Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Character Creation: Contenders

I coulda been, etc. 

The Game: Contenders
The Publisher: Prince of Darkness Games
Degree of Familiarity: None. Just read the pdf.
Books Required: Just the pdf.

This game is about boxing, as opposed to The Squared Circle or Piledrivers and Powerbombs, which are about wrestling. Contenders bills itself as a gain about hope, pain and sweat and blood. The emulation here seems to be boxing films, which is interesting, as those don't lend themselves well to group play, I'd think. Would this be a one-on-one game, like Beast Hunters? Hard to say without reading further, so I'll do that real quick (the game's only about 45 pages long).

OK, so, the game has shades of Fiasco and other scene-based games like Blowback and Ganakagok. You make your Contender, and then you can do training scenes, connection scenes, promotion scenes. Resolution system is based on cards, not dice (of which I approve, of course). So it looks like a goodly amount of this is buildup to the fight, which is fine, since that's very much in genre.

So let's make my fighter. Fighters have to start poor. My fighter was a kid who was pretty smart when he was a boy, and then he was in a car accident when he was 10. He suffered a traumatic brain injury, and while he's make a good recovery, he's lost much of his functionality as far as book-smarts goes. He was, like, a merit scholar before and just boxed for a hobby. Now his folks are divorced and his mother won't do more than exchanged frosty phone calls with him. He's trying to go the distance with this boxing thing. His name is Isaiah "Ice" Colon (that's /
kəlon/, by the way).

Good start. Now I do a Connection. Isaiah's mother doesn't speak to him much, but his dad, Diego Colon, is in it for the long haul. Diego acts as Ice's manager and promoter, helps him train, and so on. But Diego smoked heavily from age 13, and his lungs are getting bad. My Hope for Diego is that I make enough money to get him some quality medical care. My Fear is that he'll die before we can reconcile with Mom.

I get one point each in Hope, Pain, Cash and Rep, and I get 2 more points to throw around. I'll put one point into Cash (it represents time and energy as well as actual money) and one into Hope.

Now I get 6 points to split between my In-Ring stats, which are Cover, Power, Technique and Conditioning.

Well, I see Isaiah as a smart fighter, and I figure he works himself to death because he wants to make up for his dad's ill health somehow. So I'll put three into Conditioning, two into Technique, one into Cover and leave Power where it is.

Wow. And...that's it. This is actually pretty cool. I'd considering running this with a group that was into it.

Sunday, January 22, 2012

Character Creation: Haven: City of Violence

This game always makes me think of the closing credits song in the movie "Dragnet."

The Game: Haven: City of Violence
The Publisher: LPJ Design, but the site is down
Degree of Familiarity: Not much. I've read about half the book, but I'm not enthused to read the rest so I'm just gonna make the character and call it a day.
Books Required: Just the core, though Strunk and White wouldn't hurt.

OK, so, I picked this up at Origins in the cheap bin. I pick up a lot of games that way. They're not always, or even usually, good. This one, I like the premise. It's supposed to be an action/spy movie emulator in the mean streets of Haven. The problem is that the inspiration list reads like a list of every movie in which anyone ever fired a gun, ever. Payback is on the list, so is Grosse Point Blank. Those movies, while both violent, are very different in tone. So what are we emulating, here? Or, again, is the only keyword "violence?"

And then there's the writing. Here, lemme quote a sample: "The single most important part of playing any role-playing game and Haven: City of Violence is, no exception to this, is to create a believable character." That's a direct quote. That style of writing (that is, sloppy) is endemic.

But beyond that, the game is just boring. It's a traditional RPG (skill list, attributes, top-heavy combat system) hung on a really wide-open genre. The city itself has some detail to it, but it tries to shoehorn in too much, and it doesn't have a gimmick to hang its hat on.

Anyway. Let's do up a character. "Choosing a Character Prototype and adding your own touches can easily start your first character. Real leaders, however, make their own destiny and Haven offers an in-depth Character Creation system that lets you build your own personalized character from scratch." Sigh.

Oh! Oh! One more thing. The dude running the game in Haven? Called the Game Operation Director. Yeah. G.O.D.

Anyway, Step 1 (because I'm not going to just choose a Prototype and tweak it) is...Start with a pool of 100 CPs (Character Points). Um, OK. I've got a pool of 100 CPs.

