Character Creation: Apocalypse Prevention Inc, 2nd Ed

It's a living.

The Game: Apocalypse Prevention, Inc 2nd Ed
The Publisher: Third Eye Games
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

This is actually the third character I've made for this game, kinda-sorta. It's the 2nd Edition of the base game, and there's also a Savage Worlds variant. And I have to say, the premise has always been good, but this is the first time that I've actually wanted to play the game after reading it.

The first edition wants to include some dark humor, but the writing was rough and didn't really convey humor well. The SW edition, in my humble opinion, didn't make best use of that system. I have no idea of 2nd Ed uses a system that's better, but the writing in the book is much cleaner and, in places, funnier. 

So! The basic premise here is that the titular organization is working to protect humanity from otherworldly beings, collectively referred to as "demons." Quite a lot of demons work for API, or are just trying to make their way. There are serious shades of Men in Black here, and if I were running it that's probably how I'd approach it - agents are less like shadowy enforcers and more like social workers, just trying to make sure demons keep the to the terms of their Blue Cards and preventing the occasional apocalypse. 

I actually do have a concept, but I want to note that this version of the game passes the Chupp test better than the previous ones. There are a bunch of different splats of demons, and a lot of them are interesting in their own ways. The ones that mimic mythological creatures have enough of their own thing going on that it's not just "vampires, yawn." As is often the case with Third Eye Games, it feels very much like an early World of Darkness game in structure, but that's fine.

So anyway, I want to play a Burner. Burners are demons from a dimension called Caulon, but it was invaded by the Borg Chromatics, so most Burners alive today have never seen it. Burners look like imps - pointy tails, pointy ears, proclivity for fire. They have red skin but the shade varies, so we'll say my guy's skin tone is "human" enough that he can pass, because I want him to be a model.

(Yep, taking inspiration from Zoolander.)

So my character is Gerlach Mann, born in the eponymous city in Nevada. His parents, both Burners, didn't really have human surnames, and his father wanted to call him "Hugh Mann" but his mother pointed out that that was a) stupid and b) a bit they did on Futurama already, so here we are. Gerlach grew up really ridiculously good-looking, but not terribly bright (except when he set things on fire), and got into modeling and dance at a young age. 

Now, how did he hook up with API? Well, we'll get there. First of all, as a Burner I get this stuff:

But that's all for later. 

Step One: Concept & Reasons. "Reasons" as in "reasons for joining and staying with API." I'm glad this is an important part of chargen, and it's even got mechanical weight! Woo! So why did Gerlach join up? I kinda feel like he was pressured into it, maybe his career started taking off and he got a little too visible and API rocked up and was like "hey, you could be deported" and Ger was like "um, what?" So here we are. We'll call that Obligation - Ger didn't really get anything for his service, other than API leaving him and his career alone. Maybe helping him hide the ears a little better. I get a +1 to Fortitude and a +3 to a Skill of Choice (why is "choice" capitalized?). Can't have a rank in the API greater than 1, but that's fine. 

What about Reason for Staying? I think just plain old Duty. Ger got into it, and now it's part of his life. Simple as that. That gives me +2 to Discipline and Stealth, Good Reputation 1, Rank 1 (which is as high as it's gonna get) and the Lifesaver Drawback. Groovy. 

Step Two: Race. Did this already, I'm a Burner. 

Step Three: Attributes. I get 25 points to split up amongst them. Min 1, max 8 (well, "soft cap" of 8, whatever that means). Let's see. 

OMG, they list the Attributes and then the mechanics that Attribute affects, Eloy, you fucking genius. Anyway, I think Ger needs decent scores in Agility and Charm, for sure. Insight and Intellect can stay low. Power and Vigor probably on the high side of average. So let's arrange it thusly:

Agility 6
Charm 6
Insight 2
Intellect 1
Power 5
Vigor 5

That was easy.

Step Four: Skills. 30 Skill points, plus my starting IQ (so, um, 31). Also I get a few bumps from my Reasons. And Skills are listed on the sheet, oh my stars & garters. 

Well, Athletics sounds obvious (and I never regret taking it). I want Deception, not because Ger is a good liar, but because early in his career he did his own makeup. Probably some Empathy, probably some Fists (stage combat training plus a little more from API). Performance, obvs. Persuasion, sure, though I feel like it's probably unintentional ("Look, I'm very complimented, but not interested...Ok, maybe we could fool around a little.").

I have 31 points to start plus 8 in various places from my Reasons, so that's 39 total. 

