Pugmire: Beating Up a Storm

After a bit of an unintentional hiatus due to what happens when you only play once a month and then people have illness/life things happen HOW VERY DARE we're back on the high seas! 

Our heroes are on the good ship Shivering Star, and things aren't going well. All of the food on the ship has spoiled and everyone is a little, well, terrified that this voyage will end with starvation or cannibalism or something. And yesterday, poor Joey-Boy, the ship's quartermaster, fell into the sea! The heroes were able to rescue him, but their compatriot Boomer Pitbull was nearly drowned/burned up by acid/eaten by sharks in the process.

So now, the heroes are trying to figure out what's going on. Gelert Sausagedog, whose jaunty exterior hides a very well-read dog, thinks on the maritime legends he's heard and recalls stories of cursed voyages. Storms coming out of nowhere, spoiled food, all of these are hallmarks of such a curse - but what, or who, could have cursed them? 

Peppa Papillon goes to visit Joey-Boy in the sick bay (the magic salts of the ship's medic, Otame Archaidchilde, have healed him up pretty well, but he's still tender). They talk and Joey-Boy reveals that he felt something shove him into the water, and just before he did, he felt a strong wind, coming from a direction that he knows the wind wasn't actually coming from. That's why he whispered "the winds" when they pulled him out of the drink. He didn't see anyone before he fell, though, and afterwards he was too busy burning from acid.

Following up on this, Peppa goes and talks to Tally-ho Whoop Whoop, the first mate, and asks whether, perhaps, any of the ship's crew might have seen something, even without realizing it. Tally ties a rope round her waist and calls up to the cat in the crow's nest, and the cat leaps down as a counterweight, yanking Peppa straight up the mast ("YIPE!"). Tally meets her there, and together they check where Joey-Boy was shoved in. 

It's actually in something of a blind spot - the only crew member they can see near there is Jinx Von Rex, the sailing master, standing at the helm. (Joey-Boy was on the deck on the side of the cabin, and the helm is on top of it.) Peppa also talks to Pendy, the cat lookout, and Pendy didn't see anything before Joey fell. Just Joey walking the decks as usual, then the scream and the splash.

The characters get together with Captain Otterhound and ship's magician Perda Arcaidchilde and talk over their findings. They decide that something on this ship is causing the problems, but whether that's a saboteur, a cursed object, or something else they aren't sure. They are sure that magic is involved, however, so they come up with a plan.

The Captain will have Tally call a general inspection of the crew, and Peppa will interview everyone, quickly, using her Zone of Truth spell. It's not foolproof, but it'll be a start. Boomer will stay with her in case muscle is needed. Meanwhile, Petunia Pibble, Dire Newfoundland, and Sausagedog will search the ship with a special eye (nose, really) toward magic.

Tally calls for the inspection ("FALL OUT, YOU SALT! CAPTAIN'S INSPECTION! SQUAWWWK!"), and the Captain runs down what's happening. The sailors don't seem upset - they're just as scared by all this as everyone else. Peppa casts the spell and asks everyone some yes/no questions about whether they know anything about what happened to Joey-Boy and whether they know about the food spoiling. No one does, however.

Meanwhile, Petunia, Dire, and Sausagedog search the crew's quarters and the hold and find nothing out of the ordinary. The cargo in the hold hasn't been disturbed, either. They got to sick bay and talk to Joey-Boy and Otame, and look through Otame's salts and rocks (he's happy to show them). There's magic here, but nothing they wouldn't expect to find.

Finally, they realize that they haven't talked to Jinx von Rex. Jinx is easy to miss - her job keeps her at the helm a lot of the time, and she's just generally distant. The three of them go to the helm and speak to her, and Petunia immediately smells magic. She asks about it, and Jinx' eyes narrow slightly. But then the dogs realize that a strong wind is at Jinx' back!