What I don't have is a character sheet, because the author didn't think to include one. LPJ Designs, where Creative Ideas and Business Innovations meet! I found a homemade that someone did up. So there's that. On to Step 2 - Create Primary Attributes and Secondary Abilities. Correct me if I'm wrong, but if you don't have any Secondary Attributes or Primary Abilities, does that not make sense?

Anyway, there are six Primary Abilities. I buy them one for one with CPs. I don't have any idea how much is an appropriate amount to spend on these (9 to 15 is average, but that's a pretty wide range). Looking ahead, I buy skills and Benefits with CPs, but I can get some back with Drawbacks. This is actually much like Chill.

Well, I don't need to get heavy into concept yet, but one of the (very) few things I find interesting about this game is that there's a secondary stat called Counter Measures. It's basically deactivating security and traps and things. I think it'd be interesting to play a character who was good at that, so I'll set my Agility and Intelligence high (because Counter Measures is based on those).

My primary Attributes are:

Strength 8
Will 15
Agility 18
Stamina 10
Intelligence 20
Perception 15

Total: 86

OK, now Secondary things. These are averages of the primaries, so we get:

Influence 15
Movement Value 9
Accuracy 17
Fighting Value 14
Subterfuge 18
Counter Measures 19
Concussive Health 33
Lethal Health 11

That was easy. I'm not only badass at Counter Measures, but I'm a good shot and (if I'm reading the numbers right) good at fighting, too. Well, it is a CITY OF VIOLENCE!

Step 3 - Skills. I get 7 skills (it's based on Intelligence), and they add a +1 to relevant rolls. I can also spend CPs to buy levels in skills, which add more of a bonus. Hrm. There don't seem to be any combat skills, which, with as granular as this skill list is (Accounting, Agriculture, etc.) is probably good.

OK, so I'll take the following:

Bureaucratic
Computers
Demolitions
Electrical Engineering
Law Enforcement
Physics
Streetwise

My attributes are pretty good, so I think I'll leave it as a +1 for all of these for now.

Languages: I get my native language + 4, because my Intelligence is high and all smart people are multi-lingual (duh). I take Spanish, Russian, Dutch and Hungarian. Oh, and by the way, the list of languages includes the following:

English
English - United Kingdom
English - Australian

OK, first of all, as different as British, Australian and American English are, people from these disparate lands can absolutely communicate, possibly with some effort, but by no means with the same difficulty as, say, an American and a Czech (just randomly picked one). Second, did you notice how American English is apparently the standard, and thus needs no further explanation? Telling, I think.

Anyway. Benefits. They cost CPs, while Drawbacks bestow them. I have 14 at present. I want Eagle Eyes (there's a flavor quote before each of these, and the one for Eagle Eyes is, and I'm not making this up, "I see you!!!!!"). I want Eidetic Memory. These cost 2 points each. Well, the book says they cost -2, which should give me four, but I know what the author means. I'll take Marksman, which is only 1. Holy shit, Nondescript is 6 points. And there's no game effect. It's just "people don't remember what you look like." Um, no.

Wow, I'm going to buying more Skills, I think. Let's look over Drawbacks, though I'm well within my points. There's one called Personal Constraint, which is meant to be behavioral. Here's another quote: "This type of drawback, should not be too specific, including your character cannot attack people wearing the color red on a Saturday during a lunar eclipse." Oy.

I will take it, though. My character doesn't kill good cops, and he assumes all cops are good unless they demonstrate that they're bent. This "costs" +1, which again...eh, screw it. I'll also take Traumatic Flashback. I have an idea about this.

Now, Special Abilities. Um, OK. I'll take Detect Flaw (I can sense weak points) and Sixth Sense (spider sense, basically). That eats 10 points. I have 3 points remaining. I'll go back and buy up Demolitions to Master (2 points) and Physics to Expect (1 point). Oh, and I grab some random numbers and figure out my language totals. I wind up speaking Russian and Hungarian fluently, Dutch and Spanish somewhat less fluently. Interestingly, it's possible to not speak your native language fluently under this system (your score is 10 + 1d10, but 12 is fluent).

Step 4 - Get money, buy shit. No thanks. Yawn. I have guns and shit, I'm sure.

Step 5 - Concept and shit. OK. Ivan Koltay was born to a Russian mother and a Hungarian father in a crappy section of Haven. Ivan, like his father, was brilliant and technical minded. He grew up hearing stories about the Russian police, though, and what fuckers they were, and his parents were big fans of American police officers and how the system worked in favor of the accused. Ivan went to college and got a degree in Physics, but then went to academy.

