Dat 3 of the #CharacterCreationChallenge
But Cubicle 7? The character sheet that came in the 10th Doctor box? The one without room for the Areas of Knowledge for the skills? On the slick paper that doesn't take pencil well and takes ink even worse? Do better.
Anyway, a quick skim of the text for the Attributes suggests the idea of a maximum Awareness. I considered making them an actual Alien, but I decided to go with the fragile young psychic trope. (OK, my first idea was to recreate Adric from the 4th and 5th Doctor because my wife used to work with the actor, but I changed my mind.) The Doctor used to travel with younger and less glamourous companions, so the idea of an 11 year old girl psychic worked well enough.
This means Attributes of Awareness 6, Coordination 2, Ingenuity 3, Presence 4, Resolve 4, Strength 2. This is more in Attributes than the game recommends, but I'm good with it. It's easy to picture her being fragile for form but strong of spirit, standing up to adversaries of humanity with an alien level of perception and a strong will.
Positive and Negative traits next. Three Negative traits in Distinctive, Unattractive, and Eccentric. I wanted to move away from the gamine psychic child and lean into something like Dorothy Spinner from the Doom patrol comic – beetle-browed, pug-nosed, overly high forehead are my tags – so she's far from a classic beauty. Her tendency to become overly serious, to flatly state uncomfortable truths that she shouldn't know, and her deep intense stare round out the process.
For positive traits: Empathic and Psychic Training (which you may as well take if you're taking Psychic, because the cost of one is deducted from the other) from the regular Traits, with Psychic and Clairvoyant from the special Advantages. She's got a very high sense of people, can resist most psychic attacks, can read peoples surface thoughts, and even spend 1 minute seeing things up to 1 KM away.
With my remaining point I pick up Screamer, because it's one of those system/setting specific abilities that I love: when confronted she can let out an ear piercing shriek that stuns everyone nearby for a second. So in genre. Love it.
Skills: As an 11-year-old there's a lot she doesn't have (Marksman, Science, Survival, Technology and Transport are all 0). Her Athletics, Craft (specified as Dance) and Fighting (which I see as panicked wildcat brawling) are all 1. Her Subterfuge 3 (with the 'Sneak' Area of Knowledge) give her something to fall back on when her powers aren't useful.
While she's not especially ingenious, she read a lot, saw a lot, paid close attention to her minders medical activities, and has some intuitive sense, so I'm finishing up with Knowledge 3 and Medical 3 (with the Area of Knowledge Psychology).
The picture her is that she is a young girl – Katarina Olafsdottor - rescued by the Doctor from a USSR Remote Viewing experiment in the 1960's. She's been travelling with him since; originally from Iceland, she doesn't know why she was kidnapped, or where her parents are. She's in desperate need to adult affection and structure and will latch on to one of the other companions for it (the Doctor is a bit too Alien, and she can see it). Katarina is essentially a support character for the Doctor and for the other companion – she will always use her powers and presence to bolster her adult's self-confidence, so that the adult can go back to adulting for her. She's not one of those kid psychics with vast reservoirs of power… she's a kid, a lost one, who happens to have seen more than she ought.
I really like this PC and would love a chance to play a few sessions with her.
No comments:
Post a Comment