Lifepath

[viziel]

I'm a big fan of Cyberpunk 2020. One of the unique features was a character creation tool called Lifepath.

Instead of making a character as per a standard RPG (skills, feats, gear, name, stats..blah blah), players often ignore or don't put enough emphasis on other stats (age, height, background)...

So, this gives a quick and fun system for players to hammer out some backgrounds which can be GOOD or BAD! This can create a deeper character and give plenty of plot hooks for the GM to act on.

Of course, if the player is a serious RPG'er they will probably write up their own but this might give them more structure than a story of their childhood...

This is how it works, for every year the character lived beyond 16 to NOW, they roll on a chart. This chart is very simple and breaks down weather good/bad or nothing happened that year.

The result leads you to another table which can lead to more tables that further describes what events occured to your character that year. Some can lead to skill boosts (like finding a combat teacher), or money (windfalls), romance! (dates, hot/heavy...wrong species, etc.)

The tables result in good bad..and I always let the player pick n choose what they want to keep, of course if they get too picky I will just give them nothing for that year.

The end result, is maybe a couple of skill boosts, maybe a little money, a family background (are their parents alive? do they have sisters / brothers, how is their friend? who is their enemy?), as well as a romantic history too (always funny when an android gets a detailed romantic history, spending most of his time in chat rooms learning the skill of human seduction out of curiosity..lol).

It can take a few min to do, and I have either done it in private or in front of all the players for a good laugh.

I have a PDF copy here:

Please let me know if this URL dosn't work for you.

[randolph]

sort of like the career charts in TRAVELER (dang i bet that dates me....). of course i was the the guy whose
charecter died six times during generation....

[Rob Lang]

I'm a fan of life paths and Cyberpunk 2020 too. For character creation, I want to keep it fast and light. That's why I have chosen random-roll. I can see a setting-specific life path generator working very nicely but I don't want to bloat version 4 core with something that will be very setting dependent. For the Streetpunk setting, I can see this being very useful indeed as dropping out of society is a story in itself.

[viziel]

I hear that about bloat and I agree. I just wanted to bring some awareness to this mechanic which I think its quite cool..and has brought a few laughs to the table (at the expense of someone usually..lol, but thats cyberpunk...if your not living in the ditch on day 1 you aren't playing the game right).

[DOC_Agren]

I'll be honest while I like the lifepaths idea as "frame work", it is a bitch to design PC that U want to play if U want to be "out of the Box"

My Current ICAR PC is from Randolph's game is Juan from Dess-Kay-Dar, who just might have a possible Colgrinian Ancestry in his family tree. 17 years old 7'5" 500lbs or 37.5 stones, ex-Gang Banger/militia as in Randolph game we looked at that system as kind of Beruit 80's era, L/A inner City for the main city... He has very basic "education" but streetwise. He hate crowds of people, loves the rush of living life on the edge, and has a temper, don't piss him off.. and is a fighter in underground "Bare Knuckle" Fights.

[Rob Lang]

Doc, that sounds like a superb Scav Setting character!

I would probably have the life path generator as something that is used for inspiration rather than a constraint.