Athletics 7
Deception 5
Discipline 3
Empathy 3
Fists 4
Fortitude 5
Performance 6
Persuasion 4
Stealth 2

(Let's assume the 3 in a Skill of choice was in Deception.) 

Oh, also, for every Skill of 4 or 7 points, I get a talent. So for Athletics, I'll take Proficient and In the Zone. For Deception, I'll take Keeper (which makes him good at keeping secrets, though in Ger's case I think it's just that he doesn't really understand what he's being asked). Fists, we'll take Sting Like a Bee. Fortitude, Conditioning. Performance, Distracting, definitely. And for Persuasion, Honeypot, obviously.

Step Five: Bonus Points. I get 14 of these. I can spend them on basically anything, including magic. I can get more through drawbacks, too. I can take up to 10 BP in Drawbacks, though it doesn't say if the one I get from my Reason counts against that. Let's assume it doesn't. 

As usual I shall do Drawbacks first. I get Fragile Frame from being a Burner, so that's a given. Well, I want Absent-Minded, and I'll take Skill Deficient in Knowledge (which gives me a -6 to Knowledge checks, so um, let's let someone else do those). That also gives me 6 more BP, so I have 20 total. 

Let's look at Gifts first. Kinda want Master of Disguise, that's 3 points. Definitely want Attractive 4. Down by 7, 13 more. Better look up how magic works.

OK, so it looks like I spend 3 BP to unlock 1st Circle Magic. I have to pick a magical Tradition, and oh snap, Wild Magic it is (to reflect that Ger doing magic is purely instinctive and not a Good Idea). I can learn spells from (IQ/2) Paths. Let's assume we round up, so I get two paths total (one I pick, and Fire). I think I'd pick Mirrors, but I don't know that I'll take any spells from that.

Oh, 1st Circle spells are kinda weak. Maybe I'll plump for 2nd Circle. Can I afford that? It'd be 5 more points to do that, which would take me to 5 remaining BP for Spells. Eh, I'll leave it at 1st, and I'll take Bend Element, Elemental Shield, and Sense Element as my spells. Those are 2 each, so that's 6 total, which means I have 4 remaining BP. I could also buy Aspects for the spells, but eh. 

I think instead I shall spend BP on Skills. I'll buy Specialties in Performance (Dance), Deception (Disguise), Discipline (Too Dumb to Crack), and Persuasion (Harmless). 

Step Six: Equipment Packs. I get some stuff, but I also get a Role. Obviously Ger is Social, so I get +1 to Knowledge (Demonology), so that takes my penalty to -5, lol. +1 Wealth, 2 Light Weapons, 1 Light armor. 

Step Seven: Derived Traits. Health is POW + VIG + 8, or 18. Focus is the average of Insight and Charm (4, for me) +1 for 1st Circle being opened. Bureaucracy is Charm + IQ, or 7, which means Ger gets by on pure charm, which is on brand. Strengh is POW + VIG (10). Movement is POW + AGY (11). Balance is AGY + Athletics (13, no one's gonna trip me, as long as I don't have to turn left!). Physical Resistance is VIG + Fortitude (10). Mental Resistance is INS + Discipline (5...yeah). Magic Resistance is INS/2, or a big fat 1. 

Initiative is IQ + AGY (7), Base Damage is 0, and I have 3 Actions. 

And that's pretty much it! Ger is lean and well-built, perfect bone structure, eyes that are technically brown but everyone tries to find more poetic words (auburn, ember, crisp, kiss me). He has perfect white teeth that aren't too white so he looks like a monster. He used to wear hats and headbands to cover his ears, but now just as often he uses an image emitter. He gets free clothes from his job, so he's always well-dressed. He never, ever says "huh", but he does say "wait, what?" a lot. 

That'll do it! 

Character Creation: API SW

Some alphabet soup, there.

The Game: Apocalypse Prevention, Inc (Savage Worlds Edition)
The Publisher: Third Eye Games
Degree of Familiarity: Pretty conversant in Savage Worlds, never played API
Books Required: Savage Worlds Deluxe Edition and the API book

Apocalypse Prevention, Inc is...well, I did a character for the first edition of the game way back in 2013 (a simpler, more pleasant time in so many ways). The game didn't especially grab me and I couldn't tell you much about the system, but it was also quite a while ago and I've never actually played the game, which is about the only way a system sticks with me. Reading over that character now, it looks like the conversion to Savage Worlds will simplify things quite a bit (usually does). 

