Character Creation: Wraith: The Oblivion 20th Anniversary Edition

Last day of the year in a year where nothing has been normal...but then again, my "normal" died more than three years ago. As such, as fucking awful as 2020 has been on a kind of macro scale, for me personally it hasn't been so bad. I've managed to avoid getting sick, as have the people in my family. I still have my job and I'm able to do it remotely, and I'm union in a union job where the union still has a leg to stand on, so overall, I can definitely say it could be worse. It has been worse.

I told Michelle today that I didn't want to die, despite what my own brain has been telling me for the past few years. In my lucid moments, I know that's the case, but lucidity has been a kind of oasis for a while now. Mostly it's been grief, guilt, and other unpleasant emotions, and feeling that way for multiple years at a time makes one wish for death, even if it's just so that the mind could stop. 

I don't get "real" like this on my blog often because there is no goddamn point. I have very few readers anymore, and the folks who do read are either close friends who already know my mind-space, or casual folks who are just here to see me talk about RPGs or movies or whatever. And that's fine. Consider this an anomaly. I have no plans to start talking about myself or life any more than I normally do, I'm not rejoining social media, and I do not and will not have any professional contact with the RPG industry. This is how things are. Denial, bargaining, anger, grief, acceptance. 

Speaking of which.

The Game: Wraith: The Oblivion 20th Anniversary Edition
The Publisher: Onyx Path Publishing
Degree of Familiarity: Lots, but I'll delve into that a little below
Books Required: Just the one

Ah, Wraith. Far and away my favorite World of Darkness game, and probably just behind Promethean if we include Chronicles of Darkness games, too (Beast doesn't crack the top five). Wraith was the game that got me into WoD, and instilled in me the taste for long, sprawling, interconnected chronicles, akin to our current-day cinematic universes. I did a character for Wraith 1st Edition here, but of course, new edition, new character. 

Reading Wraith 20, I'm stuck by a) how easy it is to slide back into the WoD headspace (something similar happened when reading the other 20th Anniversary Editions), and b) how much I really just do not care about the whole Stygia/Dark Kingdoms/political side of things. Don't get me wrong, it's not that I don't care for the non-Skinlands aspects. I love the Tempest, the Midnight Express, and even the idea of Necropoli, but like, the guilds, the renegade/hierarchy/whatever the other one is conflict...feh. When I ran Wraith back in the mid-90s, the focus was always on the characters, their Fetters and Passions, their Shadows, and what was going on in the Skinlands. Sure, I brought in all kinds of shit from other WoD games, and I did use the Hierarchy-related stuff, but the best moments were when the wraith characters got to be ghosts. 

Wraith, even more than most oWoD games, really wanted to be what we'd now think of as an indie game. It was too big for its conceptual britches, and it had to make do with all of this extra crap bolted on - including, I'd argue, Stygia and the Charon mythos and the Maelstroms. It also had to make do with this dumb system where 1s cancel successes, but like, that's life. Or death.

OK, let's move along. One of the things that happens to me a lot is that when I hear songs, I tend to think up characters (works in reverse, too; find the song for the character). I had a concept for a Wraith character that I never did anything with, but I'm gonna do it tonight. Here's the theme song:

Step One is concept and so on. So, my character is Dustin "Dusty" Mayhall. Dusty played guitar in a country/western band, and then the lead singer got this gig in Los Angeles. They went out there, took more gigs, became more of a rock band, Dusty kinda hated it but whatever, it paid the bills, and then the other band members booted him because he wasn't down with their whole persona. 

Dusty stayed in LA and took whatever jobs he could, and wound up teaching guitar, among other gigs. One of his students was a girl named Mel - 18, just out of high school, the daughter of two moderately famous Hollywood folks. Mel had done some acting when she was younger (sitcom), but wasn't really interested in it long term and really hated the lack of privacy that came with fame. She did like singing, though, and she was picking up guitar pretty quickly. Dusty had never really wanted to be a father, but he was grooving on the "cool uncle/teacher" role he'd found with Mel.