Dire grabs her by the throat and demands to know why he shouldn't just crush her neck. Storm clouds roll in and lightning crashes, and Petunia throws a Dispel Magic spell at Jinx. She responds by opening her mouth and letting out a horrific shriek, and a huge, bat-winged demon explodes outwards. Jinx collapses to the deck, and Sausagedog backflips off the cabin onto the deck to alert Peppa and Boomer. Boomer grabs a sailor and says "You! Go get my maul!" The sailor runs off!

They both rush up to the cabin, and Peppa calls up a Spiritual Guardian next to the demon. Its light burns the demon's clouds, and it calls up gale-force winds, throwing Peppa and Petunia off the cabin. Boomer rages, and he and Dire swing on the demon, punching it will all their might (their weapons are, unfortunately, still in their cabins). The demon conjures thunder and lightning, and the skies above start wailing. Petunia dispels the storm, and Perda arrives and throws the ol' reliable Magic Missile at the demon.

The crew, at the Captain's orders, runs around securing the ship. The demon flies upwards to the crow's nest, and unleashes acid rain onto the deck! The crew falls, clutching their burning flesh, as Sausagedog struggles to get tarps over them (Dire helps). Petunia, however, finally has her shot.

She flings lightning at the demon, and it lights up like thunderheads in a storm. Boomer roars in rage and springs across the deck, climbing up the mast (the sailor finally arrives with his maul, but Boomer isn't dumb enough to try climbing a mast with a maul in his teeth). He gets to the crow's nest and sinks his teeth into the demon, holding it still, and Petunia strikes again, flinging Magic Missiles at it. The demon dissipates into wisps of clouds and ozone, and the skies clear.

Otame and Peppa spend the rest of the day healing crew members, and then the officers meet up in the cabin and talk it over. Jinx is alive, and in the brig until Peppa can talk to her, but most of the heroes feel this is a pretty clear case of demon possession. Captain Otterhound also reveals that the ship has been sailing south, rather than north (this is what happens when your sailing master gets possessed). They right the ship and start heading for the coast. Petunia recalls stories of demons of the sea called Stormcallers, evil creatures that just want to bring ships into the open ocean and sink them.

Peppa talks with Jinx, who tells her that all she remembers is trying to guide the ship through the first storm and then suddenly she was waking up on the deck with Sausagedog shaking her. She has no memory of her time in the Stormcaller's thrall. 

The crew tightens their belts and presses on, and in a couple of days they reach the coast, famished, dehydrated, but alive. Boomer leaps to the beach and digs his paws into the sand, thrilled to be alive, while Petunia steps off the boat, takes two steps, and falls on her butt because she no longer has land legs. 

Next time: On to Port Matthew!

Movie #750: Cyborg

Cyborg is a kind of terrible action/sci-fi mess directed by the inimitable Albert Pyun (he of Mean Guns and Brainsmasher...A Love Story) and starring Jean-Claude Van Damme, Deborah Richter, Victor Klyn, and Dayle Haddon. 

In a post-apocalyptic future, a plague cleverly titled "the Living Death" has ravaged the population because people wouldn't wear masks (we assume). A cyborg named Pearl Prophet (Haddon), having recovered data in New York that will allow doctors in Atlanta to make a cure, briefly meets a "slinger" (mercenary/do-gooder) named Gibson Rickenbacker (Van Damme) before getting kidnapped by the evil Fender Tremolo (Klyn). Fender intends to bring Pearl to Atlanta himself in order to own the cure. Turns out Gibson hung up his knives some years back and tried to have a normal life, and Fender and his pirates rocked up, killed his wife (Terrie Batson) and her young son (no idea, his name is never mentioned and I don't know if he's credited), kidnapped and brainwashed her daughter Haley (Kristina Sebastian as a kid and then Haley Peterson as an adult), so now Gibson is OUT FOR REVENGE. 

I hate to admit it, but this movie was kind of formative for me. It came out in 1989, and for some reason my best friend in high school had it on tape, so we watched it (this and a lot of other macho-ass action movies) a bunch of times. I never thought it was good, but I remember it being better than it is. 

