OOC

[Supercape]

Idea: Hard drinking Sailor/Smuggler

Character Name: Finn Kagge

High Concept: Knuckle-cracking Hardman for all your dirty jobs.

Trouble Aspect: Drinking on the job.

Mythos Background: Found strange footprints on Norwegian coast as a child.


Phase I Aspect: Gritty bare-handed killer

Finn's and his brother, Ingvar, did their bit when the Nazi's swept over their homeland. They were smuggling weapons and explosives to the resistance from Sweden. However, when Ingvar was captured by the Nazi regime and their operation uncovered, Finn knew his time was up. Warmed up with Vodka, he commandeered a small German ship (by swimming through freezing waters, strangling the captain with his bare hands, and stabbing two other guards to death) and - in the middle of the night - sneaked away, making his way to the shores of England. Finn is pretty proud of his feat of guts, bravery, and endurance, but tends to skim over the part where he left his brother behind.

Phase II Aspect: Stands up for the little guy

In school, Finn was not a great student. He had a particularly sadistic PE teacher, fond of caning and freezing his students. When his school friend, Gunnar, was getting a ferocious beating, Finn stepped up at the tender age of 14 and smashed the sadistic teacher up. As a consequence he was expelled from school.

Phase III Aspect: Ten steel thumbs

Despite, or perhaps because, of his juvenile records, Finn did basic military training like every Norwegian man. It went well enough; he was big and strong and reasonably athletic. One particular black moment was when he fumbled a hand grenade, and sent himself and four of his squad members to the infirmary. His training officer, Captain Jens Borgen, lost two fingers, but after considerable rage ended up being quite friendly with Finn afterwards. Finn might have giant, indestructible hands with a grip of iron, but nobody let him near explosives again. "Butterfingers" was his Army nickname. He still has some scars on his body from the shrapnel.


Skills (Broad Focus)

Great [+4] Physique
Good [+3] Fight, Will
Fair [+2] Athletics, Survival, Drive (Specialisation: Sail), Mechanics (Specialisation: Mechanical)
Average [+1] Demolitions, Empathy, Provoke, Rapport, Shoot, Soldier, Stealth


Stunts (3)

Steeled, Heavy Hitter, Tough as Nails

[Priest]

Supercape:
I like it, Finn Kagge is looking good.

[ghill]

Just about there I think

Robert Owen
High Concept: "Unflappable Old Sweat" veteran of Dunkirk.
Trouble: Always looking for the fight.

Phase Trio:
Son of an absent father and alcoholic mother Robert Owen got himself into a lot of trouble with the law, in an out of Borstal. At 17 he took the option of joining the British army as a junior soldier rather than serving time in an adult prison. The army provided both discipline and a family, Robert never looked back.

# A promising second story man
# I Owe The Army Everything

As a soldier in the 1st Bn Oxford and Buckinghamshire Light infantry Robert was responsible for guarding a field hospital during the battle of Battle of the Ypres–Comines Canal. While on duty he shot at what he described to his superiors as a dog-man who was raiding the hospital mortuary. As a result of this he was charged with being drunk on duty, negligently discharging his weapon and then subsequently striking an officer. When the battalion returned to the UK his report led to him never going to Colchester MP but being drafted into SOE.

# They can't handle the truth

One Great (+4) skill - Shoot
Two Good (+3) skills - Notice, Fight (Specialisation: Knife)
Four Fair (+2) skills - Athletics, Physique, Provoke, Soldier
Seven Average (+1) skills - Drive, Tradecraft (Specialisation: Burglary), Rapport, Will, Stealth, Survival, Deceive.

Stunts:

Shoot - Called Shot - Called Shot
Physique - Tough as Nails
Tradecraft - There is always a Way Out.

[Priest]

Excellent, just the Sanity, stress and consequences bit to do and you' there. Well sort those bits when the others have caught up.

[DrPeterson]

I'll get Maria sorted tonight, which skill do you propose to cover her linguistic aptitude? A high Rapport, Academics, or Lore?

[Priest]

The Academics skill is about knowledge gained from academia and/or a classical education. It includes essential skills required to navigate and utilise an education (such as library use), and a basic understanding of a variety of subjects: art, history, geography, mathematics, literature, etc.

The Lore skill is about unusual collections of knowledge. Lore is about the breadth of what people believe is true about the world, not necessarily what is true. Whereas Academics revolves around a classical education, Lore involves
religious study, outlying beliefs, ancient stories, studies deemed not rooted in reality, etc. This includes folklore, mysticism and occultism, mythology, theology, conspiracy theory, and fringe science.

