Create A Mortal

Process

To create a character, you'll want to log into the game. You do not need to float your concept by staff first, although you are welcome to do so if you like! If you'd rather not wait, you can just create a character bit, navigate to the character generator (by typing 'CG' after creating an account), and voila! You're ready to go. Follow the on-screen instructions, which walk you through the process. Your progress is automatically saved at each step. At the end, the game will automatically generate a character generation +request.

It'll tell you a +job number, like 643. You'll be able to open that job by typing "+job 643" (replace this with the number it gives you). Staff will process the job to approve your character. When doing so, they might add comments and ask questions or make requests for revisions of your application. To respond by adding comments to that job, use the "+job/add <#>=<comments>" command.

You can also see where you are on the character generation approval waitlist by typing "+waitlist".

What We Do And Don't Allow

We allow all the Numina found in Sorcerer Revised.

Concept Limitations

No Minors. Characters must be 18 or older.

No Barely Legal Tomfoolery. Sex worker characters must be 21 or older. In a perfect world where there aren't weirdos out there we'd let you play the 16 year old hooker with a heart of gold, but this is not a perfect world.

No True Loners. While Loner concepts are compelling, this is a social game and loners will not have fun here. Please make sure to provide some source of motivation for the character to connect with other characters so that you have something to do between staff-run scenes, otherwise you will find yourself frustrated.

No Baked-In Titles. Your character can become the leader of the most important cabal, the primogen, the Prince, a key politician, and so on. Your character can be created with strong potential to become these things. But when it comes to uncommon titles of prestige, be they mundane or supernatural, we do not approve these characters as already being the Head Of Whatever.

No Hybrids. You can be a Psychic, and you can be Sorcerer, but you cannot portray a Sorcerer who is also a Psychic. Please stick to either Hedge Magic or Psychic Numina.

Stats

You will need to log into the game and follow the on-screen instructions in order to actually assign stats to your character sheet. The character generator walks you through this process and contains explanations, but since you're already here on the wiki, here are some resources:

• You will be asked to pick a Nature and Demeanor.
• You'll then need to set your Attributes, which are defined on pages 96 through 99 of V20 Core.
• Then you'll need to set your Abilities.
  • Abilities are defined on pages 100 through 110 of V20 Core.
  • If you are looking for Secondary Abilities, please check out our Secondary Abilities house rule.
• You will have 5 points to spend on Backgrounds.
• You will have 5 points to spend on Numina, with the available selection determined by your choice to be either a Psychic or a Sorcerer.
  • Paths and Rituals show up on page 64 forward of Sorcerer Revised.
• You have 7 points to spend on Virtues.
• You will then select Merits And Flaws.
• And then you'll spend 21 Freebies.
  • Freebies are described on page 86 of V20 Core.
• You'll then pick your Specialties.
• And finally you can spend 50 starting XP.
  • You can find the XP chart on page 124 of V20 Core and 45 of Sorcerer Revised.

Backstory

You'll be prompted to write a backstory for your character. You can do it in bullet points, you can do it in prose, it can be short or long, but it does need to cover the major story beats. In the character generator, use +note/write backstory=<text> to provide your backstory. You can format with %R (carriage return) and %T (tab). If you are writing a lengthy backstory, feel free to part it out (+note write backstory 2=<stuff>, +note/write backstory 3=<stuff>).

In this backstory, you'll be expected to cover the points detailed below.

Please consider that you will be required to pick a Hook. They're backstory aspects that assert your character has a specific purpose and they confer a perk. Each sect has one of 3 hooks to choose from. If none of them quite fit, we can discuss some wiggle room, but we want all of our characters to have a direct tie into the story world and so you will have to pick something. Here are the TL'DRs of all three, which are explained in full on their respective pages:

• Mortal+ Hooks:
  • San Francisco Libertine: You, as a member of your supernatural society, have a duty to make the world a better place for the Sleepers. Whether that means protecting them or helping them ascend, you're going to reshape the status quo, no matter the resistance.
  • Salvage Operations: You're an occult collector, a lore-keeper, and you are here to recover the magic secrets lost beneath and within San Francisco. There's just one problem: the Technocracy is setting up shop again in San Francisco and has turned your mission into a race.
  • All Out Of Bubble Gum: You might not be as formidable as an Awakened mage, but you're still here to fight for free will, and have thrown your lot in with the Traditionalists and Disparates.

• Mortal+ Hooks For Ghouls Or Vanilla Humans:
  • San Francisco Libertine: You, as a mere vanilla mortal, feel a personal duty to make San Francisco a better place, closing the gulf between the haves and have nots in this city of contrasts.
  • Unwitting Pawn: Your role in life ties you to a vampiric sect! Maybe you're a cop whose department has been fingered by the kindred's influence, maybe you're a criminal entrenched in life with a gang being used by the vampiric sects, or maybe you're one of the employees at their many firms that are fronts for their criminal operations.
  • Underground Initiate: You poked around at the mysteries beneath San Francisco and it's changed your life forever. That was some time ago. You're now a ghoul or acolyte, having learned the ropes, but still on par with a summer intern in terms of personal rank and ability. Until the day comes that you, too, are a bigger fish, you're krill in a dark ocean getting coffee and doing shopping for your supervisor. Good luck, Renfield.

