Part of the reason for the Red Gate Gang's success is the older of the two Vedechi brothers. His active thieving days long past, he is now wealthy, respected and married into an ancient and noble family. In addition, he is friendly with a number of the senior officers charged with law enforcement in Karmorvus - so there is little chance of the Red Gate gang being surprised by the activities of the City Watch. However, Kalan Vedechi is living a dangerous double life - some people know about his shady past and he keeps the investifgators from digging any deeper by acting as an informer. In a way, that suits him just fine - if any serious criminal activity in his patch is dealt with by the authorities, so it keeps things quieter for the Red Gate Gang.
Note: Kalan was generated in about 15 minutes using the random character generator. The text explaining how it was done is below his character sheet.
|
CHA |
VAL |
Cost |
|---|---|---|
|
STR |
12 |
4 |
|
DEX |
5 |
-15 |
|
CON |
7 |
-6 |
|
BOD |
10 |
|
|
INT |
14 |
+4 |
|
EGO |
8 |
-4 |
|
PRE |
15 |
+5 |
|
COM |
11 |
|
|
PD |
2 |
|
|
ED |
1 |
|
|
SPD |
2 |
+5 |
|
REC |
3 |
|
|
END |
14 |
|
|
STUN |
20 |
|
|
Total |
-7 |
|
|
OCV |
2 |
|
|
DCV |
2 |
|
|
ECV |
3 |
|
Powers and Skills |
|
|---|---|
|
7 |
Lockpick (12-) |
|
5 |
Brawling: +1d6 HA |
|
1 |
Perk: member of the thieves' guild |
|
5 |
Disguise (13-) |
|
2 |
Immunity to alcohol (14-) |
|
5 |
Perk: Well-off |
|
3 |
Sleight of Hand (11-) |
|
3 |
AK: Karmorvus (12-) |
|
2 |
+1 with hearing PER rolls |
|
3 |
Bribery (12-) |
|
3 |
Stealth (11-) |
|
3 |
Concealment (12-) |
|
3 |
Riding (11-) |
|
5 |
Perk: Member of the Aristocracy |
|
2 |
KS: Local Law enforcement (12-) |
|
1 |
Perk: Favour - Captain of the city watch |
|
3 |
Shadowing (11-) |
|
3 |
PS: Estimate value (12-) |
|
3 |
Streetwise (12-) |
|
5 |
1d6 luck |
|
67 |
Total powers and skills |
|
60 |
Total character cost |
|
50+ |
Disadvantages |
|
15 |
Secret ID (Thief and informer) |
|
5 |
Age (40+) |
|
5 |
Unluck (1d6) |
Kalan was generated as an example to show a friend how to use the random character generator. The actual mechanics are pretty self-explanatory, but I also keep track of the rolls to generate a potted character history and background, which is described below.
OK, one of the long-running NPCs in the Gothick Empires game was Ari Vedechi, a thief. He had a mysterious brother who was alluded to several times but who never put in an appearance. So I decided to generate a random Rogue in the roughly 100 point range as the discussed-but-never-seen brother. Thus, I knocked 30 points off his total points for characteristics, rolled the dice, and as you can see above Kalan came off pretty poorly - he's slow, clumsy and a bit sickly. I spent 5 more points just bringing him up to SPD 2, so for his 35 points, he actually ended up with -7 points worth of characteristics. Feh! Although I've given the correct total on the character sheet above, I normally carry on with the generation as though I've actually spent those points (in other words, I don't go back and do the math until later). So that left him with 65 points to spend on his career.
The random roll on the rogue career table indicated a career as a thief. With his stat.s, pickpocketing seemed like a dangerous start to his career, so I chose lockpicking as his basic skill, and then started rolling. As I did so, I just jotted down the rolls made on a scrap of paper.
Kalan's career went like this:
So what does all that mean? Well, if you look at his Perks, he became well off, rose to become first a minor noble and then a member of the aristocracy. So Kalan's career of thievery obviously went well. Hewas enlisted into the Thieves' Guild early on, and became wealthy. One assumes he invested some of his ill-gotten gains successfully, becoming a respected citizen and rising into the minor nobility. He has the bribery skill, which might explain how that happened. Then he became a member of the aristocracy. Normally, you have to be born into that class, but it's not unknown for down-at-heel aristocrats to marry off their daughters to wealthy minor nobles with plenty of ready cash. Without any skills in High Society, I assume he would never associate with the Duces court in Karmorvus - or he would be snubbed if he did. But the connection to a high-born family certainly wouldn't do his career any harm. He also now knows about law enforcement and even has a few connections in the Guard (presumably through family contacts) which would be a great help to any remaining under-the-table dealings. That's the good side of things.
But look at the bad rolls too. Early in his career, things didn't work out as planned and he ended up with a secret ID. That was before he became wealthy and respectable. He also acquired the disguise skill at the same time. An easy explanation is that he was picked up for some crime or other, and became an informer to escape prison or the slave mines. The next ill fortune - the age disadvantage - is just one of those things. But later on he had another bout of bad luck and acquired 1d6 of unluck - perhaps he was cursed by someone envious of his rise? Or someone who had suffered from his actions? With a career like his, I'm sure Kalan would have plenty of enemies.
Finally looking at his physical characteristics - plus the age disadvantage and the immunity to alcohol - and a ready picture of Kalan comes to mind. He's become slow and unsteady - perhaps a little red-faced and overweight. He likes to drink. He's certainly not the thief he once was, so he has traded in breaking and entering for information swapping and co-ordinating the actions of younger thieves. That's not the image I originally had in mind - but I like it!
As you can see, it's pretty easy to assemble a character's backstory from the rolls made if you keep a rough record of the high and low points. Indeed, usually I find by the time I have finished rolling, the character's history is already pretty much clear in my mind.
