Character Creation

Before you start - campaign setting

No character exists in a vacuum, and characters in Afterverse are affected directly by where and when they exist. Your gaming group and gamemaster should agree on a setting for the campaign - choose an era and an adventure. The chosen setting will indicate which culture(s) you may choose for your character, as well as what kind of character concepts the team will be composed of.

Choose a Culture

More information on how cultures work in game is available in the *One Among the Crowd* chapter; lists of available cultures are in each Era in the *History* section.

Every character must have a Culture. This can be either the culture in which he grows up, or he may choose to renounce that culture later for a different one. There are many times where different cultures will interact and live in the same place at the same time; for example, Collaborators and Slaves in the Occupation Era. Different cultures interact with each other in many ways. Most of the time, cultures have a mutual distrust and/or dislike of each other.

Cultures don’t cost any XP directly, but any requisite Qualities, Skills, etc. must be bought with XP as normal, and the culture's listed Motivations must be taken, using Motivation points as normal. If a culture has listed aspects of a character which are recommended but not required (for example, "many citizens know..."), then it is not considered a part of the requirements.

The primary direct benefit that a culture provides is via its tech levels; more advanced gear is available in some cultures than others. By and large, the higher the available Tech Levels, the more skills will be required by that culture to balance it (and the skills may not always be relevant to a given character). No culture has requirements that cannot be met with the amount of XP available at puberty.

Choose a Species

The available species are listed in the *Reference* section

The next thing you must do when creating a character is to determine your species. In many cases, your campaign's era and culture will limit the available options for species. In some cases (particularly later in the history), you will have more freedom to choose. Consult your GM to determine what species are available to use.

Your chosen species will provide you with attribute bonuses, base starting XP, and Qualities. Unlike with cultures (whose requisite skills and qualities must be paid for with XP), you do not have to pay for anything the species provides - it is innate to who you are.

Decide on a Character Concept

After your gaming group decides on the exact setting and time period for the campaign, each player should choose his or her role on the team. This is not an exact definition of your character, nor does it have any real gameplay consequences, but it will guide you for the rest of your character generation process.

As you fill out the rest of your character’s properties, you’ll likely be inspired to create more of your character’s personality and backstory. How did your character gain that quality? Where did he meet that contact? When did he become enamored with a cause, taking it as a motivation? Jot down any ideas you have along the way and you will have a much more rounded character background by the time you get around to finalizing your backstory.

This list of character concepts is only a sample; it is not exhaustive. It also only serves as a guide to building your character. In addition to this, you may want to ask yourself what your character would be useful for in various situations. He may not be good at fighting, but perhaps you could raise his PER attribute so that he can act as overwatch during one. She may not be a starship pilot, but with some medical skills she could help fix up the crew in a battle. Having a character that can at least contribute in most situations will, if nothing else, keep you from being bored at the table.

Face: The face is your team’s negotiator and smooth talker. He represents the team in most matters. Often, they are good liars and tricksters as well. The Face is likely to have a litany of specializations in the Influence skill, and all three social attributes (MAN, CHA, and BEA) will be ranked highly.

Brute: Some characters are built to take a beating. Absorbing punches and hits (and with the right armor, bullets) is this guy’s job, and usually it is also his job to dish out pain as well. Naturally, the Melee skill will come in handy, and BOD should be a high-ranked attribute - but AGI should not be ignored, either.

Covert Ops: This character is sneaky. Not being seen is only one aspect of this; social stealth is also key. This role is often combined with other roles, as the character should be able to accomplish something once he has snuck into a place. The AGI attribute and Stealth skill will be key.

Hacker: This role will be more or less useful depending on the ubiquity of computers among your adversaries. As computers become more and more ubiquitous, many pieces of gear become hackable. Further, many pieces of information are available only by crawling databases. These tasks fall on the hacker. The hacker is frequently combined with the skill sets of either the Face or Covert Ops in order to take advantage of the social engineering or physical intrusion bonuses to hacking tests; the INT attribute and Computer skill will assist.

Pilot: The pilot often handles all the vehicle activity, from cars to spacecraft. Quick reaction times are a must. The Pilot skill (along with a high REA attribute) is a must, and often includes Science with the Astronautics specialization (which relies on INT).

