C. Character Creation

Creating your Character.

A new character begins with Normal in all characteristics. To allow them to customise their character they get the following adjustments.

3 points for characteristics

Upto 2 Passions, but each Passion requires a Flaw.

1 point of Advantages

5 points of Skills

The impediment 'Heroic'.

For every extra Impediment they take they will gain an extra point in any of the above, upto a maximum of 3. You can take more Impediments if you wish but they only add colour to your character.

Questions & Answers

Questions and answers are a device to expand your characterisation in certain basic areas, giving scope for the GM to develop story lines around your background.

Q: What was the name of your ship that you sailed to the new world in ?

This is your community.

Q: The ship you came in was noted for its skill in ?

You gain +1d in this skill when in your community (Ship mod).

Q: Your ship was noted for its success in keeping a specific type of domestic animal alive, pick an animal ?

You gain +1d in any skill rolls involving this animal (Ship mod).

Q: You had a close male friend on the ship, their name was ?

This can be another player (on the same ship) or an NPC, he will be important to you.

Q: You had a close female friend on the ship, their name was ?

This can be another player (on the same ship) or an NPC, she will be important to you.

Q: Which members of your family were on the ship with you ?

This is your closest family.

At the end of each adventure it is a good idea to have one or two questions about what happened and get your players to expand on their background, motivations and memories.

Flaws And Passions:

Flaws and Passions can be gained during game play, either at the request of the player or imposed by the GM. They can be bought off with Good Luck, as long as some attempt to correct the problem has been made during that session. AN Passion or Flaw is a small number of words that describes a strong belief or opinion - eg I hate Orcs!

Flaws are weaknesses or failings in your character. Successful play of a Flaw can result in the award of Good Luck. It should hinder or challenge your in game play in some way.

Passions can be Hates or Loves. Passions can be used to incite your character to greater efforts and should target fairly specific areas.

To incite a Passion the player must spend Good Luck and then they gain +1 Superiority Level (SL) to one area of play, a particular skill, related to the Passion and its target. If the bonus is applied to a combat skill it only works for a few rounds at most. If applied to a non-combat skill use the GM should allow it to apply over a single event.

A Passion is a two edged sword, the GM may incite your Passion against you, you may elect to ignore this but it will generate Bad Luck.

Social Classes:

Social structures have broken down considerably in the journey aboard the fleet. Wealth in the form of money is not an aspect of human society anymore (for now). Nobility is a delusion. The role of men and women has become much more equal under the pressures of survival. Now the things that differentiate are power, skill and success. People with power, magical power, are greatly respected and admired. The role of Priests has radically changed due to the simple fact that Evil won. Priests are now guardians of the community, healers of physical and mental wounds. The fact that Priests still retain power has been very illuminating (and is discussed in more detail in the Magic rules). Those with great skill are admired and sort after, their time is valuable and respected. Those who succeed are heroes, and the more they succeed the greater their prestige and influence.

Languages

Humans all speak a common tongue now. There are still many who speak old languages but they are quickly becoming lost under the pressure to survive. At the start of this campaign humans do not speak any of the native tongues and magic is the means via which communication has been carried out.

Outside of humans, Elvish is the common language of many, although all the races tend to have a racial or local tongue.

Encumberance.

The following system ignores the "can I carry 120kgs of stuff" concept and goes straight to "can I get my dagger of slaying Green Dragons out in a hurry".

Players can, within reason, load themselves up, but the following system will make most of that junk inaccessible in a fight. For purposes of actually carrying a load, should it matter, assume each STR dice is roughly 10 kgs (22 lbs) for extended movement purposes. Quick lifts and pulls might be up to 4 times this amount.

All objects will be rated for how much they impact on a persons encumbrance. They will all be rated for the number of "handles" they absorb. This refers basically to how many hands are needed to carry the object comfortably. Most swords are one handle, but a Great Sword is two handles. A large pillow might be two handles whilst a hammer might only be one. The equipment listings give examples of handles.

Each CCM will have a basic ability to carry a number of handles of items. A naked man would basically be able to carry 2 handles. Add clothes and a backpack and they might be able to carry quite a few more handles. Add sheaths and sashes and belts and straps and the number can be quite large.

The availability of a handle will differ from that of another handle. A sword in its sheath is more available than a dagger at the bottom of your backpack. Because of this handles are ranked in order of access. A rank 1 handle is immediately available to hand and suffers minimal delays in accessing. A rank 5 item is packed away at the bottom of somewhere and will take a long time to access, too long for the current event.

The time it will take to access an item, in action dice, is found in the following table.

The numbers of items you may have in each rank slot will vary based on your form (2 hands or more) but mostly on your gear.

