When I set my 2023 goal of 10 characters a month, I didn't factor in the idea of getting wholly sucked into a video game (Midnight Suns, if you're interested). But I'm still gonna persevere!
The Game: Savage Sisters
The Publisher: 9th Level Games
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one
Got this game in a bundle, it's nice and short, but I admit I picked it because I knew that the default was female characters and my buddy Gus gave me this song:
So I looked for games that had female characters as written. I think, however, that it's not necessarily a good fit, because the song is about systemic misogyny and being treated differently or preciously because of one's gender, and that's not really what Savage Sisters is about. So in a way, it winds up being a perfect theme song, because it's challenging!
So! Savage Sisters has an interesting meta-narrative in that the characters play the titular Savage Sisters, but those are heroes and mythical figures of old, and the story told within the game is being told by the Grandmother (GM) to a group of younger folks around the fire. The role of GM passes between the players, which is a feature I'm not always fond of, but I can see it working here. In any case, the first thing we'd do is create our "Sodal", our band of Savage Sisters. That's done collaboratively, but of course it's just me. We start off by choosing a Lar, a kind of totem spirit for the Sodal. There's a list of six, or you can make your own, but I'm cool rolling. Reindeer. Ooh, I like it. I'm meant to name the Lar, so let's call him Mjall, the Swift Reindeer.
I see my character as not being part of the same culture as the rest of the Sisters. She was a city girl, growing up in a glittering marble place built around the hot springs in this frozen land. The City of Steam (so called because steam and hot water are routed into every household) is patriarchal in nature. Women are prized members of society, at least on paper, but in truth they're treated as beautiful ornaments. Soliciting a woman's opinion is something you do as a joke, which sometimes puts women in the position of court jesters, able to speak truth to power because nothing they say is meant to be taken seriously.
But in any case, my character was the daughter of a very rich and prominent family, and was "revered" and "treasured" and called "the Jewel" or "the Sapphire" (because of her eyes). She was almost never left alone, and would almost certainly have been married off to someone that she didn't much care about, but then one day she got a little ahead of her retinue on the outskirts of town and Mjall appeared to her and knelt down.
She climbed on the reindeer's back, and it took her away into the woods, running at breakneck speed until the cold sucked her breath and the trees cut her face, and it deposited her near the Sisters who became her Sodal. And she never went back, because she knew if she did, she'd be just a girl.
Cool, good start. What next? Normally we'd pick the elemental type of magic our Lar uses, and then the rules and customs of our Sodal, but it's just me so I'm not gonna spend a lot of time on that. I will name the Sodal, though - they're called the Walkers on the Snow.
Gotta pick a name for my Sister. Clearly this is a name that her Sodal gave her after Mjall took her away; they call her Coretmjall (Mjall's Gift), or Coret, From Beyond the Forest.
So next I pick my role in the Sodal, based on how Coret solves her problems. I think she solves her problems with Strength and Heart, which makes her the Shield & Axe.
Normally I would pick relationships with other members of my Sodal, but it's just me, so I'll actually leave it there!
Coretmjall is strong and firece; I think of her as a debutante who became X-23. She still has those deep blue eyes, but her flawless skin has become marked by trees and branches, her nails are ragged from digging into bark for kindling and grubs to eat, and her lightweight, perfectly tailored clothes have given way to the furs that the Walkers on the Snow wear. She talks when she chooses to, and she relishes the ability to say what she means and not be concerned whether it's taken the wrong way or not.
That'll do it!