The Rapport skill is all about making positive connections to people and eliciting positive emotion. It is the skill of being liked, trusted, and respected. Military commanders with high Rapport are the sort of people that enlisted men say they “would follow into Hell”.

Difficult since linguistics doesn't really fit with any of the above. Lore is definately out. Academics, difficult unless we use it as a specialisation which we can. Raport really is about influencing people whereas I would imagine that her linguistics covers her ability to quickly learn a language, so probably Academics with a specialisation in Linguistics.

[Supercape]

I shall impertinently suggest you could have a custom stunt for linguistics, like "Speaka Da Lingo" or something?

[Priest]

I shall impertinently suggest you could have a custom stunt for linguistics, like "Speaka Da Lingo" or something?

That's not impertinent at all, in fact if you are customising a skill to fit the concept of your character, creating a stunt to suit is okay. As long as its reasonable.

[DrPeterson]

Idea: Former Spanish Civil War guerilla with an uncanny knack for languages.

Character Name: Maria Vega

High Concept: Master of tongues, mistress of murder

Trouble Aspect: Hunted by "los Hermanos de la Sombra"

Mythos Background: Shot Commandante Lope Fuentes of the Fascist secret police in the face and saw him absorb the bullet.

Phase Trio:
Taste for Germanic Blood
On assignment in the Schwarzwald, Maria was caught by an SS-unit. She managed to single-handedly overcome her interrogators using her nothing more than her charms and her bare teeth. Once she had managed to acquire her captor’s weapons, she made short work of the rest of the unit, but the experience left her thirsting for more.

Steadfast steely will of iron
Maria’s squad was decimated during the last day of the Segovia Offensive. She managed to survive by hiding underneath the body of Roberto Cortes, her long-timelover, where she stayed when the soldier’s took care of any survivors after the battle. To be sure she wasn’t detected, Maria waited till past nightfall as the blood and juices dripped from Roberto’s corpse onto her. The skirmish had ended at 9 a.m.

The Darling of Nations
Maria worked as a reporter at the start of the Civil War, but her gift for languages soon saw her translating and running messages for and between the different units of the International Brigades. Her fiery temperament and loose tongue soon had her conquering and breaking hearts in every regiment.


Skills:
Great (+4) Academics (Linguistics), Tradecraft
Good (+3) Shoot, Will
Fair (+2) Fight, Rapport, Soldier
Average (+1) Notice, Survival, Stealth, Deceive, Athletics

Stunts:
• Strength from Determination (Will): Use Will instead of Physique on any overcome rolls representing feats of strength.
• Always a Way Out (Tradecraft): +2 on Tradecraft rolls made to create an advantage whenever you are trying to escape from a location.
• The Gift of Gab (Linguistics): When you encounter a language you are not familiar with, you gain a free invocation to try to learn or understand it.

[DrPeterson]

Impertinence happens to be one of my strong points


Alright, Above's a try for Maria. I'm open to thoughts and suggestions.

[Supercape]

I think Finn is finished. I hope the paradox of being ten thumbs and having a basic demolitions skill is OK. Basically he is good to set simple explosives up and make things go boom effectively, but don't let him toss a hand grenade or disarm a booby trap.

[Priest]

DrP: Maria looks fine to me. If you're happy then she's good to go.

Last Bit of Character Creation

Stress &Consequences
This works exactly as per Stress and Consequences in Fate Core System, p.50 (http://fate-srd.com/fate-core/stress-consequences)


Sanity
All characters begin with the sanity threshold Of Sound Mind, with all of their sanity boxes unchecked. Every character has the same three sanity tracks with the following
boxes.
Of Sound Mind: 10 boxes
Disturbed: 8 boxes
Unhinged: 6 boxes
Taking the Incredulous Mind stunt will increase the number of sanity boxes for each of the sanity tracks: Of Sound Mind, Disturbed, and Unhinged.

Once everyone has finished their character, and is happy with the result, I will create a Character section for them

[Mr. Handy]

Character Idea: French-born actress who excels at disguise and impersonation.

Character Name: Monique Deveraux

High Concept: Woman of a Thousand Faces

Trouble: Memorably Beautiful

Mythos Experience: While bathing on a beach in Normandy in her late teens, Monique spotted something underneath the surface watching her. She couldn't see any details clearly, but it had vaguely the shape of a large man. Yet it could not have been a man, for no man could stay underwater that long without breathing. When it began to swim towards her, she fled back to the shore.

