Already getting ideas.  Perhaps my character spent the first seven years of his life growing up on a farm, where he either talked to certain animals, or believed that he could.  Did unusual things happen?  Myths springing up all around him, growing right out of the cow shit, so to speak?  To a child, getting lost in the woods by the farm and finding your way back could be like living out The Odyssey.

Glad you recommended this supplement.

Maybe he has seven elder brothers and sisters who hate him because they know he’s special… and perhaps he has a weird uncle who is the only one in his family who relates to him; when he sees him on rare special occasions such as holidays, there is always that twinkle in his eye that says, I know.
This message was last edited by the player at 08:53, Mon 09 May 2022.

In reply to Gauntlet (msg # 14):

Sounds like you want to go the apprentice route.

Okay.  We'll start from you being I think you mentioned seven years old.  So per Apprentices, work up a seven year old.

As far as background, make sure you have read up on the effects of the Gift from the core rulebook.  You'll need to decide if Jr. has a Gentle, regular, or Blatant Gift as that has a big impact here.

As far as what makes him odd (other than the Gift), that's your call.

If you want to go the talking animal route, take the appropriate story flaw.  Magical Animal Companion is the most likely choice, though Faerie Friend or Plagued by Supernatural Entity could also work.  If you want me to decide what kind of critter it is, let me know.

If you want to go the uncle route, I can work that in as well.

Let me know.  Thanks.

Could we even start earlier and play out his infancy?  I wouldn’t want to remain there forever, of course.

I think regular gift should be adequate to explain his many social problems, especially with his family.  Life is going to be more than hard enough for this kid without saddling him with blatant gift.

And I was thinking he could talk to all sorts of animals, or at least suffers from some type of mental illness that makes him think that he can. But he can definitely talk to at least some animals, and might have a magical animal companion (who probably suffers a gruesome death at some point).

It might be fun to play around with the idea that some of what he experiences is real, some is the result of his flawed perspective (including, you know, being a kid), and some is the result of the Gift.

I’m thinking that he’ll experience a great deal of loneliness, loss, disappointment, and betrayal, but will also inhabit a personal world far more wondrous than most people ever experience.  Also, I think this ‘kind uncle’ will be the one who sells him out to his eventual parens, who in turn may also reject him later on.

What do you think of the name Tristan Common?
This message was last edited by the player at 21:06, Mon 09 May 2022.

You would need to take either: Animal Ken virtue (if he can talk to animals), Delusion (if he can't), or we can leave it nebulous if you want to figure it out as we go along.

Also, you probably want to take Inoffensive to Animals. Otherwise, the animals will not react well to him.  Having Animal Ken won't overcome the effects The Gift will have on animals.

The companion is up to you.

One thing that is different with an Apprentice game as opposed to a regular game is your Virtues and Flaws will shift as the game goes on.  Using your example, the Magical Animal Companion you pick up at creation may croak by the time you gauntlet.

Tristan is fine as a name.  "Common" is fine as well, but that name puts us probably in England.  You okay with him being English?  Since Mythic Europe is just an alternate reality Medieval Europe, names tend to be more realistic sounding and less high fantasy sounding.  Also one other thing to bear in mind about apprentice games:  your name will change.  When you gauntlet your parens (me) will give you a new name.  Though of course you the player will have final say in the matter.  Just another aspect of an apprentice's life.


As far as the uncle, that's what I was thinking.  Let me figure that part out as part of the story.

For now, just figure out how old you want to start him at.  No older than 8 years old though.  Use Chapter Two of the Apprentice supplement and the core book to build Tristan out.  For now, just build him as you wish.  Don't try to fit him towards one or another Hermetic House.  I have an idea on how we'll handle house selection that is, who Tristan apprentices under.

I would advise not maxing out your Virtues/Flaws at this point.  You will pick up and discard V/Fs as we go.  So maybe keep it around +6/-6 or under.

Once you have a draft of Tristan, we can move on to the game, which will start at the Common's family farm/house/etc.

Questions?

Could we even start him off at birth?  I noticed the book even provides rules for determining whether or not mother and baby survive it.

The books also mentions Aesop’s Fables… perhaps this would be a good source of inspiration.  (Conveniently, I happen to have a long neglected copy laying around…)

Would it be possible to roleplay how Tristan acquires his virtues?  For example, how he learns first to talk to animals, and later how to be inoffensive to animals?