The premise is the same, though. It's not a million miles from Hellboy, concept-wise. The characters work for the titular organization trying to...prevent apocalypses, I guess. We've got a bunch of playable races, many of which are broadly called "demons," but the game uses that as shorthand for "supernatural beings." One of the choices is Spectrals (ghosts), and I was thinking about that, in light of my theme song.

Oh, right, my gf Jenni gave me a theme song! Happens to be a song I already knew and loved. 

So, at first glance the song would seem to point to making a human character, and maybe it does, but the line "Some people think I can solve them" kinda points to something else, maybe? There's a race called "oracles," which are demons that can see the future, but bring luck. I think that works. Now, they're listed as "illegal playable races," so does that mean API just kills them out of hand? Let's see!

Ugh. Well, no, it doesn't say that. It does say that API might keep them contained with "powerful luck magic" to make use of their ability to see the future. Gotta say, the systems here...aren't great. I mean, I don't know, I haven't done a lot of design with Savage Worlds and I could be totally wrong about this, but penalizing certain skill checks isn't something I see a lot in SW books, but it pops up a lot in these characters. Also, the oracles' propensity for bad luck is mechanic'd by having everyone around them suffer a cumulative -1 penalty per day that caps out at -4. In SW, a -4 penalty is some shit; that's the equivalent of needing a raise on every check just to be successful. Also, when does the reset happen? If the oracle fucks off for a day, does the "clock" reset? I can think of a couple of more elegant ways to represent this idea. 

Well, anyway, since I'm not going to play this game, I'm going to make an oracle character and just not worry about whether it's "illegal." Let's assume my character, Dante Brown (it's not his real name, of course, because he's actually an extradimensional demon), works with API because he stumbles into their missions by "accident" (really, of course, he's following his visions). He's kind of a wandering sage, happy to help API keeping the world from ending or other demons from killing a lot of people, but he doesn't trust the organization at all. He came to Earth because of a dream he had involving a shady (like, literally shady, not sketchy) valley covered in moss, and buried in that valley was an artifact that API is going to need to like, actually prevent an apocalypse. But he doesn't know where the valley is or when he's actually going to see it, so he keeps up with API. Once he finds the valley, though, he's going the hell back to his home dimension. If possible. 

Dante is, like all oracles, pale skinned and has dark hair. Unlike most oracles, though, he's husky. Still has the pointy ears and the weird diamond shaped eyes and the third eye on his forehead, but he's not fine and willowy. Bit of a chonk, is what I'm saying. He favors hand-knitted sweaters. 

Cool, so, as an oracle, I get Future Sight and Path of Fortunes (I have to say, I don't grok the magic system here, gotta dig into it again) as racial Edges, and Blackouts, Fickle Fortune, and Outsider as racial Hindrances. Groovy, on to Attributes. 

Now, Vigor is doubly expensive to raise at chargen, which blows. I'm tempted to leave Agility at a d4. That'll limit my Skills a bit, but oracles also get a +1 to all Fighting and Shooting rolls, so I have a little bit of an edge there. OK, I'll leave Agility at d4, I'll bump Smarts to d8, Spirit to d6, Strength I'll leave at d4, and I'll put Vigor up to d6 (which costs 2 points, so that's all 5). I might bump up Strength later, though.

Skills! They're not on the sheet, argh. No matter. API uses Guts, too. Let's see. Guess I need to figure out how magic works in case I need a Skill for it.

Oh, lord. OK, so it looks like you need a Spellcasting skill (no word on whether you need an Arcane Background Edge, but it looks like not), but then it also looks like every spell counts as its own skill, and you can raise a given spell to add upgrades? Also, it says that you need an Edge to cast spells, but then a bunch of the races say you get access to a given Path - so does that mean I don't need an Edge to cast Path of Fortune spells? Oh, wait, you don't need a Spellcasting skill, just a separate skill for each spell. Blah.

The two 1st Circle Fortune Spells are nicely simple, though - Hex (-2 to an action) or Luck (+2 to an action). I guess I'll sink a d4 into each of those (I don't get upgrades until d8 and it's not worth it). 

In addition to that, I'll put d4s in Fighting, Gambling, Healing, Investigation, Lockpicking, Notice, Persuasion, Stealth, Streetwise, and Tracking. Oh, Knowledge (Occult) sounds good, too. That leaves me one more point; I'll stick that in Knowledge, too.

