Already hit my six characters for March, so this one's gravy. Mmm, gravy.
The Game: zauBeR (I have no idea why it's stylized that way)
The Publisher: Letra Impressa
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one, and some dice
zauBeR is an urban fantasy RPG that delves into some "Hitler living in South America" conspiracies (in the game, I mean), but reading it, it's structured like D&D in a lot of ways. The opening fiction and introduction make clear that a) there's influence from Unknown Armies and Conspiracy X and b) English is not the author's first language. It's all simple enough, and it looks playable, but I wasn't wowed. But what the heck, let's throw some dice around my newly clean table and see what happens.
Same six abilities as D&D, only the range is 2-12, so we just roll 2d6. So: 7, 6, 10, 8, 9, 7. Well, that's awful nice. That gives me modifiers of:
Str 0
Dex 0
Con +1
Int 0
Wis +1
Cha 0
So nothing huge, but nothing that sucks, either. What's next! Education! Here I roll 5d6 and get...13. Well, that sucks. Elementary/middle school. Evidently I was an early dropout. Oh, no, wait! My Int and Wis modifiers apply, so it's actually 14, meanwhile I finished high school! That means I get any one Weapon Skill except Heavy Weapons, and two of any other Skills except for a handful of highly specialized ones. Let's see. Let's assume that my guy was something of a hoodlum, yeah? (I have the overture from West Side Story in my head for whatever reason.) I'll take Short Blades as my weapon, and for the other two, I'll take Athletics and Streetwise.
Next I pick a career, limited by my level of education. Fortunately Criminal is a basic one. My guy is a petty thief/mugger type of guy...at least he was, before becoming at least marginally aware of the mystical nature of the world. Anyway, that means I get to pick Short Blades or Handguns, and since I have Short Blades already that ain't no choice at all (Skills are binary in this game).
Right, what else? Oh, I get Streetwise, which, like, I have. Hrm. In that case, the book says I can pick any other Skill, so I'll take Performance (dance, probably), and then I'll take Stealth and Smuggling off the list.
And now I pick an elemental path, which is more or less my character class. These become specializations at 5th and 9th level, a la Shadow of the Demon Lord, but of course that doesn't matter much for my purposes. I think I shall make this guy...Path of Earth, I guess. That means he's a rogue, which is pretty on the nose, but I don't want to make him a spellcaster because his Int and Cha (which would give me spell bonuses) are too low, and while I could make him a warrior, I feel like rogue just fits better.
As a level 1 rogue, I get Rogue Skills (a list of things I can do, like open locks, move silently, etc.); Climb Walls (doy); and Backstab (I can do the sneaky-stab!). The specializations for rogue are interesting - there's Assassin, which is what it says on the tin, but also Explorer and Driver, which are neat outgrowths (ew) of the rogue base class.
So now what! Hit Dice and Hit Points are really badly explained, and the examples of chargen skip that step, which is dumb, but I think what happens is that I roll 1d6 and add my Con modifier (+1), so that gives me...2. Fuuuuuck. Well, I guess I'm playing Riff, since I'm capable of fighting but gonna go down in one stab.
Well, if I wear an overcoat, my AC is higher (it'd be 6 unarmored, or 10 with the overcoat). I think I should; it'll reduce my movement but you can't move if you're dead, either. Equipment-wise, I think he has a knife, and anything else I'd want to pick based on the group.
So who is this fragile little thief? His name is João Silva (this game is, by default, set in Brazil), but his buddies used to call him Folha because he would crumple up like a dry leaf. They don't anymore, because mostly they're dead. João had nothing to do with that; they were all hanging out one night deciding what to do and thinking about where they could get some food, and then someone came along and put them all into a van. João was off having a piss and when he came back, all his homies were in this van driving away. Next day, their bodies turned up in a stack, not a mark on them, all wearing blissful smiles. That was the moment João realized that the world wasn't just full of monsters, it was full of monsters. He's not sure where to go from here (but I think in a group, he might be the sort to pick a PC's pocket and get into the group that way).
João is a teenager, real skinny (emaciated, you might say), ratty black hair. He hides in a giant overcoat that he stole from a bus station one day. Ooh, maybe that's how he gets into a group - the overcoat has a name and address in it and he goes a-burglin'.
Anyway, that'll do it!
