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January 2024 Character Creation Challenge

Jan 03, 2024, 15 min read

New year, new characters!

This month I’m participating (or striving to) in the January Character Creation Challenge (thread here). I’ll store the characters in this page. I’ll use different systems and methods, that I’ll pick on the fly.

Pre-gens for a playtest

I’ll be using two of these characters to playtest my work-in-progress module for Call of Cthulhu, working title “Mother’s Tendrils”.

General Process

I first roll for inspiration on Mythic GM tables, then do the actual system-based choices.

01 - Daniel Osmond

Cthulhu Eternal - Modern

Background: (Decrease Control) Event: (PC Positive: Ruin Normal)

Daniel was part of the military occupation of Afghanistan, as a Marine Corps Scout Sniper. He recently returned home after this third tour.

Identity: (Foolish Protect)

In Afghanistan, during a raid on a compound of terrorists, he acted impulsively but foolishly. He rushed in on his own ahead of his squad, when his team lead said the orders were to only “assess” the situation from a distance. He did so because he saw that the terrorists had abducted a local farmer. He took them all out from a distance with his sniper, then freed the local.

Nature of his meeting with the unnatural? (Struggle Weapon)

In a fight with a terrorist cell, one of their members started uttering strange chants, which brought about a weird daze upon him and his mates. During debrief, he asked questions about that, but was met with a stalwart silence from his superiors.

Getting back to the US, he began researching the nature of those words. He was thus contacted by a representative of Delta Green (the Outlaws), who recruited him.

What other interests or hobbies does he have? Heal Business

Daniel volunteers at a local hospital as a nurse and started a business teaching self-defense skills.

PDF here: Daniel.pdf

02 - Izabella Stewart

Cthulhu Eternal - Modern

This time I’m going to use the Mythic Magazine vol 8 backstory generator system, rather than randomly roll. Hopefully this gives more cohesion and restricts the scope of my question.

I roll seven times on the Backstory Focus table, or until I roll the “Complete” element.

  1. New NPC. Descriptor: Frightening, Delicate. In Izabella’s childhood, she had a sick old neighbor, Mrs. Bailey Patterson. She used to spend time with her after school, doing her homework and playing in the park. Patterson was a sick old woman, whose children had long left their nest. She didn’t mind having Izabella around to provide a sense of continued motherhood. However, Patterson suffered episodes of intense migraines, during which she would lash out at Izabella. The experience made Izabella acutely aware of how precious those moments of clarity and peace truly were.
  2. Close a Thread, or New Thread. Meaning: Carelessness, Rumor. In college, in Portland, her classmates started a rumor about Izabella, based on her clumsy and awkward nature. She didn’t know what to make of her mean colleagues, so she played along, developing a self-deprecating sense of humor, in order to not be even further ostracized.
  3. CONNECTION, NPC TO NPC. Meaning: Carry, Riches. Izabella starts dating another woman in her class, Amari Baker. Amari was from a rich family from the Seattle tech scene. Invited to her rich friends’ parties, Izabella discovers that Amari is connected to a local drug dealer, Adam Wright. He and Amari seem to share a close connection, despite Adam not sharing a affluent background.
  4. CONNECTION, NPC TO NPC. Meaning: Invade Advantage. Over the next months, Izabella gets pulled into Adam’s world. She becomes adept at maneuvering around the campus’s upper class party scene. The two of them get close, and Amari becomes jealous.
  5. COMPLETE. Amari and Adam eventually have a falling out, which leaves Iza on the outskirts of their social circle. She retreats into her studies, embittered by the whole drama of university life.

I feel like this is not enough. I still don’t know much about Izabella. A few more prompts:

Character Skills: Water Mechanical

Izabella focuses on engineering and physics, with a focus on liquid simulations and hydropower.

The nature of her job: (Adventure Tone) : Evil Intellect

(that’s interesting!)

In her first serious job, Izabella is hired on a remote physics lab. Her employer is the former CEO of a multinational corporation in military tech. He’s retired and spends his energy and money on high level physics research into clean, renewable energy. A pang of guilt for the world his weapons have destroyed? In the course of her work and research at his lab, Izabella discovers something unsettling.

Action Meaning: Irritatingly Hard

Across many reproducible experiments, she notices a strange pattern in the numbers. The group had been zeroing in on a theory about quantum wave function collapses, and how this can be reproduced at a macro level with a hydropower generator. When they ask colleagues at another laboratory across the country to reproduce it, they are met with puzzled faces. They cannot. The group iterates for months until they finally realize something: the water in this lake is behaving strange. They examine samples for months only to be continuously dumbfounded about how the water in this reservoir does NOT follow the rules of physics.

One morning, when she and a colleague are collecting more samples from the lake, they spot a strange figure under the turquoise surface. Iza’s colleague freezes and collapses in a catatonic state. Iza lets out a shriek and runs for the safety of the lab. Police are sent to examine. Or at least they say they’re police. They arrive in a private car, give dismissive answers to her inquiries, and they never say where they took her colleague’s unconscious body.