I’m thinking that later in life, he may be drawn to Herbam magic.  Perhaps he is forced to tend a wicked old witch’s garden, or something like that.  As a youngster, he may try unsuccessfully to talk to trees and other plants, to whom he feels drawn.

MUCH later in life, he may aspire to create a haunted forest, and to populate it appropriately…

Definitely cool with him being English, btw.
This message was last edited by the player at 23:18, Mon 09 May 2022.

In reply to Gauntlet (msg # 18):

Coming up with stories for babies is a bit outside my comfort zone.  I can do it, but...I'd rather we start off between ages five and eight if that's alright.

In reply to The Founder's Ghost (msg # 19):

As far as roleplaying the virtues, yes.  We can start with a story about how he picks up Animal Ken for example.  The others may or may not come up during stories.  Part of your advancement will be offscreen study time.  We'll get into that later.

For now, just decide what you want Tristan to start with.  Thanks.

Let's start him at five, then.  Maybe flash back to cover potential issues such as strange wonders occurring during his birth, or whatever.

Now that I think of it, getting into how he acquires object permanence and control over his bowels may be tedious and unnecessary.

So far, I’ve settled on supernatural nuisance and short attention span.  Continuing to work on him.

Tough might also be a good choice, considering the fragility of being five years old.

Social status = peasant, of course.

Would starting him off with five points of virtues and flaws at this age be reasonable?  Also, is poor (financially) an appropriate flaw for a child?

I was also thinking of giving him poor memory: family names.  It might be funny if he kept forgetting the names of his own brothers and sisters.
This message was last edited by the player at 08:34, Tue 10 May 2022.

Here is what I’ve come up with so far.

Sharp ears [minor, general] 1
Tough [minor, general] 1
Strong-willed [minor, general] 1
Magic sensitivity [minor, supernatural] 1
Sense holiness and unholiness [minor, supernatural] 1

Supernatural nuisance [story, major] -3
Reclusive [personality, minor] -1
Simple-minded [personality, minor] -1

On first blush, I would advise changing out both Simple Minded and Reclusive.

Simple Minded is really more of a Grog kind of flaw.  For a Magi, even at apprentice level, it can be character killer in play.

Reclusive is also less about being shy and more about being militantly anti-social.  I think the core book recommends against taking it for PCs if I recall correctly.  Which has always made me wonder why they included it in the first place.

Tough makes perfect sense.  Kids back then had to be tough to survive.  Sharp Ears is always a good one.  Strong willed is also one I prefer to take for my own characters.

You surprised me with the Magic Sensitivity and Sense Holy/Unholy, especially the latter.  Not many players take that one.  I like them both.  However, this being an Apprentice game, that can lead to some issues later on.  Read pages 34 and 35 of the Apprentices supplement.  Depending on which Parens you take, you can lose one or both of the virtues fairly early on.  Not telling you to ditch them.  Just want to make sure you are aware of the risks taken.

I am guessing the Supernatural Nuisance is your talking animal?

No, I was thinking that supernatural nuisance was some sort of fairy problem.  Not that I know much about fairies... haven't gotten to that supplement yet.

I picked reclusive and simple-minded because they seemed to fit the profile of an introverted five-year-old who is sick of being bullied by his mean older siblings, with the assumption that they might be dropped later.  This assumption may have been wrong, of course.  Once you pick flaws, are you stuck with them for life?

In reply to Gauntlet (msg # 25):

Flaws are generally considered for life, yes.  You can get rid of them, mostly through stories or some concerted long term plan of education which will take away from your time to improve other areas.  Different gaming groups do handle it in different ways.

For example, I once played a Companion who was an alcoholic.  During one game, my drunk character caused another PCs death.  I decided the PC would have been shocked and would try to go sober.  The SG agreed it was possible.  But he required me to pass a "sobriety check" of sorts for so many seasons.  I think I had to make like three seasons of Stamina checks in a row.  During which, I couldn't do any other training activity.  Getting sober, especially in a world without AA or any other kind of support group, would be tough after all.  I kept missing the third check.  After a while, I ran him in another story where he managed to stay sober throughout the entire storyline.  The SG allowed me the switch out the Compulsion flaw with another one (I think I traded it out with Depressed citing his guilt complex over the other PCs death) at that point.

