I used to play Advanced Dungeons & Dragons in 1978, now I have Pathfinder which came out in 2009.

There are 30 years between these rulesets. It is still pretty much the same game, but I love the ‘Iconic’ characters they created for the Pathfinder universe. They use these Iconics in all the illustrations in the rulebooks and in the card game and they all look really cool, especially Seelah the Paladin. Here she is standing off against a giant worm of some kind.

But, for me, the archetypal Paladin will always be this old full page illustration from the 1978 Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Players Handbook, ‘A Paladin in Hell’:

There are 30 years between these illustrations, but the old black & white better captures the feel of a holy avenger battling against insurmountable odds.