In my first article about the Alien RPG I talked a little about the steps required to make a character. I thought it would be a fun and useful article to go through those 10 steps and actually build the character.
The first thing we need to know as a player is the type of campaign we are going to run. Is this going to be like Alien or do we want something more action packed liked Aliens? For this example I think we will create a character for a "Space Trucker" type campaign.
Building the Character
Step 1: Choose a career.
Who doesn't like Brett from Alien? Right.
We will choose the career:
Roughneck.
These guys are the manual labor out on the frontier. Hard working, physical laborers.
Step 2: Spend points on attributes.
We get 14 points to spend between our 4 stats: Strength, Agility, Wits & Empathy. Health starts equal to your strength score.
The minimum value we can have is 2 in each stat, meaning we have spent 8 of those 14 points before we even start. We have 6 points to distribute freeling, but we can't have an attribute higher than 4.
- Strength: 5
- Agility: 3
- Wits: 3
- Empathy: 3
- Health: 5 - Starts equal to strength score
- Encumbrance: 10 - Starts as double your strength score
*Strength is listed as a
KEY career skill, so we can assign 5 points into it.
Step 3: Spend points on skills.
We get 10 skill points we can spend up to 3 points on each of our career skills, and may assign a single point each to any remaining skill you choose.
- Heavy Machinery: 3
- Stamina: 2
- Close Combat: 3
- Ranged Combat: 1
- Comtech: 1
Step 4: Choose a career talent.
We get to choose a single talent for our career from a list of 3.
We will choose
The Long Haul. We can ignore all stress rolls from a single roll once per game sessions in the campaign.
Step 5: Choose a name.
They give you a list if suggested names for your career, so we will just pick one of those.
Sassy Diaz.
Riiight.
Step 6: Decide on your appearance.
Again, your career gives you some options to go with. For Sassy Diaz, I think I want a shorter, wiry type with short-dark cropped hair and some tattoos on her arms.
Step 7: Decide on your Personal Agenda.
This is the part of your character that drives your action, your career will give you options, but you don't have to stick to those.
Sassy is out on the rim to make a buck, and willing to take risks to do it. If she can increase her share, she will.
Step 8: Choose your Buddy and your Rival.
Since we are not creating an entire group, we will skip this step, but be aware this allows you to define your interpersonal relationships with your fellow players.
Step 9: Pick your gear and signature item.
It should not surprise you, but your career determines your starting equipment. We can choose two items from a list of 8 things, however, they are listed as "Liquor OR compression suit" so we couldn't pick both of those.
Sassy is going to start with items that will help her with her goal of making some cold hard cash on the frontier.
- Hi-beam flashlight
- DV-303 Bolt gun
We also need to pick a small item of significance to the character. Again there are a few suggestions with your career.
We will give Sassy a small silver locket she always wears that stands in stark contrast to her otherwise roughneck appearance.
Step 10: Roll for cash.
And finally, we roll for some cash. Roughnecks get $d6x100. I rolled a 4, giving Sassy $400.
The Character Sheet
Then we just need to fill out the character sheet and we are done!
Creation Summary
Now that I have walked through the process I can say it is a pretty easy creation process that will not take up that much table time, but be aware if you are trying to do it at the beginning of your session each player is going to need the career and talent section, which could easily slow things down quite a bit.
Having a fairly simple character system for campaign play might be a good idea since death out on the frontier is a very very real thing.
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