And then one night, Dusty got a phone call from Mel. She'd run away from home, she was at a dive bar, she was scared and wasn't really sure what she was doing. Dusty started heading downstairs, slipped, fell, and fractured his skull. He was in surgery three hours before he died, and remembered hearing his phone ring with Mel's ringtone before he lost consciousness.

And then Dusty woke up - kind of. He went to the bar that Mel had mentioned, and she was there. Weirdly, Mel can see him and hear him, and since then they've traveled together. Dusty hasn't told her anything about the Underworld or Stygia or any of that nonsense. That shit's for the dead. Mel's still alive, and Dusty's going to stay with her until she's ready for him to go.

Right, so. What would be "Concept" in most WoD games is split into Life, Death, and Regret. Life is Musician, Death is Accident, Regret is Love. That's easy enough.

Nature and Demeanor. Hmm. Dusty affects a kind of world-weary country boy thing, but it's less curmudgeon and more grizzled mentor, so I'll call Demeanor Pedagogue. His Nature is Caregiver, that's easy. 

Step Two, Attributes, the usual OWoD 7/5/3 spread. Hmm. I think Social/Physical/Mental, perhaps? Maybe with some freebies thrown at Wits later? So Charisma 4, Manipulation and Appearance (bleah) 3, Strength and Stamina 2 with Dexterity 4, and even 2s in Wits, Perception, and Intelligence. Sounds good. 

Step Three, Abilities! Again, usual deal, 13/9/5, not more than 3 in any one with these points, completely stupid and arbitrary divisions of Talents, Skills, and Knowledges. 

Well, Talents is gonna be primary because there's a bunch I want. I'll put one into Alertness, Awareness (it's so goddamn dumb that these are separate, especially for ghosts), and Athletics. Two each in Empathy and Expression...wait, what's the difference between Expression and Performance again? OK, Expression  is more way with words, so I think I'll skip it. Dusty's not a songwriter. 

So, three dots in Empathy, one in Intimidation, two each in Persuasion and Streetwise, and that leaves me two...I'll put one in Brawl and one more in Awareness. 

I think Skills are secondary. Three in Performance, obviously. Two in Crafts, one in Drive, one in Etiquette (country boy charm), two in Leadership. Might add to these later.

Finally, five in Knowledges. Two each in Academics and Bureaucracy, last one in Occult, boom. 

Step Four is Advantages, and we start off with kewl powerz (Arcanoi). I gotta refresh my memory on how these work. Ooh, they complicated this. Arcanoi are now split into Initiate and Common, and you can apparently have either or both at a given level. Getting the initiate stuff, though, requires Guild membership. I don't see Dusty being too into the Guilds, but if there's something I really want, I may have to rethink that. 

Well, I know I want a dot of Embody, but probably not more. Just common, thanks. Two dots of Keening, also common powers. First dot of Lifeweb, definitely. And how about first dot of Outrage? Sounds good!

Passions! These look familiar, anyway. 10 points, each needs a goal and an emotion and a rating. 

Well, I want something related to Mel, obviously, but "Protect" seems a little simplistic. "Help Mel Find Herself" is better, and the emotion is Love, of course. I'll put it at 5 dots. Hmm. I've been pretty focused so far on Mel, but I need something else. Let's say that Dusty is still annoyed with his old bandmates, especially since they're getting famous-er and using some music he wrote. I'll say that "Never Let the Band Forget Me", emotionally focused on Jealousy, is the Passion, two dots.

OK, one more Passion (rather, 3 dots). I feel like I want to circle back to Dusty being a general Caregiver, so I'll say that his last Passion is "Protect the People at the Bar". What's the emotional focus, though? Dusty feels like he's a guardian angel and he's focused on that bar (it's gonna be a Fetter) because it's where he was trying to go when he died. Responsibility? Duty? Oh, how about Respect? That works.