Turns out Pyun's cut of the movie was very different - like, black and white, gorier, more serious - and test audiences just hated it, so Van Damme and a friend recut it into the cinematic tour-de-force it is today. And like, there are some decent action scenes, because Van Damme can actually make martial arts look cool on camera. The scene of him doing the splits above one of Fender's pirates before stabbing him is nicely done, and the scene of him being crucified and breaking himself down amidst flashbacks of what happened to his family would have been effective if we hadn't already seen literally all of the flashbacks already. Shots linger too long, the dialog is one step up from RPGs played by 13-year-old boys ("I'D BE A GOD"). But some of the costumes are impressive, Van Damme is good at looking sad, and there's that nifty rotating rifle thingie he has, so y'know. 

I think it's actually more watchable than Mean Guns, which is too bad, because I like that premise more, but Pyun's gotta Pyun.

My Grade: F+
Rewatch Value: Medium

Next up: Death Warrant

Character Creation: The Great American Witch

Cackle, cackle, broomstick, etc.

The Game: The Great American Witch
The Publisher: Gallant Knight Games
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

The Great American Witch (or "GAW" which sounds like something a raven would say if you caught it by surprise) is a PbtA game about playing, well, witches. Witches belong to one of several crafts, and answer to a governing body, and are generally concerned with not being persecuted and bringing magick (note the "Brucato K" there) to the world.

Honestly, it reads like a WoD game with all of the lore stripped out. I like the emphasis on the coven and I think the resolution system is interesting, but it was not intuitive to me. But at the end of the day it's an urban fantasy game, just not one I'm likely to run, because I could probably get something close to the same experience with Urban Shadows or Thirsty Sword Lesbians or (on the more trad side of things) Witchcraft and be on surer footing. 

ANYWAY. I started typing this on Thursday and then we got Baldur's Gate 3 and we've been playing D&D in it's best expression - a video game - since then, so let's get back into the waaaaAAAAacky world of table-top RPGs. What do we need to do to make a witch!?

"Character players." I'm not gonna say this game is pretentious or anything...

OK, the first step in making a character is to figure out Coven, but of course it's just me, so how much of that do I really wish to do? Well, let's at least pick the type of Coven my character would be in, and then we'll keep the rest of the details fuzzy. I think if I were playing this game, I'd push for the Coven of the Town (very focused on community, but operating openly) or the Storm (more activist and direct in action). Let's go with Storm, just because it's more exciting. 

A Coven of the Storm is working to "dismantle the imbalance of powers in society." That's a great goal, and it's very much prone to abuse or extreme interpretation. Let's assume that our Coven is housed in a university, because personally, I have never been more prone to doing stupid but well-meaning shit than when I was in college. 

OK, everything else about the Coven is interesting and would be really important in a real game, but I think I can skip it for purposes of chargen. 

So I need to pick a Craft. In Mage this would be Tradition (or...Craft, I guess). Let's go with Hekate. I like the idea of talking to the dead, coupled with someone who's really passionate about activism in a "bricks? bricks" kind of way.

Let's say my character is a history major (since our Coven is at a university), and he had a really nasty wake-up call his freshman year. He went to a very small, very well-funded Christian boy's academy in high school, got taught the White Jesus version of history, loved learning about it, went to college, took an American History class taught by a woman who'd written her doctoral thesis on Deborah Sampson, started questioning everything, had a major blowup with his parents, thought about changing his major, talked with his history prof, read a bunch of books, started practicing magick, and joined the coven early his sophomore year. His name is John Tyler Grant, because it's the most generic white guy name I can think of it. He still dresses like his mom buys his clothes (because she does); khakis, polos, etc, but he wears a silver necklace with some Greek lettering, which doesn't stand out much in a university.

So, I get a stat array...Let's see. I think Mercy and Severity should be his better stats, so I think I'll make it Mercy +2, Wisdom -2, Severity 0. Aaaand the slots for stats on the fillable sheets don't allow more than one character so you can't put a "-" symbol there. Cool.

Moving on. I get to pick a Refuge (where I can rest and recover power). Obviously "natural history museums or archives" makes the more sense.

