Rogues of Canguine Question

[Hat]

Greetings,

My wife, son and I got exposed to the living campaigns at Origins and very much enjoyed it. We understand that the Heroes campaign is coming to a close while the Rogues campaign is prepping to launch at next Origins if I recall correctly. I'm working to reaquaint myself with character creation rules as well as explore the wide variety of options available. I have a few questions I'm hoping to get help with.

For backgrounds, can a couple of characters be tied together? A concept I'm playing with would have my wife's character as an integral part though likely with a different background. Is that reasonable/doable? For Origins, we have a different campaign whose key event is Saturday afternoon / evening and will likely be for the foreseeable future. Would we be able to still do backgrounds? Also, what would we be missing out on just from understanding what we could reasonably make.

Thanks.

With a sweep of his hat,

Paul

[salamanca]

Hi Paul.

We are very happy to work with Backgrounds that intersect. Mark loves building on that sort of stuff. But he does his best work when you give him a clear idea written from you character's view of what the events were. That way he can twist what is really happening and surprise you with the resolution.

As for the campaign and what you can expect to experience.

We will be keeping the same format on the new campaign. 2 adventures every year and replays of older adventures the year after (and then shifting the games to flashback sessions for those who still need them) The Domingo Gigante on Sunday might get a name change but will continue to be a chance for those who can't schedule an event at another time.

Personal Agendas will continue to be Saturday afternoon and evening because we enjoy closing on those. The 2 hour game session is always designed to try and add a fun but unrelated to the canpaign adventure. If we can add some backstory to some NPCs or make Canguine feel more complete we do that too. But the Personal Agenda is NEVER campaign essential.

The 2 hour portion with Mark is our only official time to work on Backgrounds. That gives each player about 15-20 minutes to deal with their own thing and many of our players love to dive in and help one another in their backgrounds. I am not saying that it is impossible to coerce him into running a 15 minute Background outside of that if you absolutely can't schedule the PA but His schedule is literally around 40 hours of running sessions over 4 and a half days. Free time is not something we have much of.

But he is a sucker for Diet Peach Snapple bribes, enthusiastic new players and great background ideas.

Also, long term, the couple of points you toss on a background are going to cost you one or two ranks of knacks. It is not something that would ruin a character if you buy it and don't get to follow up until late in the campaign. And with a 12 year plan, we might outlast your other schedule.

[Hat]

Thanks for the answers. I've been led to believe that the current campaign we play in that ties up our Saturdays (Arcanis) should wrap the current arc in 3 - 5 years, so if the next one goes on for 12, there'll be time. Are there other cons that these opportunities will be available? Glancing at the events section, it looks like Gencon and perhaps an online con?

I haven't shared my character concept with my wife yet which limits being able to post more details. Fortunately, plenty of time before Origins '25. At this point I'm relearning the character creation process and trying to understand for example things like becoming an apprentice in more than one sword school. I don't expect to go that route, but would like to understand it. If there are just 24 adventures within the story arc, I wouldn't think there's time to even consider that, much less do it and make much progress doing anything else. Is there a rough range of XP to plan on over the campaign for those of us who like to plan ahead?

[salamanca]

We run at GenCon and Mark has a couple cons in New England he runs at.

I would not recommend going the double sword schiol route. We don't run combat intensive adventures and a single school will be more than sufficient. There will be fights and uses for all those things but not at a level where you have to worry about the strategy of changing schools for the sake of advantage in the combat.

As for XP... It should exceed 150 by episode 24 plus whatever you pick up from Personal Agendas. You can master a sorcery or sword school if that is your objective. We also have had some highly successful characters that took neither, focused on sone good advantages and high basic combat knacks with a variety of skills and advanced knacks.

If I was actually playing, I would be thinking about the Rogers Pirate swordschool. Just for the Tricks like Death from Above. It will be a fun option to play but take what inspires you.