His brains pretty much meant he could pick his path, and he chose bomb squad. His parents weren't thrilled, but the technical aspects of the job thrilled him. And then his unit got offered a bribe - the local Russian mob was going to bomb a building, and the bomb squad's job was to make sure the bomb went off after the building was cleared. All the other guys went along with it, and Ivan, unwilling to turn all his buddies in and kind of touched that the mob went to such pains to clear the building first, agreed. Just this once.

He found the bomb, got the building cleared, and pretended he couldn't disarm it in time (he totally could have; it wasn't sophisticated). Watching the building from outside, he saw a face in a window. A woman, maybe his age, screaming for help...and then the building came down. No one else saw it. Ivan still has nightmares about that day, and he couldn't face his squadmates again...but neither could he turn them in.

He quit the force, and found a crappy apartment across town, in the Mexican district (he speaks a little Spanish, and he dated a Dutch girl for a while and went home with her to visit family. He joined the force around then and there's actually a large enough Dutch section of town that he was able to keep the language). He sells his services to the Russian mob, the Hungarian mob, the Mexican gangs, whatever. He designs bombs, helps the bad guys hack past security, things like that. As far as he's concerned, the system works just like it does all over the world. Everyone is for sale.


Saturday, December 31, 2011

Character Creation: Summerland

No, no one did an RPG based on this song. It's a post-apocalyptic game in which, overnight, a huge forest covers most of the world. Most people feel a pull called the Call, which drags them into the forest where they are (presumably) eaten by monsters. Some folks are immune, but it's because they're psychologically damaged enough to make it through the Sea of Leaves (which I think is a cool title). They're called drifters.

This looks like fun! Let's do a character.

The Game: Summerland
The Publisher: Fire Ruby Studios, but they don't seem to have a web page.
Degree of Familiarity: Just reading it now.
Books Required: Just the one.


The book recommends that the group figure out their themes and tone of the game - are we doing horror? Hope for humanity? Survivalist? I will, as usual, go with the example of play provided. In that, hope-horror-magic is the order of theme, while survivalist-action-investigation is the style of play. I can get behind that.

OK, so, Step One is Imagine your character. Basically, concept first. Keen. My character is in his 40s, balding, five-o-clock shadow at 10 in the morning, but going salt-and-pepper. Used to be pretty large, has become pretty lean in the aftermath of the world ending. Missing his ring and pinky fingers on his ring hand, and favors his right leg. Not sure why yet, some kind of accident.

I picture him in jeans, a vest jacket, and a silver teardrop necklace on a leather cord. His ears are both pierced, but he doesn't wear earrings anymore (since the Event, metal makes him itch). His name is George Swinton.

Let's move on to Qualities. I get 20 points to split between four of them, with 5 being average (bravo, guys). I figure Finesse will be lower for George; he's fit, but not really fast or dextrous due to his injuries. I'll put Finesse at 3, Mind at 7, Body at 4 and Empathy at 6.

Tags. Each Quality has descriptors attached. If you've been reading, you know I like these; Slasher Flick does something similar. I get two per Quality, and one of them has to be negative. So I'll put "lame" under Body, since George walks with a limp. I'll also put "tireless" there - he moves slow, but he can go forever.

Oh, wait, no, I get one Tag per Quality, except my highest (Mind) gets two. OK. I'll leave "tireless," because I want a negative Tag under Finesse. I'll put "lame" there - George is slow. Those are both descriptive tag. I'll put "good memory" and "horticulturist" under Mind - one's descriptive, the other is specialized skill. And finally, under Empathy I'll put "kind."

They each get a value equal to half the Quality, rounded down.

Trauma: Drifters are psychologically scarred, and obviously the accident was important to George. Maybe it wasn't an accident? I don't know, and actually I don't have to figure it out now - it comes out in play (again, I like this). I just note "the accident" for now. My Trauma and Stress both start at 5, and go down in play. The goal is to get to 0 Trauma.

Stuff: I get a couple of possessions that define George. This is in addition to clothes and camping gear, which I'm assumed to have. George has that teardrop necklace around his neck, which is special to him for some reason. He also has a pill bottle with five Vicodin in it. He doesn't take them, but he knows he could if his leg ever got really bad. I also decide that George was a carpenter/landscaper until the injury, and he left his community because he felt ashamed of his injuries and that he couldn't do his job anymore.