Sharpshooter: A calm trigger finger and good eyes are the mark of the sharpshooter. AGI and the Ranged Combat skill are needed here.

Soldier: A well-rounded combatant, with ranks in both Melee and Ranged Combat skills. AGI will be the most crucial attribute, with BOD a close second.

Engineer: The builder, the fixer, the tinkerer, the maintainer. Naturally requires a high INT attribute, and the Crafting skill. Frequently doubles up with hacker-related skills.

Medic: Once you get injured in combat, the medic is your best friend. High in INT, focused on the Medicine skill, and loaded down with First Aid Kits, the medic is vital to any combat team.

Team Leader: The leader's job is to hold the team together, to make decisions for the group, and to facilitate teamwork. The leader is often a tactician with an eye on overwatch, and sometimes (though not always) serves as the team's face. The Leader requires high MAN, PER, and INT attributes, and the Influence skill (with the Leadership specialization) will be augmented by the Tactics skill.

Determine Your Age

Now is the time to choose your age. Your character's age can be anything as defined by the ages listed with his species. Age impacts the amount of XP available, the number of Motivations and Interests you get, skill caps, and more. Characters younger at creation have greater potential - they earn XP faster and from a wider variety of sources, and (if the campaign has any time skips) will be around longer. Older characters have more XP to start with and more well-defined interests, but will tend to stagnate as the game progresses.

The ideal age for your character will be influenced not only by how many skills your character needs, but also by the world history and the time and place in which your character will have grown up.

Your gamemaster may impose restrictions on the ages of the player characters in order to keep all of the characters at similar ability levels (especially if the group has a history of unpleasant experience stemming from unbalanced parties), or as an innate part of the party's backstory.

Choose Your Motivations

Motivations are the aspects of your character that drive him forward. They are how he gains XP and define his goals and aspirations. See the Motivations chapter for more information on choosing your character’s Motivations. Don’t forget to include the Motivations that the character’s Culture requires, and every character is required to include at least one Motivation beyond the Culture's Motivations.

The number of points of Motivations a character has depends on their age, according to the Age Table. (These points are their own separate bank, not XP.) These points may be allocated as levels in any motivation as you see fit. The maximum level for any one motivation is 4. Some motivations have a base cost; if taking such a Motivation, the first level of the Motivation costs that many Motivation points instead of 1 as normal. (Ignore this Base Cost for culturally required Motivations; only count the base cost if you take levels in the Motivation beyond what is required by the culture.

Your GM may choose to allow players to reassign Motivation points at the end of the first session. Often the most fun way to play a character will not be apparent until after you start gameplay; this allows players to configure their characters to make their Motivations match what comes naturally to you as a roleplayer.

Create Your Interests

For more information on the usage of Interests in gameplay, see the *Skills* chapter.

Interests can be thought of as being somewhere in between Motivations and Skills. Interests are not listed anywhere - you make them up. Interests are more specific selections of what makes your character excited, and are sometimes a branch off of one or more of his Motivations. Your character might have the Environmentalist motivation, and then take an interest in Forests. Other Interests need not be connected to motivations at all; an interest in Late 20th Century Trivia, for example, does not need to link to a Motivation.

Interests can be anything, but if there are difficulties in thinking of them, players may use the following list to inspire their own characters' interests: Anarchy, Nationalism, Collecting, Gambling, Healing, Journalism, Sleuthing, Penny-pinching, Piloting, Pyromania, Robin Hooding, Kleptomania, Spacecraft Models, Dad Jokes, Novels, Bactaran History, Kung Fu movies, Voran Culture, Kennesawu Geography, Space Station layouts.

For every year of age above puberty, a character has one point to place into Interests (with a minimum of five points). For each point, he can either add a new Interest or raise the rating of an existing interest by 1, up to a maximum of 6. Like Motivations, points can be shifted among Interests only if the character is undergoing a significant personality shift, and only with the GM's approval.

Assign Your Attributes

Your character has 10 Attributes that determine his general capabilities. Every character will have the same ten number values assigned to attributes; during character creation, your task is to choose which number is associated with which attribute. The values are as follows: 6, 5, 5, 4, 4, 3, 3, 2, 2, 1 - a 6, a 1, and two of each number in between.