[Hat]

Funny you should mention Death From Above, as it was on my list to add to my character build but couldn't find the 3 points to add it in. As a Battletech player, I'd get a kick out of having my 7th Sea character landing it regularly.

[Black Jack Rackham]

Everything Dave said is right on the nose (especially the Diet Peach Snapple Bribes) My advice for new players is, Create the character that seems the most fun rather than the one who has the most mechanical benefit. Because before the campaign is over, you'll switch to the fun one if you don't pick it first. I guarantee it.

[Black Jack Rackham]

For backgrounds, can a couple of characters be tied together?

Can they? CAN THEY??? Be still my foolish heart! These are the kind of words I LONG to hear! Yes yes please, do ask me to intertwine the backgrounds!

[sofianora]

Well, I have RoC questions, and this thread already exists, so why reinvent the wheel?

How does the fortune-telling skill / card reading knack work mechanically? Flavor-wise, it looks like I can wreck up a cheap Tarot deck with a Sharpie to make a Sorte deck that I can flip during games, but what does that do for my character/other characters gameplay-wise?

[kenderleech]

ussura book. "Fortune Teller
This Skill consists of various means of divining the future—
palm reading, card reading, knowledge of omens—as well as
ways to convince a paying customer that the divinations are true.
Unlike the techniques used by Sorte strega, Fortune Telling is
non-sorcerous, relying on traditional folk techniques rather than
any supernatural power. There is no guarantee that any
predictions gleaned by use of this Skill will come true, and
practitioners learn to speak in vague terms, allowing their
subjects to fill in the particulars.
Note: The Fate Witches of Vodacce rarely use the Fortune
Telling skill. They consider a low-class aping of their very real
sorcerous powers (the Sorte ability). A Fate Witch who uses
Fortune Telling is like a world-renowned ballerina dancing on a
street corner for change."

"Card Reading: Reading the cards requires knowledge of the
traditions and symbols, and of course some understanding of the
dual nature of each card. The ability to extrapolate is also
helpful, as it is in most other Fortune Telling Knacks. Note: This
Knack has no connection to the card reading powers of Vodacce
Fate Witches. Though similar on the surface, it uses entirely
different techniques which do not readily translate from one form
to another."

So while you can certainly flip cards around, and get some good roleplay out of it, its not sorte. Unless you are using sorte while you do it, in which case, we jut use the sorte rules.

Of course, we can have a lot of fun as a non-travelling group of con-folks and snake oil salespeople as well.

[Black Jack Rackham]

And you never know when you're going to need to fool some rube into thinking you know the future...

[salamanca]

I know the future...

There is cake. And wine. And problems.

[kenderleech]

"Oh, theres the cake and wine. Dont mind if i do."




"WHERE DID THESE PROBLEMS COME FROM?!?!?!"

[sofianora]

Sounds good. Thanks!

I think I have a character sketched out, but...

...even though the character creation PDFs all seem straightforward enough, I'd still like a grown-up to look over the write-up to make sure it all makes sense in-universe before I actually pull a real character sheet together. Also, as I understand it, someone somewhere needs to know the background(s) that I've chosen so that Personal Agenda vignettes can be created prior to Origins 2026 and beyond. Unfortunately, the write-up involves not just stuff my character wouldn't necessary want to advertise, but also another player character's secret(s), so I'm not willing to post the whole thing in the RoC-specific section of these boards where such a post would make sense, and I can't PM anyone with the information yet because I'm a noob with only three posts to my username. I'm open to suggestions as to how to proceed.

[salamanca]

1- make a few more posts.
Start with a basic back story for your character in a thread for your character in the Canguine section.

Follow that with a post in the same thread for your 1st draft of stats. That way we can look at it mechanically and tell you if you made an error as well ass possibly suggest improvements or changes.

If you reply to those suggestions, you should have plenty of posts to PM your backgrounds to Captain Rackham.

[sofianora]

No problem, I'll get to redacting/editing and proceed as recommended. Thanks again for the assistance!