Maztica her philosophy to steal only from the rich, harm no innocents, and give a portion of their gains to the poor. Although not an outright villain, Sele sees rules as a completely unnecessary encumbrance.
Selena Kyle has been identified in the comics as at least partly Cuban – so perhaps even more of a stretch than Yolanda. That’s one of the reasons I chose not to do a straight-across adaptation, but take a few more liberties.
Instead of her classic whip, I gave her a staff and a magic-using class. The recent Gotham War storyline has seen Catwoman take on a leadership role, which dovetails nicely into this interpretation as a cleric. Alongside or instead of a few levels in Rogue, you can also use the Criminal background for Stealth and Deception, as well as Thieves tools.
This Tabaxi is based on the True World traditions of the Pochteca, or merchant, (a role from Aztec history). The Pochteca was turned into a Rogue sub-class in the DM’s Guild Maztica Alive! series of sourcebooks. I have a few of these Pochteca cooked up.
The Maztica Campaign Guide describes Pochteca thusly: “The pochteca are traveling merchants of the True World. They trade their goods from one side of the continent to the other and a venerable pochteca has seen more of the True World than any other dozen folk combined.
“Pochteca are also consummate spies and are greatly valued by Revered Counselors and other rulers. Typically, a pochteca has a standing just below most nobles in Maztican society and harassing one is often punished with swift death.”
I think trade routes and travelling will form a large part of my planned True World campaign. Here is an interesting quota article that explains some of the background of massive pre Columbia. trade networks .
DC Comics doesn’t have a lot of great Indigenous characters, and many of them are incredibly shallow. Like Wenonah Littlebird, aka Owlwoman.
Wenonah (Custom Lineage – Barbarian – Path of the Eagle Totem)
InAnchorome, Wenonah is a descendant of the Aearee creator race – separate from the Aarakocra and the Kenku. She is a Warrior following the Path of the Eagle totem, abroad to represent the birdfolk…and seek her fortune.
Get to Class
Giving her flight abilities, the Eagle Totem made sense. But the Path of the Beast would also work, given the comics character’s claws.
I dislike barbarian in this context, so am using the term Warrior for that class instead.
I wanted to make an owl-based custom lineage without wings. Something like a kenku. With the Aearee in Anchorome there should be a multitude of descendants.
Joining an international group of heroes or wandering the world is sort of like being an Outlander, which provides Athletics and Survival.
Further Thoughts
In DC Comics, Owlwoman is a member of the little used Global Guardians team, and represents the U.S. in the international team. She is Tsalagi or Cherokee and her powers of flight are some sort of ill-described traditional magic. Later she is mutated to have razor sharp claws.
Perhaps echoing the Global Guardians she could be a member of an elite team of adventurers representing bird folk everywhere. She is very little developed as a character, as far as I can tell, so I can’t extrapolate too much.
Even modernised it’s not a great costume.
But the old one is even worse.
The Distinguished Anchorome Series imagines DC Comics’ Indigenous characters as D&D PCs and NPCs from the Forgotten Realms “True World” setting of Anchorome, Maztica, and Lopango. See also my Marvelous Anchorome Series and soon to come Random Anchorome Series.
I’m currently embarking on a small series for the True World that features characters who fall into spaces between a traditional Indigenous/Non binary.
I do the Marvellous and Distinguished Anchorome series for fun but I also plan on running a campaign set in the True World and always want to have a good stock of NPCs while exploring character and class options. While the colonisers will be somewhat villainous I thought I would give Fort Flame a few more nuanced and sympathetic figures. Figures based on Hawk, son of Tomahawk and Pow-wow Smith, “The Indian Lawman.”
I plan to group many of these characters into a unit of Fort Flame: The Borderers. DC’s Western Comics (a genre typically not particularly sympathetic to Indigenous perspectives) proved fruitful.
Ohiyesa vs Pow Wow
In the comics Pow-wow Smith (real name Ohiyesa) is a Sioux character and an “Indian Lawman”. It is unclear to which branch of the Sioux Nation he belongs.
Ohiyesa
Human-Rogue-Inquisitive
In Anchorome I’ve imagined him as a Rogue of the Inquisitive Archetype, a pretty good go-to for any clever detective. While the comics character is Sioux (not clear whether Lakota, Dakota, or Nakoda) I think the D&D character is Minnenewah, but has found himself living in Fort Flame in order to, like his inspiration, “learn more about the White Man’s world.” He is Lord Bakshagorn’s good right hand in the Borderers unit.
Use the City Watch background to double down for this lawman, providing Insight and Athletics.
Many Indigenous people live outside of native communities like Ohiyesa. The pull factor is often economic, but the push factors are more often related to Colonial pressures that have devastated Indigenous communities (this is not to say that traditional communities aren’t treasured places to live and visit where traditions are upheld).
Earliest stories were set in the present but later ones instead set in the Old West.
