Book:Character Creation
Each player needs to create a character before he or she can play the game. One could create a one-armed, colorblind, psychic carpenter who charges into battle wielding his over-sized pipe-wrench, to a charismatic brigand, robbing from the rich, giving to the poor and wearing fantastic tights. Characters can be classic or original, simple or complex, the choice is the player's.
The Sheet
The Character Sheet is the central item to the Elysium game. It is where you keep track of your character’s condition, abilities, hurts and health, weaknesses, strengths, possessions, contacts, and anything relevant to staying inside that character and playing the game. As such, you should get to know it pretty well, as you'll need to reference it fairly often. At the end of this book is a blank character sheet which you may photocopy or scan and make copies of.
Now let's take you through the steps of creating a new character.
Step One: The Big Idea
Concept
The first thing you should do when creating a character, is to come up with a Concept. This means you need a rough idea of what kind of character you want to play. Some example Concepts might be orphan, soldier, farmer, witch, magician, bounty hunter, or diplomat. A Concept is essentially what the character does, as opposed to the next step, Personality, which is what the person is like. Concept can also very easily be the character’s occupation, and many times is. Remember: most people in Elysium don’t go off slaying dragons and fighting evil—that's what makes heroes special. So maybe your character would pick up a trade somewhere along the line; most people know one.
Personality
Personality is a listing of traits that describe what your character is like, and what people might say about him or her. Personality helps a player get a feel for how to roleplay the character’s actions and reactions, speak as the character, and represent the feel of the character. To choose a Personality for your character is very simple. Just choose at least one of the Personality Traits listed below. The less Traits you choose, the more one dimensional and predictable your character will be. The more you choose, the more dynamic and three dimensional. Choose as many as you like, but keep in mind that it will be more difficult to accurately roleplay your character if you choose conflicting traits or too many.
Motivation
Motivation is another integral part of defining what purpose your character has. Motivation details what your character wants. This serves a number of functions in the game. First off, it lets the GM in on what you, as a player, desire out of the game. If your character wants to become rich and make the world a better place, there are a number of ways the GM can go about challenging you with this. Or if your aims are narrower, such as wanting to recover your ancestral sword of your forefathers’ time, the GM can look for a way to slip something into the storyline. Secondly, it helps give you a reason for playing. There are no “winners” in roleplaying games; winning is about having fun. But having a goal can’t hurt. There is no list of suggestions for motivations, but I can throw some ideas out there for you.
Is your character running from something or someone? Does the character want to acquire something? For whom will he/she acquire it? Is the character protecting someone/something? Is he/she hiding someone or something? What about revenge? This is an old classic. Hate and Love are very strong concepts. Who/what does the character Love/Hate? If that is too strong, what about Like/Dislike? Does the character have an occupation? Is he/she happy? What changes would the character like to bring about? What impact would he/she like to have?
Alignment
Alignment is the last of these theoretical questions you have to ask about the character. Alignment is about what the character believes. Not necessarily a concept of spirituality or religion (though these can be alignments), it’s more about the character’s limitations. Alignment is probably the least important of the three, so if you can't come up with anything, don't worry, there aren't any rules that correspond to your alignment.
Ask yourself: is the character lawful or opportunistic? Do they believe in Government or Anarchy? Does he/she subscribe to the idea of Good and Evil? Now which one does he/she believe she is? Which one is he/she really? Bwahaha. Spiritualist or Materialist? Industrialist, Entropist, or Naturalist? Animalist or Humanist? Religious or Atheist? Hedonist or Pragmatist? Egoist or Altruist? Socialist, Communist, or Free Democracy? What does the character believe? (Do you need to look up any of these?) Use some of these if you like. Oh, and also rate, on a scale of 1–5, with five being the strongest, how strongly the character feels about each.
Step Two: It's Alive!
Race
For more information on races, flip to the Races section located later in this book, which details many playable races for Elysium.
Abilities
These are your character's core attributes. Every character, regardless of race, gender, or anything else, have these 12 abilities. They describe your character's natural potential, while Skills, on the other hand, which come later, describe what your character has learned. Both Abilities and Skills have ranges from 1–10, with 1 being the lowest possible score and 10 being the highest. Some supernatural creatures or highly advanced characters may have higher scores than 10, but this is extremely rare. Any Ability (not Skill) with a score of zero means the character is out of commission, one way or another. So, you need a rating of at least "1" in each Ability. Even then, that's very low. A character with a "1" in Muscle would be near dead and a character with a "1" in Intellect would be near brain-dead. So it might be a good idea to have at least two in everything to start off with. At character creation, you receive 50 points to divide up between the 12 abilities as you see fit, however your GM may see fit to give you more or less. Below, Abilities are categorized into Physical, Mental, Social, and Spirit stats.
