Hey all, sorry this took so long.
So as it turns out World of Darkness uses two traits called “Vice” and “Virtue” in their revised rule book and although this game’s intended to be free, if it does well and I want to make a limited edition hardcover version or something, I don’t want to have to get into a legal battle. Whattaya do?
Anyway, let's start out with materials. You don't need much.
-One dude willing to GM, here called the Judge
-Players, two to four is optimum
-A pair of dice for each player and a pair for the Judge
-Pencils, paper, yadda yadda, you know the deal.
-Counters for Monstrous and Redeeming points. I find black and white go stones work best.
Character Creation
1. Name your character and state what monster he is
2. Declare his Monstrous Qualities and his Redeeming Qualities
3. Determine your primary trait and your minor trait, then state your assorted skills
4. Determine Contacts, Wealth, and Posessions
1) Name and Monster
Your name and what monster you are govern your character. What monster your character is intimately determines what will be its weaknesses, its strengths, and the qualities that govern it. The name… well, you’re going to be hearing it for many sessions, you’d best not choose something annoying, or the other players will feel urges to beat you up, and some might act on said urges.
“Okay, first thing’s first, guys. Let’s hear what your character ideas are,” said Lucas. It was Friday night, and he had found an odd game on the internet called FREAKS! and decided that he could rope his buddies to play the game with him. Sitting about his table were his friends Karl, Danny, and Rachel.
Karl was the first to step up. “I think I’d like to play something like a specter, I‘ll call him Dorian. Maybe a wraith or something. He’d be able to manipulate things around him slightly and control the fears of her enemies. He’s fighting not to completely succumb to his fears and just react violently to everything around him, he‘s compassionate and wants to come back and continue helping people.”
Danny sarcastically said “So, what, he’s some kind of incorporeal wimp?”
Karl punched Danny in the solar plexus and asked what his amazing character idea was. Everyone had a hearty laugh at his expense. After regaining his breath, Danny turned to Lucas. “I’ve got a pretty good idea what I want to play already. His name’s Girthinix, he’s a mind flayer. But see, for whatever reason, he’s just really laid back, just liked researching, mostly magic. He was run out of the caves he’d lived in because everyone was afraid that his original conscious was fighting back. He managed to get out, he felt rain for the first time, and it was amazing. Since then, he’s been studying weather magic.”
“You’re not a fantasy writer, Danny. Don’t try to be.” This came from Rachel.
Danny paid her no mind, he just grinned. Lucas asked if Rachel had any ideas.
“Yeah, I’m thinking of doing a goblin girl. But she’s cute. She’s got this huge knife she mainly uses for throwing and stuff, and is good with illusions. She thinks her family is a bunch of cowards and she left so that she could find a better way of living. She’s a real fire cracker, you know?”
Lucas nodded. “Does she have a name?”
Rachel thought for a second. Female goblin names are hard.
“How about Ketva?”
Lucas shrugged and said, “Sounds good to me. All right, enough of this touchy feely back story stuff. Let’s get to actual character creation.”
2) Your monstrous and redeeming qualities
Monstrous and redeeming qualities make up one of the most important mechanics in the game. These are used to illustrate the battle between what makes your character a monster, and what makes him something more. For your monstrous qualities, write a few sentences describing the monstrous behavior that plagues your character. Two or three‘s the best number. Here are some examples from Lucas’s brood.
Dorian: If someone comes near me, I want to throw things at him and run.
If danger’s coming towards me, I am paralyzed by fear
Girthinix: When I see a person’s head, it looks like a delicious bowl of hominy pudding to me
If I meet someone in high standing, I think they could do a much better job if they were one of my thralls
Ketva: If I’m in danger, I want to push whoever’s closest into the line of fire, friend or not
When an enemy’s weaker than I am, I like to stick my knife in him and watch him squirm
Next, you choose your redeeming traits, the traits that make you more than a monster. Unlike your monstrous traits, which are shared to a greater or lesser extent by all monsters of the players type, their redeeming qualities are unique. You can have one goblin who’s generous and another who’s hard working, but both are still opportunistic cowards deep inside. These traits can contradict your monstrous ones, but they don’t have to. Once again, two or three statements describing your characters virtuous side. Lucas’s players came up with these.
Dorian: When I see someone who’s sick, I want to reach out and ease their pain
When a woman near me is in danger, I think of my wife who couldn’t be saved because I was weak
Girthinix: If any danger threatens the people who live in my town, I’ll tame the winds and clouds to protect them
I’d rather not cause any trouble, things are more peaceful like this.
Ketva: I can’t stand bullies
If you don’t believe in what you do, why are you doing it?
3) Your traits and skills.
