One of my favorite NPC Kenkus that my friend made was a bartender named Remus. He was raised by the previous owner of the bar and was taught everything he knew, including speech. "How may I help you?" "May I know your name?" "Please phrase that shorter so I may respond properly, please." That last one got used quite a bit, and he was incredibly snarky and sarcastic.
Kiri was made to be used by a talented voice actor who can not only mimic but REMEMBER every piece of spoken dialogue at the table. He nailed that NPC perfectly.
There is a gang of kenku in my campaign called “The Flock” they like hiding in alleys and try to hide behind their feathers. When you get in their territory instead of engaging, they make shout-out type sounds to scare people off.
I played one briefly for a oneshot, and when "i" spoke, not only did i use a load of different voices I also said what gender, age and race it sounded like.
My Kenku Goodwin is a druid who sneaks into people's dreams to learn about the world. If the person starts to have a nightmare he replaces it with a dream of flying, cause what could be nicer. Great video btw! Going to share with my group as we all love these kind of breakdowns and the art is such a cool, and talented bonus!
Thank you Seth, I'm glad you enjoyed the video I really like your Kenku Idea if you'd like to use the final image for your character sheet let me know you can find it on my art station.
With my Kenku, Flutter, I use his Mimicry to slowly leak out verbal pieces of his past and let the other players piece them together throughout the campaign. Things like: (young human girl): "Have you ever caught a butterfly?", "I think I'll call you... Flutter!", "No, leave him alone!" (gruff human man): "Get away from her you fucking bird!", "Kailey, back away from it!", "No... you made this happen! This is YOUR fault!" Flutter has a childlike innocence regarding death, and has a mental need to capture every butterfly he sees. No exceptions. Once he gets the butterfly, he stores it in his mouth. Whenever he talks, the butterfly will flutter out and he must then recapture it. At the end of every day, he buries whatever accumulated butterflies underneath his bed, wherever that may be. If he finds himself sleeping where he cannot bury the butterflies, he sleeps elsewhere.
@@Rookzer0 - they thought it was super goofy at first, and laughed at this bird person asking them in a child's voice about catching butterflies and all that, and everyone enjoyed laughing at the cute, weird bird. But once more pre-learned backstory voicelines started coming out, and they started piecing together the full story.. Eventually they worked out the truth, that he was himself very young and he lived with his and other Kenku families locked away in the tower of an old church being used to copy and mass produce old religious texts by a human, in exchange for safety from persecution of the rest of the city. Being young, he would slip out, where he eventually found a young (6-8years) human girl who became his best friend. She taught him how to catch butterflies, and she named him Flutter. Eventually her father found out that a Kenku had been wandering about with his daughter, and he gathered up a group of other men to "rescue" her. Flutter and Kailey were eventually caught, and the father tried to kill the bird with a hand crossbow. Kailey interfered, and the bolt struck her, killing her as Flutter ran. He retreated underground to an old cemetery, where he was contacted in his grief by an entity from the Shadowfell, who taught him a jaded perspective of death and granted him powers (homebrewed Umbra class found online). The party found him in that cemetery, as they heard a disembodied voice from the shadows. "Have you ever caught a butterfly?"
Really nice work for background. It's creepy enough to not want to find out about in game but interesting enough that my character would have to start digging! Really nice work!
Talk to your dm about it. :) I love doing voices and making up unique characters but its tough for some and can take some time. For kenku even more so. Until you find a means of playing it the way you like, try relying on your rolls. "I would like to convay that im really unhappy with whats going on, i make a bunch of pinball machine noises" "In my best clint eastwood impression i say do you feel lucky?" Then roll performance for them and see what happens. :) it can be a lot of fun to see where the dice take you.
I find learning new voices comes from watching TV and UA-cam especially cartoons, and kids movies, voices I like to imatate and quote come from things like teenage mutant ninja turtles, asdf movie, teen titans Go, Lego movies, and pop culture, just watch them, learn and quote them, then apply their voices I have around 60 voices now from that!
I'm like a few months late but, I have problems too when It comes to the mimicry i use a soundboard to record things that my friends say and re-say it, if you dont want to buy a soundboard. I believe in you my friend
I wanna play a paladin. But my faith in Bahamut and sword fighting is not that good. Just try. You will end up having lots of fun. And if you find out kenkus are not you things homebrew something you want.
My Kenku is named Bell. She lives in the attic of Waterdeep Theater and she learned to speak through watching the performances. So she basically speaks in movie quotes. I made her a Swashbuckler-Bard because her favorite play is Waterdeep's version of The Princess Bride. When our party found her she was so excited to have someone to play with she grabbed her prop rapier and said, "I am Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die." She's absolutely my favorite character I've ever made.
I have a Kenku bard nicknamed Dead Lute. He's carrying around a broken nonfunctional but pretty decorated lute and can not play any instrument, instead he makes music using mimicry. I'm new to dnd and actually really like my Kenku because when I don't know how to improvise something, I just resort to playing a melody or eerie sound instead, lol.
@@Rookzer0 The party know about this, the lute looks really devastated and some strings hang down with decorations tailored into them. He can not play a real lute but he has difficulties making music without holding his lute (part of "the ritual" for him). He's also sometimes tipping his fingers on the lute amateurishly when making music, though it's very obvious that's not doing anything.
It breaks my heart that people don't have have the love this race deserves. My favorite character I've played is my kenku, Sparkle. She's a rogue/Bard that nested in the town's thieves guild and they taught her to steal stuff, but she has no concept of value. Thieves Guild was raid by authorities and she managed to escape, running into the forest, where who happened upon a Goliath wizard, and she decided his cloak hood was her new nest and just refuses to leave. To play her, I keep a journal dedicated to her vocabulary, and write down anything useful players have said and carry it over to any other games she may come to. She is mostly nonverbal as she's meant to be very unintelligent, but I love using Vicious Mockery with insults that were clearly meant for her at some point, and seeing other player's reactions to my silly little bird.
My first character in dnd was a human wizard who got his soul trapped in a Kenku and so whatever he think the Kenku can say but the disadvantage is that If I do something that the Kenku dose not want to do I have to roll to fight for control to do that action so it's a pretty fun character to interact with and so far no one in my group knows why the Kenku can talk in full sentences so that will be a fun surprise soon.
That could be really fun. Would you try to translate for your partu with a note book or maybr big cardboard signs? Or would you hide the fact that you understand?
@@Rookzer0 Probably try and translate through _very_ broken common, I already have a character that I'm using but this one's just in case they die somehow
My Kenku is a half-Kenku with the name Riki Haddonfield. Using the human creativity they’re able to cobble sentences together without too much issue. They do however lose their perfect mimicry for this because their vocal chords are unable to reach some of the ranges needed for the imitation. (I do still get advantage on some deception rolls if the voice is within range) (I can try and explain it better if needed) They’re a NG sorlock (Raven Queen and Divine Soul) and they love collecting shiny things and bones. I love them.
I ounce played a kenku named Forge. He was a blacksmith who forge simple items like horseshoes, pots, and pans, but forge was a monk trained to use ki and martial arts I honestly loved playing forge. Forge almost became a vampire later cured by the dark god Talos. Forge actually went against talos after being cured. A small army of 100 talos worshippers would attack the town forge live in. We ofcourse won the battle leaving only 7 survivors who would later become allies. Forge would Also be bite by a werewolf becoming a wereraven and that would actually cure Forge of the kenku curse. He could talk normally again and fly too. I play as forge for quite some time but oh poor forge. Halfway through the campaign forge would die to the hands of one of the main villains of the campaign Doomblade. We all cried when Forge died.
I'm trying to build a character concept for a kenku bc I love the race, and I'm starting with what I can mimic to build them I'm ADHD and I have an echo stim, so I'm very good at mimicry. I can't really do voices well without practice, but sounds are where I shine One kind of sounds I love making (and am very good at) is wind noises, like a gentle breeze or a raging storm. I love the idea of this kenku defaulting to wind sounds when words fail them, their equivalent of humming being a faint breeze. Randomly interspersed with the occasional meow (pet cat + echo stim = meowing kid) My working name for this kenku is Wind, but I think it'd be really funny to let my fellow party members name them. They just refuse to give a name and will go by whatever the party decides, I find that hilarious I started thinking about kenkus again bc this DnD podcast I like called Just Roll With It (JRWI) had a kenku NPC in some of their recent episodes. The first thing one of the PCs did upon seeing her was start yelling "Bird! Bird!" to get her attention, she started mimicking him, and the players dubbed her Bird Bird (the DM mentioned her actual name while describing something and one of the players said "no she's Bird Bird now"). One of them immediately got unreasonably attached and started risking his life to help her (she was essentially being kidnapped) and went down 3 times during combat and rolled a few death saves. The party came very close to dying trying to help Bird Bird, but they succeeded in the end (at one point there was a 10 foot tall kenku and a 20 foot tall paladin bc silly ability + two silly magic items)
Sounds like you got them pretty well figured out. I'd suggest going with and eloquence bard if you really want to focus on the mimicry and use it to buff the party. Might have to get the ok from your dm but sounds like a good time
@@Rookzer0 I was thinking about bard, eloquence does seem like a good subclass if I want to fully lean into mimicry. I don't have a campaign in mind for this character yet (I just love making characters in my spare time) but I'd definitely get the dm ok before bringing a character like this to the table
I'm actually running a Kenku right now in one of the campaigns I'm in. Artificer/Alchemist. Learned what he knew by reverse-engineering an alchemist's tools, which he stole alongside his group/family (murder? conspiracy? yeah conspiracy sounds good). Used that knowledge to become a con artist, and the money to get more alchemist supplies. Started using a plague doctor mask to hide that he's a kenku long enough to scam the hell out of someone. Got seperated from his group and trapped in an extradimensional bubble. This bubble took the form of a bar with a TV that constantly reran Star Wars. That's how I did my mimicry, exclusively star wars quotes. I've had a lot of fun with him so far, and it's been a blast seeing my group pick up on the little star wars references.
