Past deeds and circumstance has generally granted a character with some resources that she can draw upon. These are called assets. Assets are bought at character creation and are later awarded by the GM when appropriate.
Connections
How connected is your character? Each level of connections represents a connection to one or more knowledgeable or influential people in some social circle, academic field, business or the like that you can gain information and perhaps even small favors from. Examples could be hackers, freemasons, biologists, mafiosos, police and so on.
Game mechanics : getting information may require a successful manipulation check.
Example : Berk wants to know if Rupert has a criminal record. Berk calls his connection in the police and, after a successful manipulation check, gets information on Rupert’s past misdeeds.
Celebrity
Celebrity determines how famous (or notorious) your character is. She might be a famous actor, musician, athlete or reality TV star. As a result, people treat you better and you may enjoy privileges and opportunities others don’t have.
The main drawback is that the character has less anonymity. Very famous characters wll get recognized even when they don’t want to and may even be hounded by paparazzis. While most treat celebrities with respect, there are situations where it may count as a negative.
Game mechanics : For every level of Celebrity, add +1 to manipulation rolls with people who like the character. To randomly determine whether or not someone recognizes the character as a celebrity, roll a d6. Someone with 3 levels of celebrity (ex) will be recognized by any one person on a score of 1 to 3.
Levels
- Local hero (+1 / 1 on 1d6)
- Politician (+2 / 1-2 on 1d6)
- Reality TV star (+3 / 1-3 on 1d6)
- Famous actor (+4 / 1-4 on 1d6)
- Beloved president of the free world (+5 / 1-5 on 1d6)
Experience
Your character has more experience than most. This asset can only be bought at character creation and bestows your character with some extra XP to be used during character creation or saved for later.
Levels
- Your character gets 1 extra XP at char creation
- Your character gets 3 extra XP at char creation
- Your character gets 6 extra XP at char creation
- Your character gets 10 extra XP at char creation
- Your character gets 15 extra XP at char creation
Teacher
The character has a teacher she can go to for learning skills. A teacher grants an XP discount to skill progression in some skills up to some levels. Depending on the GM, this may or may not affect the starting free XP a character gets at character creation. Teachers may serve as plot devices allowing characters to learn skills that might otherwise be unavailable, but care should be made to ensure that the teacher’s own skillset is a credible one.
For every level of teacher, your teacher can teach a new skill. As long as the teacher teaches a character this skill, progression can be bought at -1 xp cost (but never for free). The bonus only applies up to the level of the skill which the teacher already has.
Teachers have from 3 to 5 in the skills that they teach. The teacher is an NPC and the GM ultimately decides her skill levels, but they can otherwise be randomly determined by rolling 1d3 for each skill where 1 means a skill level of 3, 2 means a skill level of 4 and 3 means a skill level of 5.
Example : John is a level one teacher who teaches academics. His own skill level in academics is 4, so every student learning academics from him progresses in this skill at -1 xp cost up to level 4. A student progressing from level 4 to 5 in academics gets no xp bonus from having John as their teacher.
Treasure
This asset represents some treasure, potentially magical, that the character owns. Some rules of thumb:
When treasures grant bonuses, they do so up to their level (ex. a level 2 cloak that grants a stealth bonus would add +2 to stealth).
Granting an extra bonus counts as a +1 in itself. Lets say you have a level 3 cloak that grants bonus to stealth and survival. Because the cloak gives bonuses to both steal and survival, that counts as an extra +1 bonus. Hence, this cloak should give +1 to stealth and +1 to survival, despite being a level 3 treasure. The same cloak as a level 5 treasure could grant +2 to each skill.
Treasures may of course have more wondrous effects. Discuss the specifics and level worth with your GM. You should also make up some story about your character’s connection with the treasure. How did she come to own it?
Wealth
How wealthy is your character? Wealth may represent steady income from work, winning a lottery, selling something, inheritance, etc. When taken by children or teenagers, wealth often represents the income of their parents or guardians and how much pocket money and other privileges they receive as a result.
Levels
- Poor
- Middle class
- Upper middle class
- Rich
- Millionaire