Eran Jenevan (Final)

Moving along in this series, we come to Eran. Who is missing and may or may not be dead. What's that about? Seriously. Just like Donovan, we'll be building Eran with 250 points and up to 75 points worth of disadvantages not stemming from his racial template. The original rough draft appears here.

Sereth

35 points

Attribute Ranges: DX 11+

Secondary Characteristic Ranges: SM 0 - +1 (6' - 7')

Advantages: Acute Senses 2 (Vision) [4], Extended Lifespan 2 [2], Flexibility (Double-Jointed) [15], Long Arms x2 [20], Nictitating Membrane 1 [1], Night Vision 2 [2], Temperature Tolerance 1 (Hot) [1]

Disadvantages: Skinny [-5], Unusual Biochemistry [-5]

Special: Sereth that are natives of Serethenem (rather than being Sereth born and raised in another country) may purchase FP up to 50% more than their HT attribute, rather than the normal 30% for humanoid characters. 

Special: Sereth may, if they wish, purchase Sorcery Resistance 1+ at the normal cost. They may also buy Signature Gear 1 (Sereth Long Rifle) for the normal cost of the Signature Gear advantage. The Sorcery Resistance must be purchased at character creation if it is to be purchased at all, but the Sereth Long Rifle Signature Gear option may be purchased at any time, but note that there will be some time needed for the gun to be carried from Serethnem to the character’s location.

Special: Sereth may also take the Long Legs advantage for both legs for 20 points total at character creation to modify their legs if they wish, but it is not mandatory. They may only choose to do so at character creation.

Alright, so that's a wee bit different than the original version that appeared here on the blog.

The first special indicates that Sereth born and raised in the desert tend to be tougher and more accustomed to physical exertion, so they can buy more FP than other characters. The second special indicates that some Sereth, like the Vyanth, are resistant to sorcery and that any Sereth that feels like it can have a Sereth Long Rifle, as long as they have 1 character point on hand to buy the ability. The third special says that if you really want to be able to step over things more easily and kick farther, you can buy the Long Legs advantage at character creation for 20 points, but it's not mandatory. 

Let's get going here. 

Eran Jenevan of the Thuryn Clan

266 (249) points
1 character point leftover. 

35 year old Sereth

6' 9" 165 lbs. 

Points From Characteristics: 118

ST: 10 [0]

DX: 13 [60]

IQ: 11 [20]

HT: 12 [20]

HP: 13 [6]

Will: 11 [0]

Per: 14 [15]

FP: 15 [9]

Basic Speed: 6.25 [0]

Dodge: 9

Basic Move: 6 [0]

Build: Skinny [0]

Size Modifier: +1

Appearance: Average [0]

Technology Level: 5 [0]

Cultural Familiarity Serethnem (native), Haven [1]

Languages: Serevish (native), Asosan (accented) [4], Goebleen (accented) [4], Vyanvish [0] (accented) [4]

Wealth: Dead broke [-25]

And boom, just like that we've burned through over a hundred character points for Eran. But that's ok, Eran is kind of a stat heavy skill use guy and doesn't have a super shit ton of points invested in advantages outside of his racial template. His attributes and secondary characteristics are pretty much in keeping with what appeared on the rough draft version, so there's not much to talk about here. You'll see up there that Vyanvish is known at accented comprehension, but costs 0 points. Some of the languages in The Known World are so closely linked to one another that it doesn't seem right to charge normal price for them. For instance, Vyanvish and Serevish are almost the same language, so they count as accented versions of one another. At some point I'll get around to posting cultural templates here. Probably when I make them coherent. 

Points From Advantages: 24

Absolute Direction (Absolute Direction) [5]

Ally: Garath the Wolf (25% points, always around x4) [4]
Animal Empathy [5]

Fit (Fit) [5]

Terrain Adaptation (sand) [5]

Yup. Still about the same as last time we were here. I yanked the minion enhancement from Garath because if telepathically influencing how much someone likes you isn't mind control, neither is miraculously calling a wolf to be your companion. I did add in Animal Empathy so Eran and Garath can communicate, kind of. I should mention that a normal Timber Wolf appears as follows:

Timber Wolf
-34 character points

ST: 10 [0]

DX: 12 [40]

IQ: 4 [-120]

HT: 12 [20]

HP: 10 [0]

Will: 11 [35]

Per: 14 [50]

FP: 12 [0]

Basic Speed: 6 [0]

Dodge: 9

Basic Move: 9 [15]