At the end of the investigation, Iza is approached by Daniel (Daniel Osmond), who was posing as the local officer, to recruit her into a group dedicated to studying the unnatural: “We could use someone smart.”

PDF: https://e.pcloud.link/publink/show?code=XZKgG1Z3T1LWEpN2jRJsKMGho9OE43GyFMX

03 - Michelle Wilson

Cthulhu Eternal

For this character I already have an overall concept. She’s a new age occultist that works in marketing and interior design. She combines day-dreaming about achieving Jungian Individuation with ruthless business acumen.

I use the Lifepath Generator system from here and a bunch of other random tables (mostly from Play by the Writing)

Formatting

  • Content in this format is generated from random tables.
  • Content in between (parentheses) is my commentary on results.
    1. In the beginning… 1d6: [2] = 2 -> 2 Your family was poor or low-caste.
    • Michelle grew up in a poor family on … Isolated, aside, lonely, empty, distant … an island off the Florida coast. Her family was farmers, struggling to feed and raise their children. The struggle taught her resilience and persistence. She also developed a love of book, which were the only avenue for her to experience the larger world.
    1. 1d6: [5] = 5 -> Trait Event -> 1d6: [2] = 2 -> 1d3: [1] = 1 -> Light Trait -> 1d6: [1] = 1 -> Kind. -> 1d6: [4] = 4 -> "They didn't take you seriously"
    • In high school and college, because of her poor background, Michelle felt misunderstood. However, she responded with kindness, understanding that her path is different from others.
    1. 1d6: [3] = 3 -> Focus event -> 1d6: [2] = 2 -> War -> 1d6: [2] = 2 -> You make a risky gambit (I don’t want to make this another soldier, so I’m going to interpret this more figuratively)
    • After graduating with a degree in Communications and Literature, Michelle found herself in the cutthroat world of marketing and publishing. She moved to New York, because that’s where all the publishing business.
    1. 1d6: [3] = 3 -> Focus Event -> 1d6: [5] = 5 -> Survival -> 1d6: [2] = 2 -> Everything breaks down (Again, I will interpret this quite figuratively)
    • Struggling in a world that feels alien and overwhelming, Michelle returns to her old comfort: reading. She discovers self-help books and, through that, the rabbit hole of new age mysticism: meditation, yoga, Feng Shui, remote viewing.
    • She quits her job at a top level publishing firm and travels the world. She studies with strange mystics, experiments with magical rituals. When she returns to New York, she has remade her self. Her new brand focuses on design and marketing influenced by new age concepts.
    1. 1d6: [1] = 1 -> Locale Event -> 1d6: [4] = 4 -> Ruin -> 1d6: [3] = 3 -> You find an old treasure (wow, that’s quite a twist! What sort of treasure?) Life Change -- Vibrating, moving, shaking, unstable
    • Invited to give a workshop in upstate New York, she takes the time to hike on her own. In the old forests, she uncovers a curious plant. Having studied plants as part of various courses in alchemy, Michelle realizes this plant shouldn’t be growing in the mountains of Northern America. This is a plant rumored to have magical properties! She takes it home with her. After consulting various alchemical tomes, she brews a tea out of it and, in a leap gulp of faith, drinks it. She passes out and has wonderful vivid dreams. In the dreams, she is initially scolded by all the people that had judged her in her life. Eventually, she meets an elderly woman that looks much like herself. She is covered in greenery and flowers. Michelle takes her by the hand and together they meld into a green peaceful light. To this day, Michelle doesn’t know what that dream meant, and she intends to find out.

PDF sheet here: https://e.pcloud.link/publink/show?code=XZTKi1Z5PKhdbp1aCuXFY6Kja13BzKFD9TV

04 - Roger Schulte

Cthulhu Eternal

This is the final pregen I’ll create as part of my wip module.

This time I’ll create based on what’s could complement the other three. Looking at the list of Archetypes in the book, I think that’s “Criminal.” So that will be the focus. But again, I will use the Lifepath Generator from here and a bunch of other random tables (mostly from Play by the Writing).

Formatting

  • Content in this format is generated from random tables.
  • Content in between (parentheses) is my commentary on results.

I’ll make a few rolls until I get a clear enough idea.