Fetters! Mel, 5 dots, obvs. The bar probably needs a name, let's call it Carmen's. Three dots there. Finally, 2 dots into the band members (the band is called Catamount). 

Backgrounds! Seven points here. I'll put four into Eidolon, two into Haunt (the bar's storeroom), and one in Legacy (the music that Catamount stole). 

Willpower! I start with 5, and then I get...

Freebies! 15 points. Let's see. Well, I think I want a dot of Strength (because Outrage), so that's 5 points. I definitely want a fourth dot in Performance, and I'll take a second dot in Legacy (8 spent). Heck, let's take the second dot of Embody (13 spent), and for the last two, I'll buy another dot of Intimidation (I have a feeling that protecting Mel might sometimes take the form of manifesting and doing spooky shit). 

That's it! Oh, wait, Shadow. Not mentioned in chargen, that's weird. Oh, wait, it's in the chart. See Chapter Six. OK, then. So, first I need an archetype. What's Dusty's Shadow like? I think he's superior - he's a bigot, he looks down on everyone, and he views Mel as a stone around his neck. He thinks Dusty should have sold out, gone solo, and left the other band members in the dust. The Director works nicely.

Now I need Angst; rolling my Willpower of 5 I get three successes (ugh). So my permanent Angst is 3. 

Dark passions! This one's easy. I get 7 points, so I'll take "Get Rid of Mel" (Spite) at 4, and "Kill the Band" (Hate) at 3. Note that Dusty's Shadow doesn't necessarily want to kill Mel, just get shed of her. He doesn't care about her enough to kill her. The band is a different matter. Actually, given that, I'm gonna flip those ratings so Mel has 3 dots and the band has 4. 

So now, 10 freebies, which I could use to buy Angst, Thorns, or Dark Passions, but there's no cost listed for Angst so I guess we're just going with Thorns? Oh, wait, in the example of Shadow creation it costs 2 freebies for a point of temporary Angst, so there we go. I'll spend 4 and give the Shadow a 2-point head start. That leaves me 6 for Thorns. I'll spend 5 on Shadowplay, and then that leaves 1 more, so I'll take a 1 point Tainted Relic (a guitar). 

And that's basically everything. As a ghost, Dusty looks more or less like he did in life - late 30s, hair down to his shoulders, light beard, flannel, blue jeans, cowboy boots. Always has a guitar pick in his fingers, but never a guitar (unless his Shadow comes out to play). Light Tennessee accent, gentle voice, rarely raises it (again, that's a Shadow thing). 

That'll do it! This makes my 500th character, so I'm going to do a new index post, but that'll come in the new year. 

All the Game Prep Ever

I'm running five games right now, plus occasional one-shots. If that seems nuts, well, it is. Let's take a moment to ruminate on that.

I've always dedicated a lot of time to running games (start the clock on "always" when I was about 18 or so; I ran games occasionally in high school, but my freshman year in college was when I started to meet a lot of other roleplayers and it wasn't uncommon for me to run games four nights a week). For a while it was mostly Chill, but I'd routinely buy other games and we'd try them out. So I'd run or play Shattered Dreams, Nightlife, Paranoia, Toon, Earthdawn, and lots of others I can't even think of right now. Sometimes we'd just play a game once and then gravitate back to stuff we liked more, and once 1994 rolled around and Wraith: The Oblivion came out, then it was down the rabbit-hole that was the World of Darkness.

World of Darkness, in both incarnations ("classic" and what's now called Chronicles of Darkness), was great for the GM who likes to run multiple games because they could all take place in the same universe. That was harder with OWoD, since the cosmologies weren't really designed to mesh, but it didn't get too crazy until Demon: The Fallen by which point I had pretty much stopped running connected games. It was nice, though, if I had a random group of people one night and folks wanted to play but we didn't have a group of characters for those particular players to be able to say "OK, make Mage characters and let's pick a city." And bam, new chronicle, another entry in the binder.