Phase Trio:
Whatever It Takes
When the war broke out, Monique joined the Wrens (Women's Royal Naval Service) and served aboard a British destroyer on convoy escort duty in the North Atlantic. In the early spring of 1941, the ship was holed below the waterline by a U-Boat's torpedo and sunk. Monique made it off in a lifeboat with several of the surviving sailors, but the U-Boat surfaced and they were captured. There was not enough room for all of the prisoners aboard the U-Boat, so they remained aboard the lifeboat which was towed by the U-Boat as it set its course towards L'Orient. However, the commander of the submarine invited Monique aboard. The sailors advised her not to go, but she did anyway, as she had come up with a plan and was willing to take the chance and pay the price. The skipper was an old-school Prussian gentleman with a strong sense of honor, which was why he had not simply killed them with the deck gun as she had heard other U-Boat commanders did. She seduced him easily, as he wanted to be seduced, and that night he took her to his "cabin," which was really just a curtained alcove. While sleeping with the enemy and being unfaithful to her husband disgusted her, she did not show it, and she knew it was the only way to win her freedom and rescue the British sailors.

After the commander fell asleep, Monique quietly put on his uniform, concealing her hair under his cap. They were about the same height, as being tall was a disadvantage aboard a submarine. Like his crew, he had a full beard, as nobody shaved on a U-Boat, but she solved this problem by using his toupee as a fake beard. She also took his sidearm and keys. In the dark confines of the U-Boat, her diguise was good enough to fool the crew. She headed right for the weapons locker, loading guns and ammo into an oilskin sack, which she brought up to the deck. The sailor who was up there keeping watch and guarding the captives was tricked by her disguise long enough for her to dupe him into letting her take his weapon, after which she tied and gagged him, then distributed the weapons to the British sailors. They easily commandeered the U-Boat, overwhelming the surprised Germans, and sailed it back to a British port.

(Historical footnote: This event did not actually happen according to recorded history, though U-110 was captured on May 9, 1941 under different circumstances (along with code books and the vital Enigma code machine). However, that event was kept for secret for quite some time, as it was one of the biggest secrets of the war. That U-Boat was damaged and ended up at the bottom of the sea, so an intact U-Boat would be an even bigger prize. Thus, this could have happened, only it was kept secret forever).

It's Good To Be Bad
Monique's breakthrough stage role was Lady MacBeth, where she brought humanity to the part and got the audience to sympathize with her despite her wicked ways, emphasizing her inability to commit murder herself and her later remorse for getting her husband to do it. Through this experience, she gained an understanding of the human motivations of evil people, who did not see themselves that way and had justifications for all of their actions. This would serve her in good stead later in undercover work, enabling her to be friendly and relate to Nazis and collaborators in spite of despising everything for which they stand. Plus, she rather enjoys playing the villain.

Never Give Up
Monique's future husband first saw her performing in a play in Paris and met her after the performance. She fell in love with him, but a rival actress tried to steal him away. It was looking more and more like he was falling for the other woman's charms, but Monique used her costuming and acting talents to set her up in a situation where her true rotten self was revealed and contrived for her love to witness it. He promptly dumped her rival and devoted himself fully to Monique. In spite of the odds having been against her, her determination would not allow her to lose hope.

Skills (Broad Focus):
Great (+4): Tradecraft (Disguise)
Good (+3): Deceive, Rapport
Fair (+2): Athletics, Shoot (Archery), Stealth, Will
Average (+1): Contacts, Empathy, Fight, Investigate, Physique, Resources, Survival

Stunts:

• Trained Performer (Deceive)
• Best Foot Forward (Rapport)
• Always a Way Out (Tradecraft)

Stress:
Physical: 3/3
Mental: 3/3

Consequences:
Mild:
Moderate:
Severe:

Sanity:
Of Sound Mind: 10/10
Disturbed: 8/8
Unhinged: 6/6

[Priest]

Mr H: Monique looks good. If you're happy she's finished, please take her to the finished characters section.

[ghill]

Don't want to be "that guy" but shouldn't a Trouble be a personal struggle and or problematic relationship/s? Memorably Beautiful seems like a description of what she is. I would have thought something like "Men cant see past her looks" for a problematic relationships or something like "I'm not going anywhere until my hairs right" as personal struggle.

Priest says its cool so either way no matter.

[Supercape]

I'd guess it would be an effective complication when one wants to remain incognito; people would not forget her? At the end of the day, how often complications come up is largely dependent on what sort of game and plot is going on, so I would imagine Priest has some spy-craft ideas!

