An artist's representation of Bubbeleh the Wizard.

In my Internet ramblings yesterday, I saw that Topless Robot was running a contest about the worst RPG characters a person’s ever played. The contest ended that morning, roughly five hours before I woke up, so it was far too late to enter, but I figured that I might as well share my story.

See, I’d played around on RPG forums before. This was when I was new on the Internet, and did not know the depravity to which the tubes could sink. I must have been 12 or 13, and was extremely awkward. I don’t mean that in the hyperbolic terminology of contemporary society; I mean that I was extremely awkward. I’d wind up in these Forgotten Realms-type chat rooms where everyone was a ranger, and my character would lurk in the corner of some tavern or something while God knows what went on. In my chair in front of the computer, I’d be just a little more scarred.

But that’s not an example of the worst character I’ve played. Indeed, those characters, while bad, were mainly just… meh. No, the worst character I played was created to be bad. He was an alcoholic Wood Elf Wizard named Bubbeleh with a raven familiar named Boychick, and this is his story.
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