@@Rookzer0 The quotes were mostly for a starting vocabulary so we didn't have to debate what i would and wouldn't know but my party liked it so much i stuck with it
@@BBQPringlesEnjoyer really great work, keep it up. I might have to draw this guy eventually. I like the idea of a kenku with a stormtrooper plague mast :D
@@Rookzer0 I'm honored. I never considered a stormtrooper mask. I might have to go on Heroforge and play with the coloring. If you ever do decide to draw them, I could give you the character sheet link and a mini i made in Heroforge for fun.
This piece and Kiri from CR were actually some of the things that inspired me to create my Kenku Warlock named Shimshek! I'm also an artist and I was trying to figure out how to draw a "not creepy/realistic" Kenku and I loved the art style for this that this became one of the pieces on my mood board for when I finally decided to draw her! Shimshek is a Hexblade Warlock that grew up in an orphanage and is looking for her family. She's actually from a family that not necessarily worships but kind of protects and willingly serves an eternal entity names Kaepora, who is so old that he does not know if he is a god and does not remember where he came from. A sign that she is from this family is the patch of silver/white feathers on the top of her head. Kaepora only asks that Shimshek collects items to be sent to him, as he likes collecting things and learning about the world. He has asked her to read a smutty book, which he admitted was an awful read afterwards. When he requests that she send an item over to his plane of existance, she uses a crystal around her neck which also acts as her focus. If needed, she can also ask him for items that may help her on her journey to find her family. Currently, she is on the run from assassins sent by another Kenku who believes that she stole their heirloom/birthright (the crystal/connection to Kaepora and the powers that come with it).
I have a kenku character concept that I'm working on. He used to b an assistant to a half elf artificer who leaves him his book of inventions after they part ways. One day, he find an incomplete schematics for a back mounted levitation device. Seeing it as an opportunity to gain flight, he embarks on an adventure to complete the blueprints and build the device.
I have a level 2 paladin Kenku called shoow (sh-ooo-ow) I had my first game just yesterday their favorite word is Dep-Dep. It's the beginning of Deputy said twice. Also they hop when nervous. Instead of walking they do that little hop birds can do.
I've had this idea to play a kenku bard for forever and he communicates only through musical songs, his story was that he was picked up by a traveling circus and started to remember the songs and learned to play domen instruments, i have a whole playlist of musical songs that I pick our specific parts of that I can stitch together into proper responses, I don't know if this would actually work in the game as I've never actually played a game 👉👈 but I would love to just have a ukelele and play constant backround music for the rest of the party
I know it's kind of out of date to post this now, and this may sound weird, but in an online campaign (thanks, Covid!) my kenku would use each game session to note down everything that was spoken during the campaign, and at the end of those sessions, would choose 5 emoticons from a huge Unicode listing that she will have learned, based on her interactions with the characters. All her communications were using combinations of emoticons to simulate her relatively crude ability to piece complex thoughts together, and the other players absolutely loved the idea. After a while, she was capable of assembling semi-complex phrases using lines of said emotes. "🤲🐦🍺💯👌?" :D (Easy bonus points for figuring that one out) :) Not the best method for a live game, but on Roll20 it was perfect. ;) I only learned of Critical Role a few months back. Loved Kiri, loved Spurt. In the 80s when I played a lot more we never had DMs that let you actually enjoy the act of playing the game. :D
Sounds like your having a great time now! I'm glad you found a good group of people to play with. My attept at the emotes would be. "Give me another drink, im fine"
Hm, a Kenku barbarian sound kind of fun. Usually people play the dumb barbarians so their speach is limited, with this race it would be both similar and different. And a raging bird... Shrieking with ferocity...
Well if you're someone, like me, who doesn't like doing voices you only have to say one word every now and then and kenku I feel should have a natural bounus to intimidation, those things Are scary as hell lol.
That's a really good point. I have had a few friends really get into kenku/Tengu and none of them like doing voices so you may be on to something. I would be fine giving a character bonuses to intimidation but I would limit it to only non verbal intimidation ::blank stare:: "WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME" ::Blank Stare intensifies" "OK OK OK I DID IT" :D Great idea.
I am a person who doesn't speak much, my friends made a few jokes about it "You would be great drug dealer, you would just put drugs on table sit down and watch person in silence until they buy it"
Kenku is probably my second favorite race. I like bird people, the Ararcocra are also really cool, however flying can be a bit much. I really like the cursed lore of the Kenku. The speech thing is an interesting dynamic that most dont handle well, for good reason as it would be difficult to speak through sounds and voices you've heard.
I started playing Kenku yesterday with some mistakes, good things that my DM was forgiving and askes to give it another read because I didn't get some points, like talking normally with mixing common and crow gibberish
The solution my group is using for the lack of speaking is we're all accidentally (I swear) rogues or multiclassed into rogues. Because Thieves' Cant can be gestures and mouth sounds.
@@Rookzer0 Our party comp had to change sadly due to nobody having healing abilities except the Swashbuckler eventually multiclassing into Bard, so now I'm a Kalashtar Paladin/Sorcerer.
Her name is Maggie. She's about eight. She likes to eat bugs, steal shinies, and she can't read. The rest of the party are gruff guys who are an awful influence on her.
Thanks for this vid, I wanted to tell u I'm thinking of playing an albino kenku who is being hunted by poachers for money, the character is a bard who has spent enough time in social situations to the point where they have the equivalent of bumblebees voice from transformers, where they essentially speak TV, and the character fits my playstyle well, going to learn some Shakespearian insults for vicious mockery.
I've been thinking of making a Kenku wizard who was taught magic verbally by a kind Tortle wizard, so the main words she uses to communicate are spell names and elemental effects. For instance, if shes excited, she would hop around and say "Lightning! Lightning!" or if shes mad she would glare and cross her arms while muttering "Fireball, Fireball." She would also eventually get more words as the campaign would go on from the other players, so she could call for the healer during bad situations and such.
We've got a kenku ranger who slays monsters for glory and named his horse after the first noise it made in his presence. He has moments when he's surprisingly articulate, now that he's been traveling with our group for some weeks, but mostly still communicates by the use of sound effects and pidgin-common. I.e. "MONSTER YES! *THNK" means "I think we should go right now and slay that monster by the means of beheading." The bard, who's traveled with the kenku for longer than us, interprets for him when the rest of the party doesn't understand. Also the character has zero sense of shame nor social anxiety, a puzzling side-effect of which is that so far he's had more luck with women than the rest of the party combined, as he dishes out heartfelt flattery without second-guessing. I've taken to keeping a tab open with some official kenku concept art to remind myself that he looks creepy not like a cute bundle of feathers.
@@Rookzer0 I don't think it's a real term yet but we could make it one. And it would indeed be funny - perhaps I'll put that thought aside for a future character. That particular kenku lost the chance to be nothing but a cute bundle of feathers the moment it started pecking dead bodies. :D
I have developed a strategy to make my kenku talk: he listen to as much people he can and then he puts some of the words he learnt before together to create phrases with sense
My Kenku, Iroc, was a homeless vagrant living on the streets of Baldur's gate as a street vendor selling little trinkets he made from found objects. His forgery skills led him to discover the ability to write magic runes. The DM and I homebrewed a runecaster class where he functions like a wizard, but his spells are non-verbal and after each rest he prepares his runes which can be affixed to objects. He sometimes even "loans" one of his spells out by drawing a rune onto one of the other party member's armor which they can activate with a swipe. He "speaks" in a hodge podge of street hawker phrases "You, sir. I'll give you best deal!" mixed with movie quotes which we RP as things he might have overheard living in BG "You know what you look like to me with your good bag and your cheap shoes? You look like a rube." Incidentally, his name, Iroc, came out of confusion when someone asked him "what are you?" and he tried to make a joke "I...Roc" (like the giant bird).
Very cool idea. I love the rune crafting idea storing spells in items and alike are something they started doing with the artificer again but I miss the tattoos and alike from 3.5 and pathfinder.
I’m a very new player. I’ve made three other PCs, but I’m still running through my first campaign with my first ever character, Xassoo. He’s a kenku, now level 5 bard/warlock, and my gosh is he a joy to play. He’s 4 feet tall, snarky, impulsive, and theatric, has some pretty fun back and forth with his patron (who is Asmodeus, it’s a long story that involves a plate in a filing cabinet opening a rift to Hell), and just generally fun to play as. Even with having made a few characters of other races (elf, half elf, tiefling, and a half aarakocra half kenku) kenku are by far my favorites. The mimicry is fun to play with, they have a built in adventuring motivation, and they’re crows. Even if you play with the lack of imagination they’re still a great race and I love them.
Actually, meeting his patron and signing the contract happened within the first and second sessions respectively! It was never intended as something to happen, but it’s been really entertaining to see. As for the back and forth, Asmodeus is usually the one to initiate it, but even when Xassoo does, he’s not too annoyed. Sure he’ll make quips and such, some poking fun at Xas or the party, but he seems to enjoy them. In our campaign Hell is just a giant office and Asmodeus is the CEO, so that’s the kinda relationship that they have. As for a theme with the Eldritch blast, it’s fire as one might expect from a fiend warlock!
