Character Creation: Summerland

No, no one did an RPG based on this song. It's a post-apocalyptic game in which, overnight, a huge forest covers most of the world. Most people feel a pull called the Call, which drags them into the forest where they are (presumably) eaten by monsters. Some folks are immune, but it's because they're psychologically damaged enough to make it through the Sea of Leaves (which I think is a cool title). They're called drifters.

This looks like fun! Let's do a character.

The Game: Summerland
The Publisher: Fire Ruby Studios, but they don't seem to have a web page.
Degree of Familiarity: Just reading it now.
Books Required: Just the one.

The book recommends that the group figure out their themes and tone of the game - are we doing horror? Hope for humanity? Survivalist? I will, as usual, go with the example of play provided. In that, hope-horror-magic is the order of theme, while survivalist-action-investigation is the style of play. I can get behind that.

OK, so, Step One is Imagine your character. Basically, concept first. Keen. My character is in his 40s, balding, five-o-clock shadow at 10 in the morning, but going salt-and-pepper. Used to be pretty large, has become pretty lean in the aftermath of the world ending. Missing his ring and pinky fingers on his ring hand, and favors his right leg. Not sure why yet, some kind of accident.

I picture him in jeans, a vest jacket, and a silver teardrop necklace on a leather cord. His ears are both pierced, but he doesn't wear earrings anymore (since the Event, metal makes him itch). His name is George Swinton.

Let's move on to Qualities. I get 20 points to split between four of them, with 5 being average (bravo, guys). I figure Finesse will be lower for George; he's fit, but not really fast or dextrous due to his injuries. I'll put Finesse at 3, Mind at 7, Body at 4 and Empathy at 6.

Tags. Each Quality has descriptors attached. If you've been reading, you know I like these; Slasher Flick does something similar. I get two per Quality, and one of them has to be negative. So I'll put "lame" under Body, since George walks with a limp. I'll also put "tireless" there - he moves slow, but he can go forever.

Oh, wait, no, I get one Tag per Quality, except my highest (Mind) gets two. OK. I'll leave "tireless," because I want a negative Tag under Finesse. I'll put "lame" there - George is slow. Those are both descriptive tag. I'll put "good memory" and "horticulturist" under Mind - one's descriptive, the other is specialized skill. And finally, under Empathy I'll put "kind."

They each get a value equal to half the Quality, rounded down.

Trauma: Drifters are psychologically scarred, and obviously the accident was important to George. Maybe it wasn't an accident? I don't know, and actually I don't have to figure it out now - it comes out in play (again, I like this). I just note "the accident" for now. My Trauma and Stress both start at 5, and go down in play. The goal is to get to 0 Trauma.

Stuff: I get a couple of possessions that define George. This is in addition to clothes and camping gear, which I'm assumed to have. George has that teardrop necklace around his neck, which is special to him for some reason. He also has a pill bottle with five Vicodin in it. He doesn't take them, but he knows he could if his leg ever got really bad. I also decide that George was a carpenter/landscaper until the injury, and he left his community because he felt ashamed of his injuries and that he couldn't do his job anymore.

And that's it! That was easy. I may have to run this game, this looks cool.

Character Creation: Slipstream

I feel like making a character, and Savage Worlds characters are quick.

The Game: Slipstream
The Publisher: Pinnacle Entertainment Group
Degree of Familiarity: Pretty familiar with Savage Worlds, but I've only read this game.
Books Required: The core the Slipstream book.

Well, as usual for a Savage Worlds game, we begin with Race. There are lots of playable races, a few of which are fully detailed, but then there's a whole section on making your own race. I'm tempted to do that, but I'm also tempted by the slug people, just because, seriously, wtf.

OK, I hate to admit this, but you know why I'm going with the slug aliens? Because they can release a foul stench that uses the burst template, and that's fun. Oy. So, race is Septosian (oh, and all of these races slipped into this part of the universe through a black hole or something. The Septosians originally inhabited the twin worlds Andee and Hopp. That's in the book).