Now I don't run as much WoD, though. I'm not running any CofD games at all (for now, though we'll get back around to Promethean at some point), and I'm just running Changeling: The Dreaming as a playtest for the 20th anniversary edition. Since my priorities have shifted from "be an expert in WoD" to "play lots of different games to broaden my horizons as a designer," I'm running, at present, a Fate Core game (Atomic Robo), a PbtA game (Epyllion, or rather, the Epyllion ashcan, since the main game isn't out yet), a Gumshoe game (Night's Black Agents), and a lighter, beer-n-pretzels game (Feng Shui), in addition to Changeling.

Epyllion is nice because it's zero-prep. I wing it every session, and that's the way PbtA games work. But the rest of the games require varying degrees of prep. Feng Shui is simple enough in play, but it's got a lot of backstory and since it relies on combat, I have to have opponents statted. Night's Black Agents is Gumshoe, which is a heavy-prep game (though this particular game has been going long enough that I can wing it a little) because you have to know what clues are around for the PCs to find. Changeling, sadly, is more prep than I'd like. It used to be that I knew WoD so well that I could whip up stats off the top of my head, but even if we weren't doing a playtest with some revised rules, it's been so long since I ran an OWoD game (that last one was Demon, which wrapped in...jesus, late 2004, by the look of it?) and I largely (and deliberately) put the system out of my head when I started developing/writing for NWoD that it's weird to be running it. Doesn't help that the players, by and large, aren't familiar with it and, I think, would rather be playing it in NWoD/CofD. Atomic Robo is Fate, which means that I know the system, but it has several cool little subsystems I need to get familiar with.

And all of this is on top of the fact that the groups are very different. Atomic Robo is perfectly able to improvise and buy in with no trouble. Feng Shui has a bit more trouble with that. Night's Black Agents is finding their feet in the game, but it's taken three years and some switches in players and characters. And so on.

Time was that I had no trouble keeping up with game prep, but then again, time was that I a) had more energy and b) had more time, somehow. My day job used to afford me occasional opportunities to work on not-work, but it's gotten more intense this year, and it's sapping my energy. I'm getting older, too, which doesn't help, and then there's the freelance work.

What I am saying? I think what I need to do is set aside a day a month, to do some extensive game prep for what I'm running. One day may actually not be enough, but I have a day today (yesterday, really, but I was sick yesterday which totally pissed me off, and led to me taking today off work). In the interest of not making this post any longer, and in making it easier for players of the respective games to avoid the posts in question, I'm gonna make separate posts for each of the games (less Epyllion, because again, no prep).

First up, since I'm running it today: Changeling.

#RPGaDay2015

Here we go!

Favorite Horror Game: It's honestly a two-way tie between the new World of Darkness and Chill, with the classic World of Darkness a very close third. The only reason CWoD doesn't edge closer is because it so often wasn't a horror setting - sure, you got some very creepy, beautiful horror moments (a lot of them from Wraith), and then you got the WAAHHH-HOOOOO of Werewolf, Vampire, and Mage.

NWoD hasn't had as much wah-hoo, and has stayed pretty consistently horror. Plus, it's horror that I like, which is appropriate, since there hasn't been a lot in NWoD that I haven't worked on in some way.

And then Chill, of course, for me has always been about the people who fight the monsters. One of the thing that frustrates me about real life is that our monsters aren't the kind you can melt with salt or destroy with an incantation; our monsters are people, and people have their own struggle, even if those struggles make them monsters. It's nice to play characters who are unequivocal heroes.

Favorite RPG Setting: Hmm. Well, in the interest of not being too one-note, let's move away from WoD. I like Deadlands, but I don't know if I'd say favorite. There are some problematic elements there. But on the other hand, hucksters! Really a brilliant idea.

Oh, wait, I know: Edge of Midnight. Noir, Dark City inspired RPG with physics-magic. Very cool game.

