Shadow of the Demon Lord: The Flagellant Penitent

I know this isn't the right one but listen, I like this demon lord

I'm currently gathering players for Shadow of the Demon Lord. If there's any chance you haven't heard of it, it's what you'd get if you took 20+ years of D&D experience, a heavy Warhammer Fantasy influence, and then made a game out of it. If I sound impressed, that's because I am. Only time will tell, but reading it makes me wonder how somebody got inside of my skull and wrote down exactly what I wanted.

Anyways, the best way to learn a system is to generate a character and then look at how you're supposed to build adventures, so here we go.

Creating a Character

Choosing a Race

Since I'm a boring kind of person, I'm going to pick Human. There are pretty good race options, and each is distinct. Humans, as usual, are sort of generic. At level 4 get either a spell or the ability to be lucky once in a while. Changelings are vulnerable to iron, can see in the dark and can steal identities. At level 4 they can steal identities and freak people out in combat.Clockwork are golems, sort of, and occasionally break and turn back into objects (so they need somebody to hang around and restart them periodically). Dwarves are short, can see in the dark, hate a certain type of creature, and are resistant to poison. Goblins are folklore forest fairies and are super sneaky and vulnerable to iron. Orcs are a tough, recently emancipated slave race.

Everybody knows Humans are the best, so I write down my stats. I don't know what I want my human attribute bonus to be, so I save it for later.

Random Tables

I roll a couple times on the handful of tables (each race has one) and determine that my human once foiled a plot to kill someone important or brought a killer to justice. I don't know what to do with that yet so I keep rolling:

My human puts the interests of himself and his friends above all else. A typical roll gets a typical human result. He belongs to the Cult of the New God, whatever that is. I don't know if this is a powered by the apocalypse style prompt (where I fill in a new cult and add details later as they come up) or if this is part of the built-in setting. Either way, tells me little.

The human is a young adult, 18-35. Ok, fine. He's also a bit overweight, which is kind of interesting, I guess. He's also perfectly average in appearance, which is fine.

Rolling for Professions

Since I'm a human I either get one more profession or can speak one more language. I'm going with professions, because that sounds useful. So I get three! Professions can grant you a boon (xd6, keep the highest, cancel banes) or they can grant you an automatic success, depending on the situation. It's pretty flexible, and I like seeing these sorts of systems in game.

My human spent time in a Religious profession- a flagellant! So he's got a masochistic streak, as well as something to feel sorry about. Next, he was a miner? And then a historian? That's a pretty long life for a young man, but rearranging it, I can think of a couple ways to spin this.

Path one is very grim- He grew up in a hard, sparse town as a miner. One day he uncovered something in the deep dark earth that ought not have been released. Through his actions, he managed to save the life of the unearthed evil- and being a common miner, it's not like he has the means to stop it. Ashamed and afraid, he gave up his earthly life to try and find solace in religion. He punished himself for years. His back is still crossed with self-inflicted whip scars and in difficult moments he still craves punishment. But eventually being around a center of mystery and lore (the cult's temple) got to him, and he realized he had a fairly sharp memory for events long passed. He was illiterate, true, but soon found himself spending hours talking to the literate temple chroniclers in between his long punishment sessions.

Path two goes in reverse- as a chronicler in the cult, he had various sacred duties including the recording of important dates and calculating the appropriate times for memorial celebrations. He spent his childhood as an apprentice, learning how to make parchments, appropriate uses of ink, and the like. Unfortunately for his life, living in a destitute and mostly irrelevant backwater means raids. He was captured before he could master letters and forced into slavery. Life as an enslaved miner isn't so bad- you have to do a lot of work, but the night hours are filled with pleasure of a certain sort. And if you're smart, you can help start a riot that turns into an uprising. With freedom back in his bones he heads to the only home he's ever known- the temple. Unfortunately, as it turns out, his father was a known diabolist unknown to his son, and his teachings were tainted with demonic corruption. He ratted his own father out in fear for his eternal soul, and his father (a murderer who readily confessed to his crimes under the irons) was executed. At the temple, he was taught the purifying rituals of fire and lash, designed to focus his mind and stave back the temptation. It worked, after a fashion- he still slipped up, but his enthusiasm and emphasis on decorum served him well. When (IMPORTANT EVENT) tore him away from the temple, his presence was almost a relief, and his former compatriots ensured his departure's permance by a token collection and some spare equipment they had lying around.

Not bad, right?

I rolled "Getting By," so I get to choose between a dagger, a staff, or a sling with 20 stones. A staff seems appropriate for a pilgrim / wanderer who's not super militant. The staff has finesse, so I can use my Agility instead of my Strength, but my Strength is 11 (I used that +1 attribute on it) so I don't really care about that.

That's it for the level zero version of my character. According to the rules, you have to survive an adventure to get your first level, which is kind of cool. I like 0th level adventures in general, especially given that my stats are all average and despite my background very strongly pointing me towards picking up a level of Priest, I could still easily go Warrior and not violate my character's core concept, such as it is on this early state.