Background: You are Hekate because...you are compelled to help spirits. "White/male guilt" isn't a stated option, but that one's close enough.

Lifestyle: What do you do for money/living expenses? I'm gonna say "works with the coven," because his option, "relies on parents," isn't here.

Relationships: Skipping this, because it relies on other PCs. Or CPs, I guess.

Resources: What do you have? Ooh, as much as I'd like a hound familiar, I'll go with "publisher or media outlet" and say that the campus paper/radio station/podcast has a decent following and John has an in there.

Personality: I'll take Emotional, volatile and Self-aware, introspective. Contradictory? Yeah, people are. 

And I think I'll have John start off in Crone. Yeah, Maiden makes more sense for his age and place in his career as a witch, but his focus on history and what has come before is pulling him towards the Crone Aspect. I think learning to appreciate hope and possibility would actually be a part of his arc. 

And that's actually it! 

Atlantis: SPIDERS EVERYWHERE

As you can probably tell from the title, this episode is not arachnophobia-safe. Here's last time.

Our heroes have successfully bought some time for the town of Port Serpentslice; the mysterious ghost ship Messenger having sunk into the waves whilst the heroes go looking for its target, the other ghost ship Skartorius. The heroes head to the local tavern to have some drinks and consider their next move. The problem they have right off the bat is that all they know about the Skartorius' location is "the Kanawalla desert" and like, that's a quarter of the continent. Akala has heard stories of the Skartorius, but nothing that would help narrow down how to find it.

They decide to ask around, figuring that the residents of Port Serpentslice might have heard something more specific, and indeed, they wind up talking to a woman named Gheta. Gheta is the first mate of a ship called the Julana, and tells the heroes that she's actually seen the Skartorius and would be willing to guide them to where she saw it. But perhaps they could help the Julana with a little job? 

The Julana's crew harvests spider silk in the Pits of Haal, volcanic tunnels infested with peraka-i, giant cannibal spiders. The work is lucrative, but dangerous, and they'd love to have a bit of backup for their upcoming job. The heroes aren't crazy about the idea of going into tunnels full of man-sized venomous spiders, but they admit that it's a job that they can handle, and they need Gheta's help.

On the morrow, they leave on the Julana. Everyone is jocular and game, but they don't sugarcoat the danger - it's typical for a few of the crew to get dragged off and eaten. Eithne makes some wax figures and binds into them a "ward vs spiders" spell, and hands a few out to the crew. She also casts a spell on a couple of Jengo's arrows, which will cause the arrow to split into multiple arrows when its arc reaches its zenith. 

After a couple of days of sailing, they arrive at their stop on the western coast of Mu. They disembark and the harvesters don their face wraps (to combat the sulfurous smell) and gloves (to prevent getting stuck to the silk). They enter the tunnel and the harvesters get to work, while the heroes brace and wait. They don't have long to wait. 

The spiders boil up from apertures into the tunnel and start swarming, but the spells that Eithne has prepared work - they don't keep the spiders away entirely, but they have trouble pushing their way through the barriers. Jengo fires arrows and lays spiders low, while Akala discovers that if they maim, rather than kill, a spider, the other spiders attack it. Eithne throws blades of force and then plugs holes with ice to reduce the swarms. Imani lays out with her mong, preventing the spiders from entangling harvesters and compatriots.

The battle is intense and Eithne and Akala suffer a couple of painful bites, but the heroes keep the spiders off the harvesters long enough for them to fill their sacks and fall back to the ship. 

Once there, they clean the bites with oil from an amphora (which also contains a small, drowned spider, but the stuff draws the gunk out of the bites and makes them feel better almost right away). Gheta has the the ship set course on a river going east into the continent, and tells them that they're going to the First City.

The First City isn't actually a city, it's the ruins of one, remains of civilization bleached clean by centuries of sand and erosion. No one actually lives there, but Gheta informs them that it's infested with ghosts (and probably scorpions). But it's there that she saw the Skartorius. 

With that cheery thought in mind, the heroes sail on!