In an Apprentice game, you can trade flaws and virtues out as part of the growing experience yes.  But in most cases, there has to be some justification for it.  And that would usually require a story or some extended activity.

Here are some suggestions for building out an introvert who's gunshy around people.

Judged Unfairly is an option.  He would get that already from the Gift.  But in his case, this would also probably apply to his parens, other magi, or anyone used to the Gift.

Social Handicap.  The nice thing about Social Handicap it that it's flexible.  You can say your Handicap at creation is shyness or insecurity.  Then as Tristan develops, you can change that handicap to some other handicap, like an unwillingness to make eye contact or standoffish attitude.  Social Handicap also doesn't hamstring your roleplaying options the way Reclusive or Simple Minded can.

Clumsy.  Maybe his psychological distress manifests in him being clumsy.  As he grows more confident, it would be natural for him to become more self assured in his movements.  That would give you an easy justification to later switch this flaw out with another one.

Depressed.  Like Clumsy a symptom of his distress.  Just like clumsy, as he grows and becomes more confident about himself, it would be an easy justification to swap out for another flaw.

As far as the Simple Minded, the fact you will start out with a huge penalty to your Int is enough to simulate a child's lack of understanding.  My suggestion here is drop Simple Minded and Strong Willed to balance it out.  You can pick up Strong Willed later.  Since Tristan is starting out introverted, he may not be all that strong willed at the moment.

I am not requiring you to drop either Reclusive or Simple Minded by the by.  Just strongly recommending it.  You can pick either up as we go if need be.

The way 5E treats Faeries is one of it's strong suits.  The short version is:  Faeries are stories brought to life.  They exist to play a role or bring some kind of tale to life.

My one observation of Tristan is he seems to have a foot in several worlds.  Magic Sensitivity.  The Divine and Infernal with the SEnse Holy and Unholy.  And now the Faerie with the Faerie Nuiscance.  If Tristan was being created post-gauntlet I would probably ask you to narrow his focus a bit.  But with him being pre-apprentice, it's fine.  All the realms would take an interest in a new child with the Gift.

Tristan is a peasant, correct? So I am assuming he is growing up on a farm?

Tristan is indeed a farm boy.  Presumably this means lots of mud and animals, although I’m sure there’s a lot about medieval farming that I don’t know about.  I’m guessing this means he’ll end up being physically stronger than most other boys, although this probably has little to do with magic.

The change I’m most reluctant to make is dropping strong-willed.  Although I see him as introverted, I don’t envision him as lacking confidence.  In fact, he may be (somewhat obnoxiously) overconfident.  I also don’t want to make him depressed, although heaven knows he’ll have plenty of reasons to be.

When it comes to a social handicap, I was thinking that Tristan’s (male) parentage could be dubious.  This could cause significant resentment against him in his family, on top of that caused by the Gift.  Would that work?

I’ll go ahead and drop reclusive and simple-minded, and add judged unfairly.
This message was last edited by the player at 00:12, Wed 11 May 2022.

In reply to Gauntlet (msg # 28):

Stamina is very important to magi.  So his farming background can be a boon there.  Your call.

Understood on the strong willed. And it makes sense.

You may want to consider Bad Reputation (bastard) as well then.  Just a suggestion though.

I ask about the farming because I need to figure out the fairy nuisance for the first story. Let me get back to you on that.

For starting abilities, I would suggest one of the childhood packages on page 8 of the Apprentice supplement.  But that is a suggestion.  You can use them as a base if you like.

What about Tristan's characteristics?  Start by designing him as an adult.  That is you have 7 free points to spend to bump up the characteristics.  You can get extra ones by taking a negative on another one.  Remember you can't take a +3 or -3 without a corresponding virtue or flaw.

Questions so far?

How’s this?

Int +2
Per +1
Pre -1
Com -1
Str
Sta +2
Dex +1
Qik +1

In reply to Gauntlet (msg # 30):

That balances and looks good.

Couple of notes just for future reference.

I commented before how Stamina can be of importance for a magi.  And you can probably guess why Intelligence and Perception can be as well.

Communication can be of importance in troupe play.  When you get to writing books and lab texts, Comm can come into play.

Quickness can be useful if you play a magi who may do a lot of fast casting.

Presence can be useful if you play a magi who will get into a a lot of certamen duels.