Now, I've got a couple of ways to play solo, including the Mythic GM emulator and the solo game play Oracle in Scarlet Heroes (which both seem kind of similar to me, not that there's anything wrong with that), but I think I'll save that for another day. This is enough work already, and it gives me a couple of footholds with which to start working on some background information that I want to include.

If you've ever played with me, you know that I don't like to plan a whole lot of specific detail up front- I prefer to generate broad brushstroke settings where various organizations and actors are in dynamic tension, each wanting something they can't have but being within one lucky stroke of gaining it. This lets the players burst onto the scene, disrupt the status quo, and then watch the domino effect carry the game away with it. I tell you what, if you prime it just right, the game literally unfolds in front of you and it's an absolute blast to GM.

BUT I DIGRESS!

Character Backgrounds

In honor of my last post, which my friend Mr. Joesky the Dungeon Brawler would say makes a "blahblahblah" sound, here's some free stuff you can use.

Fighter Backgrounds
When you make a fighter-type character, you may choose to roll 1d6 and gain the following backgrounds:

1- Veteran: When you were conscripted into the army, the recruiters laughed and shouted "More meat for the grinder, boys!" and the rest of the soldiers laughed. That was almost a decade ago. Even before embarking on an adventuring career, you've seen things that would make other men's insides turn to jelly. Hellish, horrible things that haunt you to this day.
Benefits: You gain a suit of chainmail and the weapon of your choice for free from your military service. You also have 500 bonus experience from your many years of service.
Penalties: You often have a thousand-yard stare, remembering the events of wars past. When something causes stress, you have a penalty to notice things and situations. When extremely stressed, you may enter a comatose state, and be unable to be budged for 1d6 minutes.

2- Brigand: You were once a marauder of the forests, mountains, or snows. You have turned from a life of crime and murder to a life of looting and slaying. A minor change, to be sure, but certainly less stressful on your countrymen at least.
Benefits: You have an additional 1d6x20 gold to start with, booty from your theft. You also have a bow, free of charge.
Penalties: You are wanted in your home region by the law and are recognized as such. There is a bounty of 1,000 gold on your capture, and 500 for your head.

3- Blacksmith's Son: Work for years slaving over some hot iron for meager rewards? No thanks, says the Blacksmith's Son. He's seen world-weary travellers, heavy with gold and with word of their adventures, and cannot stand the thought that he'll spend the rest of his life in a hamlet somewhere, arming the free-spirited folk and never having his own adventure.
Benefits: You have the ability to work metal, able to produce your own arms and armor for 3/4 of the normal cost, as long as you're willing to spend at least a week per 100 gold total. You can also repair your own arms and armor for the same cost. In addition, you have a great and heavy one-handed hammer for free.
Penalties: Being a blacksmith's son, you have little experience handling weapons that aren't broad and heavy hammers and suffer a -1 penalty to attacks with such weapons.


4- Deserter: You signed up to serve your kingdom, not spend your days cooped up in some garrison, sharpening swords and looking wistfully at the horizon. In the cover of nightfall, under some false pretense, you escaped with your sword, armor, and horse, and never looked back.
Benefits: You have a normal sword, suit of scale mail, and a decent-quality horse. The armor is clearly identifiable as belonging to your former army, and you may be identified as a scavenger, deserter, or a member of the army you left behind, depending on their familiarity with your former allegiance.
Penalties: While your former compatriots aren't on the lookout for you, desertion is punishable by death by hanging, and if found out, you will be brought to justice and killed. You are generally paranoid about being discovered, and are always looking over your shoulder.


5- Marine: You were a soldier-sailor, one of those who would fight pirates and other men on the high seas, boat to boat. You're rough, tough, and more than a little scarred and capable of putting up a good fight regardless of the conditions. Once you were released from service, you quickly realized that the free food, shelter, and drink came to an end and decided to continue doing what you always did best: fight.
Benefits: You have the great reaving axe you carried and a suit of studded leather armor. In addition, you are capable of maintaining and sailing most kinds of watercraft, and are a passable navigator. Finally, you're able to drink most anybody directly under the table, useful in seedy waterfront bars.
Penalties: You are physically dependant on alcohol, having drank more than your fair share while out to sea. When not under the influence of some liquor or another, you suffer a -1 penalty to all rolls. Recovery, if possible, is likely long and hard and fraught with missteps.


6- Nobleman: You are the son of a minor noble who's caught wanderlust. Having been born to hear tales of chivalrous knights, dragon-slayers, and heroic battle. While never having been in an actual battle, or seen one, or even knowing what one smells like, you're awfully eager to spill some blood.
Benefits: You have a full suit of plate mail from your parents' armory. It is relatively ill-fitting, having been designed for a man larger and stouter than yourself, but you make do.
Penalties: You are naieve and haughty, and suffer a -1 penalty to your Charisma score for having and retaining henchmen. You treat them like common servants and stable-boys, and they resent your superior attitude. You are also likely to get on your compatriots' nerves, never satisfied with anything less than the finest food or sleeping arrangements, and complaining heartily that today's adventurers aren't nearly as heroic as the legends of old. In short, you're spoiled badly.