As a Septosian, I get All Thumbs (boo), Rubbery (+1 Toughness), Squelchy (-2 to Stealth and +4 to track me because I leave a trail of slime), Stench (the aforementioned horrible smell) and Tentacles (my arms are stretchy).

OK, so now I need some kind of concept. Well, Michelle mentions the slugs in Flushed Away (here) and now the idea of a Septosian bard, incorporating the squelchy noises of his own squishy body as percussion, is in my head and won't fucking leave. FINE. That's what we're doing.

Septosians have names in the burpy, slurpy style of their language, so my guy's name is Plep. Plep is fascinated by music, especially music of other races, and he's interested in learning to play various instruments and sing in different styles. Being a slug actually helps that, because his vocal apparatus is squishy and malleable, meaning he's a good mimic. Mostly he just wants to bring the gift of music to those downtrodden by Queen Anathraxa. I suspect he'd need a good, hard kick in the motivation during the first session, but he'd be receptive.

Right, Attributes. Agility is important, as is Spirit, for me. So I'll take:

Agility d8
Strength d4
Spirit d8
Smarts d4
Vigor d6

Now, Skills. I get 15 points. I want:

Gambling d4
Guts d4
Knowledge (Music) d8
Notice d6
Fighting d4
Persuasion d8
Streetwise d4
Taunt d8

Good start. I see a lot of taunt to get Shaken results in his future.

Skipping Derived traits because duh, they should go at the end, I need to do Edges. Now, if I take the Heroic Hindrance in addition to any others I take, I get a free Edge for which I can ignore Rank. Um, yes. For my free Edge, I'll take Charismatic.

Now, more Hindrances? Yes, probably. I want Curious for my Major Hindrance. For my minors, I'll take Loyal and Pacifist. Seems he's a nice slug.

So that gives me four points. I'll burn 2 and put my Smarts up to d6, and burn the other two on Skills, I think. I'll put Guts up to d8, and buy Shooting at d6.

Oh, right, and then I get an Edge. There are a few I like, but I'll take Luck. I think he'll need it.

And now Derived Traits. Pace is 6, Parry is 4, Toughness is 6 (because I'm Rubbery) and Charisma is +2.

I get 500 Slips (moneys). I'll buy "leather" armor (it's not really leather), a ray gun (turns everyone into a guy named Ray), a bubble helmet, and that'll do it. That leaves me 230 Slips left.

And that'll do it! I figure Plep always carries a few varieties of musical instrument, stuff that's small and portable. If he had quarters on a ship, they'd need to be soundproofed.

Character Creation: Fae Noir

Well, since I ran it the other day and everything, figure I may as well make a character, yeah? I made some notes about the game in my last post, so let's rock.

The Game: Fae Noir
The Publisher: Green Fairy Games
Degree of Familiarity: Played it once at GenCon, ran it last night.
Books Required: Just the one.

So, the first step is "Conceptualize all over the place." I just cleaned my table so I'll probably try to keep it contained.

There are a number of different sorts of fae to play. If I want to play a character with True Faith, I can't play a faerie. Likewise, if I want to play someone using magic, I need to play either a human or a Tuatha. So I guess I'll play a faerie, since I played a human spellcaster when I played this once before.

There are 10 species of fairy listed, so I'll just roll a d10 for my race. That'll kickstart a concept. '8' give me...Ogre! Sure, I can be a bruiser.

OK, so according to the book, ogres are big, strong and stupid. They take orders well, but they aren't very motivated just by themselves. Hmm. The fae returned in 1918, the default setting for the line is 1923 or so. Let's assume that my ogre is a mob enforcer. He popped over from Faery and went about doing ogre things - eating people in the dark, and so on. And then a member of the local mob (I'd like the GM create a colorful figure for me) stood up to me, gave me a job breaking legs, and offered to keep me out of the iron shackles that the cops would undoubtedly like to slap me in.