Many species will have a modifier for certain attributes, and some Qualities also change attribute scores. The minimum value an attribute may have after species modifications is 1, though certain qualities such as Infirm may reduce it to 0 after that. Unless the character is using the Freakish quality, the maximum value an attribute may have after all modifications (including those from qualities, genetic modifications, and so on) is (6 + species mods).

Some species do not have exactly 10 attributes; several have special attributes. In these situations, add an additional 1 to the list of attribute values. In a future expansion, some species (such as AIs) may have fewer attributes, and these will involve their own rules described in that expansion's sourcebook.

Social Attributes

Charisma (CHA)

Charisma is the general likeability of your character. A character with high CHA is generally well-liked and is likely to have many friends; a low-charisma character will be seen as unlikeable and looked down on. Charisma also determines how well you fit in to various social circles and how well the rules of etiquette are deduced and followed.

Manipulation (MAN)

Manipulation is the ability to discern and exploit the motivations of others. Negotiating, deceiving, seduction and trickery are all based on this attribute.

Manipulation and Charisma need not be similar. A character with low CHA and high MAN often gets what he wants, even if he makes enemies in the process; the bad taste he leaves in someone’s mouth may make them label him dishonest after the fact. A character with high CHA and low MAN may fail at the negotiation but will come away from it with new friends, and will probably be perceived as trustworthy.

Beauty (BEA)

The sexual attractiveness of the character is represented by Beauty. Unlike other attributes, Beauty is almost never directly used in skill tests. However, Beauty can be added as a positive modifier to any social test if the other character may be sexually attracted to them; gender, orientation, and species all play a role in this.

Mental Attributes

Intelligence (INT)

Intelligence represents your character’s smarts and knowledge base. It is used for most technical skills, such as hacking, engineering, and medicine.

Willpower (WIL)

Willpower is the ability of a character to resist others, or to grit their teeth and push through. Your character's Stun damage track and resistance are based on willpower, and it opposes certain tests such as Intimidation.

Perception (PER)

Perception represents how keenly aware of his surroundings a character is. It is used in all Perception tests, and is the only attribute that may be paired with nearly any skill when it is used for tests. For example, if trying to find enemy snipers that may be targeting your position, you might roll this attribute along with the Ranged Combat (Sniping) skill. It is also important in initiative.

Physical Attributes

Body (BOD)

How big and tough your character is. BOD is used for damage resistance, lifting, carrying, and determines your damage for melee attacks, among other things.

Agility (AGI)

Your character's dexterity and nimbleness. This attribute is used for melee and ranged attacks in combat, as well as sneaking tests.

Reaction (REA)

How fast your character can respond to new situations and react to changes. In addition to dodging and surprise tests, it is also used for piloting and driving skills.

Chutzpah (CTZ)

Chutzpah is a special attribute. It is almost never rolled as an attribute. Every game session (or at specific points within a game session, if your GM permits), your character gains a Bank of points equal to this attribute. This Bank may be spent to add extra oomph to certain actions, and may be spent to interrupt in combat. See the Chutzpah section in the Gameplay chapter for more details on how to use it.

Special Attribute

Some species have one “special” attribute, detailed in the species description. Each attribute behaves differently and has its own uses and, in some cases, its own linked skills (which may not be learned by species without this attribute).

A Word on Size Classes

BOD is a special attribute, because sizes can vary wildly from species to species, as well as all sizes of spaceships. For this purpose, there are five size classes, A through E. Most sentient life is nearly human-sized, and falls into class B. When two entities of different size classes interact, the smaller entity is made to act faster, while the larger entity is made more powerful; these rules are covered in detail in the Combat section. The BOD rating within a size class goes from 0 to 10; rating 10 of one size class is succeeded by rating 1 of the next size class up.

There are 5 common size classes:

The GM may extend this list to include things larger or smaller than those listed if he deems it fit for a given situation.

Most playable species are considered class B, and that is the default assumption if no letter is shown; anything besides class B should be listed as the class followed by the number; for example, "C6". The size class is a species trait, and cannot be modified with XP or qualities.

