This is my second in a short
series of Building Character articles based on the Gamma Worldroleplaying game. You can read the first one here. Creating player characters for Gamma World is very
different from most RPGs, because a lot of the character traits are generated
randomly. Therefore, these articles focus on how I took the randomly generated
traits and tried to imagine a cohesive interpretation of what sort of character
this might be. The game’s publisher, Wizards of the Coast, has a very handy
online tool for quickly generating the random elements of a character. You can
see it here. I used that to generate this characters' traits.
Process
Voxva is the second character
I’m creating for this Building Character series on Gamma World. The
first thing you get from the random character creation is two origins. These
describe what exactly the character is. Voxva’s origins are Wheeled and Hypercognitive.
Being Wheeled, she has one or more wheels instead of legs. Being
Hypercognitive, she can see the future before it happens. When I tried to
picture what kind of being would bring both of these ideas together, I imagined
some kind of robot or cyborg that was built for racing at extreme speeds. She
was created with advanced artificial intelligence that allows her to read
sensory data and process it incredibly quick. This was only supposed to help
her make split-second judgment calls on the track, but it has the additional
side effect of allowing her to predict the very near future in other tense
situations.
There are very few actual
choices that you make when creating a character for Gamma World. One of
those is choosing equipment. Since the Wheeled origin increases Voxva’s speed
by 1, I didn’t want to give her heavy armor, which would negate that advantage.
Instead I gave her light armor and a shield to help her avoid getting beat up
too much. I also gave her heavy one-handed weapons. Because they’re heavy
weapons they’ll do more damage. She could do more damage with two-handed
weapons, but then she would have to give up the shield. The other choice you
can make is to choose a vocation. Vocations give you a few extra bonuses as you
level up, but the first bonus doesn’t come into play until the character
reaches level 4. I’m creating Voxva as a first level character, so vocation is
irrelevant. If I were to play her at a higher level I would choose the Tribal
Scout vocation, which gives her some additional bonuses to perception and
mobility. At level 10 I would switch her to the Marauder vocation, because the
third Tribal Scout feat won’t actually do anything for her – it is redundant
with an ability she gets at first level for being Wheeled.
Personality
Characters in Gamma World
have 6 primary abilities. The values of two of these are determined by your
origins, and the other four are determined randomly. Icahbog’s ability scores
are: Strength 9, Constitution 18, Dexterity 7, Intelligence 16, Wisdom 16,
Charisma 13. Her Strength is kind of low, but her Constitution is rather high.
This makes me think she’s not particularly strong, but tenacious. Her Dexterity
being low seems at odds with her being so fast. I’m going to say that when she’s
moving in a straight line she has the grace of a cheetah, but any other time
she’s a pretty clumsy girl. She’s smart, intuitive and charismatic. I’m going
to contribute this to her predictive abilities. In a conversation she can often
predict how someone will react to what she’s about to say, and change her
statement if needed. She’s also great at comebacks, because she can start
thinking one up before you even say whatever it is that she’s going to need a
comeback for. I picture her as very outgoing, but a bit snarky and impatient as
she’s always eager to move things along. Sometimes, she probably wonders why it
takes so long for the rest of the world to catch up with her. If she was to
join a cryptic alliance (Gamma World’s political factions), she would
join the Restorationists – the most forward-thinking faction, striving to bring
about the future people once dreamed of before the world went mad.
Background
Voxva used to be an ordinary
girl. She grew up on the streets of Ew Yo scavenging for food and other
supplies while she tried to stay clear of the gangs. One day, she was hit by a
motorcycle. The motorcyclist belonged to one of the street gangs, and he was
practicing for an important race coming up in which all of the gangs competed
for territory rights. He was fine, but his bike was ruined, as was much of
Voxva’s body.