Size Modifier: +0

Points From Racial Template: 0

Claws (Blunt) [3]

Damage Resistance 1 (Tough Skin -40%) [3]

Discriminatory Smell [15]

Night Vision 2 [2]

Quadruped [-35]

• Extra Legs (4 legs) [5]
• Horizontal [-10]
• No Fine Manipulators [-30]

Teeth (Sharp Teeth) [1]

Temperature Tolerance 1 (Cold, 23 - 90 degrees) [1]

Wild Animal [-30]

• Bestial [-10]
• Cannot Speak [-15]
• Hidebound [-4]

Brawling (DX+2/E) [4]

Tracking (Per+0/A) [2]

So yeah, that's an average timber wolf as it appears in the Campaigns rulebook. There are guidelines for training animals and such in that same book as well, FYI. So with those disadvantages factored in and the understanding that Garath would be built at 25% of Eran's points, we are looking at a 62 point character with 34 points from pre-existing disadvantages. So yeah. We've got ourselves 96 points to build Garath. I'm only considering doing this due to the ease of it, but what I would do to make Garath would be as follows: SM +1, ST+6 (No Fine Manipulators -40%, SM +1 -10%) [30] (changing HP to 16), DX+1 [20] (changing speed to 6.25), HT+2 [20] (changing FP to 14) HP+3 [6] (changing HP to 21, Per+2 [10] Damage Resistance +3 (Tough Skin -40%) [9]. This leaves us with 1 extra character point left over and we could happily say Garath spent it on Signature Gear to "buy" barding or something.

Allies are something I'll need to hash out with players before they go about creating them. Disadvantages are going to be tricky, and I'm not going to let you get a bunch of disadvantages for your allies that will have no relevance in play. You want to drop a redshirt's Will to 5 for bonus points to enhance him, fine, that's a weakness in your defenses just as much as it is his. Attributes and characteristics are one thing, disadvantages are a little trickier, especially psychological disadvantages.

Points From Perks: 1

Weapon Bond (Eran's Sereth Long Rifle) [1]

This perk increases the skill and technique level of any skills or techniques Eran uses in conjunction with his rifle. It isn't mystical attunement and it doesn't apply to every single Sereth long rifle, just the one Eran has been using exclusively for the past year or so. He knows every little quirk about the rifle in an intimate way that involves lots and lots of master debating, so he can compensate for any flaws or whatever it has more easily. Or something. Motherfucker likes his rifle. 

Points From Disadvantages: -22

Curious (resist fairly often: 9 or less x1.5) [-7]

Weirdness Magnet [-15]

Same as last time. Once in a while Eran struggles to not pull the level or ask about scars, and he's a player character, so I'm going to abuse him. 

Points From Quirks: -1

Uncongenial [-1]

Eran isn't quite a loner, he doesn't actively avoid people, but he does tend to just up and do whatever he thinks is appropriate without checking with his friends or worrying about what they're up to. Actually, now that I am thinking of it, that pretty much applies to everyone in the group. Oh well. Eran does it best so he's the only one that gets it as a quirk. Fuck all of ya'll. 

Points From Racial Template: 38

Acute Senses 2 (Vision) [4]

Extended Lifespan 2 [2]

Flexibility (Double-Jointed) [15]

Long Arms x2 [20]

Nictitating Membrane 1 [1]

Night Vision 2 [2]

Temperature Tolerance 1 (Hot, 35 - 102, 15 to 102 with armor) [1]

Signature Gear (Sereth Long Rifle) [1]

Sorcery Resistance 1 [2]

Skinny [-5]
Unusual Biochemistry [-5]

Yup. That's what a Sereth looks like. 

Points From Skills: 87

Acrobatics (DX+1/H) - 14 [8]

Animal Handling (IQ+0/A) - 11 [2]

Area Knowledge: Serethnem (IQ+1/E) - 12 [2]

Armoury (IQ-1/A, TL 5 Small Arms) - 10 [1]

Bow (DX-1/A) - 12 [1]

Camouflage (IQ+1/E) - 12 [2]

Cartography (IQ+1/A, TL 5) - 12 [4]

Climbing (DX+0/A) - 13 [2]

Fast-Draw (DX+1/E, Ammo) - 14 [2]

Fast-Draw (DX+1/E, Longarms) - 14 [2]

Geography (IQ-1/H) - 10 [2]

Guns (DX+3/E, TL 5 Rifles) - 16 [8]

Hiking (HT+0/A) - 12 [2]