And that's it! That was easy. I may have to run this game, this looks cool.


Monday, December 26, 2011

Character Creation: Slipstream

I feel like making a character, and Savage Worlds characters are quick.

The Game: Slipstream
The Publisher: Pinnacle Entertainment Group
Degree of Familiarity: Pretty familiar with Savage Worlds, but I've only read this game.
Books Required: The core the Slipstream book.


Well, as usual for a Savage Worlds game, we begin with Race. There are lots of playable races, a few of which are fully detailed, but then there's a whole section on making your own race. I'm tempted to do that, but I'm also tempted by the slug people, just because, seriously, wtf.

OK, I hate to admit this, but you know why I'm going with the slug aliens? Because they can release a foul stench that uses the burst template, and that's fun. Oy. So, race is Septosian (oh, and all of these races slipped into this part of the universe through a black hole or something. The Septosians originally inhabited the twin worlds Andee and Hopp. That's in the book).

As a Septosian, I get All Thumbs (boo), Rubbery (+1 Toughness), Squelchy (-2 to Stealth and +4 to track me because I leave a trail of slime), Stench (the aforementioned horrible smell) and Tentacles (my arms are stretchy).

OK, so now I need some kind of concept. Well, Michelle mentions the slugs in Flushed Away (here) and now the idea of a Septosian bard, incorporating the squelchy noises of his own squishy body as percussion, is in my head and won't fucking leave. FINE. That's what we're doing.

Septosians have names in the burpy, slurpy style of their language, so my guy's name is Plep. Plep is fascinated by music, especially music of other races, and he's interested in learning to play various instruments and sing in different styles. Being a slug actually helps that, because his vocal apparatus is squishy and malleable, meaning he's a good mimic. Mostly he just wants to bring the gift of music to those downtrodden by Queen Anathraxa. I suspect he'd need a good, hard kick in the motivation during the first session, but he'd be receptive.

Right, Attributes. Agility is important, as is Spirit, for me. So I'll take:

Agility d8
Strength d4
Spirit d8
Smarts d4
Vigor d6

Now, Skills. I get 15 points. I want:

Gambling d4
Guts d4
Knowledge (Music) d8
Notice d6
Fighting d4
Persuasion d8
Streetwise d4
Taunt d8

Good start. I see a lot of taunt to get Shaken results in his future.

Skipping Derived traits because duh, they should go at the end, I need to do Edges. Now, if I take the Heroic Hindrance in addition to any others I take, I get a free Edge for which I can ignore Rank. Um, yes. For my free Edge, I'll take Charismatic.

Now, more Hindrances? Yes, probably. I want Curious for my Major Hindrance. For my minors, I'll take Loyal and Pacifist. Seems he's a nice slug.

So that gives me four points. I'll burn 2 and put my Smarts up to d6, and burn the other two on Skills, I think. I'll put Guts up to d8, and buy Shooting at d6.

Oh, right, and then I get an Edge. There are a few I like, but I'll take Luck. I think he'll need it.

And now Derived Traits. Pace is 6, Parry is 4, Toughness is 6 (because I'm Rubbery) and Charisma is +2.

I get 500 Slips (moneys). I'll buy "leather" armor (it's not really leather), a ray gun (turns everyone into a guy named Ray), a bubble helmet, and that'll do it. That leaves me 230 Slips left.

And that'll do it! I figure Plep always carries a few varieties of musical instrument, stuff that's small and portable. If he had quarters on a ship, they'd need to be soundproofed.

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Character Creation: Fae Noir

Well, since I ran it the other day and everything, figure I may as well make a character, yeah? I made some notes about the game in my last post, so let's rock.

The Game: Fae Noir
The Publisher: Green Fairy Games
Degree of Familiarity: Played it once at GenCon, ran it last night.
Books Required: Just the one.


So, the first step is "Conceptualize all over the place." I just cleaned my table so I'll probably try to keep it contained.

There are a number of different sorts of fae to play. If I want to play a character with True Faith, I can't play a faerie. Likewise, if I want to play someone using magic, I need to play either a human or a Tuatha. So I guess I'll play a faerie, since I played a human spellcaster when I played this once before.