#RPGaDay2015

Day 12: Favorite RPG Image: This one, surprisingly, was easy. There's one image that stuck with me as the most arresting, moving, disquieting picture in an RPG book:

This was an illustration from Shoah: Charnel Houses of Europe. It's not the only book released under White Wolf's "for adults only" Black Dog imprint, but it's the only one, IMO, that earned the "for mature audiences" distinction. It's a book about the ghosts of the Holocaust, and I've seen people over the years argue that the subject shouldn't be in an RPG. I disagree. It should be in Wraith, and if that's uncomfortable, good.

Character Creation: Wraith: The Oblivion 1st Edition

 Today I finished my final draft for A Little Meatier, and tomorrow I get to start working on my first draft for Next Phase. Yee-ha! Werewolfy goodness all around!

Tonight, though, I want to make a character, because I can stay up and do it and I don't have to get up early. I'm gonna go get a drink first, though. OK, I'm back.

The Game: Wraith: The Oblivion 1st edition
The publisher: White Wolf
Degree of familiarity: Lots. Wraith was the first WoD game I ran, and that chronicle was the first one in which I gave serious though to theme, mood and other high-falutin' concepts. My second Wraith game died out before its time, but it had some interesting moments. Wraith remains one of my favorite games of all time.
Books Required: Just the Wraith core, which is good, 'cause it's all I have.

If you died today, what would go on your character sheet? I wrote an essay on running this game some time back, y'know.

Anyway, I'm doing Wraith today because I have a concept. I was watching Dead Like Me last night, and thinking about the business of "reaping" the newly deceased. And then I thought about my school and how I have to help out the kids who are trapped behind their own voices sometimes (that's OWoD poetic, ain't it?).

So the concept I had was of a man who worked as a custodian at an elementary school. He loved the kids, but had a special place in his heart for the lonely, the sad, the misfits, the freaks, the ones that just never quite got it. He'd been like that, once, and through a series of twists and turns, this is where he ended up. He liked the work, but he always regretted not having a family of his own. And then he died one morning, driving to school. The train track's crossing guards malfunctioned and didn't fall, and he zoned out and didn't see the train...

He was Reaped by a ghost who haunted those train tracks, a ghost who, fortunately, was kind and understanding. The custodian (his name is Sylvester Cotto - the kids called him "Mr. Sly") realized as he learned about the Hierarchy that a lot of ghosts don't get treated so well. In fact, they get put straight into slavery. To Sly, that just wasn't acceptable.

That takes care of Life, Death and Regret. I think that for Nature, this guy is a Caregiver. He Reaps newly dead people and helps them steer clear of the slavers for the Hierarchy, even at risk to himself. For Demeanor, though, he's a Critic. He always had a cynical side; it was tempered before, but death put an edge on it.

On to Attributes! Sly is a Social animal, probably Physical secondary, leaving Mental tertiary. I put Charisma up to 5, Manipulation to three and Appearance to two. Sly is damned likeable. Everyone always say.

For Physical, I throw one into Strength and Dexterity and the rest into Stamina. Sly is tough. Always has been.

Mental, I make it even. I may raise Intelligence later, or I may let Abilities do the talking.

Speaking of which: Sly has been a custodian and handyman for a long time, so I think that puts Skills first (he also served in the Army, I think). Knowledge is secondary; Sly likes to read on his off time, and he does work at a school. That leaves Talents last.

Skills: I put one into Firearms (old military training), and one each into Melee and Leadership for the same reason. Three into Crafts, three into Repair (his job), one into Stealth, one into Etiquette (for dealing the parents) and two into Drive.

Knowledges: Three into Bureaucracy (military and then school? C'mon), and then one each into Computer, Enigmas, Investigation (lookin' through lockers!), Linguistics (Spanish), Politics and Science.

Talents: One each in Athletics, Awareness and Brawl, and two in Empathy. I think my freebies might go here.