There is a physical limit to the number of handles you can have that are rank 1. To a large degree it depends on how you lay them out and what they are. Several knives can be placed in rank 1 positions easily, but several broadswords cannot. The table suggests basic limits for how many handles should be allowed in an Available Rank, but these can be extended by gear.

Items can be carried on a mount or pack animal and can be as quickly accessed at times as items carried on you, the animal just needs to be close to you (in contact), or you might be riding it. A pack animal could be a squire as well as a mule. If a squire does nothing but stand ready then they may pass items to you at no extra time loss, as if they were doing it themselves.

This system lends itself to adding the feature of "extra slots" to equipment, even to adding magical slots to magical equipment. A belt might increase your level 1 slots by +1, a magical belt of holding might increase it +2 etc.

When a player lays out their Handles and Availability it should be obvious if they are trying to be unrealistic. It should be a pyramid with the wide end at the highest (slowest) AvailRanks and the pointy bit at the lowest AvailRank.

Good and Bad Luck.

Dice modifiers can be used by players and the GM to reflect both good and bad luck. Players may gain these modifiers due to ‘impediments or adjustments’ they take, or the points can be generated during play by the actions taken, or not taken. Good luck is good for players only, Bad Luck is good for the GM and consequently bad for the players.

• A luck point can be used to modify the face value of a dice by one point, making a 5 into a 6 for example, or a 4 into a 3. A single dice can only ever by modified once with luck by each side (GM vs players). However must rolls are with 4 dice, and each dice can be changed if you have enough Luck.
• It can also be used to reroll a dice roll, either one of the dice or all of them. The new roll becomes the result, the old one is forgotten. Re-rolling can only be performed once per roll, so if you reroll one dice you cannot reroll all the dice.
• Luck can be used to set a single dice out of a set to a 5 result. That dice is not rolled, it is simply set at 5. This must be chosen before any of the dice are rolled. Similarly a single dice out of a set can be set to a 2 result, under the same conditions. Obviously players will set their own dice to 5, and the GMs dice to 2s.
• Good Luck can also be used to trigger other actions or events as will be specifically listed in the rules, such as activating a Passion.

Players begin a game with 3 Good Luck, as it is expended it is lost permanently. At the start of every session of play everyone gets 1 point of Good Luck added to their current total.

Experience

Players gain experience as they play, learning and getting better at things. This is partly a matter of time and partly due to effort. The GM should award each player experience for attending and spending the time to play the game, but they should also award experience for clever thinking as well as being entertaining.

Role playing is essentially a social activity, a group of people who mostly like each other and have some things in common. The fact that they have assembled to spend time together should get some recognition, but more importantly it has to be a 'good time', and this requires effort. Those people who help to make it more enjoyable, who ensure that everyone returns again next session should also be rewarded for their efforts.

Finally there is success, winning and overcoming the obstacles that have been placed in your way. Most GMs will have a story worked out ahead of time with some idea of a start, middle and end that their players will pass through. The aim is to present them with an obstacle, allow them to work to defeat it, and then actually defeat it. This is story telling/role playing in its simplest form. Some GMs will have very elaborate, multi-thread story lines that may have many alternative endings, all of which are perfectly valid. Most GMs however have just a few story lines so as to keep their players minds focussed, especially as the social part of the evening progresses and their ability to remain focussed diminishes.

Everything that contributes to enjoying the event should get some sort of recognition, and in most games that recognition is given by experience points. ExP can be used to buy new skills, new abilities, new things. They allow the player to progress and become truly heroic.

Spending Experience

Following is a list of the various types of things that can be purchased with ExP:

+1 level in a characteristic level - 5

A new Base Skill - 4

A new level (mastery) in a Base Skill - 3

A Mod Skill - 2

A new Passion - 1 (free if a Flaw is taken)

An Advantage - variable

Buy off an impediment - cost

Players should be allowed to spend ExP only during down times, which may or may not be at the end of every session. As noted above a down time is a period of peace where the players can relax and recover, contemplate what they have done. Because of this players may end up accumulating several session or episode based ExP awards, being unable to spend any until they find a safe haven. The end of a session is NOT always a time to allow your players to spend ExP.

Awarding Experience

Time is a good guide to when your should award new experience to players. Sessions, Episodes and Adventures (as noted in the Time section above) are all moments when the GM and players should consider what they have achieved and how to reward it.

As a guide I would suggest awarding 2 ExP every session, just for being there. You might award a bonus point to those who have stood out during the evening and contributed the most. This is generally awarded at the end of the session.

The end of an Episode, where a single story line comes to and end, where a minor villain is defeated. This is also a good point to award experience, based on how difficult it was. This can happen at any time during the session, and is generally 2 or 3 pts.

The end of an adventure is where a whole plot comes to an end, where a major enemy is confronted and beaten, where their plans are completely thwarted and the players tend to take a break to go serious shopping. This award should be 5+ pts, a significant boost.