Alesmiter: 2021 Character Creation Challenge: Day 13

Wednesday, January 13, 2021

2021 Character Creation Challenge: Day 13 - Space 1889

Thomas Edison goes to Mars

The Scramble for Africa

becomes Interplanetary!!!!

Those headlines sum up the concept of Space 1889, flight through the ether to our nearest solar neighbors, colonial Mars and Venus, mad scientists building we would now call steampunk gadgets.

The character generation system is unique on my bookshelf. There are six attributes Strength, Intellect, Agility, Charisma, Endurance and Social Level and the titles self-explanatory. Under each Attribute are four skills associated with it. The first skill (and the second under Strength) are default skills and the character automatically receives a skill level equal to one less than the Attribute. Other skills come from chosen Careers and other may be bought through 'General Skill Points' at the end of character creation.

While the game support rolling dice and point buy options, I'm going with the default character generation option of taking the values 1-6 and assigning one to each Attribute. Since I want him to be an inventor with some combat capability his careers will be Engineering Officer in the British Army, followed by a second career as a Inventor. He needs at least a 3 Social to be an Engineering Officer and a minimum Agility of 3 and Intelligence of 4 to be a Inventor. These minimums will drive Attribute values. High Intelligence allows him to Invent more devices, so I'll start by giving him a 6 Intelligence.

Strength 4 Intelligence 6

Agility 3 Charisma 2

Endurance 1 Social Level 4

Slightly above average strength, with poor constitution and unsociable scion of the Gentry (Social Level 4).

Adding in the Skills for his Attributes

Strength 4 Intelligence 6

Fisticuffs 3 Observation 5

Throwing 3 Engineering*

Close Combat* Science*

Trimsman* Gunnery*

Agility 3 Charisma 2

Stealth 2 Eloquence 1

Crime* Theatrics

Marksmanship* Bargaining

Mechanics Linguistics

Endurance 1 Social Level 4

Wilderness Travel* 0 Riding* 3

Fieldcraft Piloting*

Tracking Leadership

Swimming Medicine

* denotes a Cascade Skill, where points bought are assigned to a subcategory, such as Marksmanship - Rifle and receives Skills in the other subcategories (Pistol, Bows) equal to one half of those Skill Points.

As an Officer of the Royal Engineers, he receives the following skills Leadership 2, Marksman 1, Close Combat 1 and Engineering - Fieldworks 3. He selects Marksmanship - Pistol, and Close Combat - Edged Weapons for the primary skills in those areas.

Mustering out and becoming a Inventor, he receives Science 2 (Physics), Engineering 2 (Naval Architecture)Mechanics 2. As he had two careers he gets 2 general skill points to spend as he wishes. But the cost depends on the Attribute - 5 or 6 = 1/2 General Skill Point per skill point, 3 or 1 for 1, 1 or 2 = 2 general skill points for each skill point. He spend 1 point buying two more points of Engineering - Structural (note only the first buy in a skill group cascades) and with the other he buys a point each of Science (Chemistry and Biology)

Hiram Crowle

Strength 4 (Fisticuffs 3 ,Throwing 3, Close Combat* [Edged Weapons 1, Bashing Weapons 0, Pole arms 0], Trimsman* 0)

Intelligence 6 (Observation 5, Engineering* [Fieldworks 3, Structural 3, Naval Architecture 3, Explosives 1], Science* [Physics 2, Chemistry 2, Biology 2, Geology 1, Archaeology 1, Astronomy 1], Gunnery* 0)

Agility 3 (Stealth 2, Crime* 0, Marksmanship* [ Pistol 1, Rifle 0, Bow 0], Mechanics* (Steam 1, Electrical 2, Precision Machinery 1 )

Charisma 2 (Eloquence 1, Theatrics 0, Bargaining, 0 Linguistics* 0)

Endurance 1 (Wilderness Travel* 0 , Fieldcraft 0, Tracking 0, Swimming 0

Social Level 4 (Riding* (Horse 3, Camel 1, Elephant 1, Gashant 1, Ruumt Breehr 1, Flying Skrill 1, Pacyosaurus 1) , Piloting* 0, Leadership 2, Medicine 0

As a member of the Gentry he starts with d6*50 = 5 * 50 or 250 pounds sterling and as an Inventor he receives 2d6 * 10 = 11*10=110 pounds sterling in annual royalties.

Inventing Hiram decides to research Transportation. Every skill point he has in Engineering, Science and Mechanics gives him one 'Research Die' in that skill. He also gets one die for each point of intellect. Transportation uses the skills Engineering (Structural and Naval Architect) he can roll six dice for his skills and six for his Intelligence. The limit is that each Research Die can only be rolled ONCE for each character, so you burn through them fast. Before you can invent you build your knowledge in the field.

He decides to roll all six Engineering (Structural and Naval Architect) dice on Transportation research. 4,6,4,5,3,3 gives him 25 points in Transportation, the inventions (minimum research points to invent) in this field include Space Suit (4), Submarine (10), Heavy Tractor (14), Diving suit (16), Deep diving submarine (22), Tripod Walker (24).

Hiram ties to invent a Tripod Walker which requires spending an additional Research Die. As he's out of Engineering (Structural and Naval Architect), he has to burn an Intelligence die. He rolls a 3 and has successfully invented a Tripod Walker that he intends to take to Mars for trials.