Character Creation: Punkapocalyptic

BLABBITY-FLOO FUCK FUCK DICK FART BAD LANGUAGE REEERROWW!

The Game: Punkapocalyptic
The Publisher: Schwalb Entertainment
Degree of Familiarity: Haven't played it, but it works on the same basic system as Shadow of the Demon Lord
Books Required: Just the one

OK, so, actually I think this game looks really cool. I love SotDL a lot (I ran a whole game of it, and I'd like to do it again with a group with less drama), and I think a Mad Max-style post-apoc wasteland is a perfect fit for the tone of the game. 

I just...I dunno, maybe I'm getting old.

This kind of shit just gives me flashbacks to the cringey-ass sidebars that White Wolf games used to have in the days before X-cards, the kinds of things that would say "there aren't really any vampires, dumbass, if you think there are you're stupid and need help." Like...OK. Who is that really for? 99.9% of people are just here to play superheroes-with-fangs and they know very well it's all a game. The other .01% are nuts and putting that sidebar in is about as effective as trying to tell your conservative aunt that Tucker Carlson is a liar. 

And this is kind of similar. Anyone with sensibilities delicate enough to be offended by naughty language is unlikely to even pick this game up, much less read it, much less play it. Most of us are quite able to code-switch as necessary, and know when it's appropriate to swear like a Tarantino film and when it's not. So what is this bullshit in aid of? (I admit that part of this might just be that I hate the word "crotch," especially when it's used in reference to children, so that just rubs me the wrong way.)

But for all that, the game itself looks fun. Sure, using "fuck" as punctuation hits different in print - gets gratuitous real fast - but whatever, games are meant to be played and I think with the right group this would be pretty badass. Let's make a merc!

Much like Shadow of the Demon Lord, characters in Punkapocalyptic start at level 0. After they complete a mission, they get to be real people with a level and a character class and everything. So I'm making a character that is, by the book's own admission, "fragile as a fucking robin's egg." Keen. 

We start with Attributes. I can take an array or roll some dice. This character never being likely to see play, I shall do it randomly. I roll 4d6 for each of the eight Attributes, drop the lowest die, and translate those rolls into scores that I can distribute as I see fit. Here we go! 

My scores are: 10, 12, 11, 12, 11, 10, 10, 10. Not bad, actually, nothing that's gonna give me a negative modifier (your modifier is your score - 10). So now I must assign these things. 

Let's put my 12s into Meat (which helps survivability) and Guts (DEATH AND GLORY). I'll put my 11s into Muscles and Hands, and everything else gets a 10. 

Next we choose a background. I kinda want a bow. I have horrible visions of the one bow-wielding mutant in Wrong Turn reimagined as a mutant of the wasteland. I'm thinking Scavenger might be a good fit there. 

Here we roll a d6 for a background story..."You took up with a junker band for a few months, working as a scout. You were good at wriggling into and through the tight places to get the goods." I'm good with that. I increase my Eyes by 1, which also makes my modifier there 1 instead of 0. I speak one language, let's just say English for simplicity's sake. I can scrounge to get what I need once per before-I-rest. I get tattered clothing, a knife, a sack with some stuff, and two random pieces of junk, for which I will roll later.

Oh, wait, for which I will roll now. I roll a d6 to choose a table and a d20 to choose the specific junk. First roll: table 5, "a collection of every Adam Sandler movie made in the '90s on VHS." Well, maybe they'll be useful as throwing weapons. Or battle cries. "WATERBOY, MOTHERFUCK!"

Next: Table 2, "funny sunglasses." Awesome! Something like this, I think:

Other stuff! Defense is (Feet/2) + (Eyes/2). My feet is 10, my Eyes is 11, but we round down, so that's 10. Health is equal to Meat, so that's 12. Grit is 3 + Guts modifier, or 5 in my case. Education is equal to Brains modifier (0), so I don't get no special skills or extra languages. Speech is equal to Feet/2, or 5. Size is 1, Reach is...I don't know, it doesn't tell me. Nice going, Rob! Maybe add a few more "fucks" in there instead of telling us how stats are figured out! There's no slot for Size on the sheet, so maybe Reach is equal to Size? Let's assume it is. (ETA: It is, it's explained in another chapter. Also, as long as we're bitching, the sheet has a slot for "Luck" but in the book it's called "Fortune," and more to the point the GM keeps track of it so why have a slot for it?)

Mutagen is probably 0, unless I roll a 6 on a d6...Nope. Ain't mutated yet. 

And now Character Details, in which we roll on some random tables to pick history and personality and so on. 

Age! A roll of 5 makes me a teenager. Not what I was picturing for this character but I'm OK with it. 

Looks! Normal! Dirty, scarred, stinky, about right for the wasteland. 

Height! Average.

Weight! Average.

Distinguishing Features! I have an unusual appearance, which means I roll on another table, and get...tiny hands! Heh. Probably helps with scavenging, he can stuff his hands into tight spaces (lol). 

Social interaction! Average (no special issues here; I keep rolling in the 9-12 range). 

Connections! I know people, have some friends, even a few close relationships. 

Sanity! Pretty stable. Few illusions, do what needs doing. Easy enough.

Goal! You want revenge against your enemies...ooh, now that took a turn. Who are my enemies? FORTHCOMING.

Motivation! Didn't we just...OK. Oh, that's interesting. My motivation is that I don't want the world to burn. That's a fun twist with revenge. 

Obligations! Oh, wait, this isn't saying I have any, just how I view them. As seems to be the norm for this dude, he tries to keep his word, but isn't gonna die to do it.

Morality! Neither good nor evil. Middle of the road, once more.

And finally, name. There's a table for this, too, but I actually have an idea. My guy's name is Carny Cabbage. 

See, when he was running with the junker band, they had a treasure that no one else had: a working VCR and a bunch of tapes. My guy hooked up with them (he was scavenging a landfill) and made friends with a couple of them, and one of the older dudes, a fella who called himself "McGee", noted how small my guy's hands were and mumbled something about "carnies" and "smelling of cabbage." No one knew what the hell McGee was on about (he was always out of breath, so he didn't speak clearly - we told him not to take the stairs!), but the name stuck, and Carny doesn't even remember if he had a name before that. 

So he traveled with this jolly junker band for a while, and then they ran up against a darkness-worshipping, goat-sacrificing cult ("THE NIGHT TIME IS THE RIGHT TIME") and all got slaughtered. Carny got away with his skin and a sack of his favorite tapes, but no way to play them. He's fully prepared to find that cult again and start putting pills in bros, but he needs some training first. And maybe a gun or a bow. 

Carny is an average looking dude, grimy and smelly (of cabbage?), no real notable features except his small, little, tiny, delicate hands, which he keeps covered in rags to protect them. 

And there we go! Hopefully Carny survives his first mission; I think I'd make him a Killer as a novice.