    1. In the beginning… 1d6: [6] = 6 -> 6 Your family was wealthy or influential.
    • Roger grew up in … Knowledge, literature, intel, data, information … a family of academics, in Chicago, Illinois.
    1. 1d6: [2] = 2 -> Themed Event -> 1d6: [2] = 2 -> Dark -> 1d6: [6] = 6 -> You almost don't come back.
    • Background problems: Safety: High crime, violence, murders, gangs, mobs, anarchy, there is no law - Plot hook: Conflict reached a peak tension state.
    • Even though Roger grew up in an affluent family, he decided to move on his own during his studies and early career. However, the neighborhood where he lived was dangerous, racked with petty gangs and drug dealers. One night, he is carjacked on his drive home by a member on the run from his gang. They are eventually caught. The gang member is killed in front of Roger. As they gang member raises his gun, Roger begs for his life and offers to help them in any way he can. The gangsters “hire” Roger to do odd jobs for them (drug mule, money laundering through his business as a lawyer)
    1. 1d6: [3] = 3 -> Focus Event -> 1d6: [5] = 5 -> Survival -> :1d6: [3] = 3 -> You try to get away
    • Roger sees no end in sight for his work with the gang. He eventually decides to change his name and flee across the country.
    1. 1d6: [2] = 2 -> Themed Event -> :1d6: [3] = 3 -> Sad -> 1d6: [4] = 4 -> You lose your chance
    • He moves to Louisiana but he is tracked down by another branch of the gang. They threaten his family and force him to continue laundering his money.
    1. 1d6: [5] = 5 -> Trait Event -> 1d3: [2] = 2 -> Neutral Trait -> 1d6: [2] = 2 -> Clever -> 1d6: [1] = 1 -> You connect the dots
    • Eventually, Roger realizes that with all the skills he’s built up, he can begin to offer his services of laundering money to other criminal gangs. Eventually his enterprise grows. (I will develop his in my next Lore24 entry)
    1. 1d6: [2] = 2 -> Themed Event -> 1d6: [2] = 2 -> Dark -> 1d6: [3] = 3 -> You just can't stop
    • Roger’s enterprise soars. He can’t believe how successful and powerful he’s grown. He enacts revenge on the gang that threatened his family by pitting another gang (also a client) against them.

His PDF: https://e.pcloud.link/publink/show?code=XZ6gyeZd7fxVxluFlhb2VY2uCMI5R9liwqy

05 - Cedric Moreau

KULT: Divinity Lost

Up next I’m going to create some KULT: Divinity Lost characters. I have the book and skimmed it, but never got around to play it past a one-shot. I dig its character archetypes and Dark Secrets approach, so I’m excited to dig in.

There are 20 Aware archetypes, so I’m going to roll a d20 to determine what I’m going to build first: 1d20: [7] = 7 -> Criminal (hm should I just make another Roger Schulte? Nah, I’m going to make one of the gang members he works with.)

Occupation: Corrupt cop.

(I like the trope of corrupt cops. It has legs. It’s the sort of character that has access to two interesting worlds: crime and law enforcement)

Choose your Criminal’s occupation from the list below, or invent one of your choosing. Thief, Robber, Dealer, Gang member, Homeless, Prize fighter, Corrupt cop, Enforcer, Club owner, Extortionist, Hitman, Face of the operation, Getaway driver, Con artist, Mobster, Dealer, Muscle for hire.

Let’s give him a backstory before making other choices.

I’m going to use Adventure Crafter to generate a quick backstory:

Cedric Moreau was about to get caught by his more upstanding colleagues when he was selling cocaine to some party kids in New Orleans’ French Quarter’s seedier bars. He think he’s been spotted so his paranoia is at a peak. He thinks his colleagues are onto him, which make him even more of a loner.

At a meeting with the gang he’s part of, Cedric is introduced to the prized new drug the dealers are supposed to put on the street, some new cut of crystal meth, supposedly. He’s never heard of it. He spends the entire night examining how the others react to it: they bliss out for a good half an hour on what they describe as “the best trip ever”. One of them doesn’t take it as well and starts screaming. He has to be immobilized and sedated. Cedric decides it’s better for him to cut ties with the gang and stick to dealing the coke he steals from the evidence lock-up.

He’s stuck between the two sides. He’s scared to tell them right up that he wants out, but he also doesn’t want to sell the stuff. Still he’s coerced into taking half a kilo. It sits in his apartment, unopened, in a bag at the bottom of his closet.

DARK SECRETS: ◊ Guilty of Crime -> Personal drive: Punish yourself.

DISADVANTAGES: Bad Reputation, Wanted

ADVANTAGES: Streetwise, Enforcer, Six Sense

ATTRIBUTES: +2 Fortitude, +1 Reflexes, +0 Willpower

+0 Charisma, +2 Coolness, +1 Intuition, +3 Perception, -2 Reason, -1 Soul, +1 Violence.

Clothes: worn clothes. Face: Hard Eyes: calculating, suspicious eyes. Body: Muscular, but wiry body.

RELATIONS

(TODO once the other KULT characters are done)

◊ One of the characters hid you from the police or others who were after you. Take +1 Relation with them. ◊ One of the characters knows you’ve committed a terrible crime. ◊ One of the characters is indebted to you. ◊ One of the characters is connected to one of your rivals. ◊ One of the characters knew you from before your criminal dealings. Take +1 Relation with them.

Neutral (0): His daughter, Karen, now in high school Meaningful (+1): His wife, Jolene, who doesn’t suspect the extent of his deeds, Vital (+2): Marcus, the leader of the gang

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