I created a storm sorcerer kenku who uses mold earth to write in the dirt. I named him Jacques which happens to sound like shock :) one time in battle he melted a guy with a critical chaos bolt. His catchphrase is "i am a good bird", mimicking a woman from his past whom helped him build a vocabulary of phrases.
I recently came up with a Kenku rogue with the Urchin background, but that found shelter in the crawlspaces and attics of a mansioned aristocrat, and thus learned a good number of haughty taughty phrases which he repeats when fitting
For my Kenku I decided to have him talk in broken English, mostly because I have the memory of a sieve and would forget most phrases that I hear. It still confuses people sometimes, even myself
CastroOfTheVault I had a human character from a isolated tribe, he spoke proven English and that led to many interesting things. He later became a patron that dealt with gunslinging and enchanting. He was a gunslinger artificer
As one who has played since thac0, one of my favorite characters played was a Kenku cleric. Ikati, or as people called him, Tik, as he had a habit to mimic the clockwork amulet he carried.
I recently played a Kenku artificer who made a forgery of a magical artifact. Gave it to the bard in the party who used charisma to convince a powerful NPC to hand over the quest item as a trade.
@@Rookzer0 A little exasperated? Apparently he had planned this big battle, but he applauded us for thinking outside the box. I was later told he hadn't expected me to use the forgery like that.
I’m a DM who has a kenku NPC named Iffit. She was in an illegal freak show. After the party frees her she’ll say things like “Only if it works!” “I’m fine…” “You’re a freak.” And she often repeats the last word of people’s sentences to convey understanding.
i've did a Tengu vigilante in my curent pathfinder game, and my DM love it basicaly, when level 2, my party got attacked by a group of 20 bandit tengus, i saw that from far distance so to save them (with another character) i used all my armor and metallic stuff + my warning horn to mimic the approching of an army, i got a nat 20 in bluff, so they all got scared, when my party was just like "oh it was nothing let's go sleep" i just follow their path and plan to burn the tengus camp but i got seen by one ... (i regret it a bit for his suffering) but i broke the tengu's beak with a strengh roll, he screamed, they all look at me, i rolled intimidation, got nat 20 again, i've said nothing, just stared at them while slowy walking at them and just say "run", they all run into the forest, so i've looted their camp, 1000 gold coin in a chess plus all their weapon, not bad, but what i see ?, the young tengu that one of my team mates knock-out earlier, i wake im up and told im that all his friends abandonned him, so that's is only option is to follow me, 18 + 6 on bluff he believed me,so asked him "what's your name ?", he respond "Flapette" ... the next day, when my character was walking a bit behing the group, and Flapette with all the rest of the party, the tengus group tried to sneak on me, got another nat 20, so i've sneaked behind them and said "didn't i told you to flee" the bravest of them, oubliously scared said " We want our friend back ...", intimidate them again, (sorry for their friend btw, i know it's cruel but ... eh, wanted a companion) ... several weeks in game passed we reach average level 6 and the DM accorded us to create another character, Flapette proved his inhability to fight properly so, he became my butler, so i've decided that he deserve more than that ... he became a vigilante, he's a total badass, like he fight with distance weapon, he have boomerangs as primary weapon, the DM make me found a riffle (upgraded musket) so i "taped" a spyglass and a makeshift supressor made of tin can on it to have a sniper, he also wear a flexible full plate armor plus his cape outfit, because of his beak he need a Churburg style helmet, his gauntlet have one hand-held crossbow each taped on it, his only melee weapon his a adamantium crowbar (i pick that for a bad pun, tengus are basicaly crows, so crow - bar, hehehe get it ). So yeah ... the first quest he had to be in was to found some information and investigate about a new cult in town, so basicaly the party seen Flapette only 15 minutes in-game for 8h of in-game time, someone tried to know my real identity, when he was looking where i changed disguise, i just jump off the roof with my grapple behind him ... so, we've need to colect information in the poors neighborhoods, 3 in the town, docks, where everybodys goes, prostitues places, nobody goes there, and finaly, the laborer ghetto, where i got lonely, i collect information to a kid to know who i need to see for 5 gold, he told me to go see François, the ruler of the place, so i've spoted his manshion in the neighborhood, it had 2 access, the principal one with 2 guards, and a small alleyway behing it, i look it, 4 guards, i placed some gun-powder into a trash pile on the floor, used a long wick, burn it, go accost myself on the other side of the alley but not in it, the mess exploded, 3 guards run to see what happened, when they come out the alleway, i enter in it and give 15 gold to the last guard to let me in to see the boss, what he does, upstairs, in lonely with the mafia boss than can literaly kill me when he want, but because i did an incredible roleplay, i got all my information, and goes to the cult place 4 in-games hour before the rest of the party. ps: sorry if my english is bad, my primary language is french re-ps : it took me 30 minutes to write
Very cool story, I like the idea of a boomerang vigilante. It sounds like you have a pretty good DM. That is great RP and lucky rolls. Merci pour l'histoire!
This was kinda funny to me- but my dad runs a game with me, my cousin & brother, a guy names Gage, Baxter, and Lyyssa. (all 11-14), we were getting slamemd by a dragon, and my character (A paladin) uses "Channel Divinity" or something like that, and the white dragon fails the wisdom throw, and the wall behind it was gone, so it went barreling down the side of a mountain and died.
would love to see you talk and create art about doppelgangers or their PC race changelings as I always find their deceptive shape changing tactics interesting Oni are another creature that have the same type of cunning disguise ability, such as a certain villain in critical role
Literally just made a Rogue Arcane Trickster Kenku name Zneaky he has a chalkboard that he wears like a necklace that he uses to communicate with the rest of the party
I'm currently playing in a campaign as a Kanku phantom rogue. She was found by an assassin on his way back from a mission she was bloodied and could not remember who she was or where she came from he took her in and raised her to be an assassin like him one day he goes missing and she tries to find him she spend 6 months out and about trying to locate him and that's when she meets the party that that she's with now and one of her companions is terrified of birds so she has a big issue with my character at least for a while before she considers her to be not a threat. I started her out not being able to say very many things because she was sheltered and only had one person to learn a language from so also she did learn an additional language which was draconic because of a ghost that hung around her eventually I figured she could learn a lot of different words and languages from the different ghosts that hang around her. Currently she's having a major issue with ghosts following her around and hurting her in her party she does not take kindly to anyone hurting her friends and she goes into a cold-hearted assassin mode when someone does hurt her friends. But for the most part she's practically has the mentality of a child. I named her Nightingale.
I'm currently playing a kenku druid. He's a toddler with a skunk animal companion. I asked my dm if I can roll sleight of hand checks to try to help explain what I'm saying. He agreed, the dm is my boyfriend so he has seen me talk with my hands to his grandmother who doesn't speak English and it works. My character can also do shadow puppet shows
Nobody ever remembers the 3rd part of the Kenku curse which is that they are incapable of invention. It's kind of the counterpoint to their imitation of physical acts such as forgery.
My Kenku is an albino female rouge. In her flock albinism is thought to be cursed and bring bad omens for those around them. She is a child like character in nature who prefers shiny objects over gold. She can write in common and elvish but prefer to communicate with her mimicry trait. She speaks through multiple voices when pulling together broken sentences. When she introduces herself she mimics the sound of the instrument she is named after Erhu. The only one she can talk to in her own voice in a figure of power the raven because it speaks Auran I named him lute and use him to scout ahead of us in the air.
I’m now a Kenku/Tengu Cleric Of Trickery . (Based a lot on NorthWest Coast First Person Tales) Mocking my enemies and throwing a monkey wrench in to the works. With high stealth and mimicry (forging/coping documents& items. When I’m around you never know what’s real or a facsimile. (With a “the little drunken master” tossed in) (speaking mostly short sound bites of 80’s & 90s song lyrics) -I am the walking embodiment of my Chaos God.
@@Rookzer0 yeah, they definitely are! I’m excited to play her though since I’m at that odd point where I don’t really have D&d friends, I’m a bit shy, but I love D&D so I make a bunch of characters even though I’ve never played them yet xD
Im im a long campaign playing a kenku, I love playing them, I have a dictionary of the frases my character knows. They became frequent frases in our friend group. I built the character on comedic miscommunication, my kenku knows lots of languages, is the only in the party who has identify. They are an artificer a d they loove to rant about inventions, noone understands them. And since most of their vocabulary came from children in the backstory, the party is still under the impression that they are a child, it also help that they are super chaotic.
Oddly enough, planning a Kenku Dickery Cleric for a game, as well as possibly playing a Ravenfolk Moon Cleric (wholly 3rd party toys from Kobold Press) and in my eyes, they'll the same character from different stages of their lives. So please, y'all, wish your friendly cleric Pump-a-Rum some luck!
I will. However, the Moon Cleric is a Domain based around stealth and assorted fuckery. It's in the Midgard Hero Guide. It's for a one-shot, and I'm looking forward to playing him as a puppetmaster of sorts
@@Rookzer0 It's Kobold Press's setting. It's a vaguely Norse setting, but within it there are multiple sub-settings. So yes, totally worth the read and purchase. Moon Domain is much less Loki or Enchantress and more "Feel the mysteries of the moon," with first level giving you Perception and Stealth as class skills and removing your disadvantage to stealth when wearing medium armor. It gives you very thematic spells, clever tricks, and flavor similar to the Twilight Domain from UA.