Mortal Origins

Origin: Where did your character come from and what was early life like? Family, friends, education and, if any, pivotal moments or people in their life.

Example: Jimmy grew up poor, but in a family full of love. He aspired to be the first in his family to go to college and pulled it off, graduating from MIT, his proudest moment.

Attributes At 1 Need To Be A Part Of Your Character: If you take Appearance 1, be prepared to look awful. If you take Intelligence 1, be prepared for a life that's like a box of chock-lits. You will be expected to commit to attributes at 1, and staff can, at their discretion, reject the build if it doesn't make sense.

Skills At 3 Need A Nod: Some nod to how your character honed these professional skill levels should be in the background. Long standing professions, hobbies, and innate character traits are examples of valid ways to address these bits, and you can always batch multiple stats into one reason.

Example: Jimmy has Science, Technology and Academics 3 and writes into his background: "Jimmy then found work as a software engineer and found a career among tech bros at places like Facespace and Tweeter."

Skills At 4 and 5 Need Some Thought: Skills with a rating of 4 or 5 single out your character as being the cream of the crop to the point where that skill becomes a dominant part of their lifestyle/identity. Please put some distinct attention into what propels your character to be so prodigious and/or invest so much of themselves into the skills you have at 4 and 5.

Example: Jimmy has a 4 in Crafts on his sheet, and writes into his background: "Despite his white-collar lifestyle, Jimmy never forgot his roots. Inspired by the legacy of mechanics and roughnecks that forged him, fixing cars became an eventual passion where he flourished. His well-paid career gave him the funding and time to excel at this hobby, and he became an avid attendant of car shows and a staple of the local custom car scene."

Watch Your Merits And Flaws: Merits and flaws each have the potential to bring impact to your character's regular life. Please look at your merits and flaws. Generally speaking, most of them are worth mentioning in your background. However, if they are 3 (or -3) or further, then this merit/flaw is extremely likely to be significant enough to have an impact on your character worth mentioning in the background. Staff will be looking for how your merits/flaws came to be, followed by what sort of impact they have on your character today.

Example: Jimmy has purchased the Lame flaw, and writes into his background: "But life was not all successes for Jimmy! His passion for cars got him in trouble. He tried his hand at street-racing, and that phase ended horribly with a car accident that nearly ended him. His recovery was miraculous and yet still left him with an acquired disability. While he's still leading a mostly normal life, he's psychologically not yet at peace with what happened."

Becoming

How Did It Happen? Give us an overview of how your character came about their powers.

Example: Jimmy was approached by Tracy later, who revealed the supernatural world to him. He thought she was crazy until she demonstrated her powers! He then spent time as her pupil under her direct instruction.

Timeline

Stop and take a moment to think about your character's past in terms of where they've been and major accomplishments, if the Backstory questionnaire hasn't already gotten that info out of you. We have players submit their character's timelines ("I lived in Paris from 1783 to 1800…") so that players whose characters were in the same places at the same time are introduced OOCly to one another.

You do not need an exhaustive timeline, and just picking a random handful of cities will do (so will saying you are SF born and raised). You do need to make sure these places are mentioned in your backstory (e.g. if your timeline starts in LA and ends in New Orleans, be sure to include something like, "Jimbo moved to New Orleans" in the backstory so it adds up) but you are not obligated to go into exhaustive detail just because there's some city in your timeline.

On-screen instructions will prompt you to build your timeline when you move on from the Backstory room.

Papertrail

You'll be asked to fill out the following information, which will be used by storytellers if someone snoops into you. You can be succinct, it just needs to be filled out. This is your opportunity to set what turns up in the background check ahead of time, if it ever happens.

• Date of Birth: When was your character born?
• Name: What is your character's current, full legal name they go by?
• Birthplace: Are there hospital/church records on your birthplace?
• Marriage: Are there marriage and/or divorce records? When/where/to whom?
• Family: Siblings. Kids. Parents. Any still alive? Who?
• Criminal: Tell us about your criminal record if you have one.
• Death: Does your original mortal identity have an obituary/burial/death record?
• Misc: Do you have any other stuff you want to talk about? Draft cards. Border crossings. Passports. News articles.

Notes

Through the character generator, you will be prompted to fill out some freeform information.

The information in the Notes can be copy-pasted from your Backstory where relevant (and vice-versa), but individualized notes for these aspects are needed so a storyteller (or future you) doesn't have to wade through a backstory to find something.

You may be asked about the following:

• Your Merits And Flaws: While some merits and flaws are self-explanatory like "Touch Of Frost", others are more free-form, like Enemy. We will prompt you to explain these merits/flaws through the +notes code.
• Backgrounds: Some Backgrounds require that you write notes to pair with them. Please refer to the pages about these individual backgrounds by checking out the Backgrounds index.

Starting Equipment

Your Starting Equipment is based on your Resources score, which you can read more in depth about on our Resources page.

Submitting Your Character

All of the steps describe above are facilitated by the in-game character generator. When you are done with the character generator you will be presented with the option to confirm your application and submit it to staff. This then notifies staff of your application for them to process it and add you to the game.