There are four base traits in FREAKS! Mind governs intelligence, mental capacity, that kind of stuff. You’d use it for magic and knowledge and things of that ilk. Body governs your strength, toughness, virility, etc. It’s used when your characters doing something strong or tough. Coordination governs things requiring you to do things quickly. Like sprinting, or getting out of the way of something, or sneaking about. Self determines your will, your wisdom, your general perception of things, and how others percieve you. It’s used when lying, when detecting lies, when trying to notice something out of the ordinary, and that kind of magic that’s more about what’s inside you as opposed to what you know. Each player chooses one trait to be their primary trait and one trait to be their minor trait. These determine how many skills you get and what their ranks are. Your primary trait is given one expert skill, two proficient skills, and one decent skill. Your minor trait is given two decent skills and one weakness. The other two traits get two proficient skills and one decent one. After choosing your trait hierarchy, you determine skills.
At least one skill in each trait has to be that trait’s save. Any time a contested action is rolled against your character, one of these saves is added to your rolls.
Save vs. mind control: The Mind save. Any time a wizard tries to dominate you, a dude in a black suit tries to neuralize you, or someone’s attacking you with psionics.
Save vs. plagues of the body: The Body save. Rolled any time’s trying to poison you, make you sick, or turn you into a newt or something.
Save vs. surprises: The Coordination save.Rolled when you’re trying not to get hurt by falling rocks, pit traps, and sneaky rogues hiding in outhouses.
Save vs. Deception: The Self save. Used any time someone’s trying to hide something from you, whether it be a door, a knife, the truth, or their actual motives.
Here’s an example of Danny’s character, Girthinix.
Mind
Psionics- Proficient
Weather Magic- Expert
Knowledge ( Local ocean currents)- Decent
Save vs. Mind Control- Proficient
Body
Save vs. plagues of the body-Decent
Head Crunch- Decent
Allergic to Torture- Weakness
Coordination
Skulk-Proficient
Save vs. Surprises- Proficient
Double Jointed- Decent
Self
Save vs. Deception- Proficient
Detect Lies- Decent
Sense Psionics- Proficient
4) Contacts, Wealth, and Posessions
These are like skills, but they don’t exactly fit in with the rest. Contacts are people you know who can help you out, but they‘re played by the Judge, so he can use them as leverage against you if he knows what he‘s doing. Wealth is money, anything you can use to buy things. Posessions are items that you have. They can be used to improve actions like skills. You don’t actually lose them once you use them, but they can be stolen. They are ranked like skills. You get to have one at the expert level, two proficient ones, and three decent ones.
You can use each a set number of times. Contacts can only be used once per session. Wealth is taken away after it‘s used. Items have charges relative to their rank. Each “charge” adds one to a skill roll. You can use more than one charge at a time, but once they’re used up, you can’t use that item for the rest of the session.
Here’s how Rachel allocated Ketva’s stuff.
Contacts:
Crow, a local thief king- Decent
Krix, her cousin, also estranged from the family- Proficient
Wealth:
A bag of gold coins, stolen from her family- Proficient
Posessions:
Wand of disguise- Expert
Pack of marked playing cards- Decent
Dirk- Decent
Game resolution
Uncontested actions: Each task has a certain difficulty attached to it. This is the number that the character must roll in order to accomplish the task. When you use a skill, you decrease the difficulty level by however, many ranks in that skill you have.
Difficulty chart:
Effortless 5
Easy 6
Medium 7
Hard 8
Really Hard 9
The Stuff of Legends 10
Skill Chart
Unskilled 0
Decent -1
Proficient -2
Expert -3
Grandmaster -4
Weakness +1
Actions work like this. The prime number is five. To perform an effortless uncontested action without using any skill points, a player rolls two dice and tries to get a five or higher. Say that Ketva wants to toss a crumpled piece of paper into a wastebasket six feet away from her. Rachel rolls two dice and gets a six, which is enough for her to sink the shot. Two points!
Now let us say that Girthinix, is under scrutiny for a heat wave that has hit his seaside abode and the suspicious villagers have their torches and pitchforks at the ready if he can’t bring some rain to cool them off. Calling a storm is a feat of weather magic that is the stuff of legends, and Girthinix knows it’s going to be ridiculously hard. He isn’t without skill, however, in fact, he’s an expert Weather Mage and that allows him to bring the difficulty down to medium, which still allows for plenty of error. Danny rolls, and he gets snake eyes. He can’t even bring a light wind. Seeing no effort on his part, the villagers storm his seaside cave, and he begs them for another chance. Now we go into contested actions.
A note on damage from uncontested actions: If an uncontested action is Hard or harder, then chances are the repercussions are dire enough to warrant damage. Uncontested damage is done to the skill the player used for the action. If the action was hard, one point is dealt to the skill, if it’s really hard, two, and if it’s the stuff of legends, three.
Contested actions are rolled between PC’s and NPC’s, or even fellow PC’s.
Girthinix is staring down an angry mob of villagers. He’s trying to get them to not run him out of the town, but unfortunately, begging is not a skill he has. The Judge rolls two dice for the village mob, plus their save vs. deception. They get a seven altogether. Danny rolls two dice and fervently prays he gets over that. By some glorious miracle, he gets eleven and Girthinix is not led out of town at the end of a pitchfork, but he still has to do something about the heat. Oh happy day!
So, there’s the base system. Tune in next time, where I get into how those monstrous and redeeming qualities come into play. Spending and combat will come later, followed finally by levelling up.