Character Creation - 31yrs

[Ghostrider]

Working through the modules to try and produce a good talented Mechwarrior with a few perks.
I'd like to have traits Natural Aptitude/Piloting Mech, Good Vision, and Fast Learner, to get some Piloting Special Abilities in  the future and make the upgrading of skills less onerous.

I keep feeling like the warriors wind up being very weak
I wind up resorting to increasing the base age (by taking more modules)

Just about everything I've created winds up 25-31yrs old to start, taking advantage of the Attributes bonuses from aging.
Just to get a character that doesn't feel useless and needs to hide on the base training lest he offend someone with his rank 2 Protocol and die from a slap to the face.

Looking for feedback on what others feel about making intentionally older characters

PS:
Current flavour of the week is: MIM Active Response Operative
Affiliation: Magistracy of Canopus
Stage 1: Slave (age 10)
Stage 2: Military School (age 16)
Stage 3: Military Academy (basic training + MW fields, +2yrs)
Stage 3: Intelligence Training (basic training + scout +special forces fields, +4yrs)
Stage 4: Covert Ops: Periphery (+6 yrs)
Stage 4: Tour of Duty: Periphery (+3 yrs)
age: 31yrs

[monbvol]

I find myself in a tough spot anymore.  I've played a Noble Officer Mechwarrior that is only a 5 Gunnery and 6 Piloting and I have to admit that is damned rough for a campaign that does feature a lot of in the cockpit action.  Out of the cockpit the character isn't that bad.  It is the reason why I've decided as a house rule that if there is going to be a lot of in the cockpit action Mechwarriors, ASF pilots, and Vehicle crews will get 500 extra XP.  Battlearmor is so universally useful they get no such bonus.

[kroner]

Ghost,

I've been experimenting with the character creation process for a few weeks as I develop my character sheet.  It seems to me that you get the most flexibility if you don't try to take too many modules.  The more modules you take, the more XP's tend to get tied up in non-combat skills.

For your example, don't forget that Natural Aptitude Mech Pilot is a 500 point Trait (because piloting is an advanced skill).  Also, Fast Learner is a 300 point trait.  That's 800 points on two traits. That will zap you in the Optimization stage.

Also, remember that during optimization, (pp. 87 ATOW) that Traits and Skills can not be optimized below the highest fully attained level.  Meaning, that if you are a Standard Learner, and you have 40 points in Protocol / Affliliation, you can only "shave" 10 points off that total to reduce the XP total of that skill down to 30, which is the fully realized XP total for a bonus of 1 in that skill.

Of course, you could just use the Points Only System to create your character.

[monbvol]

Yes and no.

Fast Learner is 300 XP but the XP return it offers can be returned pretty quick.  I still have issue with that though as it makes it too good of an investment really.  Worst of all there is no table showing how it interacts with Tech Empathy, Gremlins, and Illiterate.  Natural Aptitude I've crunched the numbers on and I will agree it is over priced and it makes no sense to me to have the cost determined by how many link attributes are tied to the skill.

[kroner]

Good point about the Tech Empathy and Illiterate traits.

My opinion: I would interpret it to mean that the bonuses / penalties apply only if those traits make it out of character creation.

I think I read somewhere else, that if the traits are present at the end of character creation, then the traits always existed for the character.   I would interpret that to mean that the trait would then affect skill points/bonuses that were developed during character creation.

Interesting thought about Fast Learner.  You need to have enough skills at higher levels in order to make it work for a starting character.  Roughly speaking: if you have 13 skills at 96 XP each, then you get a +4 bonus at Fast Learner rather than a +3 bonus at Standard Learning.   That's a total of 1,248 XP for 13 skills. 

Not a tremendously likely scenario as most character are going to have more than 13 skills and the lower the point value in skills, the less savings you get for Fast Learner.

Though you may have to look at it as an investment for advanced characters. 

Also, for at least one meta game reason.  Also, I assume that XP are going to be much harder to earn after a campaign starts?  How long will it take to advance +3 gunnery to +4 gunnery?  At standard leaner that will cost you 40 XP.  At Fast Learner that same advance will cost you 32 XP.  That extra 8 XP is probably a whole session worth of playing.  At least.

[monbvol]

Well to keep things from getting stupidly complicated once you have Fast Learner the game assumes you've always had it no matter what.  Because you can "bank" partial increases it doesn't really change much if you pick it up part way through a campaign in that regard.  Where it really changes things is it doubles downtime XP gained.  I'd have to look again to see if that also includes Training.  Ultimately though as long as you have 1,500 XP in skills Fast Learner will pay for itself.

[Ghostrider]

I actually don't mind most of the non-combat skills. I suppose you could assume generic mundane skills, but I'm more of the opinion that without Art/Cooking +0 or better the only thing they can cook is heat-and-eat packaged food (Ramen noodles, self-heating rations, microwave dinners)

I also like characters to have CHA related skills such that they have options beyond holding a knife to someones throat when dealing with their environment.
Your character has Language at +0?--> people think you talk like a 6yr-old
Language at +1 has mastered all the grace and skill necessary to ask "you want fries with that"
I guess I feel that proficiency in a skill doesn't start until rank 4+

For example the sample Mechwarrior from AToW is a dangerously undertrained catastrophe that is just as likely to shoot themselves in the ass as not.