Physical
Muscle
| “ | Skorna gripped her battle axe and sneered at the enormous bear in front of her. The beast roared as it stood on its hind legs, towering over her. Skorna couldn't help but smile as she lunged towards the mountain of teeth and fur and buried her weapon in its flank. | ” |
This attribute represents a character's raw strength and power.
This affects how much damage is inflicted in combat and helps with tasks of brute force. Pull yourself up from a ledge, hold a door shut against intruders, lift a boulder above your head, or crush your opponents' skulls like little tin cans.
A strong character need not have giant, rippling muscles. One could have above-average strength thanks to genetic experimentation, cybernetic implants, or supernatural powers. A pig-tailed nine-year-old with a Muscle of 8 is a perfectly acceptable and interesting character concept.
A character with a poor Muscle score is a wimp, barely able to carry a backpack, and always needs others to open the pickle jar.
A character with a good Muscle score is a powerhouse: capable of untold feats of strength.
Some examples of muscular people include weightlifters, furniture movers, and Hercules.
Agility
| “ | The court minstrels played a lively tune at the palace ball. The captain of the guard found a dance partner in Cyrilla, who danced as though the wind itself carried her. When the music stopped, he bowed respectfully and walked away with a smile. She walked away with his coin purse and the keys to the dungeon. | ” |
Agility represents a character's physical reflexes and dexterity. In layman's terms, it is how fast and flexible someone is.
This stat comes into play during combat when dodging obstacles or blows, juggling knives, leaping a chasm, and depriving others of their wallets.
A character who is agile doesn't necessarily have to be small and lithe. A huge character that is fast with sharp reflexes is frightening indeed.
Characters with poor Agility scores are oafs: clumsy, slow, arthritic, and rigid. Characters with good Agility scores move fluidly: they're quick, graceful, and balanced.
Examples of highly agile folks include circus acrobats, contortionists, and cheetahs.
Endurance
| “ | The jungles of Jerothden were like soup; thick, damp, and hot. Drinnin hacked through the brush with a crude blade, blazing a trail for his weary companions. They staggered forward, drenched in sweat and gasping for air. He whistled an upbeat melody as he plowed onward like a team of oxen. | ” |
Endurance is basically how tough a character is.
There is a big difference between being strong and being fit. A muscular person who is not fit could lift something very heavy, but will tire easily and could not run a marathon. Meanwhile, someone who does not look very strong, but is fit, could keep on running long after the unfit person has become exhausted.
This attribute comes into play by reducing the amount of damage sustained in combat, and when testing to see if one can continue doing something strenuous like treading water or holding one's breath. It can also be a measure of one's pain threshold.
A character with a poor Endurance score is a delicate flower who tires easily, is constantly sick, and always gets nauseated on carnival rides. A character with a good Endurance score has an iron stomach, a high tolerance for pain, and an active immune system.
Some examples of highly endurant people include soccer players, masochists, and Atlas.
Mental
Social
Spiritual
Derived
Advancement
As game time passes, you may feel the need to increase one or more of your character's abilities. It also makes perfect sense in-game—a soldier would spend time working out to up his Muscle, a monk spends his life attempting to refine his Self-Control. You can buy an additional ability point in exchange for 5 Expoints.
Action Points
Action Points (AP) represent the number of activities you can perform in combat. Everything costs AP, from swinging a sword, to launching a spell, to grabbing a monkey out of your pocket. Everyone starts off with 6 AP, but more can be bought with Trumps. See the Trumps and Faults and Special Powers chapters for details.
Health Points
Expoints
Skills
Skill ranks represent a character's expertise and experience with a given activity. The more ranks in a skill, the better the character gets. Ranks can be bought for mundane tasks, such as climbing or hiding, weapon skills, which enables a character to better pose an offensive threat, and magic school skills which allow a character to cast spells. You receive 50 points to buy skills when creating your character. Regular skills and weapon skills cost 2 points for 1 rank. Magic school skills cost 3 points for 1 rank. See the Skills chapter for more details.
Trumps and Faults
Trumps can be bought to customize your character with benefits and bonuses. Faults can be bought to further give your character a personality, and with it come hindrances. You can use the points from Faults to buy Abilities, Skills, Trumps, Spells, or Special Powers. Trumps and Faults are all further detailed in a later chapter.
Special Powers
Special Powers are supernatural techniques your character can utilize. Unlike trumps and faults, you purchase Special Powers in ranks up to a maximum of 5. Each rank is more costly than the previous and each rank bought further increases the attributes of the special power. These are further detailed in a later chapter.
Magic Spells
One of the more popular Special Powers is Spellcasting. Once a character has access to the realm of magic, he or she can learn its wonders by researching magic spells. Each spell costs one or more Expoints to learn. Some spells span several schools, and can be learned a little differently each time. A character has no limit to the number of spells he or she knows, but specializing usually makes for a more powerful character at the expense of diversity.
