Friday, February 20, 2009

Campaign: Rolling Characters

Well, I appreciate the exuberance.

Later on, I foresee some difficulties in getting some of you to wait for your cue. For the moment, the bit champing is probably for the good.

I intend to call all of you by your character names, when you have them. Obviously I will be playing with Anshelm, Delfig, Ryan, Josef Mieszko and Joseph; so here’s what I need. Everything should be posted as a comment on this blog entry.

Please provide this by Saturday at 2PM EST.

1) A blogspot profile. You don’t need to provide a picture to go with it until you have a better concept of what your character is…which you should have by mid-Sunday, if I continue to hear from everyone.
2) Six rolls of 4d6, from which you select the highest three dice. Arrange these scores to get your raw, unmodified statistics.
3) Choose a class.
4) Choose a race.
5) Provide me with list of six d20 rolls, in the order that they were rolled.
6) An email address. This last can be sent to alexiss1@telus.net if you don’t want to post your email online.

Ragnorakk/Josef, if you did not roll your dice with 4d6 then do so. If you DID roll your stats on 4d6, then if you were in my offline world I would have you re-roll all three of the 9s. The 8 you keep.

Following that, I’ll provide age, height, weight, hit points, modified ability scores, backgrounds (including place of birth), ages, birthdays and wealth. I will then send any rewrites for Player Handbook classes by email so you can have a closer look at changes I’ve made; I will send mages a spell book and number of cantrips, the thieves their stats and indicate how many spells everyone can pick. You won’t want to pick spells until you see the list of changes I’ve made.

I’ll provide those things starting this evening, 8PM EST, for those who have provided stats. There’s no rush. The deadline for all character creation is Sunday evening; between 8 and 9 PM EST Sunday I’ll post the opening descriptions and get the thing off the ground.

On Saturday, before I begin running my offline campaign (on which I’ll be working tomorrow through the day), I’ll email out the equipment list to those I have an address for.

If anyone wants to do any research, the party will begin in the quiet town of Dachau, Upper Bavaria, a summer residence for Bavarian princes, with a population of a little under four thousand. The town has market privileges, which was necessary for characters to get equipped (not every town has a market). The season will be early summer (first week in May).

A few pictures showing the region and town of Dachau:



30 comments:

  1. Human/Cleric

    Str: 9 (if re-roll: 11)
    Int: 8
    Wis: 15
    Dex: 9 (if re-roll: 11)
    Con: 9 (if re-roll: 12)
    Chr: 13

    6 D20 rolls: 7, 3, 10, 4, 2, 15

    if i intuit your re-roll reasoning correctly (to stay out of average range, which my re-rolls are still squarely in) then these would be the re-rolls:
    STR 15
    DEX 13
    CON 13

    This is, of course, if he re-rolls are to take place (I'm not sure that they are).

    I'm going to wait to create the gmail/blogger stuff until I know my background, nationality, place of birth.
    I'm not married to the Silesian...

    for the time being, email:
    spaceagecouple@gmail.com

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  2. I'm going to have to consult my PHB at home, so will have my character posted tonight before band practice. My scores are 9, 14, 13, 10, 9 and 7.

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  3. Josef,

    Take the second group of rolls...Str 15, Dex 13, Con 13.

    You expressed an interest in being Silesian, and I have no problem with that, as the region is close. Most of the circumstances deriving from your birth, however, the dice will decide. I'll let you know where in Silesia when you tell me what religion you are.

    Anselm,

    Reroll the two 9s; repeat until one of the two rerolls is equal to at least a 15. (if you get lucky and get two 18s, so be it).

    ReplyDelete
  4. I'm seeing him as an animist - believeing in a broad pantheon of Slavic gods & spirits by way of Polish cultural influence. Unfortunately, I do not own a copy of Deities & Demigods, and I don't remember if it had a section on Slavic deities or not - but Wikipedia searching revealed Veles, Perun, Tryglaw, and a mess of 'lessers'. Similar to Germanic paganism (by way of Norse), though many of these gods were of local origin & interpretations, and some seem to be local interpretations of Greek & even Persian gods.

    I see Josef having an affinity for Veles, the dragon at the foot of the World Tree.

    As Silesia was a 'melting-pot', I thought that Slavic beliefs would not be to far afield...

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  5. Ragnorakk,

    It was common during the period for obscure Polish Catholics to "mix" the old religious figureswith the new, and thus include icons in decoration and in their literature. It is something you might consider. Veles, as you mention, was considered a Christian saint.

    If you wish to be a pure practitioner of Slavic mythology, I'm game. I've already explained the importance of the whole pantheon being the focus; I'll point out that I play so that many different pantheons actually worship the same gods under different names. There's only one goddess, for example, that is represented by Hel, Loviatar, Ishtar, Anath and Kali.

    We can work out details for ceremonies and so on as we go; in most cases, it will closely resemble the Celtic/Druidic tradition as it was fostered in eastern Europe during the early 1st millenium B.C...that later expanded into the Slavic polytheistic religion you suggest. I'll start looking through some sources for ideas.

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  6. Ah, see? I love operating in the real world.

    If you are not familiar with it already, the Hypatian Codex would obviously be a magical tome wherein would be identified a great many details regarding the greater intent of the gods in terms of the chosen religion. This would be knowledge no ordinary cleric, even a patriarch of the church, would have. And technically the book is "missing." Compiled in the late 13th century, and not found until "1810"...this would mean that in 1650 its whereabouts was unknown.