In this sense it is interesting to contrast Ohiyesa with Sully (from Avatar), a White Saviour who has moved into a native community. Unfortunately Sully seems to fetishise and dominate his adopted community, through the power of his whiteness.
A lot of my Ohiyesa’s costume was based on Woodchuck from Record of Lodoss War, one of the great thief outfits. The Lawman himself is not one of my favourite DC designs. Pretty basic and boring. But then in this era artists had to churn stories out and colouring techniques were not advanced.
Yawn. Mono colour. This might be Herb Trimpe? Not his fault.
Hawk vs Hawk
Hawk (Son of Tomahawk) was the star of spinoff stories in a comic that featured his dad, Tomahawk, fighting the a British during the American Revolution. Hawk’s spin-off was more purely a Western, made more interesting by his mixed descent.
Hawk
Human-Ranger-HunterConclave
In Anchorome…I’ve made him a young Ranger of the Hunter Conclave. (I have tried to avoid this class/sub-class combination in Anchorome because it can be too easy and too stereotypical a choice but Hawk was never that well developed in his own comic anyway. ) the son of a famous Flaemish explorer and his Minnenewah wife, Hawk struggles to balance the two sides of his heritage and live up to his father’s reputation.
He’s more the son of a Folk Hero than one himself, but getting Animal Handling and Survival isn’t a bad idea.
Hawk is a stellar example of the common occurrence of mixed-blood (or mixed descent) inhabitants of the West. In my home country, and in my ancestry, this helped result in the creation of the Metis Nation. But not all mixed people are Métis (I’m not) and Hawk sometimes struggled with his identity. Interestingly his younger brother identifies as fully First Nations/Indian (it is not clear as far as I know from which Nation Hawk descends).
From Son of Tomahawk #133, DC Comics
In this sense Hawk is interesting to compare with Chavez y Chavez (from the Young Guns in film) and Aragorn (from Ralph Bakshi’s lord of the Rings film). Each are pop culture characters of mixed descent who have responded in different ways in regards to their identity. Both are in the pipeline for Random Anchorome!
I was a bit worried about adapting Hawk as his outfit is very 1970s, but I think it worked alright. He might have some mail beneath that shirt, but it is a bit hard to sneak armour in for some of these guys.
So 70s and so Kubert
DC has more Western Comics to choose from than Marvel, and seems to me to have more Indigenous Western characters – but Marvel still generally gets the edge in having more complex and less stereotypical Indigenous characters. Whether that holds up as we continue to explore remains to be seen.
The Flaemish Borderers will continue to be a place where I explore characters who are in both and neither Indigenous and Coloniser.
The Borderers of Fort Flame
The Distinguished Anchorome Series parallels my Marvelous Anchorome Series in that it will imagine various North American Indigenous characters from DC comics as D&D characters for the Forgotten Realms Anchorome and Maztica settings.
You guys one of the things that made me so happy in my long delayed adaptation of Indigenous DC Comics characters was the chance to do Jaime Reyes, the Latinx Blue Beetle.
Dootł’izh (Human-Artificer-Armourer Specialist)
Jaime Reyes is the third character (and, ahem, the most interesting) to assume the mantle of the Blue Beetle. His introduction in 2006 retconned the beetle scarab as an extraterrestrial armour.
InAnchorome, Dootł’izh (a Navajo word for turquoise or blue, I understand) is an Artificer (Armourer Specialist). This Azuposi is an ambassador to the Land of the Insect Men, an area in Anchorome governed by Thri-Kreen and other Insect-related folk. From them he learned to use chitin to create magical armour with a variety of powers. Now he is widely known as the Warrior of the Turquoise Beetle, and a great champion of the Long Canyon.
Get to Class
I’ve mentioned before that I’m not really always sure I “get” Artificers (probably because I prefer high and low fantasy and they always seem so steampunk/sci-fi), but I really got excited about the idea that Reyes used insect chitin for his infusions.
The Thri-Kreen and the Land of the Insect Men is canon, I believe, from the original Anchoromean City of Gold module, but of course Jon Hild has expanded this slightly in his Anchorome Campaign Guide on DM’s Guild.
Folk Hero background would give Animal Handling and Survival. Courtier would give Insight and Persuasion if you wanted to lean harder into the Ambassador role.
Further Thoughts
There was some really good beetle armour art online that I used as inspiration for this picture. I would love to give the author credit, but I can’t seem to find the original. Grah! I will update this as soon as I rediscover it.
Dootł’izh (Human-Artificer-Armourer Specialist)
The Distinguished Anchorome Series imagines DC Comics’ Indigenous characters as D&D PCs and NPCs from the Forgotten Realms “True World” setting of Anchorome, Maztica, and Lopango. See also my Marvelous Anchorome Series and soon to come Random Anchorome Series.
