Character Creation

[nrage]

Hi all, first post here.

I don't know if there is already a defined/decided upon character creation system, if not then perhaps this post will be some food for thought.

I got the recent update email and for some reason it made me recall a game I played back in the 90s. Specifically I remembered the character creation system which was so much fun that it was one of the best parts about the game, which itself - despite the numerous bugs - was excellent. The game was called "Darklands" and the character creation system, from what I can remember, was unique in several ways (compared to most modern RPGs).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darklands_(video_game)

There is a bit of a description of the character generation system in the 2nd para under Gameplay in the link above. Apparently this game inspired The Elder Scrolls, which makes sense now that I think about it.

Anyway the system was...

Your character would start at a young age 15(?) then select jobs for each 5(?) year period of your life, up until the point you decided to "go adventuring". These jobs would affect your attributes and skills in positive and sometimes negative ways. Your age would also have similar positive and negative effects on your attributes - your strength and stamina would increase until late middle age then decrease for example but your intelligence or wisdom would increase for longer before deteriorating.

So, for a young strong fighter you would take a few jobs then go adventuring, but if you wanted to create a good alchemist/magician or healer/cleric you might work for longer into middle or even old age before going adventuring.

The jobs you could select would depend on your social class (low, middle, upper) and your previous jobs, or abilities. So, picking the right jobs at the right stage was almost a game in itself. I can recall once figuring out a short path to the "knight" job, but not being able to repeat it the next time I played for some reason I could not fathom.

The jobs would determine to some degree your starting coin and equipment, and the longer you worked the more/better it got, but again work too long and you reach middle/old age and your abilities start to deteriorate.

To give some examples, I would often start a low class character and select "Labourer" as the job. This would boost strength and endurance and also blunt impact weapons for example. But, in order to reach knight I believe you had to start an upper class character and select page boy, or squire, or similar to get on the ladder to eventually select knight.

What I liked about this system was the flexibility it gave and the fact that it forced you to balance jobs taken vs age and the effects these had. The other nice factor is that it told a story about your characters beginnings and life before the adventure even started. I also like the fact that it gives you a range of unique starting characters without the need to directly manipulate their abilities and skills, making creation an art/game all of it's own.

I can imagine improving upon it by have a selectable or random family background i.e. thatcher, carpenter, etc which would have an effect on your abilities and skills and also job prospects. The background class and jobs would influence starting coin and equipment. There could be random or selectable additional quirks/traits or accidents/windfalls which would make characters more unique and interesting.

I think the thought that lead me from the update email to remembering Darklands was that I imagined the jobs and lifestyle/class of your character having a direct effect on the body shape and musculature features shown in the update email. I could imagine if you did too many paper pushing clerical jobs you could end up being a bit portly.

Anyway, hope you all enjoyed my ramblings.. I'm off to see if I can get a patched copy of Darklands running in an emulator or something

 

[Komuflage]

Oh nice read, first of http://www.gog.com/gamecard/darklands here is the GoG patched game for 2,4dollars, drm free.


Now I've just looked at a character creation video on youtube, and it all looked very complexed, I pretty much didn't understand a thing, (I think the 240P helped to that, couldn't read the text ) but after reading through your whole text I at least understood some things, it sounds like a really interesting system, and I like the part of getting a backstory? for your character, that is something I miss in todays Rpgs.
Also I'm all for complexity, so something like this would most likely be awesome

 

[the0thMonkey]

That sounds similar to Warband. A major difference is the inclusion of age which Warband didn't have, but could be a really good factor. In Warband, your history also determined which weapons you started with. If the plot of SG allows for a system like this, which it may not, I think it should definitely be considered.

My one beef with systems like these is that sometimes the connection between the life choice (e.g. apprenticing for a smith) and the change in personal attribute (e.g. getting stronger) is not very clear. In vanilla Warband all the changes were implicit, so you'd go through the entire creation process not knowing exactly what your character was going to turn out to be. Several mods for the game make the various attribute changes explicit, which breaks immersion a little but you know what your character is shaping up to be.

There are advantages and disadvantages on both sides, which do you prefer?

 

[antihero]

^ Yeah it does sound like Warband. It may have even been inspired by Darklands. Who knows. However, it would definitely add depth to the character creation and help you identify more with the character you're playing. Surely some testing would be necessary to make the best choices for your character but that's part of the natural process of getting to know how a game works. I definitely like this idea better than having a generic backstory or no backstory at all, like for instance Bethesda's prisoner fetish lol