That said, I think that it might be awkward having both high disguise skill and that flaw; in some respects they are in opposition which could be odd. Of course, I guess there might be other complications like garnering unwanted attention. Its an interesting flaw to my mind, albeit one that historically I have tried in other games (and systems) and I confess I didn't get much personal mileage out of it (I think I have a personal block on quantifying characters attractiveness). In any case, I'm very interested to see how it plays out!

A point of clarification for me on rules if you pardon my bamboozled brain; I took it from rules that specialisations are only for a few skills (like academics or soldiers)? A few of the sheets seem to have weapon specialisations. Not that I particularly object, just getting it straight in my brain!

[Priest]

ghill: The trouble aspect 'Memorably beautifull' that Mr H has put for Monique will work as Supercape says. It needs to be some kind of Aspect that can cause you problems, thereby being a source of possible Fate Point replenishment. Imagine if when trying to infiltrate a table full of SS officers in a small cafe in search of vital clues, when a local starts looking at her strangely. Does he take a Fate Point for the complication that is about to happen, or does he pay a fate point and have the Frenchman shake his head and return to his pernod?

Supercape: Weapon specialisations are fine. They merely add to the narrative flavour.

[Supercape]

I think Finn is ready to post...ok by you, Priest?

[aine]

Idea: Upper-class cloud cuckoo land

Character Name: Clarence Dalrymple

High Concept: Genius for puzzles "It's as Easy as Pi"

Trouble Aspect: Simply no commonsense

Mythos Background: Once opened a certain book in his uncle's library and was never quite the same afterwards.

Phase I Born with a Eccentric Silver Spoon in his mouth
Clarence had a sheltered and privileged upbringing (Harrow) but he was a third son and a loner and spent most of his free time wandering obscure libraries and reading old and convoluted books. He particularly liked staying with his uncle, Viscount Dalrymple, who lived in a mansion filled with esoteric art, archeological oddities, an eclectic library and an extraordinary cellar. Viscount Dalrymple was ancient and totally bonkers, when he died, Clarence was the one who showed the SOE around the house, the library and the extensive catalogue he had compiled. The SOE were singularly impressed with Clarence's knowledge, the catalogue's structure and the choice of wines with lunch. They took the library books with them and put Clarence on their own books.

Phase II One Step From Disaster
Clarence is always mulling over a complex conundrum; he rarely needs paper as the workings and solutions lay like a bright and sparkling map in his mind. With his eyes so often turned inward, Clarence has little notice of what is going on in the real world and often has or causes a mishap or misunderstanding. But when it looks certain that real disaster is about to strike, it seems someone or something is looking after him. Just the other day, a runaway milk dray was galloping headlong towards Clarence who, obliviously pondering 'something' and heedless of the desperate shouts, suddenly spotted a rare yellow-legged tortoiseshell butterfly as described by Belon (1517-1504); he stepped out of the way to have a look as the horse went thundering by. Those who know him, just can't believe how he's survived up until now.

Phase III A surprisingly fine swordsman - who? HIM??
As a child and young man, Clarence had to spend his holidays with his German cousins in Rotenburg. These were Ernst, Leopold,Karoline and Chlodwig of Lippe, the children of Leopold IVof Lippe. The German boys were keen students of academic fencing, or Mensur; Chlodwig was also a bully and the English boy was perfect fodder. Clarence had a hard time of it in the beginning but he was light on his feet and maybe it was because he could analyse the patterns and rhythms of the swords and predict his opponent's next move; he eventually became very, very good. Chlodwig of Lippe is now very influential in the German military.

2 Great (+4) skills: Academic, Fencing
2 Good (+3) skills: Lore, Will
3 Fair (+2) skills: Resources, Investigate, Contacts
5 Average (+1) skills: Sciences, Physique, Athletics, Rapport, Deceive.

Specialisations:
Academics: Mathematics, Language:German, History,
Lore: Literature

Stunts:
Broad Education. You were practically raised by books. You have two additional Academics specialisations.
Unquestioningly Brilliant. When you use an Academics specialisation to create an advantage, it has one additional free invocation.
Heavy Hitter. When you succeed with style on a Fight attack and choose to reduce the result by one to gain a boost, you gain a full situation aspect with a free invocation instead.

Stress:
Physical: 3/3
Mental: 4/4

Consequences:
Mild:
Moderate:
Severe:

Sanity:
Of Sound Mind: 10/10
Disturbed: 8/8
Unhinged: 6/6

[Priest]

I think Finn is ready to post...ok by you, Priest?

As long as you are happy with him.