There are 10 species of fairy listed, so I'll just roll a d10 for my race. That'll kickstart a concept. '8' give me...Ogre! Sure, I can be a bruiser.

OK, so according to the book, ogres are big, strong and stupid. They take orders well, but they aren't very motivated just by themselves. Hmm. The fae returned in 1918, the default setting for the line is 1923 or so. Let's assume that my ogre is a mob enforcer. He popped over from Faery and went about doing ogre things - eating people in the dark, and so on. And then a member of the local mob (I'd like the GM create a colorful figure for me) stood up to me, gave me a job breaking legs, and offered to keep me out of the iron shackles that the cops would undoubtedly like to slap me in.

Over the last few months, though, Fish (my character's nickname, because his eyes bug out and he has flaps of skin on his neck that kind of look like gills) hasn't been then leg-breaker my boss has been using. Might be because he's not subtle enough, or it could be because Fish likes to get drunk and then he brags. Either way, the clock might be running out for ol' Fish.

OK, good 'nuff for concept. Next up, we do Attributes. There are 8 of them, I get bonuses in Strength and Toughness but I take penalties in Looks, Intelligence and Agility.

OK, so this is weird. So, you start at given minimums for Attributes. Mostly it's 1, but, f'rex, as an ogre I start with Strength 3. I also, according to the fairy splat write-ups in the book, get a +3 to Strength, but a -3 to Looks. My maximum Looks is 4. So do I have to pump my Looks to 7 in order to get that? Is my Strength of 3 just...a given, or is it really 6 (that is, start at 3 and apply a boost later)? This is poorly explained, and the examples of chargen are human and Tuatha, which don't have much in the way of modifiers to use as examples. Bad form, Justin.

Well, since the modifiers match up with the min/max totals, I'll just leave it at that. Oh, wait, except I get a +3 to Strength, meaning my starting value should be 4. Ah, screw it. Assuming I start with one in everything (except Strength and Toughness, where I start with 3), I spend my 16 points thusly:

Agility 3
Strength 8
Toughness 6
Speed 3
Looks 1
Intelligence 2
Willpower 2
Perception 3

There we go.

Next up, Skills! I get 18 points here. Since there's no benefit to having a low Skill rating, I'll only wind up with a few with higher ratings.

Club 5
Roughhousing 5
Criminal Underbelly 4
Athletics 4

There we go. Now, Personality Flaws! I get 4 points. Let's do 3 in Blood-Thirsty and one in Obnoxious (he talks too much). That'll do.

And now, Build Points. Characters start with 42, but I lose 19 for being an ogre (because extra Strength is totally worth that. Oy.). That'd be 23, then.

Well, I can't buy Glamour and I can't buy magic. Looks like I should look at Edges. Well, I'll spend two points on Made, so I'm an official gangster. I'll Fists of Iron, too - I can beat on people wearing armor and not hurt myself.

Let's maybe buy some Skills? I have 18 points left. Skills are 1/1 unless I go over the linked Attribute, in which case they're 2/1. Let's spend 4 and knock Club and Roughhousing to 7, which is as high as they can go during chargen. Let's buy 2 in Bootlegging for two points, and then spend 4 more to knock it up to 4. Athletics is based on Agility...you know, maybe my last 12 points would be better spent in Attributes?

Those are 2/1, and my Agility and Speed could be higher. I can buy 6 points worth of Attributes with 12 points, which is 3 in each, which puts them both to 6. Much more better.

That means that folks have a +1 to target numbers to shoot me (I'm nimble!). I do an extra wound level because I'm fucking strong. I get an extra Severe Health Level, +2 to Initiative.

Ooh...but with Looks 1, I get 5 points of Personality Flaws to spend on various things. I'll take Ugly 5, and my low Intelligence means Skills are more expensive to raise with experience (which is stupid; it should only apply to Skills that you don't learn purely practically, but anyway).

On reflection, I like that having high or low Attributes means that you get these little bennies. That offsets the fact that you don't roll them much.

Friday, December 16, 2011

Do I still use this blog?

Yes, yes I do. Just very occasionally.

So, just to keep everyone up to speed on what's going on: I still blog over at my Livejournal (which is here). That's the spot for most of my online blather, but that may change. There's just not much going on in LJ-land anymore, and honestly this site is easier for me to access. So I may move my four main blog projects (cooking, actual play reports, movie reviews and character creation) over here soon.

