Character Creation: Inspirisles

Gotta love a good portmanteau. 

The Game: Inspirisles
The Publisher: Hatchlings Games
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one 

So here we're playing people who have traveled through a mystical gateway to another realm where there are wyrms that teach you magic (elemental in nature, performed via sign language), and over time you reforge Excalibur and then either go home as if no time has passed (with all the attendant issues therein) or remain in the Islands as a hero. PCs are called "Pendragons," and I think the intent is that they're descendants of Arthur and Guinevere, but if that's the case it could be stated a little more explicitly.

Actually, this game could generally use a little more explicitness. It's very clear about its safety mechanics and on Deaf awareness (I wasn't kidding when I said the magic works on sign language; the book gives you instruction sheets on both British and American Sign Language), but it's a little fuzzier on the underlying assumptions of the game world and our place within it. We're meant to help the fae by fomenting Belief and struggling against Disbelief, and I think the mechanics are well-explained, but there's a little more in-character chatter from Cecily and Scriv the Bard than I'd find useful. I don't dislike the game, I just think I'm missing something. 

Anyway, let's make a Pendragon. Man, this sheet uses a lot of ink.

Well, there's a handy random table of names, so I shall use it since I don't really have any idea. Rolling 2,6 gives me either "Trinity" or "Grey." I don't love Trinity (makes me think of The Matrix, obviously), so sure, my character's name is Grey, pronouns he/they.

Next I look at a list of memories and pick the ones that speaks to me. They're meant to be literal first memories, though I'm not sure what relevance they have to our character, exactly. It gives me a Friend (basically a fae race) and their home, but I'm not one of those, right? I'm a human teenager what fell through a portal?

Anyway, the memory I like most is:

So that makes Wyrmbitten my Friend and Shedscale my Home.

Now we pick an Element and the kind of divine Patron. Let's assume I'm playing in a four-player game so that all four elements are represented. I guess Grey can be all about Water, which makes their Patron Athelyn.

And then a Hobby. I can roll for this, so I think I will, though I reserve the right to change my mind. 2,4 is either karate or crocheting. I think I'll go with crocheting, just because combat is so de-emphasized in this game (and yes, karate as practiced by a teenager wouldn't have much practical combat application anyway, but I think it'd be cool if Grey could learn to crochet water with elemental magic). 

Now, that's technically the end of chargen, but there's a bit a little later on where we wind up at the Questing Cabin and get five items, and since there's a random table I'll go ahead and use it for those. Well, actually, obviously I want crocheting needles and yarn as two of them, and then I'll roll on the tables for the other three. There's a table for Carried and one for Worn. Rolling three times and checking the results on both, I'll take a scarf, a shirt, and an ocarina.

And that's it. I think Grey has blond hair, nimble fingers, but is otherwise pretty clumsy. Big feet. He made the scarf he's wearing, it was meant to be a present for a guy he had a crush on, but the guy changed schools before it was done.