    Interesting.

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  7. Interesting indeed! Now to let some Google translation mangle this one...

    Josef is no intellectual. The Christianization of his deities is of little importance to him - another face on the four-faced pillar, say - another aspect of the same power.

    His opinion of Abrahamism is low, expressing itself in dismissal over vehemence. He is disdainful of the Church(es) as earthly powers and sceptical the concept of a man as savior.

    To venerate Veles as a Christian saint is the same to him as any other 'method' - it is the personal relationship/connection he feels that is important. Perhaps, too, he considers it somewhat subversive, if that is not too complex a thought for him...

    New Info:
    http://josefwmieszko.blogspot.com
    (note the new w!)
    josefmieszko@gmail.com

    ReplyDelete
  8. Okay, Anshelm's basic stats and a sketch of his history is on the blog.

    Took me 14 rolls for the first and another 17 rolls for the second (using 4d6), but I got 2 15s. My dice rolling per usual. :)

    http://anselmhelbelinc.blogspot.com/

    AnshelmHelbelinc@gmail.com

    d20 rolls: 2, 20, 3, 18, 4, 19.

    Jeez, how's that for balance. :\

    ReplyDelete
  9. Damn.

    "Reroll the two 9s; repeat until one of the two rerolls is equal to at least a 15..."

    Try it again, Anshelm. When ONE of the two rolls is at least a 15, accept both.

    And then give me all the stats as arranged again.

    ReplyDelete
  10. STR 15
    DEX 13
    CON 10
    INT 14
    WIS 11
    CHA 11

    Human Fighter/Mage

    d20 Rolls: 18, 7, 19, 2, 3, 2

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  11. D'oh. Reading comprehension. Sorry.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Excellent Joseph,

    Any personality characteristics you'd like emphasized, or shall I just extrapolate from the die rolls?

    ReplyDelete
  13. okay, got a 17 and a 4. :)

    STR 13
    INT 14
    WIS 7
    DEX 17
    CON 4
    CHA 10

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  14. Hmm, I guess I'll wait to see what I get.

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  15. Oh, sorry. I guess I'll go with Adelbert Volkmann. When he started studying magic, he adopted the Roman name "Tiberius". Pure arrogance, I guess.

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  16. If I was too quick in writing up my history, let me know. I'll cut that out of the blog.

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  17. Anselm,

    Let me see how it goes.

    Is it Anselm or Anshelm?

    ReplyDelete
  18. Anshelm...in my haste this morning I left out the "h".

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  19. Here's Adelbert's blog:

    http://adelbertvolkmann.blogspot.com/

    ReplyDelete
  20. Sorry for the multiple comments...I'd rather see what you roll up, Alex. Both characters so far have backgrounds far better than what I've done.

    I apologize for not reading closely enough; work was busy today and I was scanning.

    ReplyDelete
  21. Delfig Kôlhupfer
    Human
    Bard/Thief

    STR 7
    DEX 14
    CON 11
    INT 10
    WIS 18
    CHA 16

    6 D20 rolls: 1, 7, 20, 7, 20, 17

    Motivation: Survive day to day, trying to get to some semblance of self sufficiency
    Objective: Create works that everyone will remember
    Personality: Playful, lusty, careful

    Things he does well: Make up stuff off the cuff, study, speak (with passion)

    Things he does poorly: Deal with authority, use common sense, use good judgement with regards to women

    Beliefs: There's more to life than survival, Go out with a bang to make your mark, It's better to have a full stomach and lie a little than to follow strict dogma and sit out in the rain.

    Instincts: Makes himself scarce when obvious authority/church figures are around, flirt/attempt to seduce a lovely (or obviously available) woman, try to avoid the strongest person if in a conflict

    Emotional attachments: Singing and dancing, trees, old books/scrolls

    http://delfigkcrs.blogspot.com/
    delfigk@gmail.com

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  22. Anshelm and Delfig,

    I'll keep in mind what you've written, but I will completely throw out anything that doesn't meet with the facts of your birth, childhood or unusual abilities/faults.

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  23. I'm good with that. :)

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  24. Anshelm,

    We have a problem.

    With a "4", you cannot be multiclassed. There are only six classes you can be, according to the Player's Handbook. In each ability, there comes a point where it says, "here or lower the character can only a"...and then it gives mage for strength, fighter for intelligence, thief for wisdom, cleric for dexterity, illusionist for constitution and assassin for charisma.

    You'll have to rethink this character.

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  25. Alexis - cool, no sweat. They're more scratch pad at this point.

    ReplyDelete
  26. Gah...I blame playing Basic for 2 years. :)

    Anshelm will be a single-classed thief, then. I will update the blog tomorrow morning. Late to band practice.

    Please accept my apologies. I don't mean to create more work for you, and will endeavour to be less of an idjit going forward.

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  27. Anshelm,

    No worries, this is all standard DM/Player getting the characters up and running shit.

    ReplyDelete
  28. Human Thief

    STR 13
    INT 14
    WIS 4
    DEX 17
    CON 7
    CHA 10

    From yesterday, d20 rolls: 2, 20, 3, 18, 4, 19

    Blog updated.

    ReplyDelete
  29. Ryan's character

    Str. 14
    Int. 11
    Wis. 9
    Dex. 15
    Con. 13
    Cha. 10

    Half-orc assassin
    d20 rolls: 4 12 10 8 17 5

    kazimir.kropt@gmail.com

    ReplyDelete

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