History (IQ-2/H, Serethnem) - 9 [1]

Jumping (DX+0/E) - 13 [1]

Lock Picking (IQ+1/A, TL 5) - 12 [4]

Melee Weapon (DX+0/E, Knife) - 13 [1]

Melee Weapon (DX-1/A, Polearm) - 12 [1]

Naturalist (IQ+1/H) - 12 [8]

Navigation (IQ+0/A, TL 5) - 11 [2]

Observation (Per+0/A) - 14 [2]

Running (HT+0/A) - 12 [2]

Search (Per+0/A) - 14 [2]

Stealth (DX+3/A) - 16 [12]

Survival (Per+1/A, Desert) - 15 [4]

Survival (Per-1/A, Arctic) - 13 [1]

Tracking (Per+2/A) - 16 [8]

So I've added and subtracted some skills a bit, mostly because I know more about the game than I did when I made the rough draft. This brings to mind something I said to Fred recently. I'm glad I didn't switch to GURPS after The Rebellion Arc. I know so much more about the game and its systems now that I didn't know several years ago. The racial templates are a lot more comprehensive than they were back then. I've cut the fat, made advantages cheaper and more sensible, and I know the ramifications of most abilities and I've passed beyond the point of throwing it in because it sounds cool. If I had used GURPS back then it would be ten times worse than the rules changes and communication issues have been in this campaign. 

Alright, I'm going to talk about defaults for a moment. Most skills have defaults. I removed Knot-Tying from Eran's skill list because I've never seen him tie a knot in game. This doesn't mean he can't tie a knot in GURPS. Most skills have something called a default, sometimes several. For instance, Knot-Tying defaults to DX-4, Climbing-4, and Seamanship-4. So what does than mean? Knot-Tying comes down to a contest between the escapee's Escape skill and the knotter's  Knot-Tying. You remember quick contests? No? Shocking. So Someone with an Escape of 12 has been tied up by Eran. The escapee rolls a 10 on 3d, so a success for him by 2. Eran doesn't have Knot-Tying, but he has a DX of 13, so he rolls at DX-4, which is an effective skill level of 9. He gets a 6 because he's damn lucky. Which is obviously a success by 3, beating the escapee's success by 2. I can only assume that Eran then master debates on the little shit as punishment.

As another for instance, Eran was a pirate citizen of Haven and served in their navy for a while. You'll notice that he has no seamanship type skills (other than the master debating). Since Pathfinder Eran has no ranks in Profession (Sailor), we can assume Eran is a shit sailor. Not surprising for a native to a desert.  His captain(s) probably tossed him into the crow's nest and told him to look at things and not touch anything on the boat. Anyway. If we look at skills in GURPS, we see that Crewman (Seamanship) defaults to IQ-4, which gives Eran an effective skill level of 7, which is consistent with our image of Eran as one of the worst pirates ever. 

You also might note that some skills have a TL level. That means you learn them at a certain TL. You can't buy a skill at a TL (have I said yet that TL is technology level?) above your own at character creation. So in a hypothetical situation, we have a Greenskin Abraxen fisherman. He has Crewman (Seamanship TL 1) - 12. He's got a raft or log or something and he paddles around on it. Say we put him in one of Haven's older TL 4 three masted ships. There's a chart in the skills section of the Characters rulebook and looking at it we see equipment with a TL three levels higher than your skill's confers a -15 to your skill level, giving our Greenskin Abraxen an effective skill level of -3, making it impossible for him to mess about with rigging and poop decks and whatnot. He probably doesn't even know any decent sea shanties. If we go one step further to Kusseth's ironclads at TL 5 we see on our chart that it is impossible for the Abraxen to know what to do with all the mechanical hardware and whatnot. This differs from the TL 4 situation in that in theory, the Greenskin Abraxen could possess something like a 25 in his Crewman skill and only be reduced to 10 on a TL 4 boat. Even with a 25, he still couldn't do anything on the ironclad. The technology is too alien for his expertise to be of use.

Points From Techniques: 4

Targeted Attack (TL 5 Guns: Rifle/Skull, Default+3) -  12 [4]

Last time I came up with a technique called Boom! Headshot (Guns). Turns out Targeted Attack covers that. It allows you to buy off up to half of the penalty for targeting a specific spot on a target. Normally, it's -7 to skill level to target the skull, giving Eran an effective skill of 9. Once we factor in his perk when using his favorite gun, it becomes 10. It's possible, but not guaranteed by any means. So with this technique we see I've purchased it at default+3. The default being Gun-7, so it becomes Guns-4. This makes the base effective level when Eran targets someone's skull Guns (TL 5 Rifles) - 12, 13 after we factor in his perk. Much better and much more feasible to hit with, seeing as how the average result of 3d is 10 or 11. 