A D&D Adaptation of DC Comics’ Aztek (Nayela Constant)
Nayeli (Human-Paladin-Oath of the Jaguar Knight)
Working my way through Indigenous DC Comics characters and reflecting that I had not drawn enough Jaguar Knights, I was pleased to come across the newer character of Nayela Constant, or Aztek.
In Maztica, My Nayeli is a Paladin (Oath of the Jaguar Knight), as described in the Maztica Alive guide available from DM’s Guild. A Paladin to a dark god, she nonetheless champions her homeland and fights against greater evils.
I think very highly of Grant Morrison, but writing a generic white dude (or at least a not specifically Indigenous dude) as (the first) character named Aztek and wrapping it in Aztec myths is not super sensitive to the fact that Indigenous religions, myths, and stories have been plundered by white people for hundreds of years with no compensation or relationship with the peoples themselves.
I am partly guilty of this myself, as I think is the estimable Jon Hild, who has authored many of the DM’s Guild True World titles. I have consulted with numerous Indigenous people as part of this project, but I fully admit that I have not done enough.
A new version of the Aztek character appeared in the late 2010s as a supporting character. Nayeli Constant let me draw a woman, a Jaguar Knight, and an Indigenous DC character.
The new Aztek
Aztek’s “fourth dimensional” helmet and accompanying powers (so Grant Morrison), and her connection to the Fourth World make Paladin a no-brained.
The Distinguished Anchorome Series imagines DC Comics’ Indigenous characters as D&D PCs and NPCs from the Forgotten Realms “True World” setting of Anchorome, Maztica, and Lopango. See also my Marvelous Anchorome Series and soon to come Random Anchorome Series.
The second in my Distinguished Anchorome series, in which I add Indigenous DC Comics series to the D&D/Forgotten Realms setting of the True World! And the first from Lopango (not Anchorome at all, really!), the South America inspired Indigenous continent south of Maztica.
This is DC comics Peruvian wizard, Extrano.
Human – Wizard – School of the Plumacaster
In Lopango, Ekekko is a Wizard (of the Plumacaster School) with a love of life and gentle nature that makes him a mentor to many heroes in the True World. His mixed descent from Faerunians and Indigenous Naticans let him deal with both worlds comfortably, though he principally resides in the Natican city of Apu Roca.
Get to Class
The Plumacaster Wizard School was introduced in the Maztica Alive! books on DM’s guild but I see no reason not to stretch magical and class traditions across the entirety of the True World (which comprises Anchorome, Maztica, and Lopango). School of Illusion would probably fit too.
I would want Insight and Persuasion, and the Courtier background will provide.
Source Material
In the comics, Gregorio De la Vega, or Extrano, is a rather famous and infamous character who is often said to be the first gay character in mainstream superhero comics. Extrano has recently made a return to comics in a much more toned down costume (and in a much more comfortable place with his identity)…
…but when he first appeared he was much more flamboyantly dressed, used feminine pronouns occasionally, and had problems with self-hatred.
He was also in a very poorly written and poorly received comic, The New Guardians.
Further Thoughts
It’s a bit too bad about the redesign, even if it does look quite good. It’s just very heteronormative.
Sex, gender, orientation, and gender performance are a cauldron of spectrums. They have been interpreted in different ways throughout time and throughout geography – contrary to some modern thought. Many Indigenous cultures in North America have Two-Spirit traditions, which is not the same as “Gay” or the same as “Trans” either. It is a cultural expression of Queerness. Another term is Indigiqueer. Not all nations have Two-Spirit traditions or have places for them, and like most everything, it is a rainbow spectrum. I don’t know much about historical Peruvian queerness (Extrano is Peruvian).
The DC comics redesign makes his queerness, at least visually, centred in orientation and not in gender expressions. It makes him more clearly Cis, and thus seems to avoid some diversity. Then again, the original Extrano was not popular and the writer of his new appearances is Queer himself (whereas I am not), so I am happy to give them the benefit of the doubt. But in my Lopango, I sort of like the idea of Ekekko not conforming to Faerunian ideas of gender or sexuality either.
I should be clear that Extrano never identified as Indigenous either. I have placed him in this context on my own cognisance. In Anchorome he may be mixed as well, as indicated by his facial hair
Lopango, the Land of Fire, is a continent I have been exploring in my drawings and I am excited to upload them. Lopango is canon, but the inimitable Jon Hild has added Lopango resources to his Maztica Alive and Anchorome projects. In addition to humans inspired by the Inca and other Indigenous peoples, it houses Supay Gnomes who worship death, Sorcerous Orc invaders, original Lizardfolk subspecies, Drow, and even degenerate barbarian Illithids!
Ekekko (Human-Wizard-School of the Plumacaster)
The Distinguished Anchorome Series parallels my Marvelous Anchorome Series in that it will imagine various North American Indigenous characters from comics as D&D characters for the Forgotten Realms Anchorome, Maztica, and Lopango settings.
HyperboreanComics 