I'll be walking through character creation step-by-step, as this is my first real character. Starting on p. 94:
Step 1 is only for using the physical book.
Step 2: Choose 2 Paths. I'll choose BOUNTY HUNTER (obviously) and VETERAN. I figure this guy is likely a veteran of the endemic warfare, has left formal service and has decided to sell his skills in a related field. (Plus the VETERAN ability to maintain Momentum seems really useful for a combat character!)
Step 3:Create Your Backstory . I like "You are haunted by past actions or failures". It's a little cliche, but I'm thinking he was a squad leader commanded by an inept or arrogant officer. He was ordered to take or hold some territory- maybe a city building or a bridge or something- against impossible odds. Most of his squad was wiped out. He brawled with his superior but was allowed to part ways without a criminal record in recognition of previous service.
Step 4: Write Your Background Vow. I don't have any real vows in mind; my backstory doesn't seem to lend itself. He's not really angry with the opposing force, and he doesn't have a burning desire to revenge himself further on his superior officer. Maybe his superior went on to become a warlord of some settlement, and he'd like to bring him down someday. We'll go with that: "Bring down Zephyr Beckett". (The name came from the Character Name Oracle.)
Step 5: Board Your Starship. I get a starship, like every good bounty hunter gets. I rolled on the random table for "Giving the Starship a History" and got "Stolen from a notorious crime boss or criminal organization". That will work- he probably had a bounty to bring back the head of a crime syndicate and did so by commandeering one of their own starships! I imagine whomever took over for the guy I brought in would be happy to have me back in their clutches.
"Envision the Starship": I rolled on the random table again and got an 87, "Strange symbols are scrawled on the deck and bulkheads in the main corridor". I don't know what they mean, but given that the syndicate primarily spoke the same language I did, I doubt this ship was originally theirs, either.
Once again I rolled on the random table for "Name Your Starship" and got "Reaper". That's suitably awesome.
Step 6: Choose Your Final Asset. This is where it gets exciting: do I take ARMORED and go with the Boba Fett theme? (I'm assuming that Paths are not unlike Traits in Burning Wheel: you can be armored but not Armored, and a gunslinger without Gunslinger; you just don't get the mechanical benefits.) A weapon path, like GUNSLINGER (whose 2nd upgrade gives you bonuses to coercing someone at gunpoint) or BRAWLER (whose base ability gives you bonuses to trying to subdue someone)? WEAPONMASTER is really cool for the Boba Fett-like (again) motif of lots of weaponry used rapid-fire.
Actually, I'll go with VESTIGE, and change up my backstory somewhat. I was part of a settlement and served in its military, such as it was. We were hard-pressed, and our
legate betrayed us to the enemy. Our army and our settlement were wiped out, and he went on to become a warlord.
Step 7: Set Your Stats. Well, Heart and Iron are both important to this concept. Heck, so's Edge. None of the stats are irrelevant.
Let's go with: Edge 2, Heart 2, Iron 3, Shadow 1, Wits 1. He's first and foremost a warrior.
Step 8: Set Your Condition Tracks. Health, Spirit, and Supply get set to +5. Momentum gets set to +2, max Momentum to +10, and Momentum reset to +2. I have no companions, so they don't get set. The
Reaper's integrity gets set to +5.
Step 9: Envision Your Character. Here we set the look, act, and wear of the character.
Look: Grizzled, weathered face. Peppered hair kept short in a military-style buzz cut. Tattoo on his right bicep of a sun rising over a curved horizon, overlaid by crossed swords, one pommel-up and the other pommel-down (the emblem of his old unit).
Act: Tends to be aggressive and no-nonsense, and has to force himself to remain calm when he doesn't get cooperation or understanding. Fairly regimented in his behavior, even now. Gets wistful when he's been drinking.
Wear: old military jumpsuit, stripped of everything but the unit patch. Combat breastplate over it when in the field.
Step 10: Name Your Character. Again we'll turn to the Oracle: Alexis Buhari, callsign "Paladin". Nobody really calls him that, and if you hear it it's a sure sign he's in the presence of somebody he served with or who knows of his military service.
Step 11: Gear Up. By default you get a spacer kit, which contains:
- Sealed environment suit
- Flashlights/headlamps
- Toolkit
- Medkit
- Personal communicator
You also get to set up to 4 or 5 pieces of specific gear that represent important aspects of your character's "approach, capabilities, or background". I'm going to need a blade, because almost everybody has a blade. Mine will be a heavy-bladed shortsword: not sexy, but practical and useful in tight spaces. He'll also carry his old military-issue plasma pistol. He'll also carry binders to restrain prisoners.
That finishes the by-the-book character creation. I did also go through the prompts from the "Choose Your Truths" section, and got:
- He does possess a pre-Cataclysm artifact. The Oracle came up with "Foreboding Spacetime", whatever that means. I've decided that it's a family heirloom. Nobody knows where it came from or what it does, but they all know that their family has had it since well before the Cataclysm, and it definitely wasn't made by human hands...at least not anyone from their society. It's a smooth octahedron of unknown metal, with a bearing of a different metal that circles the equator. It's usually almost metronomic in its regularity, but occasionally it will speed up, slow down, stop, or even reverse before going back to its normal movement. Nobody knows why.
- His family and cultural history does tell stories of the Exodus. He was raised on stories of hope and loss, and taught to believe deeply in the ideals of his settlement, which still represents everything that is good and right to him.
- He swears vows upon a blade, and everyone carries at least a small utility knife.
- He has no scars or prosthetics, no experience with Precursor vaults, and no experience with the supernatural.