I'm currently in the process of putting curse the darkness together, with the help of Michelle, Sarah and lots of other awesome people. There's a Facebook page for the game (here, so go Like us) and a Twitter that I'm using to update about the game and to post funny things my gamers say (here, go follow us). And, of course, the main development of the game is ongoing over at cursethedarkness.net.

So that's where we are. You might be seeing more activity here real soon-like.

Saturday, November 19, 2011

Character Creation: Mortal Coil

Tonight I'm running Changeling and cooking. I need to do some cleaning, and I need to take donations up to Goodwill just to clear out some clutter, and the dishes need done. But I also know that if I start doing stuff like that, I'll continue doing it, and then I won't get a character done. And I woke up this morning with a real need to make a character.

Not with a character concept, mind. I just kind of want to make one.

The Game: Mortal Coil, Revised
The Publisher: Galileo Games
Degree of Familiarity: None. I've read it, but even that's been a while.
Books Required: Just the one.


I picked up Mortal Coil at one con or another, one a big indie games kick. It looks like fun; it's much like Fiasco and Geasa (which I still haven't received my copy of, guys at IPR) in that you build the world and the setting as part of character creation.

I really do like that set-up, by the way, but I think I like it better the way Misspent Youth and Ganakagok do it where there's at least some thematic structure going in (which may be why I went that route with curse the darkness). Anyway, once again, it does make character creation from this perspective somewhat difficult. Fortunately, there are two example games set up in the book for me to glom onto.

The first bit of character creation is setting creation, as I mentioned, and we'd decide things like the tone of the game and how prevalent magic is and so on. There are two examples in the book. One is a kind of X-Files thing, the other is basically American Gods. Think maybe I'll go with the latter, since it's something I can't easily do with at least a dozen of my other games. First step in actual chargen is Character Concept. Now, this is the "old gods becoming irrelevant and drinking in a bar" setting, meaning my character is a god without worshipers. The examples are Loki, Sedna, Pele and Pluto. Seems like we've got a wide variety of pantheons to choose from. So, heading over here, and clicking on Celtic Mythology, I find my old buddy Ogma.

Now, if you've been paying attention, you know that Ogma was one of the characters in the Mage demo chronicle. He's the Irish god of eloquence and wisdom, it seems. I picture him as this kind of avuncular ex-hippie college professor, someone who might have been wild in his younger days but it just too old, too drunk and frankly too smart to be arsed to do stupid shit. I think he gets more fiery as he drinks, but the trick is getting him to actually do something rather than talk about it.

Good start for concept. I get five points to spend on Passions, which can be focused on Duty, Fear, Love and Hate. Even a one-point Passion is strong, and they just go up from there.

I don't think Duty is a big part of Ogma's life. I think Fear and Love are, though. I want a Fear: "People are losing the ability to communicate." Ogma invented an alphabet, according to legend, and he's terrified by text-speak and other new forms of language that seem to bastardize the eloquence he's used to. I'll put one point there.

I think his stronger Passion should be something about free speech. But is that Duty or Love? Hmm. I guess it could be either, but Duty, to me, implies too much of an impetus to get up and get moving, and that's not where I see this character. So let's say it's Love: "The greatest blessing is to speak freely." Two points.

One more. Ogma took the sword away from the King of the Formorians, so he's willing to throw down when necessary. I think I want a Hate. "I will not be silenced." I'll put my other two points there.

Next step: Abilities. All of the characters in this game (that is, the gods game) start at "ageless," so I get 15 points in Faculties and 15 in Aptitudes. The Faculties are Force, Grace, Will and Wits.

Well, obviously Will and Wits (which represent, respectively, mental fortitude and cleverness) are my high points. I'll put 5 points in each (the maximum). That leaves five for Force and Grace, and I think Grace should be stronger, so I'll put three there and two in Force.

And now, Aptitudes. These are nouns, as in "My character is a/the _______." So for Ogma, I want him to be the god of eloquence. That's easy enough. I also want him to be a connoisseur of fine wines and scotches and so on. I think it's fun if he's an instigator, too, someone who can get people fired up. And, just for the hell of it, I want him to be good at darts. So my Aptitudes look like this:

God of Eloquence 5
Connoisseur 3
Instigator 3
Darts Champion 4

And that's that, then. The rest of it is starting pools for points, but they wouldn't be filled in on the sheet anyway.