Character Creation: Webworld

From the world of the theater, we turn to the world of dental hygiene. No, spiders.

The Game: Webworld
The Publisher: NeonRot
Degree of Familiarity: None, and although I'd really like to run this, I suspect it'd be difficult to find players
Books Required: Just the one

Webworld is a very short RPG, but it's got everything it needs. In brief: The world has been overrun by giant spiders, and the survivors are trying to...well, survive. There's a sample setting involving an underground settlement called Hope that has people trying to build a vehicle that will survive spider attacks long enough to get north to colder climes, where the spiders can't follow (allegedly) but honestly, it'd be just as interesting to develop one's own survivor colony and go from there.

The game is simple and pretty unforgiving. You've got a pool of d8s. When you roll, you decide how many to "exert" and then you add 'em all up and add any relevant skills. If you beat a 7, you get one of your dice back. If you fail (that is, 6 or lower), you don't. The WW (World-Weaver) can give you a die back for good roleplaying, and you get your dice back when you rest, but it seems like it would be pretty easy to run through them in play. 

And that, of course, is the point - you have to be careful not to let the spiders get too close, because they will eat you (or worse, take you back to their nest and make you a Host). There's no combat in the game, which I really like - it's not about beating the spiders, it's about getting around or away from them.

The book could really have used an editor, just for purposes of language clarification. Lots of passive voice and sentences that aren't terribly clear. That said, I was able to figure everything out, so it's by no means a deal-breaker. The only other nit I have to pick is that the character sheet is pretty ink-intensive to print. 

Right, so! Chargen takes all of a minute. First off, I choose a class. 

Hmm. I like the Scout, and I like the Firestarter. I think I'll go with Firestarter, actually. I get to choose one ability from the class list, and I'll pick Sticky Bombs. I can blow up a Host (those gross zombie-people full of spider eggs) without the spiders escaping. It does damage to everyone else in the area, of course, but 1 damage is better than "eaten by spiders." 

Carl Brown was a high school chemistry teacher at St. Agnes School for Girls. His life was far from perfect - he needed to keep his sexuality under wraps, and his husband wasn't thrilled about that - but beyond that, things were OK. He was at the school when the first wave of spiders hit, and he does not talk about what he saw that day. Ever.

Suffice to say, Carl lost most of his friends and most of his students, and his husband didn't survive the first wave, either. He's spent the time since learning how to make small, effective explosives - you don't want anything too boomy because it attracts spiders, but the smallest ones work just fine on Hosts. 

Carl is pretty much in permanent "goofy teacher" mode these days. Everything is a joke, preferably a dad joke. Some people who lost loved ones (which is everyone) get grim and gritty and grizzled about it, but Carl stays light and pleasant. It's an act. Carl is 100% ready to blow himself up and take a Host with him, he just hasn't done it yet. 

Carl is in his early 40s, thinning brown hair (getting pretty shaggy in the back, now). His beard basically doesn't grow in. His eyes are blue and dead. He used to be a little on the pudgy side, but he's lost all that puppy fat and is now bordering on skinny. He still wears his wedding ring, but he's wrapped it in yarn so it fits, just like the girls at his school used to do with their boyfriends' class rings. 

That'll do it!