I want to made a Kenku Alchemist, but I’m having trouble coming up with a backstory and personality for them. I kinda want to make their reason for going on a quest to be in search of a way to gain the ability of flight, but that’s all I’ve got for now. Do you have any suggestions?
Alchemists are always fun! Id say go with your gut and work on flight angle. Focus on the need for it to be true flight not juat magical flyte but wind beneath their wings. Maybe go as far as to self expirementation and see if your dm will give you a trait or drawbavk with your feathers. Accidentaly turned them to stone. Bonus ac. Jonny stonefeather!
Rookzer0 That’s a good idea! I like the specification of wing based flight rather than something like a temporary potion or machine-based flight. The self-experimentation would also be fun to work with. Thanks for the help! :)
I was initially making a bard to teach my friend (playing a barbarian) to count. Then, I got a better idea to make a sorcerer who will eventually learn Wish and wish for the Kenku to be rid of their speech limitations and will take the downfall for their race.
I was thinking about posting them but its about 2 3 hours so would 1/4 speed be ok or would you want it at real time? Id need to get some music or something
I will start planning a full tutorial some time in the future (I'm still working on my color technique) But until then here's the uncut Kenku video ua-cam.com/video/zBmIltW3ywU/v-deo.html As well as a quick discussion on my sketching mentality ua-cam.com/video/lNjNtDOgNew/v-deo.html Thanks again for the suggestion! Let me know if you have an specific questions!
Maybe you can tell me why the Kinko and the Eric Rocher changed they actually swapped all they did was take the names switch them around and yeah that was it the races are wrong
They are in the advanced race guide for Pathfinder as well as the SRD Here: www.d20pfsrd.com/races/other-races/featured-races/arg-tengu/ If you want to do that for DND you can use the Kenku stats and just swap out the racial passives from the Advanced race guide.
I'm going to have a Kenku Sorcerer with high Persuasion named Umbra... it's going to be interesting to see how I persuade people with this speech... impediment?
@@maji6294 That sounds pretty awesome, basically part kenku. That could be a fun curse/boon for my players. Do you get it from other wear ravens or just evil birds?
@@Rookzer0 actually wereravens are lawful good. And you can only get it from other wereravens i suggest u look into the curse of strahd there is a mission on saving the wereravens and as a reward you are offered wereraven lycanthropy.
I have a back up character at the moment that's a Kenku that has been stalking and following the main party for a while now. My current character comes from a church whose leaders are doing dubious things behind close doors and suspect my character of having knowledge that would expose there evil doing and exploiting the followers of the church for power, though the Kenku is loyal to the church's principles and was told that if my character were to go against the church then he would be branded a heretic and should be murdered. Though through my characters moral and upright actions and behaviors the Kenku is having a hard time thinking my character is an enemy, but will still act if needing too, though if my current character were to die, the Kenku will join the party, read through a secret book my character has been compiling and have everything they would need to understand that the leaders are evil and vow to bring them to justice. Yet I do have a closer background for my current and my Kenku character, that as my character at a young age was taken into the church was tasked with doing the work that all young church followers do and tend to newly born Kenku chicks, of which my current character helped raise her, even though she was an utter brat of a child, pecking, clawing and cawing at him, but my character not minding as he would sit with her, feed her, tell her stories and comfort her when she had bad dreams. Though they eventually drifted apart as she was taken in to the church as a servant turned assassin as my current character became a Cleric that tries to help anyone he can.
Great storie, are you planning on letting that character die for the storyline or just having the backup as a contingency plan? I like the struggle of the church members as a main focus. Keep up the good work
@@Rookzer0 The DM told me that he is gonna weave in the Church backstory into the main plot and we will eventually have to deal with them, but when it comes to actually going against the church and my current character is alive it may come to a battle between the two, or if my character manages to convince her of what he has found, but he would definitely be branded heretic of the church at that point so I'd probably have issues on that, along with the other faithful but are just being manipulated, but we will see when it comes up.
I love the Kenku, but their curse to never have their own ideas plagues me as a player more than the character, as I can't even ask questions I haven't heard before. I usually deal with the DM to remove that aspect of the curse, possibly nerfing the character a bit to compensate
I use photoshop and for the most part I use the round brush. I have 2 custom brushes for when I want a pencil feel and a texture brush for final touch ups.
I want to play a kenku .. exactly BECAUSE I'm limited to few words. I wanted to start as a changeling! WOOOW! Such transformation, very adaptable! Easy game! NO! If I got too mich freedom, I lose interest WAY TOO FAST! Its basically the cheating argument: Why didn't you play this anymore? I cheated everything into existance! So I need a limitation! A thing that stops me from doing whatever I want without repercussions
Its a curse. They can only repeat exact phrases heard or single words. It's meant to be a challenge. I always ask my players to take it as a serious challenge, maybe with a note book or similar. Or just not to use it al all
@@Rookzer0 The thing is most of our vocabulary as humans is from mimicry we lerned from our parents. So I imagine Kenku actually speak pretty well if with a mix of difrent voices most of the time only having problems when neache or obscured phrases come by. I basicly just played my Kenku as having a patchwork of voices but near compleate word list. Like the phrase "Do you know how to get to brewery." For example being mostly one voice as that is a common question with only brewery being from a difrent voice. The drawback is just a fun option to me not in how much I can actualy speek but how Idescribe myself speaking. Like mixing siliors voice and kids voice for disonance and stuff lime that. I dont actualy fully speak that way I just give a sample and do descripti9n how that line sounded.
One of my favorite NPC Kenkus that my friend made was a bartender named Remus. He was raised by the previous owner of the bar and was taught everything he knew, including speech. "How may I help you?" "May I know your name?" "Please phrase that shorter so I may respond properly, please." That last one got used quite a bit, and he was incredibly snarky and sarcastic.
Nice work, that sounds like a good way to do it. Plus I like the idea of a bartender.
Remus i know of such kenku he is a eldrich knight of the corbeau family in the unexpectables dnd campaing
I use Kenku in my campaign as town criers, they are the best for the task of spreading a message.
Kiri was made to be used by a talented voice actor who can not only mimic but REMEMBER every piece of spoken dialogue at the table. He nailed that NPC perfectly.
There is a gang of kenku in my campaign called “The Flock” they like hiding in alleys and try to hide behind their feathers. When you get in their territory instead of engaging, they make shout-out type sounds to scare people off.
Love it!
Rookzer0 real quick I wanted to mention that you were the reason I thought of “The Bovine” and “The Flock”. That’s all have a good night.
Do you call a group of Kenku a murder?
Maybe a silent death...
Id call it a 1
A flock sadly
...oh! A murder of crows. I get it.
I played one briefly for a oneshot,
and when "i"
spoke, not only did i use a load of different voices I also said what gender, age and race it sounded like.
I do enjoy the narrated dialog some times. Instead of voices just stating your intentions is great.
My Kenku Goodwin is a druid who sneaks into people's dreams to learn about the world. If the person starts to have a nightmare he replaces it with a dream of flying, cause what could be nicer.
Great video btw! Going to share with my group as we all love these kind of breakdowns and the art is such a cool, and talented bonus!
Thank you Seth, I'm glad you enjoyed the video I really like your Kenku Idea if you'd like to use the final image for your character sheet let me know you can find it on my art station.
Goodwin is a good boy
I really want to make a kenku character where every time someone says something I write it down so I know what words I can use.
Yes! Do it!
Rookzer0 thanks
With my Kenku, Flutter, I use his Mimicry to slowly leak out verbal pieces of his past and let the other players piece them together throughout the campaign.
Things like:
(young human girl): "Have you ever caught a butterfly?", "I think I'll call you... Flutter!", "No, leave him alone!"
(gruff human man): "Get away from her you fucking bird!", "Kailey, back away from it!", "No... you made this happen! This is YOUR fault!"
Flutter has a childlike innocence regarding death, and has a mental need to capture every butterfly he sees. No exceptions. Once he gets the butterfly, he stores it in his mouth. Whenever he talks, the butterfly will flutter out and he must then recapture it. At the end of every day, he buries whatever accumulated butterflies underneath his bed, wherever that may be. If he finds himself sleeping where he cannot bury the butterflies, he sleeps elsewhere.
That sounds amazing! How did your party take it?
@@Rookzer0 - they thought it was super goofy at first, and laughed at this bird person asking them in a child's voice about catching butterflies and all that, and everyone enjoyed laughing at the cute, weird bird. But once more pre-learned backstory voicelines started coming out, and they started piecing together the full story.. Eventually they worked out the truth, that he was himself very young and he lived with his and other Kenku families locked away in the tower of an old church being used to copy and mass produce old religious texts by a human, in exchange for safety from persecution of the rest of the city.
Being young, he would slip out, where he eventually found a young (6-8years) human girl who became his best friend. She taught him how to catch butterflies, and she named him Flutter. Eventually her father found out that a Kenku had been wandering about with his daughter, and he gathered up a group of other men to "rescue" her.
Flutter and Kailey were eventually caught, and the father tried to kill the bird with a hand crossbow. Kailey interfered, and the bolt struck her, killing her as Flutter ran.
He retreated underground to an old cemetery, where he was contacted in his grief by an entity from the Shadowfell, who taught him a jaded perspective of death and granted him powers (homebrewed Umbra class found online). The party found him in that cemetery, as they heard a disembodied voice from the shadows.
"Have you ever caught a butterfly?"
Really nice work for background. It's creepy enough to not want to find out about in game but interesting enough that my character would have to start digging! Really nice work!
