Character Traits

Character traits provide you with special abilities, or weaknesses. These may relate back to your clan history, but they only affect you. There is a story behind most traits, and they are likely to lead to plot.

Pick as many quirks as you feel appropriate for your character, though bear in mind you'll probably want to spend some points on skills as well.

These are traits about who you are and what you do.

You were born during a particularly violent storm. This is very auspicious and could mean anything, but one thing that has resulted is that the Storm seems to be constantly roaring inside your mind. At times this reaches fever pitch and only drops down to normal when the built-up energy is released somehow. You'll have found a way to do this in a controlled fashion, but it still needs to be done regularly. On the plus side, you can read messages in the shifting colours of the clouds, and can use these to warn your settlement of impending danger.

Incompatible with Mist Born

One day, you simply appeared out of the mists. You could have been a babe, or fully grown. Either way, you have no idea where you came from. Your clan took you in and raised you, and now to all intents and purposes you are a member of that clan. Even so, the matter of your discovery is an oddity. You will have found that the mist has exerted a fascination on you, and you are often at your most happy when gazing deep in the Mists. Also, you will have found that you are more resistant that your fellows to the Mist and can spend a large time in it without discomfort.

Incompatible with Stormtouched

Whether you have green fingers, are a dab hand with animals or the one people go to when they need healing, you've always found yourself with a great interest in all things natural, and it seems nature appreciates the attention. This has led to you having a natural affinity for sensing how an ecosystem is working, and what you could do to alter its flow. Also, it means that you are the person people will go to in the settlements nearby when their cows are sick or their crops failing.

The ancestors of your clan are not quite as dead to you as they should be. Either you were born as one of your ancestors passed away, or you did something auspicious with granny's ashes… and now you can feel them watching you… even helping the clan through you. Through this contact, you have some knowledge of dealing with those who have passed away.

Either through training or talent you find that you are naturally in tune with any sway and motion of your fragment. This has two effects; firstly, any geomancy you perform will benefit from your instinctive knowledge of the fragment's motion. Secondly, you are very unlikely to accidentally plummet into the mist, you will not be thrown off your feet by sudden movements of the fragment, and you will have an inkling if someone is modifying the fragment's movement.

You have an innate knack for traversing the constantly shifting lands of the Archipelago. A regular traveler relies in part on luck and guesswork to arrive at the points where the fragments meet. You, however, can predict the paths of fragments many meetings in advance. For any tasks were traversing the archipelago efficiently helps, you will have a bonus.

This trait is of little value if you are skilled in Geomancy

You have strange visions. Sometimes they are of possible future, sometimes ancient histories. Sometimes they are entirely unrelated to anything.

You have spent too long in the Mists and parts of your memory do not work properly. You find that in most circumstances letting someone else remember things, or writing things down, keeps things under control. If something doesn't go according to plan however, or you are forced to think on your feet, you may make a critical mistake.

You are a Cowardly person by nature and will never takes risks extra to those you need to, and are unlikely to want to put yourself in danger. You are unable to take risky actions.

You are a natural born Daredevil. You will always press on no matter the cost. You are unable to take safe actions.

You have a sickness or frailty of the body. The cost represents the severity of the problem. 1 pt examples: Skin rashes, Mild allergies, Phobias. 2 pt examples: Malformed limb, Severe allergies, Leprosy, some kind of compulsion or bouts of insanity.

You have unexplained and uncontrolled blackouts that usually end with you waking somewhere entirely different and no knowledge of how you got there or what you did in the intervening period.

These are traits about where you fit into the society of the broken world.

• +1: You are known far and wide for some form of antics. Perhaps you throw the best parties, or are your fragement's Fragment Diving champion. Either way you will be better known among other clans than your peers, and consequentially you will have an extra minor edge when it comes to dealing with people who have heard of you.

• -1: Something happened that one time, and rumours started spreading about you. Maybe you were caught pantsless in a barn holding a saddle and a chicken, or maybe you're known as “that guy who wet his pants at that party”. Either way, people tend to take you less seriously than perhaps they should. You lose a minor edge when dealing with people who may have heard of your embarassing faux-pas.

