Mraston's Characters

Trug



Race: Human, Possible Native American Heritage
Age: 32, Gender: Male, Height: 5'11, Weight: 80 Kilos
Total Karma: 0
Current Karma: 0
Street Cred: 0
Total Notoriety: 0

Attributes:

Body: 3
Agility: 4
Reaction: 3
Strength: 1
Charisma: 5
Intuition: 5
Logic: 2
Willpower: 5

Edge: 2
Magic: 5
Initiative: 8 (6)

Qualities:

Magician (Shaman Tradition) (-15bp)
Mentor Spirit (Bear) (-5bp) (+2 for Health Spells, +2 For resisting Damage)

Prejudiced (Lone Star) (Actively Prejudiced, 2 Confrontation Threshold (Willpower and Intuition)) (+5 + 10 = 15 bp)
Flashback (+5 bp) (Trigger= Burnt/Charred corpse, Smell of burning or burnt flesh)

Skills

Conjuring Group: 3
Assensing: 2
Sorcery: 4
Dodge: 2
Perception: 4
Long Arms: 6

Knowledge Skills:

Alcohol (Spirits): 2
Area Knowledge: Seattle: 2
Magic Traditions: 2
Animals: 2
Bars: Seattle: 2
Gangs: Seattle: 2

Languages:

English

Spells:

Stunball
Heal
Increase Attribute (Body)
Increase Reflexes
Invisibility
Stealth

Gear:

Life Style: Squatter
Armour: Lined Coat and Full Body Armour
Weapons: Remington 990
Magic Gear: Magical Lodge Materials (6), Spellcasting Focus (Combat) (2)
Commlink: CMT Clip (R:1, S: 3), OS: Vector Xim (S:1, F:1)
ID: Fake Sin (Rating 4), Fake Bike License (Rating: 4), Certified Cred Stick
Misc: 6 x Stimulant Patch (R:2), 6 x Tranq Patch (R: 4), 6 x Antidote Patch (R:4), Flashlight, Survival Kit, GPS, Swag, Rations.
Vehicle: Harley-Davidson Scorpion

Nuyen: 62


Contacts:

Mechanic: L: 3, C:3
Talismonger: L: 2, C: 2

Background:

Trug was raised in the Puyallup barrens by a variety of different parental figures. Abandoned at infancy in a dusty dive bar he was unofficially adopted by the down and out clientele who drunk at the bar so much they basically lived there. His awakened powers were recognized by one of the drunkard shaman's who frequented the bar. After that Trug was helped along in his Shaman career through various blow in's. He also started working the bar at a young age, entertaining the clientele and pouring drinks. The bar's owner (And a few of the regular's) looked at Trug as a Son. Trug in turn looked up to the down and outers, and viewed them as a family. As he grew older he continued his training in Shamancy, mainly using his skills to live off the wilds and the streets. Generally preferring the wilds to the big city, trug would spend weeks at a time traveling on his own through the wild places outside of Seattle. He would do a few jobs here and there for various gangers, but he never had much of a stomach for all out brawling, preferring to help and heal people when he could. That said he had no problems breaking the law, being raised by the regulars at the bar gave him a real outlaw moral view of the world. Trug would always return to that dusty bar every few months, serving drinks and doing any odd jobs that the place needed. He felt he owed the bar that much, for not letting him die as a baby and all.

Trug probably would have lived his life out happily this way, going into the wilds, working the bar and doing odd jobs for cred when he needed it, maybe find a wife and take over the bar. But one day he returned to his "home" to find it burnt to the ground, charred corpses of the regulars, his family, strewn in the debris. He devoted the next few years of his life trying to work out what happened. The harsh brutal simplicity of the truth was heartbreaking; Lone Star was contracted out to try out some new magic tech weaponry, they randomly picked a squatter hang out in the barrens and went to town with the new wepaons. After that Trug took to Shadowrunning, fueled by a hate of the megacorps and authority in general.

Not a bad start for a newbie Have you played 'run before?

But still, there are some classic problems:

Attributes: way low. You can spend 200 BP on your attributes max and I suggest a minimum of 150 but 170-180 is much safer. You have blades and dodge, these use reaction and agility and strength, which is 1. In short, you cannot hit anybody, if somehow you do they shrug off the damage, but don't forget that they most likely will have a gun, so you cannot even get closer without being full of holes.

