Farewell to a true Paladin

Andrew Breitbart's death hit me a lot harder than I expected given that I'd never met him and in fact knew little about his personal life until his passing. Learning that he was only in his early 40's with four children about the same age mine were when John died was an extra shock beyond the general loss of such a courageous voice for conservativism who had seemed so unstoppable just weeks ago.

In a desire to do my hobbity bit to carry on his work and given that I "don't get out much" to put it mildly, and those I do interact with mostly agree, I hit upon making a blond human male character for the MMORPG that I play and naming him Breitandrew (yes that's pretty small stuff but it's what I had).

The next question was what sort of character Breitbart would have been. Was he a warrior? The term "happy warrior" was used frequently that day and was certainly accurate but didn't seem to quite fit. Was he a rogue? Okay, well yes, in terms of personality there seemed to be a good bit of roguishness but as a conservative voice there was certainly never any hiding or sneaking in what he did(although I admire his dexterity with laying traps for the media to run into) so that wouldn't work. A cleric? He seemed to have given many people wise advice over the years but binding up the wounded wasn't really part of what he did. Sorcerer? Wizard? No, although apparently Greg Gutfeld's wife called him a wizard, it was not sheer mental brilliance that affected so many people who'd never met him. I seriously considered an artificier, which is a new DDO class combining sniping attacks, magic, and an iron defender pet( that I would have called Ace in homage to the HQ) but it just didn't seem the right fit either.

Then it came to me. A fighter with a great deal of charisma, and I thinks it's pretty clear Breitbart had charisma to spare, is a paladin. His role is to both fight the monsters, zombies and kobolds seeming very appropriate in this case, directly by going toe-to-toe with the biggest guy in the room and, just as importantly, to strengthen and give courage to those who are with him, which Breitbart certainly did as well. As a paladin advances in levels it becomes impossible to force him to flee even if he's frightened and he extends this ability to the entire party. He also has the "smite evil" ability which deals a strong blow to a foe, making it possible for others to finish it off. I believe that both of these traits were much in evidence in Breitbart's life and many were better for having come in contact with him, even virtually and at third hand as in my case.