@@Rookzer0 thank you!
I want to play a Kenku so bad, but my ability to imitate voices are super limited!
Talk to your dm about it. :) I love doing voices and making up unique characters but its tough for some and can take some time. For kenku even more so. Until you find a means of playing it the way you like, try relying on your rolls. "I would like to convay that im really unhappy with whats going on, i make a bunch of pinball machine noises"
"In my best clint eastwood impression i say do you feel lucky?"
Then roll performance for them and see what happens. :) it can be a lot of fun to see where the dice take you.
I find learning new voices comes from watching TV and UA-cam especially cartoons, and kids movies, voices I like to imatate and quote come from things like teenage mutant ninja turtles, asdf movie, teen titans Go, Lego movies, and pop culture, just watch them, learn and quote them, then apply their voices I have around 60 voices now from that!
I'm like a few months late but, I have problems too when It comes to the mimicry i use a soundboard to record things that my friends say and re-say it, if you dont want to buy a soundboard. I believe in you my friend
Ask your dm if you can implement a sound board
I wanna play a paladin. But my faith in Bahamut and sword fighting is not that good.
Just try. You will end up having lots of fun. And if you find out kenkus are not you things homebrew something you want.
My Kenku is named Bell. She lives in the attic of Waterdeep Theater and she learned to speak through watching the performances. So she basically speaks in movie quotes. I made her a Swashbuckler-Bard because her favorite play is Waterdeep's version of The Princess Bride. When our party found her she was so excited to have someone to play with she grabbed her prop rapier and said, "I am Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die." She's absolutely my favorite character I've ever made.
Kinda similar to how Meowth in the Pokemon TV show learned to speak English
I have a Kenku bard nicknamed Dead Lute. He's carrying around a broken nonfunctional but pretty decorated lute and can not play any instrument, instead he makes music using mimicry. I'm new to dnd and actually really like my Kenku because when I don't know how to improvise something, I just resort to playing a melody or eerie sound instead, lol.
Very cool idea. Does the party know its not the lute? Could they play a lute if they had a real one?
@@Rookzer0 The party know about this, the lute looks really devastated and some strings hang down with decorations tailored into them.
He can not play a real lute but he has difficulties making music without holding his lute (part of "the ritual" for him). He's also sometimes tipping his fingers on the lute amateurishly when making music, though it's very obvious that's not doing anything.
It breaks my heart that people don't have have the love this race deserves. My favorite character I've played is my kenku, Sparkle. She's a rogue/Bard that nested in the town's thieves guild and they taught her to steal stuff, but she has no concept of value. Thieves Guild was raid by authorities and she managed to escape, running into the forest, where who happened upon a Goliath wizard, and she decided his cloak hood was her new nest and just refuses to leave.
To play her, I keep a journal dedicated to her vocabulary, and write down anything useful players have said and carry it over to any other games she may come to. She is mostly nonverbal as she's meant to be very unintelligent, but I love using Vicious Mockery with insults that were clearly meant for her at some point, and seeing other player's reactions to my silly little bird.
Lol that's great! I like the idea that the insults are all at her and really confusing but still cutting for the enemies.
My first character in dnd was a human wizard who got his soul trapped in a Kenku and so whatever he think the Kenku can say but the disadvantage is that If I do something that the Kenku dose not want to do I have to roll to fight for control to do that action so it's a pretty fun character to interact with and so far no one in my group knows why the Kenku can talk in full sentences so that will be a fun surprise soon.
That must be a fun mechanic. Has anyone rolled or questioned the ability to talk? Has your party bumbed into other kenku yet?
Imagine a Kenku bard that just blasts music out of its mouth, Lilo and Stitch style
Name them grammaphone the bard
I'm thinking about making a kenku that can understand most languages
*Hah, the translator can't speak*
That could be really fun. Would you try to translate for your partu with a note book or maybr big cardboard signs? Or would you hide the fact that you understand?
@@Rookzer0 Probably try and translate through _very_ broken common, I already have a character that I'm using but this one's just in case they die somehow
So kenkus learn via what they hear, so you can technically teach them a full language, but they'd speak in your voice.
My Kenku is a half-Kenku with the name Riki Haddonfield. Using the human creativity they’re able to cobble sentences together without too much issue. They do however lose their perfect mimicry for this because their vocal chords are unable to reach some of the ranges needed for the imitation. (I do still get advantage on some deception rolls if the voice is within range) (I can try and explain it better if needed)
They’re a NG sorlock (Raven Queen and Divine Soul) and they love collecting shiny things and bones. I love them.
now all i want to do is make a female kenku named ariel and her backstory is that she was promised a voice by a sketchy octopus god 😂
Nice, that could be a lot of fun.
I ounce played a kenku named Forge. He was a blacksmith who forge simple items like horseshoes, pots, and pans, but forge was a monk trained to use ki and martial arts I honestly loved playing forge.
Forge almost became a vampire later cured by the dark god Talos. Forge actually went against talos after being cured. A small army of 100 talos worshippers would attack the town forge live in.
We ofcourse won the battle leaving only 7 survivors who would later become allies. Forge would Also be bite by a werewolf becoming a wereraven and that would actually cure Forge of the kenku curse. He could talk normally again and fly too.
I play as forge for quite some time but oh poor forge. Halfway through the campaign forge would die to the hands of one of the main villains of the campaign Doomblade.
We all cried when Forge died.
Were raven sounds amazing, I'm glad you had a memorable experience with them!
@@Rookzer0 I love playing Forge the most out all my Characters my second favorite being my minotaur monk Gore.
I'm trying to build a character concept for a kenku bc I love the race, and I'm starting with what I can mimic to build them
I'm ADHD and I have an echo stim, so I'm very good at mimicry. I can't really do voices well without practice, but sounds are where I shine
One kind of sounds I love making (and am very good at) is wind noises, like a gentle breeze or a raging storm. I love the idea of this kenku defaulting to wind sounds when words fail them, their equivalent of humming being a faint breeze. Randomly interspersed with the occasional meow (pet cat + echo stim = meowing kid)
My working name for this kenku is Wind, but I think it'd be really funny to let my fellow party members name them. They just refuse to give a name and will go by whatever the party decides, I find that hilarious
I started thinking about kenkus again bc this DnD podcast I like called Just Roll With It (JRWI) had a kenku NPC in some of their recent episodes. The first thing one of the PCs did upon seeing her was start yelling "Bird! Bird!" to get her attention, she started mimicking him, and the players dubbed her Bird Bird (the DM mentioned her actual name while describing something and one of the players said "no she's Bird Bird now"). One of them immediately got unreasonably attached and started risking his life to help her (she was essentially being kidnapped) and went down 3 times during combat and rolled a few death saves. The party came very close to dying trying to help Bird Bird, but they succeeded in the end (at one point there was a 10 foot tall kenku and a 20 foot tall paladin bc silly ability + two silly magic items)
Sounds like you got them pretty well figured out. I'd suggest going with and eloquence bard if you really want to focus on the mimicry and use it to buff the party. Might have to get the ok from your dm but sounds like a good time
@@Rookzer0 I was thinking about bard, eloquence does seem like a good subclass if I want to fully lean into mimicry. I don't have a campaign in mind for this character yet (I just love making characters in my spare time) but I'd definitely get the dm ok before bringing a character like this to the table
imagine going to a dragon fight and a Kenku just Roar at the dragon back
Oooooh thats an interning use of mimicry. What do uou think bonus on intimidate?
@@Rookzer0 oh ya imagine you being this smoll boi and then you be like, deep intimating voice in the bar goes "hey"
@@liuemma7175 Basso Bird!
I love my witch tengu character. best character i ever made. wish i could still play pathfinder/dnd
that sounds like a lot of fun. I don't think I've seen a witch tengu played before, well done.
I'm actually running a Kenku right now in one of the campaigns I'm in. Artificer/Alchemist. Learned what he knew by reverse-engineering an alchemist's tools, which he stole alongside his group/family (murder? conspiracy? yeah conspiracy sounds good). Used that knowledge to become a con artist, and the money to get more alchemist supplies. Started using a plague doctor mask to hide that he's a kenku long enough to scam the hell out of someone. Got seperated from his group and trapped in an extradimensional bubble. This bubble took the form of a bar with a TV that constantly reran Star Wars. That's how I did my mimicry, exclusively star wars quotes. I've had a lot of fun with him so far, and it's been a blast seeing my group pick up on the little star wars references.
The starwars quotes I was not expecting. Well done
@@Rookzer0 The quotes were mostly for a starting vocabulary so we didn't have to debate what i would and wouldn't know but my party liked it so much i stuck with it
@@BBQPringlesEnjoyer really great work, keep it up. I might have to draw this guy eventually. I like the idea of a kenku with a stormtrooper plague mast :D
@@Rookzer0 I'm honored. I never considered a stormtrooper mask. I might have to go on Heroforge and play with the coloring. If you ever do decide to draw them, I could give you the character sheet link and a mini i made in Heroforge for fun.
This piece and Kiri from CR were actually some of the things that inspired me to create my Kenku Warlock named Shimshek! I'm also an artist and I was trying to figure out how to draw a "not creepy/realistic" Kenku and I loved the art style for this that this became one of the pieces on my mood board for when I finally decided to draw her!