I suggest around this:
B 3 - helps with damage, toxins, diseases, gives you + 1 P damage box, and lets you wear at least an armor jacket (suggestion: lined coat + securetech full body suit)

R 3 or more - immensely important, from not being the last person in combat to act to avoiding a gruesome death

A 2 - you are a spellcaster, leave the combat (especially melee) to others, but still, agi 1 maybe a little low

S - since you won't be doing any close combat, this is the only one you should keep at 1

C - one of two most important stat for shamans. Why not at least 5? Trust me, you'll need it.

I - good or because it helps wit many of your skills, even 5 isn't a bad decision

L - 1? Are you stupid? I mean the character. Logic is very helpful in many situations (for example when you would say: guys, take out the particle accelerator because I think that's what's causing the space-time instability - the GM says: hmm, your logic is 1 so the others only hear "aaaaa, I love iceee creaaam") but seriously, nobody like to work with a stupid character (and you will be expected to roleplay out you stats - A1 means clumsy, always dropping things and himself, L1 stupid, R1 sloooow) so make it 2 or 3

W - other important stat, at least 5

Magic - are you sure you want to hardmax it? that's 25 BP for 1 point of increase and you could use that 25 points elsewhere. But some people like M6 for some reason (it really doesn't give you much but 1 die) so if you are sure...

Qualities: take some negative ones, gives you extra BP, some flaws for your character - if you choose well they are fun nuisances, but not life threatening.

Skills: drop blades, pump dodge a little, maybe a little less influence (I mean 5 skills?) or shadowing (you've got invisibility) and a conjuring group 4 wouldn't hurt. And counterspelling is important as hell, it not just protects you from spells, but your teammates as well (who otherwise like snowballs in hell against magic)

Spells: too diverse, you've got spells from every type, when you are a well initiated magician, you can pull this out, but not now. Most of your spells are sustained, which means, in order to work, you have to concentrate on them, that's -2 on EVERY action you make per spell. Now you've got at least six of them, which means there is no way you can use them at once or even twice. Because of this, buffing yourself is pointless (you may increase Body and reflexes, but the you've got -4 on everything from dodging to resisting damage) and if you want to help your teammates you can sustain two, max three spells (but then go and hide instantly, let your spirits and teammates fight) and no more. I suggest you drop Charisma, analyze truth, stabilize (you've got heal and you can have a slap patch to stabilize them) and mind link (it's cool, but later).

And if you have fetishes, you have to choose a spell to use with them so write "Stunball (limited)" so the GM knows which spell you have learned this way (but beware, if you don't have your fetish with you, you cannot cast the spell)

I hope I helped. If you have questions, you know how to find me.

I've played exactly one session of RL Shadowrun, but spent the last month or so reading as much of the core books as I can.

Joined up here to supplement my RL play time and really get my head around all the rules/get into the setting.

I really appreciate the pointers, will have another look over of Trug here and spruce him up a little.

One question, would you say his backstory "works"? Not knowing much about Seattle I assumed there is wilder/natural area's on its outskirts?

Well Spoken Aalith,
I do not have much to add but I do have a couple of suggestions:

"Race: Human, Possible Native American Heritage"

Ok so the guy doesn't know where he came from, that fine, thats in the background but you and the GM should know if he is NAN or not.

Mentor Spirit: It helps to put the bonus and penalties somewhere on the character sheet so that you and the GM remember without having to look it up each time.

Skills:
I would drop the influence group, leave that skill set to the face who is pimped out for that. At least take etiquette and maybe negotiation but only at like 3 and 2 respectively.

I would drop Blades and Intimidation (you gots magicks to screw with peoples heads if you choose that route).

I personally would take pistols at 2 or 3 (with a decient agility), the reasons are thus: sometime you might be in a possition where you cant cast spells or sometimes you will want to keep the fact that you are a spell slinger secret. Remember even in 2070 the awakened are still only like 10% of the population and many people are afraid of them, whip out the mojo when you really need it.

Knowledge skill of Alcohol? narrow it down a little, even just to booze. Alcohol is a bit broad as a knowledge skill (what type of alcohol, there are alot and if you drink many of them it will kill you? what aspect of it? its chemical nature? how to make it?). What does the character drink? whiskey? tequila? pick one of those and make that the skill.

