Murlynd
| Game background | |
|---|---|
| Title(s) | The White Paladin |
| Home plane | Special, see below |
| Power level | Hero-deity |
| Alignment | Lawful Good |
| Portfolio | Magical technology |
| Domains | Good, Knowledge, Law |
| Superior | Heironeous |
| Design details | |
In the fictional World of Greyhawk campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy roleplaying game, Murlynd is a minor deity. He began as a player character created by Gary Gygax's closest friend Don Kaye in 1972 for the second-ever session of the game that would become D&D. Kaye continued to play Murlynd in Gygax's nascent Greyhawk campaign, developing him as a crossover between swords & sorcery D&D and the Wild West. After Kaye's unexpected death in 1975, Gygax subsequently created a tribute to his friend by highlighting Murlynd as one of the unique characters of the world of Greyhawk. In later editions of D&D, Murlynd was elevated to deityhood, becoming the Oeridian god of Magical Technology.
Gary Gygax's childhood friend Don Kaye created Murlynd for the second-ever session of Gygax's Greyhawk campaign in 1972, rolled up on Gygax's kitchen table at the same time as Rob Kuntz's Robilar and Terry Kuntz's Terik. Gygax later recalled that "Murlynd" was the first attempt by a player to make a creative name for a character; in the early days, most players—including Gygax himself—simply used their own name as a basis for their character's name. (Tenser = Ernest, Yrag = Gary, etc.) Don Kaye was a fan of the Western genre, and at one point during the early days of the Greyhawk campaign, Gygax had Murlynd transported to an alternate universe set in the Wild West. When Murlynd was eventually transported back the Greyhawk setting, he sported the Stetson, cowboy boots, Colt revolvers and stereotypical outfit of a cowboy. Although Gygax did not allow the use of gunpowder in his Greyhawk setting, he made a loophole for Kaye by ruling that Murlynd actually carried two "magical wands" that made loud noises and delivered small but deadly missiles. (Many years later, Gygax created a similar item called "Kaydon's Thunderous Bolters" for the Lejendary Adventures role-playing system. Gygax made it clear that these items fired their six charges using magic, not gunpowder.)
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