Shimshek is a Hexblade Warlock that grew up in an orphanage and is looking for her family. She's actually from a family that not necessarily worships but kind of protects and willingly serves an eternal entity names Kaepora, who is so old that he does not know if he is a god and does not remember where he came from. A sign that she is from this family is the patch of silver/white feathers on the top of her head. Kaepora only asks that Shimshek collects items to be sent to him, as he likes collecting things and learning about the world. He has asked her to read a smutty book, which he admitted was an awful read afterwards. When he requests that she send an item over to his plane of existance, she uses a crystal around her neck which also acts as her focus. If needed, she can also ask him for items that may help her on her journey to find her family.
Currently, she is on the run from assassins sent by another Kenku who believes that she stole their heirloom/birthright (the crystal/connection to Kaepora and the powers that come with it).
Thats a really cool warlock dirty dynamic and i think it works really well with your character design. Nicley done!
I have a kenku character concept that I'm working on. He used to b an assistant to a half elf artificer who leaves him his book of inventions after they part ways. One day, he find an incomplete schematics for a back mounted levitation device. Seeing it as an opportunity to gain flight, he embarks on an adventure to complete the blueprints and build the device.
That sounds like a great character arc
Damn you deserve more subs bro, great video, flawless dialogue
Thank you! I will keep doing my best
Rookzer0 Why you should play a bard
My character is a druid, so her language isn't very good but her birdcall is perfect.
I have a level 2 paladin Kenku called shoow (sh-ooo-ow)
I had my first game just yesterday their favorite word is Dep-Dep. It's the beginning of Deputy said twice. Also they hop when nervous. Instead of walking they do that little hop birds can do.
That is pretty adorible!
I've had this idea to play a kenku bard for forever and he communicates only through musical songs, his story was that he was picked up by a traveling circus and started to remember the songs and learned to play domen instruments, i have a whole playlist of musical songs that I pick our specific parts of that I can stitch together into proper responses, I don't know if this would actually work in the game as I've never actually played a game 👉👈 but I would love to just have a ukelele and play constant backround music for the rest of the party
I know it's kind of out of date to post this now, and this may sound weird, but in an online campaign (thanks, Covid!) my kenku would use each game session to note down everything that was spoken during the campaign, and at the end of those sessions, would choose 5 emoticons from a huge Unicode listing that she will have learned, based on her interactions with the characters. All her communications were using combinations of emoticons to simulate her relatively crude ability to piece complex thoughts together, and the other players absolutely loved the idea. After a while, she was capable of assembling semi-complex phrases using lines of said emotes. "🤲🐦🍺💯👌?" :D (Easy bonus points for figuring that one out) :)
Not the best method for a live game, but on Roll20 it was perfect. ;)
I only learned of Critical Role a few months back. Loved Kiri, loved Spurt. In the 80s when I played a lot more we never had DMs that let you actually enjoy the act of playing the game. :D
Sounds like your having a great time now! I'm glad you found a good group of people to play with.
My attept at the emotes would be. "Give me another drink, im fine"
@@Rookzer0 Spot on. ;)
Hm, a Kenku barbarian sound kind of fun. Usually people play the dumb barbarians so their speach is limited, with this race it would be both similar and different. And a raging bird... Shrieking with ferocity...
Well if you're someone, like me, who doesn't like doing voices you only have to say one word every now and then and kenku I feel should have a natural bounus to intimidation, those things Are scary as hell lol.
That's a really good point. I have had a few friends really get into kenku/Tengu and none of them like doing voices so you may be on to something. I would be fine giving a character bonuses to intimidation but I would limit it to only non verbal intimidation
::blank stare::
"WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME"
::Blank Stare intensifies"
"OK OK OK I DID IT"
:D Great idea.
I am a person who doesn't speak much, my friends made a few jokes about it "You would be great drug dealer, you would just put drugs on table sit down and watch person in silence until they buy it"
@@Rookzer0 yeah, birds already freak some people out, so imagine how much a kenku would scare some people
@@womedrah1415 Ooh yeah... the blank stare and still head... I could see that being unnerving if its the same size as you
Kenku is probably my second favorite race. I like bird people, the Ararcocra are also really cool, however flying can be a bit much. I really like the cursed lore of the Kenku. The speech thing is an interesting dynamic that most dont handle well, for good reason as it would be difficult to speak through sounds and voices you've heard.
I´d think about playing a Kenku druid who can not wildshape in to birds due to the curse. It would be a curious quirk.
Thats an interesting idea. Or possibly Wiltshire but only into birds
I started playing Kenku yesterday with some mistakes, good things that my DM was forgiving and askes to give it another read because I didn't get some points, like talking normally with mixing common and crow gibberish
It's definitely a challenge, I hope you have a lot of fun with it.
The solution my group is using for the lack of speaking is we're all accidentally (I swear) rogues or multiclassed into rogues. Because Thieves' Cant can be gestures and mouth sounds.
It's a good choice, I would argue that because of the curse it doesn't work perfectly but nice work.
@@Rookzer0 Our party comp had to change sadly due to nobody having healing abilities except the Swashbuckler eventually multiclassing into Bard, so now I'm a Kalashtar Paladin/Sorcerer.
Her name is Maggie. She's about eight. She likes to eat bugs, steal shinies, and she can't read. The rest of the party are gruff guys who are an awful influence on her.
She could write if copying something down, but she won't be able to read until someone teaches her. She loves to draw and make things, though.
Thanks for this vid, I wanted to tell u I'm thinking of playing an albino kenku who is being hunted by poachers for money, the character is a bard who has spent enough time in social situations to the point where they have the equivalent of bumblebees voice from transformers, where they essentially speak TV, and the character fits my playstyle well, going to learn some Shakespearian insults for vicious mockery.
I like that idea, maybe have a random table for insults that you can roll for so they are always fresh. Cool visuals too!
I've been thinking of making a Kenku wizard who was taught magic verbally by a kind Tortle wizard, so the main words she uses to communicate are spell names and elemental effects. For instance, if shes excited, she would hop around and say "Lightning! Lightning!" or if shes mad she would glare and cross her arms while muttering "Fireball, Fireball." She would also eventually get more words as the campaign would go on from the other players, so she could call for the healer during bad situations and such.
That's a unique way of playing a Kenku. Very cool idea
I'll be a kenku necromancer who speaks in riddles.
That sounds like a must build for my games now. Great idea. I hope you don't mind if I use it.
We've got a kenku ranger who slays monsters for glory and named his horse after the first noise it made in his presence. He has moments when he's surprisingly articulate, now that he's been traveling with our group for some weeks, but mostly still communicates by the use of sound effects and pidgin-common. I.e. "MONSTER YES! *THNK" means "I think we should go right now and slay that monster by the means of beheading." The bard, who's traveled with the kenku for longer than us, interprets for him when the rest of the party doesn't understand. Also the character has zero sense of shame nor social anxiety, a puzzling side-effect of which is that so far he's had more luck with women than the rest of the party combined, as he dishes out heartfelt flattery without second-guessing.
I've taken to keeping a tab open with some official kenku concept art to remind myself that he looks creepy not like a cute bundle of feathers.
Is pidgin-common a real term? I also think it would be funny is he was a cute bundle of feathers like a budgie kenku. ha ha.
@@Rookzer0 I don't think it's a real term yet but we could make it one. And it would indeed be funny - perhaps I'll put that thought aside for a future character. That particular kenku lost the chance to be nothing but a cute bundle of feathers the moment it started pecking dead bodies. :D
I have developed a strategy to make my kenku talk: he listen to as much people he can and then he puts some of the words he learnt before together to create phrases with sense
I'm a big fan of leaning into curses so as long as its still mimicry and clever im ok with it.
My Kenku, Iroc, was a homeless vagrant living on the streets of Baldur's gate as a street vendor selling little trinkets he made from found objects. His forgery skills led him to discover the ability to write magic runes. The DM and I homebrewed a runecaster class where he functions like a wizard, but his spells are non-verbal and after each rest he prepares his runes which can be affixed to objects. He sometimes even "loans" one of his spells out by drawing a rune onto one of the other party member's armor which they can activate with a swipe. He "speaks" in a hodge podge of street hawker phrases "You, sir. I'll give you best deal!" mixed with movie quotes which we RP as things he might have overheard living in BG "You know what you look like to me with your good bag and your cheap shoes? You look like a rube." Incidentally, his name, Iroc, came out of confusion when someone asked him "what are you?" and he tried to make a joke "I...Roc" (like the giant bird).
Very cool idea. I love the rune crafting idea storing spells in items and alike are something they started doing with the artificer again but I miss the tattoos and alike from 3.5 and pathfinder.
I’m a very new player. I’ve made three other PCs, but I’m still running through my first campaign with my first ever character, Xassoo. He’s a kenku, now level 5 bard/warlock, and my gosh is he a joy to play. He’s 4 feet tall, snarky, impulsive, and theatric, has some pretty fun back and forth with his patron (who is Asmodeus, it’s a long story that involves a plate in a filing cabinet opening a rift to Hell), and just generally fun to play as. Even with having made a few characters of other races (elf, half elf, tiefling, and a half aarakocra half kenku) kenku are by far my favorites. The mimicry is fun to play with, they have a built in adventuring motivation, and they’re crows. Even if you play with the lack of imagination they’re still a great race and I love them.
Great back stroy. Does asmodeus find the back and forth enjoyable or annoying? Anything fun theme wise with your eldritch blast?
Actually, meeting his patron and signing the contract happened within the first and second sessions respectively! It was never intended as something to happen, but it’s been really entertaining to see. As for the back and forth, Asmodeus is usually the one to initiate it, but even when Xassoo does, he’s not too annoyed. Sure he’ll make quips and such, some poking fun at Xas or the party, but he seems to enjoy them. In our campaign Hell is just a giant office and Asmodeus is the CEO, so that’s the kinda relationship that they have. As for a theme with the Eldritch blast, it’s fire as one might expect from a fiend warlock!