Determine Your Starting XP

After this point, all remaining aspects of a character are bought from zero using XP, the same way that they may be improved later as your character earns additional XP. Your character's Qualities, Skills, Languages, Contacts, Subcultures, and Gear are all bought with XP. (Your character's Attributes, Motivations, and Interests are not bought with XP; they have separate systems.)

When a new character is created from scratch, he gets a bank of XP to spend creating the character; the amount of XP given in this pool is determined by the character's species and his age. For example, humans get a base of 200 XP; Bactarans, who have naturally higher attributes, get 135 XP. In addition, for every year of age above the character’s species’s Puberty age, the character gets 10 additional XP to spend. (Characters below the age of Puberty are not playable.) The resulting formula for starting XP could be written as Species XP + 10 × (Age - Puberty Age). If creating a 30-year-old human (Puberty age of 15), the character is built using (200 + 10 × (30 - 15) ) = 350 XP. This XP is considered a part of the Timed XP value of your character (as timeskips will be, if your campaign uses them).

If you wish to create a character above your species’s Middle Age, then the effects of age apply to your character as if you were timeskipping through those years; see the Character Aging section of The March of History for those rules. These aging effects may apply during any phase of spending your character construction XP. For example, a 55-year-old human must apply 3 randomly chosen aging effects, but he can choose to roll them before he spends all of his character generation XP, so that he may spend some XP afterwards counteracting these aging effects.

Types of XP

There are five values of XP on the character sheet.

Natural XP: XP from character creation and any XP earned during timeskips gets added into this value. This is the XP your character earns simply by living.

XP Earned: Any XP gained during the campaign gets added to this value.

XP Total: All XP gets added to this value, whether during character creation, gameplay or timeskips. This value should always be equal to XP Timed plus XP Earned values. This value can be used as a rough estimate of the overall ability level of this character.

XP Bank: Like XP Total, all XP gets added to this value. Any character improvement spending comes out of this value.

Officer XP Bank: This is a special bank, only used for characters with the Officer motivation. XP from the Officer motivation goes into this bank instead of the main XP bank, and only these points may be spent to upgrade the Officer quality (earn promotions). If the character does not seek a promotion, these points may be spent as standard XP.

Players cannot spend XP to bring either XP Bank value below zero. Since it’s possible to lose XP in other ways, however, the XP Bank value may occasionally go negative from other effects. If this happens, treat the character as if he has the Depression quality; no XP will be gained from the Achievement motivation until the character’s XP Bank is positive again. Since many characters gain XP primarily from the Achievement motivation, this can be a very difficult hole to dig oneself out of; having a well-rounded character with many goals and motivations makes this easier.

Choose Your Qualities

Qualities are particular quirks of your character that cause any number of good or bad effects in variety of tests and situations. Positive Qualities cost XP, while Negative Qualities give an XP bonus. At build time, a character may have 60 XP of Positive Qualities and 60 XP of Negative Qualities. They are best used to add flavor to a character while making playing the character a more unique experience.

You may take up to 60 XP worth of Positive Qualities at build time - others may be bought later. This limit does not include Genetic Qualities or the Officer quality. Similarly, you may take up to 60 XP worth of Negative Qualities at build time. Although additional Negative Qualities may be taken later, they are usually the result of aging, bad luck, or bad decisions, and do not earn an XP bonus.

If your character's culture requires certain qualities, they must be bought with XP (or grant an XP bonus) as normal.

Aspects of Qualities

Duration

Different qualities last different time periods, ranging from weeks to generations. This should be considered the minimum duration; if you wish to keep a shorter-term quality for longer, you may.

Temporary: This quality is not inherent to the character, and may just be a short period of his life.

Standard: This is an aspect of one’s personality that will last for a considerable amount of time, but not necessarily permanently.

Lifetime: This quality will be with the character all of his life. Usually this will be from birth, but sometimes it is the result of, for example, a permanent injury. These qualities generally can never be removed, and can only be added with explicit GM approval.

Hereditary: If a character with a hereditary quality has children, this quality is passed along. Similarly, a character cannot take a hereditary quality unless one or more of his parents has it, or if he has used a genetic augmentation to add it.