Points From Special Crap Accrued During Play: 15

Ally: Gob (100% points, around fairly often: 9 or less x1) [1]

Doesn't Breathe (removed with a quick contest -30%)  [14]

Independent Income 5 [5]

Reputation: Defended the Warrens From the Warren Hunters (+2 reaction modifier, affects large class of people: Goebleen x1/2, recognized all the timex1) [5]

Reputation: Savior of the Briar King (+4 reaction modifier, affects large class of people: loyal Sereth x1/2, recognized on 10 or less x1/2) [5]

Reputation: Mouthed Off To Keroen Skathos (+4 reaction modifier, affects small class of people: Nel that think mortals are people x1/3, recognized on 7 or less x1/3) [2]

Duty: Assist Keroen Skathos (almost all the time, moderately hazardous) [-15]

So you can see some things are here. Gob's here, just like he was with Donovan's special crap, as is the Independent Income. Interestingly, Doesn't Breathe appears on here. This one time Eran was in this place called The Nightmare Lands, and there's no air there, because living, dead, imaginary, and undead Nel (the four types of Nel that exist there) don't need air. Evandor, not wanting Eran to immediately die before he had a chance to mouth off to Keroen, engaged in non-consensual Gift imbuing with Eran and granted him the ability to not need to breathe. Wee. You can also see there is a reputation for being the savior of the Briar King(s) in there. So every time you meet someone in GURPS, the GM secretly rolls 3d and applies any appropriate bonuses and penalties. Unlike normal checks in GURPS, higher is good and there is no target number. You're simply rolling and getting the result of the modifiers and the roll. So in a situation where Eran is back in Serethnem totally not doing secret agent crap for the Briar Kings he encounters a few Sereth. Eran's looking for someone, but definitely not because he's on a mission of national security, and he comes across a party of Sereth that are coming from the way he thinks his quarry has gone. Eran approaches them and I roll secretly to see if they recognize him and get an 8 and it turns out these guys recognize Eran. Then I roll secretly again and get another 8 and add in Eran's reputation bonus of +4 for a total of 12. There being no other relevant modifiers, we've got a neutral reaction from these guys. Seeing as how the information Eran wants amounts to "Hey, you seen this guy, I'm totally not hunting him down for the Briar Kings as part of a secret mission to consolidate their power so they can start waging war against other nations in an attempt to expand their borders?" they readily tell Eran whether or not they've seen him. They maybe ask for his autograph too. Or compare rifles. Whatever. If we alter the situation and these guys are actually the quarry's brothers, we scoot down to disastrous or bad and maybe they lie or try to shoot the fuck out of Eran. We have a second reputation, and it's because Eran had the flexible stones necessary to look Keroen in the eye and not back down. That only really matters to Nel, and only a handful of them, so it's not going to come into play as much and isn't worth as many points. You'll also see the same reputation Donovan had among the Goebleen because Eran (technically) defended the warrens from the warren hunters.

Eran also has some gear. He has his Sereth long rifle, some bracers that affect ranged attacks, and the Hound's hide armor. Let's start with the rifle. I know I did it in the last post, so this is merely a refresher:

Sereth Long Rifle

TL: 5 (the weapon is a TL 5 weapon)

Damage: 7d+1 pi (8 - 43, no damage modifier after penetrating damage resistance, so an average his of 25 damage against Kethranmeer's DR 8 does 17 and is then rounded down to 6 by his Injury Tolerance)

Accuracy: 8 (an aim maneuver adds +8 to your effective skill level on your next shot)

Range: 1100/4500 (it deals half damage at 1100+ yards and has a maximum effective range of 4500 yards)

Weight: 12.8/.2 (a fully loaded weapon weighs 12.8 pounds and a full reload weighs .2 pounds)

RoF: 3 (it can fire a maximum of three shorts per 1 second round, assuming it is fully loaded)

Shots: 3(3i) (the weapon holds 3 shots internally and each round must be reloaded individually, and each rounds takes 3 one second ready maneuvers to be loaded) 

ST: 10* (the weapon requires a ST of 10 to wield without affecting skill level or using up extra FP during a fight, the asterisk indicates that with a ST of 15 you can fire it one handed, but it becomes unready, and with a ST of 20 you can fire it one handed without it becoming unready, you'd still need two hands to reload though)