And now Hindrances. Are any of the ones in API worth taking? Actually, yeah. I like Combat Fear (I discard any initiative card higher than 10) and Shy (-1 to Intimidation and Persuasion rolls). I can take one more Minor. I'll take Quirk - he's always knitting. Yes, that means he could stab a bitch with knitting needles, but he'd rather not. They're expensive. 

That gives me 4 "points" to play with. I'll bump up my Strength to d6 with two of them. Would I like an Edge? Ooh, wait, I forgot a Training Package! Just basically a few Skills for free, nothing fancy. I'll take Good Cop, which gives me Persuasion d6 and Streetwise d4 for free, and frees up 2 skill points for me. Oh, also, I get Illegal as a Minor Hindrance automatically, so I don't need to take Quirk. I like it, though. I'll ditch Shy. I'll put those other two points into Fighting to boost it to d6. 

Anyway, do I want an Edge? Actually, yeah, I think I do. I'll take Rich - Dante won the lottery shortly after arriving on Earth. Not, like, a 10-figure Powerball, but enough that he doesn't need to work and he doesn't worry about driving around and getting in adventures. (And also, it means when he's on mission with API folks, he pays for everything, which goes a long way towards them not killing him.)

OK, then! Charisma 0, Pace 6, Parry 5, Toughness 5, and that's me done! I actually quite like Dante, though I don't necessarily fancy playing this particular game. Although I don't know, I'd probably give it a whirl if someone was running it. 

Character Creation: Apocalypse Prevention, Inc.

The Game: Apocalypse Prevention, Inc
The Publisher: Third Eye Games
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one, though there do seem to be quite a lot of sourcebooks.

 

I got this game, like many others, in the Haiti bundle, long ago. I don't think I shall ever see the end of it, but I shall persevere.

I'm more familiar with Third Eye's more recent offerings, including Mermaid Adventures and Part-Time Gods. This one...well. Stew Wilson made a character a while back (a while? sweet jesus, 2 years!), and wasn't especially complimentary, but I happen to know Eloy Lasanta (the author) and I know his writing has improved considerably since this game was published (five years? JESUS. TIME.).

Anyway, mostly I felt like doing some werewolf-related today, so here we are.

In this game you're a member of the titular organization, fighting against the demons ("demon" here is a blanket term that includes vampires, mutants, and so forth). The game promises "action horror with a slice of humor," though one of the examples of humor given is that scepter might be shaped like a dong. I...don't find that especially funny, as presented, but let's soldier on. I'll come back to the topic of humor in gaming later, maybe.

The list of playable races includes "Wolf People: Werewolves of unknown origins." OK, then. I want to be one of those.

Moving on. We have a letter from employee services telling us that we cannot contact former friends and family (though since my origins are unknown I don't know if that affects me), and that I can contact Hazel about my 401K. See, that's funny.

OK, we start off with Step One: Concept, Passion and Race. I know my Race already (Wolf People), so I'll write that in. Well, reading the write-up for the Race, it says that other agents kind of regard them as children with behavioral problems, and there are some lingering issues because a Wolf Person "went rogue" not long ago. While it's clumsily phrased, I like that notion - I work with a lot of kids with behavioral problems, and a lot of it is not really under their control. I want my Wolf Person to be crazy smart. Like, turning into a werewolf was the worst thing that ever happen to him, because not only did he become a monster, but he started becoming a jock. But before that: very smart, but uncontrollable in class. After the Change hit (puberty, so pre high-school) his parents and the school tried to keep him under control with meds and an IEP and all, but by his junior year he was about fed up with this bullshit. He graduated early and started trying to get into college, but API found him first.

So there's some background. Now what? Passion. Passion isn't especially well explained (and there are some subject-verb agreement issues in the first sentence that make me twitch), but it's a lot like Nature/Demeanor. Actually, I think a more relevant comparison would be Drive from any of the more recent Gumshoe games. Anyway, I'm torn between Questions and Rebellion. Questions is often fun to play, but I see this guy as young and kind of stupid (with regards to how the world really works). I think we'll do Rebellion, with the understanding that if I was actually going to play this character, his Passion would change to Questions later).

Right, now Step Two: Attributes. 30 points to split among Power, Agility, Vigor, Intellect, Insight and Charm, with an even split putting me at average (5). I actually like that; Stew's reasoning is that it should be a number that doesn't divide easily and forces me to make a hard choice, but I like the option to create someone who's just generally competent and then use other facets of chargen to make myself stand out.

