Tharsis was one of Segwyne's companions. He is a dwarven fighter, and although he didn't change race, he did have a surprise in store for him. Tharsis wasn't my dominant character, as I have difficulty playing two dominant characters at the same time. But I did invest quite a bit of time into him and enjoyed playing him very much.
Tharsis' adventures were the same as Segwyne's, since they were in the same party, but towards the end of the campaign, Tharsis' life took a different twist. As they were cavorting around the world, they passed through an ancient dwarven stronghold, and Tharsis' life was never the same. This was before Dellak got gobbled up and spit back out by his god, while we were still searching for the Oracle of Tel av el Raiz.
We spent several days working our way through the ancient stronghold, on a continent where no dwarves were known to have lived for centuries. One night we made camp in a room that had a throne. Now Tharsis was an excellent fighter, and quite cocky. So he sat himself down in the throne. Worse, still, he donned the helm he found there. Of course, this being a fantasy adventure, it was no ordinary helm. It was the helm of the one true king of the dwarves, and only the one true king could wear the helm and not go insane. Only he would also be able to take it off again. Needless to say, Tharsis did not go insane, being, of course, the one true dwarven king. Tharsis now had to accept his new role, and that meant more than just saying, "Woohoo! Now I'm king!" As we traveled from city to city, dwarves began to defer to him, and he had to step up and take the responsibility that goes with such power. At one point, a few hundred dwarves decided to follow him out of their stronghold and tried to join our adventuring party. There were skeptics, as well, and Tharsis had to prove he was worthy to be king through a trial of combat. He began to turn more often to his comrade Balin, who was a priest of Moridan, the traditional advisors to the king. This brought in more intraparty roleplay, which is always cool.
Eventually, we stumbled across an abandoned stronghold that had been taken over by drow. We evicted the drow and Tharsis set up his own stronghold with the tag-along refugees that had come to see him as their Messiah. Tharsis did not go with the rest of the party when they went to the tower that sent them back in time, so remained in his proper time and began establishing a stronghold with the hopes of uniting all the independent strongholds under one crown. His, of course.