Movie #749: Child's Play

Child's Play is a horror movie starring Brad Dourif, Catherine Hicks, Chris Sarandon, Alex Vincent, Dinah Manoff, and Tommy Swerdlow. 

Karen (Hicks) is a single mom living in a suspiciously fabulous apartment in Chicago with her son Andy (Vincent). All Andy wants for his birthday is a "Good Guy" doll, based on the rather saccharine cartoon (from what we get to see of it), but Karen can't afford it, so Andy is sad but understanding in that way that only six-year-olds can be. But then Karen comes across a peddler (Juan Ramírez) who sells her a Good Guy! All is well!

Well, not all. Turns out this particular doll was recovered from the smoldering wreckage of a toy store that exploded after a determined cop called Norris (Sarandon) chased a deranged killed named Charles Lee Ray (Dourif) down and shot him. Ray, however, is proficient enough in Hollywood voodoo to transfer his soul into another person, or something shaped liked a person, and so this Good Guy doll now houses the spirit of "Chucky." 

From there, we get to see Chucky working to get a human body back and killing anyone who gets in his way, including Karen's best friend Maggie (Manoff), his former partner (Neil Giuntoli), and the voodoo priest that taught him this stuff to begin with (Ray Oliver), until Norris, Karen, and Andy manage to set the bastard on fire and shoot him in the heart, killing him (until the sequels).

Everyone knows Chucky as this campy, wise-cracking, Jennifer-Tilly-banging smartass now (unless they saw the remake, I guess), but as with A Nightmare on Elm Street, the first movie in the series takes itself a little more seriously. Chucky is kind of silly-looking at times, but he's done through practical effects and puppetry and the result is that he doesn't move like a person, and that's kind of eerie. The first half of the movie avoids letting us see him animate, and then he just comes out full-force when Karen threatens to burn him, and that's an effective moment. 

The acting in the movie is a little wooden; Alex Vincent actually was about six when the movie was filmed, and you can kind of see the director's coaching at times. With that said, one of the most effective moments in the movie is Alex institutionalized (I mean, people keep dying around him so it's maybe not entirely unfair) and screaming for his doctor (Jack Colvin) because Chucky is coming to kill him. Chris Sarandon basically fluctuates being laconic Chicago cop and shouty Chicago cop, but he makes for a decent enough sidekick for Karen. 

Killer dolls are a horror fixture for a reason, and Child's Play hits a sweet spot between horror and absurdity. It's not making the statement about consumer culture that the writer maybe wanted to, but that's the process for ya (and it's definitely made a career for him).

My Grade: B+
Rewatch value: Medium high

Next up: Cyborg

Character Creation: Nowhereville

Hellooooo spammers from Singapore! FUCK OFF NOW.

The Game: Nowhereville
The Publisher: Nerdburger Games
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

Nowhereville is a horror game in which the characters are the only citizens of the small town of Norville that remember all of the horrible shit that happens on a fairly regular basis. It draws on Twin Peaks, a lot of Stephen King stories, and X-Files, and reminds me of RPGs like Edge of Midnight inasmuch as the PCs are the only ones that really know what's up (or rather, know that anything at all is up). 

Reading it, it seems pretty intuitive. Simple little d6-based system, but I like the track-based systems particularly. The Skill track fills when you fail a roll, similar to a PbtA game, while the Sway track bends toward order or chaos and you get different powers based on where you are on the track (not unlike Beast, actually).

SO ANYWAY, I think it'd be fun, let's make a character. First thing, we need a playbook. I think I want to use the Returned, someone who left Norville and then came back. 

Oh, so, normally you can't leave Norville, and if you do you get sick and die a few days later. It is possible to leave by building up "Impact points," but that's not something explicable in-setting because the reason for the town's isolation isn't fixed. All of this to say, my character probably wouldn't know why he was able to leave before, just that he was.

So let's see he left Norville right after high school, got an athletic scholarship to a university a few states away, and didn't come back. Now it's five years later, he's graduated with a degree in...I dunno, Communications maybe, and he realized that he hasn't been home in a long time. And that's weird, right? Like, normally you go home for holidays or summers or whatever? Why hasn't he been home? 