@@theanswerisa3758 That sounds like a lot of fun, tell you DM that they are doing it right! and keep me posted on the adventures of Xassoo.
Awesome video
Thank you :)
I created a storm sorcerer kenku who uses mold earth to write in the dirt. I named him Jacques which happens to sound like shock :) one time in battle he melted a guy with a critical chaos bolt. His catchphrase is "i am a good bird", mimicking a woman from his past whom helped him build a vocabulary of phrases.
Zappy Bird, I dig it.
I recently came up with a Kenku rogue with the Urchin background, but that found shelter in the crawlspaces and attics of a mansioned aristocrat, and thus learned a good number of haughty taughty phrases which he repeats when fitting
For my Kenku I decided to have him talk in broken English, mostly because I have the memory of a sieve and would forget most phrases that I hear. It still confuses people sometimes, even myself
that's a good way to deal with it, more for flavor than mechanics. I dig it.
CastroOfTheVault I had a human character from a isolated tribe, he spoke proven English and that led to many interesting things. He later became a patron that dealt with gunslinging and enchanting. He was a gunslinger artificer
As one who has played since thac0, one of my favorite characters played was a Kenku cleric. Ikati, or as people called him, Tik, as he had a habit to mimic the clockwork amulet he carried.
I recently played a Kenku artificer who made a forgery of a magical artifact. Gave it to the bard in the party who used charisma to convince a powerful NPC to hand over the quest item as a trade.
super cool teamwork. Was your DM excited or upset?
@@Rookzer0 A little exasperated? Apparently he had planned this big battle, but he applauded us for thinking outside the box. I was later told he hadn't expected me to use the forgery like that.
I’m a DM who has a kenku NPC named Iffit. She was in an illegal freak show. After the party frees her she’ll say things like “Only if it works!” “I’m fine…” “You’re a freak.” And she often repeats the last word of people’s sentences to convey understanding.
::sadface:: I hope she's doing well in the party.
i've did a Tengu vigilante in my curent pathfinder game, and my DM love it
basicaly, when level 2, my party got attacked by a group of 20 bandit tengus, i saw that from far distance so to save them (with another character) i used all my armor and metallic stuff + my warning horn to mimic the approching of an army, i got a nat 20 in bluff, so they all got scared, when my party was just like "oh it was nothing let's go sleep" i just follow their path and plan to burn the tengus camp but i got seen by one ... (i regret it a bit for his suffering) but i broke the tengu's beak with a strengh roll, he screamed, they all look at me, i rolled intimidation, got nat 20 again, i've said nothing, just stared at them while slowy walking at them and just say "run", they all run into the forest, so i've looted their camp, 1000 gold coin in a chess plus all their weapon, not bad, but what i see ?, the young tengu that one of my team mates knock-out earlier, i wake im up and told im that all his friends abandonned him, so that's is only option is to follow me, 18 + 6 on bluff he believed me,so asked him "what's your name ?", he respond "Flapette" ... the next day, when my character was walking a bit behing the group, and Flapette with all the rest of the party, the tengus group tried to sneak on me, got another nat 20, so i've sneaked behind them and said "didn't i told you to flee" the bravest of them, oubliously scared said " We want our friend back ...", intimidate them again, (sorry for their friend btw, i know it's cruel but ... eh, wanted a companion) ... several weeks in game passed we reach average level 6 and the DM accorded us to create another character, Flapette proved his inhability to fight properly so, he became my butler, so i've decided that he deserve more than that ... he became a vigilante, he's a total badass, like he fight with distance weapon, he have boomerangs as primary weapon, the DM make me found a riffle (upgraded musket) so i "taped" a spyglass and a makeshift supressor made of tin can on it to have a sniper, he also wear a flexible full plate armor plus his cape outfit, because of his beak he need a Churburg style helmet, his gauntlet have one hand-held crossbow each taped on it, his only melee weapon his a adamantium crowbar (i pick that for a bad pun, tengus are basicaly crows, so crow - bar, hehehe get it ). So yeah ... the first quest he had to be in was to found some information and investigate about a new cult in town, so basicaly the party seen Flapette only 15 minutes in-game for 8h of in-game time, someone tried to know my real identity, when he was looking where i changed disguise, i just jump off the roof with my grapple behind him ... so, we've need to colect information in the poors neighborhoods, 3 in the town, docks, where everybodys goes, prostitues places, nobody goes there, and finaly, the laborer ghetto, where i got lonely, i collect information to a kid to know who i need to see for 5 gold, he told me to go see François, the ruler of the place, so i've spoted his manshion in the neighborhood, it had 2 access, the principal one with 2 guards, and a small alleyway behing it, i look it, 4 guards, i placed some gun-powder into a trash pile on the floor, used a long wick, burn it, go accost myself on the other side of the alley but not in it, the mess exploded, 3 guards run to see what happened, when they come out the alleway, i enter in it and give 15 gold to the last guard to let me in to see the boss, what he does, upstairs, in lonely with the mafia boss than can literaly kill me when he want, but because i did an incredible roleplay, i got all my information, and goes to the cult place 4 in-games hour before the rest of the party.
ps: sorry if my english is bad, my primary language is french
re-ps : it took me 30 minutes to write
Very cool story, I like the idea of a boomerang vigilante. It sounds like you have a pretty good DM. That is great RP and lucky rolls. Merci pour l'histoire!
well thank you
This was kinda funny to me- but my dad runs a game with me, my cousin & brother, a guy names Gage, Baxter, and Lyyssa. (all 11-14), we were getting slamemd by a dragon, and my character (A paladin) uses "Channel Divinity" or something like that, and the white dragon fails the wisdom throw, and the wall behind it was gone, so it went barreling down the side of a mountain and died.
Unconventional but not the weirdest way I've seen someone slay a dragon
would love to see you talk and create art about doppelgangers or their PC race changelings as I always find their deceptive shape changing tactics interesting
Oni are another creature that have the same type of cunning disguise ability, such as a certain villain in critical role
Those are pretty good ideas, I add them to my list
Literally just made a Rogue Arcane Trickster Kenku name Zneaky he has a chalkboard that he wears like a necklace that he uses to communicate with the rest of the party
Sounds pretty good. If youd like to use my kiri for your character sheet you can snag it from my art station. The link is in the description
I'm currently playing in a campaign as a Kanku phantom rogue.
She was found by an assassin on his way back from a mission she was bloodied and could not remember who she was or where she came from he took her in and raised her to be an assassin like him one day he goes missing and she tries to find him she spend 6 months out and about trying to locate him and that's when she meets the party that that she's with now and one of her companions is terrified of birds so she has a big issue with my character at least for a while before she considers her to be not a threat. I started her out not being able to say very many things because she was sheltered and only had one person to learn a language from so also she did learn an additional language which was draconic because of a ghost that hung around her eventually I figured she could learn a lot of different words and languages from the different ghosts that hang around her. Currently she's having a major issue with ghosts following her around and hurting her in her party she does not take kindly to anyone hurting her friends and she goes into a cold-hearted assassin mode when someone does hurt her friends. But for the most part she's practically has the mentality of a child.
I named her Nightingale.
I'm currently playing a kenku druid. He's a toddler with a skunk animal companion. I asked my dm if I can roll sleight of hand checks to try to help explain what I'm saying. He agreed, the dm is my boyfriend so he has seen me talk with my hands to his grandmother who doesn't speak English and it works. My character can also do shadow puppet shows
Cool integration. I like to have my players roll insight to read hand signals and communicate silently. Nice real world inclusion
Kenku is literally: I can do anything you can FEATHER!
Nobody ever remembers the 3rd part of the Kenku curse which is that they are incapable of invention. It's kind of the counterpoint to their imitation of physical acts such as forgery.
That's an interesting concept. takes their mimicry to a whole other level.
I really want to play a kenku shadow monk
Great choice, let me know how it goes!
My Kenku is an albino female rouge. In her flock albinism is thought to be cursed and bring bad omens for those around them. She is a child like character in nature who prefers shiny objects over gold. She can write in common and elvish but prefer to communicate with her mimicry trait. She speaks through multiple voices when pulling together broken sentences. When she introduces herself she mimics the sound of the instrument she is named after Erhu. The only one she can talk to in her own voice in a figure of power the raven because it speaks Auran I named him lute and use him to scout ahead of us in the air.
Very cool, I like the subtle choices, bonus points for naming the raven lute. :)
I’m now a Kenku/Tengu Cleric Of Trickery .
(Based a lot on NorthWest Coast First Person Tales)
Mocking my enemies and throwing a monkey wrench in to the works. With high stealth and mimicry (forging/coping documents& items. When I’m around you never know what’s real or a facsimile. (With a “the little drunken master” tossed in)
(speaking mostly short sound bites of 80’s & 90s song lyrics)
-I am the walking embodiment of my Chaos God.
Sounds like a lot of fun
I'm about to create my 2nd kenku (ranger /gloom), my first One was bard/whisper
Very cool. I hope they play well!