Anyway, I know I want a high Intellect, probably a low Insight and Charm, and decent physicals. Let's do this:

Power 6
Agility 5
Vigor 5
Intellect 8
Insight 3
Charm 3

Anything over 8 costs an extra point, so I'll leave it like that for the moment. Now, I'm on to Step Three: Skills. I get 30+IQ points, or 38, for Skills. Same point costs. Also pick a Specialty for Standard Skills at 4, 7, and 10 and some other fiddly bits that I'll deal with as necessary. I suppose there's a Skill list. Is it on the sheet? NOPE. Balls. Oh, but it's on the chargen quick reference page, which I printed, so that's good. OK, Skills I want:

Arts
Athletics
Beast Handling
Computers
Fortitude
Intimidation
Knowledge
Perception (WHY IS THIS A SKILL)
Stealth

Nice thing about making a younger character is that I don't have as many skills to care about. Although...oh, Combat is separate. Argh. Oh, and, levels of fighting styles add to things like Initiative and Dodge, but are otherwise unremarkable, until you add the Techniques. So it's kinda like the combat system from Fireborn, maybe? Eh. I can't do anything without Fighting Style: Basic, anyway, so let's just add that in to the mix, and we come up with:

Athletics 5 (Running)
Beast Handling 3
Computers 6 (Research)
Fortitude 4 (Pain)
Intimidation 4 (Intense)
Knowledge 4 (Occult)
Perception 4 (Smells)
Stealth 4 (Hunting)
Fighting Style: Basic 4

Next up, Step Four: Bonus Points. I get 10 because I'm not human. And of course I can take Drawbacks to get more points, so I shall. I can take up to 10 points (I already have two, Lunacy and Silver, but they don't give me points). So let's see. Is "20-year-know-it-all" a Drawback? No, but Big Mouth is. I'll take that. Also Curious.

Man, there's some stuff in here that makes me wince. A gay character in San Francisco doesn't get to take the Minority Drawback, because being gay doesn't hurt you there? Tell that to Harvey Milk.

Anyway, moving on. I don't see a lot of other Drawbacks I like. How about Poor Hygiene? I'll take that at 3. It's not that he doesn't bathe, it's just that he smells kind of gamey no matter what he does. That's 8 extra BP, hopefully that's enough.

So what do I want to buy? Well, I could buy cybernetic implants, but I think they're kind of dumb for werewolves (how would I shapeshift?). I'll spend some on Attributes and Skills, how about? I'll boost my Insight to 4 (costs 2, leaves me with 16) and my Fighting Style to 7 (costs 3, leaves me with 13). I could buy a more advanced Fighting Style, but eh. I want to look at magic.

Yi. Magic is...involved. It looks interesting, but it's a spell list, and from there you can upgrade multiple elements of a given spell. Which is cool and lets you customize your spells, but boy, you'd need players that want to keep up with that level of number crunching (read: not mine).

As it is, because my guy is a Wolf Person he gets Animalia magic and that doesn't count against the number of Paths he can know, which doesn't really help me learn it. But there is a spell I want off that path, so...how do I do that? Oh, it's pretty simple. I can learn up to five different Paths (counting Animalia) because my IQ is high. I pay 1 BP for first circle spells, 2 for second, 3 for third. I have 13 BP left, but I don't want to burn them all on spells. Let's see. I know I want Beast Senses, which lets me make my sense all animal-y. That's one BP (12 remain). I like some of the spells from the Path of Augmentation, so I'll take Hyper-Jump, Iron Fist (for claws in human form) and Nightvision. Those are all level 1 spells, so I have 9 left. Let's look at Gifts.

Oh, whoops, I need to take Open Inner Circle so I can have those spells. Blargh. OK, that's 3 points. 6 remain. None of the other Gifts really excite me, so I'll dump the other six points in Attributes and Skills. I'll boost my Insight up to 5 (4 left), my Agility up to 6 (2 left), and my Vigor up to 6.

Now, derived traits! Um. I total them all up. Yep! Note that doing the Fighting Style ones would drive me nuts if I'd decided to make a real combat character.

I could do gear, but eh. That always bores me, so I'll skip it. I just need a name, then. Since I love making my names refer to other werewolf properties (did you read the Moon-Cursed section of the Forsaken Chronicler's Guide?), I'll call him Jack Talbot. Wait, have I seriously never named a character in this project Jack before? Wow.

I think "Jack" is actually his given name; it's not short for John. He hates it. To him, "Jack" sounds like a redneck name. He prefers to go by his last name.

And that's me done!