Advantages: I get five dots in Arcanoi. Ooh! Spectral power! Well, let's think. I'm going to spread out my points, here. I take the first dot in Argos, Lifeweb, Fatalism, Outrage and Castigate. All useful abilities for his existence as a Reaper.

Backgrounds: Seven dots. Woo! I'll take Memoriam, first off. The kids remember Mr. Sly, and sure enough, the place just doesn't run as well without him. Three dots there. I'll put two into Status (Renegades). What he's doing is technically against Hierarchy policy, and so he's kind of a Renegade, though he wouldn't see it that way. I'll put one dot into Haunt (his janitor's office at school) and the remaining dot into Artifact. Sly's ring of keys followed him into the Shadowlands, and he can use it to unlock any door, provided it isn't magically sealed.

Passions: OK, here's where we're off the lists and high on life! Death, rather! First passion: "Ease the transition into death." The emotion there is "Compassion," and I'll give that 4 dots. Since I want a school-related Passion, I give Sly "Keep the school running smoothly" focused on Pride (2 dots). Finally, I take "Protect the misfits", focused on Pity, at 4 dots. Pity doesn't really seem right for that, though. Sly was a misfit when he was a kid. How about we focus that on Envy, instead? He always wanted to be one of the cool people, but he wasn't and never will be. So he helps the underdogs to find their own way, not wanting the "beautiful people" to always get their way.

Fetters: 10 dots here, too. Well, definitely the school. Three dots; that's an important one. His Purple Heart from when he was in the Army gets 1 dot. The letter than his fiancee, Marla, wrote him when she dumped him to move back to Jersey with her old boyfriend gets three (remember, he always wanted a family). The train crossing where he died gets one - why did he zone out that morning? He was always a careful driver... And, finally, the book he was reading when he died, currently behind the desk at the school library, Slaughterhouse Five.

OK, now I get 15 freebies. Let's look at Talents. I spend 12 right away, buying Alertness, Awareness, a third dot of Empathy, a dot of Expression and two Streetwise. That leaves three. Normally I'd take extra freebies by giving them to my Shadow, but I don't think it's appropriate for Sly. In fact, I think I'll use those extra three points to buy Eidolon 2, and up the Artifact to 2 (because for what it does, I think it should probably be 2, since I can affect the Skinlands with it).

Speaking of the Shadow...

Sly's Shadow, I think, is just bitter. It hates children for their youth and how they squander it. It hates mopping up their vomit and listening to their stupid fights, catching them making out in the halls and dealing with the disrespectful tones. And it really hates ripping the cauls off newly dead idiots when it could be selling the little shits. This Shadow is a Director. It knows it doesn't have much time in power, and so when it does manage to snatch control away, it sets things up as best it can. It's already used Sly to sell a newly dead person into slavery, and it reminds Sly of that whenever it's feeling vicious.

Angst: I roll 5 dice at difficulty 6, and get three successes. My permanent Angst rating is 3.

Dark Passions: I get seven points to assign here. Well, first, Sly's Shadow hates kids, and wants to see them humiliated and broken. So that's "Break children's spirits" (Hate) at 4. The Shadow also wants to see Sly go get a job Reaping for the Hierarchy, which would be custodial, but also be party to slavery. "Join Hierarchy" (Greed) at 2. Finally, the Shadow blames Sly's own Reaper, Lois, for his death. "Harm Lois" (Bitterness) at 1 dot.

Freebies: I get 10 to spend on the Shadow. Definitely want Dark Allies, because I can see Spectres wanting a piece of Sly. 3 points. I'll also spend 3 points on Bad Luck - very nasty for my character's clever Shadow. Finally, I'll put the other four into temporary Angst, giving the Shadow 2 points.

And that's everything. This being a 1st ed game, I take a Charisma Specialty (Approachable) and a Stamina Specialty (Workhorse). But beyond that, I'm good to go and ready to jump into death!