Getting in to AToW: Character viability check

[VilleVicious]

I recently bought AToW and I'm planning on staring a campaign with it probably around Christmas . So I'm trying to get a hang of the character creation rules. I've been playing RPGs from the late 90s mostly old WoD and lately Indie games (so-called Forge school) and the complexity of the character creation was a bit of a surprise. But I think that I got a hang of it. As a test case I statted up one of the major NPCs: Colonel, Baronet Hai Jin Skinner, Second in Command of the planetary militia (3079, minor ex-FWL planet).

He is 46 years old so he is build on 7500 XP + Ageing points, and for life paths took the following:
Stage 0: other FWL
Stage 1: Noble
Stage 2: Military school
Stage 3: Military Academy with Cavalry and OCS fields
stage 4: Tour of duty

After spending the XPs I ended up with the Following:
Atributes:
STR   5
BOD   5
DEX 4
RFL   4
INT 7
WIL 5
CHA   7
EDG   3

Traits:
Animal Antipathy -1
Compulsion/Gambling -1
Compulsion/ Alcoholism -1
Connections 4
Dependant (Daughter 16y/o) -1
Dependant (Son 13y/o) -1
Enemy -2
Equipped   4
Glass Jaw    -1
Poison resistance   1
Poor Vision -2
Property 4
Rank    9
Reputation 2
Title 5
Wealth 4

Skills:

Administration 3
Appraisal 2
Artillery 1
Arts/ pottery 0
Career/soldier 3
Computers2
Driving/tracked    1
Driving/wheeled 2
Gunnery/Vehicle 1
Interest/Cars 1
Interest/ Military History 2
Leadership 5
Language/English 3
Language/Mandarin 2
Martial arts 3
Med Tech 2
Melee weapons 2
Navigation/ground 3
Negotiation 3
Perception 2
Protocol: FWL   5
Running   1
Sensor operations 3
Small arms   3
Strategy   3
Swimming    2
Tactics Land 4
Tech/mechanical 1
Training 2

I'm pretty sure the points add up, But does he lack something important, or is he sorely lacking in some important parts? Any and all comments are much appreciated.

[Daryk]

I think he's too heavy on attributes and too light on skills for a 46 year old.  As a landed noble, his administration should be significantly higher.  Some Career/Politician and Acting might not be a bad idea either.

[Runeslinger]

I agree. I find it helps to use the idea presented in the Tiered Skill description that the dividing line between a skill level of 3 and 4 represents a degree of professionalism or higher level accomplishment - even if the skill in question is not Tiered.

In this light, what Daryk says about the skills being low stands out. Some of the core skills the character would need are in the right ball park, but a lot of the skills required to get him there are just entry level.

• Of course - this may be your intent, and with a specific character description, these ratings may make more sense, such as his position is one of rank and family influence, not one he earned.

I am finding that skills play a more important role in task resolution than attributes in this system, and that it is okay to settle for attribute scores the write-ups call average, unlike in WoD where that is often a handicap. Having a high trait or pair of related traits can boost skill rolls, and establish a sense of the character's identity, but unless the game will have the characters continually performing skills with no training or relying primarily on their raw abilities for generic physical pursuits, you won't find attributes playing the same role in the game that you are used to with your background.

[VilleVicious]

Thanks a lot. This was just the sort of feedback I was looking for. So for attributes 3-4 is passably mediocre and for skills 4 is lower-end professional? I'll jumble around points a bit later and we'll see if I'm get on a better track then.

[Daryk]

You'll want to stick to 4's.  3's are where the penalties start.  If you're not already using a spreadsheet to help with accounting, you might want to try mine.

[VilleVicious]

@Daryk: I used a spreadsheet of my own making, very crude one. I'll probably borrow yours, or at least parts of it in the future.

After looking at the characters points again, I noticed that I'd made a mistake with the Glass jaw Trait and took on an allergy/animal dust (He doesn't like animals, and they don't like him either), to get me another 300 points to play with. So I used them to bulk up his staff officer skills:

Admin => 6
Leadership=> 6
Land Tactics => 5
Strategy=> 4

I was thinking about letting the attributes stay that way, mainly because all of the 5s were gotten from ageing effects. After traditional CharGen the stat line was STR: 4, BOD: 4, DEX: 5, RFL: 3, INT: 6, WIL: 4, CHA: 7,EDG: 3, which was pretty much what I wanted, and then piled on the ageing effects giving me the stat line in the OP. But then I looked at the sample chars and now I'm thinking of dropping maybe 3 points from the attributes and buy

Career/politician=> 3
Negotiation => 4
Acting(public speaking) => 3(+1)
Career/soldier => 4
Apprisal => 3

[Daryk]

Ah, I see.  You buy your Attributes then apply aging.  I set up my sheet to include aging in the buy process.

[VilleVicious]

Testing my ideas to see if I got them right.

Test case financials:
As the planet is not very near hostile boarders, not particularly water poor and I think his property (series of high class shopping centres) could be called Lightly industrialized, these would give admin modifier of +1. His Title and Reputation add another +3. these are added to his Admin skill of 6 and INT bonus of +1 for a total of 11. Then I roll 2d6 and add that to the sum for range of 14-23 (With the fumble taken out). As admin is Simple-Advanced skill the Target Number is 8 so the MOS will be 6-15. This translates to annual income of 92k-112k Cbills with average of about 100k. Most comfortable I guess.

Test case combat:
Hai is ambushed by an assassin (using the renegade warrior stats) firing at him with an autopistol (Surprised +2, Sturdy podium to give moderate cover -2, short range+0, His Skill +2 for total of +2), who misses(rolled 3). Hai wins initiative(9 vs 7) draws his hold-out laser pistol and fires on the attacker (2 simple actions per turn). The shot(Small arms skill +3, short range and no cover for+3) hits (rolled 9 For total of 12). The assassin is not wearing armour and takes 3 (2 base+ 1 MOS) points of damage, 1 point of fatigue and is stunned. As he lost 1/4 of his damage points he is at -1 to his rolls and must make a consciousness test at 2d6-(1+1) against 7. Assassin collapses to the ground unconscious (he rolled 7-2=5<7).