Offhand: He was a football star in high school and the town's collective support of him going off to college and maybe to the NFL! was enough to overcome the town's curse. But it kinda had the opposite effect, reversing the polarity, if you will, and repelling him from Norville. Now, though, he's out of college, very much not a pro football player (likes his skull just like it is, thanks), and that means the town pulled him back.

My character's name is Austin Kellery. Austin is about 25 now, and while he's not the muscular line...receiver...man...back (like I know anything about football) he once was, he's still in pretty good shape. He's got brown hair (receding a bit BUT JUST A BIT JEEZ), brown eyes, and he's got his college's mascot tattooed on his shoulder because he lost a bet his sophomore year. 

Right, now, 8 points split up between four Traits, except it's really 4 points because I have to put 1 into each Trait. Clearly Body should get 2 points for a total of 3, and I'll put one each into Mind and Charm. That leaves Heart at 1, and I think that speaks to Austin recently suffering some kind of tragedy. So let's say that Austin was engaged to a woman named Celia, and Celia died in some horrible accident. She was thrown (or fell, or jumped) from their apartment building, and the fall was enough to kill her but not instantly. Austin was coming home and saw her hit the ground. That was the moment he kind of lost the normal, happy-ish feeling he had, and started thinking about going home to Norville. 

Anyway, that's bleak. Two specialties. Let's take Helping Others and Pop Culture. Austin is pretty washed out these days, but he's still a decent guy.

3 Spirit, that's easy. I check one of the two boxes in the center of the Sway track, and basically it only matters inasmuch as things in the game tend to move you closer to the end of the track you're already closest to. So do I wish to be closer to Order or Chaos? I think Chaos, Austin hasn't broken yet but it's comin'. 

Three Talents! There's a list of these but I didn't print that sheet so I'm gonna just write them into Notes. Well, I definitely want Bounce Back, which lets me heal if I roll well. I'll take Lend Bravery (if I overcome a fear someone else nearby can, too) and Personal Saver (I think you mean Savior? Anyway, it lets me help people and have them owe me a favor). 

Speaking of Fears, I get two. What's Austin afraid of? Well, I think Head Injury should be one. Austin laughed it off while he was still playing football but he's actually very cognizant of CTE and what a head injury can mean. And then I'll say he's afraid of heights, ever since he saw Celia fall. 

Anchors! Anchors are perhaps badly named, because they're actually just personality traits. So let's say Austin is friendly, helpful, and confused. 

And that is actually it, son. Austin is ready to uncover the secrets of Nowhereville, or (more likely) die trying. 

Character Creation: Beyond the Garden Wall etc

This game title is too looooong!

Anyway, this is technically going to be the last game of August because I was meaning to do a game tomorrow and then I was out with Kai longer than I thought I would be. One of the very few (only, really) things I miss about social media is being able to brag about my kids.

The Game: Beyond the Garden Wall & Other Adventures
The Publisher: Flatland Games
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

Ho-hum, another OSR early D&D clone. Yawn. Yeah, you start weak as hell, you might level up, you can play a warrior, mage, or rogue (SUCH A BREATHTAKING VARIETY OF CHARACTER OPTIONS), you roll a d20 to do stuff. Seen it.

However...reading the game, I actually wanted to play it. Sure, it's simple, but it's not simplistic to the point that it feels like the training wheels are on, and more importantly, it neither patronizes the reader nor brings across this haughty better-than-these-posers attitude that a lot of OSR games do (looking at you, Dungeon Crawl Classics). 

Would I actually run it? Prooooooobably not...but then again, it's meant to be run right out of the box, to the point that they give you scenarios and character playbooks so you can pick up and go. And the playbooks aren't playbooks in the PbtA sense, they're more like lifepaths, and they're actually pretty cool (I am in fact gonna use one to make a character). So actually, yeah, maybe I'd give this a whirl on one-shot night.

