Character Creation Guidelines

Character Creation Rules

If you never have, please go ahead and read my Welcome to RPGs with Dan! Document.

To help make this a cohesive game, given the specific themes I'm looking to explore, we're going to use some character creation rules:

• All the starting PCs will be Imperial troops from Scylla's pool of Stormtroopers, or an another branch, if someone wants to play a dedicated TIE pilot or navy gunner, or something.
• Your character doesn't need to be a 100% loyal, programmed Imperial, hell-- you are encouraged to have complicated relationships with authority. However, the general idea of the campaign is that you all start Imperial and we play out the moral quandaries that lead to your eventual defection.
• No evil PCs. Please make a character who will want to change sides, or at least can grow into that when exposed to the realities of the Empire's form of law & order.
• No Force-trained characters. I do have a set of Genesys-friendly rules for the Force, and if you want your PC to develop a latent talent for that later, talk to me and we can figure that out, but I’m mostly envisioning this as a story about ordinary people being pushed to do extraordinary things. Also, in-universe, this is the height-of-Imperial-power era where, for instance, all Stormtrooper cadets are secretly screened by the Inquisition for Force-sensitivity.

Character History

Each player will create, in addition to normal character creation mechanics, the following details about their PC:

• The reason they are assigned to the Scylla. This can be pure chance, or it could be a result of previous actions, up to you!
• Their original combat unit, with at least a few fellow members (just names and a one-sentence description is fine, unless you want to write more about it, which I always encourage), and how it was lost. (e.g. “I’m the sole survivor of Stormtrooper Marine Squad Chimaera, lost in a pyrric victory against a pirate ship. My Squadmates were Sgt. White, Cpl. Dopey, Doc, Bashful, Sneezy, Happy, Grumpy, & Sleepy.”)
• The specific incident(s) that gave them their initial doubts about the Empire, and the nature of those doubts (e.g. “My Squadron of TIE bombers was deployed against a terrorist convoy, which we destroyed. I later heard through scuttlebutt that they were refugees, destroyed simply because the sector Moff didn’t want to house them, and that the deaths were blamed on Rebels. I began to doubt anyone that conceals the truth like that.”)
• The worst thing the character has ever done, in their opinion-- the thing that keeps them up at night. This could be a personal failing, something that happened on a mission in Imperial service, the betrayal of a friend or family member-- whatever you want! The intention here is mostly to add depth and GM hook potential to these PCs, not necessarily to create a redemption arc… yet.
• A positive relationship with a Ship Section other than their starting one, such as Engineering or the Space Wing. More details on this system to follow.
• A positive relationship with at least 1 of the other PCs. We can do this collaboratively during session 0.

Content Warnings

• Combat Violence: and probably plenty of it. As per usual, I'll keep my descriptions of gore and such to ~M-rated videogame.
• Slavery: probably only lightly touched on, but this might factor into the story.
• War Crimes: there will be some dark shit in this campaign, if I do things right, and your characters will be ordered to do some soul-destroying shit, assuming they don't all balk right away.