Type

Mental: This quality is based in the character’s mind somehow. This doesn’t mean it’s all in their imagination, but it is often a true psychological condition.

Physical: This quality is based on a character’s physical body.

Social: This quality only crops up when the character is interacting with others.

Choose Your Skills & Specializations

Your character may have skills purchased with XP. Skills begin at 0 and may be improved with XP at a cost of 20 XP per level. In addition, your character may have a number of specializations in that skill, which cost 5 XP each; some specializations have prerequisite skills from lower skill levels, which you must buy first. Each Specialization has a requisite level (the minimum rating that its parent skill must be before the specialization may be taken). For a list of skills/specializations and a guide on how they are used, see the Skills section.

If your character's culture has requisite skills, they must be paid for with XP.

Age and Skill Caps

Younger characters have not had the time or the maturity to delve deeply enough into a skill to become true experts. There are four ages listed for each species: Puberty, Professional, Middle, and Old Age. Skill caps are determined based on these key ages. The skill caps are listed in the Age Table above.

Learn Your Languages

Languages in Afterverse are treated like a tree and have four levels: World, Family, Language, and Dialect. New characters get one language (including dialect) for free, and any others must be bought with XP. For more information about the costs of languages, see the relevant section in the One Among the Crowd chapter.

Social Bank

Your character has a "Social Bank" containing points determined by his CHA value. If your species has a racial modifier to the CHA attribute, add that modifier × 10 to your Social Bank, but use the pre-modified value when looking up the table below.

These points may be simply banked for later use (strongly recommended for your first character), or they may be spent now on Featured Contacts and Subcultures. See the One Among the Crowd chapter for more information on how to use this bank. You may also transfer XP to this social bank for any reason.

Create Your Subcultures

Subcultures, which you come up with, are social groups your character is a part of. Subcultures have a Reach (their power in the world), Rep (your reputation within the subculture), and qualities. Their cost is Rep × Reach + Qualities; this cost may come out of your Social Bank or from your XP, or any combination thereof. Subcultures are primarily useful for finding people - they allow you to create temporary contacts on the fly.

See the One Among the Crowd chapter for more information on subcultures and how they relate to contacts.

Create Your Featured Contacts (optional)

In addition to any subcultures your character is a part of, you may create a few Featured Contacts using your. These are important people in your character's life outside of the other player characters. If you are creating your first character, it's generally recommended to leave this alone; you'll be able to make new acquaintances during gameplay using your Social Bank (which is the same bank most of your points building these contacts will come from).

Contacts have skills (generally up to rating 6) chosen from the same list of fourteen skills you do. Contacts also have a Bond rating (1 through 6, with 1 being an acquaintance and 6 being a lifelong trusted friend), and a Favor rating, which represents who owes who a favor (negative means you owe them). Favor can be up to 1 less than Bond in either direction (so a Bond 4 contact may have a Favor of -3 to 3). Finally, contacts also have Contact Qualities which affect your relationship with the person. The total cost of a Contact is (Bond + Favor) × (Sum of all skills) + (Sum of all Qualities).This cost may be spent from your Social Bank or from your XP.

Buy Your Gear, Vehicles, Augmentations

The amount of money you may spend at character creation depends both on the culture from which your character hails (as of the time of creation), and how many XP you invest in resources. Investing XP essentially buys a multiplier for the area’s Base Income. Your character's starting income is (XP × Base Income).

Once you have the amount of money desired, choose the gear you would like to purchase from the Gear chapter. Any money left over becomes your starting cash. Keep in mind, however, that purchasing items after character generation is subject to time spent and more risks, so it’s worth it to buy more items at character creation rather than simply taking it as cash.

There is a limit to the Rarity that a character can get at character creation, which is based on your contacts and subcultures. If you have a Featured Contact with the Networking skill, this skill rating may serve as the base Rarity limit for character creation; any gear below this rating can be found with no penalty. Alternately, the Reach of any Subculture may be used as the limit - use whatever value is highest.

For any gear whose Rarity is above this limit, the player may spend 1 XP per Rarity point above the limit to buy that one item. Any groups of identical items (e.g. a rare kind of bullet) count as a single item for this purpose.