Be careful with the 'hatred of authority in general' in the background. Rebel without a cause, ok fine character concept but the character is going to be part of a team, which means that at different times he is going to have orders barked at him and he better follow them for the sake of saving everyones hoop.

--SN

It's a solid background, explains most of your skills, maybe even the bear totem, hate for the megacorps and problems for authority will be interesting to play out to say at least, but everybody loves a good challenge (shadowrunners work mostly for megacorps and unless you are the leader, you ought to get orders from someone).

Maybe take up Lost loved one, Prejudiced (megacorps), Big Regret (not being there, maybe could have done something), Flashback (haunting image of your "family), Vendetta and Enemy (Lone Star, maybe an officer who ordered the test) as negative quality (not all, of course) to represent what happened at that fateful day. This gives you plenty of plus BP (max is +35) so you can buy attributes and such.

It's a shame, really it's a good background and a good concept, just 400 BP is rarely enough to build a hardened bear shaman on a chopper, maybe with a shotgun or something. So you have two choices: you stay with the high magic (I really recommend 5) and highest spellcasting skill (6) and make a "pure" spellcaster (weak in everything else, but can magically kicks everyone's arse) or go a little easy on the magic stuff (C 4 W 4 spellcasting 4, magic 4 or 5) but having a little better reaction and agility, and a good weapon skill. That way you can sling spells (buffer, healing, non-combat spells recommended) and waste people from that sweet chopper.

Right now, this character is between them, unfortunately not in a good way. Having very low physical attributes and only mediocre mental, but with skills like blades, outdoors, shadowing.

If you choose "pure" pump mental attributes and conjuring, maybe have a sustaining focus, and consider an elf or a dwarf as metatype (human is good too).

If you go with "badass shotgun shaman" (which I think is more in tune with the pully background, I mean having S1, L1, R1 and B2 in the barrens is equal to a death sentence) consider an ork (best, cheap and gives high body, strength and still can have willp 5 and C4) or dwarf.

mraston - I can't really add much to what has been said. They're all good points. You have a good handle on your concept. You just need to adjust your mechanics a bit. Make your revisions and let us take a look at it and we'll go from there.

Thanks to Aalith and St Nougat

The help is much appreciated guys!

I have tweaked him a little, trimmed the fat and muscled him up.

Let me know what you think.

Seems pretty good. Why don't you use him in one of the games here? There is one which uses a "lite" version of the rules which might be pretty good.

I'd like to see how he plays.

This will be fun.

Some small addtional suggestion

You could use some specialization for example the shotgun, +2 diece and only 2 BP cost

Com - S1 F1 You are a liability to the teams network, i they are not slaved, your comlink will be a easy pick foe a low level hackeras he would only need one hit to breack into it. then use it against the team and you. you sure you want to risk it?
I would suggest at least All above 3 comlink, better even if it has stealth installed and running, but that only my preference, and OS is good, but have some programs too. like firefox or word - browse and edit.
And my preference is at least to have a Pro user package instaled in it too, then what's the point of having a comlink if you cant surf the matrix or do a data search even if defaulting.
No mods for the bike? not even anti theft or Manual control override?

in shadowrun "3" is a average thing, even a disposable comlink has better stats, then yours, as far as i remember.

P.s. this shsould be happening in Cahracter concept page not this one.

The thing is with commlinks is that you really only use them for messages if you are not a hacker but they are so damn expensive. Even an all 3 'link with a pro package is almost 3k and believe me, that's not a challenge for a hacker. From that, they just grow even more expensive and if you don't buy the programs (f.e. IC), then what's the point? A rating 6 firewall can be hacked only a few second later than the R3, it just gives the system more time to identify the threat. And if detect that you are being hacked, what can you do? Without attack, IC, data bomb or similar programs, you have only one chance: turn off the 'link. Then your communication is successfully stopped. That's why I slave my crappy 'links at the beginning of every game until I have the money for a good one, and a team hacker who copies some of his programs to my 'link and then I run them night and day.

Anyway, I just wanted to say this is a much better character now, very good for a first experience here. Just be sure you know at least the core books rules about magic and combat very well, especially with longarms. If you have any problems, we are here, better ask before posting something you are not sure about.