Character Creation: Nest

FOR THE FOURTH GAME OF XMAS, TWENTY-TWENTY-FOUR,
FOUR NESTING BIRDS,
THREE VELVET GENS,
TWO SONGBIRDS
AND BARD THE RPG!

Squawk, squawk.

The Game: Nest
The Publisher: Gila RPGs
Degree of Familiarity: I've played NOVA, of which this is a spin-off, but not this
Books Required: Just the one

NOVA has you playing humans going out into the Dusk and dealing with Corvus aliens and marauders and suchlike. In Nest, you're playing the aforementioned birb aliens. Much like NOVA, it's diceless and tactical in nature. The main difference, I think, is that NOVA is more open-ended while Nest assumes you're playing a five-session campaign (including a session zero), and doesn't give you info to make new missions. 

Now, it wouldn't be hard to make new missions, but like, the PDF of this game is $10. Figure on each session taking 3ish hours. That's 15 hours of entertainment for less than a dinner at McDonalds. I think that's pretty good (I paid a little more because I backed the Kickstarter for a hard copy, but still).

Anyway, let's make a birb! (Yes, gonna spell it that way every time.)

The Corvus are, as mentioned, bird-like aliens, and their tactics are much more based on stealth and positioning (I mean, the Sparks in NOVA can do that, but they have more clobberin' time options, too). That's cool, let's me lean into my proclivities for snipers and such. First thing I need to do is pick a class.

Oh, these are all pretty dope. The artwork isn't as awesome as NOVA, but they managed to carve out some pretty impressive niches in an army concept that had the potential to get samey. I think I'll go with Lasher.

Flexible weapons are dope

So now I write in my Talents and Powers. My Talents are: Pull a small object toward you, cling to a wall, assess the best point of entry. My Powers are: Whirlwind (I smack everyone nearby), Launch (I huck a chunk of debris at someone), and Tangle (I wrap up an enemy so they take extra damage). 

Approaches! There are three, Sun, Moon, and Shade. I get 1 in each and then 4 more points to split up. I think I'll put three points into Moon, one into Shade, and be a really fast birb.

I start with 6 Health and 4 Battery, so that's easy.

And then I need to decide my callsign, description, and what my last mission was. Sure.

My lasher's callsign is Nerve. He's thin and almost brittle-looking, his feathers are somewhat thin in places (because he neglects grooming), but he's fast and intense. His last mission, he was stuck out in the Dusk for...a little too long, maybe? He was doing recon work, and there's a big section of rock spires that he was well-suited to leap between. And he witnessed a Spark do battle with a bunch of things from the Dusk, and they swarmed the Spark and Nerve was thinking this guy was gonna get ripped apart...and the Spark burst into flame and cooked all the creatures to a crisp. 

Nerve hung back and watched this, but then realized there was a second wave of monsters coming, and that Spark didn't stand a chance. Nerve dropped lower and killed a few of them with this whip, giving the Spark the time it needed to power back up and get back to its squad. Nerve didn't communicate with the Spark (he doesn't speak Humanese anyway), but the Spark waved to him. Nerve isn't sure why, but what he'd witnessed was a little disquieting. 

Anyway, Nerve's glad to be back at the Aerie. For now. 

That'll do it!