Character Creation: Trinity

Fun fact: This game was originally called Æon, but then MTV sued (or maybe just threatened to sue) White Wolf, and they had to put stickers on the cover of the books. That's why the other two games start with "A" and Trinity is the odd one out.  

The Game: Trinity
The publisher: White Wolf
Degree of familiarity: None, really. I read it, I've run Aberrant and played Adventure! (and made characters for both, as you know), but my experience with Trinity pretty much ends there.
Books Required: Just the Trinity book.

What everybody knows about Trinity (other than the whole "should've been called Æon but MTV sucks" thing) is that it's a space opera game, the first in the Æonverse (though chronologically the last), and it's a fairly typical White Wolf game. Mountains of setting, serviceable mechanics, lots of dots.

Sci-Fi isn't really my bag, normally. In fact, I'm not sure where I got the book. Probably snagged it from the WW warehouse before I left Atlanta. Like I said, I've read it, but skimming over it now I don't have a lot of memory of all of the setting conceits. There's a lot going on, which I like as an ST, but it does make character creation a little overwhelming - how much of this do I need to know?

Well, let's do this. Since I know step one is going to be "get a concept," I'll flip to a random place in the setting half of the book and find a hook that interest me. Hang on. OK, I flip to the section on Nippon. What I find interesting here is that Nippon was isolated during the Aberrant Wars, and everything's gotten really tech'd all to fuck. Lots of simulated intelligences, and folks treat them like pets or kids. And I think I'd like to play a telepath or empath, born into a society where people talk to machines like they're really people, and they fucking aren't, because people with real minds feel real.

Finding out that he wasn't crazy or afflicted with some kind of mental disorder, but that he was creeped out by SIs because he's a psi, was the best thing that ever happened to Yori Tanaka. Always a twitchy, kind of emo kid, he flipped out when he was 10 and got put on lots of different kinds of meds. Nothing really helped. It wasn't until he turned 15 that someone figured he might be a latent psion, and shipped him to China for testing. Of course, he wound up at the Ministry.

As an aside: Is it me, or is having every telepath be a Ministry member really...stupid? Why can't I make a dude who's a telepath but works for one of the other orders? Blah. Stupid splats. So glad that WW got less rigid about that, even if it did take three NWoD games for them to do it.

Right, I think that's enough to start.

Step One: Concept. As above. Yori (or "Lucky" as his Western friends call him) is about the opposite of the cold, stone-faced Ministry op. He loves people and animals, hates robots an SIs (they just don't feel right). He's friendly, if a little jumpy, still, but is quite happy to enforce all of the nutty laws that the Ministry wants enforced, if it means he gets to stay the fuck away from "fake minds." I might give him some bioware, too, just because it means he can't go home again (Nippon kills people with bioware).

I already know my Aptitude and Allegiance (Telepathy and the Ministry, respectively), but I have to choose an Origin - life before psi. I pick Outsider. Lucky did not fit in with his friends, all cooing over their virtual dogs and people and so on. Ew. For Nature, I'll take Caregiver. Like I said, Lucky likes people. He just doesn't like fake people.

Step Two: Choosing Attributes. The usual OWoD split, 7/5/3. I think if Lucky had grown up elsewhere, he'd wind up more Social, but Nippon's society led him to live in his own head. That makes Mental primary, Social secondary, and leaves Physical as tertiary.

Mental: I'll put Intelligence and Perception both at 4, and leave Wits at 2. Lucky is jumpy, but not especially fast.

Social: Three into Manipulation, one each into Charisma and Appearance. Good at talking, not great at the first impression thing, by compare.

Physical: Average across the board.

Step Three: Choosing Abilities. I get 10 in my Ability Group, and then 13 more anywhere, and can't go over 3 in any one. Looking at the Abilities in the Ministry's group, I can see I'm going to specialize somewhat, since a lot of these skills aren't very much what I have in mind for Lucky. I'll put three into Rapport, obviously. Three into Interrogation; Lucky is amazing at the "good cop" part of good cop/bad cop. I'll put two into Bureaucracy (he likes knowing his place) and one each into Martial Arts and Etiquette.

Now I get 13 more points for any Abilities I like. Athletics is a must; 1 dot for now. I'll put one more in Martial Arts. Two into Stealth. Three into Awareness, two into Investigation (perceptive, and by the way, telepathic). Two into Linguistics (for the English and Chinese families; Nihonjin is his native). One dot in Engineering (did grow up in Nippon, after all) and one in Subterfuge round me out.

Step Four: Advantages. I get seven dots in Backgrounds. Let's check 'em out. I'll take a dot in Citizenship (Nippon and China). Two into Cipher; he's just one of those guys. One into Status with the Ministry. And, the other three into Device, which I'll leave off on deciding just yet (since I might buy more dots with bonus points).

I get three dots to buy Modes, and my choices are Empathy, Mindshare and Psychbending. Hang on while I read those. OK, I like the basic powers for these three, but I think the second-dot powers are too aggressive for Lucky, at least for now. I'll buy the first dot of each of them.

Step Five: Finishing Touches. I start with 5 Willpower. My Psi starts at 3 because the Attributes upon which it's based suck. My Initiative starts at four, but that I might raise. My movement starts based on my Dexterity, which I doubt I'll raise, so Lucky walks 5m, runs 14m, and sprints 26m.

OK, now bonus points. Well, since my Psi is my dice pool for all my magic telepathy, better raise that to five. Which eats 10 of my points. Balls. I spend two more to buy a dot of Academics (I hate not having that Ability), one to buy Device to four, one to buy a Good Cop Specialty in Interrogation, and one to buy an Aikido Specialty in Martial Arts. That leaves my Initiative at 4, incidentally. But I do need four dots worth of Device. Ah, hell. Looking at this, it's not that you get special gear from this Background. This is the magic item Background, which means I have to fucking make something up. OK. Checking out the gear section, I like the bioweave armor. But since this is a Device, it's extra special. I think this bioweave armor works naturally with the flow of Lucky's body, allowing him to boost his ability to deflect incoming force (same principles as Aikido, almost). He can add his Marital Arts rating to his soak, as well as his armor rating. That's still not uber enough, but I'd need to actually play the game to get a sense of what would be. Oh, and some examples might've been nice, guys.

Now, where'd he get it? By mistake, I think. He checked the wrong box on a form, the form somehow got sent to R&D, and he got the damn bioweave with an experimental upgrade, wouldn't ya know. Just Lucky, I guess. Also would give me a good reason to boost Martial Arts in play.