Character Creation: The Devil, John Moulton

Had a really shit day yesterday, today's not looking particularly great either, although at least I'm able to get off the couch. Depression sucks, I hate it. So obviously I'm gonna make a character for a light-hearted, silly ga-

The Game: The Devil, John Moulton
The Publisher: Teapot Dome Games
Degree of Familiarity: None yet
Books Required: Just the one

Oh, goddammit. 

I mean, I joke, but this is very much the kind of game that a) I would love to play/run and b) would 100% give me Feels. It's about a group of people who all sold their souls to the Devil (in the personage of John Moulton) and are hunting his happy ass down. Along the way, you might be gunned down, you might walk away into the desert forever, you might be eaten by demons, or you might actually catch Moulton and make him pay. 

This is very much a work-in-progress kind of game, and I know that because the game tells us so. Using my keen powers of former-game-designer perception, this very much feels like a pre-publish iteration of a game, but it also looks very much playable. Character creation without a group is going to be somewhat difficult but not impossible, so let's do this!

The way this would work in a real game is that all of the players would get dealt X cards (not X-cards, though this is very much a game that should have one of those on the table), where X determines how long the game is going to be. More cards = longer game. Let's assume I'm making a character for a one-shot, so the hands would be five cards. This deck is a custom deck, BTW, consisting of 48 cards, so I'm gonna grab a deck of cards, remove a few, and figure out a way to make this work.

OK, got it. There are five types of cards (Who Were You, Scruple, Secret, Act of Evil, and Demonic Miracle). So let's pull out the Jacks, and say the suits correspond to those card types in hearts, diamonds, spades, and clubs, and the remaining eight face cards are Demonic Miracles. 

(Would it have been less work to just print out the damn cards? Who knows.)

So, dealing myself 5 cards, I get:

• Who Were You? A bounty hunter
• Who Were You? A former robber baron, now penniless
• Scruple: I never let an innocent be hurt
• Secret: I need to kill the Devil John before he gets to my loved ones
• Scruple: If someone shows an honest desire to atone for their past, I'm gonna help them

I get to pick one of these cards, and then "pass" the rest to the left. Boy, tough call. I think I'll just lean in to how I'm feeling today and pick the last one. I would now get handed 4 more cards, so I'll pick four more and pretend they came from whoever is sitting to my right (probably that'd be Gus). 

• Who Were You? A criminal on the run
• Scruple: I only fight in fair fights; no ambushes, no ganging up, etc.
• Scruple: I always want to see the corrupt and powerful taken down
• Demonic Miracle: The Golden Boot

Hmm. Well, I don't want the miracle (I can hang my boot up by the mantle and Santa Moulton fills it with gold coins, which is cool and all but eh). I already have a Scruple, so I think I'll take the "criminal on the run." Set the rest aside, deal three more:

• Who Were You? A freed slave seeking fortune
• Secret: I'm just out for money. I'd switch sides if Moulton offered more
• Secret: Devil John has lived for centuries, and I want to be immortal, too

Well, I think I want to be immortal, thanks. Now I get two more cards, and I pick one and discard the other.  

• Demonic Miracle: Money Talks 
• Secret: Devil John holds my heart in a lock little silver box

Once again, that miracle doesn't do anything for me. I shall take the extra secret. 

So now, some backstory. Danny Barker rode with a gang of hoodlums and robbers for a while. They got caught by what they thought were Marshals, but it turned out these "lawmen" were planning on stringing them up in the middle of nowhere, taking their loot, and continuing their work. As they were being led to the gallows, Danny saw another man riding alongside them - the Devil John. He made a bargain with him, and the Devil John reached into Danny's chest and took his heart, and locked it in a little box. Danny survived the hanging, but he's had a change of heart (lol) since. He believes that it's possible to do enough good to balance out the bad, if you have enough time. But he's got a lot to do, and that means he needs the time. And for that, he needs his heart. 

Now I need to figure out my traits. I've got four: the Ways of the Gun, Drifter, Bastard, and Soul. They start at d4 by default, but the cards I picked raise them. Hang on, gotta look that up. "Criminal on the run" raises Drifter to d6, "I wanna be immortal" bumps Gun to d6, "If people atone I'm good with that" bumps up Soul to d6, and "Devil John has my heart" bumps up Gun to d8. Bastard stays a d4. 

I have a demon bound to me, and I need to decide what miracle that demon gives me (everyone gets at least one) and what form it takes. Well, my miracle is that I can survive any injury, clearly. The demon that allows it probably has a name, but Danny just calls it "the Leech." It lives in his chest where his heart used to be, sucks up the hurt and the blood, and keeps it or expels it or whatever.

Now, normally the table would decide on a price that the Leech demands for this power, but since I don't have a group, I'll say that the Leech excretes injury in the form of a sweet black liquid, which Danny must then feed to a living thing.

And finally, I would explain why I need the help of the player on my right, but it's an empty chair at an empty table (WHERE MY FRIENDS WILL SING NO MOOOOOORE), so we'll skip that. Anything else? Well, the cards have questions on them so I should make sure I've answered them.

Who did you stab in the back when you ran off with the loot? Marty, one of the other gang members. He was hanged, too, but he managed to get his foot into a knothole in the tree and didn't die. I saved him, but then poisoned him. He was the first. 

What do you do if someone you're helping to atone lies about changing? Offer them a drink. It's a little sweet, but it'll grow on ya.

That'll do it! Danny is a young man, probably only about 20 or 21. Blue shirt, always unbuttoned a little (otherwise Leech gets antsy), brown hat that he took from Marty, and a shiny six-gun on his hip. 

And that'll do it! Definitely gonna have to run this at some point.