EDIT: I guess Piloting 5 / Gunnery 5 is a slightly below average green pilot in Tabletop rules, but ugh, feels like an underachiever from the Timbuktu school for talentless rejects

[monbvol]

+3 for most of the out of cockpit stuff is actually pretty respectable.  +0 in Small Arms is already above 50% odds you'll hit your target in a gun fight unless they have cover or are at range.

In cockpit yeah +4 seems to be the minimum unless of course that isn't the main focus of the campaign.

[Kobura]

What I did was allow characters to 'twist' the modules to be more specific.

A rifleman in BCT in a modern military wouldn't get Equipped for instance, they might get Contacts instead, making a friend from a high(er) place.

Someone going through OCS wouldn't have their wealth, they'd have something else, perhaps. A University student didn't make friends with Connections for 200xp, but they did take accreditations for 200XP of Equipped instead.

Little tweaks like that produced characters that were still true to the spirit of the life paths, but didn't have so many "???" skills or traits.

[Ghostrider]

Now this guy I like, good attributes, decent skills, Natural Aptitude, Good Vision, Attractive, Fast Learner and a Light Mech!

Created to play starting in the 3050-era as a Comstar Special Ops Mechwarrior assigned to the 91st Division.
As play progresses he will experience Tukayyid, the Schism (likely he's going to stay in ComStar, but might be a WoB sympathizer), the upheaval in ComStar from the loss of Terra, Bulldog, Serpent and the Great Refusal.

Age: 31years
Affiliation: ¹/₂Terran + ¹/₂Marian Hegemony^† + Comstar^†
† Affiliation info from Era Report:3052
Stage 1: Slave
Stage 2: Adolescent Warfare
Stage 3: Military Academy <BT, MW, SF> +4 years
Stage 3: OCS <Officer> +1 years
Stage 4: Agitator +4 years
Stage 4: Covert Ops: Comstar +6 years

STR	4	+0
BOD	6	+0
RFL	7	+1
DEX	7	+1
INT	7	+1
WIL	7	+1
CHA	4	+0
EDG	5	+0
Traits	Value
Attractive	+2
Bloodmark: 18,000 C-Bills	-1
Compulsion/Distrust non-Terrans	-1
Compulsion/Paranoid	-1
Connections: ROM Case Officer	+4
Enemy: Ordo Vigilis	-5
Fast Learner	3
Good Vision	1
In For Life: ComStar	-3
In For Life: ROM	-3
Introvert	-1
Natural Aptitude: Piloting/Mech*	+5
Rank: (O2) Adept	+5
Reputation/Marian Hegemony	-2
Reputation/Stigma: Slave	-1
Reputation/Stigma: Ruthless	-1
Vehicle: MON-66 (25tons)	+2
Wealth	-1
Skills	Level
Acrobatics/Free-fall	+1
Acting	+3
Administration	+3
Career/Soldier	+1
Comms/Conv'l	+2
Computers	+2
Cryptography	+2
Demolitions	+1
Disguise	+3
Driving/Ground	+2
Gunnery/Mech	+3
Interest/Writings of Jerome Blake	+1
Interrogation	+3
Language/English	+4
Language/Latin	+1
Leadership	+4
Martial Arts	+1
MedTech	+2
Melee Weapons	+2
Navigation/Ground	+1
Negotiation	+3
Perception	+4
Piloting/Mech*	+3
Prestidigitation/Quickdraw	+3
Protocol/ComStar	+3
Running	+1
Sensor Operations	+2
Small Arms	+5
Stealth	+3
Strategy	+2
Streetwise/Marian Hegemony	+4
Survival/Arctic	+0
Survival/Jungle	+3
Swimming	+1
Tactics/Infantry	+1
Tactics/Land	+3
Technician/Electronics	+2
Technician/Mechanical	+1
Tracking/Urban	+1
Training	+3

From your earliest memory all you can remember is that you and your parents were slaves.
That changed when there was an uprising and your parents joined the fight. Knowing failure meant certain death for your loved ones, you also fought as a child-soldier against your oppressors.
Over time the rebellion was put down, your parents and most of your friends did not survive, but you carried on the fight. Always moving, always hiding. Striking targets of opportunity and then fading away. Small pinpricks of resistance, but your enemy knew they did not have complete control and they hunted you mercilessly.
The fight changed after a chance contact with an agent of ComStar. They made an offer of support if you agreed to pass along information you found and occasionally hit targets that they identified.
The support was needed and the resources they provided gave you an edge. For six years you were a vengeful ghost lashing at your former slavemasters. Just when you were gaining the popular support to instigate another uprising, a traitor in your midst turned and you were uncovered.
A nightmarish fight to an extraction point and flight to freedom ensured your ComStar benefactors could not be connected to the resistance, an outcome usually enforced with two bullets in the head.
However, they found you a useful tool, crude and unrefined but they saw great potential for what you could be. They offered a second chance away from those that now knew your face and would kill you on sight. With the resistance crushed and no other prospects, you felt you had no choice.
Whisked away to Terra, you have little time to marvel at the wonders of the cradle of humanity. Your instructors are a lesson in efficiency and single-minded pursuit of molding capable warriors regardless of background. Some cannot take the pressure and wash out, but you are determined and driven to succeed, posting above average scores and even earning a coveted place in Officer Candidate School.
As a newly graduated Adept Delta/Epsilon, you are awaiting your first assignment. You are heavily invested in your new family, one that is demanding and can harshly punish for failure. You know you have been given a second chance, but wonder if you have really escaped your past or just found new masters to control your destiny.