You are considered a good catch. Maybe you have pretty eyes, ample assets, or your family is in high standing. Who knows, they could even be after an alliance. (Note: this is not required for PCs marrying each other in the game, but will have more of an effect for marrying NPCs)

You have something Dark in your past. If people were to find out about it they would be less willing to work with you, and could lead to clan disownment. This is for something that no-one knows about including clan.

You have an embarrassing or dangerous vice. 1 pt examples: Drug use, Compulsive gambling, An affair within your household (not incest)2pt examples: Sacrificing virgins to your volcano god, an affair outside your clan.

You really know how to put your foot in things. You can be counted on to foul up your clan's first contact with other clans, other fragments, even other races, whether inadvertantly because you're not too good at etiquette, or just becuase you're such a bigot.

Someone in your past is very unhappy with you, and would like to meet back up with you to “set everything right”. (Please tell your GMs who by and why you are being hunted). At -2 you have done something to piss off one person, such as reneged on a deal or stole his girlfriend. At -3 you've done significantly more than that; you might have abandoned an entire clan on a sinking fragment, destroyed a family's home, or looted artefacts from a huge and derelict temple gaining the wrath of its guardian.

These are traits about things that you have in your possession. You can take Heirloom and Pet as many times as you like, if you want lots of gadgets or a menagerie of creatures.

You have come into possession of a clan heirloom with some interesting qualities. (Note: The cost of the quirk will reflect how good the widget is)

• 1 pt example: You have a scythe that never needs sharpening;
• 2 pt example: You have an automatic scythe that needs to be pulled by beasts of burden;
• 3 pt example: You have a combine harvester which doesn’t require fuel.

You have a pet Thing. It is loyal, well trained, and surprisingly helpful. This could be something mundane like an attack dog, or could be something weird and alien. Let the GMs know what you want and what’s important about it, and we’ll find something appropriate to the setting.

• Option: Untrained (-1) - Your pet is immature, or bad tempered. It'll require some training before it is reliable.
• Option: Winged (+1) - Your pet has wings, and can fly between fragments. It is able to carry small to medium weights, but is not strong enough to carry a person.

You have come into possession of an artefact rumoured to be from before the apocalypse. This could be a strange looking tool that your pappy uses as a walking stick, or a large tablet with runes carved on it that was an absolute bugger to transport to the archipelago. Currently it doesn't do much, but you probably have stories about what its supposed to do…

In the Broken World, rocks are important. Your clan (or just you) have adopted a favourite rock that you feel an affinity for, or just think is shiny. Tell us what your rock it is and what it symbolizes. You could use traditional crystal healing as an inspiration, or make something up. Note we are using a very loose definition of rock. For example, Aquamarine symbolizes water and purity, Porcelain symbolizes cleanliness and inspiration. This trait will tell us something about you, but could come become more important in the future…

You have an egg. You don't know what's in it. Maybe you found it in an abandoned nest, maybe it just appeared some day in your house. Eggs can range from pea-sized to the size of a barn.

These are traits about all the strange things that might have happened to your character, and places they have ended up tdue to strange quirks of fate. Feel free to suggest a specific 'flavor' for your luck, such as 'involves badgers'. We can't promise to acknowledge it though.

Luck plays a role in all day-to-day activities, but often not enough to be noticeable. In your case however, you seem to be luckier than most.

Your home is in the outside of the Archipelago, and so you are more likely to have contact with things from outside.

In OOC temrs, take this trait if you can't get enough of the plot stick, and want the GMs to keep throwing outside threats/adventures at you.

You settled deep inside the Archipelago, and so hardly ever get to hear much about what's going on outside it.

In OOC terms, take this trait if you don't really want to be hit with much GM driven plot, or be involved with/threatend by outside elements

Your fields have corn in them.

There is something special about the fragment you chose. You have no idea what it is, but you might experience some symptoms of it. Perhaps your soil is unusually fertile, or you can hear singing coming from beneath the earth.

A specific kind of animal does not like you and will do what it can to hunt you down and hurt you or otherwise be a nuisance.

These are traits that show your relationship with a particular other person. For information on these, see the Clan NPC page.