Just throwing those out there as food for thought on future characters.  Nothing you need to change here.

Okay.  So now we take those scores as a base and make him a 5 year old.  Per the tablee on page 7 of Apprentices, subtract 5 from each of those scores.  So Tristan's starting characteristics would be:

Int:  -3
Per:  -4
Pre:  -6
Com:  -6
Str:  -5
Sta:  -3
Dex:  -4
Qik:  -4

His size starts at -2.

What were you thinking about abilities?

I found this in the manual under sample childhoods:

Exploring Childhood: (Area) Lore 2, Athletics 1, Awareness 1, Native Language 5,
Stealth 1, Survival 2

This looks pretty good to me.

In reply to Gauntlet (msg # 32):

Okie doke.

Just because I'm old and prone to forgetting things, can you put all that together on a character sheet for me please?  You can use the RPoL one if you like (link to a message in another game) or one from Metacreator if you are using that, or just type the basics up in whatever format you like.

I'll open up your character sheet under Character Details.  Please post it there.  We'll worry about the other scores as we go.

I'll want to take one more look at the completed sheet, and then I think we can start a game.

Questions thus far?

In reply to The Founder's Ghost (msg # 33):

I believe I updated you to Tristan now.  The Character Sheet should be open for you but let me know if you cannot access.  Had some trouble with it.

Thanks.

For now, can I put off assigning specializations to my abilities?  Also, my virtues and flaws are currently slightly imbalanced.  Is this acceptable, since I plan to add Animal Ken later?

Update: I did add (certain obvious) specializations for athletics, awareness, and stealth, all designed to avoid and out-maneuver hostile older siblings.
This message was last edited by the player at 23:32, Wed 11 May 2022.

In reply to Tristan (msg # 35):

You can change up the specializations during the apprenticeship cycle.  Put down an "Inherited Flaw: Unknown" or "Inherited Virtue: Unknown" as needed to balance out the Virtues/Flaws.  We can fill them in later.

How are you imbalanced?  What does the current Virt/Flaw list look like?

In looking back through the thread, are you something like this:

Sharp ears [minor, general] 1
Tough [minor, general] 1
Strong-willed [minor, general] 1
Magic sensitivity [minor, supernatural] 1
Sense holiness and unholiness [minor, supernatural] 1


Supernatural nuisance [story, major] -3
Judged Unfairly (-1)

Did you take Social Handicap?  If so you are balanced.  That is without the Animal Ken, even as an Inherited Virtue.  If you want to take Animal Ken now, just take "Inherited Flaw: Unknown -1" for now to offset it.  However...

Taking Animal Ken now is probably going to cause some problems when your parens opens your arts (see Message 24).  You already are running a risk with just the two you got.  Plugging in Animal Ken now, even as an Inherited Virtue, raises the difficulty level of those rolls even higher.  You may lose one or all the virtues at the time Tristan's arts get opened.

That might be interesting in and of itself.  Tristan suddenly reacting to losing a sense he had always had.  Depends on how you want to roleplay it.  I just bring it up so you know ahead of time the risks involved.  Don't want to suddenly spring it on you.

We can use a story to give him Animal Ken later.  But that's got it's own set of rules.  I didn't want to get into them just yet, cos they're kind of advanced class.  The supplements that cover them are Houses of Hermes: Mystery Cults and The Mysteries.  Also, with a story, there is a chance of failure.

All that is to say, there's risks taking Animal Ken now and there's risks taking Animal Ken later.  Just be aware of that before we proceed.

Okay, looks like I’ve got ‘em balanced now.  Here’s what I’ve got:

Virtues

The Gift
Sharp ears [minor, general] 1
Tough [minor, general] 1
Strong-willed [minor, general] 1
Magic sensitivity [minor, supernatural] 1
Sense holiness and unholiness [minor, supernatural] 1

Flaws

Supernatural nuisance [story, major] -3
Judged unfairly [minor, personality] -1
Social handicap [minor, general] -1

---

I’m cool with playing out him acquiring Animal Ken (or perhaps failing to) as a story, as I welcome an element of randomness and uncertainty.
This message was last edited by the player at 07:36, Thu 12 May 2022.

Sorry folks.  Having a thing at work.  I hope to catch up on postings for all my games Friday Evening.  May be Saturday.

Thanks.