Character Creation: Scum & Villainy

Well, sure. This'll be quick.

The Game: Scum & Villainy
The Publisher: Off Guard Games, by way of Evil Hat 
Degree of Familiarity: Haven't played it, but I ran a very long game of Blades in the Dark, and this basically Blades in space
Books Required: Just the one

Scum and Villainy works on the same principles and systems as Blades, right down to doing jobs and having downtime and so on, but it sets the action in the Procyon Sector of space, consisting of four star systems, in which our space-scoundrels must contend with the Empire Alliance Hegemony. Yes, there are parts of it that are heavily derivative of Star Wars and Firefly, but that's fine. Presumably you're playing this game because you want to evoke parts of those properties, without actually going all the way and having to learn the lore.

As with Blades, there's lore here but it's pretty non-intrusive. And as with Blades, part of character creation would normally be crew creation (and, here, ship creation), but as it's just li'l ol' me, I'll just make my character and assume someone would hire him.

As such, I need to pick a role. I'm torn between Mystic and Stitch. Mystics get to muck about with the Force Way, and that means using fun artifacts and powers, but the Stitch is meant to be the moral compass of the crew and that sounds like something I'd enjoy. I'll think I'll do that.

My starting ability is I'm a doctor, not a... which allows me to roll my doctor rating instead of another one, which is awesome. I also get a special ability. Hmm. I'll take combat medic. I can spend special armor to resist a consequence while I'm doctoring someone, and I clear stress if I doctor someone in combat (note that I can't necessarily clear harm during action, but that's OK, lots of other reasons to doctor).

Now I pick a Heritage. I want something that lends itself to my combat medic prowess. I don't want to be a xeno (alien). I think spacer or colonist would make the most sense, since I just made a character who grew up in space for After the War, I'll do colonist. I get a detail, there, too, so I'll say my detail is one of the 77 survivors of M32. My character was part of a colonist party that was all but wiped out on a moon designated M32.

Background is next. I'll pick military. He joined the military after getting off M32 and was a combat medic for a while, but was discharged when it was discovered that he falsified his medical documentation. He only did that because the institution where he trained no longer existed and he couldn't prove his cred any other way, but the Hegemony wasn't interested. Dishonorably discharged combat medic.

Next up, action ratings. I start with doctor 2 (duh) and study 1. I'm meant to choose one that reflects heritage, one that reflects background, and then two anywhere. Well, I want a point in scramble (lots of that going on back on M32) and scrap (I was a soldier, after all). And then I'll take one in command (again, military training) and one in rig (you learn to improvise when you're in the shit).

Choose a friend and a rival from the list. Well, for my friend, I'll take Jackev. He's a former comrade-in-arms, and most of the "drugs" he sells are purely medicinal. He just sells them illegally. For my rival, I'll take Lynie, a hospital admin. My guy applied for a job at the hospital after getting discharged, and Lynie not only gave him the boot, but informed other hospitals in the system about him. Snitches get stitches, man.

Pick a vice. I want gambling. I see this guy as someone who's not given to vices that impaired his senses, but he's pretty superstitious and prone to confirmation bias. His particular poison is games of dice and cards. No online or video gambling, that shit's rigged.

Name, alias, look. OK. His name is Wyndam Zer, but he goes by Dice (I almost went with "Bones," as in "roll 'em", but then I caught myself). For look, I'll say that Dice wears the remnants of his uniform, but he's stripped it of any insignia or indicator, so you could only tell by the cut and the fabric that it's Hegemony issue.

Dice is what you might call "grizzled." He's not unfriendly and he's not grouchy, but he's been through some shit and he kind of feels like he got dealt a bum hand being on M32. He doesn't like to talk about what happened there, but I think that the 77 survivors can all detect one another - they recognize each other on sight. That would be a nifty plot point to have surface, I think.

That's it!