The street gang offered Voxva’s
parents an opportunity to help their daughter. They knew a scientist who wanted
to test out some experimental cybernetics. The implants would save the girl’s
life, if the operation didn’t kill her, but she would have to race for the gang
if things worked. Desperate to save their child’s life, Voxva’s parents agreed.
Not only did her new
cybernetics replace Voxva’s legs with a wheel and equip her with a powerful
electric motor, but enhancements to her brain made her hypercognitive, allowing
her to predict the very near future and make split-second decisions with
greater accuracy than any normal person. Her life was saved, but now she had to
race for the gang. Racing wasn’t so bad. Voxva was good at it, and she quickly
earned fame and accolades. She let the rush of power and prestige go to her
head, and she soon became absorbed in her own self-gratification.
Her hypercognizance grew
stronger at times, especially in situations she had become very familiar with.
In the weeks leading up to the biggest race of her life, she began to have
dreams about the race. In her dreams, she would pull ahead of the pack, and
then somebody else’s desperate attempt to catch her would cause an accident
that would result in the deaths of twelve other racers. She told her parents
about these dreams, and they advised her not to ride in the race. To
self-centered and proud to take the advice, Voxva reasoned that if anyone did
get hurt it would be their own fault for running against her.
The day of the race came, and
events played out exactly as Voxva’s dreams had predicted. As she drifted
across the finish line, she looked back at the wreckage, heard the moans and
cries for help from the injured and dying racers, and felt very sick deep
inside. She took to the highway that day and never looked back. She didn’t stop
until she had driven half way across the continent, to a town called Far-Go. On
the way she had plenty of time to think. She had decided she wanted to quit
thinking only of herself and find some way to help others. In Far-Go she found
two other young adventurers looking to see more of the world and to make a
difference in it. She’s been riding with them ever since.
Combat Tactics
In a fight, Voxva is all
about speed. She has a pretty substantial bonus to Initiative from the Hypercognitive
origin, so she’ll likely go first in most encounters. She can also move farther
on her turn than most people, even ignoring difficult terrain, by virtue of her
Wheeled origin. She’s good at avoiding attacks that she can dodge, but anything
that tests her fortitude or will might cause some problems. Fortunately, she
has a pretty high number of starting Hit Points, so she can stand to take a hit
or two.
For weapons, she’s got a
heavy one-handed melee weapon. This could be almost anything, but I think the
idea of a racer wielding a stop sign as a weapon is just the kind of irony
Voxva would enjoy. She’s also got a heavy one-handed ranged weapon. This does
decent damage, but it has a pretty limited range. Maybe she stuffs a rock in
her tailpipe and then launches it at an enemy. Or, maybe she spins her wheel
and sprays debris on the bad guy.
Voxva is very much a team
player. She is good at chasing down elusive enemies and picking them off before
they can cause too much trouble for her and her friends. She may often be able
to get to enemies that her allies can’t reach. A couple of her powers make her
target more vulnerable to her allies’ attacks. From her origins, she gets a
very mobile attack that draws the attention of her target away from her friends
(Wheeled’s Maximum Overdrive power). Or, she can strike her foe in a way
that opens him up to further attacks (Hypercognitive’s Uncanny Strike
power). As she increases in level, Voxva will gain powers that let her literally
blaze a trail, leaving a line of fire behind her (Wheeled’s Burning Rubber),
plow over her enemies, crushing them beneath her tires (Wheeled’s Monster
Truck), predict her enemies’ attacks and get out of the way (Hypercognitive’s
Saw it Coming), and strike an enemy a blow that will leave him reeling (Hypercognitive’s
Exploit Weakness).
As you can see, there aren’t
a lot of choices being made here while building a character for the Gamma
World RPG. This is mostly me deciding how to interpret the results I got
from the random generation process. I’d be curious to read your thoughts on
this character and on how I chose to develop her. You can download a copy of her
character sheet below, if you would like to use her in your home game. (Simply
right-click and pick “Save image as…”, or whatever the equivalent function is
for non-Windows-users.)
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