Imagine: Creating Characters

A couple of days ago, on a whim, I decided to try to create some characters for a solo game of Imagine. I used to really enjoy this game and, now that I have the technology of solo play, I feel it might be fun to have a go.

I’m going to take a “discovery” route with this game, making the most of the rolled character approach. I really have few preconceptions aside from the fact that I traditionally favour thieves and wizards. That said, I also like the idea of priests and warriors. I’m going to see where the dice take me.

Because I’m returning to Imagine after about 5 years away, I’m going to take it slow and just use the core Player’s Guide rulebook at this stage. I plan to create a pair of friends from a village somewhere in the marshes of Pellembrel. I’m thinking of starting with a brave defence of the village from Goblin raiders.

The rest of this post is a largely unedited transcript of my solo play notes.

Creating Your First Character

To begin, I am using the “Creating Your First Character” summary on page xiii of the Player’s Guide. It’s a useful aide memoir on the process. I’ve got my dice, some printed off character sheets, a pencil and eraser. Having re-read the first two pages of the Player’s Guide, I am ready to roll up the first character.

First choice: as GM, what character type will we choose: Normal, Adventurer, Heroic, or Legendary? This is about relative power level. While the gamer in me wants to head for the Adventurer type, reading the description of Normal appeals in a grim kind of way: these would be average people, typical peasants who never left the village. I decide to go for Normals. Gulp.

Normals roll 5d4 for all their attributes, missing out on the extra dice that the higher tier character types enjoy. Thus, I pick up my d4s and roll:

• Strength (STR) 18
• Agility (AGL) 11
• Vitality (VIT) 15
• Intelligence (INT) 13
• Wisdom (WIS) 15
• Knowledge (KNW) 11
• Appearance (APP) 7
• Charm (CHM) 13
• Social Class (SOC) 14
• Aura (AUR) 13
• Piety (PTY) 12
• Will Force (WIL) 11

I choose to play a male character. To keep things simple, I initially opt for a Civilised Human because it’s the race that has no modifiers to the attributes. This also fits my basic premise for the game. That decision opens up all of the classes to him, but I am thinking of a fighter-type right now because his best attributes are physical: Strength and Vitality. To be a Warrior, however, I’ll need to boost his Agility to 13 to meet the requirements. There is the possibility of shifting some attributes around – Normal characters can do this on a 2 for 1 basis – or I can take a second look at the races. If I choose a Barbaric Human, I get some physical boosts in exchange for intellectual and social penalties. Having read the description of the Barbaric Human and considered how wild the region I aim to game within is, this makes some sense to me. Let’s do it – a Barbaric Human Warrior.

First, using the racial modifiers, I boost his STR to 20 (maximum allowed), his AGL to 12, and VIT to 17. His INT drops to 12, KNW to 9, and SOC to 11. I need to get AGL to at least 13 and the Normal character can alter stats on a 2 for 1 basis. I decide to take 2 points from CHM, making that 11, and give 1 point to AGL. His hideous APP isn’t much use, so I drop it to 5 (the minimum) and give another point to AGL – making it now 14. I jot all this onto the character sheet and record the various bonuses that come from those base attribute values.

The next thing to do is average each group of attributes to give the four characteristics: Endurance, Perception, Affinity, and Fortune. Beginning with Endurance, I average (round up) his STR, AGL, and VIT = 17. I then add +3 for being a Barbaric Human = 20. I do similarly for the other three characteristics and he gets a stunning 8% Perception, 11% Affinity, and 18% Fortune.

Next comes the racial stuff. I roll 15+1d4 for starting age = 18. I note down and modify the five resistances: Magic is 35%, Illusion is 45%, Control is 30%, Poison is 70%, and Disease is 55%. From the list of offered Racial Skills, I can only choose one (due to KNW being 9) and I opt for Move Unheard. I also get some starting equipment (instead of money, being barbaric): Hide armour, a spear, and a dagger.

I roll for Height, scoring a natural 100 and making him 6’ 11” tall. Wow! His AGL and STR give him a Heavy frame. That impacts his Weight, meaning I roll 12d6 and add 259 to score a total of 298lbs. Handedness is rolled – I roll d100 for 14, making him right-handed. Although I can choose for hair colour, I opt to roll (for fun) – his hair is black, as is his body hair, his eyes blue, and I choose a ruddy skin. Movement rates are referenced from his attributes and race, and I work out the encumbrance values. It’s amusing to note he can carry a maximum of 596lbs. Reading through the alignment descriptions, I choose Active Good.

I’m at the point where I need to settle on a class – Warrior – and sort out his skill choices. Being a Warrior, the character will gain +30% to all core skills, +10% to combat skills, and +5 Endurance. I add the Endurance first, before I forget, bringing that up to 25. I then choose his Social skill (because, with a KNW of 9, he can have a maximum of one) from the Warrior options – Running.

At 1st Title, the Warrior can take the Body Parry, Weapon Knowledge, and Weapon Parry (the core skills) plus Shield Parry. You have to take the core skills but the others are optional. You might not choose a skill because you want to save a Class Skill slot – my character can have 20 class skills – for later. I see no reason to drop Shield Parry so I add it. I now calculate the base chance and starting bonus for each skill. For example, the Move Unheard racial skill I chose is calculated thus: the skill uses Agility – my hero has AGL 14 – and the skill’s rating is subtracted from the AGL with the result multiplied by 5% as the base chance. Move Unheard is rated 12, so my guy gets 10% base chance (14 – 12 = 2 x 5% = 10%). The skill then gets a starting bonus which, for Move Unheard, is 2d10%. I rolled 14 so my character gains 14%. As this is a racial skill, representing knowledge from before he became a Warrior, the bonus is doubled (class and social skills don’t double). That adds 28% and makes his Move Unheard 38%. Easy.

Equipment comes next but the Barbaric Human gets no money and the gear mentioned earlier. The GM can allow some small items, like a waterskin or pouches. For now, I’ll come back to this and assign some stuff at the end.

The last step is to determine the combat information. The character’s Endurance is used for measuring damage and numbers are distributed across the body diagram. In short, my guy has Endurance 25 so hit locations have 50, 25, or 13 points assigned depending on their fragility: for example, the head gets 25, upper torso gets 50, and hands get 13. Simple stuff. After this, it’s time to fill out the attack chart, based on the Warrior’s Novice attack skills, and add all the armour and weapons details.

Just need a name. The region of my world is inspired by Phoenician culture but that would be the civilised folk of the city-state. I think the barbaric tribes might be more Greek. I open up a fantasy name generator, choose Greek names, and generate some ideas. I rather like Kyro. Adding his 1st Title, I can call him Kyro the Brawler. That made me smile.

Done.

Addition: If you want to see Kyro’s character sheet, it’s available here: Kyro the Brawler