History Characters / PennyArcade

Originally known as Chuck, an anti-Apple strawman, he had a great fall and was retooled as the hipper Charles. Lives across from Gabe and Tycho and occasionally visits to talk about Apple-based matters.

%%* BadassBeard

* KillerGameMaster: Attempting to impart his wisdom onto Gabe, nonetheless.
** Though it turns out he hasn't actually run a game since junior high because of his Killer Game Master reputation.

* SesquipedalianLoquaciousness: Frequent. In the Penny Arcade card game, there is an attack of his that deals damage based on the number of letters in a given card. In-universe, he has an enormous affinity for words and grammar, to the point where Gabe letting him babble about Bookworm Adventures is his christmas present.
** Occasionally lampshaded in the news posts [[SelfDeprecation where he calls it]] "faux erudition", implying that he is excessively wordy on purpose.

* SophisticatedAsHell: Especially apparent in TheRant.

* GameMaster: "Your party stands before the Cave of Tits."
** Ironically, despite his anti-RPG sentiments in the early days of the strip, he arguably spends more times with tabletop games these days than ''Tycho'' does.

* RefugeInAudacity[=/=][[RefugeInVulgarity Vulgarity]]

* BareYourMidriff: In the earlier strips.

* LittleMissBadass

* BadassBeard

* UpToEleven: Whatever Tycho's deepest desire really is, Jesus states that acquiring it would damn even him.

* SmallReferencePools: You'd have a hard time finding anyone who knew what a DIVX player was even in 1998, today it's borderline archeological.

* UpToEleven: Whatever Tycho's deepest desire really is, Jesus states that aquiring it would damn even him.

* ShellShockedVeteran: He's a Vietnam veteran, and his experiences in the war has completely warped him.

* ICallItVera: Named his personal M4 Carbine "Vera" after the TropeNamer.
* LetsGetDangerous: When zombies overran the mall in the ''Armadeaddon'' arc, Frank was one of the handful of people trapped inside. He pulled out his old army helmet and asked Vera if she wanted to go dancing.

! Jerry's and Mike's Families
Comic versions of the real-life spouses and children of Jerry and Mike. Usually deployed for strips that are inspired by things that happened to the creators away from their offices and in the world at large.

* ActuallyPrettyFunny: When Tycho makes an IncrediblyLamePun related to sawing KrisStraub in half so they can have an even number of players, Gabe exclaims "Damn son, there's that gallows humor!"

* AmbiguouslyBi: His fantasies about Franchise/SpiderMan and Creator/PatrickSwayze tend to point this way. Not to mention his weird on-off HoYay with Apple fanboy Charles.

* OnlyHereForGodzilla: Or [[https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2018/11/16/radio-active Fallout soundtrack]]. Or [[https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2011/02/04/urdhva-mukha-svanasana slow-motion bullets]].

* AmbiguouslyBi: His fantasies about SpiderMan and Creator/PatrickSwayze tend to point this way. Not to mention his weird on-off HoYay with Apple fanboy Charles.

* CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass: The Cardboard Tube Samurai ''is'' Gabe. Therefore he can slice things up with a perfectly round tube. He can actually cause nosebleeds by hating someone, which ''may'' be caused by the fact that [[Franchise/StarWars Darth Vader]] [[LukeIAmYourFather might be his dad]]. Oh, and he got a blood infusion from SpiderMan. Hell, in ''the very first comic'', he gained psychic powers.

!UsefulNotes/JesusChrist

Yeah, [[Literature/TheBible that one]]. In addition to being the Lord and Savior of Mankind, he loves fighting games, first person shooters, and is, in general, [[JesusWasWayCool way cool]].

* OnlyHereForGodzilla: Or for [[https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2018/11/16/radio-active songs]].

! Jerry's and Mike's Families
Comic versions of the real-life spouses and children of Jerry and Mike. Usually deployed for strips that are inspired by things that happened to the creators away from their offices and in the world at large.

* CameBackStrong: He was originally a dorky cipher the authors used to mock Mac gamers, but when Halo was cancelled for the Mac, Chuck attempted to kill himself by jumping out the window. The reconstructive surgery not only made him look cooler, but also changed his personality to the much more suave Charles.

* NoodleIncident: Exactly what led to the loss of his eye during a Warcraft 2 match is never revealed, but it has far enough reaching consequences that it meant he and Tycho had to make a pact to not play any future Warcraft games against eachother.

* ViolenceIsTheOnlyOption: Gabe's knee-jerk reaction to nearly everything. He once curb stomped Tycho to death because he thought there was only one copy of VideoGame/PuzzleQuest left in the store, and tore out Tycho and Charles's throats with his teeth when he panicked over the proper pronounciation of "Gif".

* IThoughtItMeant: In one strip, Gabe asks Jesus for info on the coming Nintendo Revolution (the development name for the Wii), and Jesus thought he was talking about an unspecified future cataclysm involving cybernetic apes that would lead to humanity being forced underground.

* DeadpanSnarker

* {{Jerkass}}

* AxCrazy

* BiTheWay: Arguable. His fantasies about SpiderMan and Creator/PatrickSwayze tend to point this way. Not to mention his weird on-off HoYay with Apple fanboy Charles.

* {{Fetish}}: Has expressed attraction to numerous things: giraffes, ostriches, jellyfish, and whatever's at [=ColdTurkeys.com=]. More specifically, he's said he's attracted to long, slender necks, of the sort you can't usually find on humans. He's also [[https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2017/11/29/the-f-word implied that he finds literature-related mods]] (such as quill physics) as titillating as other people find nudity mods.

* {{Fetish}}: Has expressed attraction to numerous things: giraffes, ostriches, jellyfish, and whatever's at [=ColdTurkeys.com=]. More specifically, he's said he's attracted to long, slender necks, of the sort you can't usually find on humans.

* TheBeastmaster: A pet dragon, a phoenix, unicorn, and several VideoGame/{{Pokemon}} to his name. At one point he also managed to aquire a flock of {{Pikmin}} that proceeded to trash the apartment and kill Tycho. And his roster may grow at any time...

!JesusChrist

* SirSwearsALot

* ManChild

* PsychopathicManchild

* CovertPervert
* GranolaGirl

* LittleMissSnarker

* JesusWasWayCool

* SitcomArchNemesis: To Gabe.

* LetsGetDangerous: Can, if necessary, activate Code Omega. [[GoryDiscretionShot We don't see what this entails]], but it's enough to turn a horde of zombies into chunky salsa.

* PalsWithJesus: Gabe mostly. He's friendly with Tycho, but its difficult to bond with someone who doesnt think you exist.

* {{Badass}}: Facing Jim, an undead skeleton necromancer in "Armadeaddon," Tycho goes, "I'll handle this." Pulling out his red d20, he says, "Roll for initiative." He gets a "natural 20"--this gets Jim to KnowWhenToFoldEm (and realize someone who can roll natural 20s can only ensure he'd beat Jim's scenario).

* {{Fetish}}: Has expressed attraction to numerous things: giraffes, jellyfish, and whatever's at [=ColdTurkeys.com=]. More specifically, he's said he's attracted to long, slender necks, of the sort you can't usually find on humans.