Play@YSDC

Hello. I will start working on a character. Decisions, decisions.

I've updated my character sheet, swapping those two skills and adding Sources of Stability.

I've added Christopher's sources of stability. One might need your approval, as he is not a fictional character.

carnage_lee wrote:I've added Christopher's sources of stability. One might need your approval, as he is not a fictional character.

Approved

Hi there, folks! Here's my guy.



Name: Ian Morin
Age: 26
Sex: Male
Occupation: Journalist
Drive: Sudden Shock

Pillars of Sanity:
Truth prevails
Love for Boston
Human equal worth
Moral code

Sources of Stability:
Charles Morin, loving father, who raised two boys by himself, keeping them out of the streets.
Sean Morin, younger brother, by which he still feels responsible.
Sophie O'Rourke, co-worker. They share a mutual professional admiration. His father thinks they should marry.
Alessandro "Alex" Longo, best childhood friend.

Ian is the oldest son of Montreal-born baker Charles Morin, 49, and Elizabeth Morin (deceased, maiden name Sullivan). He lived his whole life in East Boston. His mother died when he was 7, and his father never got married again. He's a smoker and a hockey enthusiast, being a supporter of the Boston Bruins (which leads to heated arguments with his Montreal Canadiens-fan father).

Investigative Abilities:
Academic
Accounting 1
*Languages 2 (French and Italian)

Interpersonal
*Assess Honesty 2
Bargain 1
*Cop Talk 3
Credit Rating 2
Flattery 2
*Oral History 3
*Reassurance 2
*Streetwise 2

Technical
Craft 1
*Evidence Collection 2
*Photography 2

General Abilities:
Athletics 8
*Disguise 6
Filch 4
Firearms 5
Fleeing 3
Health 10
Sanity 12
Stability 12
Scufflilng 5
Sense Trouble 3
*Shadowing 6
Stealth 3

@leonardolad: ok, the investigator is fine. Just a quick question: it is possible, for the Sudden Shock drive, to leave it open for future developments - the character has amnesia and does not exactly remember what happened, just that something horrible happened. Are you interested in this kind of approach? In this case I would decide exactly what the sudden shock was, and you'll have to discover it during the campaing. I'm bringing this up since Eternal Lies could implement well this kind of drive. I'll leave the decision to you, don't want to force anything

No problem! Sounds like a good way to insert some mystery in the mix. I'll edit my post

I have a question, though: If my character doesn't remember the shocking episode, how or why does he feels compelled to face the perils to come?

Overlord87 wrote:

laitang wrote:

Overlord87 wrote:Ok laitang, that's fine, just define better your sources of stability: a name and a few words of description (it's ok to keep the two children as a single source of stability though, but give them a name; extended family needs to be better defined).

Sources of Stabilty:
wife - Viola Lanalor, devoted and loving wife, tries to keep Clarence's curious nature in check.
2 children - Ethan and Harriet, both fast approaching their teens, mirrors of his wife and himself.
extended family - uncles: Wilbur, Regan, Ernest, aunts: Betty Bishop and Kate Tyr . As a child, Clarence was showered with gifts from his uncles and aunts, for birthdays and Christmas. But now as a man, they keep reminding Clarence he needs to support his family, thus show good example to his children, and not rely on handouts from the family.

Ok, good, but pick just one of your ancles/aunts. Maybe your favorite, or the one you spent more time with, or the one who taught you an important lesson. A source of stability should be a single person (I'll make an exception for the two children). The other uncles and aunts will be just part of your investigator's background.

Then I will choose Wilbur, the oldest of the uncles, who I spent a lot of time with.

leonardolad wrote:No problem! Sounds like a good way to insert some mystery in the mix. I'll edit my post

I have a question, though: If my character doesn't remember the shocking episode, how or why does he feels compelled to face the perils to come?

Well, you have amnesia, perhaps vague nightmares, glimpses of some kind of horror you've encountered. You want to know more. You never know what might help you recover your memories. And so you push forward.

I don't know if this might work for you. Think about it. It's your investigatore, you must be comfortable with it

Finally arrived at something I like! First time creating a character in this system, let me know if I've messed it up/hopelessly handicapped myself/accidentally made myself a shining golden god.

Name: Father Cecil Flanagan
Age: 50
Sex: Male
Background: Clergy
Drive: Duty
Pillars of Sanity:
•Religious Faith
•Staunch Moral Code (Pacifist, God-given duty to help others)
*Human dignity and value of life
Sources of Stability:
•Cpl Milton Shattuck, a Catholic soldier Cecil met while serving as a military chaplain during WW1, who became a firm friend during the war.
•Father Enoch McCarney, the local priest from Cecil's hometown, who him find solace in faith after his (Cecil's) sister's death at a young age.
*Sarah Flanagan, Cecil's mother, who gave him all her love after the death of his sister.

Investigative Abilities:

Academic
Art History 2
*History 3
*Language (Latin, Greek) 2
*Library Use 3
Occult 2
*Theology 3

Interpersonal
*Assess Honesty 3
Flattery 1
Intimidation 1
*Reassurance 2
*Oral History 2
Credit Rating 2

General Abilities:
Athletics 8
Firearms 5
First Aid 10
Health 8
*Psychoanalysis 4
Sanity 9
Sense Trouble 12
Stability 9
Stealth 10

TheLibrarian wrote:Finally arrived at something I like! First time creating a character in this system, let me know if I've messed it up/hopelessly handicapped myself/accidentally made myself a shining golden god.