Bulk: -6 (any time you use a move and attack maneuver, or try to conceal the weapon, you get a -6 to your skill level)

Recoil: 3 (see below)

Cost: Signature Gear for Sereth, stolen, or gift only

LC: 0 (certain items can only be used by certain individuals, an LC of 0 means only Sereth are supposed to have this weapon and it means trouble if they see it with a non-Sereth)

Attachments: scope (+1 accuracy factored in above, +3 to weight factored in above)

Below: Alright, so recoil is a stat that manages rapid fire weapons. You need a rate of fire of 2 or higher (sorry single action revolvers) to do this though. Say Eran wants to unload on Kethranmeer and pulls the trigger three times when he makes an attack action. We've got three bullets in the air. So Eran's skill level with Guns (TL 5 Rifle) is 16, 17 with his perk. He gets a 5. Well fuck, I just rolled that, that's really good. I said it before, but a critical success occurs on any roll of 3 or 4 on 3d, if your skill level is 15+ you critically succeed on 3 to 5, and at 16+ (Eran's skill level) you do so on a 3 to 6. We'll ignore that for now. So Eran succeeded at his attack roll by 12 points. His recoil is 3 per shot and he succeeded with one, so he needs to succeed by 3 to hit with a second shot, and 6 to hit with the third. So yeah. Eran just plugged Kethranmeer with 3 shots of 8 - 43 damage. 

The first hit was a critical so Kethranmeer gets no active defense against it. When a critical success occurs in combat your target gets no active defense, then you roll on a special chart (there is an even more special one for hits to the head). So we roll 3d for Eran's crit and get a 9. Which unfortunately does normal damage to Kethranmeer, but at least he didn't get to dodge. Attempting to dodge the other two shots fails for Kethranmeer. His dodge is only 9 (I rolled a 14 and a 14) and you can't block bullets with a shield. So Kethranmeer ends up taking 4, 8, and 6 piercing damage after we factor in his damage resistance and Injury Tolerance and puts him at 12 hit points out of 30. But now it will take Eran at least 3 rounds to reload a single shot and Kethranmeer has a really big blackstone hammer with Eran's master debating name on it. It should also be mentioned that Eran's rifle is enchanted for silence when it fires, making it impossible to track where it is coming from based on sound alone. 

The Hound's Hide armor is basically torso, leg, and arm leather armor with a damage resistance of 4 vs everything but impaling attacks, against which it has a damage resistance of 3. In addition, it confers one level of the Temperature Tolerance (Cold) advantage using the Hound's HT (which is 20) meaning that Eran is comfortable while wearing the armor until it gets to be below 15 degrees Fahrenheit. 

Eran's sharpshooter bracers have a deflect enchantment on them, granting him a +1 to his dodge chance against ranged attacks and are also enchanted for accuracy, improving his skill level when making ranged attacks by +1 (his base is 16, plus this and the perk puts it at 18). Additionally, because leather is flexible, you can layer it and stack damage resistance in GURPS. So Eran's bracers have a damage resistance of 1 vs. non-impaling attacks, which stacks with the Hound's Hide armor for a total damage resistance of 5 on his arms, but only 3 vs. impaling attacks. 

I just want to point out that you can layer your armor in GURPS. So you can put on your DR 4 coat of mail over your DR 2 coat of leather for a total DR of 6. Just watch out for maces and shit. Flexible armor is shit against crushing damage and blunt trauma. There is a DX penalty if you later too much though, so bear that in mind. 

So, that's Eran in a nutshell. We have one unused character point, but we fit comfortably in the 250 point range. You'll also notice that his actual character point value is 266 and Donovan's was 289. Like I said, sometimes things don't always match up evenly. Donovan has been a lot more active interacting with NPCs and stuff than Eran has been, so he has a lot more extra special crap from that. 

Now, if this were a long term campaign where we were logging what the player's were doing in their off time there would be some big variances. For instance, we could count Eran's scouting and patrolling on a daily basis during his off time towards improving his various outdoors skills. The time Donovan spends torturing warren hunters could go towards improving his mind control and people reading skills. It takes like 200 hours of work to gain one character point towards something, and doing so without a teacher is something like 2 or 4 hours counting as an actual hour spent learning or training, but still. 

GURPS, a game where you improve by doing things and can layer your armor for additional protection at the cost of mobility. What more could you want?