For today, however, I'm gonna make a character, and I'm gonna use the Self-Taught Mage playbook. 

So: My basic backstory is that I was the smartest kid in the village, but there was no one to teach me magic, so I had to do it myself. I start with Int 12 and everything else 8, but then I get to roll some dice to see what happened to me!

First: What my parents did. My dad was the local smith and taught me how to be all smithy. I get +2 Str, +1 Dex, and +1 Cha (not sure why being a smith makes me more charismatic, but who am I to say no). Also I get the Smithing Skill. 

How did I distinguish myself as a child? There wasn't a game I couldn't win. +2 Dex and +1 Int. Nice.

Who else was my friend in the village? (It's assumed that the PCs are my besties, which I like a lot.) Hmm. I roll "laboring with the blacksmith took my mind off my troubles," which is kinda redundant, but let's assume I'm just really close with Dad. I get +2 Str and +1 Cha (do they mean Con, maybe? That would make much more sense). 

And then I find a spellbook! Dope! I get Ancient History as a skill, I get Spell Casting and Sense Magic, and I get to roll to see who wrote my book. The head of a secret order from long ago. Ooooh. I get +3 Wisdom and the Politics Skill. Said writer was a charming enchanter, so I get +2 Cha (see, here it makes sense), the False Friend spell, the Hexing cantrip, and the Arcane Experiment ritual. Neat. False Friend is basically a charm spell, that tracks. 

So then a spirit of chaos came to eat me! Someone in the party helped and would get a bonus, but I'll ignore that bit since it's just me. I do get a spell, though. Ooh, neat. The spirit escaped and is still looking for me. I get +2 Dex and the Magic Missile spell!

And finally, a real wizard came through town and I impressed him with my knowledge. I get +2 Int and a book I barely understand. Neat! 

OK, so let's total everything up. My stats start at Int 12, everything else 8, but then I add: 

Str 8 + 2 + 2 = 12
Dex 8 + 1 + 2 + 2 = 13
Con 8 (boo)
Int 12 + 1 + 2 = 15
Wis 8 + 3 = 11
Cha 8 + 1 + 1 + 2 = 12

Not a bad spread. I get a dagger, robes, a tome, "many pouches," components for a ritual, and 4d6 (hang on...16) silver. I can be Lawful, Chaotic, or Neutral. I don't think my guy is Chaotic, but Neutral sounds about right. 

My Base Attack Bonus is 0, no surprise there. My Initiative is +2, though. My AC is 11 (10 + my Dex bonus; no armor, of course). Three Fortune Points, 5 HP (6 -1 because my Con sucks).

OK, cool! So, Arish was the blacksmith's son, and while he spent a lot of time with his father learning how to smith, he never developed the arm strength (or the stamina) to really get good at it. His father wasn't disappointed, though, because Arish learned how to beat him in strategy games (go or wizard's chess or machine strike or whatever the hell they play) while still very small - he was quick and smart, and his father figured he'd be able to make his way. 

And indeed, Arish found a book in a chink the wall around the village, read it, and learned the secrets of the Order of the Verdant Ring, a society of mages and rogues long since wiped out. The secret handshakes and codes he learned were cool and all, but the spell notes he found scribbled in the margins were the really impressive thing and soon he was able to charm people with a spell. 

That was all very well, but it turned out that be opening the book without the proper key he'd released a Chaos spirit set to guard it. The spirit doesn't know that the Ring doesn't exist anymore, and it's still looking to find the book and kill the one wielding it. Arish thinks he's banished it. 

Arish has his mother's thick head of brown hair, his father's twinkly blue eyes, and he's worked on making sure his smile is welcoming and friendly rather than leering and sinister (there's a whole section on it in the book). 

I see Arish as eventually having to make a choice between being a bastard and being a hero, probably involving some devastating event involving the other PCs and possibly learning that the Verdant Ring isn't quite as gone as he first believed.

And that's it! Neato. See, this OSR game actually sounds cool because there's some emphasis on character building, not just stat-crunching.