Over the last few months, though, Fish (my character's nickname, because his eyes bug out and he has flaps of skin on his neck that kind of look like gills) hasn't been then leg-breaker my boss has been using. Might be because he's not subtle enough, or it could be because Fish likes to get drunk and then he brags. Either way, the clock might be running out for ol' Fish.

OK, good 'nuff for concept. Next up, we do Attributes. There are 8 of them, I get bonuses in Strength and Toughness but I take penalties in Looks, Intelligence and Agility.

OK, so this is weird. So, you start at given minimums for Attributes. Mostly it's 1, but, f'rex, as an ogre I start with Strength 3. I also, according to the fairy splat write-ups in the book, get a +3 to Strength, but a -3 to Looks. My maximum Looks is 4. So do I have to pump my Looks to 7 in order to get that? Is my Strength of 3 just...a given, or is it really 6 (that is, start at 3 and apply a boost later)? This is poorly explained, and the examples of chargen are human and Tuatha, which don't have much in the way of modifiers to use as examples. Bad form, Justin.

Well, since the modifiers match up with the min/max totals, I'll just leave it at that. Oh, wait, except I get a +3 to Strength, meaning my starting value should be 4. Ah, screw it. Assuming I start with one in everything (except Strength and Toughness, where I start with 3), I spend my 16 points thusly:

Agility 3
Strength 8
Toughness 6
Speed 3
Looks 1
Intelligence 2
Willpower 2
Perception 3

There we go.

Next up, Skills! I get 18 points here. Since there's no benefit to having a low Skill rating, I'll only wind up with a few with higher ratings.

Club 5
Roughhousing 5
Criminal Underbelly 4
Athletics 4

There we go. Now, Personality Flaws! I get 4 points. Let's do 3 in Blood-Thirsty and one in Obnoxious (he talks too much). That'll do.

And now, Build Points. Characters start with 42, but I lose 19 for being an ogre (because extra Strength is totally worth that. Oy.). That'd be 23, then.

Well, I can't buy Glamour and I can't buy magic. Looks like I should look at Edges. Well, I'll spend two points on Made, so I'm an official gangster. I'll Fists of Iron, too - I can beat on people wearing armor and not hurt myself.

Let's maybe buy some Skills? I have 18 points left. Skills are 1/1 unless I go over the linked Attribute, in which case they're 2/1. Let's spend 4 and knock Club and Roughhousing to 7, which is as high as they can go during chargen. Let's buy 2 in Bootlegging for two points, and then spend 4 more to knock it up to 4. Athletics is based on Agility...you know, maybe my last 12 points would be better spent in Attributes?

Those are 2/1, and my Agility and Speed could be higher. I can buy 6 points worth of Attributes with 12 points, which is 3 in each, which puts them both to 6. Much more better.

That means that folks have a +1 to target numbers to shoot me (I'm nimble!). I do an extra wound level because I'm fucking strong. I get an extra Severe Health Level, +2 to Initiative.

Ooh...but with Looks 1, I get 5 points of Personality Flaws to spend on various things. I'll take Ugly 5, and my low Intelligence means Skills are more expensive to raise with experience (which is stupid; it should only apply to Skills that you don't learn purely practically, but anyway).

On reflection, I like that having high or low Attributes means that you get these little bennies. That offsets the fact that you don't roll them much.

Do I still use this blog?

Yes, yes I do. Just very occasionally.

So, just to keep everyone up to speed on what's going on: I still blog over at my Livejournal (which is here). That's the spot for most of my online blather, but that may change. There's just not much going on in LJ-land anymore, and honestly this site is easier for me to access. So I may move my four main blog projects (cooking, actual play reports, movie reviews and character creation) over here soon.

I'm currently in the process of putting curse the darkness together, with the help of Michelle, Sarah and lots of other awesome people. There's a Facebook page for the game (here, so go Like us) and a Twitter that I'm using to update about the game and to post funny things my gamers say (here, go follow us). And, of course, the main development of the game is ongoing over at cursethedarkness.net.

So that's where we are. You might be seeing more activity here real soon-like.