Name: Father Cecil Flanagan
Age: 50
Sex: Male
Background: Clergy
Drive: Duty
Pillars of Sanity:
•Religious Faith
•Staunch Moral Code
Sources of Stability:
•Cpl Milton Shattuck, a Catholic soldier Cecil met while serving as a military chaplain during WW1, who became a firm friend during the war.
•Father Enoch McCarney, the local priest from Cecil's hometown, who him find solace in faith after his (Cecil's) sister's death at a young age.

Investigative Abilities:

Academic
*History 4
*Language (Latin) 4
*Library Use 4
*Theology 6

Interpersonal
*Assess Honesty 6
*Reassurance 2
*Oral History 2
Credit Rating 2

General Abilities:
Athletics 8
Firearms 9
First Aid 10
Health 8
*Psychoanalysis 4
Sanity 8
Sense Trouble 12
Stability 6
Stealth 10

Hello TheLibrarian, I thought you had disappeared. OK, we'll be 6 after all - the more the merrier

Remember that you can and probably should buy also abilities that are not occupational, to have more variety.

Your character is probably too well-versed in combat to be a priest - even if he was involved in the war.

You should consider rising your stability to 8 or you'll go crazy real quick (which is not strictly a bad thing, but 6 is really low).

Overlord87 wrote:

leonardolad wrote:No problem! Sounds like a good way to insert some mystery in the mix. I'll edit my post

I have a question, though: If my character doesn't remember the shocking episode, how or why does he feels compelled to face the perils to come?

Well, you have amnesia, perhaps vague nightmares, glimpses of some kind of horror you've encountered. You want to know more. You never know what might help you recover your memories. And so you push forward.

I don't know if this might work for you. Think about it. It's your investigatore, you must be comfortable with it

Yeah, no problem. I'm just figuring out how it will work in game.

I have performed a cross check on your investigators and listed the abilities none of you possess. They are:

Intimidation
Accounting
Archaeology
Art History
Criptography
Geology
Art
Astronomy
Craft
Forensics
Outdoorsman

On the other hand, you have a lot (probably too much) of Evidence Collection, Assess Honesty and Reassurance. While it is not mandatory to cover all abilities, you have left too many gaps for a 5-men party. Try and see if some of those abilities could fit with your character and maybe spend a point or two there. Remember that in Trail of Cthulhu even a single point in an ability is sufficient to use that ability successfully.

One more thing: since all the players are here and all have submitted their investigator, I would like to start this coming weekend, if we manage to fix the last few things in this couple of days.

I think you're right. I'll take a point from Evidence Collection and put it in Accounting.

Oooops. Evidence Collection, Assess Honesty and Reassurance are all Occupational abilities for my character so I would have to take 2 points of one of them to make 1 in Accounting. Hmm.

From what I've heard, there's no reason to have an investigative skill at 4 or higher (other than Credit Rating). 3 is the maximum you should ever need. For occupational skills that come at half cost, you don't always need to buy even numbers of points in them. I didn't. You can get 3 in an occupational skill for 1.5 points, for instance. If you do that twice, you can get two skills at 3 for three points.

Assess Honesty and Reassurance do fit my character, which is why I took them. Reassurance isn't an occupational skill, but it's still something that fits. The others don't really work with her, and I already have a fairly diverse selection.

Mr. Handy wrote:From what I've heard, there's no reason to have an investigative skill at 4 or higher (other than Credit Rating). 3 is the maximum you should ever need. For occupational skills that come at half cost, you don't always need to buy even numbers of points in them. I didn't. You can get 3 in an occupational skill for 1.5 points, for instance. If you do that twice, you can get two skills at 3 for three points.

Oh, ok. I didn't know we could work with half points. I'll take accounting.

One other thing... Don't we still need Quatermass character? Maybe he can cover some of these abilities.

leonardolad wrote:

Mr. Handy wrote:From what I've heard, there's no reason to have an investigative skill at 4 or higher (other than Credit Rating). 3 is the maximum you should ever need. For occupational skills that come at half cost, you don't always need to buy even numbers of points in them. I didn't. You can get 3 in an occupational skill for 1.5 points, for instance. If you do that twice, you can get two skills at 3 for three points.

Oh, ok. I didn't know we could work with half points. I'll take accounting.

One other thing... Don't we still need Quatermass character? Maybe he can cover some of these abilities.

Since theLibrarian came back Quatermass offered to step back to the reserve list. I considered a maximum of 6 players at first, but then I realized it was probably too many. So you'll be 5 players

Overlord87 wrote:

leonardolad wrote:Oh, ok. I didn't know we could work with half points. I'll take accounting.

One other thing... Don't we still need Quatermass character? Maybe he can cover some of these abilities.

Since theLibrarian came back Quatermass offered to step back to the reserve list. I considered a maximum of 6 players at first, but then I realized it was probably too many. So you'll be 5 players

I see. We probably should try to cover some ground ourselves then. I took 1 point from Evidence Collection and put it in Accounting. Also, I took 2 half-points from Cop Talk and Oral History to make a point in Craft.