I for one as a kenku will base it off of a Eurasian magpie because cool
Heh, Kenku was the race I used for my first character
I hope you enjoyed it! Kenku are fun
@@Rookzer0 yeah, they definitely are! I’m excited to play her though since I’m at that odd point where I don’t really have D&d friends, I’m a bit shy, but I love D&D so I make a bunch of characters even though I’ve never played them yet xD
Im im a long campaign playing a kenku, I love playing them, I have a dictionary of the frases my character knows. They became frequent frases in our friend group. I built the character on comedic miscommunication, my kenku knows lots of languages, is the only in the party who has identify. They are an artificer a d they loove to rant about inventions, noone understands them. And since most of their vocabulary came from children in the backstory, the party is still under the impression that they are a child, it also help that they are super chaotic.
Great kenku build. Sounds like fun I'm glad you have your phrases written down
If I'm not mistaken, Tengu are supposed to be legendary for their skill with the sword. Now you have a thematic race for playing a Kensai!
Pathfinder focus on this a little bbetter. I'd allow a free proficiency for a specific sword type
Oddly enough, planning a Kenku Dickery Cleric for a game, as well as possibly playing a Ravenfolk Moon Cleric (wholly 3rd party toys from Kobold Press) and in my eyes, they'll the same character from different stages of their lives. So please, y'all, wish your friendly cleric Pump-a-Rum some luck!
Ha ha pump-a-rum is a great kemku name. Let me know what happens to your cleric/druid
I will. However, the Moon Cleric is a Domain based around stealth and assorted fuckery. It's in the Midgard Hero Guide. It's for a one-shot, and I'm looking forward to playing him as a puppetmaster of sorts
@@BR4IN1N4J4R Very cool, is that based around Loki or the enchantress? a Midgad hero guide sounds pretty dope, I will definitely look that up!
@@Rookzer0
It's Kobold Press's setting. It's a vaguely Norse setting, but within it there are multiple sub-settings. So yes, totally worth the read and purchase.
Moon Domain is much less Loki or Enchantress and more "Feel the mysteries of the moon," with first level giving you Perception and Stealth as class skills and removing your disadvantage to stealth when wearing medium armor. It gives you very thematic spells, clever tricks, and flavor similar to the Twilight Domain from UA.
I want to made a Kenku Alchemist, but I’m having trouble coming up with a backstory and personality for them. I kinda want to make their reason for going on a quest to be in search of a way to gain the ability of flight, but that’s all I’ve got for now. Do you have any suggestions?
Alchemists are always fun! Id say go with your gut and work on flight angle. Focus on the need for it to be true flight not juat magical flyte but wind beneath their wings. Maybe go as far as to self expirementation and see if your dm will give you a trait or drawbavk with your feathers.
Accidentaly turned them to stone. Bonus ac.
Jonny stonefeather!
Rookzer0 That’s a good idea! I like the specification of wing based flight rather than something like a temporary potion or machine-based flight. The self-experimentation would also be fun to work with. Thanks for the help! :)
I think I might call him Icarus Stonewing
@@neutrinoccino8475 Nice one
How would you do a half kenku, half tengu?
The same way.
My head cannon are kenkus are cursed tengus
I approve of this head cannon, and will probably steal for my own head cannon.
Can someone tell me what the title in english is? UA-cam translated it, and now it makes no sense.
Why you should Play a Kenku / Tengu. Kiri critical role fan art. RPG Art Rookzer0.
I might update this
@@Rookzer0 Thank you!
I was initially making a bard to teach my friend (playing a barbarian) to count. Then, I got a better idea to make a sorcerer who will eventually learn Wish and wish for the Kenku to be rid of their speech limitations and will take the downfall for their race.
do you have realtime process on doing your style?..
I was thinking about posting them but its about 2 3 hours so would 1/4 speed be ok or would you want it at real time? Id need to get some music or something
@@Rookzer0 yeah thats awesome any hours would still be great let me request it in real time pls cause im a slow learner. thanks man you're great!
I will start planning a full tutorial some time in the future (I'm still working on my color technique) But until then here's the uncut Kenku video ua-cam.com/video/zBmIltW3ywU/v-deo.html
As well as a quick discussion on my sketching mentality
ua-cam.com/video/lNjNtDOgNew/v-deo.html
Thanks again for the suggestion! Let me know if you have an specific questions!
The guy at the end of comments is the public enemy now
Remeber to love each other.
Maybe you can tell me why the Kinko and the Eric Rocher changed they actually swapped all they did was take the names switch them around and yeah that was it the races are wrong
Tengu are traditional cursed bird monsters. I'm not sure whete kenku came from.
Where would I find stats for Tengu or is it a homebrew race because i only found homebrew race
They are in the advanced race guide for Pathfinder as well as the SRD Here: www.d20pfsrd.com/races/other-races/featured-races/arg-tengu/
If you want to do that for DND you can use the Kenku stats and just swap out the racial passives from the Advanced race guide.
@@Rookzer0 Thanks, I was planning on using a Tengu NPC for my Kenku player in DND
I'm going to have a Kenku Sorcerer with high Persuasion named Umbra... it's going to be interesting to see how I persuade people with this speech... impediment?
Kenku comment challenge: Only use words said in the video
OPENS THE DOORS TO ALL KINDS OF DIFFRENT POSSIBILITIES!
Good videos :)
Thank you!
Are you familiar with the wereraven?
No, tell me more!
@@Rookzer0 its a lycanthrope raven style they get mimicry and a beak attack and can transform into a raven-humanoid form and raven from.
@@maji6294 That sounds pretty awesome, basically part kenku. That could be a fun curse/boon for my players. Do you get it from other wear ravens or just evil birds?
@@Rookzer0 actually wereravens are lawful good. And you can only get it from other wereravens i suggest u look into the curse of strahd there is a mission on saving the wereravens and as a reward you are offered wereraven lycanthropy.
@@maji6294 Nice, I will do that. thanks for sharing!
Rapid voice changes because they have to mimic and use only words they've heard how they heard them, but can make they own sentences
I have a back up character at the moment that's a Kenku that has been stalking and following the main party for a while now. My current character comes from a church whose leaders are doing dubious things behind close doors and suspect my character of having knowledge that would expose there evil doing and exploiting the followers of the church for power, though the Kenku is loyal to the church's principles and was told that if my character were to go against the church then he would be branded a heretic and should be murdered. Though through my characters moral and upright actions and behaviors the Kenku is having a hard time thinking my character is an enemy, but will still act if needing too, though if my current character were to die, the Kenku will join the party, read through a secret book my character has been compiling and have everything they would need to understand that the leaders are evil and vow to bring them to justice. Yet I do have a closer background for my current and my Kenku character, that as my character at a young age was taken into the church was tasked with doing the work that all young church followers do and tend to newly born Kenku chicks, of which my current character helped raise her, even though she was an utter brat of a child, pecking, clawing and cawing at him, but my character not minding as he would sit with her, feed her, tell her stories and comfort her when she had bad dreams. Though they eventually drifted apart as she was taken in to the church as a servant turned assassin as my current character became a Cleric that tries to help anyone he can.
Great storie, are you planning on letting that character die for the storyline or just having the backup as a contingency plan? I like the struggle of the church members as a main focus. Keep up the good work
@@Rookzer0 The DM told me that he is gonna weave in the Church backstory into the main plot and we will eventually have to deal with them, but when it comes to actually going against the church and my current character is alive it may come to a battle between the two, or if my character manages to convince her of what he has found, but he would definitely be branded heretic of the church at that point so I'd probably have issues on that, along with the other faithful but are just being manipulated, but we will see when it comes up.
@@RegalMasquerade Great work, and props to your DM, tell them they are doing it right!
@@Rookzer0 Will do
I love the Kenku, but their curse to never have their own ideas plagues me as a player more than the character, as I can't even ask questions I haven't heard before. I usually deal with the DM to remove that aspect of the curse, possibly nerfing the character a bit to compensate
I'm glad you can do that, being able to talk with your DM is super important, well done.
I ignore that on general, and so does my DM
What program+brushes do you use to draw on?
I use photoshop and for the most part I use the round brush. I have 2 custom brushes for when I want a pencil feel and a texture brush for final touch ups.
I want to play a kenku .. exactly BECAUSE I'm limited to few words.
I wanted to start as a changeling! WOOOW! Such transformation, very adaptable! Easy game!
NO!
If I got too mich freedom, I lose interest WAY TOO FAST!
Its basically the cheating argument:
Why didn't you play this anymore?
I cheated everything into existance!
So I need a limitation!
A thing that stops me from doing whatever I want without repercussions
Always good to find a DM that can help you play your characters to their potential and stay within their limits.
One thing I don't understand: If Kenku can mimic speech, and understand common... in what way can they not speak? That sounds like speaking to me.
Its a curse. They can only repeat exact phrases heard or single words. It's meant to be a challenge. I always ask my players to take it as a serious challenge, maybe with a note book or similar. Or just not to use it al all
@@Rookzer0 The thing is most of our vocabulary as humans is from mimicry we lerned from our parents. So I imagine Kenku actually speak pretty well if with a mix of difrent voices most of the time only having problems when neache or obscured phrases come by.
I basicly just played my Kenku as having a patchwork of voices but near compleate word list. Like the phrase "Do you know how to get to brewery." For example being mostly one voice as that is a common question with only brewery being from a difrent voice. The drawback is just a fun option to me not in how much I can actualy speek but how Idescribe myself speaking. Like mixing siliors voice and kids voice for disonance and stuff lime that. I dont actualy fully speak that way I just give a sample and do descripti9n how that line sounded.
Just play him like bumblebee LOL
I would love to see one of my players do that.
Kenku are very much inspired by the Tengu, so here's how to make a ninja in DnD: ua-cam.com/video/XIRRoprnYG8/v-deo.html
Nice find, thank you